Chapter Summaries

Xu Huo and his companions discussed robot engineering and the Platinum Eye’s marriage alliance with the Outer District, then heard how Bai Kou stopped a deadly robot uprising six years earlier. The chapter ended with Liao Ying recounting Bai Kou’s speech and the rebels surrendering control of the robots.

• Bian Jun showed the group his family’s latest robot, and Xin Rong explained how smart chips and connecting wires could improve robots.
• The group discussed the Platinum Eye’s engagement alliance with the Outer District and criticized the Lang family members they had met.
• Liao Ying told Xu Huo about Bai Kou’s response to a robot uprising six years earlier, when smart robots took hostages and attacked weapons factories.
• Bai Kou shut down the robots’ attack functions and threatened to activate the central interference system unless the rebels stopped controlling them.
• Bai Kou’s speech rallied the Platinum Eye, and the Artificer behind the robot rebellion voluntarily returned control.

Xu Huo watched an account of Bai Kou's role in quelling a crisis six years earlier, then secretly researched what had really happened and how it brought her into the Platinum Eye's ruling ranks. The next morning, he met Bai Kou at the Mechanical Castle, where they discussed the items He Pu had left behind.

• Liao Ying showed footage of Bai Kou leading the City Hall Players through the aftermath and demanding that City Hall cover the losses.
• Xin Rong explained that registered residents received compensation, while Liao Wei said the Player who shot a City Hall employee was exiled from the Platinum Eye.
• Xu Huo pretended to be drunk, then researched the six-year-old crisis and learned that an Artificer had uncovered illegal weapons tests before unrest spiraled out of control.
• Xu Huo learned that Bai Kou's handling of the crisis led to the weapons company's expulsion, a City Hall purge, and her rise to the Command Center.
• Xu Huo returned to the Mechanical Castle the next morning and asked Bai Kou whether she wanted to keep one of He Pu's belongings as a memento.

Bai Kou taught Xu Huo how the range and depth of Mental Evolution affected his Spiritual World, and explained how Spatial Evolution could support it. Xu Huo left understanding that he needed to expand his Spiritual World’s coverage and Mental Power before focusing on precise control.

• Bai Kou tested Xu Huo’s current ability to perceive and interfere with people through his Spiritual World.
• Bai Kou explained that Mental Evolvers divided their power among targets, reducing the strength of their control as the number of targets increased.
• Bai Kou demonstrated how Spatial Evolution could alter the rays inside objects and help Mental Power pass through obstacles.
• Bai Kou advised Xu Huo to close his eyes and confirmed that the absolute Spiritual World range let him affect everyone inside it equally.
• Xu Huo returned to the Book Tower and concluded that he should expand his Spiritual World’s range and raise his Mental Power before pursuing deeper control.

Xu Huo studied Old Zheng’s notes and mastered a new way to spread his mental energy, while Bai Kou dealt with pressure from her mother and the Lang family. The chapter ended with Xin Rong stopping Xu Huo outside the mechanical Castle and inviting him to have fun.

• After failing to increase his mental energy, Xu Huo studied Old Zheng’s notes while Bai Kou told Hou Pei to watch over him.
• The mayor’s wife contacted Bai Kou, urged her to meet Lang Zongjing, and promised her a borrowed Time Origin.
• Bai Kou told Hou Pei to send Lang Zongjing away and went to the Laboratory.
• Xu Huo used Old Zheng’s notes to practice spreading his mental energy in a net-like pattern and mastered the technique by nightfall.
• Hou Pei escorted Xu Huo out, but Xin Rong pulled up beside him and invited him to have fun.

After learning that someone was following him, Xu Huo stayed at Xin Rong’s villa, where Xin Rong tried to recruit him and hosted a card game. An assassin attacked Xu Huo in the night with a human-shaped shadow, and Xu Huo tracked the real attacker down, leaving them locked in combat.

• Xin Rong told Xu Huo that someone had followed him and brought him to stay at his home for safety.
• Xin Rong explained how Players could apply for residency in Platinum Eye through a company and invited Xu Huo to consider joining his company.
• Xu Huo joined Xin Rong, Zhao Jicheng, Bian Jun, Liao Wei, Liao Ying, and Zheng Ning for cards, then went to a guest room when the game continued.
• At two in the morning, a human-shaped shadow attacked Xu Huo with a blade, but he woke and fought it off.
• Xu Huo sensed the attacker outside, tracked him to a street a thousand meters away, and kicked him before the man grabbed Xu Huo’s leg with a shadow-stretched hand.

Xu Huo fought off a Player who attacked him while asking about Miss Koukou, then accepted ten days of monitored protection from the law-enforcement team. Back at the villa, Liao Ying and Xin Rong pressed him for details about his connection to Miss Koukou.

• A Player ambushed Xu Huo with a slender sword, and Xu Huo countered with defensive items and abilities.
• Xu Huo used Important Notification to force the attacker to stop speaking and asked about his interest in Miss Koukou.
• Xin Rong and the others intervened while law-enforcement personnel surrounded the street; the attacker escaped after the barrier fell.
• An officer offered Xu Huo ten days of monitored protection, which Xu Huo accepted and signed for.
• Liao Ying asked Xu Huo about his relationship with Miss Koukou, and Xin Rong asked whether they had been together in the Mechanical Castle.

Xu Huo accompanied Bai Kou to a concealed activation laboratory, where she arranged tests and training to help him develop his physical potential and absorb his Evolution Potion. His activation rate measured 79%, and Bai Kou said his data qualified him for the 55% to 68% activation room despite his Evolution rate being under 50%.

• Xu Huo told Xin Rong and Liao Ying that he knew Bai Kou but could not promise to introduce them to her.
• The next morning, Xu Huo went with Bai Kou to a concealed military-zone laboratory while law enforcement officers returned to the Mechanical Castle.
• Bai Kou explained that activation instruments could help Evolvers develop their physical potential and absorb Evolution Potions, then privately disconnected the laboratory from its network.
• Xu Huo wore the activation suit and tested at 79% activation rate.
• Bai Kou said Xu Huo's Evolution rate was below 50% but his data qualified him to use the 55% to 68% activation room.

Xu Huo underwent activation at Platinum Eye’s Laboratory, enduring the machine’s stimulation until the process ended successfully. Bai Kou said his activation rate was above 85 percent, and he left the Laboratory after she departed on urgent business.

• Xu Huo asked Bai Kou about the risks of activation and showed her a Photo of the person who had attacked him.
• Bai Kou explained the activation machine and warned Xu Huo that he could not use it again for a year.
• Xu Huo endured the activation process as the machine repeatedly pushed his body to its limits, then completed the recovery period.
• Bai Kou told Xu Huo his activation rate was above 85 percent, his Evolution rate had not increased, and he could soon use another Potion.
• Bai Kou invited Xu Huo to lunch, then left after receiving a message and told him to take her car to the Mechanical Castle.
• A female researcher gave Xu Huo two bottles of stamina recovery Potion and hinted that he could leave.

After recovering at the Yongxing Hotel, Xu Huo joined Xin Rong at an auction of equipment and weapons in the Platinum Eye. They won wilderness-survival items, while a group of Players asked Xin Rong to bid on another camouflage item for them.

• Xu Huo rested until noon, then read messages from Yan Jiayu and Xin Rong and arranged to meet Xin Rong on One-Fifth Avenue.
• Xu Huo and Xin Rong went to an auction house, where Xin Rong helped a short-haired woman and a baby-faced man from another district get inside.
• Xin Rong explained that many weapons could not be taken into the game and bid successfully on a Camouflage Protective Suit and Sound Capture.
• When a related camouflage item came up for auction, the short-haired woman asked Xin Rong to bid on it for her.

At the auction, Xu Huo and Xin Rong discussed dangerous contaminants and the struggles facing Players from a troubled Sub-district. When poisoned drinks were served, Xu Huo warned the others and tried to save the short-haired woman and the baby-faced man.

• Xin Rong suggested the short-haired woman and her companions seek dangerous, unlisted items at the Underground Market after they bought many auction items.
• Xu Huo told Xin Rong about a Poisoned Person, and Xin Rong described a contaminant that had killed tens of thousands in a city.
• The short-haired woman explained that her Sub-district was in turmoil and that she had become a C-class player by spending money to survive.
• Xu Huo noticed the poison in his drink and warned everyone not to drink; he, Xin Rong, the short-haired woman, and the baby-faced man showed symptoms.
• Xu Huo injected the short-haired woman and the baby-faced man with Syringes as they lay convulsing on the floor.

After a poisoning at the auction house, Xu Huo returned to his hotel under heavy protection, where he caught and killed an assassin named Zeng Lou. Zeng Lou refused to reveal who had sent him, leaving Xu Huo and the enforcement team to investigate his belongings.

• Xu Huo used King Fungus antidote to save two poisoned Players, then learned someone had poisoned the food and drinks at the auction house.
• Xin Rong offered to protect Xu Huo, who returned to the hotel with enforcement team escorts and additional guards.
• Zeng Lou checked into the room across from Xu Huo and prepared to kill him with intersecting lasers.
• Xu Huo used a double to lure Zeng Lou into an ambush, severed his legs, and demanded to know who had sent him.
• Zeng Lou threatened Xu Huo but gave no name, and Xu Huo killed him just as the enforcement team entered.
• Xu Huo handed Zeng Lou's belongings to the enforcement team to help identify him and his faction.

After Zeng Lou’s attack, Xu Huo agreed to meet Bai Kou for dinner and arranged to leave the hotel with an enforcement team escort. While shopping for a gift for Bai Kou’s younger sister, he was approached by a tipsy woman.

• The enforcement team collected evidence after Zeng Lou’s death and asked Xu Huo to leave the room, while he warned that his attacker’s backers might still target him.
• Bai Kou called Xu Huo to ask about the attack, and he invited her to dinner the next evening; she accepted and offered to send a car.
• The enforcement team arranged stronger protection for Xu Huo and questioned him about his relationship with Bai Kou.
• While shopping for a formal outfit, Xu Huo learned that Bai Kou had many admirers and asked the enforcement team player to buy a doll for her younger sister, Peipei.
• A tipsy woman approached Xu Huo in the fitting room and asked him to take her to the restroom, but he stepped aside and rejected her advance.

Xu Huo exposed a woman who tried to ambush him, prompting the enforcement team to hunt her across Platinum Eye. He then met Bai Kou, learned her engagement to an eight-year-old was a political alliance she wanted to disrupt, and went with her to a lavish dinner.

• Xu Huo foiled the woman's attempt to approach him, trapped her in a Glass Bottle, and told the enforcement team she was likely connected to the people who had attacked him.
• The woman escaped when enforcement players fired bullets that briefly disabled the Glass Bottle, and the team sealed the Mall and issued a citywide wanted notice.
• Bai Kou picked Xu Huo up at the hotel, and he gave her a doll set for her younger sister.
• Xu Huo guessed that Bai Kou wanted to end her engagement to eight-year-old Lang Zongjing and damage the alliance between their factions, and Bai Kou warned him about the Lang family's tracking methods.
• Xu Huo and Bai Kou arrived at a romantic restaurant where an entire floor had been reserved for them.

Xu Huo discussed Dr. Wu, the Holy Sword Society, and the nature of the game with Bai Kou before she left. After receiving his first A-rank time-type Defense Artifact, Zoetrope, he examined its ability to stop time and display an incoming attack.

• Bai Kou told Xu Huo that Dr. Wu had left information in some game Dungeons and might be able to anticipate events or understand how the game operated.
• Bai Kou dismissed the factions that emerged from the Holy Sword Society and said that Evolution was the foundation of the game.
• Xu Huo felt the underground tremor during his ride back to the Yongxing Hotel and considered what Bai Kou had meant by Evolution.
• Fang Jie told Xu Huo that Teacher Lu had finished his artifact, and Xu Huo paid the remaining balance through the game platform.
• Xu Huo received Zoetrope, an A-rank Defense Artifact that stopped time within fifty meters for five seconds after an Ability attack and showed him the attack so he could dodge.

Xu Huo obtained the Zoetrope and helped the law enforcement team confront a player who seemed to be targeting him, then left Platinum Eye using a return ticket. He arrived in E25-026’s eastern slums, where he killed the men chasing a boy and decided the place suited his purposes.

• Xu Huo used the Zoetrope to spot a distant player, and the law enforcement team moved to surround him.
• The fleeing player broke through the team’s defenses and attacked Xu Huo, but the squad leader blocked one strike while Xu Huo evaded another with the Inviolable Territory.
• The squad leader sent his people into the paint-based Random Instance to catch the player, and Xu Huo hoped to learn who had sent him.
• Xu Huo visited Bai Kou and said goodbye to Xin Rong before using a costly return ticket to travel to E25-026.
• Xu Huo arrived in the eastern slums, ignored watchers and a needle attack, and continued toward the edge of the district.
• Xu Huo killed the men chasing a boy and looked toward the gloomy sky, deciding the slums were a suitable place.

Xu Huo searched the slum for lodging while the boy from the Underground Palace followed him, and he eventually found an inn that would take them both. After settling in, Xu Huo injected himself with the P3S potion and felt his physical control improve dramatically.

• Xu Huo killed several people who tried to ambush him and continued searching for a place to stay with the boy following behind.
• A lodging shopkeeper refused Xu Huo because of the boy, who then took back Xu Huo's White Cash note.
• Xu Huo left biscuits with an elderly woman, who fought off two starving men and fed the crumbs to her hidden child.
• Xu Huo paid an old, one-eyed innkeeper two hundred White Cash for a spacious room for himself and the boy.
• Xu Huo sealed the room with his Spiritual World and injected the P3S potion, which made him feel energized and gave him far greater control over his body.

After reaching a 50% Evolution rate, Xu Huo tested his enhanced physical and sensory abilities by fighting off a group of Players who had ambushed him. He returned to the inn and began training his mental power as other Players gathered nearby.

• Xu Huo discovered that his heightened senses let him perceive people and objects through nearby buildings, and his Personal Panel showed an Evolution rate of 50%.
• Xu Huo fought the Players who attacked him, killing several with his speed and strength while the rest tried to flee.
• One Player escaped, and Xu Huo returned to the inn, where he sent the trembling boy to the room across from his own.
• Xu Huo began extending his mental power beyond the inn and sensed nearby residents, retreating Players, and a group of twelve approaching with a wounded Player.
• Xu Huo continued training his mental power, trying to expand its range while filling gaps in the net he had learned to form.

Xu Huo explored the slum and gave hungry children biscuits while the boy who had escaped the Underground Palace refused to return. The boy warned Xu Huo that the children would die, leaving Xu Huo’s response unresolved.

• After the Underground Palace threatened him, the boy told its thugs he would rather die than go back.
• Xu Huo left the inn for a walk, and the innkeeper gave the boy a worn garment to wear as he followed.
• Xu Huo gave a biscuit to a hungry child, whose older brother refused it and dragged him away; someone snatched the biscuit as they left.
• More children gathered around Xu Huo, and he gave each one biscuit while refusing requests for seconds.
• Xu Huo gave the first child two more biscuits after learning someone had taken his first one, and the boy warned him that the children would die.

Xu Huo confronted Dong San and the water shop players after learning how the slums controlled access to water. When the Underground Palace men seized the boy Xu Huo had befriended, he forced Dong San to have him brought back and left the water shop in control of the situation.

• After Xu Huo gave biscuits to children, two boys told him how residents obtained clean, ordinary, and acid-rain water.
• A tall, dark-haired man brought Xu Huo to the water shop, where Dong San questioned him about his stay and warned him not to ask too many questions.
• When the Underground Palace men grabbed the boy downstairs, Xu Huo revealed cutting threads around Dong San's neck and demanded that the water shop protect the boy.
• Dong San ordered his men to retrieve the boy, and Xu Huo waited upstairs, drinking tea.
• After the boy returned with the water shop players, Xu Huo withdrew his threads and pinned several attackers to the wall, prompting Dong San to order him escorted out.

Xu Huo uncovered how the slum’s factions used rumors to protect their territory and learned from a water shop ledger how tightly the city controlled supplies. He fed the orphaned children and treated an injured boy, while the ledger left him considering how the slum’s people survived.

• A player signaled the water shop’s man to call off an ambush against Xu Huo, who realized the factions were spreading rumors to make him a common enemy.
• Xu Huo returned to the inn and found the alley’s children gathered there after receiving biscuits, then paid the innkeeper to buy food and cook for them.
• Xu Huo brought the two brothers inside, gave the older boy an E-class Self-Healing Agent, and told him his injured leg would recover enough to walk in a few days.
• The children ate the meal together while Xu Huo reviewed the water shop’s ledger and learned that the slum’s food and water supplies were limited and controlled by city factions.