Chapter Summaries

Bai Weiyang suppressed Chi Songzi’s attempt to spread an ominous reading and began assigning martial artists from various factions to the Demon-Subduing Army. As the arrangements continued, Shi Lan recognized a faint connection to a young man from Chongxu Pavilion, and Bai Weiyang beckoned her forward.

• Chi Songzi claimed his hexagram foretold victory for the Demon-Subduing Army, then blamed a suit of armor for threatening its fortunes, and Bai Weiyang sealed his acupoints and sent him away with Ren Kaiyang.
• Bai Weiyang placed the Rakshasa Manor members under Ren Kaiyang’s command, including Zhao Jing'an.
• Bai Weiyang assigned Miaoyin Valley’s musical support practitioners to the women’s camp under Lü Anqing.
• As Bai Weiyang arranged the remaining factions, Shi Lan noticed a young Chongxu Pavilion disciple whose face seemed familiar and faintly connected to her.
• Bai Weiyang beckoned Shi Lan over while fewer than a hundred people remained unassigned.

Bai Weiyang tested Shi Lan’s full strength to assess what Earthly Fiend Realm warriors she could command. Shi Lan broke through his spiritual barrier with her Black Domain, and Bai Weiyang responded by gathering far more spiritual energy.

• Bai Weiyang asked Shi Lan to attack him with everything she had so he could judge her abilities.
• Shi Lan struck Bai Weiyang’s barrier, cracking it with her amplified true qi while he remained unharmed.
• The onlookers marveled at Shi Lan’s strength, and Shen Tianlan admitted she had no chance of matching her.
• Bai Weiyang trapped Shi Lan in a contracting barrier, which she could not escape despite unleashing hundreds of halberd strikes.
• Shi Lan activated the Black Domain and devoured the barrier, prompting Bai Weiyang to gather spiritual energy nearly ten times denser than before.

Shi Lan demonstrated that her Black Domain could nullify Bai Weiyang’s spiritual-energy cage, then received command of a force of nearly a thousand warriors. After cultivating and gathering her new subordinates, she recognized something about Liu Ziming and asked about his family.

• Bai Weiyang’s spiritual-energy cage crumbled when it approached Shi Lan, and he ended their demonstration after suppressing her briefly with the power of space.
• Bai Weiyang assigned eight Earth Fiend Realm warriors, dozens of Xiantian Realm warriors, and two hundred Body Tempering Realm warriors to serve under Shi Lan.
• Bai Weiyang privately asked Shi Lan whether she would join the Bai Household, then withdrew the question and let her leave.
• Shi Lan absorbed the spiritual energy from the Black Domain’s clash, opened the Hegu acupoint, and found that her Jade Forging Art had not advanced beyond the sixth level.
• Shi Lan assembled her nearly thousand subordinates and questioned Liu Ziming after recognizing his name, learning that he lived in Shuangyue City with his elderly father.

Shi Lan discovered that Liu Ziming owned the Divine Cloud Bow and told him that Twin Moon City had fallen and his father, Liu Ping, was likely dead. Meanwhile, Bai Weiyang pressed Chisongzi for the result of his divination and learned that the army’s expedition was deeply inauspicious, but she rejected his advice to avoid confronting the Demon Race.

• Shi Lan recognized the Divine Cloud Bow on Liu Ziming, learned he had won it at auction, and invited him to her quarters to discuss something important.
• Shi Lan reorganized her forces, assigning most martial artists under the four Hundred-Man Commanders and placing the eight Earth Fiend Realm martial artists in a squad under her direct command.
• Shi Lan told Liu Ziming that Twin Moon City had fallen to the beast tide and that his father, Liu Ping, was likely dead; Liu Ziming left in a daze.
• Shi Lan returned to her quarters, opened the Black Domain, and began drawing out the Spirit Transformation Pill’s medicinal power.
• Bai Weiyang demanded the truth about Chisongzi’s divination, and he said he could not see the battle’s outcome but that the army’s expedition was deeply inauspicious.
• Chisongzi advised Bai Weiyang to avoid meeting the Demon Race head-on, but she ordered him to keep the divination secret and threatened to kill him if rumors spread.

Shi Lan struggled to cultivate amid constant fights aboard the warship and harshly punished the Blood Fiend Hall and Windblade Sect after their latest brawl. Samsara warned that Phoenix blood, killing intent, and impatience were affecting her, and the warship stopped near Taixu Academy.

• Chisongzi begged Bai Weiyang to release him, but Bai Weiyang kept him confined and promised to protect him.
• Over nearly half a month, Shi Lan absorbed more Phoenix blood, broke through three acupoints, and was repeatedly pulled away from cultivation to settle conflicts aboard the crowded warship.
• Shi Lan stopped a fight between the Blood Fiend Hall and the Windblade Sect, kicked two fighters, and ordered everyone involved hung from the deck after her kick damaged the floor.
• Samsara told Shi Lan that Phoenix blood, the warship's killing intent, and her impatience were making her unusually agitated.
• Shi Lan went onto the deck as the warship stopped, and she saw Taixu Academy in the distance.

Bai Weiyang led Shi Lan and the Demon-Subduing Army to Taixu Academy, where he reunited with Lin Yusheng and revealed that he had come to borrow troops. Lin Yusheng asked how many men he wanted, and Bai Weiyang requested as many as the academy could lend.

• Bai Weiyang and his commanders rode toward Taixu Academy, while Shi Lan followed on an unfamiliar dragon-horse.
• Lin Yusheng arrived at the academy entrance with teachers and disciples to welcome the visitors.
• Bai Weiyang greeted Lin Yusheng, and Lin Yusheng recognized Shi Lan and remarked on her rapid growth in strength.
• Bai Weiyang declined Lin Yusheng's invitation to go inside and said he had come to borrow men because the Demon Race was powerful.
• Lin Yusheng asked how many troops Bai Weiyang needed, and Bai Weiyang answered that he wanted as many as the academy could lend.

Bai Weiyang secured Lin Yusheng and over a hundred scholars from Taixu Academy for his westbound army, while Shi Lan briefly reunited with Xu Yuanbai. As the warship neared the battlefield, Shi Lan prepared her troops and gave Wu Lingkong a protective talisman before a sudden crash shook the ship.

• Bai Weiyang demanded a great scholar and at least a hundred scholars from Taixu Academy, and Lin Yusheng agreed to accompany the army with over a hundred scholars.
• Shi Lan recognized Xu Yuanbai at the academy, but left him behind as he regretted his past choices and lamented his failed ambitions.
• Bai Weiyang assigned the scholars quarters aboard the warship and sped west toward the battlefield with the army.
• Shi Lan prepared her subordinates, and the Demon Suppression Army received dragon horses and black banners.
• Shi Lan gave Wu Lingkong a Heavenly Spirit Talisman to protect her on the battlefield, then a thunderous crash shook the warship.

Shi Lan and the Demon-Suppressing Army charged into the beast tide while Lei Wuji fought a powerful demon in the sky. As Bai Weiyang directed the battle, two mysterious figures appeared beside the warship.

• Shi Lan joined the forces on deck, where they found a slain giant demon bird and sensed a powerful demonic cloud approaching.
• Lei Wuji confronted the burly demon with a storm of lightning while Bai Weiyang led the army down a golden road toward the beast tide.
• Shi Lan and the martial artists fought through the monsters, and Liu Ziming helped her by shooting giant toads whose corrosive pus threatened her.
• Bai Weiyang spotted a jade-haired man and a seductive woman appearing in the air beside the warship, and the woman said she wanted to turn him into a wraith.

Lin Yusheng and the Confucian scholars attacked two demon kings with the power of a sage’s phantom. The green-haired demon king sacrificed his vitality to protect Little You, leaving her alive beside his dying ancient-tree form.

• Bai Weiyang asked Lin Yusheng to make his move against the two demon kings.
• Lin Yusheng and the Confucian scholars summoned a sage’s phantom, whose divine light wounded Little You after she transformed into a giant black tiger.
• The green-haired demon king used his ancient-tree phantom to heal and shield Little You, while she refused to retreat.
• Lin Yusheng merged with the sage’s phantom, and the scholars’ true words formed a giant sword that struck at the black tiger.
• The green-haired demon king became a towering ancient tree and took the sword’s blow to protect Little You, suffering fatal damage.
• Little You returned to human form, stroked the tree’s scarred trunk, and heard Evergreen urge her to go.

Shi Lan led her battered troops through the final stage of the beast tide, activating the Demon Slaughtering Array and learning how it drew on and redistributed the army’s blood reserves. The surviving beasts fled, and the chapter ended with the Demon Suppression Army retreating to its ships while crews gathered the dead for burial.

• The ancient tree crumbled and transported the woman inside it away, while Lei Wuji drove off the wounded demon king who had been fighting him.
• After hours of battle, Bai Weiyang ordered Shi Lan to form the Demon Slaughtering Array as her troops’ losses mounted.
• Shi Lan connected to the array, which drew out the formation’s stored strength and redistributed its physical toll among the martial artists.
• With the demon kings gone and the beasts fleeing, the battlefield was cleared, but more than six thousand of the people who had disembarked from the warships had died.
• Shi Lan returned to the ships with her surviving troops as Bai Weiyang ordered the battlefield cleared and the dead gathered for burial beneath a memorial stele.

After the battle, Shi Lan treated her wounds and prepared to advance her cultivation while Bai Weiyang’s forces planned to seek protection from the Demon Suppression Army. In the Central Heaven Domain, the Bai Clan worried over Bai Weiyang’s disappearance, and a figure in the Imperial Palace revealed that an object had been sent from another age through the River of Time.

• Shi Lan distributed healing pills, assessed the heavy losses among her troops, and noticed that the battle had united the warship’s factions against the Demon Race.
• Shi Lan cut away the poison-corroded skin, healed her wounds with a Spirit Transformation Pill, and prepared to advance the Jade Forging Art.
• Bai Weiyang, Lei Wuji, and Lin Yusheng discussed the escaped Demon Kings and decided to move closer to other Demon Suppression Army divisions for protection.
• Senior members of the Bai Clan worried about Bai Weiyang’s disappearance, while their ancestor reassured them that Yan Jun and six Primordial Spirit experts were heading to the border.
• A figure in the Imperial Palace said that someone had opened the River of Time with boundless might and sent an object from another age.

A remnant of Wang Gu told a refined man that a treasure fragment would appear in Chengtian Domain in three years and ordered him to obey Taishi’s decision to abandon the domain while the Imperial Lord pursued a distant starfield. Meanwhile, Shi Lan advanced her Jade Forging Art and cultivation, then left her room seeking to make faster progress on her quests.

• The remnant of Wang Gu told the refined man that an uninvited guest would arrive in Lingyang Realm in three years, relying on a supreme treasure fragment that would appear in Chengtian Domain.
• The refined man protested Taishi’s order to hold Chengtian Domain with few forces for two years, but Wang Gu sealed the Imperial Palace and restrained him from acting.
• The refined man tried to contact the Imperial Lord through the crystal tome, but failed and lamented the fate of ordinary lives.
• Shi Lan completed another transformation, advancing the Jade Forging Art to its seventh layer and opening the Hegu acupoint, which raised her cultivation to Early Earth Fiend Realm.
• Shi Lan checked her system panel and quests, saw that she had killed twenty-two Earth Fiend Realm demonic beasts, and left her room to seek faster progress.

Shi Lan recovered and cultivated aboard the warship while Bai Weiyang sought a safe route using Chisongzi’s divination. Three days later, a woman in green and the black-armored demon king trapped the warship and demanded that Bai Weiyang hand over the person who had killed Changqing.

• Shi Lan asked Wu Lingkong why the warship had not used demon-breaking crossbows, and learned that using them would put the ship at risk.
• Shi Lan spoke briefly with the injured Shen Tianlan, then returned to her quiet room to cultivate as the warship headed southeast.
• Chisongzi told Bai Weiyang that their route was blocked, then spotted a possible solution while examining the green shoot Bai Weiyang held.
• After three peaceful days, bamboo vines bound the warship, and the woman in green and the black-armored demon king confronted Bai Weiyang.
• Bai Weiyang defended the warship with his sword, but the woman in green stopped her attack just short of the ship and demanded he hand over Lin Yusheng, threatening to kill a hundred people with every passing breath.

Bai Weiyang used the green sprout and her Human Emperor lineage to stop the woman in green from attacking the battleship, then tested whether the sprout could protect the group from nearby great demons. Shi Lan was inspired by Bai Weiyang’s power and set herself the goal of reaching the peak of the world.

• Bai Weiyang gave the woman in green the green sprout, then threatened to kill herself with a jade sword to keep everyone aboard the battleship alive.
• Bai Weiyang summoned the phantom of the Human Emperor, forcing the woman in green to withdraw rather than risk Changqing’s life essence.
• Bai Weiyang struck at the woman in black armor, and the woman in green returned to shield her before Bai Weiyang asked her to tell nearby great demons not to target the group.
• The woman in green asked Bai Weiyang’s name and left with the woman in black armor; Bai Weiyang later revealed that her sword strike had tested the green sprout’s value.
• Shi Lan reflected on the Human Emperor phantom and resolved to one day stand at the peak of the world.

Shi Lan’s warship arrived at a heavily guarded fortress, where Bai Weiyang led nearly one hundred thousand people inside. After being told to rest for two days before joining the fighting, the troops set up camp and celebrated with meat and liquor.

• Shi Lan reflected on her cultivation and steadied her resolve as the warship set course southwest.
• Yan Jun and six others arrived where Weiyang had activated her bloodline, sensed a Heavenly Demon, and split up to search for her.
• The warship reached the fortress, and Shi Lan encountered Lu Anqing and the women of Miao Sound Valley as they disembarked.
• Bai Weiyang met a ten-thousand-man commander at the fortress gates and led the troops to camp in a former training ground.
• The commander delivered tents, beast meat, and liquor, and told Bai Weiyang the troops could rest for two days before joining the fighting.
• The troops lit bonfires and feasted, while drunken men who approached the women's battalion were beaten back.

After a drunken night in the women soldiers’ camp, Shi Lan awoke and went for a walk outside the fortress. There, she encountered a powerful old man whom Samsara said had come to find her, possibly to take her as his disciple.

• Shi Lan met Lü Anqing at the entrance to the women’s camp, and Lü Anqing urged her to stay there rather than risk the drunken men across the way.
• Wu Lingkong pulled Shi Lan into a drinking gathering, and Shi Lan later carried the passed-out Wu Lingkong and other women soldiers to their tents.
• Shi Lan slept in a tent crowded with drunken women, then woke at dawn and thanked Lü Anqing, who had guarded the entrance all night.
• Shi Lan left the camp and spotted an old man fishing beside a river.
• Samsara told Shi Lan that the old man was above the third level of the Heavenly Human Realm and had likely come to take her as his disciple.

Shi Lan met a powerful old man who taught her his understanding of martial Dao, though she remained wary of his intentions. When he announced he would leave for good, she offered him a Demon Suppression Army banner as a parting memento, surprising him.

• Reincarnation warned Shi Lan that the old man might be trying to recruit her, so she tried to leave, but he used his power to stop her.
• The old man asked Shi Lan what she believed martial Dao was and explained the difference between martial power and Dao.
• The old man invited Shi Lan to return the next day, and she listened to his teachings by the river throughout the following day.
• The old man told Shi Lan he would never return, and she ran back to camp before presenting him with a military banner as a memento.
• The old man was astonished because he had expected Shi Lan to bring a gift for a disciple-acceptance ceremony.

Shi Lan evaded Extreme Cloud High Person’s attempts to recruit her as a disciple, then prepared for the Demon-Suppression Army’s coming battle. After a night of cultivation and spring rain, she joined her soldiers and marched with the assembled army under Bai Weiyang.

• Extreme Cloud High Person revealed his identity and hinted that Shi Lan needed a teacher, but she repeatedly agreed without accepting his offer.
• After Extreme Cloud High Person left, Shi Lan returned to camp, where soldiers prepared their weapons for the coming clash with the Demon Race.
• Shi Lan cultivated in her tent and absorbed phoenix blood while avoiding the divine senses sweeping the camp.
• After the rain passed, Shi Lan mounted her dragon horse and led the fewer than three hundred Demon-Suppression soldiers to the assembly ground.
• The assembled Demon-Suppression Army set out toward its designated position with Bai Weiyang leading.

At a massive military assembly, Shi Lan heard the Demon-Suppression Marshal rally the troops before they marched toward the ships. Afterward, she unexpectedly reunited with her father, Shi Tianlu, and struggled to respond to his care as their unit prepared to leave.

• The Demon-Suppression Marshal addressed the gathered troops, recalling the devastation of the war and urging them to fight for humanity’s future.
• The soldiers drew their weapons and answered the marshal’s call before marching out of the parade ground.
• Shi Tianlu spotted Shi Lan among the formations and wondered if he had seen his daughter.
• Bai Weiyang ordered the camp to pack quickly and prepare to board the ships.
• Shi Lan recognized Shi Tianlu, and the two exchanged hesitant greetings as he marveled at her strength and she wrestled with her feelings toward him.
• The camp finished packing and began moving toward the fortress gates.

Shi Lan volunteered to act as bait to draw out a shapeshifting demon king, after Bai Weiyang explained the dangerous plan for the battlefield. A system quest revealed that Shi Lan needed to draw out the demon king to earn a lottery draw and reputation points, leaving her preparing to carry out the assignment alone.

• Shi Tianlu reassured Shi Lan that her mother was safe in Immortal Martial City and told her to seek his help if she ran into trouble.
• Shi Lan boarded the battleship, and Bai Weiyang briefed her officers on a plan to lure out and attack three beast packs.
• When no one accepted the bait assignment, Shi Lan volunteered, and Bai Weiyang gave her a jade bead that could withstand three attacks from a shapeshifting demon king.
• Shi Lan told Bai Weiyang she would go alone, then returned to her room and checked the system quest that required her to draw out the demon king.