Chapter Summaries

Key plot points and events

• Senior White purchases four rare spatial materials from the merchant Everything Can Be Sold for sixty Ninth-Grade Spirit Stones, without bargaining.
• The Boundary-Crossing Waterstar splits into five when Senior White pats it, revealing that it is in its breeding period. He gives four of them to Song Shuhang to raise.
• Senior White discovers that the supposed Spatial-Transfer rune Gem contains a more valuable crystal diamond. He identifies it by intuition, while the merchant regrets failing to appraise it.
• The merchant pays one more Spirit Stone to learn how Senior White spotted the unusual items. Senior White explains that the Waterstar’s breeding call can be heard, while finding the crystal diamond was simply a matter of intuition.
• Song Shuhang jokes that information has a price when the merchant asks who is pursuing him. The merchant refuses to pay and reveals that the pursuer is a powerful Nine Netherworld figure—whose ability to leave the Nine Netherworld remains a mystery.
• Senior White finishes a new flying sword using the purchased materials, merit-tree branches, and a cloth-bag-like framework. He names it Disposable Flying Sword: Break the Little Black Room—001 Edition, designed to escape the Heavenly Dao’s “Little Black Room,” and asks who will test it.

Character developments and interactions

• Senior White is relaxed, confident, and opportunistic: he makes a quick purchase, benefits from the Waterstar’s reproduction and the hidden crystal diamond, and charges the merchant for his explanation. He also reveals that the sword’s design was planned well in advance.
• Everything Can Be Sold shifts from pleased seller to rueful, humiliated customer after realizing how much value he missed. Still, he remains professional and tries to learn from the mistake.
• Song Shuhang imitates Senior White’s bargaining tactics by joking that information costs money. He holds back laughter at the merchant’s misfortune.
• Soft Feather laughs openly at the merchant’s repeated losses; Su Clan’s Sixteen is present as one of those given merit berries.
• Senior White and the merchant maintain a playful, competitive rapport, while Shuhang’s joke adds to the teasing.

Significant themes

• Commerce and bargaining: The chapter humorously overturns the usual seller’s advantage: Senior White’s lack of haggling and sharp discoveries leave the merchant regretting the deal.
• Knowledge, value, and intuition: Expertise can come from careful observation, but Senior White’s most valuable discovery is attributed to instinct.
• Inventiveness and experimentation: Senior White’s long-planned design turns unusual materials and merit-tree components into a device intended to break out of a seemingly inescapable prison.

Key plot points and events

• To test an escape route from the Heavenly Dao Little Black Room, Song Shuhang creates a durable clone. Senior White launches it on a disposable flying sword inscribed with a space-travel spell.
• After a terrifying half-hour journey, the clone breaks through into the Present World. The flying sword runs out of energy and disappears, but the clone lands safely and reports success.
• The clone arrives at a grove scarred by a recent Heavenly Tribulation. Song Shuhang recognizes it as the site where Tree Demon Mi Lulu faced her tribulation, which he had unknowingly helped by sending her power through his Sage Seal.
• He finds Mi Lulu’s charred remains and realizes she failed the tribulation. Nearby is a sapling grown from the part of her body that bore his Sage Seal.
• Song Shuhang takes the sapling to his Core World and plants it by the Living Spring, promising to make it his disciple if its consciousness awakens again. He gives it the Daoist name Wood Daoist.

Character developments and interactions

• Song Shuhang’s clone inherits his bluntness and comic anxiety, loudly demanding guardrails on Senior White’s flying swords. Senior White launches it anyway, while Song Shuhang and the others watch its escape.
• Song Shuhang shifts from joking about the clone technique to grieving Mi Lulu’s death. He reflects that the support and protection he has received from the Nine Provinces Number One Group may be why he survived dangers that claimed her.
• His promise to raise the sapling as a disciple shows his compassion and sense of responsibility toward Mi Lulu’s possible continuation.
• Everything Can Be Sold Big Shot is astonished that the Little Black Room can be breached and worries about what that might mean for the Netherworld Ruler. Soft Feather and Su Clan’s Sixteen contribute gossip about group members’ alternate accounts.

Significant themes

• The cost of cultivation: Tribulation failure means death, underscoring the harshness of the cultivation path.
• Fate, bonds, and renewal: The Sage Seal links Song Shuhang to the sapling, offering a possible continuation of his bond with Mi Lulu.
• Humor amid danger: The clone’s flying-sword complaints contrast with the serious discovery of Mi Lulu’s fate.
• Support and responsibility: Song Shuhang recognizes the help he has received and chooses to give the sapling a safe place to grow.

Plot points and events

• Song Shuhang checks on the disciples in his Core World. Xiao Cai is still obsessively cultivating, and he decides that her diligence may not be a problem after all—though he briefly fantasizes about training several Tribulation Immortals before admitting that the goal is far beyond his reach.
• He notices Chu Chu practicing the Thirty-Three Beasts Innate Unity Qi Technique. The Never-Falling Holy City’s projection points to the Ancient Ape Chapter as the path best suited to her, despite her feline appearance.
• Song Shuhang prepares the second and third volumes of the Ancient Ape Chapter for Chu Chu, along with the Sacred Ape Dragon Force Divine Art and Steel Hand. He also gives her cultivation pills. Chu Chu recognizes the value of the techniques and vows to live up to her teacher’s expectations.
• He leaves Golden Merit Bayberries beside the sleeping Li Yinzhu, then sees Onion Lady applying a facial mask to Senior Turtle.
• In Time City, Fairy Six Cultivations is teaching artifact refinement to the Thirty-Three Beast God Division, but her lesson veers into ways to make customers’ hearts ache by charging them more. Song Shuhang arrives and confirms that the Thirty-Three Beast Dharma Artifacts are complete and that he has reached Fifth Grade and combined them.
• When Song Shuhang says he is ready to pay the promised remuneration, Senior White Two appears and grabs him, declaring that he has found the scent he was looking for.

Character developments and interactions

• Song Shuhang shows a growing sense of responsibility toward his disciples. He considers Xiao Cai’s obsessive effort more kindly and carefully selects a cultivation path and useful resources for Chu Chu. His ambitions remain grand, but he recognizes the gap between his current level and his dreams.
• Chu Chu responds to her teacher’s gifts with gratitude and determination. Her appreciation reflects her awareness of how rare and valuable powerful cultivation techniques are, given her family’s past persecution over a sword manual.
• Fairy Six Cultivations channels her frustration with Song Shuhang into her comical “heart-stabbing” approach to artifact refinement. His voice now makes her brace for more work or materials; she is visibly distressed when he confirms the artifacts are finished and asks about payment.
• Senior Seven Cultivations and Four Cultivations listen to the lecture and notice Song Shuhang’s advancement, asking whether he has reached Fifth Grade and successfully combined the artifacts.
• Onion Lady and Senior Turtle appear unusually companionable, with Onion Lady tending to the turtle’s face mask while it smiles at Song Shuhang.

Significant themes

• Mentorship and responsibility: Song Shuhang supports his disciples with techniques suited to their individual talents and makes an effort to treat them fairly.
• Effort, ambition, and perspective: The chapter contrasts Xiao Cai’s relentless cultivation and Song Shuhang’s lofty dreams with the immense difficulty of reaching the highest realms.
• The value of knowledge and opportunity: Chu Chu’s reaction emphasizes how precious advanced cultivation techniques are, especially to someone from a modest clan.
• Humor and camaraderie: The facial-mask scene, Fairy Six Cultivations’ customer-charging advice, and Song Shuhang’s interactions with the seniors provide comic relief amid the cultivation and training.

Plot points and events

• Song Shuhang’s clone returns from the Heavenly Dao’s black room. Senior White Two realizes that Everything Can Be Sold is hiding there and decides to pursue him once he learns how to escape.
• Senior White Two fulfills a reward for Fairy Six Cultivations: she chooses to free Four Cultivations from the Nine-Rebirth Phoenix Saber rather than free herself. Four Cultivations can now cultivate beyond the Fourth Grade.
• After thanking Four Cultivations for guiding her and Seven Cultivations, Six Cultivations abruptly kicks him hundreds of meters away, joking that doing so makes her feel better. She then says goodbye to Shuhang and leaves to recover from her heartbreak.
• Shuhang explains that he escaped the black room using Senior White’s disposable flying sword, which imitates the Disaster Giant Turtle’s ability to cross space-time. Senior White Two asks him to obtain another sword and sends a challenge to Everything Can Be Sold: a four-day game of hide-and-seek, with prizes for either outcome.
• In the black room, Senior White’s clone confirms that Shuhang’s clone escaped and prepares more flying swords. Shuhang passes on Senior White Two’s request for a sword, as well as the hide-and-seek challenge.
• Senior White’s group departs the black room on the new flying swords. Everything Can Be Sold protests that he does not want to travel with Shuhang, but the swords launch before he can object.

Character developments and interactions

• Six Cultivations shows gratitude and affection for Four Cultivations by giving him her chance at freedom, trusting that Seven Cultivations will eventually help her. Her tender farewell immediately gives way to her mischievous, impulsive habit of kicking him.
• Four Cultivations is moved by Six Cultivations’s sacrifice and recognizes that she has granted him the freedom to grow again.
• Senior White Two is delighted by the prospect of pursuing Everything Can Be Sold and treats the chase as entertainment, deliberately making it a challenging game. He also hopes to use the other captive beings as leverage.
• Shuhang acts as messenger between Senior White Two, Senior White, and Everything Can Be Sold. He worries that helping Senior White Two might harm someone who has helped him, but ultimately passes on the challenge.
• Everything Can Be Sold is alarmed by the threat and blames Shuhang, even writing his name in a notebook. Senior White, meanwhile, agrees to meet Senior White Two after returning to the Present World.

Significant themes

• Sacrifice and gratitude: Six Cultivations gives up her own immediate chance at freedom to repay Four Cultivations’s long-standing care.
• Freedom and renewal: Four Cultivations’s release restores his ability to progress beyond a realm that had been fixed by the saber.
• Loyalty and divided obligations: Shuhang’s concern for both Senior White Two and Everything Can Be Sold highlights his competing friendships.
• Playfulness amid danger: Senior White Two turns a potentially serious pursuit into a game, while the chapter’s humor also comes from Six Cultivations’s sudden kick and Everything Can Be Sold’s futile protest.

Key plot points

• Senior White’s exhausted clone sends Song Shuhang, Su Clan’s Sixteen, and Soft Feather out of the Heavenly Dao’s black room, carrying their treasures on the flying tractor. It then disperses, leaving no backup behind if they are captured again.
• The group travels through spatial turbulence on disposable flying swords. Everything Can Be Sold Big Shot breaks away, using a protective treasure to enter the turbulence on his own and hide from the Netherworld Ruler.
• After about half an hour, the trio crash-land on a beach in an unfamiliar place. Their phones have no signal, and Song Shuhang cannot open the Core World. Sixteen discovers that a formation prevents flight above roughly four and a half meters.
• Soft Feather uses her upgraded reconnaissance artifact to locate a nearby plaza. There, the trio find a gathering of humans, beast cultivators, winged beings, and demons, mostly of modest cultivation levels.
• A tiger demon recognizes Song Shuhang and panics over rumors that his lecture made everyone in the worlds pregnant—and that his gaze alone can cause pregnancy. The other attendees repeat and embellish the stories, leaving Song Shuhang mortified while Sixteen suppresses laughter and Soft Feather laughs openly.
• Elsewhere, the three Number Cultivations are devastated after receiving the lecture’s effects through a broadcast.

Character developments and interactions

• Song Shuhang remains protective and cautious: he warns the others about their dangerous landing, catches Sixteen when she falls, and leads the group carefully into the plaza.
• Soft Feather is delighted by the adventure and eagerly uses her upgraded artifact to scout. She finds the rumors about Song Shuhang hilarious.
• Sixteen stays composed and practical, assessing the flight restriction and helping keep the group grounded—literally and figuratively.
• Everything Can Be Sold Big Shot chooses self-preservation over staying with the group, while Senior White’s clone sacrifices its remaining energy to get them out.
• Song Shuhang’s companions react very differently to his bizarre reputation: Sixteen barely contains her amusement, while Soft Feather can hardly stand from laughing.

Significant themes

• Reputation and exaggeration: Song Shuhang’s lecture becomes a wildly distorted legend, turning him into a feared figure even among those who never witnessed it.
• Uncertainty and survival: The group arrives in an unfamiliar, restrictive location without access to their usual escape methods and must investigate cautiously.
• Comedy amid danger: The perilous escape and strange new setting are undercut by absurd rumors and the group’s contrasting reactions.

Plot points and events

• Sage Seven Cultivations suffers through the Confucian Sage’s Pregnancy Gaze and turns to the Nine Provinces Number One Group for comfort. The chat reveals that nearly every cultivator who heard the lecture—including children and sect members—has become pregnant, with pain, accidents, and plenty of jokes as a result.
• The group’s shared misery makes Seven Cultivations feel less alone. When Fairy Six Cultivations says she does not want children because pregnancy is so painful, he reassures her that they can wait or simply take disciples instead.
• At the stone plaza, Song Shuhang tries to convince the other cultivators that his eyes cannot cause pregnancy. No one dares look at him. More arrivals recognize him as “Tyrant Confucian Profound Demon,” and they too avoid his gaze.
• After an hour, the Trial Road opens. The crowd lines up to enter, eager to get away from Song Shuhang.
• Everything Can Be Sold appears to sell a foot-care balm to entrants, but flees into the Trial Road as soon as he spots Song Shuhang. His retreat makes the crowd even more afraid of Song.
• Song Shuhang, Su Clan’s Sixteen, and Soft Feather join the end of the line and prepare to enter, removing their shoes first.

Character developments and interactions

• Sage Seven Cultivations finds comfort in shared suffering and shows tenderness toward Fairy Six Cultivations, prioritizing her wishes over having children.
• Song Shuhang is embarrassed and miserable about his unintended reputation, while his companions remain with him despite the crowd’s fear.
• The cultivators and demons react to Song with panic, mistaking Everything Can Be Sold’s flight for proof that even a powerful expert fears his gaze.
• Everything Can Be Sold tries to conduct business with the elf entrant, then abruptly escapes when Song calls to him.
• Su Clan’s Sixteen and Soft Feather prepare to enter the trial alongside Song, while the elf entrant declines the merchant’s balm until after the trial.

Significant themes

• Shared hardship can ease loneliness, even when the situation is absurd.
• Accidental power can create unwanted fame and social isolation.
• Humor comes from the contrast between a serious cultivation trial and the widespread, humiliating effects of the Pregnancy Gaze.
• The chapter also emphasizes consent and personal choice: Seven Cultivations readily accepts Six Cultivations’ decision to postpone or forgo children.

Key plot points and events

• Su Clan’s Sixteen, Soft Feather, and Song Shuhang enter the Trial Path’s first section, the Thorn Path, barefoot. The passage inflicts pain on their feet, with each experiencing it differently.
• Song Shuhang’s body-tempering techniques make the pain dramatically worse, so he turns them off and continues with the pain reduced. Sixteen concludes the trial scales its pain to a participant’s physical strength.
• As they walk, the three discuss things they would like to buy. Soft Feather wants a blanket like the one worn by Everything Can Be Sold, hoping to give one to her father; Sixteen and Song Shuhang also mention purchases.
• Everything Can Be Sold is hiding nearby. Tempted by the group’s potential purchases, he nevertheless avoids Song Shuhang, whom he has blacklisted after past misfortune, and plans to approach the women at a later fork.
• They pass a defeated centipede spirit. Its unusually strong body and five hundred pairs of legs made the foot-based trial nearly impossible, though it had already shown great perseverance by making it that far.
• The endless passage tests patience as well as pain tolerance. Song Shuhang says it can temper the Dao Heart, and begins telling Sixteen and Soft Feather a story to relieve their boredom.

Character developments and interactions

• Song Shuhang demonstrates extraordinary pain tolerance, shaped by his past ordeals, and tries to reassure the others. He walks between Sixteen and Soft Feather, sharing lighthearted conversation with them.
• Sixteen calmly analyzes how the trial works and recognizes its benefits for the body and Dao Heart. She also hints at wanting to buy something, while glancing at her chest.
• Soft Feather remains playful and energetic, jokes about the sensations in her feet, and wants to buy a matching blanket for her father. The long walk begins to bore her, so she asks Song Shuhang for a story.
• Everything Can Be Sold wrestles with his merchant’s instinct to serve promising customers and his fear of trading with Song Shuhang. His comical plan is to wait until the group separates.
• The centipede spirit’s complaint—that the trial is “too anti-centipede”—adds humor while illustrating how differently the same challenge affects different bodies.

Significant themes

• Endurance and self-cultivation: Pain and monotony both serve as tests that strengthen the body, resolve, and Dao Heart.
• Trials are relative: A challenge calibrated to a participant’s strength can still become especially punishing for unusual physiques or many-limbed beings.
• Companionship eases hardship: Conversation and storytelling make the long, difficult passage more bearable.
• Humor amid adversity: The chapter balances painful trials with playful banter, the centipede’s predicament, and Everything Can Be Sold’s conflicted salesmanship.

Key plot points and events

• While Song Shuhang recounts High Monk’s Ascetic Diary, an unseen voice remarks that he will soon no longer be an only child. The possibility that his rejuvenated parents might have another baby leaves him surprisingly excited.
• A playful discussion about marriage turns to the cultivation world’s traditions: some clans restrict daughters from passing on family techniques. Soft Feather suggests that great strength can overcome such objections, while Sixteen quietly considers how advancing in cultivation could give her more independence.
• Shuhang continues the diary’s tale of a monk enduring extreme hardship—poison, beasts, harsh terrain, and natural disasters—only for the monk to die at the end of his journey and have his soul sublimated. The unseen commentator, identified as Senior Everything Can Be Sold, objects to the bleak ending.
• Hearing the story helps Sixteen grasp the diary’s hidden Soul-Deliverance Art. She uses it with a gesture, and a Little White Dragon and merit power appear.
• The three companions take their final step along the Thorn Path. Shuhang manifests his tenth Ancient Giant Ape and Confucian scriptures; Soft Feather’s constitution is strengthened; and Sixteen’s White Dragon appears, with small horns emerging from her head.

Character developments

• Song Shuhang finds himself looking forward to having a younger sibling, imagining sharing extraordinary adventures with them. He also shows a practical understanding of clan traditions.
• Su Clan’s Sixteen moves closer to mastering the Soul-Deliverance Art and reflects on gaining greater standing within her clan through cultivation.
• Soft Feather keeps the conversation lively with teasing and clever deductions, while demonstrating familiarity with cultivation-world customs.
• Senior Everything Can Be Sold briefly reveals his presence through commentary, then disappears when Soft Feather calls him out.

Significant themes

• Endurance and sacrifice: The monk’s extreme asceticism culminates not in survival but in spiritual sublimation.
• Learning through insight: Sixteen’s breakthrough shows that understanding can emerge from attentive reflection, even without formally mastering a related scripture.
• Family, tradition, and autonomy: The group discusses how clan customs can limit women’s inheritance of techniques—and how personal strength can challenge those limits.
• Humor amid cultivation: Serious spiritual topics sit alongside teasing, marriage jokes, and the absurd prospect of Shuhang becoming an adventurous older brother.

Character interactions

• Shuhang, Soft Feather, and Sixteen banter about his baldness, marriage, and the possibility of a new sibling.
• Soft Feather explains clan attitudes toward daughters and techniques; Sixteen’s response suggests the subject matters personally to her.
• The trio listens to and reacts to Shuhang’s dramatic retelling, while the hidden Senior Everything Can Be Sold interrupts with skeptical remarks.
• Sixteen’s breakthrough and the group’s simultaneous final step mark a shared milestone on the Thorn Path.

Key plot points and events

• After completing the trial, Su Clan’s Sixteen shows signs of dragonification: small crystalline horns grow from her head, and she becomes flushed and radiates intense heat and steam.
• Sixteen collapses, and Song Shuhang catches her. Worried that the White Dragon may be affecting or possessing her, he uses his Appraisal Secret Method to investigate.
• The first appraisal mistakenly describes Sixteen’s dress. The second reveals that Sixteen remains herself, has reached the Fourth-Grade Xiantian Realm, and has undergone partial dragonification after receiving the Merit White Dragon’s protection.
• The appraisal also hints at private gossip involving Song Blockhead and a dragon, but censors the details. Song Shuhang connects this to earlier clues about the Golden Dragon Progenitor and the White Dragon.
• The Merit White Dragon manifests. Soft Feather playfully touches its tail, and the dragon communicates with her and Song Shuhang.
• When Soft Feather says gold is “mighty” and silver-white merely “stylish,” the White Dragon recalls Song Blockhead using the same phrase. She explains that she was born white, but one day woke up as a Golden Dragon after he said it—and then beat him until he cried.

Character developments

• Sixteen remains conscious and herself despite her new horns and dragon-related changes. Her injuries are healed, and she has advanced to Fourth Grade.
• Song Shuhang shows concern for Sixteen and carefully catches her, suppressing his Steel Hand technique so he won’t hurt her. His appraisal brings painful consequences and unwanted, increasingly intrusive results.
• Soft Feather supports Shuhang by preparing a healing spell, then displays her curious, playful side with the White Dragon.
• The White Dragon is revealed to have a distinct will and a warm, gentle manner. Her past connection to Song Blockhead—and her transformation from white to gold—becomes clearer.

Significant themes

• Identity amid transformation: Sixteen’s body is changing, but the appraisal confirms she is still herself.
• Care and trust: Shuhang’s caution and willingness to endure pain reflect his concern for Sixteen.
• Comic consequences of power: The appraisal technique is both costly and unreliable, producing embarrassing results and censored gossip.
• Mythic history and personal ties: The White Dragon’s recollections connect present events to Song Blockhead’s mysterious past.

Character interactions

• Soft Feather alerts Shuhang to Sixteen’s condition and helps heal him after his appraisal wounds.
• Shuhang reassures himself that Sixteen’s identity is unchanged, while warning the White Dragon that he is not Song Blockhead and will not answer for his actions.
• The White Dragon responds calmly, exchanges thoughts with Shuhang and Soft Feather, and shares a memory that portrays Song Blockhead as both influential and decidedly troublesome.

Chapter Summary

• White Dragon’s past and reincarnation: Song Shuhang recalls that Song Blockhead once turned White Dragon gold, leaving her unable to return to her original color and earning her the name Golden Dragon Progenitor. He suspects a mysterious merchant supplied the technique but keeps the thought to himself. White Dragon clarifies that her reincarnation method is still waiting in the Dragon Tomb for Song Blockhead; if he never comes, she intends to keep waiting. Song Shuhang jokingly advises her to set a deadline or go beat him, and she teases him about his connection to Song Blockhead.
• Sixteen’s dragon transformation: White Dragon explains that she only catalyzed a process already underway. Sixteen had consumed Dragonbone Withered Vine and carried True Dragon Bloodline, which the Trial Path and White Dragon’s use of her Merit Power awakened. Her transformation is therefore a natural expression of her heritage, not a mutation. White Dragon adds that her presence has temporarily influenced Sixteen’s gentle manner, and that Sixteen will soon enter a dormant stage of evolution.
• Waiting—and teasing: Song Shuhang and Soft Feather decide to wait for Sixteen to wake before continuing the trial. They settle her between them, with her head on Soft Feather’s lap and her legs against Song Shuhang’s feet. Soft Feather discovers that touching Sixteen’s dragon horn makes her moan in her sleep, and tries to persuade Song Shuhang to help record it. He refuses, wary of repeating past embarrassing antics; White Dragon finds the whole episode amusing and does not intervene.
• A sudden complication: A Dragon Pattern mark appears on Sixteen’s forehead, and White Dragon says her dormant evolution could last from several days to a month. As Song Shuhang prepares to carry her onward, Soft Feather gives the horn one last pinch. Sixteen releases an electric shock that knocks Soft Feather unconscious and numbs Song Shuhang, leaving him with both her and the dormant Sixteen to transport.

Character Developments and Themes

• Song Shuhang is protective and cautious, prioritizing Sixteen’s safety while resisting Soft Feather’s playful schemes.
• Soft Feather is mischievous and affectionate, especially toward Sixteen, and enjoys teasing Song Shuhang.
• White Dragon acts as a gentle guide to Sixteen’s transformation, while also showing warmth toward Soft Feather and playful humor.
• The chapter explores heritage and transformation, presenting Sixteen’s dragon nature as something inherent rather than imposed. It also emphasizes friendship, trust, and affectionate teasing, with comedy arising from the group’s close relationships.

Summary

Song Shuhang carries unconscious Soft Feather and hibernating Su Clan’s Sixteen through the Trial Path on his Shrimp Dragon Swift Chariot. After two days of grueling trials, he emerges physically strengthened, with eleven Ancient Sacred Ape projections behind him. The Merit Snake Beauty and White Dragon Sister soon sense that something is watching them, and their attention turns to Soft Feather.
Soft Feather awakens with completely black eyes and a strange, powerful presence. Shuhang tries to send the chariot back into the Trial Path, but the figure stops it and reveals that she is the Heavenly Emperor, who had been trapped in the Trial Grounds. She says she possessed Soft Feather from the moment the group entered and was able to escape thanks to Shuhang and his unusual chariot. She intends to remain in Soft Feather’s body for “an entire lifetime” and eventually rebuild the Heavenly Court.
The Heavenly Emperor’s presence unsettles the Merit Snake Beauty and White Dragon Sister. The latter realizes the Emperor concealed himself by exploiting her fondness for the aura associated with Song Blockhead, which dulled her suspicion. The Scarlet Heaven Sword challenges the Emperor over possessing Soft Feather, while the Emperor makes light of the situation and even promises to place Shuhang in her future harem. Fairy Cheng Lin then warns Shuhang that the Emperor is stalling and urges him to force her back into the Trial Grounds.

Character developments and interactions

• Song Shuhang shows endurance and resourcefulness, but his usual escape route—the Core World—remains sealed. He shifts from concern for his unconscious companions to readiness to fight once Soft Feather’s body is revealed to be under the Emperor’s control.
• Soft Feather remains unconscious or absent as the Heavenly Emperor speaks through her body, leaving her fate uncertain.
• Su Clan’s Sixteen stays in hibernation and is protected by White Dragon Sister.
• The Heavenly Emperor is revealed as a powerful, manipulative survivor trapped in the Trial Path. Her playful manner contrasts with her serious ambition to rebuild the Ancient Heavenly Court.
• White Dragon Sister recognizes that her emotional attachment to Song Blockhead was exploited, and treats it as a dangerous vulnerability.
• The Scarlet Heaven Sword voices the group’s objection to the possession; Fairy Cheng Lin provides the tactical warning that the Emperor is buying time.

Significant themes

The chapter contrasts affection and trust with vulnerability, as the Emperor turns White Dragon Sister’s fondness into a means of concealment. It also explores identity and gender, as the Emperor rejects the assumption that the title “Heavenly Emperor” implies a man. Finally, Shuhang’s hard-won progress gives way to a larger danger: escaping one trial has delivered him into a confrontation with a powerful figure whose intentions remain threatening.

Plot points and events

• Song Shuhang prepares to attack the Heavenly Emperor, who is possessing Soft Feather’s weak Fourth-Grade body. Cheng Lin urges him to knock her back into the Trial Grounds, the only apparent way to free Soft Feather.
• Song charges with his Never-Falling Holy City and its associated weapons. The Heavenly Emperor blocks the attack with an Imperial Script, an exceptionally powerful defense she created herself.
• A hand tractor suddenly emerges through space and hits her, briefly forcing her backward. Song follows with his Pregnancy Gaze, but the Imperial Script blocks it.
• Song uses a Disposable Flying Sword to perform a short-range Trans-Spacetime Stroll, bypassing the defense and crashing into the Heavenly Emperor. The Holy City then strikes as well, but Song’s energy runs out; he collapses, and the Heavenly Emperor catches him.
• At White Dragon’s demand, the Heavenly Emperor releases Song, who falls through a Space Gate. White Dragon follows with Su Clan’s Sixteen.
• As the Heavenly Emperor prepares to leave, a powerful, golden-robed Confucian scholar forces his way into the area and restrains her. She identifies him as Cheng Lin, but he denies it, saying, “Fool, I am you.”

Character developments and interactions

• Song Shuhang acts decisively despite knowing the odds, using every available weapon and ability to reach the Heavenly Emperor. His assault fails to defeat her but succeeds in drawing out his full resources and ends with him unconscious.
• The Heavenly Emperor remains composed and overwhelmingly powerful, blocking most attacks and adapting her position after the tractor’s surprise hit. She shows a teasing interest in Song, even jokingly naming him her future “Tyrant Consort,” but is ultimately caught off guard by the scholar.
• Cheng Lin guides Song from within him, urging him to act without hesitation. Her hostility toward the Heavenly Emperor is clear, though the chapter’s ending complicates her identity.
• White Dragon openly protects Song and pursues him through the Space Gate, prompting the Heavenly Emperor to call that attachment a new weakness.
• Su Clan’s Sixteen is with White Dragon throughout the confrontation and follows Song through the gate.

Significant themes

• Courage against overwhelming power: Song keeps fighting even when his attacks appear ineffective, relying on improvisation and persistence.
• Unexpected timing and hidden resources: The delayed hand tractor and Song’s spatial technique disrupt the Heavenly Emperor’s confidence.
• Attachment as both strength and vulnerability: White Dragon’s concern for Song is evident, and the Heavenly Emperor frames it as a weakness.
• Identity and paradox: The final claim, “I am you,” raises a mystery about the relationship between the Heavenly Emperor and the golden-robed scholar.

Key plot points and events

• A golden Confucian scholar confronts the resurrected Heavenly Emperor and claims they are fragments of the same being, offering the Emperor Pearl as proof. Though their resonance confirms a shared origin, the Heavenly Emperor initially resists with Imperial Scripts.
• The scholar reveals himself as Song Blockhead, or “Death-Seeking Song,” and says he once merged with the Heavenly Emperor before the Ancient Heavenly Court fell. He traps her in a sealing formation and triggers their resonance by declaring, “I love you,” with the second attempt working after he claims the first had poor reception.
• The Heavenly Emperor is absorbed into him, and the consciousness that had possessed Soft Feather is pulled from her body. The scholar names their combined identity Ghost God Song Three, explaining that “Song Two sounds really stupid,” then puts Soft Feather back to sleep.
• The transformed Song Three opens a portal to an army of golden-armored warriors and seven powerful longevity immortals. He begins completing their Daos through a lengthy Imperial Script contract. Several sign, including the Soul-Reaping Great Emperor, the Western Great Emperor, and Flat Peach True Person. As the fifth begins signing, a voice from within Song Three invokes the Way of Time, and the space around him distorts.

Character developments and interactions

• The Heavenly Emperor learns that her memories are incomplete and that she and Song Blockhead share a deeper history than she remembers. Her initial defiance gives way to involuntary resonance and absorption.
• Song Blockhead is revealed as a scheming, theatrical figure whose long-laid plan depends on reuniting with the Heavenly Emperor and preparing the longevity immortals’ Daos.
• Soft Feather briefly awakens during the changeover, confused by the name “Ghost God Song Three,” before Song Blockhead returns her to sleep.
• The Northern Great Emperor, already freed from the Heavenly Emperor’s Dao and present in the current world, declines to sign and instead agrees to stand guard.
• Flat Peach True Person signs but jokingly refuses to discuss selling her soul until Song Blockhead resolves his many romantic entanglements. Their banter underscores the group’s familiarity with his personal life.

Significant themes

• Fragmentation, identity, and reunion: The Heavenly Emperor and Song Blockhead are parts of a former whole, raising questions about what remains of each after they merge.
• Memory and lost history: The Heavenly Emperor’s forgotten past makes her vulnerable and leaves the truth of the Ancient Heavenly Court’s fall partly obscured.
• Power and sacrifice: Song Blockhead spends substantial energy writing the contract, while the longevity immortals trade signatures for complete, perfected Daos.
• Comedy amid cosmic stakes: The absurd confession, “bad signal” excuse, and “Song Two sounds really stupid” contrast sharply with the resurrection plot, vast army, and reality-warping final interruption.

Plot points and events

• Song One, the golden scholar, tries to complete an Imperial Script Contract by merging with the weakened Heavenly Emperor. Their opposing time powers clash, and an ally inside Song One helps hold the Emperor in place.
• The fifth, sixth, and seventh mysterious Longevity Immortals begin petrifying before the contract can be completed. The Heavenly Emperor breaks free and reveals that she, like Song One, is a fragment from a shared source—though each fragment has become an individual.
• The Emperor’s resurrected body contains another, exceptionally powerful force. She summons Soft Feather’s body, but Song One protects it. She instead pulls out Soft Feather’s spirit ghost and merges with it, taking on a regal appearance and seeming to regain memories.
• Declaring that Song One has failed, the Heavenly Emperor claims the three Longevity Immortals and says Song One will eventually belong to her. A barrage of attacks from Song One is stopped by enormous golden hands, which carry her and the three immortals away.
• The three immortals’ bodies crumble, but their dao seeds survive, giving Song One and his allies hope of rescuing them. Song One suspects the golden hands were created by the current Heavenly Dao, perhaps as part of a plan to restore its missing component through the Heavenly Emperor and the Ancient Heavenly Court.
• The chapter ends with the golden hands appearing in spatial turbulence, protecting the Heavenly Emperor as White Dragon and Merit Snake Beauty travel with Su Clan’s Sixteen and Song Shuhang.

Character developments and interactions

• Song One shifts from determined confidence to grief and frustration after losing the Emperor and the three immortals. He remains hopeful because their dao seeds survived, and begins piecing together the Heavenly Dao’s possible involvement.
• The Heavenly Emperor shows her independence and growing power, revealing her fragment origins, reclaiming memories through Soft Feather’s spirit ghost, and asserting that she will control any future fusion with Song One.
• Song One’s inner ally helps restrain the Emperor, then jokes that Song One should win Fairy White Dragon over.
• The Northern and Western Great Emperors and Peachfruit Fairy help evacuate the petrifying immortals and comfort Song One—though the Western Emperor’s blunt “get up and fight” reassurance only irritates him.

Significant themes

• Fragmented identity: Beings from one source can develop into distinct individuals, raising questions about whether origin determines identity.
• Control and incomplete restoration: The struggle between Song One and the Heavenly Emperor mirrors the suspected Heavenly Dao plan to recover what it lacks.
• Hope amid loss: Though the immortals are taken, their surviving dao seeds leave open the possibility of saving them.
• Dry humor in tragedy: Song One’s exasperation with the repeated advice to “get up and fight” punctuates the chapter’s grief and tension.

Key plot points and events

• The Heavenly Emperor appears before Song Shuhang and White Dragon, but cannot remember Song Shuhang or Su Clan’s Sixteen—even though she met them moments earlier. White Dragon suspects the Heavenly Dao Little Black Room is still erasing traces of them from people’s memories.
• The Emperor says her newly resurrected body is causing memory lapses. She recalls that Song helped her escape the Trial Grounds by allowing her to possess one of his companions.
• She invites Song to help rebuild the Heavenly Palace, promising he could become a Longevity Immortal with a complete path of his own. White Dragon rejects the offer on his behalf. The Emperor gives Song an Emperor Pearl as a way to contact her, and it unexpectedly survives in his hand.
• After the Emperor leaves, White Dragon tells Song they are still in spatial turbulence and is searching for a way back. She believes Soft Feather is no longer possessed and may be where they left her.
• Exhausted, Song falls asleep and enters a vivid Dream Entry. He experiences the life of a ghost held in a laboratory and repeatedly examined, cut apart, and restored.
• A silvery-white Liquid Metal Ball arrives and identifies the captive as a fragment of the Ghost God and the first true Spirit Ghost—a creation of the Third Heavenly Dao. Song recognizes the fragment as connected to Cheng Lin, whose shattered state remains unresolved.

Character developments and interactions

• Song Shuhang wakes too depleted to move, remains wary of the Heavenly Emperor, and refuses the idea of joining her plans. His Dream Entry reveals a previously unknown link between his experiences and the origins of the Spirit Ghost.
• White Dragon protects Song, answers the Emperor’s questions for him, rejects her offer, and takes responsibility for finding a way back and checking on Soft Feather.
• The Heavenly Emperor is powerful and persuasive, but her memory failures make her seem unstable and hint that the Little Black Room’s erasure effect persists. Despite the offer, she leaves Song a means to contact her.
• Soft Feather is no longer apparently under the Emperor’s control, though her whereabouts remain uncertain.
• The Liquid Metal Ball Heavenly Dao appears in Song’s dream as an investigator examining the Spirit Ghost fragment, revealing a connection between the current Heavenly Dao and Cheng Lin.

Significant themes

• Identity and memory: The Little Black Room may erase people not just from records but from others’ memories.
• Power, choice, and ambition: The Emperor tempts Song with an extraordinary future, but White Dragon questions whether such a promise is credible.
• Endurance and captivity: Song’s dream forces him to experience prolonged, invasive study, echoing the chapter’s broader concern with beings used as tools or experiments.
• Hidden origins: The final revelation links the Spirit Ghost, Cheng Lin, the Third Heavenly Dao, and the mysterious current Heavenly Dao.

Key plot points and events

• Song Shuhang remains inside a “Dream Entry” vision, observing the Liquid Metal Ball Heavenly Dao while trying not to attract its attention.
• The Heavenly Dao studies the Third Heavenly Dao’s Ghost God Fragment, hoping to repair its own flaw. It rejects the Third Heavenly Dao’s escape plans and instead develops a Heavenly Dao Completion Plan, also called the Heavenly Court Project.
• The project aims to create a Heavenly Court and fuse it with the Dao of Longevity Immortals. The Heavenly Dao needs a suitable “protagonist” to carry it out.
• Drawing on the Second Heavenly Dao’s eye-based experimental subjects, it creates an eyefied humanoid guide and sends it through a space gate to undergo reincarnation and growth. Song suspects this is the Demon Catcher who later pursued Cheng Lin and helped destroy the Jadewater Pavilion.
• The chapter surveys what the previous Heavenly Daoes left behind: the Second favored eye-based beings; the Third was a prolific inventor associated with the Golden and Evil Lotuses and the Ghost God Fragment; the Fourth and Fifth left little of interest; the Sixth acquired the Heavenly Dao Seat through a transaction; and the Seventh was the Liquid Metal Ball’s predecessor, whom it calls an idiot.
• After the experiment, the Heavenly Dao seems to abandon the project. Song remains trapped and bored for years, then a century more, using the time to organize the historical timeline and strengthen his Dao Heart.
• The Heavenly Dao eventually returns, revealing that 107 experimental subjects have failed. It wonders whether only the Ghost God Fragment can serve as the project’s protagonist, but fears relying on something it does not control.

Character developments

• Song Shuhang becomes increasingly disciplined at maintaining a blank, distraction-free mind. His long confinement strengthens his Dao Heart, though the boredom becomes so severe that he wishes the Heavenly Dao would resume studying him.
• The Liquid Metal Ball Heavenly Dao is revealed as insecure about its damaged, incomplete nature and determined to fix itself. It is pragmatic and dismissive of other Heavenly Daoes’ legacies, but cautious about using the Ghost God Fragment because it may pose a danger.

Character interactions

• Song silently observes the Heavenly Dao, carefully suppressing his thoughts so it will not detect him.
• The Heavenly Dao treats its experimental subjects as raw material, creating and dispatching one humanoid creature as part of its plan.
• Song connects the creature to the Demon Catcher and to Cheng Lin’s past, suspecting the Heavenly Court Project was tied to the Jadewater Pavilion’s destruction.

Significant themes

• The burden of power and incompleteness: Even the Heavenly Dao feels flawed and seeks a way to become whole.
• Creation, control, and exploitation: The project turns living beings into experiments and potential instruments.
• Cycles of history and hidden causality: Song’s timeline suggests that the Heavenly Dao’s research may have shaped major past events.
• Patience and endurance: Song’s prolonged observation transforms confinement into a test of mental discipline.

Key plot points and events

• The Liquid Metal Ball Heavenly Dao modifies Song Shuhang’s Ghost God Fragment, rewriting it with its own governing will. Since it cannot divide its immortal body, it swallows the fragment and later spits it out as a handsome male figure.
• It names this new being the Heavenly Emperor and sends it through a “reincarnation” process: not a traditional rebirth, but the Heavenly Dao using its authority to legitimize the fragment’s entry into the Present World.
• Song Shuhang experiences the Heavenly Emperor’s life through a Dream Entry, though he misses the reincarnation itself. At six, the Heavenly Emperor is taken in by a mysterious, double-pupiled teacher and begins cultivation.
• The Heavenly Emperor advances rapidly but steadily: Second Grade at six, Third Grade at eight, Fourth Grade at twelve, and Fifth Grade at seventeen. Her teacher leaves after she reaches Fifth Grade, when sealed powers and an inheritance awaken within her.
• The inheritance explains Golden Core Diagrams and guides her in drawing one: a vast depiction of the Heavenly Court, centered on its main palace and spreading outward into countless other palaces.

Character developments and interactions

• Song Shuhang gains years of cultivation experience through the Dream Entry. Although the Heavenly Emperor’s techniques are too specialized to be useful to him or his disciples, experiencing her gradual progress eases his insecurity about his own unusually rapid rise.
• The Liquid Metal Ball Heavenly Dao demonstrates both caution and control: it fears hidden safeguards in the Third Heavenly Dao’s creation, then reshapes the fragment and installs its own will.
• The Heavenly Emperor grows from a reborn child into a Fifth-Grade cultivator, trained by a mysterious mentor and ultimately guided by the inheritance embedded within her.
• The double-pupiled teacher trains the Heavenly Emperor with techniques tailored to her constitution, then departs once the assigned goal—her reaching Fifth Grade—is achieved.

Significant themes

• Creation, control, and legacy: A fragment created by one Heavenly Dao is altered and repurposed by another.
• Cultivation as personal expression: A Golden Core Diagram reflects a cultivator’s true heart; its strokes are permanent, and the final mark demands insight.
• Growth through experience: Song Shuhang benefits less from acquiring techniques than from witnessing a slower, more grounded path to advancement.
• Identity and transformation: The fragment’s appearance, consciousness, and purpose are all changed as it becomes the Heavenly Emperor.

Key plot points and events

• Through Dream Entry, Song Shuhang learns how the young Heavenly Emperor created her Golden Core Heavenly Court Diagram. She completes nearly all of it, but needs a final insight before she can draw its last stroke.
• Seeking a life-or-death trial, the Heavenly Emperor prays for guidance. Song Shuhang, apparently able to communicate with her through the dream, jokingly tells her to seal her spiritual energy and jump from a cliff.
• She follows his advice, believing the near-death experience will help her breakthrough. She survives the fall but is badly injured and loses consciousness; because he is experiencing events through her, Song Shuhang suffers the impact too and blacks out.
• Song Shuhang wakes in the Present World after nearly a day. White Dragon Sister has found the Trial Grounds’ exit and brings him back with the still-unconscious Su Clan’s Sixteen. Soft Feather is also safe.
• White Dragon reveals that part of the nearby grassland is an Ancient Heavenly Court Fragment. She cannot take it as a Merit Avatar, but leaves a coordinate so Song Shuhang can return for it later. He worries the reborn Heavenly Emperor may claim it first.
• Song Shuhang and the others leave the secret realm and return to Wenzhou City.

Character developments

• The young Heavenly Emperor is powerful and talented but remarkably inexperienced outside cultivation. Her sincere, misguided attempts to pray for help reveal her naïveté. She also shows boldness and determination by acting on Song Shuhang’s advice, and the experience gives her the insight she needs for her Golden Core diagram.
• Song Shuhang gains detailed knowledge of the Heavenly Emperor’s cultivation and believes he could reproduce much of her diagram, perhaps making it even more elaborate. His role in her cliff jump also underscores how his Dream Entry experiences can expose him to real pain and danger. He remains wary of becoming entangled in the Heavenly Emperor’s plans.
• White Dragon Sister acts as a steady protector and guide, keeping the group safe and helping them escape the secret realm.

Significant themes

• Insight through adversity: The Heavenly Emperor seeks a life-or-death experience to gain the understanding needed to finish her cultivation diagram.
• Experience and imitation: Song Shuhang’s ability to absorb another cultivator’s memories raises the possibility that a “copy” might surpass the original.
• The danger of reckless advice: A joke from Song Shuhang becomes a literal, painful ordeal for both him and the Heavenly Emperor.
• Unresolved legacy: The Heavenly Court Fragment and the Heavenly Emperor’s rebirth suggest that the Heavenly Court Project may still be active.

Character interactions

• Song Shuhang and the Heavenly Emperor communicate across the Dream Entry, though she mistakes him for a god and takes his sarcastic advice seriously.
• White Dragon Sister comforts and protects Song Shuhang, explains the Heavenly Court Fragment’s significance, and arranges a way for him to retrieve it later.
• Song Shuhang checks that Soft Feather is safe and places her and the unconscious Sixteen aboard the Shrimp Dragon Swift Chariot before leading the group home.

Key plot points and events

• Song Shuhang stores the conspicuous Shrimp Dragon Swift Chariot and the unconscious Soft Feather and Su Clan’s Sixteen in his Core World, then returns to Wenzhou.
• He visits his parents, hoping for an emotional reunion after the long subjective passage of time caused by Dream Entry.
• Instead, Mom and Dad Song cannot remember him. They believe their first child died in infancy and recognize Song Shuhang only through his public Sage Title, “Tyrant Song.”
• His parents immediately forget him again whenever their attention shifts. They even discuss having another child, leaving Shuhang stunned and hurt.
• Song Shuhang leaves without entering his home. White Dragon Sister comforts him and suggests the identity-erasing effects of the Heavenly Dao Little Black Room may still be reversible.
• He suspects Soft Feather and Sixteen are similarly forgotten by their families. He plans to wait for Senior White and attend Fairy Bie Xue’s Immortal Chef Banquet after the seventh.
• At a nearby hotel, staff repeatedly forget Song Shuhang moments after registering him, and his booking disappears from the computer. He gives up and calls Lay Buddhist Most Transcendent.

Character developments and interactions

• Song Shuhang is shaken by his parents’ rejection but masks his pain with humor and resilience, drawing on past hardships. He recognizes that the Little Black Room’s effects remain serious.
• Mom and Dad Song appear younger and affectionate with each other, but their memories of Shuhang have been replaced by the belief that he died as a baby.
• White Dragon Sister stays beside Shuhang, observes the modern world, and gently consoles him.
• The encounter highlights the painful distance between Shuhang and the people he hopes will recognize him; even ordinary interactions, such as checking into a hotel, become impossible.

Significant themes

• Identity and recognition: Shuhang is physically present, yet people cannot retain the knowledge that he exists.
• Homecoming and estrangement: A return to his familiar home becomes more alienating than welcoming.
• Resilience amid loss: Shuhang’s humor and composure help him endure a deeply personal blow.
• Lingering consequences: Escaping the Heavenly Dao Little Black Room has not ended its effects on him or possibly his companions.

Key plot points and events

• Song Shuhang calls Lay Buddhist Most Transcendent, initially confusing his name with another senior’s. Most Transcendent has recently advanced to the Seventh-Grade Venerable realm, but his increasingly weak presence means people often forget him or ignore his messages.
• Shuhang realizes they share the same problem: after his own repeated manifestations, people can recall his title briefly but forget him once they look away. Their mutual confusion over each other’s names only strengthens their sense of kinship.
• The two agree to meet in Wenzhou the next day and travel together to Fairy Bie Xue’s Immortal Chef Banquet. When Most Transcendent recognizes that Shuhang is Tyrant Song, he asks whether the Sage’s second manifestation cured his fading presence. Shuhang confirms it did not, leaving Most Transcendent disheartened.
• While waiting on a rooftop, Shuhang watches over the still-sleeping Soft Feather and Su Clan’s Sixteen. White Dragon Sister says she wants to eat a whole roasted horse, prompting Shuhang to recall a black horse spirit and Fairy Bie Xue’s past plans to serve it as a meal.
• In the Nine Provinces Number One Group, members discuss Tyrant Song’s infamous Pregnancy Gaze and the upcoming banquet. They joke about possibly fake invitations, wonder whether Senior White is awake, and note that the banquet has added tables despite fewer invitations being distributed. The approaching Power Tide may be making cultivators more eager to attend.

Character developments and interactions

• Song Shuhang and Lay Buddhist Most Transcendent find comfort in recognizing each other’s experience of being forgotten. Their names are repeatedly mangled, but this becomes a source of affectionate camaraderie. Shuhang’s title, Tyrant Song, is easier to remember, though it offers only temporary relief from his condition.
• Most Transcendent is both proud of his recent breakthrough and saddened that it has made him even easier to overlook. Discovering that Tyrant Song still suffers the same problem drains his brief hope.
• White Dragon Sister’s sudden craving for roasted horse provides a comic interruption to Shuhang’s quiet rooftop wait.
• Group members tease one another while discussing invitations; their banter underscores how routinely Shuhang’s dramatic reputation and the group’s everyday social dynamics coexist.

Significant themes

• The pain of being forgotten: Both Shuhang and Most Transcendent struggle with fading recognition, turning an unusual supernatural affliction into an emotional bond.
• Identity and memory: Names and titles offer only fragile recognition; even powerful achievements cannot guarantee that others will remember someone.
• Humor amid hardship: Misnaming, group-chat misunderstandings, and absurd side comments lighten the characters’ loneliness and the chapter’s underlying despair.