Chapter Summaries

Gao Tian watched desperate survivors outside Bolaka beg the convoy for food and work as it drove through the Slave Cave. When a starving couple risked their lives to stop the vehicle, Lemming explained the danger of showing mercy, leaving Gao Tian looking to Lin An for help.

• A starving mathematics professor, an award-winning novelist, and a construction worker chased the convoy, offering their credentials and skills for food.
• Women lined the road and offered themselves to the convoy, while one man urged his wife to dance in exchange for grass cake.
• The woman danced in the muddy road, and Gao Tian told Lemming to stop or let her go.
• Lemming warned that stopping could bring the crowd swarming and explained that patronizing the couple might protect them from other slaves.
• The woman's husband lay in front of the convoy, and Gao Tian fell silent and looked to Lin An for help.

As Lin An’s convoy approached Bolaka, Zhang Tie witnessed the city’s soldiers abuse newcomers and the crowd butcher a murdered survivor for food. Zhang Tie was left furious and wanting to kill the people responsible.

• Zhang Tie tossed a couple of survivors back into the crowd, then told Lin An he felt bad about what he had done.
• Lemming raised the wild-wolf flag and prepared to handle the checkpoint as the convoy neared Bolaka’s gate.
• Bolaka’s soldiers forced newcomers to strip, confiscated their weapons, and abused a woman named Nana during an inspection.
• Nana’s boyfriend, Zhang Liang, charged to rescue her but was shot dead from the city wall.
• Soldiers restrained Nana while Bolaka’s residents cut up Zhang Liang’s corpse and fought over the meat.
• Zhang Tie clenched his teeth and told Lin An he wanted to kill the soldiers and the crowd.

Lin An led the convoy into the Outer City after using his Mental Strength to kill the soldiers abusing a girl outside the walls, then ended the girl’s suffering when she went mad. Inside the city, Lemming explained how slaves were treated as property and raised like dogs.

• Lemming persuaded the inspection soldiers to let the convoy enter by claiming the cloaked companions were auction items and bribing them with dried meat.
• After the vehicles passed through the gate, Lin An used his Mental Strength to kill four soldiers who had been tormenting a girl outside the city.
• Lin An sensed that the girl had gone mad and killed her as the convoy continued into the city; Lin Ruolan asked whether he would do the same for her if she no longer wanted to live.
• Lemming described the Outer City’s slave trade and explained how owners used unclothed or lightly clothed people as working and ornamental slaves.
• Gao Tian reacted with anger as he watched two slaves kept like dogs, while Lemming treated the practice as ordinary.

Lin An questioned Lemming about how to find Bolaka, the hidden leader of Bolaka Safe Zone. Lemming proposed impersonating Troy Envoys arriving for an auction and offered to find out where they were.

• Lin An and his group checked into the best hotel in Bolaka City's Outer City after paying three catties of flour.
• Lemming told Lin An that Bolaka lived in a guarded Imperial Palace and concealed his whereabouts behind heavy armor and Suicide Soldiers.
• Lin An offered Lemming the rest of his cigarette pack if he found a way to reach Bolaka.
• Lemming revealed that newly selected Troy Envoys would attend an auction and discuss trade cooperation with Bolaka, and suggested killing them and taking their identities.
• Lemming swore allegiance to Lin An and offered to find the Troy Envoys' location through his contacts at the auction.

Lin An learned that Bolaka faced scheduled Zombie Tide attacks and suspected a hidden force was directing the zombies. After Gao Tian noticed the absence of zombie corpses, Lin An ordered his team to investigate whether they were being used to raise maggots.

• Lemming told Lin An that the Zombie Tide attacked Bolaka three times a year from the west, with the next attack due in about a month.
• Lin An secretly attached a thread of Mental Strength to Lemming before sending him to obtain information about the Troy Envoy.
• Lin An considered why Awakeners, including a Third Order Peak, had died in the Amoeba Worm instance despite the apparent lack of high-end Combat Power.
• Gao Tian pointed out that they had seen no zombie corpses in the city or the wasteland where Bolaka resisted the Zombie Tide.
• Lin An ordered Gao Tian to tie someone up and Zhang Tie to fetch Lin Ruolan so they could investigate what happened to the zombie corpses.

Lin An questioned a white-robed man about what happened to zombie corpses, then killed him after learning they dissolved into corpse water. He suspected their world was like a petri dish and planned to seize control of the region before attacking the city, but Lemming returned with invitations before Lin An could finish explaining.

• Lin An asked the white-robed man how zombie corpses were disposed of, and the man said they dissolved into corpse water that evaporated or seeped underground.
• Lin Ruolan confirmed that zombie corpses decomposed too quickly to raise maggots.
• Lin An ordered Zhang Tie to crush the white-robed man, and Zhang Tie killed him and flushed his remains down the toilet.
• Lin An considered whether their world was a petri dish and planned to kill the Troy Envoy, take control of Bolaka and the region's military forces, then attack the city.
• Lemming returned to the hotel carrying several gold-embossed invitations.

Lemming reported that he had located the Troy Envoy Delegation and arranged invitations and transport so Lin An could enter the Inner City and attend the auction. Lin An headed there with Mo Ling while Bear Dunce went ahead, leaving Lemming to take Zhang Tie under a slave identity.

• Lemming told Lin An that the Troy Envoy Delegation was staying in an Inner City villa with only two hired thugs accompanying them.
• Lemming handed Lin An four auction invitations and explained that he had sold the Wild Wolf Gang’s supplies, moved its remaining members to his residence, and arranged for a friend to watch them.
• Lemming advised Lin An to attend the auction before meeting Bolaka the next day, and Lin An agreed to go despite the tight schedule.
• Lemming arranged two sedans and warned that Zhang Tie would need to pose as a slave because his size did not match the envoy delegation’s roster.
• Lin An sent Bear Dunce to the auction ahead while he and Mo Ling rode with Lemming toward the Inner City.

Lin An infiltrated a Troy delegation to learn why it had come to Bolaka, then brought Gao Tian to the city’s brutal auction house. Gao Tian confronted the extent of Bolaka’s cruelty as they entered the VIP box and waited for the auction to begin.

• Gao Tian asked Lin An whether the world would become as cruel as the Inner City, and Lin An privately feared the real world would be worse.
• Lin An incapacitated the Troy delegation in a villa, interrogated its envoy Henry, and learned the delegation wanted Bolaka’s support against the Zombie Tide in exchange for slaves.
• Lin An killed the delegation after discovering a recently dead woman upstairs and human flesh served as food on the table.
• Lin An and Gao Tian entered the auction house, where living children had been mutilated and restrained to serve as furniture.
• Gao Tian reacted with anger to the auction house’s abuses, and Lin An explained how its cruelty and sensory stimulation encouraged guests to abandon reason.
• Gao Tian dismissed the attendants in their VIP box and silently watched the auction stage.

The Bolaka Auction opened with Penguin Huba’s grotesque Zombie spectacle, which frightened newcomers and excited the regular guests. As the crowd’s appetite for the auction grew, Zhang Tie told Lin An over Team Voice Chat that he was near the end of the lots and demanded that Lin An buy him.

• Penguin Huba introduced chained Court Lady Zombies as auction attendants, then let them lunge at the guests before reassuring the frightened newcomers.
• Huba promised free menu spending to the guests who had been scared and threatened punishment for attendants who displeased customers.
• Chefs sliced flesh from the Zombies and staged a biting contest, driving the audience into a frenzy.
• Lin An watched the spectacle from a private room while Lemming studied the menu and Zhang Tie complained that the auctioneers valued him cheaply.
• Penguin Huba announced that the auction had begun and introduced the first, cheapest batch.

At the Bolaka Auction, Saintess Anna, the former Troy Safe Zone princess, was put up for sale, and Lin An learned she might know secrets about the High Tower, rumored to be the source of the disaster. Lin An decided to bid for her as the auction began, while the crowd competed for her with bids of grass cake.

• Penguin Huba introduced Saintess Anna as the first auction item and revealed her past as Troy’s princess and First Temple Saintess.
• Huba drew attention to Lin An’s booth, and the guests speculated about Troy’s envoy and Anna’s possible knowledge of the High Tower.
• Lemming told Lin An that Troy’s mission was to bring Anna back and explained the rumor that the High Tower was the disaster’s source.
• Lin An resolved to win Anna, both to conceal his identity and to learn about the High Tower.
• Penguin Huba set Anna’s starting bid at one grass cake, and the guests erupted into competing bids.

Lin An entered the bidding for Anna at the auction, driving the price far beyond the other bidders' offers. When Du Landi challenged Troy and bid fifty tons, Lin An threatened to invade and slaughter the Landy Safe Zone if he bid again.

• A wealthy merchant bid sixteen tons of cornmeal for Anna, but Lin An had Lemming raise the offer to thirty tons.
• A middle-aged man bid thirty-one tons and offered Lin An a dance troupe, but Lin An recognized the ploy and raised the bid to forty tons.
• Du Landi, the eldest son of the Landy Safe Zone's grand duke, mocked Troy and bid fifty tons for Anna.
• Lin An revealed himself at the glass and bid fifty-one tons, warning Du Landi that another bid would bring Troy's troops against the Landy Safe Zone.

Lin An attended Bolaka’s auction, where Gao Tian and the others witnessed the brutal sale and abuse of people as commodities. Lin An bought Zhang Tie back and returned to the hotel, where a Court Lady begged him to take her with him.

• Lin An’s threat silenced Du Landi, and Lin An won the opening auction item with his final bid.
• Huba auctioned off people in increasingly grotesque lots, and Gao Tian grew furious and eventually stopped watching.
• Lin An spent a ration of food to buy Zhang Tie back from the auction.
• Lin An left for the hotel prepared by the organizers, still interested in the High Tower.
• A Court Lady serving Lin An dropped to her knees and begged him to take her with him.

Lin An left the Bolaka Auction with Anna after witnessing the cruelty imposed on its court ladies and refusing to take one with him. On the way to the hotel, Gao Tian said the Amoeba Instance Dungeon’s world felt rotten to the core.

• A court lady wept after Lin An and his companions left, then prepared to return to the degrading work needed to feed her family.
• Lin An waited outside the auction house while Slave Owners and Commander Mark tried to befriend him and invited him to the Slave Arena, but he declined.
• The auction house manager gave Lin An two hotel room cards and confirmed that the court lady’s cigarette-burn scar could secure her a safer administrative job for a year.
• Gao Tian rode with Lin An and, overwhelmed by the world’s cruelty, said it was rotten to the core.

Lin An questioned Anna in the Bolaka Royal Hotel about the High Tower and the origin of the Zombies. Anna revealed that her father suspected the High Tower was their origin, but the chapter ended before she could explain what the crashed plane had reported.

• Lin An and his companions arrived at the Bolaka Royal Hotel and were unsettled by its extravagant service and rigid class divisions.
• Lin An found Anna sedated in his suite, woke her with Mental Strength, and demanded information about the High Tower and the Zombies.
• Anna said the High Tower was a black tower in the center of the world, at the core of the former Bodoer Capital.
• Anna told Lin An that her father believed the High Tower might be the Origin Land of the Zombies.
• Anna began describing an air force unit’s investigation and the message sent before its plane crashed, but the drug’s effects left her unable to finish.

Lin An grew increasingly irritated by Bolaka’s decadent society and the attempts to appease and humiliate him. After receiving a submissive-etiquette booklet and two girls sent by Mark, he ordered his team to attack Bolaka Safe Zone when they met the next day.

• Lin An failed to wake Anna and had Mo Ling tie her up and gag her.
• A court lady delivered Mark’s card, two girls he had bought at auction, and a booklet demanding that Lin An kneel and kowtow to Bolaka.
• Lin An threw the two girls into the room after they begged to be let in, then knocked them unconscious and ordered Mo Ling to tie them up.
• Lin An contacted Zhang Tie and ordered him to tell Gao Tian to begin attacking as soon as they met, with the goal of taking Bolaka Safe Zone within an hour.

Lin An met with Army Commander Mark, who revealed that Troy’s Third Expeditionary Force had been destroyed by the Lion Safe Zone and that the Lion had declared war on Troy. Mark argued that Troy was now too weak to matter to Bolaka, but Lin An remained unconcerned.

• Lin An accepted Mark’s invitation to breakfast while leaving Mo Ling asleep.
• Mark asked about Lin An’s purpose in Bolaka and offered help with supplies and weapons.
• Lin An told Mark to stop rambling and speak directly.
• Mark revealed that the Lion Safe Zone had annihilated Troy’s Third Expeditionary Force and declared war on Troy.
• Mark warned that Bolaka might abandon Troy and that Lin An could lose his status, but Lin An showed no concern.

Lin An asked Mark whether Bolaka had nuclear bombs, while Mark mistook the question for a calculated hint that Troy possessed a secret weapon. Lin An left after learning no such weapons existed, and Mark realized he had been played.

• Lin An wondered whether nuclear bombs could threaten him and asked Mark if Bolaka had weapons capable of destroying an entire Safe Zone.
• Mark speculated that Lin An was hinting at a secret weapon Troy possessed and offered to cooperate.
• Lin An concluded that the lack of nuclear bombs meant fewer ways to clear Zombies but less danger from other factions.
• Lin An left the restaurant after dismissing Troy's troubles as irrelevant to him.
• Mark realized Lin An had been playing him and slammed his palm against the table.

Lin An and the Troy Delegation waited for an audience with Bolaka while palace officials delayed and mistreated visiting factions. At the security checkpoint, Eden Silk endured a degrading inspection, and Zhang Tie watched with growing fury as the Troy Delegation was called next.

• Lemming bribed an Internal Affairs Officer after Bolaka’s meeting was delayed, and Lin An assessed the Imperial Palace’s extensive defenses.
• An inspector refused to let Eden Silk’s delegation pass without a humiliating search, despite her objections and their urgent need to negotiate for supplies.
• Eden Silk submitted to the inspection after thinking of the women and children depending on her, while the girl with her followed in distress.
• Zhang Tie watched the inspectors mistreat Eden Silk and clenched his fists, yearning to slaughter them.
• The checkpoint guards called for the Troy Delegation to come forward.

Lin An’s delegation faced humiliation and threats while entering Bolaka’s hall, but Lin An discovered that the man on the throne was a decoy. After locating the real Bolaka underground, Lin An shattered the bulletproof glass and ordered his team to begin the slaughter.

• The inspector tried to force Lin An to remove his robe and mask, while the Lion Safe Zone Envoy encouraged him to drive Troy’s delegation away.
• Lin An and his companions entered the hall after Bolaka summoned them, and Lin An sensed that Bolaka’s defenses underground were unusually heavy.
• The Lion Envoy and Du Landi accused the delegation of disrespecting Bolaka and urged him to expel them.
• Lin An located the real Bolaka on the second underground level and refused to kneel.
• Lin An blasted through the bulletproof glass with his Mental Strength and ordered his team to begin the slaughter.

Lin An and his team stormed the palace, killing Bolaka’s guards and overpowering the envoys as Lin An pursued the real Bolaka underground. Zhang Tie and Gao Tian faced the arriving soldiers while Mark pretended to be dead.

• Lin An used Celestial Human Form and Telekinesis to turn the guards’ guns on them, killing hundreds before they could fire at him.
• Lin An ordered his team to kill the resisters and chased the real Bolaka underground through the palace floor.
• Lin An crushed the armored Bolaka beside the throne into an iron ball, while the false Bolaka screamed.
• Zhang Tie transformed into a Black Bear, broke the Lion Envoy’s legs, and silenced him as Du Landi fled toward the reinforcements.
• Mark pretended to be dead as Zhang Tie challenged Gao Tian to compete against the arriving soldiers, who opened fire on them.