Chapter Summaries

Chen Ming rejected Yu Xiaogang’s attempt to use him to support Tang San, then steadily cultivated until he reached level seventeen and was recommended to Heaven Dou Royal Academy. The chapter left him completing the academy’s admission assessment under Qin Ming’s supervision.

• Yu Xiaogang offered Chen Ming guidance in exchange for helping Tang San, but Chen Ming refused and used the Dean’s favor to end the conversation.
• Chen Ming and Tang San avoided each other, while Old Jack brought Chen Ming vegetables and mushrooms; Chen Ming arranged regular deliveries of meat, eggs, and milk.
• Chen Ming cultivated to level twelve by the end of his first year and level fifteen in the second year, then disrupted Xiao Wu and Tang San’s chance to become sworn siblings during a visit to Holy Soul Village.
• When Chen Ming reached level seventeen, the Dean escorted him to Heaven Dou City and submitted a recommendation to Heaven Dou Royal Academy.
• Qin Ming tested Chen Ming’s Soul Power, Martial Soul, and first Spirit Skill, verified his information, and completed his admission assessment and registration.

Chen Ming was admitted to Heaven Dou Royal Academy, and the Education Committee also approved Nuoding City Junior Soul Master Academy’s promotion to an intermediate academy. Qin Ming brought Chen Ming to his new school and showed him an exclusive underground training ground, where Chen Ming planned to live and cultivate.

• The Education Committee Members praised Chen Ming’s background, Earth Dragon Martial Soul, first hundred-year Spirit Ring, and rapid cultivation, then approved his admission.
• Bai Baoshan issued Nuoding City Junior Soul Master Academy a promotion certificate, and Qin Ming returned with the documents for Chen Ming and Dean Lu.
• Dean Lu tearfully bade Chen Ming farewell and hurried back to Nuoding City to tell his teacher about the academy’s promotion.
• Qin Ming led Chen Ming into Heaven Dou Royal Academy and explained its vast mountain campus and training facilities.
• Qin Ming showed Chen Ming an unused mine shaft designated as his exclusive Mimicry Training Ground, and Chen Ming said he preferred to live there for convenient cultivation.

Chen Ming explored Heaven Dou Royal Academy and was astonished by its exceptional facilities and resources. After choosing to cultivate in a rich mineral-vein training ground and receiving a valuable Storage Soul Tool, he saw how the academy could support his growth and research.

• Chen Ming chose to stay in the Mimicry Training Ground because its mineral-vein environment could significantly boost his cultivation.
• Qin Ming gave Chen Ming a fifteen-cubic-meter Storage Soul Tool containing his academy uniform, badge, identification, and other belongings.
• Chen Ming changed into the Heaven Dou Royal Academy uniform, and Qin Ming praised his appearance.
• Qin Ming showed Chen Ming the academy’s facilities over two days, including its library, cultivation grounds, testing areas, and beast arena.
• Chen Ming learned that students could fight captive Spirit Beasts for free and use the academy’s resources to study them.
• Chen Ming realized Heaven Dou Royal Academy’s facilities would greatly aid his cultivation and his AI Analysis research.

Chen Ming spent his free time rapidly reading Heaven Dou Royal Academy’s library books, revealing to its elderly Spirit Saint overseer that he had photographic memory. The overseer offered Chen Ming a chance to earn access to the library’s sixth floor by passing an assessment after reading the first three floors.

• Chen Ming spent nearly every day in the library, quickly browsing books on its first three floors.
• The old Spirit Saint tested Chen Ming by asking about books he had read, and Chen Ming recited their contents and details from memory.
• Chen Ming admitted that he never forgot anything he read at a glance and explained that he planned to memorize the books on the first three floors.
• The old Spirit Saint offered Chen Ming one chance to pass an assessment and earn access to the sixth floor.

Chen Ming demonstrated his Bed Crossbow and Hand Crossbow to Heaven Dou Royal Academy’s Education Committee Members, who recognized their military value and presented them to Emperor Xue Ye. Impressed after testing the weapons himself, Xue Ye summoned Chen Ming to the palace that night.

• Chen Ming searched for familiar names at Heaven Dou Royal Academy and found that Dugu Yan had not enrolled, while her future teammates were already students there.
• Chen Ming recreated a Spinning Jenny and Water Frame, then made a Han Dynasty Bed Crossbow and a simple Hand Crossbow.
• Chen Ming demonstrated the crossbows to Bai Baoshan, Meng Shenji, and Zhi Lin, and the Bed Crossbow pierced Bai Baoshan’s Soul Ancestor-level defenses.
• The three Education Committee Members took the crossbows to Emperor Xue Ye, who tested them and praised Chen Ming’s inventions.
• Xue Ye summoned Chen Ming to the palace overnight.

Chen Ming explained how he invented the Bed Crossbow and Hand Crossbow to Emperor Xue Ye and the Heaven Dou Empire’s officials. Impressed by their military potential, Xue Ye made Chen Ming the hereditary Holy Soul Viscount and granted him land, gold, and precious medicines.

• Chen Ming described how he adapted bows and millstone mechanisms to create the Bed Crossbow and Hand Crossbow.
• Xue Qinghe praised Chen Ming’s unconventional way of making bows easier to use while increasing their power.
• Ge Long said the crossbows could be learned quickly and could threaten even Soul Ancestor-level Spirit Masters when enlarged and fired by several soldiers.
• Xue Ye promoted Chen Ming to hereditary Holy Soul Viscount, granted him territory centered on Holy Soul Village, and promised one hundred thousand gold coins and precious medicines.

After becoming a viscount, Chen Ming claimed Holy Soul Village and the fertile land around it, then used his wealth and connections to support the village and Nuoding Academy. Back at Heaven Dou Royal Academy, his exceptional performance made him a campus legend, and a green-haired girl blocked his way one evening.

• Chen Ming returned to Fasinuo Province and received Holy Soul Village, sixteen surrounding villages, and more than fifty thousand mu of farmland as his territory.
• Chen Ming gave Old Jack ten thousand gold to develop the village, and the villagers replaced their old sign with one reading Holy Soul Territory.
• Chen Ming donated money to Nuoding Academy and gave Dean Lu a personal gift to ask him to protect Holy Soul Village.
• Chen Ming returned to Heaven Dou Royal Academy, where he learned that Dugu Yan had enrolled and that rumors about his title and wealth had spread.
• Chen Ming excelled in his classes and earned the nickname “Monster” as his reputation grew.
• A green-haired girl stepped onto Chen Ming’s path as he headed back to train after dinner.

Dugu Bo, desperate to cure the poison afflicting him, mistook Chen Ming for a possible lead and tested him, then became alarmed when Chen Ming identified signs of poisoning. He carried Chen Ming to a forest outside Heaven Dou Royal Academy and pressed him to explain how he knew, leaving Chen Ming listing Dugu Bo’s symptoms.

• Dugu Bo encountered Chen Ming at Heaven Dou Royal Academy, examined him with Soul Power, and realized he was an ordinary human rather than a transformed Hundred-Thousand-Year Spirit Beast.
• Chen Ming deduced Dugu Bo’s identity from his appearance, clothing, and medicinal traces, then pointed out signs that Dugu Bo was poisoned.
• Dugu Bo reacted with shock to Chen Ming’s observations and carried him away to a forest outside the academy.
• Dugu Bo demanded to know how Chen Ming had recognized his poisoning, and Chen Ming described numerous symptoms for him to check.
• A shadow guard assigned by Xue Qinghe panicked that Dugu Bo might kill Chen Ming and hurried to report what had happened.

Chen Ming examined Dugu Bo and explained that his Martial Soul had poisoned him for decades, with the condition potentially inherited by his descendants. He ruled out abandoning his poison arts and revealed that he had three possible methods to address the poison, but the chapter ended before he explained them.

• Dugu Bo confirmed that poison had invaded his internal organs, and Chen Ming clarified that the condition was difficult but not impossible to treat.
• Chen Ming examined Dugu Bo and concluded that he was suffering backlash from his own Martial Soul rather than practicing poison arts.
• Chen Ming explained that the poison had spread throughout Dugu Bo’s body and might be inherited by descendants who awakened the same Martial Soul.
• Chen Ming warned that abolishing Dugu Bo’s poison arts or destroying his Soul Power would almost certainly kill him.
• Chen Ming told Dugu Bo that he had roughly three methods to address the poison, but had not yet explained them.

Chen Ming explained two symptom-treating methods for managing the toxins in Dugu Bo’s body: regulating himself to slow their effects and periodically transferring toxins into a suitable medium. Dugu Bo tried the meditation technique, and Chen Ming proposed finding a ten-thousand-year Jade Phosphor Snake to investigate the second method.

• Chen Ming told Dugu Bo that regulating his body could slow toxin buildup and reduce the severity of backlashes.
• Chen Ming taught Dugu Bo a meditation posture, and Dugu Bo felt his condition stabilize slightly after trying it.
• Chen Ming explained that meditation would help with daily regulation but would not prevent the pain of a true backlash.
• Chen Ming proposed transferring Dugu Bo’s toxins into a ten-thousand-year Jade Phosphor Snake and studying how to use the Spirit Beast as a purifier.

Chen Ming discussed possible ways to control Dugu Bo’s poison backlash, and Dugu Bo agreed to trust him with finding a treatment. Dugu Bo then took Chen Ming into Sunset Forest to test his abilities, leaving Chen Ming’s stay away from Heaven Dou City in someone else’s hands.

• Chen Ming explained that Dugu Bo might turn his poison into a weapon by cultivating an Inner Core, though he admitted he did not know how to carry out the method.
• Dugu Bo showed Chen Ming his Poison Core, and Chen Ming judged that it was too impure to prevent backlash on its own.
• Chen Ming estimated Dugu Bo had only a few years without intervention, but said he could likely suppress the worsening condition and backlash within a few years.
• Dugu Bo swore to protect and aid Chen Ming if he helped the Dugu Family, and Chen Ming agreed to study ways to restrain the poison.
• Dugu Bo took Chen Ming toward Sunset Forest, saying he would test Chen Ming’s capabilities there.

Dugu Bo brought Chen Ming to the Ice and Fire Yin-Yang Well and tested his medical knowledge, discovering that Chen Ming understood theory but lacked practical skills. Chen Ming rapidly memorized Dugu Bo’s poison manuals, leaving Dugu Bo astonished.

• Dugu Bo led Chen Ming through the poisonous barrier to the Ice and Fire Yin-Yang Well and offered him its treasures if he could cure his poison.
• Chen Ming suggested that Sunset Forest was named after a sun that had fallen there, and Dugu Bo reconsidered the origin of the strange terrain.
• Dugu Bo questioned Chen Ming about medicine and poisons, finding that he knew theories but not prescriptions, poison-making, or antidotes.
• Dugu Bo gave Chen Ming a poison manual to memorize, and Chen Ming finished it in about ten minutes and accurately recited its contents.
• Dugu Bo tested Chen Ming with more books, then spent an hour watching him memorize them as sweat poured down his body.

Chen Ming treated Dugu Bo’s toxin-ravaged body and taught him methods that brought rapid relief, earning Dugu Bo’s trust. After a month, Dugu Bo felt dramatically healthier and let Chen Ming explore the inner region of the Ice and Fire Yin-Yang Well for herbs.

• Chen Ming learned Dugu Bo’s medical and poison arts while recording his deteriorating condition and devising a five-stage treatment plan.
• Chen Ming taught Dugu Bo a modified cultivation method that slowed his metabolism and safely carried him through an impending toxic backlash.
• Chen Ming treated Dugu Bo with exercise, breathing techniques, gua sha, bloodletting, dietary changes, and reduced toxin production while studying Jade Phosphor Snakes.
• After a month, Dugu Bo’s pain and toxic symptoms eased, and he believed the treatment could protect him and his descendants from severe poison backlash.
• Dugu Bo escorted Chen Ming into the Ice and Fire Yin-Yang Well’s inner region and gave him his Ruyi Hundred Treasure Pouch to gather herbs.

Chen Ming searched the Ice and Fire Yin-Yang Well for the Earth Dragon Golden Melon, hoping it would strengthen his Heavy Armored Earth Dragon Martial Soul and help it evolve into a true dragon. He and Dugu Bo discussed why the herbs were so young, and Chen Ming finally found the golden melon.

• Chen Ming explained that the Earth Dragon Golden Melon could strengthen his body and Martial Soul, improve his potential, and help him attempt a thousand-year second Spirit Ring.
• Chen Ming noticed that the herbs in the Ice and Fire Yin-Yang Well were only around ten thousand to twenty thousand years old, and Dugu Bo said he had also wondered why no plant-type Spirit Beasts lived there.
• Chen Ming reasoned that someone may have cleared the original herbs and planted seeds here thousands of years earlier, while Dugu Bo considered that someone else might have discovered the place before him.
• Chen Ming spotted several Immortal Herbs, including the Ink Jade Divine Bamboo and the Singular Velvet Sky Chrysanthemum, but did not find the other herbs he expected.
• Chen Ming's Martial Soul trembled near a particular spot, and he followed the feeling to find a golden melon lying on the ground.

Chen Ming realized the Earth Dragon Golden Melon was too dense and hard to eat, so he reasoned that it could be fused into the body like a Dragon Core. He began refining it into an External Elixir, planning to use its remaining energy to strengthen a Spirit Beast and later obtain its Spirit Ring.

• Chen Ming struggled to lift the fist-sized Earth Dragon Golden Melon and discovered that it weighed nearly a hundred jin and rang like metal when struck.
• Dugu Bo suggested Chen Ming choose more edible herbs, but found that even he could barely break open the melon.
• Chen Ming concluded that the melon was meant to fuse into a body like a Dragon Core rather than be digested, and Dugu Bo agreed with his reasoning.
• Chen Ming asked Dugu Bo to cut the melon’s vine, then pressed the cut stem to his Dantian and guided its energy into his body.
• Chen Ming decided to refine the melon into an External Elixir, drain most of its energy, and feed the remainder to a Spirit Beast before obtaining its Spirit Ring.

Chen Ming modified his body's basic processes with carefully prepared medicines, diet, and training, dramatically improving his physical condition. After sharing his methods with Dugu Bo, Chen Ming began refining the Earth Dragon Golden Melon.

• Chen Ming used herbs, pills, dietary changes, and exercises to stimulate his growth and digestion while carefully managing his body's responses.
• Chen Ming fasted, purged impurities, and gradually resumed eating and training with medicinal treatments to recover from fatigue.
• Dugu Bo watched Chen Ming lose weight and then grow nearly ten centimeters as his hair, nails, skin, and vitality changed.
• Chen Ming explained his methods and prescriptions to Dugu Bo, who understood that they worked but struggled to grasp their principles.
• After bringing his body to peak condition, Chen Ming began refining the Earth Dragon Golden Melon rather than simply absorbing it.

Chen Ming refined the Earth Dragon Golden Melon for a month, strengthening and transforming his Martial Soul until he could shape his scales into a Dragon-Patterned Shield. He showed Dugu Bo the new ability and asked to acquire a Spirit Ring, but Dugu Bo instead wondered if his own Martial Soul could develop the same talent.

• Chen Ming infused the Earth Dragon Golden Melon with his origin and life force, gradually forming a connection with it and purifying his Martial Soul.
• After his scales became stronger and lighter, Chen Ming gathered them into a Dragon-Patterned Shield and realized he was ready to obtain a Spirit Ring.
• Chen Ming carried the shield to Dugu Bo, who had been researching Chen Ming's theories while Chen Ming studied and treated him.
• Chen Ming demonstrated that he could turn his scales into a shield and then return them to his body.
• Dugu Bo summoned his Martial Soul and asked Chen Ming to check whether it had the talent for Beast Soul Tool-ification.

Chen Ming asked Dugu Bo to help him hunt a Spirit Ring and explained that his Beast Soul Tool-ification could let him bear an older ring. He sought a Dragon Transformation skill, and the chapter ended with Dugu Bo taking him into Sunset Forest to find a suitable Sub-Dragon Spirit Beast.

• Chen Ming explained how a Weapon-type Spirit Skill could help create a simplified form of Beast Soul Tool-ification.
• Chen Ming asked Dugu Bo to help him hunt a Spirit Ring and said he wanted a Dragon Transformation skill.
• Dugu Bo considered searching Star Dou Forest for a pure-blooded Sub-Dragon, but Chen Ming warned him against the danger.
• Chen Ming said his second Spirit Ring could reach about thirteen hundred years and proposed examining and modifying Sunset Forest’s Sub-Dragons.
• Dugu Bo took Chen Ming from the Ice and Fire Yin-Yang Well toward the area of Sunset Forest where earth-element Sub-Dragons lived.

Chen Ming and Dugu Bo searched Sunset Forest’s fissures for a suitable earth-attributed Sub-Dragon Spirit Beast. They found a Heavy Armored Earth Dragon sleeping in a mineral cavern, and Chen Ming estimated it had just over a thousand years of cultivation.

• Dugu Bo poisoned a Rat-Headed Earth Dragon after it attacked them from underground, then said it could serve as Chen Ming’s Spirit Ring later.
• Chen Ming used sulfur scents, underground water, ores, and other clues to guide their search through the fissures.
• Chen Ming and Dugu Bo discovered several earth-attributed Sub-Dragon Spirit Beasts, but none they found was suitable for Chen Ming.
• Chen Ming found a concealed tunnel leading to a cavern with hot spring water, plants, and a mound of high-quality ore.
• Chen Ming inspected a sleeping Heavy Armored Earth Dragon, judged its cultivation to be just over a thousand years, and asked Dugu Bo to turn it over for a closer look.

Chen Ming selected a Golden Belly Heavy Armored Earth Dragon for his second Spirit Ring and killed it before absorbing the ring with the Earth Dragon Golden Melon. The process awakened a gigantic Dragon Head Hammer, whose eyes and golden sphere seemed to carry a dragon’s presence.

• Dugu Bo paralyzed the Heavy Armored Earth Dragon, and Chen Ming questioned him about whose aura determined who could absorb a Spirit Ring from a poisoned Spirit Beast.
• Chen Ming examined the Heavy Armored Earth Dragon, estimated its age at around eleven hundred years, and chose it for his second Spirit Ring because it had a Golden Belly.
• Chen Ming killed the beast with an iron stake and hammer, then began absorbing its purple Spirit Ring while drawing energy from the Earth Dragon Golden Melon.
• After one shichen, Chen Ming completed the absorption and manifested a dragon-headed hammer with the Earth Dragon Golden Melon in its jaws.
• Chen Ming’s hammer expanded into an enormous warhammer as its eyes flashed and the golden sphere shone.