Chapter Summaries

Chen Changsheng taught Ma Yuxuan that governing required trusted allies and urged him to seek people who shared his ideals by lighting lamps in the darkness. Ma Yuxuan chose to explore the world and begin that work in Golden Sand Harbor, where Gu Yi helped him learn about the region.

• Chen Changsheng explained to Ma Yuxuan how confidants served great figures and why people who shared their ideals were different from treacherous officials.
• Ma Yuxuan said he wanted to see the world and light its first lamp, so Chen Changsheng agreed to accompany him with Hong Ling and Gu Yi.
• At Golden Sand Harbor, Ma Yuxuan asked Gu Yi to explain local life and take him into the sky so he could make a geological map.
• Chen Changsheng sent Hong Ling away and told Xiao Hei that Gu Yi was seeking Ma Yuxuan's favor as the Gu Family's future ally.
• Chen Changsheng said Gu Yi could be useful for now, while Ma Yuxuan would have to prove he could handle such people himself.

Chen Changsheng explained to Xiao Hei why Ma Yuxuan’s buried killing intent made him a dangerous person and why he planned to guide him. After Ma Yuxuan accidentally knocked fruit from a poor woman’s basket and apologized, Chen Changsheng left him unaware of the deeper consequences, intending to see how he would respond to the world’s cruelty.

• Chen Changsheng told Xiao Hei he would stay in the Divine Land Epoch to guide Ma Yuxuan, explaining that Ma Yuxuan’s heavy killing intent came from witnessing a beautiful world and seeing it ruined by human-made calamities.
• Chen Changsheng said repeated failures had made figures such as Xiao Yunshu and Ma Xu'an despair of the outside world, and argued that Ma Yuxuan might become a murderous Demon Lord without guidance.
• Chen Changsheng resolved to help Ma Yuxuan adapt to the world’s cruelty without losing his emerging values, then planned to leave once Ma Yuxuan could form his own outlook.
• Ma Yuxuan accidentally bumped into a raggedly dressed woman, apologized, and helped her gather the fruit scattered across the ground.
• Chen Changsheng chose not to explain the incident’s deeper significance to Ma Yuxuan, then called him away; Ma Yuxuan handed the woman the last piece of fruit and followed his teacher.

Ma Yuxuan learned that the nobles of Golden Sand Harbor treated slaves as property and had ordered the woman he accidentally touched to be tortured. After Chen Changsheng showed him the execution chamber, Ma Yuxuan turned cold and asked Lord Bai if he could kill everyone there in twenty breaths.

• Ma Yuxuan said he would address slavery after taking over the Sophora Blossom Great World, but Chen Changsheng and Gu Yi warned him that nobles saw slaves as less than people.
• Gu Yi explained that the nobles would interpret Ma Yuxuan helping the woman as an insult and would likely send him a wine cup made from her skull.
• Chen Changsheng revealed that Golden Sand Harbor's nobles knew Ma Yuxuan's identity and had likely already arranged the woman's death, so Ma Yuxuan asked his teacher to help.
• Chen Changsheng transported Ma Yuxuan, Gu Yi, Hong Ling, and Xiao Hei to an execution chamber, where they found the woman tied up and wounded.
• Chen Changsheng explained that the cruelty was accepted by the nobles, the servants, and even the woman herself, leaving Ma Yuxuan horrified.
• Ma Yuxuan looked at the woman's numb eyes and asked Lord Bai whether he could kill everyone in the execution chamber in twenty breaths.

Ma Yuxuan punished the nobles of the Sophora Blossom Great World, freed a tortured girl, and named her Bai Su. As he struggled to govern his new territory, Chen Changsheng warned him to study and build his strength before trying to reform everything.

• Xiao Hei promised to kill the nobles of the Sophora Blossom Great World within three days, but Ma Yuxuan decided that mass killing would not create the world he wanted.
• Ma Yuxuan freed the woman from the execution chamber and stripped the baron's family of their noble status and property.
• Ma Yuxuan learned that the woman had no name and named her Bai Su, then promised to show her a different world.
• Ma Yuxuan struggled to govern the vast territory with too few capable workers and asked Chen Changsheng to lend him manpower.
• Chen Changsheng rebuked Ma Yuxuan for neglecting his studies and warned that hostile nobles could attack him before he had the strength to protect those depending on him.

Ma Yuxuan proposed opening a school and industrializing the Sophora Blossom Great World, but Chen Changsheng told him to build his strength first and delay industrialization. Chen Changsheng began teaching Ma Yuxuan and the other young people, leaving Ma Yuxuan with the daunting task of learning every inheritance Chen Changsheng had collected.

• Chen Changsheng advised Ma Yuxuan to wait, grow stronger, and focus on developing agriculture before attempting industrialization.
• Ma Yuxuan proposed turning the Marquis's Residence into a school for all children, and Chen Changsheng agreed to teach there for a proper salary.
• Chen Changsheng warned Ma Yuxuan that industrialization would threaten the Divine Land Epoch's factions and that the world lacked the conditions to support it.
• Chen Changsheng gathered Bai Su, Hong Ling, Gu Yi, and Ma Yuxuan, ordered them not to claim him as their teacher except for Ma Yuxuan, and began passing on cultivation methods.
• Chen Changsheng taught Hong Ling the Original True Understanding and a fist technique, offered Bai Su the Heavenly Lotus Sacred Method, and gave Gu Yi the Eighteen Transformations of Wuji.
• Chen Changsheng gave Ma Yuxuan dozens of Jade Slips containing great emperors' inheritances and supreme arts, ordering him to learn them all and surpass him.

Chen Changsheng trained Ma Yuxuan and the others under a strict hundred-year deadline, then contacted Yun Yu to discuss how to kill the four powerful figures. Yun Yu explained that Chen Changsheng would need to surpass him, but warned that Yun Yu might die before Chen could catch up.

• Chen Changsheng gave Ma Yuxuan and the others one hundred years to cultivate and ordered Xiao Hei to punish anyone who slacked off.
• Chen Changsheng contacted Yun Yu using a special Magical Artifact and asked whether God-Slaying Weapon technology could kill him.
• Yun Yu advised Chen Changsheng to target Xiao Yunshu first, then the Beast Ancestor, with Ma Xu'an as a possible helper.
• Yun Yu said he had no reliable way to kill himself and that Chen Changsheng would need to surpass him to ensure he could not return.
• Yun Yu revealed that he had lived nearly nine million years and warned that he could die unexpectedly before Chen Changsheng caught up.

Chen Changsheng and Yun Yu discussed Ma Yuxuan’s cultivation and whether immortality existed, with Yun Yu arguing that eternal life would make existence meaningless. Chen Changsheng claimed his Immortality System made him immortal, but Yun Yu demanded proof and left the claim unresolved.

• Chen Changsheng asked Yun Yu whether Ma Yuxuan should follow the Immortal Domain’s methods or those of the outside world, and Yun Yu favored the outside world’s cultivation methods.
• Chen Changsheng asked whether Yun Yu believed in immortality, and Yun Yu said he sought it to prove that it did not exist.
• Yun Yu explained that immortality would make beautiful things and entire eras fade into meaninglessness, leaving Chen Changsheng silent.
• Chen Changsheng claimed he was immortal because of his Immortality System, but Yun Yu challenged him to produce proof.
• Chen Changsheng said he had lived for hundreds of thousands of years, and Yun Yu countered that he had lived for nine million and challenged Chen Changsheng to return after fifty million years.

Chen Changsheng reflected on immortality and his eventual death, then tested Ma Yuxuan’s resolve after he had killed the remaining nobles to advance a new system. He set Ma Yuxuan and his companions a trial to make the Divine Land Epoch accept their existence, leaving Ma Yuxuan questioning whether four people could overcome it.

• Chen Changsheng discussed immortality with Yun Yu and later asked the system whether it could provide proof that others could see.
• Chen Changsheng accepted that immortality might leave him alone and said he would take the Deathward Path after completing his remaining work, while vowing to one day kill Yun Yu.
• A hundred years later, Chen Changsheng praised Ma Yuxuan’s population census results but warned that eliminating nobles had angered the Divine Land Epoch.
• Ma Yuxuan admitted that he had killed the last group of nobles that morning because he believed the new system could not be implemented otherwise.
• Chen Changsheng made settling the Divine Land Epoch a trial for Ma Yuxuan and Hong Ling and the others, requiring them to win acceptance from its powerful nobles and force them to submit.

Chen Changsheng told Ma Yuxuan to prepare for a confrontation with the Divine Land Epoch's elites, then revealed to Xiao Hei that Yun Yu's technology could kill cultivators by altering spiritual energy and epoch barriers. He explained that Yun Yu had long been behind the Little Immortal Elder's plan to limit cultivators through “severing earth from heaven,” and left Xiao Hei reeling at the revelation.

• Chen Changsheng told Ma Yuxuan to attend the Divine Land Epoch's three emperors' court in three days and face the elites who would challenge him.
• Chen Changsheng admitted to Xiao Hei that Ma Yuxuan could not win, because he wanted the pressure to force Ma Yuxuan to gain new insights.
• Chen Changsheng revealed that Yun Yu had developed technology capable of changing spiritual energy and epoch barriers, potentially killing every cultivator.
• Chen Changsheng explained that Yun Yu planned to unleash the technology after his death, and that adapting to its changed environment could take a hundred thousand years and devastate the world.
• Chen Changsheng told Xiao Hei that Yun Yu had backed the Little Immortal Elder and used the Chang Sheng Epoch to test ways of limiting high-level cultivators.
• Chen Changsheng said Yun Yu's faction believed eliminating cultivators would bring peace, while Xiao Hei reacted in shock.

Chen Changsheng explained that Yun Yu and Little Immortal Elder planned to kill high-level cultivators to prevent epoch-spanning wars, and admitted that he shared some of their concerns. He argued that he could not restrain the powerful forever and hoped new leaders might improve the world, but Xiao Hei challenged him over the danger that they could become like the Forbidden Ground.

• Chen Changsheng told Xiao Hei that Severing Earth from Heaven was meant to limit high-level cultivators and keep each Great World isolated.
• Chen Changsheng explained that Yun Yu and Little Immortal Elder believed killing powerful cultivators could prevent devastating wars, even if they themselves died in the attempt.
• Xiao Hei asked why Yun Yu and Little Immortal Elder had not acted, and Chen Changsheng said they hesitated and hoped he would prove their plan wrong.
• Chen Changsheng said high-level cultivators caused much of the world's turmoil but argued that the current leaders, not high-level cultivation itself, were at fault.
• Chen Changsheng admitted he could not restrain the powerful forever because exhaustion could twist his heart, and Xiao Hei asked what he would do if new leaders became like the Forbidden Ground.

Chen Changsheng explained to Xiao Hei why he feared the pursuit of immortality and laid out plans for Ma Yuxuan to adapt to coming changes in the cultivation system. He then traveled to the Purple Star Enclosure to meet the three rulers of the Divine Land Epoch, including the Purple Star Emperor.

• Chen Changsheng warned Xiao Hei that the pursuit of immortality could force him to kill people he cared about, and Xiao Hei promised they would stay by his side.
• Chen Changsheng planned to send Ma Yuxuan to the Divine Land Epoch and later the Netherworld Epoch, while Xiao Hei would remain behind to protect the Great Worlds and help build an army.
• Chen Changsheng told Xiao Hei to watch Bai Su, Hong Ling, Gu Yi, and Qin Gui, and explained that Ma Yuxuan needed to consult the Divine Land Epoch's leaders before acting at the court assembly.
• Chen Changsheng entered the Purple Star Enclosure and greeted the Grand Star Emperor, the Purple Star Emperor, and the Celestial Market Emperor.
• The Purple Star Emperor welcomed Chen Changsheng as the Imperial Tutor and remarked that it was his turn to rule in the Divine Land Epoch.

Chen Changsheng met with the Divine Land Epoch’s rulers to ask them to spare his disciple Ma Yuxuan and to reveal what he had learned about the Immortal Domain. The rulers offered conditional leniency, but doubted his discovery, leaving Chen Changsheng to offer them a chance to join him or be left behind.

• Chen Changsheng dismissed the nobles Ma Yuxuan had killed as vermin and claimed he could not control his disobedient disciple.
• The Grand Star Emperor challenged Chen Changsheng for acting behind the Divine Land Epoch’s rulers’ backs, and Chen Changsheng denied that Ma Yuxuan’s reforms were his plan.
• Chen Changsheng asked the rulers to spare Ma Yuxuan and ordered cultivators below the Great Emperor Realm to leave the hall.
• The Purple Star Emperor agreed not to pursue Ma Yuxuan’s actions as long as they did not spread beyond the Sophora Blossom Great World.
• Chen Changsheng told the remaining rulers that he had uncovered the truth of the Immortal Domain and that the Four Madmen were its remnants guarding the way in.
• When the Celestial Market Emperor asked for proof, Chen Changsheng admitted he had none and warned the rulers they might lose their chance to enter the Immortal Domain.

Chen Changsheng secured the Divine Land Epoch’s agreement to prepare for an assault on the Immortal Domain, promising guidance in exchange for the Four Madmen’s lives. Three days later, Ma Yuxuan faced a series of challenges at court, and Chen Changsheng explained that the trial would escalate as Ma Yuxuan grew stronger.

• Chen Changsheng told the Divine Land Epoch’s rulers that he had found the Immortal Domain and proposed that they build their strength before confronting the Four Madmen.
• Chen Changsheng demanded the Four Madmen’s lives and promised guidance inside the Immortal Domain; the rulers agreed and asked him to help Ma Yuxuan face a trial.
• Three days later, Ma Yuxuan attended the court assembly and rebutted the nobles and scholars who impeached him.
• Ma Yuxuan accepted challenges from the nobles while Chen Changsheng told Xiao Hei that the agreement only ensured Ma Yuxuan would have a chance to survive.
• Chen Changsheng said Ma Yuxuan’s opponents would keep advancing in rank, from Immortal Venerables to Title Immortal Venerables, until Ma Yuxuan could no longer fight.

Ma Yuxuan endured three years of attacks against him and the Sophora Blossom Great World, earning recognition before Chen Changsheng agreed to take him to the Netherworld Epoch. Chen Changsheng prepared to travel there to check on Jiang Shan and activate a plan involving the Six Paths of Reincarnation.

• Chen Changsheng set a three-year test for Ma Yuxuan, requiring him to defeat an Immortal King Fifth Grade opponent or lose the chance to visit the Netherworld Epoch and control of the Sophora Blossom Great World.
• Ma Yuxuan faced assassinations and other attacks, eventually driving back a powerful enemy and securing a thousand years of peace for the Sophora Blossom Great World.
• Chen Changsheng reprimanded Ma Yuxuan for his arrogance, then invited him to accompany him to the Netherworld Epoch and told him to leave the world's affairs to Gu Yi and the others.
• At the Epoch Passage, Chen Changsheng told Xiao Hei he planned to check on Jiang Shan and activate a backup plan using the Six Paths of Reincarnation and a portion of the Underworld's origin.

Chen Changsheng explained that the Six Paths of Reincarnation could restore incomplete True Spirits but could not recreate completely vanished friends such as Qian Ya. As he and Ma Yuxuan traveled toward the Netherworld Epoch, Chen Changsheng warned him about its unusual laws and demonstrated them with a broken bowl that turned water into blood.

• Chen Changsheng told Xiao Hei that the Six Paths of Reincarnation could give some dead a chance to live again, but could not revive Qian Ya and others whose True Spirits had vanished completely.
• Chen Changsheng left the Divine Land Epoch with Ma Yuxuan, entrusting Xiao Hei with guarding the Household and asking him to report major events.
• During their journey, Chen Changsheng warned Ma Yuxuan that the Netherworld Epoch was harsher than the Divine Land Epoch and its laws constrained things unusually strongly.
• Chen Changsheng poured water into a chipped bowl, where it turned into blood, then urged Ma Yuxuan to drink it.
• Ma Yuxuan steadied himself and drank the red liquid from the bowl.

Chen Changsheng gave Ma Yuxuan a Netherworld Epoch specialty, causing a scarlet eyeball to emerge from his palm, and explained how the epoch’s cultivators used Negative Energy and followed the Deathward Path. He left Ma Yuxuan wondering about the origin of Chen Changsheng’s bowl, a naturally formed Netherworld magic treasure.

• Ma Yuxuan drank the special liquid, and a scarlet eyeball emerged from his palm and crawled up his arm.
• Following Chen Changsheng’s instructions, Ma Yuxuan bound and purified the eyeball with the World Cleansing Mantra, but it remained part of his hand.
• Chen Changsheng explained that Netherworld Epoch cultivators drew on Negative Energy and could have grotesquely mutated bodies.
• Chen Changsheng described how Netherworld cultivators could die and become Ghost Cultivators, avoiding further bodily mutations while continuing to grow powerful.
• Chen Changsheng explained that the Netherworld Epoch’s unusual laws could produce magic treasures naturally, then asked Ma Yuxuan if he wanted to know where his bowl came from.

Chen Changsheng explained the broken bowl’s gruesome origin and the dangers of Eerie Treasures to Ma Yuxuan before revealing he would enter the Netherworld Epoch to pursue his own cultivation and settle a misunderstanding with Zhu Ge. Zhu Ge, still obsessed with the White-Clad Woman, learned Chen Changsheng was alive and declared he would not run.

• Chen Changsheng told Ma Yuxuan that a beggar’s eyes had made the bowl an Eerie Treasure, and Ma Yuxuan vomited after hearing its history.
• Chen Changsheng explained how Netherworld Epoch negative energy created dangerous Eerie Treasures and said he and Ma Yuxuan would cultivate there.
• Ma Yuxuan revealed that Lord Bai had warned him about Zhu Ge, and Chen Changsheng explained that Zhu Ge had tried to marry his mistress while believing Chen Changsheng was dead.
• Chen Changsheng said he intended to make Zhu Ge into a “good person,” while Ma Yuxuan worried about what his teacher might do to him.
• In the Netherworld Epoch, Zhu Ge admired a portrait of the White-Clad Woman, learned Chen Changsheng was alive, and vowed to face him rather than flee.

Chen Changsheng and Ma Yuxuan entered the Netherworld Epoch and discussed how its negative-energy environment affected cultivators and its grotesque natural treasures. In Yellow Mud Village, Ma Yuxuan studied how extreme yang could give rise to yin and wondered how the drought-stricken villagers survived.

• Zhu Ge dismissed the blurred figure’s warning and continued looking at the painting.
• Chen Changsheng told Ma Yuxuan that he wanted to psychologically break Zhu Ge rather than kill him easily.
• Chen Changsheng and Ma Yuxuan arrived in the Netherworld Epoch, where Ma Yuxuan recoiled from the foul air.
• Chen Changsheng explained that the realm’s negative energy weakened most cultivators and that its flesh-and-blood-grown treasures resembled Eerie Treasures.
• In Yellow Mud Village, Ma Yuxuan recorded his observations of the drought and abundant yin energy as Chen Changsheng explained how extreme yang could produce yin.
• Ma Yuxuan asked what the village’s common people ate during the severe drought.

Chen Changsheng and Ma Yuxuan investigated a barren village in the Netherworld Epoch, where villagers dried rice meat despite the lack of plants. Ma Yuxuan discovered that the region’s Water Law had been extracted, and Chen Changsheng explained that restoring rain there required extraordinary power, leaving the Netherworld Epoch’s wider plight beyond saving.

• Ma Yuxuan questioned Chen Changsheng about how people survived in the barren region, and Chen Changsheng told him to investigate for himself.
• At a village, Ma Yuxuan found cured meat hanging at the entrance, then realized it was rice meat and nearly vomited.
• Ma Yuxuan tried to burn the rice meat, but Chen Changsheng warned that destroying it would only lead to more people starving and producing more.
• Ma Yuxuan used talismans and spells to summon rain, but his attempts failed, and he realized the region had no Water Law.
• Chen Changsheng explained that the Water Law had been extracted and that restoring it would require a profound expert to recreate it.
• Chen Changsheng said the remote region’s problem illustrated why cultivators in the Virtual World era considered the entire Netherworld Epoch beyond saving.

Chen Changsheng explained why the Netherworld Epoch depended on importing pills and how harsh conditions and its rulers’ priorities shaped trade and society. Ma Yuxuan learned that outsiders viewed reform as a threat, while Chen Changsheng revealed Yun Yu’s plan to kill every cultivator and warned that the younger generation needed to find a new path.

• Ma Yuxuan questioned how the Netherworld Epoch could yield high profits, and Chen Changsheng explained the value of its minerals and Eerie Treasures.
• Chen Changsheng told Ma Yuxuan that imported pills could cost twenty times their usual price, or even a hundred times more, because the Netherworld Epoch could barely produce pills itself.
• Chen Changsheng explained that hostile conditions, Negative Energy, and the risk of being captured made local pill production difficult, while the ruling powers preferred seizing goods to organizing alchemy.
• Ma Yuxuan asked whether the rulers cared about the Netherworld Epoch’s future, and Chen Changsheng said they could simply move elsewhere and did not care about the Common People.
• Chen Changsheng told Ma Yuxuan that the Divine Land Epoch’s people saw reforming the Sophora Blossom Great World as a threat because they could not understand it.
• Chen Changsheng revealed that Yun Yu and others were planning Severing Earth from Heaven, a plan to kill every cultivator, and said he agreed with only part of it.