Recaps

Li Qing learned from Wu De that the blood moon marked the start of a recurring extinction cycle, then discovered that cultivators entering Skywater City were being screened amid a nationwide manhunt. The search appeared to target him, and he faced a checkpoint at the city gate.

• Wu De told Li Qing that the blood moon heralded a great Extinction every 3,300 years, when Anomalies devastated civilization before the Dao Lineages helped rebuild it.
• Li Qing recorded his suspicions that the Dao Lineages might allow the Anomalies to destroy civilization for reasons tied to the cycle.
• Li Qing and Wu De approached Skywater City and found a long queue of people waiting to enter.
• Li Qing used a Shadow Paper Doll to observe a Daoist at the gate scanning entrants with a mirror that revealed their auras.
• Li Qing found a notice reporting that Li Wushuang had entered the Spirit Consciousness Realm and that the Dao Lineages had ordered a nationwide manhunt requiring Spirit Consciousness Realm cultivators to register when entering major cities.

Li Qing learned that the Shadow-Reflecting Mirror could expose his true cultivation, so he used Wu De as a distraction to enter Skywater City unnoticed. After the pair sold techniques at the Scripture Tower and split the payment, Wu De planned to visit the capital while Li Qing intended to stay in the city.

• Li Qing learned that the Shadow-Reflecting Mirror revealed a cultivator’s fundamental life essence and decided to use Wu De to draw the gate guard’s attention.
• Li Qing used Wish Spell and Calamity Qi to provoke the Spirit Consciousness Realm guard into pursuing Wu De, then slipped into Skywater City.
• The guard stopped Wu De and mistook him for the wanted Li Wushuang, but Wu De proved his identity with his Miscellaneous School token.
• Li Qing met Wu De in Hundred Gates Alley, and they went to the Scripture Tower, where Wu De sold techniques from Orchid Pavilion Temple for ten Disaster Extreme Essence Stones.
• Wu De gave Li Qing half the payment and said he planned to visit the capital, while Li Qing chose to stay in Skywater City.

Li Qing expanded his information network, mass-produced Hundred Things Eyes, and traveled through Skywater City before beginning to condense his second corporeal soul, the Corpse Dog. As the Corpse Dog soul took shape, he sensed chilling danger and strange whispers outside.

• Wu De invited Li Qing to join him in exploring the imperial mausoleums at Hidden Dragon Mountain, and they agreed to meet in the capital.
• Li Qing decided to build an information network across Dragon Province and completed a new batch of Hundred Things Eyes, sending out the Dream Projection and his remaining Shadow Paper Dolls.
• Li Qing replenished his Dharma Power and explored Skywater City, noticing vacant houses, scarce vital essence, and vast formations beneath the city.
• Li Qing began refining the Earthly Path Corpse Dog Curse with the Supreme Fate Flame to condense his second corporeal soul.
• As the Corpse Dog soul emitted a mysterious ripple, Li Qing sensed danger and chill outside and heard whispering voices.

Li Qing discovered that the Corpse Dog Po exposed him to dangerous anomalous forces, then learned that the Legalist School was preparing to surveil Skywater City and fled before its formation was complete. From a hideout outside the city, he compiled intelligence on Sons of Destiny across three provinces.

• Li Qing sensed a deadly torrent through the Corpse Dog Po, withdrew his perception, and checked that he had not suffered Aberrant Contamination.
• Li Qing absorbed the remaining Baleful Intent-grade Essence Stones and read that Lu Yuzhang was installing the Legalist School formation The Law Net Is Vast in Skywater City.
• Li Qing left Skywater City and dug an underground chamber beneath a nearby hill to wait.
• After half a month, Li Qing gathered intelligence from his Hundred Things Eye network and listed the Sons of Destiny in North Province, Yang Province, and Dragon Province.

Li Qing investigated the Chosen Ones, the Longevity Realm cultivators, and the hidden forces active across the three provinces, uncovering their plans for the Six Paths Investiture of Gods. He began examining the imperial family’s response, which he suspected would center on Li Qinglian.

• Li Qing redirected factions under his control to secretly pledge allegiance to nearby Chosen Ones, prioritizing those with fewer supporters.
• Li Qing reviewed information on thirty Longevity Realm cultivators and learned they were building power for the Chosen Ones by infiltrating institutions and assembling five hundred thousand Dao soldiers.
• Li Qing discovered that Emperor Kuntai was set to die on the fifth day of the fifth month in Kuntai’s twentieth year, after which the conflict would become a contest among four great powers.
• Li Qing investigated mysterious forces and learned that figures including Zhang Daqian and Ma Bowen, along with several organizations, were preparing to exploit the coming chaos.
• Li Qing began researching the imperial family’s plan and concluded it would likely depend on Li Qinglian, the Son of Destiny.

Li Qing learned that Emperor Kuntai had spent centuries preparing a secret scheme to sacrifice the people of the imperial city and eliminate rival powers, leaving Li Qinglian to rebuild Great Tang. His divination revealed that the coming conflict could unleash a catastrophic invasion and transform Li Qing into a monstrous creature.

• The Jade Tablet restored the details of Emperor Kuntai’s plans, including his creation of Li Qinglian as a hidden heir and his intended sacrifice of ten million people in the imperial city.
• Li Qing recognized that the imperial family’s long history of princely struggles had helped preserve the scheme, and suspected their mysterious treasure was a Logic Relic.
• Li Qing considered negotiating with the imperial family by offering information about the Upper Realm’s immortals and a mysterious organization, while fearing that the ensuing battle could expose the Nine Provinces to invasion.
• Li Qing used Cosmic Mind Star Divination and saw a blood-soaked city, the deaths of millions, demonic forces invading from the Border Wilderness, and much of the Nine Provinces reduced to ruins.
• Li Qing saw himself transformed into a vacant-eyed monster before awakening and realizing he was in trouble.

Li Qing planned to exploit the great Tribulation and traveled toward the capital, studying formations while avoiding the Legalist School’s surveillance in Skywater City. On the river, he encountered a Spirit Awareness-level Anomaly and learned that the northern Tribulation had killed two million people, with famine likely to follow.

• Li Qing decided to use the imperial family’s plan to seize Qi Fate and left his underground dwelling for the capital.
• Li Qing traveled down the Pu River while studying formations and ordered his subordinates in Skywater City to avoid drawing attention under Lu Yuzhang’s surveillance.
• Li Qing reflected that nighttime Anomaly attacks were disrupting travel and that cities might soon be cut off from one another.
• A mass of dark clouds attacked Li Qing with black threads, and he destroyed it with his Sword Pellet.
• A Shadow Paper Doll brought Li Qing a Spirit Awareness-level Essence Stone from the fallen creature, and Li Qing learned the northern Tribulation had caused two million deaths in a month and threatened famine.

Li Qing used the Jade Tablet to uncover how intelligent Anomalies were countering the Six Paths Investiture of Gods plan through hidden agents and organizations. Facing threats across the Nine Provinces and limited intelligence resources, he considered how to steer events and prepare for the coming journey to the capital.

• Li Qing recorded his suspicion that intelligent Anomalies had noticed the Six Paths Investiture of Gods plan and were plotting against it.
• The Jade Tablet revealed that the Anomalies intended to destroy the plan, seize the Nine Provinces, and use the Royal Survival Plan as one of their pieces.
• Li Qing identified the Memorial Organization, the Evil Spirit Sect, the Rebirth Society, and Ma Bowen as possible pieces in the Anomalies' schemes.
• The Jade Tablet disclosed that a Wisdom One was eroding Ma Bowen, while the Memorial Organization was preparing sacrificial sites to summon an Anomaly's power and contaminate the Nine Provinces.
• Li Qing weighed the danger of the Anomalies against the Six Paths Investiture of Gods plan and resolved to consider how to turn events to his advantage.
• Li Qing assessed his limited Shadow Paper Dolls and concluded that he could establish an intelligence network in at most one Daoist Sect province before reaching the capital.

Li Qing worried that his limited Shadow Paper Dolls left him unable to foresee threats to the Six Paths Investiture of Gods, while he continued gathering power and resources. In the Western Region, four leaders of the Buddhist, Monster, Demonic, and Ghost Paths discussed Li Wushuang, concluding that he was a major variable and planning to test his supposed treasure before trying to capture him alive.

• Li Qing recognized that his limited information network could leave his plans vulnerable and searched for ways to expand it.
• Li Qing absorbed a Fierce-grade Essence Stone and calculated that he still needed 270 Baleful Intent-grade Essence Stones to condense his third soul.
• Bone Bodhisattva, Demon God Taotie, Blood Demon King, and Samsara King met in a Western Region palace to discuss the Six Paths Investiture of Gods.
• Bone Bodhisattva told the others that Li Wushuang had disrupted their plans and attributed his foresight and ability to integrate cultivation methods to an unknown supreme treasure.
• Bone Bodhisattva proposed testing whether the treasure could observe their conversation, then setting a trap based on Li Wushuang's likely search for Dharma Form techniques in Dragon Province.

Bone Bodhisattva outlined a plan to expose Li Wushuang through a logic counterattack and unite the Four Outer Domains to seize the Six Paths Investiture of Gods. Meanwhile, Li Qing learned that the Radiant Buddha Bone Temple ruins were about to emerge and resolved to seek their inheritance, though he suspected a hidden scheme.

• Bone Bodhisattva explained that rumors about the Radiant Buddha Bone Temple would lure Li Wushuang into triggering a logic counterattack that could reveal him.
• Bone Bodhisattva proposed that the Four Outer Domains unite their Sons of Destiny, let them fight for leadership, then attack the Nine Provinces after its powers had weakened.
• Taotie Demon God and Blood Demon King questioned Bone Bodhisattva's plan, while Bone Bodhisattva insisted that each force would have to rely on its own abilities.
• The Jade Tablet told Li Qing that the Radiant Buddha Bone Temple ruins were about to emerge and contained the Buddhist Sect's first-generation Dharma Form Catalog and the Radiant lineage's inheritance.
• Li Qing recognized the ruins' potential value for completing the Comprehensive Record of Humanity Under Heaven, recorded that the rumor originated in the capital, and suspected a great figure's scheme lay behind the ruins.

Li Qing encountered a Disaster-class Anomaly in the river, whose rampage caused a catastrophic flood, and tested his Calamity Qi against it. A cultivator from the Infinite Sect arrived and killed the Anomaly, leaving Li Qing to conclude that enough Calamity Qi could affect Disaster-class Anomalies.

• Li Qing destroyed a shadow Anomaly following his boat and continued studying formations and miscellaneous arts.
• A sudden storm swelled the river and flooded the surrounding farmland, forcing Li Qing to store his boat and investigate underwater.
• Li Qing discovered a colossal Anomaly causing the flood and absorbing negative vital essence and emotions.
• Li Qing sent Calamity Qi into the Disaster-class Anomaly, then moved ten miles away to wait for its effect.
• A sword-wielding cultivator from the Infinite Sect fought the Anomaly beneath the river and killed it, ending the storm.

Li Qing encountered Zhang Family Village's ritual of sacrificing children to the Pujiang Dragon King and used the Jade Tablet to uncover the truth behind it. The sacrifices were demanded by a carp water monster, which exploited the Dragon King's tribute system to prey on several riverside villages.

• Li Qing reflected on how Calamity Qi and monsters were disrupting city life, then continued down the Pujiang River.
• Li Qing saw villagers preparing to sacrifice a boy and a girl at a riverside dock in Zhang Family Village.
• Li Qing learned that the villagers had begun making annual sacrifices after a witch blamed a family's death on the Dragon King, and that the demanded sacrifices had increased to three times a year.
• Li Qing recorded the village's situation, and the Jade Tablet revealed that a carp water monster controlled the witch and collected children from several villages as tribute to the Pujiang Dragon King.

Li Qing subdued the carp water demon and redirected it toward Coiling Dragon Lake, where he planned to recruit Sun Qiankun and build a network of spies inside the Dao Lineages. The Jade Tablet confirmed that those brainwashed by Heavens Civilization Torrent could never advance beyond Li Qing’s realm, and he began considering suitable targets.

• Li Qing decided to recruit the carp water demon and other water demons into his forces, then sent his Shadow Paper Doll to find the carp demon’s underground residence.
• Li Qing used Doomsday Mist Extinguishing Transcendence and Control of Myriad Laws and Myriad Qi to incapacitate the guards and demons in the residence, then brainwashed the carp demon with Heavens Civilization Torrent.
• Li Qing ordered the carp demon to end the villages’ sacrifices and lead elite demon soldiers to Coiling Dragon Lake to await his orders.
• The carp demon obeyed Li Qing, announced an end to the sacrifices, and set out with his soldiers for Coiling Dragon Lake.
• Li Qing considered recruiting gifted disciples as spies within the Dao Lineages and asked the Jade Tablet whether those he brainwashed could break free after surpassing his realm.
• The Jade Tablet revealed that Heavens Civilization Torrent prevented its targets from advancing beyond the caster’s realm, and Li Qing decided to test the method on carefully chosen targets.

Li Qing reached Coiling Dragon Lake and discovered that its dragon vein had been engineered by the Novelist School to support Pan Chengfeng. The revelation that the school had spent three thousand years nurturing the vein left Li Qing impressed and wary.

• Li Qing continued toward Coiling Dragon Lake, reflecting on his rapid cultivation, his repeated encounters with calamity, and his ambition to gain the power and freedom of an immortal.
• Li Qing caught and cooked a large black fish while the Carp Monster King and other water monsters escorted him.
• Li Qing sent at least five Monster Kings and dozens of monster soldiers into Coiling Dragon Lake, preparing them for Pan Chengfeng.
• Li Qing studied the lake and concluded that a dragon vein flowed toward Coiling Dragon City, where its essence gathered.
• Li Qing recorded his discovery and used the Jade Tablet to learn that the Novelist School had created the dragon vein through a secret art, completing it twenty years earlier when Pan Chengfeng was born.
• Li Qing recognized that the Novelist School had spent three thousand years preparing the land for Pan Chengfeng and wondered whether its patriarch had foreseen the present.

Li Qing used a Shadow Paper Doll and the Jade Tablet to uncover Sun Qiankun’s origins, wisdom, and plan to use Pan Chengfeng and the Novelist Academy to seek the true method of cultivation. He approached Sun Qiankun to propose an alliance, but Sun Qiankun remained skeptical.

• Li Qing sent a Shadow Paper Doll into Coiling Dragon City and found Sun Qiankun guarded by three True Method Realm cultivators.
• Li Qing observed Sun Qiankun studying a map of the Nine Provinces and noticed that he had no mana despite his extraordinary bearing.
• Li Qing used the Jade Tablet to learn that Sun Qiankun was born from Dragon Lake’s dragon nature and became Pan Chengfeng’s strategist to gather cultivation methods and pursue the true method of cultivation.
• Li Qing concluded that Sun Qiankun was trapped by cultivation’s hidden food chain, but believed his own outsider status gave him a chance to escape it.
• Li Qing used the Shadow Paper Doll to meet Sun Qiankun and offered him an alliance to gain a chance of survival and change his destined fate.
• Sun Qiankun calmly questioned Li Qing’s offer and called it a jest.

Sun Qiankun rejected Li Qing’s offer of an alliance, but the Shadow Paper Doll revealed his hidden origins and ambitions. Sun Qiankun then deduced that Li Qing was actually Li Wushuang, and asked what he wanted from him.

• Sun Qiankun said he knew nothing about Li Qing, saw no crisis, and had no reason to ally with a cultivator as a mortal.
• The Shadow Paper Doll revealed that Sun Qiankun had been born from the Coiling Dragon’s dragon nature and had avoided cultivation while seeking a flawless path to escape the world’s great terror.
• Sun Qiankun acknowledged that the Shadow Paper Doll knew secrets unavailable even to him and described the Novelist Academy’s intelligence and precautions concerning dragon nature and Aberrant Contamination.
• Sun Qiankun deduced that Li Qing was Li Wushuang, a World Patrol of Jixia Academy who used a Supreme Logic Relic and information to manipulate cultivators.
• Sun Qiankun said they could now speak openly and asked Li Wushuang what he wanted from him.

Li Qing told Sun Qiankun that corrupted cultivation methods and the approaching Great Cycle threatened his chances of escape, then offered him a role in a war against the major Dao Lineages. Sun Qiankun accepted the challenge, determined to pursue transcendence rather than become bait for others.

• Li Qing warned Sun Qiankun that the twisted cultivation methods of the Hundred Schools could not lead him out of the cultivation food chain.
• Sun Qiankun admitted he had suspected the problem and hoped that studying distorted methods might still reveal a new path.
• Li Qing explained that the Six Paths and Eight Immortals used the Great Cycle to delay the world's destruction, and that the current cycle's end was near.
• Li Qing said the Six Paths Investiture of Gods plan aimed to counter Anomalies and entrench the power of the major Dao Lineages, and he offered to restore a true cultivation method for Sun Qiankun.
• Sun Qiankun agreed to join Li Qing's hundred-thousand-year struggle, vowing not to become anyone's bait.

Li Qing recruited Sun Qiankun to help carry out a hundred-thousand-year war plan, outlining how he would build Sun Qiankun’s strength and infiltrate the forces of the Sons of Destiny. The chapter ended with Li Qing explaining how compartmentalized networks across different trades would keep the people under his control from discovering the broader organization.

• Li Qing used the Jade Tablet to learn that Sun Qiankun wanted to join his war while watching to see whether Li Qing sought a true alliance or merely intended to use him.
• Li Qing told Sun Qiankun to gather materials for a Formation Grotto-Heaven that would protect him but accumulate tribulations, which Li Qing promised to help him overcome later.
• Li Qing tasked Sun Qiankun with cultivating the water monsters of Coiling Dragon Lake and infiltrating Pan Chengfeng’s army and the forces of other Sons of Destiny.
• Li Qing explained that controlling the middle and lower ranks would let his faction retain practical power even if the upper ranks of a future empire changed.
• Sun Qiankun questioned whether the people at the bottom could be trusted, and Li Qing proposed secretly brainwashing them and dividing the organization into isolated branches that would not know about one another.

Li Qing and Sun Qiankun agreed to build a vast, compartmentalized organization to undermine the Dao Lineages, and Li offered Sun a Longevity Spirit Curse in exchange for access to the Novelist School’s books. Sun collected Li’s talisman at Coiling Dragon Lake and received the methods and information needed to begin their covert work.

• Li Qing described a secret organization whose disconnected trade groups would infiltrate the Dao Lineages and eventually overturn them.
• Li Qing asked to inspect the books in Sun Qiankun’s spiritual world, and Sun agreed in exchange for a benefit.
• Li Qing gave Sun the Longevity Spirit Curse and instructed him to avoid cultivation and collect a talisman at Coiling Dragon Lake.
• Sun Qiankun retrieved the talisman from the lake and returned to his courtyard, where it sent golden radiance into his body.
• Li Qing’s method examined the information in Sun’s mind and told him that control of the world’s middle and lower levels was now in his hands.

Li Qing sailed toward the capital and spotted a vermilion flower boat whose guests were already dead, their bodies hollowed out. After the boat’s strange influence tried to draw him in, he sent a Shadow Paper Doll to investigate, where it found a vessel filled with corpses disguised as women in burial gowns.

• Sun Qiankun accepted responsibility for refining Li Qing’s plan as Li Qing continued toward the capital, trusting the Jade Tablet to expose any betrayal.
• Li Qing sailed through a prosperous stretch of Dragon Province and drew curious looks as his tiny skiff passed larger vessels.
• At a brightly lit harbor, Li Qing saw dead men with hollowed-out bodies acting like living revelers after leaving the vermilion flower boat.
• The flower boat’s strange power tried to draw Li Qing toward it, but he expelled the influence and sent a Shadow Paper Doll aboard.
• The Shadow Paper Doll found deathly white lanterns and corpse-like women in burial gowns welcoming guests inside the flower boat.

Li Qing discovered that the Scarlet Flower Boat was a Disaster-grade Anomaly led by Du Shiniang, who lured lustful men aboard and drained their organs. After learning the flower boat’s history, he launched a powerful attack and withdrew as Du Shiniang sensed danger.

• Li Qing watched the flower boat’s corpse women drain their patrons’ organs and followed them to a flesh creature beneath the cabin.
• Li Qing recorded the Scarlet Flower Boat as an intelligent Anomaly that turned its victims into walking corpses.
• The Jade Tablet revealed that Du Shiniang had become a Disaster-grade Anomaly after Li Zongxian betrayed and disfigured her three hundred years earlier.
• Li Qing decided to destroy Du Shiniang and sent Heaven and Earth Turning Wheel Tribulation Qi into the flower boat.
• Du Shiniang sensed the incoming danger as Li Qing’s Shadow Paper Doll carried his boat away.

Li Qing discovered that the barriers between the Nine Provinces, the bright side, and the dark side were weakening, making large-scale Anomaly invasions more likely. As he traveled toward Jingcheng, he recruited demon spies to monitor a mysterious force in Dragon Province and finally reached the capital.

• An Anomaly swallowed Du Shiniang’s Scarlet Flower Boat amid spatial fissures that carried the dark side’s aura, and Li Qing used the Jade Tablet to learn that the barriers between realms were weakening.
• Li Qing continued toward the capital, observing the growing chaos and sending water Monsters to Coiling Dragon Lake to serve under Sun Qiankun.
• After learning that a mysterious Demon Race was recruiting demons in Dragon Province, Li Qing searched the mountains for the rat demons of Yellow Wind Cave.
• Li Qing subdued Huang Silang, the Yellow Wind King, and ordered him to infiltrate the mysterious great demon’s ranks and report its movements.
• Li Qing recruited three nearby demon kings for the same surveillance mission, then reached Jingcheng, the capital of Great Tang.

Li Qing arrived at the capital and planned to map its hidden book collections so he could eventually contact the Emperor. He sent Shadow Paper Dolls to infiltrate a declining family’s Library Tower, beginning with the least protected collections.

• Li Qing surveyed the capital’s defenses and considered how its gangs, cultivator families, and guarded libraries limited his knowledge.
• Li Qing decided to record the city’s books, targeting weaker family collections before the stronger holdings of major families and sects.
• Li Qing made more than a hundred talismans and gave them to Shadow Paper Dolls, which slipped into the capital.
• A Shadow Paper Doll entered the Wang Family’s Library Tower unnoticed by the elderly Rogue Cultivator guarding it.

Li Qing used Shadow Paper Dolls to collect cultivation records from the capital’s minor families, compiling them into the Encyclopedia of World Truths and learning that every Dao Lineage relied on vast numbers of lives to advance. He turned his attention to the Wang Family, a Confucian Sect-affiliated Dao Lineage family, and identified the elder guarding its Library Tower.

• Li Qing had Shadow Paper Dolls transcribe unusual books from hundreds of minor families in the capital.
• Li Qing’s Jade Tablet compiled the collected information into the Encyclopedia of World Truths, whose images depicted terrifying supreme patriarchs and second-echelon beings.
• Li Qing studied illustrations showing that every Dao Lineage required vast numbers of lives to break through certain realms.
• Li Qing concluded that the world raised living beings like livestock and chose the capital’s Dao Lineage families as his next targets.
• Li Qing identified the Wang Family’s Library Tower guard as a nearly three-hundred-year-old Spirit Consciousness Realm elder who served in exchange for cultivation opportunities for his branch’s descendants.

Li Qing used the Wish Spell and Calamity Qi to distract guardians and steal knowledge from the Wang Family and other Dao Lineage families. After uncovering the capital’s factions, hidden dangers, and competing plans, he concluded that its destruction was inevitable and decided to seek intelligence from the thirty-eight Dao Lineages stationed there.

• Li Qing caused Wang Shuming’s Aberrant Contamination to erupt, distracting him while the Shadow Paper Doll slipped into the Library Tower and recorded its books.
• After Wang Shuming suppressed the outbreak, he told the Wang Family head that he had little lifespan left and asked to be sealed in feigned death until the family faced a crisis.
• The Wang Family carried Wang Shuming into its shrine chamber, where he became one of the clay figures above a pit filled with the remains of other races.
• Li Qing used the Wish Spell and Calamity Qi to exploit guardians’ weaknesses and gather the accumulated knowledge of multiple millennia-old families.
• Li Qing reconstructed the capital’s underground routes, secret sites, factions, and schemes, including plans that threatened the city’s millions of inhabitants.
• Li Qing decided to seek intelligence about the thirty-eight Dao Lineages in the capital to better understand the Six Paths Investiture of Gods.