Chapter Summaries

At the Xingwu Emperor’s birthday banquet, Zhou An met Great Yue’s delegation and refused Monk Kongwen’s offer to join Kongchen Temple. King Yuanxi arranged a contest between the two nations’ young talents for the next morning, and Eunuch Wei summoned Zhou An to the Imperial Study before he could return to grinding Fortune-Telling.

• Great Yue’s prodigies decided to avoid provoking Zhou An, while King Yuanxi, Xuan Xin Dao Ren, and Monk Kongwen discussed Great Chu’s growing unity and their interest in Zhou An.
• Zhou An attended the birthday banquet, met the Xingwu Emperor and the First Prince, and briefly reported his work and his conflicts with Indulgence and the Wild Taoist Sect.
• Monk Kongwen approached Zhou An and invited him to join Kongchen Temple as a Buddha Child, but Zhou An declined.
• King Yuanxi proposed a contest between Great Chu’s and Great Yue’s young talents, and the Xingwu Emperor agreed to hold it the next morning.
• After the banquet, Eunuch Wei gave Zhou An a waist token and told him that the Xingwu Emperor had summoned him to the Imperial Study, then revealed his yin energy and said he would slap the person Zhou An had poached.

Zhou An met with Xingwu Emperor, learned that Great Yue proposed an alliance against the Barbarian Kingdom, and refused to join a contest between their younger generations. After meeting the First Prince, he raised Fortune-Telling to level six and discovered that the Qi Body Little Person node had brightened enough to reveal a startling new secret.

• Zhou An went to the Imperial Study with Eunuch Wei's token, where two powerful eunuchs welcomed him and Xingwu Emperor discussed his deeds and possible rewards.
• Xingwu Emperor showed Zhou An Great Yue's proposal to unite the nations against the Barbarian Kingdom and asked whether he would participate in a contest, but Zhou An declined.
• After Zhou An left the Imperial Study, he learned Eunuch Wei had burned a tenth precept scar onto Monk Kongwen and met the First Prince, who praised Zhou An's words about living boldly.
• Zhou An returned to his room and ground Fortune-Telling to level six, choosing Eight Trigrams Arithmetic and gaining the Formations attribute.
• Zhou An tested his new golden Eight Trigrams formation and saw that all his skills had reached level six, then sensed the brightly lit Qi Body Little Person node and realized it was even better at cheating than he was.

Zhou An discovered that the Qi Body Little Person could convert stored proficiency into skill progress, then attended the banquet and watched Great Chu and Great Yue compete. After Ding BuSan proposed a wager over the stolen armor, he unexpectedly named Zhou An as the Casting Gate’s contestant.

• Zhou An transferred all the light stored in the Qi Body Little Person’s node into Butcher Dismemberment Blade, raising its proficiency by 40,000.
• At the morning banquet, Zhou An learned that Xu Quan, Ye Shuang, Gongsun Yun, and Xu Bing would represent Great Chu in the four contests.
• At the martial arts arena, Xu Quan and Ye Shuang won their matches, while Gongsun Yun deliberately lost and Great Yue defeated Xu Bing in the forging contest.
• Ding BuSan challenged Zhang Bu Wu to wager the armor’s key against the stolen armor, with another disciple match deciding the winner.
• Ding BuSan named Zhou An as the Casting Gate’s contestant, shocking everyone at the arena.

Zhou An won the forging wager against Zhang Bu Wu by using his own body as the forged item, reclaiming the Casting Gate’s armor. He then accepted Monk Kongwen’s challenge because Black Jade wanted the Sharira, and his clash with Zhiyuan began with Zhou An’s slash cracking the monk’s prayer beads.

• Zhou An stepped forward to take part in the forging wager, despite Zhang Bu Wu and the Great Yue prodigies dismissing his skills.
• Zeng Xian forged a fine longsword, but Zhou An revealed his golden Body Forging and proved his strength by breaking the sword with his bare hand.
• Zhang Bu Wu surrendered the pitch-black sphere containing the armor to Ding BuSan, honoring the wager and returning it to the Casting Gate.
• Monk Kongwen challenged Zhou An through his Buddha Child, Zhiyuan, and offered a Sharira as the prize; Zhou An agreed after Black Jade said she wanted it.
• Zhiyuan used Kongchen Temple’s secret art to fight at Spirit Connection Realm strength, but Zhou An summoned his Sacred Spirit Demonic Body and struck, cracking Zhiyuan’s prayer beads.

Zhou An defeated Zhiyuan, forced Monk Kongwen to surrender two Sharira, and discovered they could briefly let Black Jade summon the Bizarre Assembly at its peak. At the birthday banquet, the Xingwu Emperor rewarded Zhou An with a promotion and appointed him Capital Commissioner of the Huaixi Capital Demon Suppression Division, leaving Zhou An suspicious that the appointment concealed another purpose.

• Zhiyuan's nurtured Buddhist bead shattered before Zhou An's slash, and Monk Kongwen intervened to save him as the arena's formation began to collapse.
• Zhou An demanded that Monk Kongwen kneel for interrupting the match, and Eunuch Wei seized him while the National Teacher and Xuan Xin Dao Ren faced off.
• King Yuanxi offered compensation, and Monk Kongwen surrendered two Sharira to Zhou An instead of kneeling.
• Black Jade absorbed the Sharira and explained that they could briefly clear the mind of the Bizarre Assembly, which she could summon at its peak.
• Zhou An spent the day grinding proficiency before attending the evening banquet, where the Xingwu Emperor appointed him Director of the Huaixi Capital Craftsmen's Bureau and Capital Commissioner of the Huaixi Capital Demon Suppression Division.
• Zhou An suspected the Demon Suppression Division appointment had another purpose after Eunuch Wei signaled him to wait for further explanation.

Zhou An accepted the post of Capital Director of the Demon Suppression Division in Huaixi Capital after Eunuch Wei revealed its secret purpose and Zhou An divined that it would benefit his proficiency grinding. Strange entities wearing clothes from the previous dynasty then appeared across the capital, and the Xingwu Emperor led the gathered officials and prodigies to a cemetery where he revealed that a rift had appeared.

• At the banquet, the Second Prince regretted failing to recruit Zhou An, while the Third Prince mocked him and Eunuch Wei later invited Zhou An to discuss the imperial decree.
• Eunuch Wei explained that the previous Capital Director of Huaixi Capital had secretly belonged to Indulgence and gave Zhou An a letter describing his new post and its role in gathering intelligence.
• Zhou An used Eight Trigrams Arithmetic to determine that becoming Capital Director would benefit his proficiency grinding, then accepted the appointment.
• Zhiyuan was bewitched by a strange entity and attacked a Demon Suppression Division member, while Zhou An defeated other bewitched prodigies and killed the strange entities around his residence.
• The Xingwu Emperor told the gathered guests that strange entities from the previous dynasty had appeared and that their emergence might be linked to the old capital battle.
• The Xingwu Emperor brought the group to a cemetery where heroes' graves suppressed the previous dynasty's Resentful Energy, then revealed that a rift had appeared there.

The Xingwu Emperor sent Innate Realm prodigies through a black gate to eliminate anomalies beneath the cemetery, while Zhou An stayed behind after suspecting the Emperor's explanation concealed a trap. The Mirror Image Talisman exposed Xuan Xin Dao Ren as an Indulgence member, and he revealed that a rift held another rift within it before facing execution.

• The Xingwu Emperor explained that the cemetery's feng shui formation could be damaged by powerful fighters, so he sent Innate Realm prodigies through the black gate to fight the anomalies below.
• Zhou An warned Ye Shuang to watch the people around her, then stayed outside because the Xingwu Emperor judged his strength too dangerous for the formation.
• After the prodigies entered, the Xingwu Emperor surrounded those remaining with Demon Suppression Division members and revealed his plan to expose Indulgence using a Mirror Image Talisman.
• The mirror image showed Xuan Xin Dao Ren's disciple using a strength-boosting talisman, and Xuan Xin Dao Ren admitted he had joined Indulgence after a rift wound left him dying.
• Xuan Xin Dao Ren explained that he sought greater Dao knowledge in the rift and accepted Indulgence's White Bone Dao Art to survive, then gave the art to the National Teacher and revealed he had seen a rift within a rift.

Xuan Xin Dao Ren was captured after Zhou An proposed using him to explore the rifts, and the Xingwu Emperor sent Zhou An into the graveyard to kill a peak Spirit Connection Realm anomaly. After Zhou An effortlessly defeated it, a crack opened and the Bizarre Assembly began pulling him inside.

• Xuan Xin Dao Ren confessed that he had leaked intelligence to explore the rifts, and Zhou An suggested capturing him and using him to investigate them.
• Eunuch Wei and the other experts subdued Xuan Xin Dao Ren, while Yuan Qingyi offered the Soul-Hooking Drug to keep him under control.
• The Xingwu Emperor revealed a peak Spirit Connection Realm anomaly led by Liu Bai and ordered Zhou An to kill it to establish his standing as Capital Commander.
• Zhou An entered the graveyard with Black Jade, encountered Wu Ping and the other prodigies pretending to beat a Zhou An-shaped anomaly, and reflected their attacks back at them.
• Zhou An confronted Liu Bai and his army of anomalies, then wiped them out with one strike of his Sacred Spirit Demonic Body.
• A crack opened onto the Bizarre Assembly's streets, and a terrifying suction force began dragging Zhou An inside.

Zhou An survived the Bizarre Assembly’s attack with Eunuch Wei’s intervention, then left the capital after spending three days with Ye Shuang. On the way to take office in Huaixi Capital, he encountered a Demon Suppression Division checkpoint and learned that an object-parasitizing strange entity called the Evil Buddha was causing trouble.

• The Bizarre Assembly attacked Zhou An through a rift, but Eunuch Wei blocked its destructive strike and drove it away.
• Zhou An returned to the palace banquet, then spent three days in the capital with Ye Shuang before leaving with Black Jade for Huaixi Capital.
• During the journey, Zhou An continued cultivating Eight Trigrams Arithmetic and learned that his carriage was approaching Huaixi Capital.
• Demon Suppression Division members stopped Zhou An’s carriage because a strange entity was causing trouble on the road.
• Wang Xin identified himself and explained that the Evil Buddha was an object-parasitizing strange entity named after the Buddha statue it first possessed.

Zhou An investigated Heart Peace Temple after its Buddha trinkets were linked to bizarre phenomena, uncovering corpses used to create the possessed statues and killing the fleeing abbot. He found the abbot’s strange Buddha statue and prepared to destroy it, but Black Jade moved first.

• Wang Xin told Zhou An that Heart Peace Temple had distributed Buddha trinkets connected to bizarre phenomena, and Zhou An flew there with Black Jade.
• Zhou An ordered Zong Shan Yin and the Demon Suppression Division members to overcome the monks blocking their search, then led them through the temple.
• Zhou An found Buddha statues placed on more than a hundred stolen corpses and deduced that their Resentful Energy had transferred to the statues.
• Zhou An used Eight Trigrams Arithmetic to locate the fleeing abbot, caught up with him, and killed him after the abbot attacked with a life-sized Buddha statue.
• Zhou An examined the strange statue, found it empty, and decided to destroy it, but Black Jade suddenly moved.

Zhou An used a Sharira to awaken the bronze Buddha statue and learned from Hua Chen about the Spirit Connection Space, the founder of the Eight Unique Skills, and Indulgence’s past. After killing Hua Chen at his request, Zhou An returned to Huaixi Capital and began reviewing the Demon Suppression Division’s affairs.

• Black Jade used a Sharira to awaken the bronze Buddha statue, revealing the golden Buddha within as Hua Chen, abbot of the Sorrowful Joy Golden Body Temple.
• Hua Chen told Zhou An that he had fought the founder of the Eight Unique Skills and explained how Indulgence later entered the rift, expanded it, and helped cause the strange entities to spread.
• Hua Chen revealed that the Spirit Connection Space had been created as a buffer between the rift and the world, then asked Zhou An to kill him before his strange instincts took control.
• Zhou An killed Hua Chen, then returned with Black Jade and the Demon Suppression Division members to Huaixi Capital.
• The Demon Suppression Division welcomed Zhou An, and First Division Head He Sheng brought him to his quarters and presented records of the division’s operations.

After arriving in Huaixi Capital, Zhou An learned that the local yamen disliked him because of his ties to the Prime Minister and began investigating Indulgence through the Demon Suppression Division. When families connected to Indulgence were found dead with their blood essence and qi drained, He Sheng suggested an Eight Unique Skill might be involved.

• He Sheng told Zhou An that his poor relationship with Huaixi Capital's yamen stemmed from Capital Magistrate Pei Lin's ties to the Prime Minister, and Zhou An dismissed the matter as trivial.
• Zhou An settled into his new residence, visited the Craftsmen's Bureau and Hengtong Merchant Guild, and resumed grinding Eight Trigrams Arithmetic while Black Jade played with her chair.
• Zhong Quan, a covert agent for the Demon Suppression Division, agreed not to build relations with Zhou An while gathering information on Indulgence, and Zong Shan Yin later reported the situation to Zhou An.
• Zhou An tried to use level-six Eight Trigrams Arithmetic to uncover Indulgence's plans but could not calculate the details, so he continued training the skill in hopes of reaching level seven.
• After a Demon Suppression Division member summoned him, Zhou An found several bodies from families deceived by Indulgence, all drained of blood essence and qi, and He Sheng suggested an Eight Unique Skill might be responsible.

Zhou An ordered the Demon Suppression Division to control the clans tied to Indulgence, while the Black Robed Man exploited the distraction to advance his plan to turn Su Su into a vessel for multiple professions and abilities. After days of grinding Eight Trigrams Arithmetic, Zhou An finally succeeded at something, leaving the Demon Suppression Division startled by his shout.

• He Sheng identified the drained clan members as victims of Arranging Troops and Dispatching Generals, and Zhou An ordered the Demon Suppression Division to control every implicated clan while he trained Eight Trigrams Arithmetic.
• The Black Robed Man revealed that he had transferred martial artists' and Qi Refiners' qi and abilities into Su Su, and planned to have her approach Pei Jing Ling to acquire Scholar abilities and surpass the Spirit Connection Realm.
• Su Su used a mind-controlling talisman and seduction to lower Pei Jing Ling's guard, then began manipulating him in the yamen's inner courtyard.
• Zhou An stayed at the Demon Suppression Division to grind Eight Trigrams Arithmetic, and he decided to give Arranging Troops and Dispatching Generals to Black Jade if he could obtain it.
• After many days, the Indulgence members vanished and the Demon Suppression Division's subordinates privately criticized Zhou An for alerting the enemy.
• Zhou An suddenly shouted from his room that he had succeeded, startling everyone in the Demon Suppression Division.

After leveling up Eight Trigrams Arithmetic, Zhou An traced the plot against him to the Huaixi Capital yamen and raided it despite Pei Jing Ling’s objections. He defeated Su Su, but she killed herself by severing her connection to the Black Robed Man, leaving Zhou An determined to pursue the conspirators.

• Zhou An reached level seven in Eight Trigrams Arithmetic, calculated a trail to the yamen, and ordered He Sheng and Zong Shan Yin to gather the men.
• Pei Jing Ling found Zhou An and the Demon Suppression Division outside the yamen, then reluctantly stepped aside when Zhou An threatened to treat him as an enemy.
• Zhou An followed the golden threads into the inner courtyard and discovered Su Su, whose composure revealed that she was connected to the plot.
• Su Su fought Zhou An with martial arts from the Nan and Wu families and a Qi Refiner technique, but Zhou An struck her down and poisoned her.
• Su Su severed her connection to the Black Robed Man and turned to ash before Zhou An could capture her alive.
• Zhou An ordered his men to wipe out the remaining conspirators.

Zhou An tracked down and killed the Black Robed Man, while Black Jade learned Arranging Troops and Dispatching Generals. After discovering that the underground tomb complex hid a natural formation holding back vast Resentful Energy, Zhou An explored deeper and found writing beneath a coffin lid.

• Zhou An used Eight Trigrams Arithmetic to trace the mastermind westward, then pursued the fleeing Black Robed Man through a well and into an ancient tomb.
• The Black Robed Man raised more than a thousand corpses with Arranging Troops and Dispatching Generals, but Zhou An destroyed them with the Wok Suppression Art and defeated him.
• Zhou An tortured the Black Robed Man until he revealed Arranging Troops and Dispatching Generals, and Black Jade quickly learned the skill.
• Zhou An killed the Black Robed Man, then used his Thousand Mile Eye and Formation attribute to discover that the tomb extended beneath the battlefield and was protected by a natural formation.
• Zhou An carved a path into the lower tomb, opened a coffin, and found densely packed writing beneath its lid.

Zhou An destroyed the corpses in an ancient graveyard, awakening a powerful anomaly that split into flesh and bones before he defeated it. After the coffins were brought to Huaixi Capital and their ancient writing was sent for deciphering, Zhou An trained his Butcher Dismembering Human Knife Technique to level seven and discovered that it had changed.

• Zhou An destroyed the corpses on the graveyard’s upper levels, then faced an anomaly awakening from the massive coffin on the lowest level.
• Zhou An lured the anomaly away from Huaixi Capital and fought it in the wilderness, defeating its skeletal and fleshy forms after a prolonged battle.
• Zhou An ordered He Sheng to retrieve the coffins, and He Sheng arranged for specialists to decipher their ancient writing.
• Zhou An returned to Huaixi Capital, where He Sheng said the script might predate the era of the Eight Unique Skills; Zhou An ordered the deciphering expedited.
• Pei Jing Ling received a punishment that effectively ended his official career, while Zhou An trained his knife technique by carving water.
• Zhou An reached level seven in the Butcher Dismembering Human Knife Technique and noticed that the technique had changed.

Zhou An discovered that his new Sword Intent let him control a second blade through the air, then trained the Wok Suppression Art by sealing the immortal Black Jade. After deciphering revealed that the coffin inscriptions described a map written in Years Calligraphy, Zhou An decided to guard the Demon Suppression Division; meanwhile, two sect leaders plotted to take the maps and kill him.

• Zhou An used Sword Intent and the Qi Body Little Person to wield one blade while controlling another blade through the air, then chose to improve the Wok Suppression Art.
• Zhou An tested the Wok Suppression Art’s sealing attribute on Black Jade and gained proficiency when she resisted it.
• A Demon Suppression Division member deciphered a coffin inscription, and He Sheng summoned Zhou An to examine the result.
• Zhou An learned the inscriptions described a map written in Years Calligraphy, ordered the remaining texts translated in secret, and used Eight Trigrams Arithmetic to decide to stay at the Demon Suppression Division.
• Subduing Dragon Taoist and Zen Heart Monk discussed how Zhou An obstructed their plan to obtain the maps, and Zen Heart Monk claimed he had a way to take them and kill Zhou An.

Zen Heart Monk and Subduing Dragon Taoist lured the Bizarre Assembly to Spring Breeze Street to kill Zhou An, but Zhou An entered it with Black Jade and planned to use her Sharira to restore its sanity. The Bizarre Assembly instead pursued the two schemers, who fled toward Zhou An in hopes of making it attack him first.

• Zen Heart Monk revealed a Resentful Energy-filled Buddhist bead and convinced Subduing Dragon Taoist to use it to summon the Bizarre Assembly on Spring Breeze Street, where they planned to kill Zhou An and seize the maps.
• Zhou An learned the Bizarre Assembly had appeared, used Eight Trigrams Arithmetic to determine that entering was otherwise certain death, and found that using Black Jade's Sharira would make the outcome auspicious.
• Zhou An ordered the Demon Suppression Division to guard the coffin lids and keep everyone else out while he entered the Bizarre Assembly with Black Jade.
• Black Jade treated the Bizarre Assembly like home and took a book from a stall without triggering its rules, while Zhou An waited for the Bizarre Assembly to appear.
• The Bizarre Assembly's Black-Clothed Woman chased Subduing Dragon Taoist and Zen Heart Monk, who realized it was targeting them first because Eunuch Wei had previously stopped it from reaching Zhou An.
• Zen Heart Monk urged Subduing Dragon Taoist to lead the Black-Clothed Woman to Zhou An so the Bizarre Assembly would attack him instead.

Subduing Dragon Taoist and Zen Heart Monk tried to use Zhou An as bait but were outmaneuvered, while Black Jade’s Sharira restored the Bizarre Assembly’s consciousness. After the Bizarre Assembly killed the two pursuers and explained what she could about the rifts, she offered Zhou An a safe glimpse of one, leaving him confused when she told him she had not meant for him to enter.

• Zen Heart Monk used his life-bound Buddhist bead to halt the Bizarre Assembly long enough for Subduing Dragon Taoist to divine Zhou An’s location, and the two rushed toward him.
• Zhou An tricked the Bizarre Assembly into attacking Subduing Dragon Taoist and Zen Heart Monk, then stopped their escape with his blades and pot so she could strike them down.
• Zhou An had Black Jade throw a Sharira to her mother, restoring the Bizarre Assembly’s consciousness; Black Jade called her Mother, and the Bizarre Assembly killed the two sect leaders.
• The Bizarre Assembly accepted that Zhou An had treated Black Jade well and told him that rifts led toward the source of the pollution, which she could not describe because of the rules.
• The Bizarre Assembly offered to show Zhou An a rift in exchange for more Buddhist relics, dissolved part of her street to reveal one, and told him she had not asked him to enter.

Zhou An watched Black Jade explore the rift, learned of a rift-bearing Weirdness, and escaped Bizarre Assembly with the other entrants. After his forces captured raiders and deciphered a vast map, Zhou An was assigned to attend the Town Region Blade Sect’s annual disciple contest.

• The Bizarre Assembly sent Black Jade into the rift, where Zhou An watched through a magical projection as she explored its eerie landscape.
• Black Jade witnessed a hundred-meter Weirdness carrying another rift devour two fighting Weirdnesses, and Zhou An inferred that entering this inner rift would require defeating it.
• As her consciousness faded, the Bizarre Assembly sent Zhou An and the other entrants away, warned him to avoid her unless he found another Sharira, and scolded him about marrying Black Jade.
• Zhou An returned to find He Sheng’s forces had captured the Wild Taoist Sect and Wild Buddhist Sect raiders, then ordered their interrogation and continued work on deciphering the recovered materials.
• The Demon Suppression Division completed a large map sought by the two sects, and Zhou An memorized it before it was sent to the capital through secret channels.
• He Sheng told Zhou An to attend the Town Region Blade Sect’s annual disciple contest, and Zhou An agreed to go the next day with Zong Shan Yin.