Chapter Summaries

Key plot points and events

• Wuxiang Watson agrees to exchange knowledge with Yin Ming: he will share Ritual Studies fundamentals and some of his Seal Formula research, but not all of his findings.
• Watson teaches Yin Ming and develops a foundational spell, Thousand-Hand Sorcery, to make Seal Formulas faster and easier to use. His other personalities continue refining the system.
• Yin Ming realizes Seal Formulas may suit his primordial spirit exceptionally well. Unlike conventional wizardry, they do not require him to divide or project his mental power; his Fate-split thoughts can also help execute them.
• In a separate thread, Simon Marshall learns from the Mother of All Snakes that the Void Abyss lies on the Dark Plane, a dangerous realm associated with Baleful Entities. Knowing its location is not enough to find it.
• Simon offers information about Godheads—including an Evil God’s Godhead in Dark Dragon’s possession—and promises the Scavenger Gourd. The Mother agrees to take him to the Void Abyss, though she says his offer alone would not have been sufficient.

Character developments

• Yin Ming gains a major foundation in Ritual Studies and grows more confident in Seal Formulas as a path suited to his unusual cultivation and primordial spirit. He sees knowledge-sharing with a powerful collaborator as a way to accelerate his progress.
• Wuxiang Watson commits to developing Seal Formulas, using his multiple personalities to refine the system while teaching Yin Ming its foundations.
• Simon Marshall shifts from seeking a direct route to Yin Ming toward bargaining for access to the Void Abyss, using valuable intelligence when resources are no longer enough.
• The Mother of All Snakes remains self-interested and demanding, but her own plans to visit the Void Abyss create an opportunity for Simon.

Significant themes

• Knowledge as power and currency: Access to advanced teachings is rare, and strategic exchanges can be more valuable than ordinary resources.
• Collaboration and innovation: Watson’s work and Yin Ming’s insights show how shared expertise can speed the creation of a new power system.
• Adapting power to one’s nature: Yin Ming’s primordial spirit offers an unconventional way to use Seal Formulas, suggesting that systems work best when shaped around the practitioner.
• The danger of hidden realms: The Dark Plane makes the Void Abyss difficult to reach even for powerful beings.

Character interactions

• Yin Ming and Watson negotiate a knowledge exchange, then work in parallel: Watson teaches and develops spells while Yin Ming studies and evaluates the system’s potential.
• Simon questions the Mother of All Snakes about the Void Abyss and bargains with her using information about Godheads, Dark Dragon, and the Scavenger Gourd.

Key plot points and events

• The Mother of All Snakes leads Simon Marshall into the Dark World, locates the Void Abyss, and uses a flaw she left in its barrier to break inside.
• In the Nightmare World, Yin Ming is studying the Thousand-Hand Dharma Form with Wuxiang Watson when the intrusion shakes the Void Abyss and reveals its true surroundings.
• Yin Ming recognizes the Mother of All Snakes. Wuxiang explains that she covets his bloodline and wants him to father a race of snakes; he has resisted, but fears she now intends to force the matter.
• Yin Ming tries to escape but finds the Void Abyss sealed. Wuxiang offers to intervene if Yin Ming gives him authority over the Nightmare World’s second layer. Yin refuses to surrender it yet.
• Meanwhile, a long-imprisoned Ancient God receives a surge of contaminated Faith Power. Once lucid, he appears to be under Wuxiang’s control as an avatar.
• Wuxiang invokes True Illusion, channeling law power through Faith Crystals to affect the Ancient God and the Void Abyss. The chapter ends as his plan begins.

Character developments

• Yin Ming is wary and self-protective: he refuses to let Wuxiang gain control over his authority, even though he is trapped and facing danger.
• Wuxiang Watson reveals that he has managed Faith Crystals and the sealed Ancient God for a long time. His offer to help Yin Ming comes with a strategic price.
• The Mother of All Snakes is shown as powerful, methodical, and determined to obtain Wuxiang’s bloodline.
• Simon Marshall discovers that elemental energy is scarce in the Dark World, limiting his ability to recover mana.
• The sealed Ancient God briefly regains clarity after receiving Faith Power, but his dependence and compromised state are made clear.

Significant themes

• Power and control: Wuxiang’s authority over the Nightmare World and the Faith Crystals gives him leverage over others.
• Bloodline and coercion: The Mother of All Snakes’ desire to breed a new race turns bloodline inheritance into a threat rather than a legacy.
• Corruption through time: Even small amounts of contaminated Faith Power accumulate, driving an immortal Ancient God into madness.
• Trust and bargaining: Yin Ming and Wuxiang are allied by circumstance but remain cautious about trading power or protection.

Character interactions

• Yin Ming and Wuxiang trade dark humor and threats, revealing familiarity but limited trust.
• Wuxiang explains the Mother of All Snakes’ intentions and offers to fight her in exchange for Yin Ming’s authority.
• The Mother of All Snakes ignores Simon and focuses on breaching the Void Abyss.
• Wuxiang’s control of Faith Power connects him to the weakened Ancient God, whose renewed lucidity sets the stage for Wuxiang’s next move.

Key plot points and events

• The Mother of All Snakes breaks through Void Abyss’s final barrier, carrying Eternal Silence’s Remains into its innermost layer. Wuxiang Watson intervenes with the Illusion Character Law, trapping her and Simon Marshall in separate True Illusions.
• Wuxiang cannot leave Void Abyss, so he gives Yin Ming a choice: defeat Simon and escape through the Nightmare Rune, or wait and hope the Mother of All Snakes has no interest in him. Wuxiang claims they have a day or two before she wakes, then enters her illusion to keep her occupied.
• Yin Ming decides to fight Simon. He summons the White-Bone Soul Banner’s Seventh-Ring Undead Skeleton and attacks Simon, who counters with his domain, the City of Eternal Silence.
• The True Illusion makes attacks and injuries consequential across both dream and reality. Simon evades Yin Ming’s strike by swapping places with a corpse, sacrificing its undead spirit.
• Simon recognizes Yin Ming, is shocked by his rise to the Fourth Ring, and decides he must kill him rather than risk letting him escape with the Law Fragment. He compresses his domain, weakening Yin Ming’s own Fourth-Ring domain, and orders him to use his own domain.

Character developments

• Yin Ming shows greater confidence and resourcefulness, combining his True Blood, succubus core, and White-Bone Soul Banner to challenge a much stronger opponent. But he recognizes the danger of facing a domain wizard without a comparable domain.
• Simon Marshall, still a formidable Sixth-Ring undead wizard despite past losses, proves ruthless and tactically sharp. He targets the weakness of Yin Ming’s lower rank rather than directly confronting the summoned skeleton.
• Wuxiang Watson uses his unusual illusion power to create an opening for Yin Ming, while taking the risk of distracting the Mother of All Snakes himself.
• The Mother of All Snakes is powerful enough to threaten Void Abyss’s core, but remains temporarily contained in the illusion.

Significant themes

• Illusion and reality: The True Illusions blur the boundary between dream and waking life; actions in the illusion can cause real harm, while each trapped mind experiences its own version of events.
• Power and vulnerability: Yin Ming’s rapid advancement cannot erase the gap between Fourth-Ring and domain-level strength.
• Risk and strategy: Survival depends on exploiting limited openings, managing powerful abilities, and choosing which threat to confront first.

Character interactions

• Wuxiang explains Yin Ming’s options and buys him time by engaging the Mother of All Snakes in her illusion.
• Yin Ming attacks Simon while he is trapped in the True Illusion, but the illusion links their minds and makes the confrontation dangerous for both.
• Simon recognizes Yin Ming and turns the fight into a contest of domains, pressuring him to reveal or deploy his own domain.

Key plot points and events

• Trapped inside Simon Marshall’s City of Eternal Silence, Yin Ming realizes his Netherworld domain is close to collapsing. He has no domain of his own: he lacks both the Elemental Body needed for a wizard’s Elemental Domain and the Fourth-Ring True-Name Totem Rune needed for a warlock’s Life Domain.
• Yin Ming uses Myriad Transformations and Mental Simulation to copy Simon’s appearance and spiritual aura. The city briefly mistakes him for its owner, stabilizing Yin Ming’s domain and letting him perceive the undead and corpses within the city.
• Using that access, Yin Ming commands the Seventh-Ring Undead Skeleton to destroy many of Simon’s mummy substitutes with Moon Bind.
• Simon activates the Rune Source Core and uses undead arts, but Yin Ming counters with the Moon Law Fragment and the White-Bone Soul Banner. His pale moonlight refines the city’s undead miasma and contaminates its corpses, depriving Simon of many substitutes.
• Simon avoids direct combat by turning the city into black mist. Yin Ming declines to pursue him, knowing that his skeleton’s power depends on his own judgment and that Simon could exploit any mistake.
• Yin Ming’s Yin Spirit sees through Simon’s Sixth-Ring Undead Mist and exposes him. Simon realizes he has been discovered and ignites his burial cloth, preparing to act.

Character developments

• Yin Ming shows adaptability and restraint: rather than overpowering Simon directly, he exploits the city’s systems and his Moon-law abilities while carefully guarding against a fatal counterattack.
• Simon Marshall is revealed to be diminished. The city has lost much of the undead wealth accumulated over thousands of years, and Simon’s attempts to hunt gods have failed. He remains dangerous, however, and turns to evasive tactics when Yin Ming gains the advantage.

Significant themes

• Domains as sources of power and control: They let fighters deploy their full strength and draw on the energy of the world, but Yin Ming’s lack of one leaves him vulnerable.
• Adaptation and deception: Yin Ming turns Simon’s own identity and domain against him.
• The cost of power and decline: The City of Eternal Silence’s vast reserves have been depleted, weakening Simon.
• Laws and countering: The Moon Law can suppress related undead powers, illustrating why a direct contest of laws is so dangerous.
• Caution over aggression: Yin Ming recognizes that a single opening could let Simon kill him, so he prioritizes maintaining control over pursuing a quick victory.

Character interactions

• Yin Ming mocks Simon’s weakened city and uses Simon’s aura to access its defenses and information.
• Simon curses Yin Ming for appropriating his domain, then tries to defend the city and evade the Moon Skeleton’s attacks.
• Yin Ming and Simon engage in a contest of tactics: Simon relies on substitutes and mist, while Yin Ming contaminates those substitutes and uses his Yin Spirit to locate him.
• Two people remain unconscious inside a True Illusion bubble; Yin Ming checks on them but does not leave his position.

Key plot points and events

• Simon Marshall sacrifices half of the City of Eternal Silence, detonating more than a thousand White-Moon-tainted corpses. Yin Ming’s Seventh-Ring Undead Shield blocks the blasts, but the corpses’ accumulated resentment passes through it and traps Yin Ming in a sensory-depriving state of “eternal perdition.”
• Yin Ming resists surrendering by retreating into the Scavenger Gourd, since doing so would leave behind the White-Bone Soul Banner and cost him his chance to win. His Yin Spirit preserves a fragment of his awareness, while the First-Ring Golden Light Spell uses purifying flame to burn away the resentment.
• Yin Ming wakes just before his shield fails. Simon tries to finish him, then flees when he realizes Yin Ming is awake and vastly stronger than expected.
• Because Simon remains trapped in the True Illusion—and asleep in the real world—he cannot escape. Yin Ming uses the Seventh-Ring Moon Bind to strike him in both places, killing him.
• Yin Ming then has the Seventh-Ring Chaotic Undead weaken Simon’s remnant soul before capturing it with the White-Bone Soul Banner and storing it in the Undead Orb.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming demonstrates discipline and tactical restraint: he endures a potentially fatal assault, refuses the safer retreat that would mean abandoning his objective, and uses several abilities in coordination to survive and prevail.
• Simon Marshall is resourceful and ruthless, sacrificing much of his domain to attack. But once Yin Ming recovers, Simon recognizes the mismatch and attempts to escape. His final regret is not that he pursued a god, but that he failed to prepare adequately.
• The confrontation is strategically a two-against-one struggle: Yin Ming must protect his weaker Fourth-Ring self while directing the Seventh-Ring undead combatant. Simon exploits this vulnerability, but ultimately cannot overcome their combined defenses and abilities.

Significant themes

• Endurance and resolve: Yin Ming’s survival depends on preserving even a small measure of consciousness through overwhelming torment.
• Power and preparation: Simon’s defeat highlights how incomplete preparation can squander the chance to gain immense power.
• Cost and sacrifice: Simon destroys much of his own city and sacrifices countless imprisoned undead to create his attack.
• Control and confinement: The illusion traps Simon as completely as the corpses once trapped their undead occupants, and Yin Ming ultimately enslaves his remnant soul.

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming defeats and kills Simon Marshall, a Sixth-Ring necromancer, whose soul is drawn into the White-Bone Soul Banner and begins its transformation into an undead. Simon’s death also destroys the restraint holding Yin Ming in the Void Abyss, allowing him to escape.
• Yin Ming collects Simon’s corpse pouch, finding undead materials, element crystals, and a God Hunter’s Ring—but not the major treasures Simon was known to possess. He hopes to recover their locations later from Simon’s memories.
• Nearby, Wuxiang Watson maintains his True Illusion confrontation with the Mother of All Snakes. She learns Simon is dead and Yin Ming has escaped, and questions why Wuxiang allowed him to leave. Wuxiang argues that Yin Ming may be valuable to a future alliance of outsiders seeking a share in the world’s resources.
• Mother of All Snakes ends the illusion and departs after piercing the Void Abyss Barrier.
• In the Source Plane, four Third-Ring wizards investigate an unexplained elemental-energy disturbance. When their detection tool registers a nearby teleportation, they follow it to the entrance of the Flame-Burners Association.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming shows a mix of regret and pragmatism over Simon’s fate, then prioritizes survival and escape. He also recognizes that Simon’s apparent poverty is likely because his true wealth was stored elsewhere.
• Simon Marshall is revealed as repeatedly unlucky in god-hunting: although he helped find opportunities, others claimed the godheads. His usual resurrection safeguard fails because the True Illusion traps his soul.
• Wuxiang Watson treats Yin Ming as a potentially useful future ally, despite his current lack of Seventh-Ring strength, and persuades the Mother of All Snakes to let him go.
• Mother of All Snakes is skeptical of Yin Ming’s usefulness and displeased that Simon’s promised compensation is lost, but accepts Wuxiang’s strategic reasoning. Her exchange with Wuxiang reveals a cautious, transactional alliance.
• The four investigating wizards debate the disturbance’s cause, then act on their instrument’s detection of a teleportation event.

Significant themes

• The cost and limits of survival: Simon’s resurrection method fails when his soul is trapped, showing that even elaborate safeguards have vulnerabilities.
• Power, fortune, and competition: Simon repeatedly participates in god-hunting but never gains the prize himself.
• Strategic alliances and future value: Wuxiang argues that overlooked or currently weak parties may become important partners in the struggle over the world’s resources.
• Consequences of hidden power: Yin Ming’s breakthrough produces an energy disturbance that draws official investigation, even though it is likely unrelated to the larger crisis known as “Source Silence.”

Key plot points and events

• After returning from the Void Abyss, Yin Ming gives up his authority over the Nightmare World’s second layer and sends the Chaotic Void Spirit—and the Second-Ring Nightmare Rune—back to Wuxiang Watson.
• Wuxiang reclaims the second layer of the Void Abyss. As he does, vast stores of Faith Crystals shatter, and the Dark Plane’s Void Abyss is swallowed by surrounding dimensional black mist.
• Yin Ming uses the White-Bone Soul Banner and his Second-Ring Undead Possession spell to examine the memories of Simon Marshall’s undead remains. He learns that Simon’s treasures and research are hidden in a Plane Fragment, but cannot reach them without a lost teleportation array.
• Simon’s memories also reveal Sixth-Ring knowledge about Seventh-Ring gods and explain what happened to the Flame of Shadow Touch: after Ember vanished, Norman Martin’s will awakened inside the flame and fused with Flameburn, becoming an incomplete Flameburning Fire. Norman intends to destroy the Source Plane rather than let invaders claim it.
• Eternal Silence’s Remains refused to fuse with the incomplete fire to become a false god, instead leaving for the Void Abyss with the Mother of All Snakes’ help. Yin Ming realizes he needs a complete Flameburning Fire to create a true Sect-Suppressing Supreme Treasure.
• Four concealed wizards enter the Underground City, suspecting someone may be conducting illicit experiments. Yin Ming detects them and appears in their path.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming settles the danger posed by the Chaotic Void Spirit and accepts the loss of an accessible fortune, focusing instead on the valuable knowledge in Simon’s memories.
• Wuxiang Watson regains his former authority and celebrates reclaiming the Void Abyss.
• Norman Martin’s will has become part of Shadow Touch and is now driving the Flame’s destructive purpose.
• Ember tells Yin Ming that destroying the Origin Plane would trigger Humanity’s Karmic Fire Curse. Yin Ming consults Ember about Norman’s plans but learns that the memories contain no details about how the destruction will be carried out.
• The four intruders speculate about who might be inside the Underground City; Yin Ming intercepts them before they can investigate further.

Significant themes

• Exchange and repayment: Yin Ming returns authority to Wuxiang, framing the act as repayment for the burden Wuxiang bore.
• Knowledge versus access: Yin Ming discovers where Simon’s wealth lies but cannot reach it, illustrating the frustration of knowing a prize’s location without the means to retrieve it.
• Power and compromise: Eternal Silence’s Remains rejects a shortcut to godlike power, while Yin Ming distinguishes between a patched-together artifact and a genuinely higher-ranked treasure.
• Destruction and consequence: Norman’s determination to deny the Source Plane to invaders threatens catastrophe, while the potential eruption of Humanity’s Karmic Fire Curse makes that destruction consequential for everyone.

Chapter Summary

• Yin Ming demonstrates his Fourth-Ring strength. After landing, he uses the First-Ring Modified Intimidation Spell to overwhelm four Third-Ring wizards from the Wizard Black Tower. They explain that the Black Tower sent them to investigate Source Silence, a growing loss of elemental energy across the Source Plane.
• The plane is approaching an End of Dharma. The drain began three months ago and is accelerating; the red-haired wizard estimates that elemental energy could vanish entirely within ten years. The Black Tower’s Fourth-Ring-and-higher wizards are investigating, leaving the plane more exposed to invasions by extraordinary beings.
• Yin Ming identifies a likely cause. He consults Ember, the spirit of the Scavenger Gourd, who suspects Shadow Touch is responsible and links it to Norman Martin’s plan to destroy the plane’s value so predators will leave it alone. Powerful outside beings could potentially stop Shadow Touch, but the effort would cost more than the plane is worth.
• Yin Ming lets the four wizards go. Having learned what he needed, he dismisses them peacefully. He then decides to leave the Underground City, believing his Fourth-Ring power gives him enough protection to move on.
• He sets new priorities for his growth. After an unusually rapid rise from Second Ring to Fourth Ring in just two years, Yin Ming recognizes gaps in his knowledge and training. He plans to advance his cultivation method, develop spells from Seal Formulas, study the “Moon” Law Fragment, and gather resources. He can obtain Element and Soul Crystals through the gourd, but his supply of magical-beast True Blood is limited, threatening progress in the Eight-Nine Mystical Art’s Second Transformation.

Character Developments and Interactions

Yin Ming’s confidence has grown with his power, but he remains cautious about the approaching crisis and his own limitations—especially the Humanity’s Karmic Fire Curse, which makes leaving the Source Plane difficult. His encounter with the Black Tower wizards highlights both his overwhelming strength and his willingness to spare those who pose no threat. Ember provides a strategic interpretation of Shadow Touch’s plan, while the frightened wizards offer the first clear account of the plane-wide emergency.

Significant Themes

The chapter centers on decline and survival: extraordinary power is spreading even as the world’s magical foundations disappear. It also explores the cost of intervention, since saving the Source Plane may not be worth the resources required, and the limits of rapid advancement, as Yin Ming’s breakthrough leaves him powerful but underprepared and short of essential resources.

Key plot points and events

• With the Age of Dharma Decline approaching, Yin Ming decides to stockpile cultivation resources. He considers production too slow and risky, and rejects indiscriminate killing as destructive and unsustainable. He settles on returning to Hell Valley to gather resources through an organization.
• While flying across the Source Plane, he sees a major war outside the Landon Duchy’s capital. Extraordinaries harvest the dead for materials, while Demon Bloodline hosts consume their souls. The battle illustrates how ordinary people are suffering as the Wizard Black Tower’s control weakens.
• Yin Ming believes the Source Plane’s decline is unavoidable and doubts that saving it would help: powerful factions are unlikely to intervene, while opportunists will exploit the resulting disorder.
• At Hell Valley, he finds the once-barren area covered by the Green Forest, with Twisted Treants living on its mountains. He suspects the Flame-Burners Association has become a vassal of the Green Forest and wonders whether Tree Ancestor Sadi has reached the Fourth Ring.
• Yin Ming recognizes Klee Gler and realizes the Flame-Burners Association’s council speakers survived the spatial disaster on Xu’s plane. Their agreement entitles him to knowledge from the Beast God Cult ruins and first choice of half the resources.
• Cautious about Sadi’s possible strength, Yin Ming disguises himself as a haggard middle-aged warlock and enters Hell Valley to investigate.

Character developments

• Yin Ming shows himself to be pragmatic and wary. He wants resources but rejects reckless, destructive plunder; he also avoids confronting unknown threats before assessing them.
• He is troubled by the possibility that his actions have brought disaster to other factions, though he recognizes that he cannot shoulder responsibility for the Source Plane’s collapse.
• Tree Ancestor Sadi is not seen directly, but the Green Forest’s expansion raises the possibility that he has grown powerful enough to threaten Yin Ming.

Significant themes

• Decline and disorder: As the Age of Dharma Decline nears, weakening oversight allows war, exploitation, and supernatural predation to spread.
• Resource acquisition and ethics: The chapter contrasts productive resource gathering, exploitative trade, and violent plunder, emphasizing the wider damage caused by predatory methods.
• Limits of responsibility: Yin Ming understands the suffering around him but doubts that intervening can meaningfully change the outcome—and fears others would simply claim the rewards.
• Power and caution: Even great strength does not remove vulnerability, so Yin Ming chooses information-gathering and disguise over a direct confrontation.

Character interactions

• Yin Ming recalls the terms of his agreement with the Flame-Burners Association: its surviving council speakers owe him access to their discoveries and half the resources, with his choice of what to take.
• His brief observation of the Landon Duchy’s war reveals the relationship between ordinary casualties and the opportunistic Extraordinaries and Demons exploiting them.
• He avoids engaging the demons and proceeds to Hell Valley, where he hopes to assess the Green Forest and Sadi’s power before approaching the faction directly.

Plot points and events

• Yin Ming returns to Hell Valley and finds it orderly and thriving under Tree Ancestor Sadi’s rule. The New Flame-Burners Association has grown, and its Wizard Laboratory and Red Maple Valley have expanded their work.
• After joining the association, Yin heads to Red Maple Valley, now a restricted production site where Demon remains are processed into fertilizer.
• He sends Klee Gler a First-Ring Bloodline Potion as a way to gain access. Before revealing himself, Yin uses an Awe Spell to destroy nearby tree spirits that might be listening.
• Klee initially fails to recognize him and warns that he may keep the potion if he cannot help. When Yin reveals his identity as Scholar Eno, Klee is genuinely delighted to see him alive.
• Klee recounts that he and President Robert Kava left the God Era Ruins early, avoiding the battle that destroyed the plane. Because Yin was absent, they could not negotiate with Sadi as planned. They later learned Yin had only invoked Sadi’s name to pressure his descendants; Sadi himself had known nothing about the ruins.
• Klee and the others nevertheless handed Sadi the knowledge they had recovered and half their resources. Sadi was so surprised that his giant banyan body shook for days. Yin wonders why they would pay a debt no one had demanded, then asks whether Sadi used the resources to reach Fourth Ring. The chapter ends before Klee answers.

Character developments

• Yin Ming remains cautious and strategic, using a valuable potion to secure entry and eliminating possible eavesdroppers before talking openly. He is also surprised by the group’s honesty and recognizes his own part in the situation.
• Klee Gler is shown as loyal, forthright, and emotionally attached to Yin. His happiness at Yin’s return is genuine, and he freely recounts how the group honored the supposed agreement despite discovering the truth behind it.
• Tree Ancestor Sadi emerges as a powerful but knowledge-hungry figure whose authority has helped the valley prosper. His reaction to the unexpected tribute reveals that he had not known of Yin’s earlier dealings.

Significant themes

• Honesty and integrity: Klee and his companions honor an agreement even when they could have avoided doing so.
• Trust and debt: Yin reflects on the rarity of repaying an obligation when no one is enforcing it.
• Pragmatism and caution: Yin uses resources, disguises, and secrecy to navigate a potentially dangerous return.
• Knowledge and power: Sadi’s growing influence is paired with a strong appetite for learning, while the recovered knowledge and resources reshape the valley.

Character interactions

• Yin’s polite exchange with the association’s recruiter shows how the organization has adapted to attract and retain members.
• His guarded approach to Red Maple Valley contrasts with Klee’s warm welcome once they recognize one another.
• Their reunion is grounded in shared history: Klee once served as Yin’s mount, and Yin previously protected him and allowed him to keep valuable materials.
• Klee’s account of the tribute leaves Yin impressed—and uneasy—about the group’s sense of obligation.

Key plot points and events

• Klee Gler tells Yin Ming that Tree Ancestor Sadi seized the Flame-Burners Association’s knowledge, resources, and leadership after taking control of Green Forest. The association’s members are bound to serve him, and forest-fire precautions make it difficult to threaten him.
• Klee advises Yin Ming to get the Beast God Cult’s excavated knowledge from President Robert Kava and leave before Sadi notices. Yin Ming instead flies directly to Green Forest’s center, intending to claim the knowledge himself.
• Yin Ming sees Sadi’s enormous banyan tree and uses his Yin Spirit to investigate. He discovers that Sadi’s true body is hidden inside the trunk, while the tree manifests the Bloodline Origin Ancestral Talisman. Sadi is at the peak of the Third Ring and may soon reach the Fourth.
• When Sadi approaches, Yin Ming launches an immediate attack, combining Undead Possession with the Fourth Ring spell Moon Bind. Sadi withdraws his consciousness and raises a powerful Life Domain that bends and weakens the strike, though it damages the tree.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming is confident and determined to take what he needs, despite Klee’s warnings. He sees Green Forest as strategically valuable for securing the clan’s ancestral talisman, the ruins’ knowledge, and access to extraordinary beast blood.
• Klee Gler remains resentful of Sadi’s rule and the decades of unpaid work it imposes, but accepts that the forest is safer and more organized under Sadi.
• Sadi is revealed as much closer to Fourth Ring advancement than Klee believes. He initially treats Yin Ming politely, but reacts quickly when he senses the threat.

Significant themes

• Power and control: Sadi has turned the association and forest into instruments for developing his clan and knowledge.
• Pragmatism over past grievances: Yin Ming’s plans are driven less by revenge than by resources and strategic advantage.
• Advancement and preparation: Sadi’s vast tree form and developing domain show how he is accumulating the power needed to break through to the Fourth Ring.

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming creates his own Fourth-Ring Undead Domain, using the White-Bone Soul Banner to overlap part of the Undead Space with the living world.
• Tree Ancestor Sadi recognizes him as the “arsonist” from their earlier encounter. Disbelieving that Yin Ming has advanced so quickly, Sadi attacks with life-charged vines.
• The Undead Domain withers the vines, but their explosion releases a cloud of living Rotspirit Tree Fungus—transcendent microorganisms Sadi cultivated. Yin Ming identifies the strain, collects samples, and considers how such organisms might be developed into a weapon against lower-level transcendents.
• Yin Ming’s Seventh-Ring Undead Skeleton tears apart Sadi’s giant banyan form, destroying his Pseudo-Domain and exposing his true body, a Third-Ring Twisted Treant.
• Sadi pleads for his life by citing his work as a Warlock Alliance potion maker. Yin Ming assures him he will not let him die, then fires Moon Bind at Sadi’s Tree Heart. The chapter ends before the outcome is shown.

Character developments

• Yin Ming demonstrates his growing power and tactical restraint: he avoids using a conspicuous Seventh-Ring technique until the end, mindful that the Wizard Black Tower could detect it. He also treats Sadi as a source of valuable knowledge rather than merely an enemy to kill.
• Sadi shifts from arrogant disbelief and aggression to panic once his domain and giant-tree body are destroyed.

Significant themes

• Power and concealment: Yin Ming balances overwhelming force with caution about attracting attention.
• Knowledge as a resource: He values expertise and research alongside tangible spoils, and sees Sadi’s biological experiments as potentially useful.
• Weaponizing science: The Rotspirit fungus suggests that threats to a faction’s lower ranks could be more devastating than a weapon aimed only at powerful individuals.
• Debts and reciprocity: Yin Ming frames his past exchanges with Sadi as a chain of favors, though his final attack complicates how sincere that framing is.

Character interactions

Yin Ming and Sadi’s earlier dealings shape their confrontation: Sadi recognizes Yin Ming from the old timber dispute, while Yin Ming recalls Sadi’s connection to the Golden Sore Medicine formula. Their exchange turns from Sadi’s accusations and threats to his plea for mercy—and Yin Ming’s reassuring words immediately before he strikes.

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming kills Tree Ancestor Sadi by shattering his Tree Heart with Moon Bind. Before Sadi’s body has fully cooled, Yin Ming collects his True Blood and takes control of the Twisted Treants’ Bloodline Origin Ancestral Talisman.
• To preserve Sadi’s expertise and usefulness, Yin Ming uses the White-Bone Soul Banner’s Rebirth ability to restore him as an undead. Unlike ordinary Undead Revival, Rebirth preserves the deceased’s memories.
• Yin Ming then brands Sadi with Undead Enslavement, giving him control over Sadi’s life and actions, though not his thoughts.
• Sadi awakens resentful and questions why Yin Ming killed and revived him. Yin Ming argues that Sadi’s research has potential, criticizes his narrow approach to Transcendent Microorganisms, and claims that learning under him could eventually earn Sadi’s freedom.
• Yin Ming grants Sadi a small share of the Twisted Treants’ ancestral runes, while retaining control of most of the talisman.

Character developments

• Yin Ming proves willing to kill someone he values if doing so helps secure control, then revive and enslave them rather than discard their talents. He sees exceptional, creative minds as valuable resources.
• Sadi returns as an undead, retaining his memories and personality. He is hostile and humiliated, but Yin Ming’s critique unsettles him because he recognizes some truth in it.
• Yin Ming and Sadi’s relationship shifts from apparent cooperation to a master–subordinate arrangement built on coercion, with the possibility of future freedom dangled as an incentive.

Significant themes

• Resurrection and identity: Rebirth restores memories and a recognizable self, raising the question of whether an undead copy is truly the same person.
• Control versus freedom: Sadi’s body and actions are bound, but his mind remains his own; Yin Ming seeks to motivate him rather than rely on obedience alone.
• Talent as a resource: Yin Ming treats gifted innovators as too valuable to waste, even when preserving them requires killing and enslaving them.
• Power and persuasion: Yin Ming combines magical domination with pointed criticism and promises, attempting to turn resentment into ambition.

Character interactions

• Sadi’s final accusing gaze reflects his sense of betrayal: Yin Ming had promised not to let him die, yet killed him.
• After reviving Sadi, Yin Ming defends his choice by praising Sadi’s potential while bluntly condemning his stalled research and lack of progress.
• Sadi challenges the value of working without freedom. Yin Ming counters that Sadi can learn and grow—and perhaps regain freedom if his future contributions warrant it.

Chapter Summary: Blood Ancestor Origins

Key Plot Points

• Yin Ming condenses a blood crystal infused with a portion of the Bloodline Origin Ancestral Talisman and offers it to Tree Ancestor Sadi.
• Sadi accepts, and the talisman merges with him, restoring the giant banyan tree that had been destroyed by the Seventh-Ring Undead Skeleton. The Green Forest's tree network is rebuilt.
• Sensing danger, dozens of Second-Ring Twisted Treants gather to attack the Undead Domain. Yin Ming refrains from harming them, restrains the death aura, and then conceals himself with the Myriad Transformations Talent, withdrawing the Netherworld.
• Sadi dismisses the treants, claiming he had "hired" the wizard to experience a Fourth-Ring Domain. No turmoil erupts, but power has secretly changed hands.
• Sadi invites Yin Ming into a hidden library inside his trunk. They discuss terms.
• Yin Ming receives the Beast God Cult knowledge and research results as "interest" for the occupation of Hell Valley, and gains control over the Green Forest while letting Sadi manage it.
• Sadi agrees to purchase True Blood and potion materials from the Warlock Alliance, but only up to Third-Ring materials.
• Yin Ming discovers that Divine Era Extraordinary Magic Beasts had no rank system and no True-Name Totem Runes; the Beast God's power resembles a prototype of the Bloodline Origin Ancestral Talisman.

Character Developments

• Yin Ming: Now a Fourth-Ring Wizard, he consolidates his power by quietly subjugating Sadi and the Green Forest, turning a loss (Hell Valley) into a strategic resource-gathering base. He also gains deep insight into the origins of bloodline runes.
• Sadi: A powerful Third-Ring Tree Ancestor whose survival instinct outweighs his pride. He submits to Yin Ming's authority while desperately preserving his dignity. He rationalizes his subservience by noting Yin Ming's rapid rise from First Ring to Fourth Ring.
• Twisted Treants: Remain loyal to Sadi, unaware that their clan has effectively been annexed by Yin Ming.

Significant Themes

• Power and Submission: Sadi yields not to force alone, but to Yin Ming's undeniable growth and potential. The weak submit to the strong; the strong submit only to the unreachable.
• Origin and Evolution: Yin Ming reflects on the nature of runes and origin species, concluding that even "first-born" beings must evolve from weak to strong. The Beast God's power is revealed as an early form of the Bloodline Origin Ancestral Talisman.
• Knowledge as Currency: The Beast God Cult's research and Yin Ming's own understanding are treated as valuable spoils, shaping future power.
• Pragmatic Domination: Yin Ming imposes simple, reasonable prohibitions rather than cruel control—ensuring compliance while minimizing resistance.

Character Interactions

• Yin Ming and Sadi: A tense negotiation wrapped in Sadi's cold façade. Yin Ming issues terms; Sadi internally acknowledges his helplessness but bargains for small concessions. Their history (first meeting as First-Ring versus Fourth-Ring) underscores the power shift.
• Sadi and the Twisted Treants: Sadi lies to maintain his authority, preventing panic and preserving the clan's stability.
• Yin Ming and the Treants: He deliberately spares them, recognizing them as future resources for bloodline power.

Yin Ming studies the Beast God Cult’s recovered books and experimental records, quickly sorting their contents into historical intelligence and practical knowledge. He identifies the cult’s blood-sacrifice ritual as an early form of the True-Name Totem Rune, while its beast-specific Sacrificial Dances appear to be prototypes of the Bloodline Origin Ancestral Talisman.
Using his Four-Phase Thought Model and the True Mirror in his Sea of Consciousness, Yin Ming reconstructs fragments of the Wizard World’s past. He concludes that Extraordinary Magic Beasts in the God Era could not advance beyond Third Ring without cultivation, and that someone deliberately filled them with inherited but useless knowledge, preventing them from developing further. This kept them from uniting into a power that could challenge humanity. The Bloodline Origin Ancestral Talisman, meanwhile, seems to have been held mainly by humans or other non-beast powers; the one genuine beast who possessed it, Tree Ancestor Sadi, is effectively under the Warlock Alliance’s control.
From these clues, Yin Ming infers that a powerful civilization once reshaped the Wizard World after the God Era. Runes appeared, warlocks emerged, and the Formless Tree may have been cultivated during this turning point. The civilization’s records were deliberately erased, leaving it as a hidden civilization.
Yin Ming treats historical deduction as both research and cultivation: it improves his Fate Studies, refines his thought model, and strengthens his Yin Soul. He records his conclusions in Conjecture on the History of the Wizard World, Volume One, then turns to organizing the practical knowledge from the ruins.
Character development: Yin Ming grows more confident as a historian and Fate scholar, connecting scattered evidence into a theory about humanity’s rise and the suppression of extraordinary beasts. His deductions resolve some mysteries but leave him aware that much remains unknown.
Key themes: The power of history and inference; knowledge as a tool of control; the costs of preventing potential rivals from advancing; and the idea that intellectual inquiry can itself be a form of cultivation.
Character interactions: There are no direct conversations in this chapter. Yin Ming’s main “interactions” are with the books, records, and historical figures and institutions he reconstructs—especially the Beast God, the Warlock Alliance, Tree Ancestor Sadi, and the unknown civilization behind the Wizard World’s transformation.

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming continues developing the Eight-Nine Mystical Art while studying bloodlines, rituals, and Sadi’s research. He learns to create True-Name Totem Runes and Bloodline Origin Ancestral Talismans.
• Seeking a new transcendent species, Yin Ming decides that creating humans—specifically Celestial Humans—is more practical than inventing a new Extraordinary Magic Beast. He reasons that Abyss Demons may once have been a form of transcendent humanity.
• Using the Formless Tree, he grows bark bearing human faces, then combines its bloodline properties with the aura of a “moon” Law Fragment, Extraordinary Magic Beast blood, and other ingredients.
• After many failed attempts, Yin Ming produces the Lich Potion, a formula the Scavenger Gourd cannot guarantee will succeed. It transforms the drinker into a new intelligent species with a frail body, powerful soul, affinity for Undead Miasma, and the ability to revive while its Life Bone remains intact.

Character developments

• Yin Ming advances from studying bloodline techniques to applying them experimentally. He shows patience and resourcefulness through repeated failures, and takes an ambitious step toward creating a new species.
• Tree Ancestor Sadi continues cultivating his kind and researching Transcendent Microorganisms, while supporting Yin Ming with experimental data and Demon corpses.

Significant themes

• Creation and transformation: Bloodlines, magic plants, and ritual knowledge can be used to design entirely new forms of life.
• Experimentation and uncertainty: Even with powerful tools and extensive knowledge, biological creation remains unpredictable and requires persistence.
• The nature of humanity: The chapter challenges the boundary between humans, Celestial Humans, and Abyss Demons, suggesting that species identities can change over time.
• Life, death, and survival: The Lich Potion offers a form of immortality, but through a fragile body and dependence on an intact Life Bone.

Character interactions

• Sadi supports Yin Ming’s work by supplying research findings and Demon remains for Soul Crystal extraction.
• Yin Ming’s relationship with the Formless Tree is practical and experimental: he harvests its bark and uses its properties as the basis for the Lich Potion.
• Yin Ming reflects on absent figures—especially Wuxiang Watson and the Mother of All Snakes—as potential sources of valuable human bloodline samples.

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming plans to use fragments of the Undying Moon Law to unite the Undead Race, seeing it as a way to compete for power on a far larger scale than simply creating a new extraordinary species. He considers two possible routes: dominate other races through overwhelming strength, or unify them all—an ambition that would require defeating the Abyss and establishing the Six Paths of Reincarnation.
• After refining and documenting the first Lich Transformation Potion, Yin Ming quickly produces 137 more bottles. The 138 potions can transform candidates into Liches, whose souls and Moon Law affinity give them the potential to reach the Fourth Ring and supply the bloodline power needed to create a Bloodline Origin Ancestral Talisman.
• Yin Ming leaves his seclusion to find candidates, especially wizards, for the new race. Before departing, he examines Sadi’s cultivated Rotten Tree Fungus. It can rapidly consume and corrode a low-level extraordinary host, but Yin Ming advises making it less toxic so hosts survive longer and spread the fungus more widely.
• Yin Ming’s many competing projects are outlined, from developing his own sorcery and bloodline techniques to pursuing the distant goals of overthrowing the Abyss and the Wizard Black Tower.
• Using the Fate Dice to locate an auspicious destination, Yin Ming travels to the royal capital of the Landon Duchy. There, a month-long war has been engineered to harvest resources: a Blood Demon warlock refines the knights’ blood into crystals, while Abyss Demons collect the souls of the dead. Once enough blood has been gathered, the war’s supernatural force is withdrawn and the exhausted defenders collapse.
• Seeing the mass slaughter, Ember compares the victims to crops harvested in the Tribal Era. Yin Ming responds that the strong prey on the weak, and that humanity’s position could reverse once people of the Origin Plane grow powerful enough.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming emerges as a deliberate, ambitious strategist rather than an impulsive experimenter. He accepts risk only when the potential reward is substantial, and treats the war’s horrors with cold pragmatism.
• Sadi presents his fungal research for Yin Ming’s assessment. Yin Ming gives him a practical adjustment but leaves the further work to him.
• Ember reacts with sorrow and moral unease to the war’s exploitation of ordinary people. Yin Ming counters with a bleak view of power and social order.

Significant themes

• Power and exploitation: The war turns blood, bodies, and souls into resources; Yin Ming views this as an expression of the strong preying on the weak.
• Ambition and risk: Yin Ming’s race-building plan is motivated by the belief that danger is worthwhile only when the possible gains justify it.
• Life, death, and division: The Undead Race could help establish a boundary between living and dead, but doing so ultimately requires confronting the Abyss and creating reincarnation.
• Overwhelming workload: Yin Ming’s rapid rise has left him with more urgent projects and long-term ambitions than he can easily manage.

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming concludes that his and Norman Martin’s convictions are too deeply rooted to change, but their ideals can coexist. Yin Ming needs to build a people or school to gain the knowledge required to advance his theories and reach High Rank.
• As Landon Duchy’s capital falls, Yin Ming searches the city and finds Ediye Pitt, an elderly scholar who risks his life to rescue and read books rather than flee.
• Yin Ming offers Ediye a chance at endless life and more time to pursue knowledge. Ediye accepts without hesitation.
• Yin Ming refines Ediye and takes him to the Scavenger Gourd’s inner space, which can now shelter the Undead Clan while they remain hidden from the Wizard Black Tower’s watch.
• Ediye drinks a Black Lich Bloodline Potion. During his transformation, Yin Ming plants a Demon Seed shaped from Ediye’s passion for knowledge, intending to make the pursuit of knowledge a Lich’s enduring instinct.
• Ediye completes his transformation into a Lich, releasing dense Undead Miasma.

Character developments

• Yin Ming shows himself as both a visionary and a deliberate creator: he wants the Undead to be a purposeful people devoted to developing cultivation, not merely a source of bloodline power. He also acts cautiously, keeping them concealed while the Wizard Black Tower still holds influence.
• Ediye Pitt proves that his love of learning outweighs fear and self-preservation. He willingly trades his mortal body for a long life devoted to study, becoming the first example of Yin Ming’s intended knowledge-seeking Liches.

Character interactions

• Yin Ming recognizes Ediye’s commitment when he finds him reading amid the burning palace and offers him immortality.
• Ediye accepts the offer immediately, trusting that survival will let him continue learning.
• Yin Ming then uses the Demon Planting ritual to preserve and strengthen Ediye’s obsession, shaping his new existence according to Yin Ming’s vision.

Significant themes

• Conviction and purpose: Deeply held ideals cannot easily be changed, but different convictions can still coexist.
• Knowledge versus survival: Ediye chooses learning over escape, while Yin Ming seeks a people who will devote their long lives to knowledge.
• Creation and responsibility: Yin Ming argues that a created species should have a meaningful purpose, not merely serve its creator as a tool.
• The cost of immortality: Ediye gains long life through a transformation that strips away his mortal body and binds his soul to Undead existence.
• Control and identity: By planting Ediye’s passion as a Demon Seed, Yin Ming turns a personal desire into an engineered, lasting instinct.

Key plot points and events

• Ediye Pitt awakens as the first Lich: an undead, knowledge-hungry being made from his soul, remains, a Demon Seed, Undead Miasma, and a fragment of the “moon” Law. He has no inherited memories or innate instruction, so he must learn to control his new body himself.
• Yin Ming gives Pitt a cultivation method and foundational knowledge, including how to strengthen Soul Fire with Undead Miasma and preserve himself by refining his Life Bone. He promises to provide deeper teachings as Pitt advances.
• With the Scavenger Gourd refining contaminated Undead Miasma, Pitt advances rapidly. Yin Ming explains that later Liches may benefit from a True-Name Totem Rune, but deliberately leaves them room to learn and develop independently.
• Yin Ming searches a war-torn Origin Plane for suitable candidates and gives them Lich Bloodline Potions, adding more Liches to the Gourd Space.
• After two months, Yin Ming has distributed all the potions. Pitt has reached the peak of Third Ring, though the Gourd has twice removed contamination from him, costing him his memories. Yin Ming restores those memories through Divine Sense inheritance.
• Pitt begins forming a primordial spirit: his Soul Fire gathers into a hazy Divine Essence body that gradually takes shape as a Yin Spirit.

Character developments

• Ediye Pitt shifts from a disoriented, speechless newborn Lich into a highly advanced cultivator, driven by an intense hunger for knowledge. His rapid growth brings an uncertain change in identity: he retains memories of being a professor, but may experience them as someone else’s life.
• Yin Ming acts as creator, teacher, and recruiter. He supports the Liches’ growth while choosing not to eliminate every obstacle, valuing their potential for independent research.
• The new Liches are introduced as future scholars and sources of research and computing power, though their individual stories are not yet developed.

Significant themes

• Knowledge and power: Liches are defined by their pursuit of knowledge, and cultivation makes learning faster and more effective.
• Identity and memory: Pitt’s memories survive repeated soul-cleansing, but whether they remain truly his is left unresolved.
• Immortality and its cost: The Lich’s enduring life depends on its Life Bone, yet the transformation strips away ordinary human pleasures and risks loss of self.
• Growth through effort: Yin Ming provides tools and instruction but leaves Liches to cultivate and advance on their own.
• Crisis as opportunity: Widespread war and elemental depletion create turmoil, while also allowing Yin Ming to find candidates suited to transformation.

Character interactions

• Yin Ming teaches Pitt directly, transferring knowledge through Divine Sense and promising further instruction at each stage of advancement.
• Pitt responds immediately with eager study and cultivation, embodying the Lich’s instinctive fascination with unfamiliar knowledge.
• Yin Ming entrusts Ember with the remaining Lich teachings and uses the Scavenger Gourd to refine miasma and restore Pitt’s memories, though the restoration leaves Pitt’s sense of self uncertain.

Plot points and events

• Yin Ming observes Ediye Pitt complete the first Lich’s breakthrough to the Fourth Ring, giving him a model for creating the Lich race.
• He wipes the memories of 138 Liches in the Scavenger Gourd, leaving their basic instincts intact so he can rebuild their inherited knowledge.
• Over the next half month, he creates a Fourth Ring True-Name Totem Rune and a Bloodline Origin Ancestral Talisman. Unlike other extraordinary beasts, Liches develop through a transformation ritual, with their runes bound to their Life Bones, Yin Spirits, and Soul Fire.
• Yin Ming establishes the Liches as a new extraordinary race, giving them foundational knowledge while arranging for them to develop and exchange further knowledge through offerings to Ember. He keeps the race hidden, wary of provoking the Wizard Black Tower, Warlock Alliance, or Abyss.
• Yin Ming returns to Green Forest to cultivate, while Ember maintains the Liches. Yin Ming occasionally introduces books to stimulate discovery and competition among them.
• Meanwhile, the Origin plane’s elemental energy declines, unrest spreads, and the deaths of native humans strengthen Humanity’s Karmic Fire Curse.
• Ember questions Yin Ming’s apparent inaction as the End of Dharma and the curse threaten the Origin plane. Yin Ming admits he has no solution yet, but argues that the crisis distracts major powers and may benefit him. He also suggests the Liches, made from local natives, could preserve a “Civilization Fire Seed.”

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming shifts from studying a single Lich’s breakthrough to founding an entire race and knowledge-producing system. He remains cautious and politically shrewd, choosing concealment over immediate use of his creation.
• Ember, the Scavenger Gourd’s spirit, continues supporting the Liches but becomes concerned by Yin Ming’s calm response to the looming catastrophe. Their exchange reveals a difference in priorities: Ember worries about preserving civilization, while Yin Ming considers how the crisis affects his own position.
• The Liches are made dependent on Yin Ming’s controlled knowledge system. Their ambition and competition are deliberately cultivated, even as Yin Ming treats their development with a mixture of strategic interest and amusement.

Significant themes

• Knowledge, labor, and control: Yin Ming turns the Liches into a workforce that produces knowledge, while controlling what they know and what they must trade to learn more.
• Power and established systems: A lone genius may be suppressed, but a new race or intellectual system could challenge entrenched powers—and risk being branded heretical.
• Civilization and survival: The chapter contrasts the impending collapse of the Origin plane with Yin Ming’s attempt to preserve a potential seed of future civilization.
• Self-interest versus responsibility: Yin Ming’s willingness to let the crisis proceed raises questions about whether preserving a civilization means saving its people, its knowledge, or merely a surviving remnant.