Chapter Summaries

Chapter Summary

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming decides to build a Divine Kingdom using his mastery of the undying law. He initially considers harvesting dead souls without believers, but realizes faith is the most practical way for a Divine Kingdom to identify and receive its followers.
• He constructs the Undying Divine Kingdom in a single day. Unlike the luxurious afterlives built by other gods, it is deliberately bleak and minimalist: barren land, rubble and bones, a dim red sun, a pale moon, and harsh weather. Its undead inhabitants will need neither physical comforts nor simulated senses.
• Yin Ming then considers how to gain believers. Most planes are already controlled by gods, while the Source Plane has little living population. He concludes that the Abyss’s demons offer the best opportunity: they can be invaded, and their realm is vulnerable.
• He retrieves Soulstones supplied by the Monkey Quasit tribe, whose members have prospered in the Abyss by ambushing demon lords and sharing their survival manual. Yin Ming prepares to summon demons, using his knowledge of alchemy to make a permanent summoning array without needing fresh magical-beast blood.

Character developments

• Yin Ming shifts from trying to bypass the believer requirement to accepting that he must establish a faith. His practical, no-frills outlook shapes both his Divine Kingdom and his plans for expansion.
• He feels some embarrassment about exploiting demons once again, since their contributions helped him rise in power, but decides it is necessary to advance his greater goal of constructing the Netherworld.
• The Dark Dragon is briefly shown refining faith into divine power and transforming from the Sixth Ring to the Seventh Ring.

Significant themes

• Faith as the basis of divine power: A Divine Kingdom depends on believers, making preaching and political access essential as well as magical mastery.
• Pragmatism over idealism: Yin Ming rejects elaborate heavenly comforts in favor of a functional, austere kingdom suited to undead.
• Expansion and exploitation: His ambitions rely on finding openings in other realms and using demon conflicts to his advantage.
• Resourcefulness and adaptation: When conventional routes to gaining followers are blocked, Yin Ming looks for a vulnerable target and repurposes existing resources.

Character interactions

• Yin Ming deliberately leaves the Dark Dragon undisturbed while it undergoes its transformation.
• He reflects on his long-running relationship with Abyss Demons, acknowledging their past contributions while preparing to manipulate their realm again.
• The Monkey Quasits’ success in the Abyss—despite losses—provides Yin Ming with Soulstones and demonstrates how effectively they have learned to survive there.

Plot points and events

• Yin Ming uses a demon’s token to summon Red Nose, but the spell is hijacked by a Third-Ring war demon working for Demon King Pasdi. The demon demands Yin Ming’s resources as compensation for the supposed offense.
• The war demon reveals that Red Nose’s refusal is connected to the Abyss Survival Manual, whose latest edition apparently discourages demons from answering even token-backed summons. Yin Ming suspects Pasdi’s faction is using powerful demons to eliminate potential threats.
• Rather than submit, Yin Ming immobilizes the demon with a Fourth-Ring Soul-Calming Seal, strengthens the summoning array, and forcibly brings the phantom to the Source Plane. He kills it with a precise strike and captures its soul with the White-Bone Soul Banner.
• Yin Ming then summons Red Nose, first damaging its soul to ensure it cannot refuse. Red Nose arrives, reports that it has collected ten thousand Soul Crystals, and explains that it invested in Abyss Publishing, which sold the manual. It says other quasits wrote the book and that it later sought Pasdi’s protection after the business grew too profitable.
• Red Nose reveals that its initial investment came from loot taken from the treasury of the succubus Aman, after Aman was killed by a mysterious person.

Character development

• Yin Ming demonstrates formidable power and a ruthless, resource-conscious approach: even a dangerous demon is quickly subdued, killed, and harvested for its soul. He is also curious about how Red Nose became involved in Abyss Publishing.
• Red Nose has become an ambitious entrepreneur who invested in a successful publishing venture and sought powerful protection when its profits attracted danger. It remains cautious and deferential toward Yin Ming.
• The war demon begins arrogantly, but quickly realizes Yin Ming vastly outranks it and dies in fear and regret.

Character interactions

• The war demon threatens Yin Ming and offers him a place in Pasdi’s organization; Yin Ming responds by overpowering and killing it.
• Red Nose greets Yin Ming respectfully and begins explaining its missed meeting and accumulated Soul Crystals. Yin Ming interrupts to question its connection to the survival manual, prompting Red Nose to disclose its business dealings and source of funds.

Significant themes

• Power and vulnerability: Even a modest summoning can become a threat, but overwhelming strength can reverse the situation instantly.
• Pragmatism and control: Yin Ming treats summoning, combat, and even death as processes to manage efficiently.
• Risk, profit, and protection: Red Nose’s success brings both wealth and exposure, forcing it to seek a patron.
• Unexpected consequences: Yin Ming’s earlier advice and the growth of a survival manual have produced a publishing enterprise with ties to a Demon King.

Plot and key events

• Yin Ming reflects on how unfairly little he gained from killing the succubus Aman, compared with the wealth a quasit has apparently earned through Backstab. He concludes that some people simply aren’t destined for easy riches.
• Recognizing that Red Nose owns Abyss Publishing, Yin Ming gives him the remaining quasit Soulstones and assigns him to summon demons, with a warning beforehand—using the Soulstone Verifier to communicate.
• While Red Nose works, Yin Ming drafts the Undying God Cult’s doctrines. He keeps them deliberately simple, designed to spread faith quickly rather than deeply indoctrinate believers. He plans to use portraits of Undying Xuanming instead of statues, with the god’s appearance serving as the divine image’s Source Core.
• Once the demons are gathered, Yin Ming tells the monkey quasits that the previous offer to exchange ten thousand Soul Crystals for freedom is over. They can still reclaim their Soulstones by providing value.
• His new task: spread the cult’s doctrines across the planes. The quasits are alarmed at being asked to proselytize, since demons are usually enemies of religious faiths. Yin Ming clarifies that they need only print and circulate the material—not establish religious organizations or personally cultivate believers.
• With Red Fifteen’s suggestion, Yin Ming allows them to hire other demons. He sets an initial target of reaching one hundred million intelligent beings and promises to return their Soulstones if they succeed.
• Red Nose asks what the doctrines are. Yin Ming presents a single sheet of yellow paper bearing Undying Xuanming’s image and forbids any changes to its contents.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming remains pragmatic and calculating: he strips religion down to its most efficient form and turns the quasits’ desire for freedom into a mass-distribution campaign. He also delegates work to Red Nose rather than doing it himself.
• Red Nose is an experienced, responsive assistant. He follows Yin Ming’s instructions, recognizes the need to clarify the assignment, and helps establish the cult’s publishing effort.
• Red Fifteen shows initiative by asking whether the quasits may hire help and how large the target is, prompting Yin Ming to create a plan suited to their limited strength.
• The monkey quasits shift from dread and disbelief to cautious hope once they learn the task is distributing a simple document and that success will earn back their Soulstones.

Significant themes

• Power and coercion: Yin Ming motivates the quasits by controlling their Soulstones and tying freedom to service.
• Pragmatic belief and mass communication: The cult’s doctrines are designed for reach and faith production, not theological depth.
• Dark comedy and irony: Demons are tasked with spreading a religion, and the “doctrine” turns out to be one sheet of paper.
• Fate and unequal fortune: Yin Ming’s opening reflections contrast lucky windfalls with the slow, difficult work of building resources.

Plot points and events

• Yin Ming gives the Monkey Quasits a one-page doctrine and orders them to spread the Undying faith across the planes, setting a target of one hundred million believers.
• The Quasits devise a decentralized plan using Abyss Publishing’s branches and resources. They will recruit separately, avoid gathering in one place, and use demon-bloodline descendants to distribute the leaflets.
• Yin Ming approves the plan and sends them back to the Abyss. He then begins designing the third refinement of the White-Bone Soul Banner, which he intends to make the anchor of his religion and his dominion over the Netherworld.
• After half a month of meditation and blueprint work, Yin Ming senses that the first believers have appeared. Their faith becomes a Holy Spirit Mark on each believer’s soul, rather than power he absorbs directly.
• The chapter ends in the Vic Plane, where Duke Georges Maiga learns that his son Charles has joined the Undying Church. He reads its blunt promise: “Those who believe in me shall receive eternal life!!”

Character developments

• Yin Ming is confident that the doctrine’s promise and broad distribution will attract believers across many planes. He delegates the practical work to the Quasits, then turns to careful preparation of his divine treasure.
• The Monkey Quasits show initiative and experience, developing a practical strategy that lets them cooperate while minimizing the risk of being caught together.
• Georges Maiga is introduced as a powerful, skeptical nobleman, while his son Charles’s involvement in the secret society hints at a possible family conflict.

Significant themes

• Faith as a response to mortality: The Undying Church appeals to the universal desire to live, making it potentially persuasive even where believers are few.
• Religion as organized influence: The chapter presents faith as something that can be spread strategically through simple messaging, networks, and institutions.
• Delegation and resilience: The Quasits’ distributed approach ensures that the mission can continue even if one member is discovered.
• Preparation for power: Yin Ming’s work on the White-Bone Soul Banner links the spread of his religion to his larger ambition to rule the Netherworld.

Character interactions

• Yin Ming gives the Quasits a demanding goal but leaves the logistics to them; they respond by presenting a detailed plan, which he approves.
• The Quasits discuss how to share work safely, drawing on Abyss Publishing’s infrastructure and each other’s strengths.
• At the close, Georges questions his butler about Charles’s secretive behavior. The butler explains that Charles has joined the Undying Church and shows him its doctrine.

Plot points and events

• Near death, elderly Duke Georges Maiga becomes fixated on the promise of “eternal life” in the Undying Doctrine, despite initially dismissing its god as an obscure evil deity.
• He secretly retrieves the crumpled pamphlet and performs its simple sacrificial ritual. His longing produces a small amount of faith, which Yin Ming uses to place a Holy Spirit Mark on Georges’s soul.
• Georges feels the pull of another realm and recognizes it as resembling the Dawn Church’s account of a Divine Kingdom summons. He interprets this as proof that he may be unusually devout.
• Reading the pamphlet’s fine print, he learns that believers can enter the Undying Divine Kingdom, while recruiting more followers promises stronger blessings and higher status after death.
• Georges resolves to spread the faith, even if the Dawn Church brands him a heretic and sends Holy Knights after him.

Character developments and interactions

• Georges shifts from skeptical contempt to secret worship, driven by fear of death and a desire to preserve his power and privilege. He assumes eternal life will let him continue enjoying luxury and commanding others.
• Yin Ming is revealed as an opportunistic god: anyone who worships once can receive an invitation to his Divine Kingdom, regardless of how sincere or spiritually suitable they are.
• Georges dismisses his butler’s apparent devotion to the new faith, then privately embraces the very doctrine he condemned. The Dawn Church remains a looming rival whose authority Georges is now willing to defy.

Significant themes

• Fear of mortality: Power and pleasure cannot shield Georges from aging, and the prospect of death overturns his judgment.
• Religious manipulation and fine print: The promise of “eternal life” is technically true, but its meaning is narrower than Georges imagines; benefits depend on recruitment and long delays.
• Status and ambition: Even beyond death, Georges wants rank and strength, treating the afterlife as another hierarchy to conquer.
• Predatory faith: Yin Ming’s indiscriminate invitations and the pamphlet’s recruitment tiers portray belief as a system for harvesting followers and expanding influence.

Plot and key events

• Yin Ming prepares to reforge the White-Bone Soul Banner as the core of a Netherworld in the Dark Plane.
• He replaces the law imprint sustaining his only Seventh-Ring undead—the Chaos Undead formed from Lady White Moon’s remnant soul—with an Undying Law imprint. The undead nearly disintegrates, but Yin Ming repairs its soul fire using power from the Undead Factory.
• He repurposes a Twin Dragon Egg lent by the Dark Dragon, removing its spiritual essence and embedding its pattern in the banner. The egg lets the banner draw baleful energy from the Dark Plane.
• Yin Ming converts that energy into blighted undead miasma. The Elemental Plane rejects the banner’s new energy, but the Undead Domain protects it, and the undead workers adapt well to the miasma.
• He begins linking the White-Bone Soul Banner’s Undead Space to his Undying Divine Kingdom, so dead believers can be transformed into undead and used to produce undead bone. Tens of thousands of holy spirits are already being transferred when the process starts.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming demonstrates careful planning and a ruthlessly practical approach: he risks neither his rare Seventh-Ring undead nor his larger project, and values believers for their usefulness rather than their devotion.
• The Dark Dragon is indirectly involved through the borrowed egg. Though it is occupied preparing to advance to the Seventh Ring, Yin Ming keeps the egg and treats its silence as consent.
• The holy spirits react to their arrival with confusion, fear, repentance, and confidence that they are entering a true Divine Kingdom. Yin Ming pays no attention to their feelings.

Significant themes

• Faith as utility: Yin Ming differs from deities who cultivate believers’ affection; to him, the spirits themselves are the resource.
• Transformation and adaptation: Laws, energy sources, and souls are altered to serve the emerging undead realm.
• The cost of power: Rare divine souls and vulnerable undead make advancement dangerous and difficult.
• A grim afterlife: The supposed refuge of the Divine Kingdom is also a mechanism for converting its inhabitants into labor and material.

Plot and events

• Yin Ming uses Abyss Demons to spread a simple message across the planes: mortals who desire eternal life may worship the Undying Xuanming God. Their faith forms Divine Kingdom Reception Marks, and after death their souls pass through the Divine Kingdom before the White-Bone Soul Banner converts them into undead and sends them to the Undead Space.
• Seeing the Divine Kingdom as a transfer station between life and death, Yin Ming recognizes a parallel with the immortal path’s Yellow Springs and earth-god shrines.
• He begins the banner’s third reforging, aiming to solve two problems: the Undead Space’s limited capacity and the difficulty of making undead produce undead bone automatically.
• Applying alchemical-civilization principles, he spends a month and a half inscribing extensive rune arrays. The result is the Core of the City of Rest, a millstone-sized white-bone disk with rotating gear spheres.
• The core reorganizes the Undead Space into tightly packed honeycomb cells, increasing its capacity more than a hundredfold. It also automatically draws soul power from each undead to refine a piece of bone, replacing it once it becomes silver bone.

Character development

• Yin Ming demonstrates growing insight by connecting different supernatural systems and independently grasping the need for a transition point between life and death.
• He also shows ambition and technical ingenuity, adapting alchemical automation to manage the undead at a scale beyond direct control. Though physically and mentally exhausted by the work, he is pleased with the result.

Character interactions

• Yin Ming’s relationship with the undead is increasingly that of a manager and employer: he calls them “employees,” but the new system confines them and extracts their soul power without regard for consent.
• The chapter highlights the tension between his practical goals and the undead’s welfare: he recognizes that the cramped cells may drive many to choose soul-destruction, but treats that as a separate problem to solve.

Significant themes

• Life, death, and transition: Death requires an intermediary; the Divine Kingdom functions like the Yellow Springs or a local shrine.
• Automation and scale: Alchemical systems can perform tasks independently of operators, enabling mass storage and production.
• Control versus welfare: Efficient systems may achieve their aims through coercion, with severe human—and undead—costs.
• Shared principles across systems: Different supernatural traditions may use different energies while following similar underlying rules.

Plot points and events

• The undead imprisoned in the White-Bone Soul Banner are kept physically in its honeycomb-like cells, but their consciousnesses are moved into an illusion within the Undying Divine Kingdom.
• The illusion, called Hungry Ghost Hell, offers a changing landscape and humanoid bodies—an improvement over the undead’s cramped, unchanging cells, though it is bleak and harsh.
• Hunger drives the undead to hunt chaos undead and consume their soul fires. Their efforts in the illusion are mirrored in the real Undead Space, replenishing the soul power spent refining bone.
• Yin Ming completes the White-Bone Soul Banner’s third refinement: the Hell Disc, the core of the future City of Rest. As it nurtures itself, the artifact will turn undead bone into divine jade bone and gradually form a vast bone city and sea.
• The Hell Disc provokes the surrounding Elemental Plane, which rejects the baleful artifact. Yin Ming suppresses the resulting elemental surge, but recognizes that the disc must eventually be moved to the Dark Plane.
• He stays in the Origin plane for now, waiting for the dark dragon to reach the Seventh-Ring Tier and help choose a suitable location.

Character developments and interactions

• The Undead Bigmouth Demon, once an undead king, awakens in Hungry Ghost Hell and appreciates its relative freedom. He dismisses another undead’s complaints and its fantasy of a luxurious afterlife, then hunts to satisfy his hunger.
• Yin Ming shows both practical concern for the undead’s living conditions and ruthless ambition: he gives them a tolerable illusion while using their activity to sustain an effectively endless bone-refinement process. He also acknowledges that his methods place him increasingly on an “evil” path.
• The complaining undead’s demand for comfort contrasts with the Bigmouth Demon’s gratitude for even a modest escape from confinement.

Significant themes

• Comfort as a matter of perspective: Hungry Ghost Hell is grim, but freedom and variety make it preferable to the undead’s real cells.
• Exploitation and survival: The undead’s hunger keeps them active and replenishes the resources Yin Ming needs for his artifact.
• Power and moral compromise: Yin Ming chooses a shadowy, ruthless path because he believes the conventional route is too crowded.
• Conflict with the natural order: The Hell Disc’s rejection by the Elemental Plane signals that Yin Ming’s creation is fundamentally at odds with the living world.

Key plot points and events

• In a crystal palace drifting through the void, the Dark Dragon converts the Moon God’s crystallized faith into divine power and uses it to complete its Seventh-Ring breakthrough. It refines the Moon God’s altar into a more manageable Acupoint Diagram of 36,000 apertures, then reshapes its body into a luminous, milky-white Moon Dragon.
• The transformation makes the Dark Dragon a powerful Seventh-Ring creature in principle, but it cannot yet properly use the Moon God’s power: it lacks insight into the moon law and has no divine arts. It can only rely on brute force.
• Guided by Yin Ming’s earlier advice, the Dark Dragon sees a longer-term path: use the sacrifice law to harmonize the conflicting powers of multiple gods, strengthen its divine body, and eventually reach beyond the Seventh Ring. The plan is promising but extraordinarily difficult.
• After completing the White Bone Hell Disc and waiting for the Dark Dragon’s return, Yin Ming prepares to enter the Dark Plane. He divines with the Fate Dice, but the result offers no useful prediction.
• Yin Ming breaks through the World Crystal Wall and meets the transformed Dark Dragon in the void. They plan to establish their destination coordinates before entering the Dark Plane.

Character developments

• The Dark Dragon achieves the Seventh Ring and undergoes a radical physical change, effectively becoming a Moonlight Dragon. Its breakthrough brings greater potential, but not immediate mastery: the new divine power conflicts with its existing abilities, leaving it unusually weak for its tier.
• Yin Ming continues to plan cautiously, balancing the creation of a future power base with the need to conceal his activities. He relies on the Dark Dragon’s knowledge to navigate the Dark Plane.

Character interactions

• The Dark Dragon reports its breakthrough and limitations to Yin Ming, who reacts with surprise at its changed appearance.
• The Dark Dragon acknowledges Yin Ming as its master and advises him about dangers and features of the Dark Plane. Yin Ming decides they should settle on coordinates before crossing into it.

Significant themes

• Power versus mastery: A higher rank does not guarantee effective strength without the knowledge needed to use it.
• Transformation and identity: The Dark Dragon’s evolution into a Moonlight Dragon changes both its body and its relationship to divine power.
• Ambition and difficulty: Harmonizing several gods’ powers could lead to immense strength, but the path is daunting.
• Planning amid uncertainty: Yin Ming’s preparations and inconclusive divination underscore the risks of acting in a world where outcomes cannot always be predicted.

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming seeks a safe location in the Dark Plane to install the White Bone Hell Disc and support the Undead Clan’s development. Barriers and dense hordes of mindless Baleful Entities make most areas unsuitable.
• The Dark Dragon suggests seeking a Divine Aberration’s territory. These powerful beings are formed from gods’ lingering thoughts, and their presence keeps ordinary Baleful Entities away for thousands of miles.
• The Dark Dragon knows of a relatively weak, Sixth-Ring Divine Aberration in a barren region. Yin Ming agrees to visit it and test whether its essence could provide material for another powerful undead.
• The Dark Dragon opens a passage to the Dark Plane using dark energy and a protective rune from one of his scales, bringing Yin Ming with him.
• In the Dark Plane, baleful energy severely suppresses Yin Ming’s magical power. The Dark Dragon establishes their location and offers to carry him toward the Divine Aberration.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming demonstrates strategic foresight, weighing the threats that could obstruct the Undead Clan before committing to a location. His curiosity about Divine Aberrations quickly turns into a practical plan to test one.
• The Dark Dragon serves as guide and protector, sharing his knowledge of the Dark Plane, shielding Yin Ming, and navigating the realm. He also reveals his familiarity with a specific Divine Aberration from past experience.
• Their interaction is cooperative and trusting: Yin Ming accepts the Dark Dragon’s help without hesitation, while the dragon takes responsibility for their safe passage.

Significant themes

• Planning amid danger: The Undead Clan’s expansion depends on anticipating environmental threats, not merely overcoming them later.
• The cost of death and lingering souls: Remnant thoughts can become monstrous Baleful Entities, while a god’s remnants may endure long enough to become exceptionally powerful.
• The gulf between realms: The Dark Plane’s hostile energy and lack of clear landmarks make travel perilous and sharply limit Yin Ming’s abilities.
• Transformation and potential: Even a fragment of a god can evolve into a formidable being, raising the possibility of turning a dangerous remnant into a source of power.

Chapter Summary

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming and the Dark Dragon travel through the Dark Plane to hunt a Divine Aberration. The Dark Dragon explains that releasing a trace of divine power should lure the creature to them.
• He uses a moonlight crystal infused with baleful energy as bait. After a delay, the Divine Aberration arrives, pulling the baleful mist into a vast vortex.
• The creature is far larger and stronger than expected: a hundred-li-tall, two-part colossus with an octopus-like mass of tentacles and eyes atop a melting giant’s body. Though technically Sixth-Ring, it has accumulated energy hundreds of times greater than that of a Seventh-Ring being, apparently by consuming another Divine Aberration.
• The Dark Dragon urges retreat because the Dark Plane suppresses their powers and makes it difficult to replenish mana. Yin Ming chooses to test the enemy first, hoping the creature could serve as a lasting source of baleful energy beneath the City of Rest.
• Yin Ming summons the Undying Xuanming God Phantom to fight. The chapter ends as the Dark Plane’s suppression leaves him with only about thirty percent of his full power.

Character developments

• Yin Ming shifts from treating the hunt as a test of strength to seeing a strategic use for the Aberration: imprisoning it as a renewable source of baleful energy. Despite the danger, he remains willing to engage.
• The Dark Dragon shows experience and caution. He recognizes that the monster has grown beyond his expectations and prioritizes survival over the original plan to let Yin Ming deliver the finishing blow.

Significant themes

• Growth through loss of self: Divine Aberrations can expand their power by abandoning humanity and identity, becoming immense but instinct-driven.
• Power versus control: The creature’s vast energy makes it dangerous, yet its poor control and enormous size also make it unwieldy.
• Ambition versus caution: Yin Ming sees potential value in a threat that the Dark Dragon believes is too risky to face.
• Environmental limits: The Dark Plane’s suppression of divine and elemental power sharply changes the balance of combat.

Character interactions

• The Dark Dragon initially expects Yin Ming to help finish off a fleeing enemy, but the creature’s unexpected strength overturns that plan.
• When the Dark Dragon proposes retreat, Yin Ming rejects it for now, deciding they can withdraw later if necessary.
• Their exchange highlights the contrast between the Dark Dragon’s hard-earned caution and Yin Ming’s willingness to take calculated risks.

Key plot points

• Yin Ming’s original Necromantic Beam barely harms the hundred-li-tall Divine Aberration: it destroys only a few hundred Baleful Entities attached to its body.
• The Godspawn Giant attacks like a natural disaster, raining corrosive energy and striking with a hand that can break apart and then reform. Yin Ming and the Dark Dragon evade it, but cannot meaningfully damage it.
• Yin Ming asks the Dark Dragon to keep the monster occupied while he retreats into the Scavenger Gourd. There he replaces his usual energy with baleful energy from the Dark Plane, forming Baleful Undying Xuanming—a more sinister power that lets him operate comfortably in this environment, though prolonged use threatens to erode his living vitality.
• During his retreat, Yin Ming refines accumulated undead bones into divine jade bone and forges 365 slender spears, intended as essential components of the Palace of Rest.
• After three days, he returns to the Dark Plane. The Dark Dragon, exhausted from evading the still-relentless giant, hands the fight back to him.
• Yin Ming channels his newly adapted power into a bone spear and throws it at the giant. It pierces the creature’s palm, proving he can now break its surface—but the wound is negligible, since the giant is immense and has no obvious vital points.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming responds to failure by adapting his energy to the Dark Plane rather than continuing to rely on magic that the environment suppresses. He also combines combat preparation with his longer-term artifact-making work.
• The Dark Dragon reluctantly agrees to act as bait, then uses the Moon God’s power to evade the giant until it can no longer continue. Its exchange with Yin Ming highlights both its wariness and the strain of the task.
• Yin Ming and the Dark Dragon work as a temporary team: the dragon buys time, while Yin Ming changes tactics and returns with a weapon capable of penetrating the giant’s defenses.

Significant themes

• Adaptation through transformation: Yin Ming gains an advantage by becoming more like the hostile environment, at a cost to his own vitality.
• Scale and the limits of power: Even a successful strike means little against an opponent whose size and energy make it resemble a natural catastrophe.
• Preparation and patience: Yin Ming’s retreat is not surrender; he uses the time to develop new power and forge the tools needed for the larger struggle.

Plot points and events

• Yin Ming uses the Undying Xuanming God and 365 Divine Jade Bone spears to attack the enormous Godspawn Giant. The spears barely injure it; instead, their rune arrays create channels of undead energy that help it control its power.
• Rather than trying to kill the Divine Aberration, Yin Ming treats it as a vast, mindless “living plane.” He reasons that its immense strength is undermined by its chaotic consciousness and lack of fine control.
• He completes a network of meridians throughout the Giant’s body, then places the White Bone Hell Disc in its forehead. The undead in the disc act together to draw on the Giant’s baleful energy and impose organized control over it.
• When the Giant attacks, Yin Ming commands it to kneel. The meridians transmit his order through its body, paralyzing it and confirming that he can control it from within.
• Yin Ming plans to use the Giant as a mobile, energy-rich base and eventually let Divine Jade Bone cover and imprison it beneath the City of Rest.
• He then discovers an inactive rune array embedded in a piece of supernatural material inside the Giant. It emits an aura that guides the creature in a fixed direction, suggesting that someone deliberately enlarged or directed it—and had prepared something in the Dark Plane before Yin Ming arrived.

Character developments

• Yin Ming shows strategic restraint and ingenuity. He rejects a direct fight and turns the Giant’s weakness—its disordered consciousness—into a means of control. His success also reveals an increasingly ambitious, utilitarian approach: he intends to rule and exploit the creature rather than destroy it.
• The Dark Dragon initially fears that the bone spears are making the Giant stronger. Yin Ming explains their real function, and the Dragon’s warning helps prompt the clarification of Yin Ming’s plan.
• The Godspawn Giant becomes more capable of controlling its energy, but remains mentally chaotic and vulnerable to coordinated external control. It reacts instinctively and can be subdued through its newly constructed meridians.

Character interactions

• The Dark Dragon questions Yin Ming’s tactics and points out that the Giant appears to be growing stronger.
• Yin Ming explains that the spears are building meridians and that he intends to control the Giant, not kill it.
• The Giant attacks Yin Ming with a tentacle, but Yin Ming answers with a command transmitted through the meridian network, forcing it to kneel.
• The undead within the White Bone Hell Disc function collectively as Yin Ming’s control system, overpowering the Giant’s less coherent consciousness.

Significant themes

• Strategy over brute force: Yin Ming targets the Giant’s structural weakness instead of matching its raw power.
• Control and exploitation: A seemingly unbeatable creature can be subdued by imposing organization on its chaotic inner workings.
• Order versus chaos: The undead’s coordinated consciousness defeats the Giant’s immense but disorganized power.
• Ambition and moral ambiguity: Yin Ming’s plan is openly described as cruel, yet he justifies it by viewing the Giant as an unintelligent beast.
• Hidden forces and foreshadowing: The guiding rune suggests another actor has been shaping events in the Dark Plane, raising the possibility of a larger plan.

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming analyzes and destroys a Hexagonal Prism used to lure Divine Aberrations, hoping to draw out whoever is directing them. Its destruction alerts an old man in a black meteorite, who suspects Divine Aberration Number Seven has been lost. He records its location but cannot investigate for several years.
• With no immediate enemy appearing, Yin Ming establishes the Palace of Rest in the Dark Plane. The White Bone Hell Disc draws power from the imprisoned Godspawn Giant to create a concealed, thousand-mile detection barrier and serves as a teleportation anchor.
• Yin Ming adds an Undead Domain powered by a Seventh-Ring Chaos Undead, intended to repel intruders. He then prepares defenses against Divine Aberrations by reviving eight divine-jade-bone Undead Skeletons and stationing them as hidden guards.
• The Palace’s long-term plan is to grow through the White Bone Hell Disc and the Undying Divine Kingdom: more undead will accumulate, build the City of Rest, and eventually help the undead occupy the Dark Plane.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming acts cautiously and strategically, combining concealment, detection, teleportation, and layered defenses. He feels gratitude toward Lady White Moon, Lucky Star Lucia, and the six skeletons Lady White Moon created, but treats other skeletons, including Keli and Cote Yukeli, more ruthlessly: he erases their memories and gives them fabricated undead instruction.
• The old man behind the Divine Aberrations is revealed as a cautious, apparently powerful figure who monitors his creations but is constrained by the Dark Plane’s vastness and his inability to travel there quickly.
• The eight Undead Skeletons complete their revival when exposed to the Dark Plane’s baleful energy. Their souls link to the White Bone Hell Disc, and they take up positions as dormant guardians.
• The Godspawn Giant is kept imprisoned and used as an energy source for Yin Ming’s defenses.

Significant themes

• Life as a resource: The opening frames living beings as a renewable, highly valuable resource that supernatural factions compete to control.
• Strategic expansion and exploitation: Yin Ming turns the Dark Plane’s hostile conditions, imprisoned beings, and undead into tools for establishing a foothold.
• Secrecy and preparation: The Palace is built to detect threats and remain hidden while its forces grow.
• Memory, identity, and control: Yin Ming’s treatment of different skeletons shows the tension between gratitude and manipulation, especially in how he preserves some beings’ origins while rewriting others’.

Plot and events

• Yin Ming nurtures the embryonic White Bone Hell Disc in the Dark Plane, then absorbs elemental undying magic power until he forms over twelve thousand Magic Cores and restores his Undying Xuanming God to its elemental state.
• Guided by the Dark Dragon, he uses the opposing energies of the Elemental and Dark Planes to perform Void Teleportation. He reaches the space near the Source Plane with only a small navigational error.
• The Dark Dragon, now Seventh-Ring, stays outside the Source Plane to avoid spiritual contamination and plans to place a Plane Fragment nearby. The two agree to share intelligence and Gods’ Altar Diagrams through their mark.
• Yin Ming spends six months secluded in Tree Ancestor Sadi’s library, cultivating, studying fate, and observing the approaching End of Dharma.
• Across his domains, the Liches develop a system of Seal Formulas through the Third Ring and begin work on Fourth-Ring foundations; the Fire Seed prepares the Sunside to resist the Undead Calamity; and the Dark Dragon establishes the Dragon-Pig Clan as sacrificial livestock.
• The Undying God Cult’s casual believers grow rapidly, reaching five billion before growth slows. At the same time, more Holy Spirits arrive in the Divine Kingdom—evidence that powerful groups are suppressing and killing believers.
• On the Vic Plane, Black Tower wizards trace the doctrine’s spread to a Scythe Demon hired through the Abyss. Unable to understand the Cult’s purpose and alarmed by its accessibility, they declare Undying Xuanming a wanted Evil God and launch a broad campaign to suppress the faith through laws, forged pamphlets, and frightening rumors.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming demonstrates growing mastery of planar forces and fate principles. He trusts the Dark Dragon’s judgment and agrees to cooperate through their shared mark.
• The Dark Dragon has advanced to the Seventh Ring and now operates as an equal to many Chief Gods, but recognizes that entering the Source Plane would expose him to contamination.
• The Black Tower wizards move from puzzlement to coordinated hostility. Their debate reveals they see the Cult as a threat even without understanding its motives, and they consider extreme measures—including killing believers—before choosing organized suppression.

Significant themes

• A belief cannot be fully contained: The Black Tower can slow the doctrine’s spread, but people’s fear of death and hope of survival keep it circulating.
• Powerful institutions suppress what they cannot explain: The wizards prioritize control over understanding, treating unfamiliar religious behavior as dangerous.
• Preparation and gradual growth: Yin Ming cultivates patiently while his followers and other projects develop on a much larger timescale.
• Faith as both protection and vulnerability: The Cult offers continued existence after death, but its growing visibility brings persecution and mass casualties.

Plot points and events

• In the Source Plane, the Flameburning Fire has become a black sun that drains away transcendent energy. The world is nearing the End of Dharma, expected in less than three months.
• Yin Ming plans to use this energy-starved era to expose his Divine Sense to the harsh Material World and rapidly temper his Yin Spirit into a Yang Spirit—a process that would otherwise take centuries.
• The Dark Dragon reports that the Abyss has shut down Abyss Publishing and that most powers have branded the Undying Xuanming God a wanted evil god. Yin Ming expected the crackdown and intends to let the cult spread in secret, trusting that belief in escaping death will eventually revive it.
• Tree Ancestor Sadi presents Demon Plague No. 108, designed to survive in degraded form during the End of Dharma and become a symptomless Transcendent Plague in the Abyss. Yin Ming approves it and orders work on No. 109.
• As elemental energy dwindles, Sadi proposes dormancy to conserve resources. Yin Ming instead gives him enough Element Crystals to keep him alive for thousands of years, disappointing Sadi’s hopes of getting a break.
• Half a month later, Yin Ming finds that the Undying Divine Kingdom has gained many holy spirits: of its six billion believers, three billion have died and joined the Undead Space. The resulting surge in bone production has depleted the White Bone Hell Disc’s supply.
• Yin Ming asks the Dark Dragon to buy bones from the Divine Kingdom. The request is refused.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming remains patient and pragmatic. He accepts the cult’s suppression without retaliation, prioritizes his own survival, and turns the approaching catastrophe into an opportunity for spiritual advancement. He is also relentless in his research demands.
• Dark Dragon acts as Yin Ming’s messenger and intermediary, reporting the cult’s persecution and attempting to arrange a bone purchase through his standing as a God of Sacrifice.
• Tree Ancestor Sadi demonstrates his scientific progress with the plague potion but tries to use the energy crisis as grounds for rest. Yin Ming’s generous supply of crystals keeps him working instead.

Significant themes

• Endurance and renewal: Yin Ming believes persecution cannot permanently extinguish a faith centered on the universal desire to escape death.
• Adaptation to collapse: Characters respond to the End of Dharma through spiritual training, stored resources, dormancy, or engineered plagues.
• Death as a resource: The mass deaths of believers strengthen the Undead Space, but their remains also create a material shortage.
• Power has costs: The cult’s growth brings persecution, while its success strains the infrastructure that supports it.

Key events

• After the Divine Kingdom’s gods refuse to trade for ordinary bones, Yin Ming realizes that association with the wanted Undying Xuanming God makes them fear attracting scrutiny. He decides to gather bones from the Origin Plane himself.
• Using his Undying Xuanming God form, Yin Ming sends down black rain that revives buried skeletons. The undead soon perish in the Origin Plane’s harsh end-of-dharma environment, leaving their bones behind for him to collect.
• Over a month, he gathers roughly 760 billion skeletons, enough to meet his immediate needs. He then visits the Dark Plane to inspect the White Bone Hell Disc and replenish its materials.
• Two factions send teams of Fourth Ring wizards to investigate him: the Wizard Black Tower seeks to protect the established order, while the God Hunter Association considers whether he can be killed. Yin Ming kills all seven and uses their corpses to create undead, then reads their memories.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming remains practical and focused on long-term survival, harvesting bones rather than attempting the full undead calamity before he is strong enough. He is also aware that the undead he revives are short-lived in the end-of-dharma conditions.
• He is frustrated that the wizards view him as an evil god and insist on “seizing his laws,” despite his self-image as a restrained, sustainable developer.
• The gods’ refusal to trade and the later arrival of the wizard factions show that Yin Ming is increasingly isolated. He suspects the Divine Kingdom has leaked information about him, though the wizards’ memories do not identify the source.

Significant themes

• Survival under decline: As transcendent energy vanishes, even magically revived beings cannot endure; Yin Ming adapts by stockpiling resources.
• Reputation and threat: His actions and status attract hostile attention, regardless of how he understands his own conduct.
• Political distrust: The gods avoid association with him, and Yin Ming concludes that the Divine Kingdom may betray even its nominal Chief Gods.

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming decides to remain in the Source Plane, where the environment of Dharma decline and mortal dust miasma weaken potential opponents more than they weaken him. He judges the Wizard Black Tower manageable but considers the numerous, reckless members of the God Hunter Association a greater danger.
• He concludes that his best defense is to strengthen himself and eliminate gaps in his abilities.
• The Source Plane fully enters the age of Dharma decline. Its remaining supernatural energy vanishes, magic materials and artifacts lose their powers, and the Twisted Treant descendants fall dormant as ancient trees. The Flame-Burners Association’s practitioners begin slowly losing their mana.
• Yin Ming recognizes the transformed world as a rare opportunity: he will use it to turn his Yin Spirit—his Divine Sense—into a Yang Spirit.
• He plans to temper the fragile, body-free spirit with the first sunlight at dawn, when yang energy rises gradually and lets him stop before the strain becomes dangerous.
• Rather than wait for dawn, he flies east and prepares for the first light, sealing his mana and spreading his Divine Sense over a wide area.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming remains confident but cautious. He weighs the distinct threats posed by the Wizard Black Tower and the God Hunter Association, then shifts his focus toward self-improvement.
• He feels a trace of sorrow for Norman Martin and laments that humanity has disappeared from the Source Plane, leaving no civilization to benefit from the end of supernatural rule.
• His relationship with the transformed world is unexpectedly harmonious: while Dharma decline harms cultivation in general, he finds its return to mundane reality reassuring and sees it as useful for his own training.
• No direct confrontations occur; the chapter mainly follows Yin Ming’s strategic thinking and preparation.

Significant themes

• Adaptation and home-ground advantage: Yin Ming turns a hostile environment into protection and an opportunity.
• Power and vulnerability: Even an immense Divine Sense remains fragile without supernatural protection.
• Transformation through gradual hardship: The dawn’s steadily increasing yang energy offers a controlled method for changing the Yin Spirit.
• Civilization lost: The world’s return to mundane conditions might have enabled mortal progress, but humanity’s collapse makes that possibility moot.

Chapter summary

Key plot points and events

• Yin Ming uses the first light of dawn—Dawn Glow Purple Qi—to temper his Yin Spirit, hoping to strip away its yin nature and turn it into a Yang Spirit.
• Inside his Sea of Consciousness, the sunlight becomes a vast sea of fire. Yin Ming endures the soul-searing pain for just over seven minutes before instinctive terror forces him to withdraw his Divine Sense.
• He concludes that the pain is only part of the challenge: he must also overcome the fear of becoming illusory and ceasing to exist. Since the dawn energy has faded, he flies west to wait for sunrise elsewhere and continue the process.
• At the God Hunter Association, a watcher sees three lights vanish, indicating that three fourth-ring wizards have died on the Source Plane. He speculates that the killer is the Seventh-Ring-tier god Undying Xuanming and sells the rumor, despite admitting the Association does not require its information to be reliable.
• The rumor prompts sixth-ring powerhouses to form hunting squads. One four-person squad reaches the Source Plane and uses a bronze mirror to locate Yin Ming as he waits for dawn.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming proves highly disciplined and resilient, but discovers a new limit: the overwhelming fear of his own existence dissolving. He recognizes that this instinct, rather than pain alone, is what he must master to complete his cultivation.
• The God Hunter Association’s watcher turns the deaths into a lucrative but uncertain rumor, showing the organization’s opportunistic attitude toward intelligence.
• The four-person hunting squad, led by a winged, black-robed warlock, acts on the rumor and begins tracking Yin Ming. The chapter ends with the squad locating him, setting up a confrontation.

Significant themes

• The cost of shortcuts: Accelerating a process that might normally take years means enduring its accumulated suffering and risk all at once.
• Fear versus willpower: Yin Ming can withstand agony, but must also confront the primal terror of fading from existence.
• Uncertainty and opportunism: The hunters’ pursuit rests on an unverified claim, reflecting how ambition can turn speculation into action.
• Cultivation through repetition: Yin Ming’s plan depends on a daily cycle of exposure, recovery, and renewed effort.

Key plot points

• Four outsiders—two warlocks and two wizards—use the Mirror Demon Ancient Mirror to track Yin Ming, whom they suspect is the Undying Xuanming God. The mirror reveals his movements but requires the elderly warlock to feed it his blood, a costly effort in the energy-starved End of Dharma environment.
• They follow Yin Ming across the Source Plane and repeatedly find him sitting at sunrise before flying west. His routine seems pointless to them, and they can find no clue to his motives.
• In reality, Yin Ming has spent a month pursuing the sun to temper his Yin Spirit. He captures midday sunlight and uses its pure yang flames to refine it, enduring intense pain.
• The final trace of yin substance disappears, completing his transformation into a Yang Spirit. Though its range is smaller, his Divine Sense now perceives the world with far greater precision and is no longer limited by the environment.
• Knowing the pursuers are still behind him, Yin Ming declares that he will deal with them.

Character developments and interactions

• Yin Ming advances his cultivation significantly, transforming his Yin Spirit into a Yang Spirit through sustained effort and painful refinement.
• The four pursuers grow exhausted and frustrated as the mirror’s repeated images provide little useful intelligence. They debate what Yin Ming is doing, while the old warlock continues to shoulder the physical cost of operating the artifact.
• Their misunderstanding creates dramatic irony: they interpret Yin Ming’s disciplined cultivation as strange, aimless sunrise-watching.

Significant themes

• Perseverance and cultivation: Yin Ming’s progress comes through repetitive, difficult practice.
• Limits of intelligence-gathering: The pursuers can observe his actions but cannot understand their purpose.
• Deception and dramatic irony: Their assumptions conceal the significance of the ritual—and the danger Yin Ming may pose now that his transformation is complete.