Chapter Summaries

Plot points and events

• Lin Feng and Granny Weiming go to the Yellow River with a piece of dead wood, hoping to contact the Yellow River Earl. Lin Feng cannot summon the deity himself, so Granny Weiming performs a ritual dance with the wood.
• The ritual brings forth the River Earl’s aura in the form of a Water Monkey, a surprising appearance that raises questions about how the god’s identity has changed across history and legend.
• The Earl reacts to a vast, featureless shadow beneath the river ice. As the shadow attacks the ice, Lin Feng recognizes that a mark on his arm is drawing it toward him and urges Granny Weiming to get away.
• Granny Weiming tries to repel the entity with a ritual, but it continues its attack. Lin Feng’s body releases an Evil-Driving Thunderclap, prompting the Earl to strike his arm and forcibly tear out the mark. The mark disappears, but Lin Feng’s soul is injured.
• With its target gone, the shadow retreats. Granny Weiming bows to the Earl and concludes that Lin Feng has received both a foundation and room to develop. She advises him to consult Wind’s Messenger about the White-Haired Wind, refine the dragon bones into a magical artifact, and seek “the thoughts of the multitude” to advance further.

Character developments

• Lin Feng shows caution and quick judgment by recognizing the danger of the mark and retreating. He also learns that the River Earl’s help can be powerful but painful.
• Granny Weiming demonstrates ritual skill, composure, and insight. Though she cannot secure the Earl’s forgiveness, she understands the significance of his intervention.
• The Yellow River Earl appears as a powerful, bluntly practical deity: he ignores Granny Weiming’s worship but directly removes the mark threatening Lin Feng.
• The shadow beneath the ice remains mysterious, but its pursuit of Lin Feng—and its departure after the mark is removed—suggests that the mark was drawing it to him.

Significant themes

• Changing identities of gods: The Earl’s Water Monkey form reflects the uncertain, evolving nature of ancient deities and folklore.
• The cost of divine aid: The Earl saves Lin Feng from the mark, but the crude intervention injures his soul.
• Power and its limits: Lin Feng cannot simply command a great god, while Granny Weiming’s ritual and authority also prove insufficient to control the shadow.
• Inheritance and growth: The Earl has given Lin Feng a foundation, but further progress requires effort, materials, and collective human thought.

Character interactions

• Lin Feng and Granny Weiming’s initial misunderstanding exposes their different assumptions about his ability to summon the Earl.
• Granny Weiming approaches the Earl with reverence, while the Earl disregards her and focuses on the threat beneath the river.
• Lin Feng’s warning and the Earl’s intervention show their practical alliance, though the Earl’s help is forceful rather than gentle.
• Afterward, Granny Weiming interprets the Earl’s actions for Lin Feng and directs him toward his next steps.

Key plot points and events

• Granny Weiming explains that gods differ: some exist independently of worship, while others rely on people’s belief and offerings. The Yellow River Earl belongs between these types and has given Lin Feng a protective connection that lets him gather the Thoughts of the Multitude.
• Lin Feng realizes this may be the missing support he needs to reach the Sixth Rank. Though Granny Weiming warns that governments suppress unauthorized worship, he sees an opportunity to build an audience through an upcoming youth-oriented, Chinese-inspired entertainment project.
• Granny Weiming gives Lin Feng a jade token and asks him to identify the location of the White-Haired Wind. He shares the map to the One-Eye Country ruins, where Menzang E'pang’s secret investigations have yielded little beyond disturbing objects and violent, incurably mad survivors.
• The ruins trouble Lin Feng: he wonders why the ancient people fled, especially since an agricultural civilization would normally favor settled life. Granny Weiming departs through the Underworld to settle her remaining affairs.
• Lin Feng leaves the Yellow River with the Guesthouse’s ghostly inhabitants and heads for Weicheng, where he plans to make a magical artifact and conduct his first sacrifice. He hopes to establish worship of Zuan Wangye, whose power will grow as the game spreads. Weizhou, his intended area of influence, is currently a war zone full of restless souls.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng shifts from uncertainty to a practical plan: he recognizes that public belief, rather than further personal tempering alone, may be what his cultivation lacks. He remains cautious about the ruins but is willing to pursue his own religious project.
• Granny Weiming reveals that she herself has godlike powers and was once worshiped, though she refused the role. She respects her own spiritual path even while explaining Lin Feng’s different one, and departs without asking for his help.
• Their conversation is measured and candid: Granny Weiming advises Lin Feng and warns him of political and supernatural dangers; Lin Feng thanks her, shares the map, and lets her investigate ahead.
• Menzang E'pang’s history of secret expeditions underscores both the ruins’ danger and the constraints imposed by surveillance under Li Yuanhao.

Significant themes

• Faith and power: Worship can sustain gods and may also enable Lin Feng’s advancement, though the Yellow River Earl’s protection gives him unusual freedom.
• Religion and political control: States treat unauthorized cults as potential rebellion and suppress them, making public belief difficult to gather.
• The uncanny past: The ruins and the fleeing ancient civilization suggest that history’s gaps conceal a terrifying, potentially inhuman reality.
• Different paths and personal resolve: Granny Weiming accepts the fate of her tradition, while Lin Feng pursues a newer route built on popular attention and worship.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Feng arrives in snowbound Weizhou City and finds a wealthy, abandoned residence saturated with yin energy. Its dead inhabitants have become vicious Bound Earth Spirits, and the failed rites of Kongtong Mountain’s ritual masters have left the site close to becoming a Haunted Land.
• Lin Feng attacks the haunting with his bell, dark Flame, and Break the Army sword talisman, clearing the immediate supernatural distortions. He summons the wandering souls from outside the gate, sending the Temple Keeper and his summoned Zhong Kui inside to deal with them.
• As local supernatural authorities gather—the Night Patrol Deity, Civil Judge, Land God, and a Primordial Lady—Lin Feng is confronted by an ominous paper sedan chair from the Underworld. They question his right to operate in their territory because he appears to be a yin object.
• Lin Feng insists that he is alive and therefore subject to the rules of the living. Showing a piece of Withered Wood bearing the Yellow River Earl’s aura persuades the Primordial Lady to withdraw, but the other powers remain.
• The sedan chair’s occupant says something is “missing,” then launches a tongue toward Lin Feng’s Zhong Kui. Lin Feng catches it, and the curtain opens to reveal a vast, grotesque Ghost God surrounded by countless ghosts. Lin Feng recognizes him as Authentic Zhong Kui—the genuine deity’s divine essence has been drawn out by Lin Feng’s imitation.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng remains calm and assertive despite facing multiple local gods and an Underworld power. He uses both force and authority—his supernatural techniques, his claim to be alive, and the Withered Wood—to manage the confrontation.
• Lin Feng’s summoned Zhong Kui appears more powerful than before, wielding a sword infused with Lin Feng’s qi and Flame. Its divine essence makes it seem nearly seventh rank, but this power also draws the attention of the real Zhong Kui.
• The local deities act cautiously: the Primordial Lady leaves once she recognizes the Yellow River Earl’s aura, while the Land God stays and the City God’s representatives watch rather than intervene.
• The cliffhanger establishes a direct confrontation between Lin Feng’s counterfeit Zhong Kui and the authentic Ghost God whose presence it has summoned.

Significant themes

• Authority and jurisdiction: The gods enforce boundaries between the living world and the Underworld, while Lin Feng challenges their claim over him.
• Imitation and authenticity: Lin Feng’s summoned Zhong Kui has become powerful enough to attract the genuine deity, raising questions about the consequences of copying divine power.
• The cost of neglected death: The uncollected souls and failed rites show how unresolved deaths can corrupt a place into something increasingly dangerous.
• Hierarchy and unequal power: The local gods defer to the Underworld’s more formidable presence, reflecting the shifting status of supernatural offices and the gap between ordinary spirits and major divine beings.

Key plot points and events

• Zhong Kui confronts Lin Feng for making a statue in his likeness without permission. Lin Feng admits the offense, but Zhong Kui’s anger proves partly teasing: he criticizes the statue for lacking Zhong Kui’s true spirit and argues that its treatment of evil ghosts is too lenient.
• Zhong Kui captures the mansion’s ghosts in fiery chains and cangues, then gives Lin Feng a token to protect him while walking the Yin Road. He promises to answer if Lin Feng calls for help and demonstrates his overwhelming “intent” before departing.
• Afterward, Lin Feng returns to his real task: using his flames and “intent” to work on the dragon’s bones. His Life-Bound Artifact shelters the courtyard, while the Calamity Hounds’ flames reveal and draw on memories and techniques left by previous bearers, including the Root Teacher.
• Lin Feng begins a deeper process of contemplation and refinement; scales grow on the dragon bones. He also uses the New Moon Mirror to inspect the Indian Monk trapped in the Bronze Urn, but avoids touching the potentially dangerous records in the jadeified eyes.
• Lin Feng prepares offerings for Zhong Kui and the Yellow River Earl. His public worship at the haunted mansion attracts attention from local religious communities, which he welcomes as he needs folk belief in Zuan Wangye as an anchor.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng respects the Nuo Opera Masters’ defiant courage and recognizes that, like them, he has little room to retreat. He approaches Zhong Kui with humility but remains wary and determined. His growing command of inherited powers lets him pursue several tasks at once.
• Zhong Kui appears stern and formidable, but also shows humor and generosity. He punishes the ghosts, offers Lin Feng protection, and teaches him by revealing his true manifestation.
• Lin Feng and Zhong Kui establish a wary but respectful connection. Zhong Kui recognizes Lin Feng’s association with Green Mountain and seems to expect him to be dealing with some larger disaster.
• The Indian Monk remains silent and apparently unaffected by Lin Feng’s flames; neither he nor Lin Feng seeks contact.

Significant themes

• Defiance in the face of overwhelming power: Lin Feng identifies with the Nuo Opera Masters, who keep resisting even when defeat seems inevitable.
• Belief and divine power: Zhong Kui’s strength reflects accumulated titles, incense, vows, and popular belief; worship can also give Lin Feng a needed anchor.
• Justice and the supernatural: Zhong Kui treats the ghosts as criminals subject to harsh punishment, extending earthly law into the afterlife.
• Inheritance and transformation: The Calamity Hounds preserve the memories and abilities of past bearers, allowing Lin Feng to build on their legacy.
• Caution amid ambition: Lin Feng advances his work while refusing to risk releasing whatever may be contained in the jadeified eyes.

Chapter summary

Key plot points and events

• Lin Feng transforms Zhong Kui’s “intent” into a Nuo mask and ritual presence. He makes the mask’s defining quality pure malice, arguing that Zhong Kui must be terrifying and merciless toward the Little Ghosts he is meant to suppress.
• Lin Feng offers meat to Zhong Kui and confirms that the deity has accepted it when the food turns tasteless, like wax. He then searches for Little Ghosts to use as fuel for Zhong Kui’s power.
• The Daoists, monks, and local officials largely avoid intervening. At night, masked figures emerge from Lin Feng’s residence with fiery chains, capturing Little Ghosts.
• Lin Feng completes magical Formation Banners made from dragon bone, marked with the True Form Diagram of Mount Tai and natural runes. Their power draws attention, but onlookers are too wary to take them.
• Lin Feng leaves behind a shrine-like site containing Zhong Kui portraits, statues of the Yellow River Earl and Zuan Wangye, offerings, talismans, and captured Little Ghosts. People mistake the wax-like offerings for ordinary food and are told to bow to the River Earl.
• Lin Feng departs, leaving the “seeds” of his work behind for the Historian to decide whether to preserve. Granny Weiming reports that the White-Haired Wind has appeared near Youzhou, so the group must travel north. When she meets Lin Feng again, she studies him as if seeing him anew.

Character developments

• Lin Feng demonstrates his skill at shaping spiritual “intent” into ritual objects and using it pragmatically. His approach to Zhong Kui is deliberately severe: he removes the mask’s warmth to better serve its purpose.
• Zhong Kui is presented as an aggressive, relentless force whose nature is defined by hostility toward Ghosts, especially Little Ghosts.
• Granny Weiming appears to have gained a new perspective on Lin Feng, regarding him with fresh scrutiny at their reunion.

Character interactions

• Lin Feng’s ritual offerings establish a tacit relationship with Zhong Kui: Zhong Kui accepts them and permits Lin Feng to borrow his power.
• The community watches Lin Feng’s residence from a distance, fearful of its supernatural presence. Officials eventually make contact but remain cautious.
• A bystander’s attempt to eat the offerings prompts another person to correct him and urge him to show reverence to the Yellow River Earl.
• Lin Feng leaves his creations and shrine behind for the Historian to judge, then reunites with Granny Weiming as the journey shifts toward Youzhou.

Significant themes

• Intent and representation: A deity’s image must capture its essential nature; for Zhong Kui, that means mercilessness rather than kindness.
• Ritual and belief: Offerings, masks, carvings, and talismans carry spiritual force, while observers interpret them through fear and reverence.
• Authority and avoidance: Local religious and civic powers decline to confront Lin Feng, leaving him an unsettling anomaly.
• Legacy and judgment: Lin Feng leaves his work behind, and its survival depends on another person’s decision.

Key events

• Granny Weiming brings a group of Weiming shamans to explore the mysterious ruins near Youzhou. They expect the journey may kill them; Menzang E’pang’s hostility means they have little to lose. Lin Feng, who has also prepared for the possibility of death, agrees to go.
• The group discusses a centuries-old, undecayed quilt Lin Feng found. He recognizes its material as the work of the Lei Ancestor Tribe, while Granny Weiming identifies its markings as patterns of lightning rather than characters meaning “longevity.”
• At midnight, they travel by Yin Road to a barren, wind-scoured region near Youzhou. Granny Weiming counts all sixteen people and warns them not to separate. They light torches fueled by fat from a strange Yellow River fish, which can illuminate supernatural darkness.
• Lin Feng scouts an apparently empty settlement: three tents and seventeen posts, with no sign of ordinary habitation. He and Granny Weiming then notice approaching riders and extinguish the torches.
• The riders look like dead men dressed in mirrored funeral clothing, but their steaming breath suggests they are alive. Granny Weiming thinks they may be tomb guardians.
• A rider’s bone whistle causes several shamans to choke and bleed as if their bodies have become whistles. Lin Feng recognizes the foul odor of the Poison Dragon once suppressed beneath Heavenly Capital Mountain. The weakened god associated with Li Yuanhao also appears to be pursuing it.
• The Poison Dragon crashes into the settlement, followed by the godlike presence, and both plunge underground. The riders split up, some attacking the group and others charging toward the impact site. Lin Feng’s wind deflects their arrows, but his Jade Axe’s anti-magic field is drastically weakened, reaching only six steps around him—and potentially suppressing Lin Feng himself.

Character developments and interactions

• Granny Weiming is revealed as a resolute, seasoned shaman who accepts death with calmness and frames the expedition as a chance to encounter truths beyond ordinary life. She explains the risks openly to prevent resentment among her clanspeople and carefully keeps the group together.
• Lin Feng remains cautious and pragmatic. His memories of the Shuzhong Black Hole reinforce how little humans can control ancient powers; he scouts ahead, trusts his instincts, and responds quickly when danger appears.
• The Weiming shamans share their leader’s fatalistic resolve. They obey her directions and enter the ruins despite their fear, but the bone whistle immediately exposes their vulnerability.
• Lin Feng and Granny Weiming work in quiet coordination: she watches the riders while he observes them and prepares defenses. She asks for his judgment before entering, and he signals his agreement.
• Menzang E’pang remains an indirect source of danger, having made the shamans’ deaths seem inevitable even before the expedition begins.

Significant themes

• Mortality and meaning: Granny Weiming treats a potentially fatal journey as worthwhile if it brings knowledge or revelation.
• Human limits before ancient powers: The Black Hole episode and the sudden arrival of the dragon and god show how plans and strength can be rendered insignificant by forces beyond human control.
• Knowledge through risk: Lin Feng accepts that dangerous explorations may cost lives, while the expedition itself becomes an attempt to learn what the ruins conceal.
• The uncanny boundary between life and death: The seemingly dead riders are alive, the settlement resembles a grave, and the group’s familiar magical tools prove unreliable in this place.

Plot points and events

• The tomb guardians charge despite the dragon’s fall, but their horses panic. Meanwhile, strange light spreads through the tomb, making apparent people and tent-lights vanish or appear. Granny Weiming orders the Shamans to light torches: one light burns those it touches, while the other makes them disappear.
• Lin Feng realizes the Ancient God’s presence has vanished from the sky but may have survived by possessing tomb guardians. The group retreats toward an underground tomb as the strange light closes in.
• Lin Feng discovers that the apparent ruins conceal an older mausoleum beneath them, identified as the Mausoleum of the Many-Armed Corpse-Shedding King. Its vault contains potent Elixir Fire, which burns over the badly wounded Poison Dragon.
• The Shamans descend into the tomb, but the dragon attacks them before collapsing. Their torches go out, and the pursuing light stops at the tomb’s opening.
• The possessed Ancient God then appears above the opening. Lin Feng leads the others away, but the supposedly dead dragon reveals that it has been feigning death and attacks the Ancient God, setting the two enemies against each other.
• Lin Feng notices that the mausoleum seems unfinished: its passage has no sealing door and runs level rather than toward an obvious exit, leaving the group unsure whether it leads anywhere safe.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng acts decisively under pressure, using wind to protect and move the group, carrying the injured Granny Weiming himself, and prioritizing escape over fighting an unknown threat. He also carefully observes the mausoleum’s construction and questions its purpose.
• Granny Weiming remains authoritative and composed. Her order to light the torches is obeyed immediately, and she communicates her suspicions to Lin Feng through Intent; their shared judgment helps guide the retreat.
• The Shamans show strong loyalty and courage, following Granny Weiming’s orders despite the danger. Several are lost to the lights, and another is killed by the dragon.
• The Poison Dragon shifts from an apparently helpless victim to a cunning survivor: despite its wounds and apparent death, it has saved enough strength to ambush the Ancient God.
• The Ancient God, reduced to a final vestige, survives through possession but is now vulnerable through its host. Its clash with the dragon gives Lin Feng and the others a chance to escape.

Significant themes

• Survival through adaptation: Lin Feng, the dragon, and the Ancient God each rely on quick decisions or concealed strategies.
• Unreliable appearances: The lights create deceptive visions; the dragon is not dead, and the seemingly straightforward tomb is full of puzzling design choices.
• Ancient danger and human cost: Powerful forces and forgotten tomb defenses overwhelm the expedition, costing the Shamans several lives.
• The unfinished past: The mausoleum’s incomplete construction raises questions about its builder’s circumstances and whether the tomb was ever meant to be entered—or exited.

Key plot points and events

• In the mountains of Yunnan, badly wounded Teacher Xun and Professor Han are cornered by Fangxiangshi, a masked pursuer. Rather than attack, Fangxiangshi waits for their injuries to kill them.
• Professor Han uses the painful, imperfect spell “Heavenly Edict in the Mouth” to force Fangxiangshi to answer Teacher Xun’s questions. Fangxiangshi reveals that their plans are being disrupted by living Historians appearing at crucial points, that the Thirty-Six Stockades of Western Hunan were deliberately released, and that they are searching for Lin Feng, whose nature they cannot divine.
• Fangxiangshi breaks free once the spell’s effect ends, but a Buddha-like being erupts from the ground and crushes him. Teacher Xun escapes with Professor Han as the being absorbs the blood and disappears.
• Elsewhere, Hong Ni stops driving to rest while Lin Feng and the unconscious Mr. Luo remain in the car. She notices that the Sky Pearl has somehow moved from her wrist to Lin Feng’s. When she reaches for it, it turns scorching hot.
• A hand pulls Hong Ni from the car, and a sinister double of Lin Feng appears. It transforms into an exact copy of Hong Ni. Black hands emerge from the ground and drag her into the Haunted Village.

Character developments and interactions

• Teacher Xun remains composed despite mortal injuries, interrogating Fangxiangshi while managing Professor Han’s dangerous attempt to use his power. He prioritizes escape once the buried being appears.
• Professor Han demonstrates formidable but costly supernatural ability: his forced command works, but causes him intense pain and has limits. His exchange with Teacher Xun shows their trust and coordination.
• Fangxiangshi is revealed as a patient, calculating hunter, but the spell forces him to disclose information before he can escape its control. His confidence proves insufficient against the being underground.
• Hong Ni acts cautiously and practically, stopping before fatigue makes driving unsafe. Her curiosity about the Sky Pearl leaves her vulnerable to the sudden attack.
• Lin Feng remains unconscious in the car, but his unexplained connection to the Sky Pearl—and the enemy’s inability to divine him—suggests he is central to the unfolding conflict.

Significant themes

• Hidden forces and forbidden knowledge: The ancient mountains, the buried Buddha-like being, and the Haunted Village conceal powers beyond ordinary understanding.
• Power at a cost: Professor Han’s command compels truth, but inflicts severe physical pain and can only hold its target temporarily.
• Identity and imitation: The double’s transformation into Hong Ni raises questions about what makes a person truly themselves.
• Plans disrupted by the unpredictable: Fangxiangshi’s group admits that events involving living Historians and Lin Feng have upset schemes they believed were controlled.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Feng’s double, appearing as Hong Ni, travels with the Five Ghosts of Thief’s Gate. At a red light, a dump truck deliberately rams their car. A ghost attack and occult talisman trigger an explosion that destroys both vehicles and appears to kill the occupants. The real Hong Ni survives elsewhere, having witnessed the attack.
• The Temple Keeper sends yin soldiers to pursue the attackers and shelters Hong Ni in the Divine Temple. The Five Ghosts are now being directed effectively under a chief steward’s supervision, while Teacher Xun’s protective umbrella finally breaks and the rain resumes.
• Meanwhile, Lin Feng and Granny Weiming enter a strange burial chamber that resembles an abandoned mine rather than a conventional tomb. Inside is a tiny, windowless temple that Granny identifies as a Yin Temple—not intended for worship by living people.
• Lin Feng’s wind scouts the temple and finds a Tree Coffin bearing Ancient Zhangzhung inscriptions: “Dedicated to the merciful, the eternally undying.” Lin Feng can read the script through knowledge inherited from the Root Teacher, though that legacy offers no explanation for the temple.
• A slow, ominous sound and descending light signal a new danger. A shaman finds a narrow opening behind the temple, but Lin Feng remains focused on the chamber’s contradictions—especially how the thunder-patterned quilt associated with Menzang E’pang could have come from this place.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng’s supernatural network is becoming more organized: the Temple Keeper and Five Ghosts act under clearer oversight, though the temple’s followers remain bound by their separate roles.
• Hong Ni is shaken by the staged killing and is placed under the Temple Keeper’s protection.
• Lin Feng and Granny Weiming work together to interpret the tomb. Granny brings practical knowledge of temples and burial customs; Lin Feng uses his wind and inherited script-reading ability to investigate.
• The shamans’ discovery of a possible passage does not immediately resolve the mystery, leaving Lin Feng cautious and observant.

Significant themes

• Identity and substitution: Lin Feng’s double takes Hong Ni’s place, while the apparent deaths leave uncertainty about who was truly in the vehicles.
• Hidden systems and inherited knowledge: The Root Teacher’s transmission lets Lin Feng recognize an ancient script, but knowledge alone cannot explain what he finds.
• The uncanny and the sacred: The Yin Temple and its prayer-like inscriptions blur the boundary between burial, worship, and supernatural activity.
• Order amid danger: The Haunted Village operates through strict divisions of responsibility even as its members confront escalating threats.

Key plot points

• The group finds a narrow passage into the tomb. A young Shaman scouts ahead but is torn apart by a creature inside; the Shamans pull back part of his body and rescue another survivor whose body has begun to grow scales.
• Lin Feng uses the New Moon Mirror to inspect the surrounding mineral walls. He discovers that they contain neatly dressed Zhou People who appear to have suffocated themselves as part of a ritual. Their bodies are changing into Terrain Dragons. When they awaken, they claw through the ore—revealing that they made the passage the group has found.
• Lin Feng enters the passage after Granny Weiming tells him she can manage on her own. He fights smaller, soil-like Terrain Dragons and climbs an L-shaped shaft.
• The shaft contains exceptionally well-preserved corpses, wrapped in thunder-patterned quilts and lacking souls. An inscription in Ancient Zhangzhung reads, “At the beginning of eternity, death and new life coexist. Life is death, and death is life,” beside an Ouroboros matching the Snake Family’s emblem.
• Lin Feng suspects the tomb belongs to the Many-Armed Corpse-Shedding King and wonders whether the Snake Family is connected to the site. He climbs out of the shaft, with Granny Weiming following, and finds another disjointed, unsettling scene.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng stays analytical under pressure, using the Mirror and his knowledge of the dead to identify the danger and interpret the clues. He weighs whether to protect Granny Weiming or proceed, recognizing that everyone’s survival has a cost.
• Granny Weiming reassures Lin Feng that she can make her own way through, allowing him to scout ahead.
• The Shamans respond to the scout’s death with discipline: they use poison, crossbows, and a grappling claw to retrieve the survivors rather than panicking.
• The scout’s fate demonstrates how vulnerable the group is in the narrow passage, where there is little room to fight.

Significant themes

• Death and renewal: The inscription, the preserved corpses, and the transforming bodies all blur the boundary between life and death.
• Ritual and resurrection: The Zhou People’s arranged bodies and the intact corpses suggest deliberate rites and the possibility of revival.
• Survival as calculation: Lin Feng treats danger as a matter of managing costs, including deciding who should take the greatest risk.
• Discordant history: The tomb combines seemingly unrelated cultures, symbols, and structures, creating a sense of mystery and unease.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Feng enters a magnificent chamber called the Eternal Land, a striking contrast to the dark, sinister spaces below. A crystal in the ceiling casts colored light onto a seven-tiered pyramid altar, where twenty-eight intact, apparently deceased people sit peacefully beneath thunder-patterned quilts.
• A lingering force surrounds the altar and repels Lin Feng’s wind, suggesting that something here may still be alive. Lin Feng helps Granny Weiming and several shamans climb out of the shaft; fighting with the Terrain Dragons continues below.
• Granny Weiming identifies the chamber as the Eternal Buddha’s Eternal Pure Land, a legendary sacred place. She explains that the Eternal Buddha’s obscure lineage was connected to monks who fled Tibet during the last Tsenpo Darma’s anti-Buddhist campaign.
• The chamber’s purity unsettles Lin Feng. The evil shrine below, the unusual quilts, and the possibility that religious ideas could be made real make him fear that the place’s apparent holiness conceals danger. He orders the others to search for an exit while he investigates.
• Lin Feng and Granny Weiming examine the bodies: they are dead, intact, and still warm. Granny Weiming performs a chant that creates a protective mist, but the effort appears to consume her life force.
• At the altar’s summit, Lin Feng finds a huge natural crystal overhead and a dry stone basin beneath it. When he pours in water, it quickly drains through small holes in the basin.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng remains cautious and analytical, using the New Moon Mirror to inspect the chamber and questioning what its objects and arrangements mean. Though he is curious about the site, his suspicion grows as its sacred appearance conflicts with the evil below.
• Granny Weiming reveals her knowledge of Tibetan religious history and confirms the chamber’s legendary identity. She acts protectively, warning Aming to be careful and using a costly chant to shield the group.
• Aming and the other shamans help Granny Weiming out of the shaft and begin searching the chamber while combat continues below.

Significant themes

• Sacredness and corruption: The pure, radiant chamber sits above a sinister shrine, leaving uncertain whether the site is truly holy or dangerously deceptive.
• History and lost traditions: The Eternal Buddha’s obscure lineage and the vanished peoples connected to the site show how much of the past has disappeared from record.
• The cost of protection: Granny Weiming’s protective magic appears to draw on her own vitality.
• Unresolved mystery: The bodies’ preserved warmth, the crystal, and the draining basin raise questions about what the Eternal Land was designed to do—and whether its power is still active.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Feng pours his stored purified water into an ancient basin. The water vanishes into a network of lead pipes, apparently reactivating a mechanism beneath the site.
• The basin reflects people according to their true nature: Lin Feng does not appear; Granny Weiming appears as a skull; a corpse looks unmistakably dead; and A-Ming sees himself as an Evil Ghost. A-Ming falls into a trance and attacks Lin Feng, who subdues him; Granny Weiming revives him with smoke.
• The flowing water reveals Sanskrit scriptures on the Pyramid and creates enchanting sounds that draw the Shamans into reading. Their vital blood drains toward their brows, apparently forming seeds through a dangerous, improper process. Lin Feng uses the Land God’s blessing tone to break some of the spell and tells the others to shut their eyes and ears.
• Looking through the New Moon Mirror, Lin Feng discovers the mechanism’s lower levels and a seemingly meditating High Monk. The figure awakens and drinks the water; surrounding corpses also awaken in a sense, chanting in unison. The chant puts the Shamans and Granny Weiming to sleep, while the Terrain Dragons flee.
• A mutilated, shadow-like being emerges from a pit and is identified as Peng Zu’s Grandson. Lin Feng considers the uncertain legends surrounding Peng Zu and the possibility that this being is an ancient descendant. Rather than confront Lin Feng, the entity retreats into the Pyramid, and the corpses’ thunder-patterned coverings turn to ash.
• As everyone else falls into dreams, Lin Feng remains awake and alone. Teacher Xun then climbs out of the pit. Though he does not initially recognize Lin Feng, the Vertical Eye mark helps him do so. He grips Lin Feng’s hand excitedly and says that Lin Feng’s arrival means he succeeded.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng remains practical and composed in an escalating supernatural crisis. He investigates the basin, protects A-Ming, counters the scripture’s influence, and uses the mirror to trace the mechanism. His calm greeting of Teacher Xun suggests he had anticipated their meeting.
• Granny Weiming helps interpret the Sanskrit text and understands the danger of the ritual. Though initially amused by the basin’s reflection of her as a Corpse Demon, she is eventually overcome by the chanting.
• A-Ming is revealed to have become an Evil Ghost without anyone noticing. The basin’s reflection triggers his trance, but Lin Feng restrains him and Granny Weiming brings him back.
• The Shamans become absorbed in the revealed scripture and risk their lives as their vital blood is drawn into seed formation. Lin Feng’s intervention briefly restores their awareness, but the later chant puts them to sleep.
• Teacher Xun appears markedly more driven and battle-ready than Lin Feng’s earlier memory of him. His recognition of Lin Feng—and his claim that he “succeeded”—sets up an important unresolved connection.

Significant themes

• Appearance versus true nature: The basin strips away disguises and reveals what beings really are—or what they have become.
• Knowledge and spiritual danger: The scripture promises supreme wisdom, but its enchanting sounds and forced seed-making show that insight can be twisted into a lethal process.
• Ancient history and uncertain identity: Conflicting accounts of Peng Zu make the entity’s name and lineage difficult to interpret, linking myth, history, and supernatural survival.
• Isolation and hidden purpose: Lin Feng alone remains outside the collective sleep, while Teacher Xun’s arrival and cryptic words hint that events are unfolding according to a larger plan.

Chapter Summary: “Containing the Nightmare”

Key plot points and events

• Lin Feng reunites with Teacher Xun, who emerges wounded from a shaft. Below them, a Historical Remnant is fighting an Other God—a supernatural guardian created to defend tombs from such beings.
• Teacher Xun explains that the site contains at least four nested tombs. One belongs to followers of the Eternal Buddha, a Buddhist lineage whose spiritual masters eventually found what they believed was their Sacred Ground.
• The pair discover a surviving monk inside a pyramid-shaped altar. The monk offers to guide people to the Pure Land, insisting that he would save anyone from the suffering of the world, regardless of their beliefs. He lets Lin Feng and Teacher Xun descend into the ruins below.
• As they travel down a seemingly endless passage, Teacher Xun reveals that the One-Eye Country’s people migrated repeatedly because they were imprisoning the Nightmare Phenomenon.
• The Nightmare is a real, hostile creature that attacks sleeping beings, potentially killing vast numbers of people and animals. The One-Eye Country’s remnants have vanished, and their containment methods—including the giant eye that ended up in the Yellow River—are gone. The Nightmare may now be breaking free, and the travelers may already be inside it.
• The chapter ends with Lin Feng asking what price the One-Eye Country paid to use Qitu, a method that could restrain Nightmares but had severe side effects.

Character developments

• Lin Feng grows more able to accept extraordinary explanations, but remains alert and skeptical. He connects the disappearance of the One-Eye Country with the imminent danger of the Nightmare.
• Teacher Xun is revealed as a determined archaeologist and historian who has independently traced the One-Eye Country’s history. Despite his injuries and the danger, he remains absorbed in uncovering and preserving knowledge.
• The monk is portrayed as compassionate and sincere. His wish to lead people to the Pure Land seems rooted in witnessing repeated destruction and rebirth, not in rejecting or judging other faiths.

Character interactions

• Teacher Xun guides Lin Feng away from the battle below and explains the overlapping tombs and the Eternal Buddha lineage.
• Lin Feng questions the monk’s willingness to save people whose beliefs differ from his own; the monk responds that he will save anyone he can.
• As they descend, Lin Feng and Teacher Xun compare their interpretations of the One-Eye Country and the Nightmare. Their exchange turns the descent into a shared investigation—and an increasingly urgent warning.

Significant themes

• Knowledge amid danger: Teacher Xun’s scholarly curiosity persists even when survival is uncertain.
• Compassion and religious tolerance: The monk treats salvation as a response to universal suffering, not a reward for belonging to one faith.
• Cycles of destruction and renewal: Historians and certain beings retain memories across time’s cycles, while others are erased from memory.
• The cost of containment: The One-Eye Country’s efforts to hold back the Nightmare may have contributed to its people’s decline, raising the question of what sacrifice Qitu demands.
• Fragile safeguards: A threat once restrained for generations may return when its keepers and their methods disappear.

Summary

• A strange, mournful call grows louder as Lin Feng and Teacher Xun descend through a dark, rippling space. Teacher Xun identifies it as the Nightmare itself, an ancient force that once traveled as black mist, killed all living things it covered, and then moved on. It has no known humanlike emotions, and Teacher Xun still does not understand how the One-Eye Country managed to imprison it.
• The One-Eye Country’s defeat by Guifang suggests that it had already become severely weakened. Its people knew how to keep the Nightmare dormant, but their short lives and the eventual disappearance of their civilization left its containment dependent on a fading inheritance.
• Teacher Xun explains that monks associated with the “eternal Buddhas” had investigated the Nightmare’s traces and taken away its remnants. Meanwhile, the dregs of history are pursuing Lin Feng and Teacher Xun because they want to obtain the Nightmare—not as a singular prize, but as part of a wider effort to become immortal, self-sustaining “natural phenomena” and replace part of the Heavenly Dao. The Thirty-Six Stockades are cited as an example of unnatural phenomena once created and later suppressed.
• Lin Feng realizes that the dregs’ plans involve beings and forces such as the Heaven-Bearing Temple, the Mount-Viewing Kiln Factory, and the Fu Hao mirror. Teacher Xun confirms that Lin Feng and he are the only Historians left, though he does not know whether the others were killed.
• Since Lin Feng controls the Mount-Viewing Kiln Factory, Teacher Xun says Lin Feng must take charge of the Nightmare. If it escapes—or falls into the dregs’ hands—the result could be a resurgence of spiritual energy and countless Uncanny beings roaming the night.
• As they near the One-Eye Country’s final sacrificial refuge, the men suspect that the scene and its people may be far from what they hope. Teacher Xun still has not answered Lin Feng’s question about the Qitu.
• The chapter ends with an ambush: a bloodied hand attacks Lin Feng from the wall. Teacher Xun identifies the attacker as the Other God, a master of Esoteric Arts whose body bears curse-script and reeks of Ripe Copper. A second hand—the Many-Armed Corpse-Shedding King’s—strikes from the side.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng moves from investigating the Nightmare’s history to accepting responsibility for containing it. He thinks critically through Teacher Xun’s explanation and understands the stakes of failure.
• Teacher Xun remains composed and precise, sharing what he knows while openly acknowledging what remains uncertain. He entrusts Lin Feng with the Nightmare because of Lin Feng’s control of the Mount-Viewing Kiln Factory.
• Their relationship is marked by trust and practical cooperation: Teacher Xun explains the threat, Lin Feng draws out its implications, and both recognize the danger without needing to spell out every consequence.

Significant themes

• Fragile inheritance: Human civilizations and traditions fade, while ancient forces outlast their keepers.
• The cost of immortality and control: The dregs seek to become enduring natural laws, turning power into a threat to the world.
• Limits of human understanding: The Nightmare is neither clearly alive nor governed by human motives, making it difficult to predict or contain.
• Responsibility amid uncertainty: Lin Feng must act despite incomplete knowledge and catastrophic risks.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Feng is trapped in the Nightmare, a reality-warping force that strips people of their usual strengths and makes them forget what is happening. A monk’s recitation of the Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra and the golden light of Lin Feng’s talisman help anchor him.
• He escapes into the Haunted Village, where his Zhong Kui decree manifests and the Nightmare breaks through. Lin Feng confronts the rulers gathered around the sealed New Moon Mirror, warning that releasing the Nightmare would kill them. He takes the Nightmare away, aided by the One-Eye Country remnants.
• The chapter jumps ahead: Lin Feng has spent eleven years in the game settling unfinished matters. He returns with the Nightmare and unusual beings created by eating Qitu flesh, explaining that Qitu and Ranyi may persist beyond death by transforming people into something neither human nor Ghost.
• Lin Feng reveals that the vertical eye between his brows contains a bound consciousness, and that the Nightmare’s birdlike victims are both horrifying and capable of suppressing other Nightmares. He has also acquired a folk Shamanic register that draws qi to sustain its seal.
• Lin Feng leaves the Haunted Village with Hong Ni, sensing the Historical Remnants nearby. The chapter ends with an unidentified man in a Book of Changes Hall watching news of a traffic accident and remarking, “Serves them right.”

Character development

• Lin Feng emerges older and more experienced after eleven years of investigations and unfinished business. He is more knowledgeable about immortality, transformation, and the nature of historical remnants, and acts decisively when confronting dangerous forces.
• Hong Ni is confused by Lin Feng’s sudden arrival, but he reassures her.
• Teacher Xun remains gravely injured, represented by a “remnant,” while the Temple Keeper accepts Lin Feng’s warning and keeps his distance from the Qitu-transformed beings.

Significant themes

• Reality and history: Nightmares distort logic, while remnants and objects left in “history” can persist as tangible realities.
• Transformation and immortality: Qitu and Ranyi may survive through the transformation of those who consume them, blurring the boundaries between human, Ghost, and other forms of existence.
• Knowledge and control: Scripture, talismans, seals, and hard-won understanding offer ways to resist or contain supernatural forces, though not without cost.
• The horror of survival: The birdlike beings can suppress Nightmares, but their existence is itself a form of suffering and grotesquerie.

Character interactions

• Lin Feng uses threats and blunt explanations to persuade the rulers to let him remove the Nightmare; the One-Eye Country remnants handle those who resist.
• A Daoist gives Lin Feng a talismanic seal, which he attaches to the Altar associated with the Nightmare.
• Lin Feng explains the risks of Qitu transformation to the Temple Keeper, who obeys his warning.
• Lin Feng comforts Hong Ni as they leave, while the final observer’s approving reaction to the traffic accident hints at another thread of events.

Plot points and events

• Zhou Tao, a locally famous fortune-teller, secretly relies on a stolen Fish-Basket Guanyin statue. The statue came from a small temple’s “deity storage” service, where unwanted statues are kept under restraint. After taking it, Zhou Tao developed a supposed gift—but also suffered exhaustion and disturbing symptoms.
• Lin Feng arrives with a woman and immediately recognizes that the statue contains a trace of a Fangxiangshi. He pins Zhou Tao down with Flame, crushes the statue, and destroys the supernatural presence inside. Zhou convulses, but Lin Feng uses several techniques to stabilize him.
• Lin Feng explains that the Historical Remnants have hunted him for decades, though their power has weakened. He suspects a later version of himself may have weakened them. The game’s hidden condition means that once the remnants discover him, he cannot finish unless he dies.
• Lin Feng sees Nightmare—an uncontrollable threat—as leverage against the remnants, but recognizes that confronting them directly is more difficult. The Fangxiangshi, an ancient hereditary group of exorcists, are the most relentless pursuers.
• Zhou Tao wakes to find the statue shattered. He thinks he has lost his livelihood, unaware that his remaining life is also nearly spent; Lin Feng has only managed to preserve it temporarily.
• Lin Feng watches Mr. Luo enter a police station to surrender, then prepares to travel to the Min Mountains, where the Boat Coffin is connected.
• Teacher Xun disappears from Lin Feng’s livestream. His name remains online, but important work has vanished, and Lin Feng learns that a pivotal excavation in Xun’s life apparently never took place. Professor Han is also absent and reported ill. Lin Feng concludes the remnants may have altered events and asks Teacher Xu to investigate Lin Youzhi and his wife during the Northern Song.
• Lin Feng sends Hong Ni away and distinguishes ordinary Underworld Uncanny, which ritual masters can handle, from Historical Remnants, who remain active and now pursue him.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng is increasingly angry and defiant after years of being hunted. He destroys the statue’s inhabitant but still treats Zhou Tao, a collaborator with the remnants, rather than simply abandoning him. He is also alarmed by signs that the remnants can erase or rewrite people’s histories.
• Zhou Tao is exposed as a fraud whose success depended on an entity housed in the statue. His bargain with the supernatural has left him gravely ill, though he does not yet understand the cost.
• Teacher Xun is absent, and evidence suggests the remnants have altered his past. Professor Han is likewise unavailable, deepening Lin Feng’s concern about his allies.
• Mr. Luo turns himself in, while Lin Feng continues his investigation and journey.

Significant themes

• The cost of supernatural bargains: Zhou Tao’s “gift” comes at the price of his health and life.
• Belief, power, and exploitation: Religious services, spiritual authority, and genuine supernatural forces overlap, making it difficult to distinguish faith from manipulation.
• History as a battleground: The remnants appear able to alter not only events but people’s records and life histories.
• Escalating survival and resistance: Lin Feng’s pursuit has become a direct struggle against ancient powers, with Nightmare serving as both danger and potential leverage.

Key plot points and events

• While traveling to Sichuan, Lin Feng reviews historical records about Lin Youzhi, a shadowy figure connected to political intrigue and an assassination attempt in the Song era. Emperor Renzong’s distrust of officials and his declining mental state are described, while records of Lin Youzhi’s family appear to have been deliberately preserved and information about Monk Wu and others erased.
• Lin Feng considers his recent gains, especially “Nightmare,” a mysterious force that descends when living beings sleep and leaves only a blank, spotless landscape. He has no clear way to understand or control it. Other entities and beings he has encountered—including the Many-Armed Corpse-Shedding King and the One-Eye Country Remnants—seem unrelated to it. The Root Teacher is the only person he knows to have become an enduring supernatural “origin.”
• Teacher Xun approaches Lin Feng, carrying a map marked with sites that Fangxiangshi must not reach first. The marks include the Boat Coffin site in the Min Mountains and places across the Plateau, western Hunan, Sichuan, and Yunnan.
• Near death, Teacher Xun says he intends to confront Fangxiangshi. He has protected the Xie family from disaster and tried to keep young Han safe, though Han was drawn into the upheaval and took an ancient path connected to the Queen Mother of the West.
• Teacher Xun explains his theory about that ancient lineage: its people used the Jade Pool, a natural phenomenon with restorative properties, to perform a form of bodily grafting—giving humans serpent bodies in an effort to achieve longevity. He believes ancient tribes dependent on supernatural natural features gradually disappeared when those features vanished. The Ascension Pool beneath Shuzhong, which helped young Han, may be modeled on the Jade Pool.
• As Teacher Xun and Lin Feng exchange this information through their “intent,” Lin Feng’s Twelve-Sided Die signals approaching danger. Train staff arrive claiming to conduct a routine inspection. Lin Feng disappears; Teacher Xun has already passed out, his intent gone, and needs to sleep.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng remains composed and analytical, weighing historical evidence and supernatural theories. He prioritizes Teacher Xun’s information over the warning from his die, then evades the approaching inspection.
• Teacher Xun is dying but determined to face Fangxiangshi and learn their true nature. He reflects on years of conflict with them, his promise to the Xie family, and his failed attempt to shield young Han.
• Lin Feng and Teacher Xun share a rapid, information-rich exchange about ancient myths, the Queen Mother of the West, and the origins of serpent-bodied longevity practices. Their mutual surprise at the connection to Fuxi and Nüwa underscores the importance of the discovery.

Significant themes

• History as fragmented and controlled: Records are incomplete, selectively preserved, or erased, leaving figures like Lin Youzhi surrounded by secrecy.
• The limits and cost of immortality: Longevity depends on rare phenomena and extreme transformations, while those who rely on them may disappear when their source is lost.
• Knowledge amid danger: Lin Feng and Teacher Xun pursue understanding even as their time and safety run out.
• The uncanny and the unknowable: “Nightmare,” the Root Teacher, and ancient supernatural practices remain only partially understood, emphasizing the limits of human comprehension.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Feng escapes the Fangxiangshi’s pursuit by exploiting the confusion surrounding a train ticket inspection. A Fangxiangshi agent realizes he has lost Lin Feng, reports it, then resumes his apparent role as railway staff.
• Lin Feng interprets his Twelve-Sided Die as an early-warning device. Its symbols help identify cultivators, anomalies, time-related figures, and natural phenomena. He concludes that Teacher Xun is in danger because Professor Han has acquired powerful abilities and may have completed a successful grafting procedure.
• Studying Teacher Xun’s marked map, Lin Feng suspects he was searching for the elusive Fangxiangshi. The map lists sites and famous figures across Confucian, Buddhist, and Daoist traditions. Lin Feng is especially struck by Liu Bingzhong, who had mysterious contacts late in life and built numerous empty tombs.
• The Fangxiangshi search for Lin Feng but cannot reliably divine his location; their methods risk exposing them in return. They are also unsettled by Professor Han’s escape from their control. He possesses the Three Mounds, a powerful ancient text fragment that can turn the illusory into reality.
• Lin Feng follows the map’s coordinates to the Western Sichuan Plateau. As Fangxiangshi pursuers arrive, an overlapping mountain and mist reveal a hidden realm. Lin Feng enters it, leaving his pursuers unable to follow or identify the place.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng becomes more deliberate and strategic. He uses his knowledge of the die, his map, and misdirection to evade pursuit and investigate the Fangxiangshi’s history. He also enters the mountain using his developing ability to perceive hidden sacred places.
• Teacher Xun remains absent but central: his danger and investigation into the Fangxiangshi drive Lin Feng’s actions.
• Professor Han emerges as a major threat, having escaped the Fangxiangshi and gained formidable powers from the Three Mounds fragment.
• The Fangxiangshi appear organized and secretive, but their limits are exposed: they cannot freely divine Lin Feng or access every hidden location. Their agents cooperate in the search but remain wary of revealing themselves.
• Lin Feng observes the pursuers from a distance, while they watch him enter the hidden realm helplessly—an encounter that underscores the widening gap between his capabilities and their intelligence.

Significant themes

• Knowledge and secrecy: The Fangxiangshi’s power depends on mystery, while Lin Feng gathers clues from scattered historical records and sites.
• Power and its limits: Even ancient, organized practitioners cannot simply obtain powerful relics or control every emerging threat.
• History repeating and concealing itself: Ancient shamanic practices, religious traditions, and modern supernatural conflicts are intertwined.
• Perception and access: Hidden realms are always present, but only those with sufficient cultivation can perceive and enter them.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Feng disappears into the fog without the Fangxiangshi following. Their hesitation and slow flow of information reveal the limits and bureaucracy of their organization.
• Following directions from the Iron-Crowned Daoist, Lin Feng passes through the fog into a hidden, sealed mountain range. He uses protective artifacts and disguises himself as the Temple Keeper, leaving his real location concealed.
• The mountains are unnaturally pure and filled with suspended Boat Coffins and intact black corpses that never touch the ground. The strange scene, along with Lin Feng’s reacting Anomalous Object, suggests a powerful entity has been sealed there.
• Buddhist and Daoist traces surround the site: a talismanic seal, a small temple and damaged bronze statue, engraved steps, and remnants of blessings. The weakening inscriptions indicate the prison may eventually fail.
• As Lin Feng climbs, the mountain’s influence begins to distort his thinking. He questions what distinguishes Natural Phenomena from Anomalous Objects and realizes even the protections of his Haunted Village cannot keep him safe from the corruption.
• The Temple Keeper senses the danger and uses ritual gestures, Zuan Wangye’s flame, and a hand drum to connect with the old sealing power. Lin Feng pulls the Temple Keeper and a retrieved corpse into the Haunted Village.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng acts cautiously, using disguise, protective tokens, and supernatural abilities to investigate. His scholarly curiosity turns to alarm when he recognizes his thoughts may be compromised.
• The Fangxiangshi are shown as powerful but fallible: their lower ranks must wait for orders, and they cannot access or control everything.
• Lin Feng and the Temple Keeper work in parallel against the mountain’s influence. The Temple Keeper reinforces the seal while Lin Feng extracts him and the corpse into relative safety.
• Lin Feng’s reflections on the Nightmare, the Black Light of Shuzhong, and the nature of Natural Phenomena show how uncertain even his best theories remain.

Significant themes

• Knowledge and uncertainty: Lin Feng’s attempt to classify supernatural forces exposes how incomplete his understanding is.
• Institutional limits: The Fangxiangshi’s hierarchy and poor communication contrast with the dangers that demand immediate action.
• Secrecy and hidden worlds: Sacred or supernatural places may exist beyond ordinary geography, accessible only through special means.
• Containment and decay: The fading inscriptions and corroded statue suggest that even ancient protections weaken over time.
• Contaminated perception: The mountain threatens not only bodies but also thought, making certainty and self-trust fragile.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Feng uses Heavenly Fire to revive a corpse, forming the character “纂,” but the flames stir something dormant in his Altar.
• The sound of Qitu laughter spreads through the mountain. Qitu flesh can ward off nightmares, but its effects are deadly: people who hear the creature’s laughter are compelled to imitate it and die. Lin Feng’s Source Seed lets his body adapt, but the corpses he revived begin coughing up sparks—the vitality he gave them—and “laughing” uncontrollably.
• The disturbance reaches the Boat Coffins and stirs something within the stone mountain. The Temple Keeper rushes toward its source.
• Lin Feng sees a Fangxiangshi leading a ritual procession through the fog. Its followers dance Nuo-style steps, beat drums, burn vegetation for smoke, and make frightening sounds. Blood-red threads connect the Fangxiangshi to them: they serve as its anchors, not merely its slaves, and their presence suggests the place is important.
• The Temple Keeper enters a cave apparently excavated from a burrow made by a giant Bashé. He finds ciphered slips, which he takes to decipher later.
• Deeper inside, they discover a grisly site of failed or completed body alterations: Stitched Abominations, surgical tools made from bone, and corpses lining the passage. Beyond a large open doorway is a lake and stone beds still stained with fresh blood, suggesting surgery took place there recently.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Feng remains alert and analytical amid the supernatural danger. His Source Seed begins adapting his throat to the Qitu’s voice, while his observation reveals how the Fangxiangshi is connected to its followers.
• The Temple Keeper acts decisively, heading toward the disturbance and collecting the ciphered records, which he believes he can eventually decode.
• The Fangxiangshi and its followers have a mutually dependent relationship: the followers summon and anchor it, while it controls their movements through blood-red threads.

Significant themes

• The cost of unnatural power: Qitu flesh, Heavenly Fire, and the mountain’s influence all produce dangerous side effects.
• Adaptation and transformation: Lin Feng’s body can change to meet supernatural threats, while the cave’s inhabitants were subjected to grotesque bodily alterations.
• Ritual, belief, and dependence: The Fangxiangshi’s followers both empower and sustain it through ritual.
• A decaying old order and buried history: The Fangxiangshi’s former strength has faded, while the cave’s encrypted records and recent-looking surgical traces point to a history—and possibly an ongoing practice—that remains only partly understood.