Chapter Summaries

Key plot points and events

• Xu Yin, a Calamity God of Central Blood City, advances through Xinhu Blood City to reach Gao Ming. His arrival warns the other factions that blocking him could provoke a war with Central Blood City.
• The weakened Lords of Illusory and Aging Blood Cities yield. The Lord of Time Blood City also holds back, wary of the Calamity Gods gathered around Gao Ming.
• Central Blood City’s representative reveals that it has taken over Rotting Blood City, gaining its rules and power. He also warns that the Lord of Xinhu Blood City may be returning from the depths of the Blood Sea—an uncertain claim that makes the other Unknowables hesitate.
• Xu Yin crosses the passage between Xinhu and reality, then faces the Lord of Void Blood City, the hidden Unknowable that had nearly killed Gao Ming.
• The representative prompts Painter to depict Void Blood City. Under the pressure of its rules, Painter’s protective shell breaks, and he briefly returns to the detached state he had at the Ghost School. He finishes the painting and says, “It’s done.”
• Xu Yin passes through Void Blood City’s rules without being attacked and continues toward Gao Ming.

Character developments and interactions

• Xu Yin is shown as fiercely devoted and unusually dangerous: his love and hatred are absolute, and he treats combat as self-destruction. His steady advance forces even powerful opponents to reconsider fighting.
• Gao Ming is recognized by Blood Color as an ordinary man who escaped Fate through sheer struggle and achieved what no current Blood City Lord could accomplish alone.
• The Central Blood City representative uses intimidation and carefully chosen information to protect Xu Yin’s path, exposing the city’s growing strength and exploiting the rivals’ uncertainty.
• Painter is revealed to use black pigment associated with Darkness Blood City to conceal himself and withstand its influence. The void rules disrupt that protection, briefly exposing his original, emotionally blank self.
• Blood Color shows unexpected respect for Gao Ming, while still viewing Hanhai as a dangerous threat.
• The Lords of Illusory, Aging, Time, and Void Blood Cities each hold back for different reasons: exhaustion, damaged rules, risk, or uncertainty.

Significant themes

• Defying fate: Gao Ming’s rise is admired because he appears to have seized control of his own destiny.
• Power and deterrence: Central Blood City’s accumulated strength prevents a direct confrontation, even among formidable Unknowables.
• Endurance and sacrifice: Xu Yin’s way of fighting blurs the line between harming others and destroying himself.
• Uncertainty as leverage: The possibility that Xinhu’s lord is returning is enough to stall an attack, whether or not the claim is true.
• Concealment and identity: Painter’s shifting protections and exposed self suggest the cost of hiding beneath another power’s influence.

Plot points and events

• Xu Yin breaks the Delirium World’s rules, captures the dazzling butterfly containing Dream’s stolen power, and rescues Gao Ming, whose body and spirit have been horribly damaged.
• Banban is left behind under the scrutiny of seven Unknowables. Terrified, he hides among the corpses and pretends to be dead.
• As Xu Yin tries to escape through the Void Rules, Fake Number Zero attacks him with a saw-mark that cuts through his memories and reawakens the agony of a past operation.
• A powerful ally erupts in anger, but Xu Yin refuses to retaliate. His restored heart lets him restrain his destructive Calamity God power, which could otherwise endanger Gao Ming.
• The Blood City Lords do not unite against Xu Yin: Void withdraws, Blood Color watches, and Fake Number Zero retreats. Illusion also flees, leaving Time surrounded and badly weakened.
• Xu Yin reaches the man waiting outside the rules. On his instruction, Xu Yin destroys the butterfly and returns Dream’s stolen power to Gao Ming, whose heartbeat steadies. The man introduces himself as Chen Ge, also known as “the evil of Supreme Evil.”

Character developments and interactions

• Xu Yin shows restraint despite being attacked and thrown into agonizing memories. His priority is carrying Gao Ming to safety, not revenge.
• Gao Ming survives in an extremely fragile state, and the returned power begins restoring him.
• Banban realizes that the Unknowables’ attention is focused on Xu Yin and Gao Ming, but remains too frightened to act.
• Fake Number Zero attacks Xu Yin’s deepest vulnerabilities, then retreats when the expected support from Void never comes and the confrontation turns against him.
• Chen Ge provides the next step in Gao Ming’s rescue, revealing both his connection to Supreme Good and his ominous reputation among the Blood City Lords.

Significant themes

• Restraint amid overwhelming power: Xu Yin’s refusal to unleash destructive force is an act of care and self-control.
• Trauma and memory: Fake Number Zero’s attack shows how past suffering can wound someone even when their physical defenses seem invulnerable.
• Distrust and divided interests: The Blood City Lords and Unknowables fail to act as a united front; their rivalries and calculations shape the outcome.
• Care amid ruin: Xu Yin’s gentle question—“Does it hurt?”—and his determined rescue contrast with the chapter’s violence and decay.

Key plot points and events

• Dream is annihilated by the Calamity Gods. Its power and accumulated faith flow back to Gao Ming, completing Hanhai Blood City’s Ghost Markings and restoring Gao Ming’s consciousness. He becomes the true master of Dream’s shrines.
• Chen Ge explains the larger struggle: the original Fate was replaced by a Giant Tree that predetermines everyone’s lives. Defiant souls are cast into the Deep World, where their suffering and regrets gave rise to the Thirteen Blood Cities.
• The first ghost damaged the Giant Tree and left thirteen powers that could oppose it, but the Blood Cities were divided. Chen Ge and Xinhu Blood City’s other lord therefore devised a Blood Sacrifice: use Fate’s corpse as fuel and the thirteen rules as flames to destroy the tree and return control of fate to everyone.
• Gao Ming’s use of Delirium was central to the plan. It drew Dream’s will into the Delirium World, enabling Xinhu’s lord to destroy Dream’s original body and free Xinhu’s strongest fighter. Delirium also kept the other seven Unknowables from interfering.
• The plan took years. By combining the powers of Darkness, Xinhu, Rotting, and Central Blood City, the allies moved Fate’s corpse six months earlier. They then sent the spider boy to Xinhu to help rescue Gao Ming.
• Chen Ge treats Gao Ming with rare medicines, then gives him the rebirth half of Rotting Blood City’s core to restore his vitality. He confronts the Lord of Time Blood City, and a battle begins.

Character developments and interactions

• Gao Ming recovers from near death and gains control of Dream’s shrines, though he remains unable to speak. He realizes how essential he was to the allies’ plan and quietly absorbs the core’s life-giving power.
• Chen Ge reveals himself as a cheerful, dependable leader willing to risk everything for freedom from predetermined fate. His apparently “ultimate evil” nature contrasts with his noble cause; he also gives Gao Ming an extraordinarily valuable treasure without hesitation.
• Gao Ming and Chen Ge share a moment of mutual recognition: Chen Ge credits Gao Ming with making the plan possible, while Gao Ming watches him with amazed, skeptical admiration.
• The Blood City leaders and allies have coordinated across years, overcoming political division and immense danger to advance the Blood Sacrifice. Chen Ge now turns that struggle directly against the Lord of Time Blood City.

Significant themes

• Free will versus predestination: The central conflict is the effort to reclaim individual control over fate from the Giant Tree.
• Sacrifice and commitment: Chen Ge’s plan deliberately leaves the Blood Cities no retreat, demanding immense risks to force a decisive confrontation.
• Cooperation amid division: The Blood Cities’ rivalries nearly doomed their cause, while their combined powers make progress possible.
• Good and evil as misleading labels: Chen Ge is called the ultimate evil, yet acts as a source of hope and compassion; the chapter questions the assumptions behind moral titles.

Key plot points and events

• Gao Ming retains the core of Central Blood City, using its power only to heal rather than merge with the city. The Flesh-and-Blood Immortal and its allied entities are strongly tempted by the core.
• Xiao Bu reveals a remarkable ability: using her embryonic ghost city, Liwan, she simulates the Ghost Markings of Central, Xinhu, and Rotting Blood Cities. With their Blood City Lords’ help, she may eventually build a new, fourteenth Blood City.
• Xiao Bu’s simulated cities suppress the Lord of Time’s powers. After a week-long battle, the Calamity Gods destroy it. Its River of Time and shrines are gathered, and time throughout the Deep World begins to flow slightly more slowly.
• Gao Ming returns to the dead versions of himself contained in the tunnel of time. Reclaiming their memories and wills restores his sense of self and greatly increases his power.

Character developments

• Gao Ming comes to understand that every past version of himself—whatever their character—helped him survive. Their accumulated will, shaped by his experiences in the Delirium World, makes him stronger than an ordinary Unspeakable.
• Xiao Bu emerges as a shy but extraordinarily powerful figure whose talent could reshape the balance among the Blood Cities.
• Blood Color, recognizing Xiao Bu’s growing threat and the danger around Gao Ming, withdraws from the battle.
• The Lord of Time is finally defeated, though only after prolonged resistance.

Character interactions

• Gao Ming is careful with Central Blood City’s core, despite pressure from the entities within him to claim its power.
• The Central Blood City Lord’s cooperation enables Xiao Bu to reproduce its Ghost Markings, astonishing the Lord of Time.
• Chen Ge and the Painter explain why Time had to be targeted first and bring its shrines to Gao Ming, encouraging him to use the recovered corpses to regain himself.
• Gao Ming’s confrontation with his own past selves becomes an inward act of reconciliation: he recognizes them all as parts of himself.

Significant themes

• Identity and integration: Gao Ming’s selfhood is built from every version of himself, including the flawed and painful ones.
• Rebirth through hardship: Surviving the Delirium World transforms Gao Ming rather than merely leaving him damaged.
• Power through cooperation: Xiao Bu’s potential depends on the Blood City Lords’ willingness to share their Ghost Markings.
• Time, mortality, and freedom: Destroying the Lord of Time releases the Deep World from a force that had been draining lifespans and constraining its inhabitants.

Key plot points and events

• Gao Ming’s will breaks free from his physical limits as the Flesh-and-Blood Immortal merges with the Rotting Lord. His new power is great enough to threaten the weakened Immortal.
• Gao Ming perceives the Deep World’s underlying rules as colored threads. He can control the rules of dreams through his authority over Hanhai Blood City, as well as the rules tied to grotesques and Madness Infection.
• Using those powers, he designs a layered nightmare trap for the escaped Lord of Illusory Blood City. The Lord detects the danger and escapes by leaving behind a phantom. Gao Ming also discovers that creatures from his nightmares can manifest in the Deep World.
• Central Blood City takes Time’s shrine. The Calamity Gods then persuade the Lord of Aging Blood City to accompany them as their “guest,” while the Delirium World’s influence over Xinhu Blood City dwindles.
• Gao Ming learns that Shen Luo escaped through the passage to reality, apparently following Fake Number Zero.
• Chen Ge explains that Xinhu is more than a gateway to reality: it contains routes to many mortal worlds. Controlling it could offer a way out of the Deep World, and Fake Number Zero once came close to escaping.

Character developments and interactions

• Gao Ming undergoes a major transformation, gaining an Unspeakable-like perspective and the ability to combine dream and grotesque rules. He begins using his old game-design instincts to build supernatural death traps.
• The Flesh-and-Blood Immortal is vulnerable during the merger and fears Gao Ming’s ability to sever himself from his body and become a powerful Dream Ghost.
• The Lord of Illusory Blood City recognizes Gao Ming’s trap and evades it, showing both caution and perceptiveness.
• The Calamity Gods turn from attacking Time to negotiating with Aging; their “request” results in Aging being taken to Central Blood City.
• Gao Ming and Chen Ge discuss Xinhu’s importance and Fake Number Zero. Gao Ming connects Chen Ge’s account to Lu Zang and his earlier theory that Lu took Situ An to another mortal world.

Significant themes

• Power and transformation: Gao Ming’s emerging will surpasses the limits of his body, though that power could come at the cost of his physical form.
• Creation through imagination: Gao Ming’s dreams can produce real threats, making his game-design talent an unexpectedly potent ability.
• The limits of redemption: Xinhu’s lord sought to heal the Deep World, but its vast accumulation of despair may be beyond any single world’s ability to mend.
• Escape and possibility: Xinhu’s hidden routes suggest that the Deep World may not be inescapable—and that powerful figures may be seeking paths to other realities.

Key plot points

• Gao Ming asks whether Fake Number Zero could be Lu Zang. Chen Ge has never heard of Lu Zang, but explains that people—and alternate versions of people—from the Endless Mortal Worlds sometimes arrive in the real or Deep World.
• Chen Ge reveals that Gao Ming came from one of those worlds. The most exceptional alternate Gao Ming is Hanhai’s other Blood City Lord, Gao Yun; Gao Ming himself may be the most ordinary version.
• Chen Ge recounts Doctor Gao’s attempt to defy Fate. After years of resisting Fate’s control, Doctor Gao concluded that he had to kill Fate. He planned to become Hanhai’s Blood City Lord and gain command of one of the thirteen rules, but Gao Ming ultimately took that position instead.
• Gao Ming realizes that his supposedly ordinary origins may have helped Fate overlook him—until the support of his alternate selves allowed him to break Fate’s script.
• Chen Ge urges him to unite the Blood Cities, arguing that only the Deep World’s combined strength might defeat Fate. He helps Gao Ming absorb the Rotting City Core to heal his grievous injuries.
• Gao Ming’s wounds resist even the core’s power. He explains that, in the Delirium World, he sacrificed his skin, soul, and heart to protect others and sustain Xinhu Blood City’s will, but failed to trap the Unknowables.
• After three days, the Flesh-and-Blood Immortal and the Rotting Lord complete their merger. The Immortal’s will takes control, creating a powerful four-faced, eight-armed Unknowable marked by the rules of decay, rebirth, and dreams. Rotting Blood City is now under Central Blood City’s control, and the fused being is counted among Hanhai’s Unknowables.

Character developments and interactions

• Gao Ming learns that his identity is tied to the Endless Mortal Worlds and that his past sacrifices left wounds deeper than ordinary healing can mend. Despite those losses, he remains committed to resisting Fate.
• Chen Ge acts as a candid ally and strategist, sharing what he knows about Doctor Gao and pushing for cooperation among the Blood Cities. He is moved by Gao Ming’s account and helps seek treatment.
• Doctor Gao emerges as a former rebel against Fate who eventually sought to kill it through control of a Blood City. His failed plan made way for Gao Ming.
• The Flesh-and-Blood Immortal and Rotting Lord become one being, with the Immortal’s will dominant. Their connection to Gao Ming’s flesh and blood makes their relationship unusually close.

Significant themes

• Fate versus free will: Gao Ming’s unlikely rise challenges Fate’s expectations, while Doctor Gao’s history shows how difficult it is to escape its design.
• Sacrifice and survival: Gao Ming’s extreme self-sacrifice saved others but left lasting physical and spiritual damage.
• Unity against a greater threat: Defeating Fate may require rival Blood Cities to combine their strength.
• Identity across worlds: Different versions of the same person can have radically different fates, strengths, and roles.

Key plot points

• Nine days after the Flesh-and-Blood Immortal became an Unknowable, Han Fei returned from the Blood Sea. His arrival ended the threat to Xinhu: a distant Blood City was struck by his blade, and the rules of illusion were severely damaged.
• Xinhu Blood City had been nearly destroyed by the Unknowables. Its remaining survivors—including an old woman Gao Ming had met—were crowded into one residential complex, while only a fragment of the city’s will remained.
• Han Fei returned Dream’s last shrine to Gao Ming. Dream’s body and wings contained countless painful memories and nightmares; as Gao Ming absorbed them, the past versions of himself gained dreams of their own.
• Han Fei used his healing power, the healed souls within his bladeless knife, half of Rotting Blood City’s core, and Dream’s remains to help Gao Ming’s injuries finally heal. Gao Ming’s heart grew stronger, and he seemed to break through a physical limit.
• After thanking Gao Ming for protecting Xinhu, Han Fei asked a favor: when the situation stabilized, he wanted to enter the World of Delirium and retrieve Number Two’s will, which had died there. He then returned to reality alone.

Character developments

• Gao Ming recovers from his severe injuries and grows more powerful by absorbing Dream’s nightmares. His unusual will allows him to use them in a way even other powerful figures cannot.
• Han Fei returns as Xinhu’s calm, formidable protector. Despite possessing Dream’s valuable remains, he gives them to Gao Ming without bargaining, then risks his healing power to save him.
• Xinhu’s remaining will and survivors are revealed to have endured near-total destruction, surviving largely because Gao Ming rescued the city’s will and helped defend it.

Themes

• Healing through shared suffering: Gao Ming’s recovery comes from the painful memories and healed souls carried by others.
• Sacrifice and duty: Han Fei gives up valuable resources and intends to enter the tormenting World of Delirium to recover Number Two.
• Memory, dreams, and identity: Dream’s remains hold people’s worst memories, while Gao Ming’s many past selves turn those nightmares into strength.
• Humanity and coexistence: Gao Ming recognizes Han Fei’s original vision of a world where humans and ghosts could live together as the foundation for Hanhai’s hope.

Character interactions

• Han Fei and Gao Ming share a solemn reunion: Han Fei returns Dream’s shrine, helps heal Gao Ming, and thanks him for protecting Xinhu.
• Gao Ming rejects the idea of severing his bond with the Flesh-and-Blood Immortal, acknowledging that it helped him escape the tunnel.
• Han Fei asks Gao Ming to help retrieve Number Two from the World of Delirium, leaving the decision for later.

Plot points and events

• Gao Ming worries about the Lord of Xinhu Blood City, who has entered reality alone. Chen Ge reassures him: Han Fei is extraordinarily powerful and should resolve Xinhu’s crisis before returning.
• Gao Ming reflects on his four years in the Delirium World, where he and Number Two endured the ordeal together and grew deeply reliant on each other.
• Through dream communication with Gao Yun, Gao Ming learns that Hanhai Blood City has expanded and strengthened. Its seven Dream Ghosts include Zhang Ding, the first to advance in reality, whose specialty is creating mass-disaster dreams.
• Hanhai survived an attempted attack by Aging Blood City. Its people and returning criminals are now protected by the city’s rules, making it a formidable force—but one driven by intense resentment toward other Blood Cities.
• Gao Ming has healed and grown far stronger, though he does not yet understand the full extent of his abilities. He discovers that his power includes nightmares originating from the Endless Mortal Worlds, suggesting dreams have been crossing Fate’s barriers.
• Fate’s Giant Tree begins attacking the Deep World with chains of rules. Chen Ge treats this as evidence that their resistance is working. He gives Gao Ming a cursed phone so they can stay in contact, warning him to keep it from the Nether Fetus.
• Xinhu is engulfed by a blood sea as the conflict escalates. Central, Xinhu, Hanhai, Rotting, and Darkness Blood Cities stand together against Fate, despite pressure from other Blood City Lords to withdraw.
• A new surge from the Endless Mortal Worlds tears fissures across the Deep World’s sky. Gao Ming and Chen Ge face it beside the frenzied Calamity Gods, and Chen Ge declares that Fate itself is afraid.

Character developments and interactions

• Gao Ming is increasingly powerful and confident, while remaining concerned for his allies and unsure of his own limits. He and Gao Yun exchange information through dreams.
• Chen Ge acts as a mentor and strategist: he reassures Gao Ming, gives him a means of communication, and openly defies Fate. He says he bears no ill will toward the Nether Fetus in its present state, though the reason for the creature’s hostility remains unclear.
• Gao Ming and Number Two have become close through their long ordeal in Delirium.
• Hanhai’s Dream Ghosts and citizens have become a strong, nearly weakness-free force, though their thirst for revenge threatens to make them reckless.
• The spider boy reunites with Gao Ming and joins the blood-sea struggle, visibly suffering as the sea pours from the door within him.
• The Calamity Gods refuse to submit to Fate and join the stand alongside Gao Ming and Chen Ge.

Significant themes

• Defiance of Fate: Fate’s violent response suggests that the allied Blood Cities’ resistance is challenging its control.
• Power and paradox: Gao Ming’s supposedly ordinary nature contrasts with his growing status and immense abilities; the chapter also highlights contradictions in the world’s seemingly fixed moral roles.
• Dreams crossing boundaries: Nightmares from the Endless Mortal Worlds reveal that Fate’s barriers may be permeable.
• Alliance, loyalty, and vengeance: Cooperation has made Hanhai and the allied cities stronger, but Hanhai’s hatred of its enemies could turn strength into a danger.

Key plot points and events

• As Fate’s influence threatens to tear the Deep World apart, Chen Ge urges the Blood City Lords to set aside their conflicts and unite. He argues that challenging Fate is the world’s only chance at survival and renewal.
• On the thirtieth day after the Flesh-and-Blood Immortal became an Unknowable, Xinhu is swallowed by the Blood Sea. Painter completes a painting of the Thirteen Blood Cities, then collapses from exhaustion; Xiao Bu takes over, and the painted cities begin to take shape.
• Han Fei returns to Xinhu badly wounded. Chen Ge explains that, despite repeated betrayal, Han Fei has remained devoted to healing despair and building a world where humans and ghosts can coexist.
• Han Fei uses his Bladeless Butcher’s Knife to free Spider Boy from the living door embedded in his body. The door grows, absorbs Spider Boy’s monstrous body, and is strengthened with blood offerings and part of Rotting Blood City’s core.
• With the Calamity Gods’ help, Han Fei opens the door and repeatedly cries, “Summon Soul!” His call breaks through an unseen barrier and begins raising the true Fate’s corpse from the bottom of the Blood Sea. Fate retaliates by sending chains toward everyone in Xinhu.
• The corpse’s emergence reveals the immense scale of the struggle—and the sacrifice behind it. Han Fei has brought nearly all of Xinhu’s ghosts into the effort, leaving himself no escape, while Blood Sea creatures also answer his call.

Character developments and interactions

• Chen Ge reveals a hopeful but uncompromising purpose: not merely to save individuals, but to lift the darkness threatening everyone. His respect for Han Fei deepens the sense of Han Fei’s moral courage.
• Gao Ming recognizes both the danger of Chen Ge’s power and the extraordinary goodness of Han Fei, whom he admits he could not have imitated.
• Han Fei returns battered but remains focused on the collective effort. His willingness to risk himself and Xinhu’s ghosts makes his selflessness central to the chapter.
• Spider Boy accepts Han Fei’s help and is freed from the painful door and monstrous body he has endured.
• The Blood City Lords, Calamity Gods, Xinhu’s ghosts, and Blood Sea monsters converge around Han Fei’s plan, turning a personal act into a shared rebellion against Fate.

Significant themes

• Solidarity against oppression: Old rivalries must give way when the entire world is threatened.
• Self-sacrifice and moral goodness: Han Fei’s refusal to seek personal gain persists despite betrayal and suffering.
• Hope through collective action: The struggle is not simply to save individual souls, but to transform the conditions that keep everyone in darkness.
• Identity and perspective: Chen Ge’s description of the Black Box—as the Deep World viewed from another perspective—hints that reality and Fate may be understood differently.
• Rebirth through destruction: The world’s apparent collapse may be the beginning of a new order.

Plot points and events

• Han Fei, Chen Ge, and their allies enact a long-prepared plan to free the corpse of the true Fate from the Blood Sea. Han Fei’s Summon Soul call, the Xinhu Blood City Lord’s sacrifice, Central Blood City’s temporary passage, and the support of creatures throughout the sea all contribute.
• Doctor Gao arrives, binding the corpse with chains steeped in sin and karma. Though the Blood City Lords distrust him, they share his immediate goal: killing Fate.
• With Doctor Gao’s help, the corpse is forced through the Blood Gate into Xinhu. The gate strains and begins to shatter, while cracks spread through the Deep World’s shrines, divine statues, and rules.
• Three immensely powerful figures stand around the corpse: Doctor Gao, a formidable red-clad woman, and a man who looks like Han Fei. Together, they have surpassed limits Fate imposed on the Deep World.
• Han Fei approaches the corpse, which appears differently to each observer. Gao Ming sees many versions of himself within it, prompting him to wonder why Fate died in the Blood Sea.

Character developments and interactions

• Han Fei reveals his patience and determination, suppressing his urge to attack Doctor Gao until the shared plan is complete.
• Gao Ming recognizes how long Doctor Gao has manipulated events around him. He realizes that their connection—reinforced whenever people call him “Doctor Gao”—has served both as protection and control. His understanding turns to wary hostility.
• Doctor Gao is exposed as a ruthless, long-term schemer who has repeatedly driven versions of Gao Ming toward death and sought to hide Gao Ming from Fate. Despite being a common enemy, he is temporarily allied with Han Fei and the others.
• The Blood City Lords and other forces cooperate across old suspicions, driven by the need to free the corpse and confront Fate.
• The three figures around the corpse embody different forms of power and defiance: Doctor Gao’s chains and sin, the woman’s overwhelming ghostly abilities, and the Han Fei-like man’s hardened contempt for Fate and death.

Significant themes

• Defiance of Fate: The operation challenges the order governing both the Deep World and the mortal worlds.
• Sacrifice and cooperation: Many factions pay a heavy price and work together to achieve what none could accomplish alone.
• Manipulation and agency: Doctor Gao’s influence over Gao Ming blurs the line between protection and control, while Gao Ming’s resistance asserts his own will.
• Identity and perception: The true Fate’s corpse takes different forms for different observers, suggesting that Fate is both a being and a reflection of those who encounter it.

Key plot points and events

• Han Fei explains that the figure each person sees as Fate reflects their own memories and experiences. The being called Fate is not the true Fate but a monster that stole its power; the true Fate is dead, and its corpse may be better understood as “destiny.”
• As the red-eyed sky drains Gao Ming’s lifespan and weakens most of his abilities, he spreads his dream and grotesque rules to protect others. The ghost creatures around him suffer severe bodily damage.
• Han Fei and Chen Ge initiate a blood sacrifice, beginning with themselves. Their plan uses the Thirteen Blood Cities’ diagrams—and the true Fate’s dissolving corpse—to alter the passage between the Deep World and the Endless Mortal Worlds, potentially breaking the boundary between them.
• Other figures join the sacrifice: a powerful Central Blood City Calamity God, Xinhu’s monsters and remaining will, Painter, and representatives of Rotting Blood City. Painter crosses out names concealed in his paintings, while Gong Xi and the Flesh-and-Blood Immortal help Rotting Blood City connect to its rules.
• As the chapter ends, Gao Ming heads toward Hanhai Blood City’s diagram. Doctor Gao makes the same choice, suggesting that the sacrifice will involve them too.

Character developments and interactions

• Han Fei reveals his understanding of Fate and joins Chen Ge in the final plan. The two Blood City Lords agree to sacrifice themselves, standing back to back like the Twin Flowers.
• Gao Ming remains focused on saving others despite Fate’s attack, relying on his unusual rules and the Flesh-and-Blood Immortal. He ultimately steps forward to contribute to the sacrifice.
• Chen Ge places his Blood City core into the ritual and signals others to take part.
• Painter, aided by Zhang Wenyu, joins Darkness Blood City’s diagram and erases hidden names from his paintings.
• Gong Xi, representing life, and the Flesh-and-Blood Immortal, associated with death and decay, together help restore Rotting Blood City’s connection to its rules.
• Doctor Gao independently chooses to join Gao Ming, foreshadowing a significant shared role.

Significant themes

• Fate versus freedom: Fate imposes fixed lives and suffering, while destiny represents open possibilities. The characters’ struggle is ultimately to control their own lives.
• Sacrifice and resistance: The Blood City Lords accept immense personal costs to challenge the system and alter the boundary between worlds.
• Suffering and healing: Han Fei recalls how Fate’s cruelty drove Mad Laughter into madness, underscoring the harm caused by a power that seeks to prevent change.
• Life, death, and renewal: Rotting Blood City’s monsters decay and return, presenting death not only as an ending but as part of rebirth.
• Collective action: Despite differing powers and reservations, figures from multiple Blood Cities gather for a common attempt to change the Deep World.

Plot points and events

• Gao Ming confronts Doctor Gao at Hanhai Blood City. Doctor Gao says the suffering Gao Ming endured was meant for him, praises Gao Ming for containing the Unknowables, and offers to help restore the city’s power.
• Doctor Gao sacrifices his own strength into Hanhai’s emblem. Gao Ming adds his blood and nightmares, strengthening the city’s Blood Sacrifice.
• With Hanhai and the other Blood Cities contributing, Fate’s corpse dissolves into the passage inside Xinhu Blood City. The Fate Giant Tree retaliates, killing monsters and threatening to erase souls across the Deep World.
• Chen Ge urges the Blood Cities to join the gamble. Aging, Time, and the unexpectedly powerful Blood Color and Void cities answer; eventually all thirteen cities contribute their rules.
• Their combined sacrifice merges Fate’s corpse into the passage and drives it toward the Endless Mortal Worlds. At the final barrier, a leaf in one mortal world sheds Fate’s influence and becomes a coordinate for the Deep World’s power.
• Gao Ming recognizes that the world bears traces of the Deep World. In one of his acquired nightmares, he sees an indistinct figure wearing an Eight-Character Fate Token.

Character developments and interactions

• Gao Ming remains wary of Doctor Gao: he acknowledges the man’s role in both his suffering and his rise to power, and would still kill him if the opportunity arose. He nevertheless allows Doctor Gao’s sacrifice and contributes his own blood and nightmares.
• Doctor Gao shows a rare willingness to speak candidly and gives up power to strengthen Hanhai, though Gao Ming cannot tell how much of his explanation is true.
• Chen Ge takes the lead in persuading the Blood City Lords to risk their remaining strength for a chance to strike Fate.
• The Blood City Lords, despite their differences and fear of the consequences, unite in the sacrifice. Void’s unexpectedly eager response surprises both Chen Ge and Gao Ming.

Significant themes

• Cycles versus eternity: Chen Ge frames life, death, dispersal, and gathering as natural cycles that Fate’s pursuit of eternity violates.
• Sacrifice and collective resistance: The thirteen cities stake their power and the Deep World’s survival on a shared attempt to wound Fate.
• Ambiguous relationships and agency: Gao Ming’s bond with Doctor Gao combines resentment, suspicion, and recognition, while Gao Ming increasingly acts by his own choice.
• Hope at the brink: The mortal-world leaf’s rejection of Fate offers an unexpected opening just as the passage seems unable to advance.

Key plot points and events

• Mortal-world inhabitants begin severing the fate tree’s veins, revealing that people in several worlds have already broken free of fate’s restraints.
• The Deep World’s thirteen rules turn toward the mortal worlds. Their collision shatters the barrier between the two realms, and people everywhere feel an invisible burden lift.
• True Fate’s corpse and the thirteen rules fuel a massive blood sacrifice. The new passage from Xinhu Blood City spreads through the mortal worlds, while nearly half the fate tree’s leaves turn red and nearly half the worlds break free of its control.
• The sacrifice leaves the Blood Cities and their leaders badly weakened, but gives the mortal worlds a chance to destroy the fate tree. Chen Ge resolves to send the Deep World into those worlds to help finish the fight.
• Chen Ge asks Gao Ming to become the first “ghost” to enter the mortal worlds. Because Gao Ming originated there, he should be able to pass through without being rejected. He accepts the possibility of finally going home.

Character developments and interactions

• Gao Ming is overwhelmed by the prospect of returning to his true home. Despite Doctor Gao’s attempt to speak with him, he continues to ignore him and instead checks on the weakened Flesh-and-Blood Immortal.
• Chen Ge remains hopeful and determined, treating the sacrifice as a necessary step toward freeing everyone. He personally gives Gao Ming a red garment marked with Central Blood City’s emblem and entrusts him with the mission.
• Han Fei stands alongside Chen Ge, sharing in the victory and witnessing the mortal worlds’ response.
• Doctor Gao explains that the fate tree feared being replaced and imposed restraints to preserve itself—even breaking its own rules—but Gao Ming refuses to engage with him.
• The Flesh-and-Blood Immortal, essential to Gao Ming’s past and survival, is also left exhausted by the sacrifice.

Significant themes

• Free will versus imposed destiny: Breaking fate’s chains brings people both greater freedom and the burden of facing life’s hardship and decay.
• Collective resistance and sacrifice: The liberation of nearly half the mortal worlds comes at a tremendous cost to the Deep World.
• Hope amid suffering: The characters’ pain, deaths, and losses have created a real chance for change.
• Home and identity: Gao Ming’s return is both a physical journey and a reckoning with the memories and origins he has struggled to recover.

Key plot points and events

• Han Fei entrusts Gao Ming with the Afterlife Knife, warning that Fake Number Zero may have survived and returned to the Endless Mortal Worlds. Gao Ming is chosen to lead the first group of ghosts there, since his dream-travel ability may connect the two worlds.
• Chen Ge and Han Fei cannot accompany him: both have urgent responsibilities as the fate giant tree prepares to retaliate against the deep world. Chen Ge jokes that he plans to open a Horror House in the mortal worlds.
• Doctor Gao offers to follow Gao Ming and help through the Execution House’s chains. He clarifies that he did not mastermind Gao Ming’s arrival: someone in the Endless Mortal Worlds opened the tunnel, and Gao Ming was chosen almost incidentally.
• Doctor Gao gives Gao Ming thirteen medical records, each from a different mortal world. Their names are erased, but their photographs all show Gao Ming, suggesting his origins are tied to one of those worlds.
• After the successful Blood Sacrifice, the Thirteen Blood Cities prepare for the fate giant tree’s counterattack. Gao Ming returns to Hanhai Blood City, then decides to continue into the Endless Mortal Worlds to find the truth of his beginnings.
• Gao Ming walks through the city, revisiting places and people connected to his past, and finally reaches the tunnel’s entrance.

Character developments

• Gao Ming accepts a dangerous leadership role and pursues answers about his origins, even when Gao Yun urges him to stop dwelling on the past.
• Han Fei shows deep trust and gratitude by lending Gao Ming his treasured knife and expressing concern for his safety.
• Doctor Gao reveals that Gao Ming’s arrival was not his doing, while committing to support him in the mortal worlds.
• Gao Yun reveals how much Gao Ming’s absence has weighed on him and wants him to stay, but Gao Ming remains resolute.
• Chen Ge remains focused on confronting fate, while finding opportunity—and entertainment—in the danger ahead.

Significant themes

• Fate versus self-determination: The characters prepare to challenge the fate giant tree and reclaim control over their lives.
• Identity and origins: The thirteen records and the unexplained tunnel make Gao Ming’s past a central mystery.
• Trust and chosen family: Han Fei’s gift and Gao Yun’s welcome show the bonds Gao Ming has formed in the deep world.
• Home and belonging: Gao Ming reflects on Hanhai as home even while feeling compelled to seek his beginnings elsewhere.

Character interactions

• Han Fei entrusts Gao Ming with the knife and promises to wait for his return.
• Chen Ge exchanges a wry remark with Gao Ming about opening a Horror House in the mortal worlds.
• Doctor Gao explains the records and offers practical support through their shared chains.
• Gao Yun tries to persuade Gao Ming to stay; Gao Ming promises to return after confronting the fate giant tree.
• Gao Ming silently revisits places and observes those whose lives he changed, before approaching the tunnel.

Key plot points and events

• Gao Ming enters the tunnel linking the Deep World with the Endless Mortal Worlds. His powers reveal that the rift’s origin is not the Deep World, but the Mortal Worlds.
• The tunnel is filled with corpses that are all versions of Gao Ming, each marked with talismans representing a different birth chart and destiny. Every fate has ultimately ended in death, yet Gao Ming cannot identify a fate belonging to his present self.
• Rather than destroy the tunnel, Gao Ming transfers it—including the School Bus and the corpses—into his Execution House. After seven days, the tunnel vanishes from the Three-City Junction, and the Execution House seems changed.
• Gao Ming then visits Blood-Color Blood City and returns a keepsake belonging to Xue Se: a photograph of a mother and son. Blood Color accepts it but warns Gao Ming to leave. In return, he receives a mysterious, unreadable map.
• He sets out for Void Blood City, the least conspicuous of the Thirteen Blood Cities, and wonders what makes it special.

Character developments

• Gao Ming’s mastery of dream and grotesque rules lets him perceive the tunnel’s hidden structure and safely relocate it. He has become powerful enough to reshape a passage tied to countless deaths.
• The tunnel’s many dead versions of Gao Ming deepen the mystery of his identity: he is connected to all of them, but none of their destinies seems to be his.
• His decision to preserve rather than destroy the tunnel suggests both caution and a willingness to take responsibility for its consequences.

Significant themes

• Fate and identity: Birth charts promise to define a person’s destiny, but the corpses show that no fate could escape its end. Gao Ming’s own fate remains unknowable.
• Worlds and connection: The tunnel embodies a link between the Deep World and multiple mortal worlds, with power originating beyond the Deep World.
• Death and memory: Gao Ming’s accumulated deaths are not merely memories; they have become part of the tunnel and can be carried into the Execution House.
• Mystery and exchange: The return of Xue Se’s keepsake prompts a guarded response and yields a map whose meaning is still unknown.

Character interactions

• Gao Ming recalls Doctor Gao’s explanation and confirms it through what he observes in the tunnel.
• He sends the tunnel and its dead versions of himself into the Execution House, effectively bringing them “home.”
• Blood Color’s immense presence accepts Xue Se’s photograph gently but remains hostile, telling Gao Ming to leave. Its mysterious map serves as an unexplained counter-gift.
• Gao Ming’s final approach to Void Blood City sets up a new encounter, though the chapter ends before he meets anyone there.

Key plot points and events

• Gao Ming investigates the Void Blood City, a strange city that seems to exist between the nightfall and the earth. It consumes places and things that are fading from existence.
• Inside, he finds a recreated version of Zhang Ding’s vanished supermarket and a masked ghost resembling an idealized, incomplete Zhang Ding. The ghost and other paper-masked figures eventually disappear into a vast, seemingly living grave at the city’s center.
• The grave offers Gao Ming a pale paper-person mask. He takes it but does not investigate further, unnerved by the masked faces watching him from the city’s fading buildings.
• Returning to Xinhu Blood City, Gao Ming learns the Fate Giant Tree has repeatedly attacked the passage, but the Calamity Gods and Xinhu’s Unspeakable have held it back.
• Gao Ming prepares to travel to the Endless Mortal Worlds. He says he intends to return rather than treat his departure as a farewell. Han Fei gives him some of the Healing Personality’s power, stored in the Afterlife Butcher’s Knife.
• The Ghost Manager escorts Gao Ming and Shen Luo through the passage. Han Fei explains that he rescued Shen Luo after prolonged torture and insists he go to the Endless Mortal Worlds.
• Chen Ge arrives from Central Blood City to see Gao Ming off, accompanied by Dean Sun of the Cursed Hospital. Chen Ge has kept Dean Sun away from Han Fei because Dean Sun possesses Black Fate, which could make their meeting dangerous.

Character developments and interactions

• Gao Ming remains curious and observant, but the Void Blood City’s grave unsettles him enough to leave without probing it. Though he has people he wants to see, he avoids a drawn-out goodbye and resolves to return if he survives.
• Han Fei is exhausted from defending the passage but stays sharp and caring. He supports Gao Ming’s departure and shows unusual concern for Shen Luo.
• Shen Luo reappears after suffering torture; Han Fei’s rescue and decision to send him onward suggest his survival carries special importance.
• Chen Ge and Dean Sun share a familiar, teasing rapport. Chen Ge’s careful handling of the potential meeting with Han Fei shows his caution, while Dean Sun’s complaint hints at his own pride.

Significant themes

• Loss and remnants: The Void Blood City gathers places and identities that have vanished or been left behind, suggesting that what disappears may persist in altered form.
• Death, burial, and uncertainty: The living grave and its gift make the city ominous and mysterious; its purpose and lord remain unknown.
• Farewell and hope of return: Gao Ming’s departure is framed not as a final goodbye but as a risky journey he intends to survive.
• Fate and conflict: The Fate Giant Tree’s attacks and the characters’ efforts to protect the passage underscore the continuing struggle against forces of fate.

Key plot points and events

• The Blood City Lords send wandering souls from the Deep World through a passage toward the Endless Mortal Worlds, where they may escape the fate giant tree’s devastation. Gao Ming, Dean Sun, Ghost Manager, Shen Luo, and the Cursed Hospital’s Red Garments enter the passage.
• Gao Ming awakens in the Yin-Yang Interstice, a strange membrane between the Deep World and the mortal worlds, and sees the fate giant tree at close range. Its vastness dwarfs even the Flesh-and-Blood Immortal.
• Uncanny beings in the Interstice converge on the passage, threatening to deform it. Ghost Manager awakens and, apparently as part of Han Fei’s plan, uses his powerful aura to draw Fate’s attention toward Shen Luo.
• Once the Cursed Hospital’s Red Garments enter, the fate giant tree intensifies its attack. Cause-and-effect “fruits” fall, and the passage begins to merge with the Interstice instead of reaching the mortal worlds.
• Dean Sun and Ghost Manager make desperate sacrifices: Dean offers his strange heart to Fate, while Ghost Manager uses Shen Luo’s body and faith. Both collapse, but their apparent attacks seem to do nothing—until Gao Ming spots two black marks on the tree.

Character developments

• Gao Ming gains a clearer sense of Fate’s overwhelming scale and remains cautious amid the crisis. He is unsettled by the danger posed by both enemies and allies.
• Dean Sun reveals how far he has gone to strengthen himself, augmenting his body with blood, curses, and supernatural forces. He willingly sacrifices his heart.
• Ghost Manager accepts severe harm from Fate and uses Shen Luo as a conduit, ultimately sacrificing Shen Luo’s will as part of his attack.
• Shen Luo becomes the unwilling vessel for Ghost Manager’s markings and loses his will in the process.
• Han Fei’s strategy appears to involve deliberately using Ghost Manager’s unspeakable aura to attract Fate’s gaze toward Shen Luo.

Significant themes

• Fate versus resistance: The passage and its travelers are caught in a struggle with a force vast enough to threaten entire worlds.
• Sacrifice and resolve: Dean Sun and Ghost Manager risk everything in an attempt to damage or distract Fate.
• The cost of escape: Reaching the mortal worlds requires traversing a dangerous boundary and endangering both the travelers and the route itself.
• Uncertainty and misdirection: Gao Ming repeatedly discovers that events—and other characters’ intentions—are not what he first assumed.

Character interactions

• Boss Chen reassures Dean Sun, easing his resentment and encouraging him to lead the Red Garments through the passage.
• Gao Ming tries to understand Han Fei’s purpose in sending Ghost Manager, then realizes the plan may be to draw Fate toward Shen Luo.
• Gao Ming watches Dean Sun and Ghost Manager enact their sacrifices, unsure whether the danger comes more from Fate or from his own allies.
• Dean Sun’s sacrifice and Ghost Manager’s use of Shen Luo occur in parallel, but their apparent failure leaves Gao Ming to notice the only visible result: two black marks on the fate giant tree.

Key plot points and events

• Gao Ming spots faint, pitch-black flaws in the fate giant tree. They are traces of what the tree discarded—misfortune that returned in the forms of Dean Sun and Shen Luo.
• Dean Sun had long experimented with making himself more unfortunate. At the Cursed Hospital, he discovered he could take other people’s misfortune onto himself, effectively curing them.
• A wound opens in the passage to the Endless Mortal Worlds, exposing it to attacks from the fate tree and the Yin-Yang Interstice. Gao Ming waits until the others—including the unconscious Dean Sun and Shen Luo—can escape, then crosses through himself.
• Trapped outside the passage, Gao Ming uses his dream-making and grotesque-embracing abilities to kill the attacking entities. He studies their memories and concludes that the Interstice is a membrane around the Mortal Worlds, with some route into them.
• With the passage healed and the other souls safely through, Gao Ming explores the Interstice. He sees immense, uncanny beings associated with mortal worlds, fate, and karma, many of which seem to act through instinct or collective thought rather than individual consciousness.
• Inspired by the horrors of Pale Delusion, Gao Ming creates a vast dream from his memories of it. Wounds and scars from that world appear across the darkness, eventually forming a gigantic monster made entirely of wounds.

Character developments

• Gao Ming shifts from cautious escapee to active explorer and attacker. Alone in the Interstice, he tests the full reach of his powers and creates something on a scale he has never attempted before.
• Dean Sun is revealed as someone who deliberately took on greater misfortune, using himself to absorb the suffering of others. His actions explain the hospital staff’s deep respect and fear.
• Shen Luo is linked to the same discarded misfortune as Dean Sun, though he has largely accepted his fate rather than trying to change it.

Significant themes

• Fate and its flaws: The fate tree’s control is powerful but imperfect; what it rejects can return as a weakness.
• Sacrifice and suffering: Dean Sun turns his own misfortune into a means of helping others.
• Collective thought and horror: The Interstice’s monsters appear to embody the distorted thoughts and obsessions of people under fate’s oppression.
• Memory transformed into power: Gao Ming turns the pain and imagery of Pale Delusion into a weapon and a new creation.

Character interactions

• Gao Ming helps Dean Sun, Shen Luo, and the other departed souls pass through the wounded passage before he stays behind.
• He confronts the Interstice’s creatures directly, using dreams to trap and kill them, then absorbs their memories and thoughts.
• The chapter also reveals Dean Sun’s relationship with the Cursed Hospital’s patients: he took their misfortune onto himself, earning the red garments’ lasting reverence.

Key plot points and events

• Gao Ming finishes weaving a nightmare called the Dragon Centipede, made from his wounds and memories. It attacks a divine anomaly—a road of umbrella-carrying figures—and tears the road apart. The resulting rupture breaks veins of fate, restoring some vitality to the living, though others become manic.
• Gao Ming learns that most beings in the Yin-Yang Interstice are anomalies serving the Fate Giant Tree. Only a few are independent “divine anomalies,” and even they generally cannot enter the Mortal Worlds directly.
• He realizes the dream-filled inner lives of mortals are a weakness in Fate’s otherwise orderly dominion. He hopes the Dragon Centipede can grow by hunting divine anomalies and eventually break through into the Mortal Worlds.
• The Paper Person Mask, an artifact from the Void Blood City, reveals a connection to people across the Mortal Worlds who are resisting fate. Guided by it, Gao Ming finds a ghost-filled train moving through darkness.
• Rather than let his nightmare attack the train, Gao Ming sends the Flesh-and-Blood Immortal into the Execution House, hides his presence, and boards the train himself. Each carriage contains corpses of Gao Ming, apparently representing different days of his past. The multiplying bodies distort the train until it slows near a possible station.

Character developments

• Gao Ming shifts from simply surviving the Yin-Yang Interstice to using its divine anomalies as a way to challenge Fate. He remains cautious, especially about trusting the Paper Person Mask, but is willing to investigate the train.
• The Dragon Centipede becomes more powerful and savage after destroying the ancient road, demonstrating that it can damage divine anomalies and disrupt fate.
• The Paper Person Mask proves more than a suspicious artifact: it can reveal far-reaching connections and guide Gao Ming toward a significant anomaly.

Significant themes

• Fate versus agency: The Fate Giant Tree controls much of existence, but Gao Ming seeks openings through dreams, rebellion, and the people resisting its influence.
• Dreams as a source of power: The Mortal Worlds may be orderly, but dreams are unpredictable—and therefore beyond Fate’s complete control.
• Death, memory, and identity: The train appears to manifest Gao Ming’s past as repeated deaths, suggesting that his history is both an enormous burden and something he must confront.
• The uncanny and the hidden: Objects, roads, and trains can be manifestations of rules and forces whose purpose is not immediately clear.

Character interactions

• Gao Ming directs the Dragon Centipede’s attacks but restrains it when it targets the train he wants to investigate.
• The Paper Person Mask first urges Gao Ming to wear it, then responds to his distrust by revealing its patterns through his palm instead. It subsequently guides him to the train.
• Gao Ming’s own dead doubles fill the train’s carriages, confronting him with distorted versions of his past as he travels toward an unknown destination.

Key plot points and events

• Gao Ming leaves a strange train at a hidden stop in the Yin-Yang Interstice. The train rejects him so thoroughly that it discards not only his past-death corpses but also the seat and handrails he touched.
• Guided by a paper-crafted eyeball, he crosses a sealed, yin-filled hollow and reaches a village arranged like a burial mound. Its ominous feng shui, coffins in every home, and lack of protective thresholds suggest a place that welcomes the dead.
• A Welcoming the God procession approaches: the villagers wear Paper Person Masks, bear severe injuries and illnesses, and escort a red-and-white sedan chair as if expecting Gao Ming.
• Gao Ming enters their dreams to learn that many villagers have lived in the hollow for generations, while others became trapped there after arriving from elsewhere. The village’s ritual is repeated regularly, but even its elders do not know which god they are welcoming. Entering the village binds people to it karmically and sets them against the fate giant tree.
• In the ancestral hall, Gao Ming finds Lu family spirit tablets alongside many strange gods and supernatural beings. Every divine statue wears a Paper Person Mask. He begins searching the tablets for Lu Zang’s name.

Character developments and interactions

• Gao Ming remains confident and defiant toward supernatural forces, viewing his conflict with the fate giant tree as an unavoidable feud. He also treats the mask’s guidance as trustworthy, suspecting the lord of Void Blood City knows something about their conflict.
• The villagers’ silent endurance reveals lives shaped by generations of suffering. They neither panic nor cry out when Gao Ming probes their dreams; some wake from the nightmares, while others awaken on their own.
• The villagers greet Gao Ming not with hostility but with an apparently prepared ceremony, kneeling and offering him the sedan chair. Their intentions—and the identity of the god they mean to welcome—remain unclear.
• Inside the ancestral hall, Gao Ming and the Flesh-and-Blood Immortal both sense that multiple supernatural entities are watching them, but Gao Ming presses on.

Significant themes

• Fate and resistance: The village’s karmic bond places its inhabitants in opposition to the fate giant tree, echoing Gao Ming’s own conflict with Fate.
• Suffering and endurance: The villagers’ damaged bodies and accustomed silence show how suffering has become part of everyday life.
• Ritual and uncertain faith: A ceremony persists even though its participants no longer know which god it serves, and the gods enshrined there seem unable to protect them.
• Masks, divinity, and hidden influence: Paper Person Masks appear on both villagers and supernatural statues, suggesting a far-reaching power whose relationship to the beings it marks is still uncertain.