Chapter Summaries

Key plot points and events

• During his college entrance exam, Shi Feiyang collapses while using divination to choose a multiple-choice answer. He awakens underwater in the body of a black dragon.
• He inherits the memories of a nearly three-thousand-year-old dragon and realizes he has entered the world of The Swordsmen of Shu Mountain.
• The dragon had stolen a sealed jade casket from Dinghu Peak after killing two sword immortals who found it. Despite years of effort, he could not open it.
• Shi Feiyang learns that the dragon’s periodic skin-shedding leaves him helpless and that, in a little over a year, the sword immortal Wei Fengniang and her lover are destined to kill him for the casket.
• He decides that opening the casket is his best chance of survival. Comparing its markings with the Golden Seal Heavenly Talismans on the lakebed walls, he identifies 360 corresponding talismans.
• As he studies them, someone on the shore notices the lake’s strange golden and red light and suspects a treasure is appearing.

Character developments

• Shi Feiyang shifts from a bewildered exam student to a determined survivor. Though frightened by the dragon’s fate, he reasons carefully and commits to seeking the casket’s power rather than simply fleeing.
• The dragon’s inherited memories give him vast knowledge of the supernatural world, but also reveal the danger surrounding his new identity and possession.

Significant themes

• Fate versus agency: Shi Feiyang faces a seemingly predetermined death but searches for a way to change his outcome.
• Knowledge and perseverance: His methodical study of divination and talismans may succeed where brute force has failed.
• Power and vulnerability: Even a mighty, ancient dragon becomes defenseless during a natural transformation.
• Survival in a perilous world: Possessing a great treasure offers hope while attracting deadly enemies.

Character interactions

• Shi Feiyang has no direct conversation with another character in the chapter; his central struggle is internal, as he weighs escape against the risks of keeping the casket.
• The two sword immortals appear through the dragon’s memories: they found the casket, but the dragon ambushed and killed them.
• The chapter ends with an unidentified observer on the lakeshore, setting up a possible confrontation.

Key plot points

• Shi Feiyang hides his heavenly book and investigates a flash of light in Dinghu Peak’s deep lake.
• Two Chongming Island disciples—Sikong Xuan and Ma Cheng—arrive, suspecting the light marks a treasure. Sikong uses a magical black-canopied boat to descend.
• Feiyang conceals himself and warns them away, claiming the light came from a treasure he is refining. Sikong’s Three Talents Mirror exposes Feiyang as a dragon, and the disciples attack.
• Feiyang retreats to the lakebed, where the Zhoutian Divine Talisman’s golden light blocks the mirror. The disciples follow but lose sight of him.
• Feiyang ambushes them from above, pouring all his cultivation into his True Water Core and striking a yellow-jade stone. The blast destroys their boat, kills Ma Cheng, and leaves Sikong gravely injured.

Character developments and interactions

• Shi Feiyang is cautious and initially seeks to avoid killing the strangers. Once exposed and attacked, he responds with overwhelming force—having underestimated his own power and overestimated theirs.
• Sikong Xuan is confident and contemptuous of nonhuman beings. After identifying Feiyang as a dragon, he treats him as prey and urges Ma Cheng to help kill him.
• Ma Cheng eagerly follows Sikong’s lead, introducing their identities and preparing to fight, but is killed in Feiyang’s counterattack.
• The encounter shifts from a tense attempt at intimidation to a pursuit and then a one-sided ambush, as Feiyang uses concealment and the lake’s terrain to gain the advantage.

Significant themes

• Prejudice and unequal power: Nonhuman beings are treated as legitimate targets, while human sword immortals assume superiority.
• Caution and misjudgment: Feiyang’s excessive caution leads him to unleash far more power than necessary; Sikong’s arrogance blinds him to the danger.
• Hidden strength and appearances: Feiyang’s concealed form and the lakebed’s defenses conceal the real balance of power until the final strike.

Key plot points and events

• Shifeiyang surveys the wreckage after the battle: Ma Cheng and his boat are destroyed, while Ma Cheng’s treasure mirror and forks lie underwater. Sikong Xuan’s sentient flying sword returns to protect him, but Shifeiyang easily captures and seals it.
• Sikong Xuan is gravely injured and near death. Shifeiyang extracts his primordial spirit, and Sikong Xuan pleads for release, accepting blame for the attack.
• Under questioning, Sikong Xuan reveals that he and his companions came to Dinghu Peak to collect five rare Azure Spirit Grasses for an immortal-elixir recipe. They mistook the strange light in the lake for the legendary Yellow Emperor’s treasure and were drawn into the battle.
• Sikong Xuan explains his uncle Sikong Hu’s history with Pu Miaomiao: after a turbulent courtship and a duel, they found an immortal’s cave on Chongming Island, obtained separate Daoist scriptures, and have cultivated there for sixty years.
• Shifeiyang learns that Sikong Hu’s text, the Twenty-Eight True Scripture, concerns metal and wood techniques. Pu Miaomiao’s Twenty-One True Scripture concerns metal and fire. Both texts are incomplete parts of a larger five-volume work. Shifeiyang pressures Sikong Xuan into recounting most of his uncle’s scripture.
• After nightfall, Shifeiyang takes Sikong Xuan to help locate the Azure Spirit Grass. Following the mountain’s stone veins, they find it hidden near the rear of the peak.

Character developments and interactions

• Shifeiyang is calculating and inquisitive: he captures Sikong Xuan’s spirit, interrogates him for useful knowledge, memorizes the scripture, and uses him as a guide.
• Sikong Xuan shifts from defeated attacker to fearful, compliant informant. Though he tries to bargain for reincarnation, Shifeiyang keeps him under control and extracts his lineage’s secrets.
• Sikong Hu and Pu Miaomiao, described through Sikong Xuan’s account, began as adversaries—she pursued him romantically, while he resisted—before becoming fellow cultivators with separate inheritances.

Significant themes

• Power and coercion: Shifeiyang’s physical and magical superiority leaves Sikong Xuan little choice but to cooperate.
• Knowledge as a prize: The battle leads Shifeiyang to obtain rare information about Daoist techniques and a potentially valuable medicinal herb.
• Incomplete legacies and hidden meaning: The scriptures’ coded names and missing volumes hint at a larger system Shifeiyang has not yet fully understood.
• Ambition and unexpected partnership: Sikong Hu and Pu Miaomiao’s unlikely relationship evolves from pursuit and conflict into a long period of shared cultivation.

Key plot points and events

• Shi Feiyang harvests the Qingling Immortal Herb, leaving its roots intact so it can regrow, and returns to the lakebed where Sikong Xuan remains immobilized.
• He swallows a grass bead and must decide which of his two inner cores should absorb its power: his life-sustaining true water core or his cultivation-bearing divine fire core.
• Drawing on the Book of Changes, he concludes that cold medicinal power should nourish the water core, allowing true yang to arise within it and then pass into the fire core. This could harmonize water and fire without forcing the cores together.
• Shi Feiyang endures three days of intense freezing rather than use the fire core to warm himself. At the brink of collapse, true yang emerges from the water core, travels through his body, and enters the fire core.
• The successful exchange awakens and refreshes his consciousness. The two cores begin to attract and revolve around one another, suggesting the first real progress toward their eventual union.
• Encouraged, he consumes the remaining four grass beads. The water core produces five streams of true yang in total, purifying the fire core and making its energy hotter, though the total energy stored in the cores does not increase.

Character development

• Shi Feiyang moves beyond relying on the black dragon’s instinctive memories and Sikong Xuan’s questionable explanations. He applies his own learning and develops a cultivation method through independent reasoning.
• His success strengthens his confidence, but it also demonstrates his discipline: he withstands extreme pain and cold rather than take the easier course and risk wasting the herb’s power.

Character interactions

• Sikong Xuan has little direct involvement in the events, but his earlier instruction—the Twenty-Eight True Scripture—serves as a contrast to Shi Feiyang’s own interpretation. Shi Feiyang suspects Sikong Xuan’s explanations may be flawed or deliberately distorted.
• Shi Feiyang’s recollection of Wei Fengniang becomes a private source of resolve as he urges himself to endure.

Significant themes

• Learning through practice: Shi Feiyang’s joy comes from applying knowledge successfully to a real problem.
• Balance and transformation: The chapter centers on harmonizing apparent opposites—water and fire, yin and yang—through gradual exchange rather than force.
• Endurance and self-mastery: Progress demands resisting pain and instinctive reactions.
• Knowledge versus instinct: The black dragon’s accumulated power and experience are not enough; Shi Feiyang’s reflective reasoning opens a new path.

Key plot points and events

• Shi Feiyang’s cultivation transforms his elixir fire: by drawing true yang from Kan into Li, he gives the fire a seed of pure yang. This change awakens the jade casket hidden inside him.
• The casket opens to reveal the Lesser Book of Heaven, a wide-ranging collection of spells, techniques, formations, talismans, treasure- and sword-making methods, and pill formulas.
• The book’s history emerges: it originally held treasures and a scripture left by Guang Chengzi, but an unnamed, self-important earth immortal later replaced the upper treasure with his own writings and falsely attributed them to Guang Chengzi.
• Shi Feiyang studies the book and finds the Immortal-Skewering Pill, whose ingredients might help him stay conscious while shedding his skin. He also learns the Primordial Spirit-Binding Technique.
• He binds Sikong Xuan’s spirit to the Three Talents Mirror and sends him to locate a human-shaped queen mother grass near Dinghu Peak. The technique also lets Shi Feiyang observe Sikong from afar.
• Shi Feiyang studies the book’s spells and refines Sikong’s flying sword for his own use. Sikong, meanwhile, secretly arranges for a jay to carry a message to his uncle and seek rescue.
• Shi Feiyang notices the bird through the mirror, tracks it from the mountaintop, and uses elixir qi to seize it as it flies away.

Character developments

• Shi Feiyang becomes more capable and resourceful: he gains access to a vast body of Daoist knowledge, begins mastering its spells, and uses the book’s techniques to control and monitor Sikong.
• Sikong Xuan initially cooperates in hopes of earning his freedom, but grows increasingly cautious and plots to escape by secretly contacting his uncle.
• The unnamed earth immortal is revealed as vain and unscrupulous: he claimed another’s authorship for his book, though clues in his hurried writing expose the truth.

Significant themes

• Transformation through cultivation: a small change in the nature of Shi Feiyang’s fire unlocks a powerful relic.
• Knowledge as power: practical learning allows Shi Feiyang to expand beyond brute magical force and gain new abilities.
• Control versus freedom: Sikong’s apparent assignment is also a form of imprisonment, while his escape attempt is compromised by Shi Feiyang’s surveillance.
• Deception and legacy: the book’s false attribution reflects the earth immortal’s vanity, while its genuine value survives despite its deceptive origins.

Character interactions

• Shi Feiyang offers Sikong conditional freedom in exchange for finding the queen mother grass, then warns him that leaving a fifty-li radius will trigger soul-refining torment.
• Sikong agrees eagerly, brings back other spirit herbs, and later tries to outwit Shi Feiyang by sending a message to his uncle.
• Shi Feiyang’s magical mirror lets him watch Sikong’s movements, turning their arrangement into a contest of surveillance and escape; the chapter ends with him intercepting Sikong’s messenger.

Shi Feiyang receives Sikong Xuan’s plea for help through a magically compelled jay. The spell drains the bird’s life once its message is delivered, but Shi Feiyang is unsurprised: he expects Sikong Xuan to summon his uncle, Sikong Hu. He deliberately plans to face Sikong Hu as a test of his strength before the more dangerous Wei Fengniang arrives. If he cannot defeat the uncle, he intends to flee.
While waiting, Shi Feiyang studies the Lesser Book of Heaven, mastering its spells, refining Sikong Xuan’s flying sword, practicing underwater, and making pills. He buries the remains of former cultivators whose caves he searches, then takes their furnaces and cauldrons. With these, he successfully makes a large quantity of Five Chariots Bait, a nourishing food for cultivators that supports health and replenishes the body’s vital energy. Since he is a dragon who neither needs nor can use so much food, he solves the problem by mastering the Inverted Five Elements Technique and transforming the Book of Heaven’s jade box into a spatial treasure large enough to store the bait and other ingredients.
Sikong Xuan grows increasingly impatient as Sikong Hu fails to arrive despite repeated messages sent by sacrificial birds. Shi Feiyang, meanwhile, continues cultivating and preparing for future threats. The chapter ends when Sikong Xuan excitedly reports finding a thousand-year-old queen mother grass that has developed a human form and can run. Shi Feiyang agrees to go with him, promising to release him if the report is true—and threatening him if it is not.
Character developments and interactions: Shi Feiyang is methodical and pragmatic, turning captivity into an opportunity to train, experiment, and prepare for stronger opponents. He treats Sikong Xuan as both a prisoner and a useful guide, offering conditional freedom in exchange for cooperation. Sikong Xuan remains desperate to escape, first trying to summon his uncle and then seeking Shi Feiyang’s favor by reporting the rare herb.
Themes: The chapter emphasizes survival through preparation, the harsh hierarchy in which the strong prey on the weak, and the uncertain boundary between cultivation’s righteous and cruel methods. It also highlights resourcefulness: Shi Feiyang repurposes the mountain’s remains, materials, and ancient techniques to strengthen his position.

Plot points

• Shi Feiyang, in dragon form, follows Sikong Xuan to a secluded clearing where the Queen Mother Grass grows beside a large black fungus. He fills the area with mist, concealing his movements.
• Sikong Xuan’s uncle, Sikong Hu—the Three Light Cave Master—arrives with sixteen talisman banners and attacks what appears to be the dragon. The figure is a decoy: Shi Feiyang’s real body ambushes Sikong Hu from behind with a sword strike.
• Sikong Hu recognizes his own sword, which he had given Sikong Xuan, and assumes the dragon cannot truly control it. Shi Feiyang exploits his confidence, nearly cutting off his arm and leaving a deep wound in his palm.
• They duel with flying swords. Shi Feiyang’s swordsmanship is technically superior, but he lacks experience and his sword is inferior to Sikong Hu’s, so he begins to lose.
• Shi Feiyang brings out the Three Talents Mirror, but Sikong Hu breaks through its power with a desperate, blood-fueled strike. He pierces the mirror and destroys Shi Feiyang’s sword, refusing to stop even at the cost of his own treasures.
• Shi Feiyang asks whether Sikong Hu wants his nephew back. Sikong Hu, still intent on revenge, is confused by the remark.

Character developments and interactions

• Shi Feiyang shows tactical ingenuity, using mist, a decoy, and Sikong Hu’s assumptions against him. His mastery of Daoist sword-refining methods surprises his opponent, though his limited experience and cultivation remain weaknesses.
• Sikong Hu shifts from contemptuous confidence to caution after being repeatedly deceived and injured. His fierce attachment to Sikong Xuan drives him to sacrifice valuable weapons and magical treasures for revenge.
• Sikong Xuan leads Shi Feiyang to the clearing and calls out to his uncle, but Sikong Hu tells him to stand aside. His relationship with his uncle is presented as deeply affectionate and almost father-son in nature.

Significant themes

• Overconfidence and misjudgment: Sikong Hu underestimates Shi Feiyang because he assumes a spirit beast cannot possess disciplined techniques or refined magic.
• Skill versus experience and power: Shi Feiyang’s superior sword methods cannot yet overcome Sikong Hu’s greater cultivation, experience, and weapon quality.
• Loyalty and revenge: Sikong Hu’s devotion to his nephew is profound, but it also makes him reckless and consumed by vengeance.

Key plot points and events

• Sikong Hu destroys the Three Talents Mirror while attacking Shi Feiyang, not realizing it anchors his nephew Sikong Xuan’s primordial spirit. Its destruction scatters Sikong Xuan’s soul, leaving Sikong Hu grief-stricken and enraged.
• Shi Feiyang brings out his Divine Fire Core to fight Sikong Hu’s flying sword. Sikong Hu then unleashes his treasured Tianxin Divine Needles, but Shi surrounds himself with immortal fire and burns all 28,000 needles to nothing.
• Sikong Hu deploys sixteen banners containing demons and attacks with yin thunderfire. Shi counters with fire creatures created through his core, while secretly filling the valley with mist.
• Shi intends to use the mist to send his true-water core behind Sikong Hu for a surprise attack. Before he can, a red-scaled venomous snake emerges from the mist and poisons Sikong Hu.
• As Sikong Hu turns to kill the snake, Shi’s fire dragons ignite the banners. The Divine Fire Core then strikes Sikong Hu, killing him. Shi captures his flying sword and retrieves his core; the snake is also dead.

Character developments

• Shi Feiyang grows more confident and tactical in his first magical battle. He uses his dragon nature, fire core, and concealment together, shifting from direct combat to a carefully planned ambush.
• Sikong Hu moves from confidence in his powerful weapons to rage and desperation. The loss of his nephew and his treasured needles drives him into a reckless pursuit that ends in his death.
• Sikong Xuan dies when the mirror anchoring his spirit is destroyed, though Sikong Hu’s attack—not an intentional choice by Shi—causes the loss.
• The red-scaled snake unexpectedly intervenes against Sikong Hu, but its motives remain unknown, and it dies in the encounter.

Significant themes

• The dangers of impulsive action: Sikong Hu’s attack destroys the object binding his nephew’s spirit, turning his aggression into personal tragedy.
• Adaptability and strategy: Shi survives not through strength alone, but by exploiting elemental advantages, creating a diversion, and using the mist to conceal danger.
• The cost of vengeance and overconfidence: Sikong Hu’s desire for revenge narrows his attention, leaving him vulnerable to the snake and Shi’s finishing blow.
• Uncertainty of motives: The snake’s intervention may be help or a private act of vengeance, but the chapter offers no answer.

Key plot points and events

• Shi Feiyang meets the Queen Mother Grass, a tiny, sentient herb, and agrees to protect him rather than harvest him. The herb offers his miraculous saliva, which can revive the dead and heal even catastrophic injuries.
• The Queen Mother Grass uses that power to reassemble his former guardian, the Red-Scaled Strange Snake, who had been cut into three pieces. Impressed, Shi Feiyang invites the snake to visit Dinghu Peak and discuss becoming his subordinate.
• Shi Feiyang transports the herb and a nearby black lingzhi to his cave abode. He reshapes part of the lakebed into a spring-fed, dry habitat and uses his sun-derived Divine Fire Core to provide the light and warmth the herb needs.
• Grateful for Shi Feiyang’s protection and generous aid, the Queen Mother Grass eagerly accepts him as his new guardian.
• The herb reveals that he has cultivated for nearly ten thousand years and has survived by arranging for powerful creatures to guard him. His former guardians included a Three-Legged Golden Toad that served him for over a thousand years before disappearing.

Character developments and interactions

• Shi Feiyang shows restraint and foresight: rather than exploit the herb’s power for himself, he chooses a mutually beneficial alliance. He also demonstrates care by creating a suitable home and sharing his cultivation energy.
• The Queen Mother Grass moves from fear and suspicion to trust and affection. He proves his loyalty by reviving the snake who protected him for centuries.
• The Red-Scaled Strange Snake is restored to life and, awed by Shi Feiyang, hopes to serve under him and learn cultivation methods.
• The dragon and herb overcome their lack of a shared language through observation and cooperation, forming a practical means of communication.

Significant themes

• Mutual benefit over exploitation: Shi Feiyang gains a rare ally by protecting the herb instead of consuming it.
• Trust and loyalty: The herb repays his former guardian’s service, while both herb and snake seek new bonds of protection and allegiance.
• Compassionate power: Shi Feiyang’s strength is expressed through restraint, hospitality, and support, not merely force.
• Survival and adaptation: The herb’s long life depends on ingenuity—especially his changing alliances with guardian beasts.

Key plot points and events

• Queen Mother Grass explains how he protects himself: his red-scaled snake has served him for centuries, while the poisonous, lingzhi-like Immortal’s Couch beside him lures herb gatherers to their deaths. Shi Feiyang names the little plant Mo Zhui and begins nourishing Immortal’s Couch with his core qi so it may develop awareness.
• The wounded snake visits Shi Feiyang, hoping to become his follower and guard. Shi instead teaches him a sun-based cultivation method, promises to consider taking him in after his coming tribulation, and sends him back to practice.
• As his own shedding approaches, Shi Feiyang prepares medicines and pills. Mo Zhui willingly gives blood from his arm so Shi can make remedies from the ten-thousand-year-old grass.
• Shi forces Sikong Hu’s captured spirit to recite and explain two Daoist scriptures. Comparing them with texts on the rock wall, Shi concludes that Sikong and his fellow sword immortals have fundamentally misread both books.
• Shi explains that the scriptures concern lesser yin and lesser yang, not the combinations of heavenly stems and elements Sikong inferred. Together, they describe an inner-alchemical practice joining yin and yang. Sikong is left stunned.

Character developments

• Shi Feiyang shows resourcefulness and confidence: he turns potential threats into protections, cultivates unusual plants, prepares for danger, and demonstrates deep insight into Daoist texts.
• Mo Zhui is revealed as clever and trusting. He accepts the name Shi gives him and freely offers his blood to help Shi.
• The red snake is devoted but inexperienced. He eagerly seeks Shi’s protection and instruction, and accepts the task of cultivating independently.
• Sikong Hu, once arrogant, is now captive and compliant. His confidence in decades of scriptural study collapses when Shi challenges its foundations.

Significant themes

• Knowledge versus mistaken interpretation: Expertise and long study do not guarantee understanding; Sikong’s practiced reading proves fundamentally wrong.
• The dual nature of poison and medicine: Immortal’s Couch is dangerous yet potentially useful, reflecting the idea that a substance’s value depends on how it is used.
• Cultivation through guidance and care: Shi helps beings with potential advance by sharing methods, qi, and attentive support.
• Preparation for adversity: Shi makes pills and gathers resources as his own tribulation draws near.

Character interactions

• Shi treats Mo Zhui as a valued companion, naming and nurturing him; Mo Zhui responds with trust and generosity.
• The red snake offers loyalty to Shi, who sets boundaries while still giving him a chance to learn.
• Shi dominates his exchanges with Sikong Hu, compelling him to provide knowledge before exposing the errors in his interpretation.

Chapter Summary

Key plot points and events

• Sikong Hu struggles to accept Shi Feiyang’s claim that he and Pu Miaomiao had fundamentally misunderstood their Daoist scriptures. Recalling the contradictions and cultivation mishaps they experienced, he begins to suspect Shi Feiyang is right. Their former adviser, Xu Feiniang, had deliberately steered them toward demonic interpretations, strengthening their magic while secretly gaining control over them.
• Shi Feiyang recognizes the two texts as orthodox Daoist elixir manuals. They give him a systematic path to unite yin and yang within his water and fire elixirs and eventually form a dragon pearl.
• As his two-month skin-shedding begins, Shi Feiyang must absorb solar essence by day and endure a dangerous nighttime cycle when he falls unconscious. To stay awake and replenish his depleted power, he takes painful Immortals-Slaying Pills. He refuses Mo Zhui’s offer of blood, insisting the ordeal is his to face and warning the little guardian beast to hide.
• Near the end of the shedding, Shi Feiyang senses intruders. Wei Fengniang and the barbarian monk Bruninga arrive at Ding Lake, intending to exploit his weakened state, kill him, and seize the Heavenly Book.

Character developments and interactions

• Sikong Hu moves from disbelief toward recognizing that his lifelong cultivation may have been based on a false reading—and that Xu Feiniang manipulated him.
• Shi Feiyang demonstrates resolve and foresight: he endures severe pain as part of his transformation, prepares his medicines carefully, and protects Mo Zhui by ordering him to stay hidden.
• Mo Zhui is deeply anxious and loyal. Though he obeys, he watches from hiding, ready to give Shi Feiyang his blood if the danger becomes too great.
• Wei Fengniang is introduced as a powerful, cruel, and sexually predatory practitioner who turned against her own teacher to escape punishment.
• Bruninga is Wei Fengniang’s demonic-cult companion and accomplice. Their relationship is unconventional and mutually permissive; together, they now plan to take advantage of Shi Feiyang’s vulnerability.

Significant themes

• False understanding and manipulation: Xu Feiniang’s deception shows how apparent success can conceal corruption and control.
• Endurance and self-mastery: Shi Feiyang accepts pain and danger as necessary stages of cultivation.
• Betrayal and moral consequence: Wei Fengniang’s betrayal of the teacher who raised her leaves Abbess Guangming gravely wounded and disillusioned.
• Predation and vulnerability: The chapter ends with Wei Fengniang and Bruninga targeting Shi Feiyang precisely when his transformation leaves him exposed.

Plot points and events

• Wei Fengniang and Bruninga arrive at the lake at midnight to kill Shi Feiyang and claim the Heavenly Book. Bruninga warns that the dragon may have prepared an ambush, so they decide to drain the lake and weaken him; Wei sets up the Ten Thousand Li Yellow Sand Formation to prevent his escape.
• As the water is drawn into a huge sphere above the lake, Shi Feiyang creates a water-dragon decoy. He places Sikong Hu’s newly freed primordial spirit inside it, giving the illusion the hunters are facing a living dragon. Their sword and saber strike the decoy, buying Shi time to climb the cliff.
• Shi attacks Bruninga with his water and fire inner cores. The impact blasts Bruninga away from the peak and leaves him gravely injured. Wei is forced to abandon her attack long enough to find and revive him.
• Bruninga insists that Wei continue while Shi is still weakened, and gives her the Crow-Venom Thorn. Wei returns to the lake, churns and freezes the water into a funnel, then descends through its opening to confront Shi.
• Shi is weakened by the Immortal-Skewering Pill and has to take another Fury Profound Pill to rouse his strength. He holds off Wei’s sword with his two inner cores, hoping to last until midnight passes and his power begins to recover.
• Wei presses the attack but cannot get past the inner cores in the narrow space. She prepares to use her formidable Great Vajra Palm as the battle continues.

Character developments and interactions

• Shi Feiyang shows cunning and resourcefulness, using a convincing decoy to exploit his enemies’ assumptions. He also frees Sikong Hu’s spirit, gives it a chance at rebirth, and uses it as part of his escape plan.
• Sikong Hu unexpectedly gains a water-dragon body and, sensing danger, flees upward—unwittingly helping Shi’s deception.
• Bruninga is cautious and strategically minded, but suffers severe injuries when Shi’s cores strike him. Despite his condition, he remains determined to complete the mission and urges Wei onward.
• Wei Fengniang is skilled, relentless, and loyal to Bruninga: she rescues him rather than pursuing Shi, then returns to fight. Her backstory is also revealed: she left Daoism for Buddhism after betraying her master, but learned no Buddhist teachings from Abbess Guangming; instead, she developed her powerful palm technique from Bruninga’s Great Hand Seal and her own cultivation.
• The alliance between Wei and Bruninga is practical and intimate, built around coordinated magic and a shared goal. When Bruninga is incapacitated, Wei takes charge of the assault.

Significant themes

• Deception and perception: Shi’s decoy succeeds because it carries a real spirit, blinding even powerful opponents to the trick.
• Strategy under pressure: Both sides exploit the terrain, timing, and each other’s weaknesses; Shi aims only to survive until his strength returns.
• Power and vulnerability: Even formidable cultivators can be badly injured when caught off guard, while Shi’s immense power is constrained by his temporary weakness.
• Moral ambiguity and consequence: Sikong Hu’s spirit is freed, while Wei’s path from Daoism to Buddhism is marked by betrayal and unresolved contradiction.

Key plot points and events

• Wei Fengniang attacks Shi Feiyang in the cavern, striking the Crouching Dragon Stone with her Diamond Divine Palm before following up with her sword, Yellow Cloud Nails, and the venomous Crow-Venom Thorn.
• The thorn pierces Shi Feiyang, but the Immortal-Skewering Pill’s poison and the ten-thousand-year queen mother grass juice within it keep him from succumbing.
• Wei’s Diamond Divine Palm repeatedly dissolves before reaching Shi. He has sheltered beneath the Golden Seal Heavenly Talismans and calculated which one is active at that time; it neutralizes her spells. Her other Daoist and demonic techniques fail as well.
• Wei switches to sword-and-nail attacks. Shi defends with his inner cores, whose water and fire powers gradually turn the tide.
• As the hour changes, Shi’s mind clears and his magical power returns. Wei realizes her advantage is slipping and tries to draw him out of the cavern, where her Ten Thousand Li Yellow Sand Formation awaits.
• Wei flies upward into the fog. Shi sheds his black dragon body, emerges in a new white-dragon form, and animates the empty black husk with his blood and magic. He follows it out to continue the fight.

Character developments

• Shi Feiyang endures severe pain and a dangerous assault through preparation, knowledge of the talismans, and resilience. As the pill’s effects shift, he regains clarity and strength, and reveals a new dragon body.
• Wei Fengniang begins confidently, relying on an array of powerful weapons and spells. Her frustration grows as her attacks fail, and she resorts to luring Shi into a prepared formation.

Significant themes

• Knowledge and preparation: Shi’s understanding of celestial calculations and the talismans’ timing turns the cavern into a defensive stronghold.
• Endurance and transformation: Shi survives poison and pain, then physically sheds one body for another.
• Limits of force: Wei’s impressive spells prove ineffective against a defense she does not understand, while Shi’s counters and patience let him recover the initiative.

Character interactions

• Wei presses the attack with spells, sword, and magical weapons; Shi evades, withstands, and counters with his cores and the talismans’ protection.
• Once her magic fails, Wei attempts to change the battlefield by challenging Shi to pursue her outside. He accepts, sending his animated black husk ahead as he follows in his white-dragon form.

Plot points

• Wei Fengniang, frustrated that the Black Dragon will not emerge from the lake, attacks with her flying sword, Diamond Divine Palm, snow, wind, and demon fire.
• Her blows strike the Crouching Dragon Stone. A severed dragon body and a radiant Jade Casket appear, and Wei assumes she has killed the dragon and found the Heavenly Book.
• She takes the casket and races toward the summit. The real dragon—now revealed as a Scaleless White Dragon—blocks her with its water core and collapses the ice walls, flooding the passage.
• Wei fights her way upward, only to find herself back at the lake bottom. She realizes the dragon has trapped her with Reversal of the Five Elements, a powerful spatial distortion that turns “up” into “down.”
• Unable to escape, Wei convinces herself the casket’s Heavenly Book will show her how to break the trap. She attempts to open it, unaware that Shi Feiyang has cursed it.
• The chapter closes by explaining Shi’s deadly curse, the Ten Thousand Poisons Corrupting Immortals Great Method, a demonic-fire art made from poisonous stones, herbs, and insects and described as capable of killing all life across a vast area.

Character developments and interactions

• Wei Fengniang begins confident and impatient, expecting her superior magic and formation to defeat the dragon. Greed for the Heavenly Book makes her ignore warning signs; once trapped, she becomes frightened but clings to rationalizations about the formation and possible rescue.
• The Black/White Dragon appears to be a passive target, but its apparent death is a decoy. It uses the false body and the Jade Casket to lure Wei into a trap, then actively seals her escape.
• Shi Feiyang, though absent from the confrontation, has prepared the casket’s curse and remains a hidden threat.
• Wei’s struggle is a contest of deception as much as magic: she attacks the dragon, the dragon manipulates her expectations, and Shi’s earlier preparation compounds her danger.

Significant themes

• Overconfidence and greed: Wei’s desire for the Heavenly Book leads her to seize the casket before verifying the dragon’s death.
• Appearance versus reality: The severed dragon is only an empty shell, and the apparent route to safety loops back to the trap.
• Preparation and knowledge: The dragon’s spatial spell and Shi’s curse show how planning and specialized arts can overcome raw magical power.
• Power’s moral cost: The curse’s gruesome ingredients and mass-death potential emphasize the dark, destructive nature of demonic cultivation.

Plot points

• Wei Fengniang tries to open Shi Feiyang’s jade casket, but its hidden Formless Fiendfire contaminates her true qi and primordial spirit. Her fear and greed keep her from noticing the danger in time.
• Shi Feiyang presses his attack with his two inner cores, preventing Wei from recovering. The fiendfire spreads through her internal organs and eventually erupts, killing her; Shi then smashes the Crouching Dragon Stone and collects her primordial spirit and possessions.
• After cleaning the cavern, Shi reviews his spoils: Wei’s flying sword, qiankun pouch, cultivation notes, medicinal ingredients, and pills. Her notes reveal methods for the Tianshan Sect’s Ten-Thousand-Mile Yellow Sand Flags, which Shi retrieves and quickly understands. He also seals Bruninga’s Crow-Venom Thorn so it cannot be recalled.
• Shi avoids pursuing the wounded Bruninga, knowing other attackers may still be nearby. The chapter reveals that Xiong Manniang, another would-be treasure seeker, has been watching Shi for months and was poised to act before someone stopped her.
• A flashback explains Xiong’s background: her master, Abbess Yinkong, gave her no cultivation manual, only a verse and two sealed notes that would become readable on specified dates. Xiong’s fate may lead either to an ordinary life or to Dinghu Peak, where she hopes to kill the dragon and gain the heavenly scripture.

Character developments and interactions

• Shi’s victory confirms his patience and strategic discipline: although the fight is dangerous, he relies on the fiendfire and sustained pressure rather than rushing to finish Wei.
• Mo Zhui congratulates Shi and offers his own blood to help him recover. Shi refuses, concerned that Mo’s vital blood is too precious, revealing mutual care and trust between them.
• Mo Zhui’s long experience has made him wary of human predators; he believes Shi is unusually powerful, intelligent, and considerate.
• Wei’s downfall stems not only from Shi’s attack but from her inability to stay calm: fear and covetousness compromise her judgment.
• Xiong Manniang is introduced as a patient, conflicted figure whose future hinges on her master’s cryptic instructions and her choice of path.

Significant themes

• Greed and composure: Wei’s desire for the scripture destroys the inner calm her cultivation requires.
• Preparedness and restraint: Shi survives by anticipating danger, using measured tactics, and declining to pursue every possible enemy.
• Care and reciprocity: Shi and Mo Zhui’s exchange contrasts genuine concern with exploitative relationships.
• Fate and choice: Xiong’s two possible futures frame the tension between worldly life and cultivation.

Key plot points and events

• Zanglingzi, head of the Qinghai Sect and one of Shushan’s most powerful figures, stops Xiong Manniang from pursuing the heavenly book. He uses the Separation and Reunion Divine Light to restore her memories of a past life.
• He reveals that in that life Xiong Manniang loved him, but their destined encounter in the present life would have caused them both to lose their virginity and fall into ruin. That calamity was accidentally averted when Shi Feiyang moved the Queen Mother Grass and redirected the snake’s cultivation.
• Zanglingzi argues that Shi Feiyang has become their benefactor: harming him to take the book would repay kindness with enmity and invite heavenly retribution. Xiong Manniang reluctantly accepts, though she grieves that the book may have secured her future.
• He urges her to consult the message left by her master and leaves to drive other cultivators away. After midnight, she reads the message, follows its different plan, and rides down the mountain.
• Unaware of Zanglingzi’s intervention, Shi Feiyang remains hidden in the lake until dawn. After shedding, he grows larger and more dragonlike, continues cultivating, and envies the freedom of ordinary humans.

Character developments and interactions

• Xiong Manniang confronts the embarrassing truth of her past-life devotion to Zanglingzi. Seeing him clearly in this life, she feels incredulous that she once loved him, but accepts his account of the avoided disaster and ultimately gives up the heavenly book.
• Zanglingzi shows both formidable authority and restraint. Though he had also sought the book, he abandons that goal out of gratitude to Shi Feiyang and concern for karmic consequences. He avoids further involvement with Xiong Manniang, wary of reviving their dangerous entanglement.
• Shi Feiyang grows physically stronger but remains isolated and cautious. His envy of human life reveals the cost of his dragon form: power comes with limited freedom.
• Zanglingzi persuades or forcibly removes rival groups, shielding Shi Feiyang without the dragon’s knowledge.

Significant themes

• Karma and gratitude: Shi Feiyang unknowingly saves two cultivators from disaster; Zanglingzi sees harming him in return as a grave moral and spiritual wrong.
• Fate and altered destinies: A foretold calamity vanishes because of an unintended change in events, while Xiong Manniang’s master’s message points her toward a new path.
• Memory and perspective: Restored memories reveal how differently Xiong Manniang understands her past love from her present self.
• Power versus freedom: Shi Feiyang’s growing strength contrasts with his longing for the ordinary mobility and social life humans enjoy.

Key plot points and events

• Shi Feiyang continues cultivating at Dinghu Peak, since none of his current methods can give him human form. He studies Daoist scriptures, swordsmanship, spells, elixir-making, and formations while strengthening his yin and yang energies through his two inner cores.
• He also nourishes the immortal herbs in his cave. The Queen Mother Herb, Mo Zhui, grows stronger, while the three-thousand-year-old Immortal’s Couch finally awakens spiritual intelligence and takes human form. Shi names him Moxiang.
• A red-scaled snake returns with a huge Black Tortoise, asking Shi Feiyang to accept her as a disciple. The two have been mates for centuries and draw stellar essence from the Black Warrior constellations through their union.
• Recognizing their complementary natures, Shi explains that the snake’s fire-based method would harm the water-natured tortoise. He gives the snake a method for drawing true yin from fire and teaches the tortoise a distinct method for generating true yang from water.
• With the pair as capable followers, Shi Feiyang gains help gathering medicinal ingredients and news. During the rainy season, he enjoys the weather, recites from Record of Yueyang Tower, then dives from Dinghu Peak into Lianjin Creek to swim.

Character developments and interactions

• Shi Feiyang remains cautious about traveling beyond his refuge, but becomes more effective as a teacher and master. He tailors cultivation methods to each creature’s nature and builds a small network of loyal helpers.
• Mo Zhui acts as Moxiang’s older brother and teases him; Moxiang, gentle and guileless, treats Shi as his father and Mo Zhui as his elder brother.
• The red snake and Black Tortoise show deep trust and gratitude toward Shi, accepting his guidance and becoming his disciples. Their partnership is also a source of unusual spiritual power.

Significant themes

• Cultivation suited to nature: Different beings require different methods; applying the wrong one can hinder or even harm them.
• Mentorship and loyalty: Shi’s care helps others advance, and his followers repay him with service and trust.
• Transformation and maturation: Moxiang’s awakening and the tortoise’s new path show spiritual development as gradual and nurtured.
• Harmony of opposites: The snake and tortoise’s complementary energies create strength through union, echoing Shi’s own practice of balancing yin and yang.

Key plot points and events

• Shi Feiyang enjoys swimming in Lianjin Creek, but severe rains cause widespread flooding and destruction.
• He saves more than thirty villagers trapped by a flash flood: he halts the flood crest, freezes a long ice bridge to high ground, and then redirects the torrent safely into the creek.
• Shi Feiyang’s turtle ally, Black Tortoise, rescues two children swept downstream. She explains that Red Snake wanted to eat them, but she stopped him. Shi Feiyang praises her and promises to speak with Red Snake.
• Over several days, Shi Feiyang continues diverting floodwaters. Stories spread that Mount Xiandu is protected by a Dragon King and his Turtle and Snake Generals.
• Yao Suxiu, a literate villager who survived the flood, embellishes his accounts of meeting the Dragon King. He claims the Dragon King appeared in a dream and ordered him to build a temple, threatening greater floods if the villagers refused.
• Yao and his relatives pressure the villages into funding the temple, demanding money or labor even from families already impoverished by the floods. One villager suggests asking the Dragon King to stop the rain so construction can begin.

Character developments and interactions

• Shi Feiyang acts as a powerful but compassionate protector, using his abilities to rescue people and control the flood rather than seeking their worship.
• Black Tortoise demonstrates her kindness by saving the children and opposing Red Snake’s cruelty. She confides in Shi Feiyang, who responds warmly and promises to confront Red Snake.
• Red Snake is characterized through Black Tortoise’s account as violent and predatory, in sharp contrast to her gentle nature.
• Yao Suxiu turns from a storyteller into a self-serving opportunist, exploiting the villagers’ gratitude and fear to gain influence and collect resources.
• The villagers initially respond with awe and gratitude toward Shi Feiyang, then become vulnerable to Yao’s coercion because of their belief in the Dragon King and their recent suffering.

Significant themes

• Compassion and responsibility: Shi Feiyang and Black Tortoise use their power to protect vulnerable people.
• Faith and exploitation: Genuine acts of supernatural aid are twisted into a threat by Yao, who uses religious devotion for personal advantage.
• Contrasting forms of power: Shi Feiyang’s power serves rescue and public safety, while Yao’s influence depends on manipulation and fear.
• Community vulnerability: Disaster leaves villagers both physically devastated and susceptible to coercion.

Plot points and events

• Yao Suxiu exploits the villagers’ fear and desperation during the floods, claiming he can perform a ritual to ask the Dragon King to stop the rain. He collects money and stages an elaborate ceremony.
• Unbeknownst to him, Shi Feiyang has independently found a way to end the rain: he gathers the clouds’ moisture into his inner core and refines it into the Cloud-Mother Veil. When the rain stops, the villagers mistakenly credit Yao’s ritual, and his influence grows.
• The villagers build a Dragon King Temple, while Yao continues inventing occasions to demand money. When people begin objecting, he claims the Dragon King wants four young brides.
• Yao chooses the daughters of the families who challenged him. When their families try to escape, he has them restrained and forces the girls, bound and gagged in wedding clothes, into Lianjin Creek.
• Red Snake, hunting fish downstream, sees one girl drifting by. Though he has long hated humans, he remembers his leader, the Black Dragon King, wants him to avoid harming them. Hoping to earn the chief’s approval, he rescues her and revives her. She recognizes him as the Dragon King’s general and assumes he has come to take her to the Dragon Palace.

Character developments

• Yao Suxiu turns successful deception into unchecked power, using the Dragon King’s supposed authority to extort the villagers and commit a grave act of coercion.
• Red Snake remains distrustful and resentful toward humans, but begins to follow the Black Dragon King’s example and orders. His decision to save the girl marks a tentative shift from hostility toward purposeful restraint.
• The rescued girl is terrified and overwhelmed, yet responds to Red Snake with recognition and relief, believing him to be a divine messenger.

Significant themes

• Faith manipulated for power: The villagers’ sincere belief is exploited by Yao for money, authority, and control.
• Coincidence mistaken for proof: Shi Feiyang stops the rain independently, but the villagers’ attribution to Yao strengthens his fraud.
• Prejudice and changing loyalties: Red Snake’s hatred of humans is challenged by his allegiance to a leader who protects them.
• Abuse of religious authority: Yao uses threats of divine punishment to force families into an atrocity.

Character interactions

• Yao presents himself as the Dragon King’s spokesman, first winning the villagers’ trust and later threatening them with floods.
• The villagers move from enthusiastic support to resentment, but Yao suppresses dissent by targeting the families who object.
• Red Snake acts on the Black Dragon King’s influence even in his absence, saving the girl; she immediately identifies him as the Dragon King’s servant and mistakes the rescue for a summons to the Dragon Palace.

Key plot points

• Red Snake rescues four young women in wedding clothes from the river, believing they have been sent to the Dragon King. Unsure what to do with them, he carries them to Shi Feiyang at Dinghu Peak.
• Shi Feiyang is making Union Incense, a medicine made chiefly from the annual mating-season essence of Red Snake and Black Tortoise, plus twelve balancing herbs and Immortal’s Couch sap.
• The incense is meant to help Shi Feiyang reconcile his opposing water and fire inner cores. Its effects require complete freedom from lustful thoughts; otherwise, it can dangerously drain the user’s vital energy. Because his dragon body does not stir his human mind, Shi Feiyang can use it safely.
• The four women believe they were chosen as brides for the Dragon King and that Red Snake’s rescue confirms it. Their account reveals that Temple Keeper Yao Suxiu has been impersonating the Dragon King’s wishes, staging the marriages and putting the women’s lives at risk.
• Enraged, Shi Feiyang takes Red Snake and the women to the Dragon King Temple. Yao and the villagers are feasting there after the supposed wedding send-off. Red Snake appears on the temple roof, while the four women descend nearby.

Character developments and interactions

• Red Snake is uncomfortable around humans and cannot speak their language, but he acts decisively to rescue the women. He expects Shi Feiyang to praise him, only to be scolded at first for apparently abducting brides.
• Shi Feiyang shows careful discipline and ingenuity in developing the incense, then shifts from cultivation to decisive action when he learns his name is being used to deceive and endanger people.
• The four women move from fear and suspicion to eager acceptance of the supposed marriage, convinced by the Dragon King’s apparent power and Yao’s claims. Their innocence exposes how thoroughly they have been misled.
• The encounter connects Red Snake’s rescue to Shi Feiyang’s confrontation with the temple community, setting up his reckoning with Yao Suxiu.

Significant themes

• Deception and abuse of authority: Yao exploits the Dragon King’s reputation to manipulate people and put lives at risk.
• Discipline and balance: The incense’s benefits depend on mastering desire and bringing opposing forces into harmony.
• Misunderstanding and appearance: Red Snake’s rescue is mistaken for an arranged abduction, while the women’s trust in the supposed ritual rests on false claims.
• Power and responsibility: Shi Feiyang’s supernatural authority carries consequences when others use his name to harm the vulnerable.