Chapter Summaries

Plot points and events

• After setting a fuse at the City Lord’s Residence, Lin Bai assesses his growing abilities and his several overlapping systems. He has gained substantial Inner Force, is close to unlocking a lightness technique, and expects another spirit fruit soon, but worries that his lack of sleep may have consequences.
• A Shadow Guard, Zhou Jiang, arrives to take Lin Bai to the city lord. Lin Bai politely delays the summons so he can check on his guests; Zhou agrees to wait, giving Lin Bai reason to think the city lord may be open to negotiation.
• Lin Bai returns to find Luo Congwen, Song Qing, and Zhu Huan shaken and angry after his staged encounter with the Song family’s ghosts. He reframes their fear as an exhilarating lesson, and the three grudgingly admit the experience was more memorable than an ordinary dinner.
• Lin Bai explains that the stunt also taught them not to trust appearances: ghosts can disguise themselves, and firsthand experience makes the warning stick. The guests thank him, and Song Qing praises his earlier charitable work.
• Seizing the opportunity, Lin Bai invites the three men to invest in the Chef God Restaurant. Luo Congwen, Song Qing, and Zhu Huan all agree. Lin Bai proposes that each contribute two thousand taels, reasoning that the Returning Dragon Temple’s contribution of three thousand taels and labor for a ten-percent stake makes equal terms unfair to the temple.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Bai remains a shrewd, playful entrepreneur who turns a frightening stunt into both a moral lesson and a business pitch. He is also increasingly aware that his martial strength may not be enough for the dangers around him.
• Luo Congwen moves from caution to admiration and eagerness to invest, partly because he wants to stay close to Lin Bai. His romantic interest in Song Ling persists.
• Song Qing begins resentful and distrustful, but Lin Bai’s explanation softens him; he accepts the lesson and decides to invest.
• Zhu Huan remains bitter about being frightened, yet ultimately agrees to invest, echoing Lin Bai’s language about entertainment that teaches.
• Song Jinnan, Wu Xiuxiu, and Song Ling react to Lin Bai’s suggestive reference to a “third option”; the adults are embarrassed, while Song Ling innocently asks what he means.
• Zhou Jiang stays guarded and professional, refusing Lin Bai’s invitation because he will not place himself at risk.

Significant themes

• Entertainment as education: Lin Bai argues that a vivid, frightening experience teaches more effectively than a lecture.
• Appearance versus reality: The ghost scenario warns that deceptive appearances can be dangerous.
• Business built on spectacle: Lin Bai converts emotional intensity and social influence into investment for his restaurant.
• Manipulation and sincerity: Lin Bai presents his scheme as both a lesson and a service, while openly acknowledging his commercial motives.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Bai’s restaurant investors—Luo Congwen, Song Qing, and Zhu Huan—agree to become partners, valuing Lin Bai’s creativity and influence more than the modest investment required.
• Lin Bai asks them to help run the restaurant’s first Night Service, using their presence to attract customers. Zhu Huan, newly recovered from an earlier humiliation, enthusiastically plans to lure in guests and make the experience memorable.
• Lin Bai explains that the restaurant needs new scare stories to keep the Night Service popular, but he must leave after a Shadow Guard summons him to the City Lord’s Residence.
• Luo Congwen offers the backing of his powerful family if the city lord causes trouble. Lin Bai is pleased that his new partners provide the connections he lacks.
• Outside, Lin Bai jokes that Shadow Guards are anonymous agents who could die without anyone knowing their identities, irritating the escort, Zhou Jiang. Lin Bai leaves his apprentice Deng Libuduo behind to assist the new shareholders.
• On the dark road, Zhou Jiang suddenly attacks Lin Bai. Lin Bai anticipates the ambush and knocks him down with a single palm strike.
• Zhou Jiang reveals that the city lord set a test: if Lin Bai defeated the Shadow Guard, he could meet the city lord; if the guard killed Lin Bai, he could still meet him. Lin Bai realizes the city lord has mistaken him for a player.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Bai demonstrates shrewdness in business and politics: he recruits influential partners, notices Zhou Jiang’s suspicious behavior, and handles the ambush with confidence.
• Luo Congwen, Song Qing, and Zhu Huan move from wealthy acquaintances to committed partners. Luo offers political support; Song contributes practical cooperation; Zhu turns his earlier embarrassment into eagerness to help the restaurant succeed.
• Deng Libuduo resents being left behind and feels trapped by his role as Lin Bai’s apprentice and waiter. His outward obedience contrasts with his growing frustration.
• Zhou Jiang is initially a stern escort, then reveals himself as an attacker carrying out the city lord’s test. Lin Bai’s taunts and suspicions provoke his resentment.
• The group’s teasing camaraderie contrasts with the serious danger surrounding Lin Bai’s summons.

Significant themes

• Relationships as power: Lin Bai recognizes that allies and family connections can compensate for a lack of personal strength.
• Integration and survival: He deliberately builds ties across social classes, aiming to unite the world’s NPCs against the unpredictable players.
• Appearance versus reality: The supposed escort is an assassin, and a formal summons conceals a test.
• Agency and constraint: Lin Bai navigates events proactively, while Deng feels bound by his imposed role and the game’s rules.

Plot points and events

• After realizing the city lord may suspect him of being a player, Lin Bai remains unsure whether the suspicion came from careful investigation or prior knowledge.
• Zhou Jiang, a badly wounded Shadow Guard who had attacked Lin Bai, urges him to go to the City Lord’s Residence and insists the city lord will not harm him.
• Lin Bai refuses to abandon Zhou Jiang. Before helping him, however, he searches him thoroughly and pockets his weapons, money, and medicine to prevent another attack. His intrusive “help” humiliates Zhou Jiang, who is too injured—and too determined to deliver important intelligence—to resist.
• While carrying Zhou Jiang, Lin Bai wishes he knew medicine. This activates the Peerless Divine Doctor System, whose first quest is to treat one patient for a Constitution point. Lin Bai doubts that improving his own constitution will help his patient, but hopes medical abilities will follow.
• Near midnight, Lin Bai brings Zhou Jiang to the City Lord’s Residence. He presents himself as exhausted and selfless, asks the guards to prepare healing pills, and insists on continuing to support Zhou Jiang. The guards admire his apparent kindness, earning Lin Bai positive-emotion rewards.

Character developments

• Lin Bai shows genuine reluctance to leave an injured man behind, but mixes compassion with extreme caution, opportunism, and comic shamelessness. He also sees the new system as another opportunity to grow stronger.
• Zhou Jiang is reduced to helplessness after Lin Bai’s attack. Though furious and humiliated, he suppresses his anger because he must survive long enough to report that the City Lord’s Residence may have been infiltrated.
• The guards respond positively to Lin Bai’s apparent concern and begin treating him with goodwill.

Character interactions

• Lin Bai and Zhou Jiang’s exchange is a comic contest: Zhou Jiang tries to maintain his dignity and conceal his anger, while Lin Bai teases, searches, and handles him under the pretext of helping.
• Lin Bai’s considerate behavior toward Zhou Jiang contrasts with his private suspicion and practical self-protection.
• The guards accept Lin Bai’s insistence on carrying Zhou Jiang and interpret his actions as honorable.

Significant themes

• Small acts of kindness: The chapter’s title is reflected in Lin Bai’s decision not to leave Zhou Jiang behind.
• Kindness mixed with self-interest: Lin Bai’s help is real, but his caution, desire for rewards, and suspicion complicate its sincerity.
• Appearances and reputation: Lin Bai’s theatrical display of concern wins admiration, even as Zhou Jiang knows how rough and self-serving he can be.
• Growth through systems: A casual expression of concern triggers a new system, continuing the story’s playful pattern of rewards appearing in response to Lin Bai’s actions.

Key events

• Lin Bai brings the injured Zhou Jiang into the City Lord’s Residence, refusing to hand him over until a physician intervenes. He then takes the healing pill from the physician and feeds it to Zhou himself, completing a treatment quest and gaining one point of Constitution.
• An attendant summons Lin Bai to meet the city lord. There he discovers that Xu Longyun is a woman, and that she has been struggling to complete poems in Lin Bai’s Heavenly Fragment Collection.
• Xu questions Lin Bai about the collection and his identity. Lin Bai admits he does not know the missing verses, then turns the conversation to the outsiders, or “Heaven-Sent Ones.”
• Xu calls the outsiders a threat but explains that a divine oracle forbids the government from interfering with them while they are in the city. Violating the decree would bring heavenly thunder down on the city and its people.
• Lin Bai realizes this may explain why his disruptive actions have gone unpunished. He proposes that he and Xu work together, suggesting the lack of divine retaliation for his actions could be the basis of their cooperation.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Bai carefully manages appearances, using his concern for Zhou Jiang to build goodwill while also keeping a potential hostage close. He remains opportunistic, but shows growing interest in understanding his larger mission and the rules governing the world.
• Xu Longyun appears authoritative but exhausted, and her intense interest in the poetry collection reveals a more scholarly side. Her suspicion of Lin Bai softens into curiosity, though she remains frustrated by the predicament his actions have created.
• Zhou Jiang remains unconscious and badly injured; Lin Bai’s decision to bring him back and oversee his treatment may affect their relationship once he wakes.
• Lin Bai and Xu test one another with pointed questions. Their discussion shifts from the poems to the outsiders and the divine restriction, ending with Lin Bai proposing an alliance.

Significant themes

• Performance and self-interest: Lin Bai’s apparent kindness serves both his reputation and his practical aims.
• Rules and protection: The divine decree shields the Heaven-Sent Ones during their novice period, even when their actions cause trouble.
• Uncertainty and cooperation: Lin Bai and Xu each have incomplete knowledge, making the possibility of partnership more valuable—and more complicated.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Bai proposes that City Lord Xu Longyun cooperate with him, but she refuses to accept responsibility for the Heaven-Sent Ones in her residence or for Zhou Jiang’s attempt on Lin Bai’s life. Lin Bai recognizes that, as city lord, she must act cautiously to protect Jiamao City.
• To regain her interest, Lin Bai quotes the beginning of a poem, “If love between two hearts can endure,” then refuses to provide its continuation. Xu Longyun’s literary fascination—and frustration—becomes a source of comic leverage.
• Lin Bai pitches a plan to make Jiamao City a “City of Incompleteness,” using his unfinished poem collection as a unique attraction. Shops and products would embrace deliberate flaws, drawing visitors and spending while potentially discouraging Heaven-Sent Ones from settling there.
• Xu Longyun questions the effect on ordinary people. Lin Bai argues that tourism and commerce would improve livelihoods. He also proposes an annual poetry festival, with further incomplete collections to keep the city’s attraction distinctive.
• Xu Longyun offers cooperation in exchange for one completed poem. Lin Bai refuses, saying he does not trust her and that solving the poems herself would be more satisfying.
• They discuss the covert guards at the residence. Xu may take on the useful recruits, but Lin Bai asks her not to retain Lao Mi, whom he has chosen to lead the Beggar Gang. Instead, Lao Mi should infiltrate the gang and then have his guard status officially revoked. Xu points out that Lin Bai has already turned her covert guards into “Open Guards.”

Character developments

• Lin Bai shifts from assuming Xu will readily cooperate to understanding her political constraints. He proves himself an inventive, provocative entrepreneur who uses incomplete poetry both as a bargaining chip and as the foundation for his city-development scheme.
• Xu Longyun remains guarded and politically careful, but Lin Bai’s proposal makes her consider an unconventional way to protect and enrich Jiamao City. Her romantic attachment to poetry also emerges beneath her stern exterior.

Significant themes

• Pragmatism and responsibility: Xu’s caution reflects the risks a city leader faces, in contrast to Lin Bai’s freedom to experiment.
• Turning disruption into opportunity: Lin Bai reframes the Heaven-Sent Ones’ arrival as a chance to reshape Jiamao City and attract wealth.
• Incompleteness as identity: Deliberate flaws, especially in poetry and commerce, become a possible source of cultural distinction and economic value.
• Trust and leverage: Lin Bai and Xu negotiate while withholding what the other wants, using poetry, personnel, and political cooperation as bargaining tools.

Character interactions

Lin Bai alternates between provoking Xu with unfinished verses and persuading her with practical arguments. Xu challenges his motives and presses for a poem, while Linai refuses to surrender his advantage. Their negotiation ends without a firm agreement, but their final exchange shows their increasingly familiar, sparring relationship.

Key plot points and events

• The city lord observes the players training and marvels at their stamina, rapid progress, and uniform technique, while remaining wary of their unreliable loyalties.
• Lin Bai maintains his image as a powerful, mysterious expert, despite privately worrying about how he compares with the world’s stronger martial artists and what rewards his system may eventually provide.
• The city lord summons Lao Mi and Jing Mi to assign them an undercover mission in the Beggar Gang. They must give up their Shadow Guard status, rise through the gang’s ranks, and receive further instructions only after gaining influence.
• Lin Bai is named their sole contact and urges them to become convincing beggars—not merely disguise themselves as such—and climb as high as possible.
• Before the meeting, Lin Bai overhears players praising Deng Libuduo as a marketing genius and blaming Lin Bai, the restaurant owner, for giving him only a 30% stake. Some players are even discussing killing Lin Bai at open beta. Lin Bai realizes Deng has taken credit for his work and become a threat to his business.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Bai keeps his composure and strategic persona, but is angered by Deng’s apparent betrayal and alarmed to learn that players consider him a public enemy. He nevertheless treats Lao Mi and Jing Mi warmly and supports their mission.
• Lao Mi shifts from resentment toward Lin Bai to renewed admiration when he realizes Lin Bai helped arrange his opportunities. Eager for quests and advancement, he accepts the undercover assignment and resolves to protect Lin Bai if needed.
• Jing Mi is initially disappointed at returning to the Beggar Gang after becoming a Shadow Guard, but Lao Mi persuades him that the assignment could be a valuable hidden opportunity; he agrees.
• The city lord recognizes the players’ extraordinary usefulness but distrusts their loyalties. She works with Lin Bai to use them strategically, while keeping the mission’s details secret until the pair gain standing.
• The players’ private conversations reveal a sharp contrast between their admiration for Deng and their hostility toward Lin Bai. Lao Mi and Jing Mi conceal this danger from Lin Bai for now.

Significant themes

• Power and mistrust: The players’ tirelessness and fast growth make them valuable, but their shifting loyalties make them difficult to trust.
• Reputation and credit: Deng’s rise as a celebrated “gaming god” exposes how easily credit can be misappropriated—and how public opinion can turn against Lin Bai.
• Identity and role-playing: Lao Mi and Jing Mi are instructed to embody beggars fully, turning performance into a tool for infiltration and advancement.
• Hidden opportunities and ambition: The pair see the undercover mission as a chance to gain status and recognition, while Lin Bai and the city lord use their ambition to serve a larger plan.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Bai escorts Lao Mi and Jing Mi from the City Lord’s Residence, explaining that he arranged their “notorious bandit” cover so they could make contact with the Beggar Gang. He tells them to find their own way into the gang.
• Realizing Lao Mi sees the assignment only as a temporary mission, Lin Bai urges him to treat the Beggar Gang as a lasting career—and an independent power base rather than a future tool of the city lord.
• Lin Bai gives Lao Mi 200 taels of silver to fund the venture. The money, and the prospect of building a gang, convince Lao Mi to commit to becoming its leader.
• Jing Mi agrees to support Lao Mi rather than compete for leadership. This completes one of Lin Bai’s system quests and triggers another: Lao Mi needs authority over territory.
• Lin Bai advises the pair to infiltrate the gang and earn territory, then leaves to pursue his own business. He uses the Morning Flight lightness technique, impressing both men.

Character developments

• Lao Mi shifts from reluctantly treating beggary as a quest to embracing it as a chance to build a lasting organization. He becomes ambitious and sees the gang as a potential player-built guild.
• Jing Mi remains wary of the grand promises but is persuaded by the practical value of Lin Bai’s funding. He willingly takes the subordinate role and becomes eager to learn Lin Bai’s martial arts.
• Lin Bai acts as mentor and benefactor, steering his brother toward independence while using system quests to support his growth. He recognizes that he cannot micromanage Lao Mi’s entire career and leaves the next steps to the pair.

Significant themes

• Agency versus manipulation: Lin Bai guides Lao Mi, but worries that fulfilling every quest for him would turn his brother into a puppet.
• Ambition and opportunity: The Beggar Gang offers Lao Mi a path to influence beyond serving the city lord.
• Practical support and loyalty: Lin Bai’s tangible gift of money carries more weight than the city lord’s verbal promise.
• Game and reality: The players debate whether their experience is a game or something more like another life, while approaching the gang as a long-term enterprise.

Character interactions

• Lin Bai uses intimate, persuasive language and a dramatic vision of Lao Mi’s future to win his commitment, then backs his words with money.
• Lao Mi and Jing Mi privately discuss the unusual “game” and later agree that Lao Mi should lead while Jing Mi supports him.
• Lin Bai’s display of Morning Flight leaves both men envious and increases their determination to earn his martial arts instruction.

Key plot points and events

• City Lord Xu Longyun watches Lin Bai fly through the air and wonders about his sect. She orders the heads of several prominent families and the city’s artisans’ associations to meet at her residence to discuss matters.
• Lin Bai enjoys the freedom of flight and notes that his businesses and supernatural “systems” are increasingly running themselves. Overnight, his haunted-house venture earns attention and rewards from both familiar and unknown people.
• As morning comes, the ghosts and wealthy young men leave. Deng Libuduo stays behind, hoping to learn martial arts from Lin Bai.
• Lin Bai sets a condition: Deng must perform ninety-nine good deeds in Jiamao City and collect one copper coin from each person he helps, without being beaten. If he succeeds, Lin Bai will accept him as a disciple that night.
• Lin Bai recounts an even more absurd advanced entrance test, claiming he once helped a villain become enlightened and turn into a monk. Alarmed, Deng settles for the basic test.

Character developments

• Lin Bai grows more confident in his unconventional approach. With the city lord and wealthy patrons supporting his ventures, he can act as a hands-off manager.
• Deng Libuduo remains eager to become Lin Bai’s disciple, but his confidence and suspicions are shaken by Lin Bai’s bizarre tests and stories.
• Xu Longyun is intrigued by Lin Bai’s unusual abilities and begins taking practical steps to involve the city’s influential groups.

Character interactions

• Xu Longyun discusses Lin Bai’s flight with her attendant, then issues orders for a city meeting.
• Lin Bai and Deng trade a series of comic exchanges: Deng pretends to be exhausted, while Lin Bai recognizes the act and gives him an impossible-sounding test.
• Lin Bai’s tale of his supposed advanced trial leaves Deng imagining how Lin Bai manipulates others into gratitude and cooperation.

Significant themes

• Unconventional morality and mentorship: Lin Bai frames dubious, transactional behavior as good deeds and uses it as a test of character.
• Power through influence: His success comes not only from supernatural abilities but from recruiting wealthy allies and delegating work.
• Perseverance and “an invincible heart”: Lin Bai presents resilience as the sect’s true strength, while Deng must decide whether he can endure the test.

Key plot points and events

• Deng Libuduo tries to complete Lin Bai’s “good deeds” quest by offering to carry an old woman’s vegetables and a woodcutter’s firewood for one copper coin. Both refuse, assuming he is trying to scam them.
• Zhang Bao and Zhang Dashan follow Deng, carrying signs advertising the Chef God Restaurant. Zhang Bao records each failed attempt, while local children trail the group and turn Deng’s humiliating encounters into a new game.
• Frustrated by the near-impossibility of completing the quest under supervision, Deng hides in a privy and logs out to recruit players through his famous forum account. He frames the effort as a promotional event for the restaurant, expecting players in Jiamao City to stage or support his good deeds.
• Forum users respond enthusiastically, praising Deng and promising to join him. Deng enjoys the attention—until he sees an announcement that a second batch of 10,000 pioneer accounts will be drawn in three days.
• The game’s new features will include livestreaming, audience interaction and tipping, and a currency exchange between Blue Star Coins and in-game copper coins. Deng fears that livestreams will expose his humiliating dependence on Lin Bai.
• He resolves to use the remaining three days to learn Lin Bai’s martial arts and find a way to kill him, while keeping the restaurant and his celebrity status for their financial and social value.

Character developments

• Deng Libuduo shifts from grudgingly attempting the quest to using his fame and knowledge of the player community to work around it. He recognizes that Lin Bai’s methods are effective, even as he resents him, and becomes increasingly calculating about preserving his celebrity account, wealth, and influence.
• Zhang Bao and Zhang Dashan act as Lin Bai’s supervisors and reluctant advertisers, documenting Deng’s failures while drawing a curious crowd.
• The forum community is established as eager to follow Deng, especially with a new wave of players about to enter the game.

Significant themes

• Gaming and reality blur: Player forums and in-game events influence one another, letting Deng recruit outside help to shape what happens in the game.
• Fame is fragile: Deng’s online celebrity image may collapse once livestreams reveal how powerless he is in person.
• Money and influence: Deng views the restaurant, his reputation, and the coming influx of players as assets to protect and exploit.
• Humiliation and unintended entertainment: Deng’s failed acts of kindness become a spectacle for children and passersby.

Character interactions

• The old woman and woodcutter distrust Deng’s offers, interpreting them as attempts to take advantage of them.
• Zhang Bao and Zhang Dashan supervise Deng while promoting Lin Bai’s restaurant; Zhang Bao records his failures.
• Children follow the group, laughing and imitating Deng’s encounters.
• Online fans flatter Deng and volunteer to help, reinforcing his confidence—before the livestream announcement makes him fear exposure.

Key plot points and events

• Deng Libuduo resumes his “good deeds” quest in Jiamao City. A player deliberately stages a fall so Deng can help him for one copper coin, but then turns the scene into an advertisement for the Chef God Restaurant. Deng is mortified, while nearby NPCs interpret the stunt as one of Lin Bai’s clever marketing schemes.
• Lin Bai watches the players’ performance, amused, then leaves to attend to other matters.
• Lao Mi and Jing Mi confront the beggars’ gang. To frighten them into submission, Lao Mi suddenly kills Jing Mi in front of the gang, then flees as if escaping justice.
• The beggars dispose of the “corpse,” only to find Jing Mi alive again when he returns with Lao Mi. The pair claim they cannot die and threaten to kill the gang one by one. Knowing the players have already revived once, leader Liu Quan decides not to risk challenging them.
• Liu Quan agrees to serve under Lao Mi, but begs him to stop killing his own companions. The quest to take control of a street is completed, rewarding Lin Bai with fortune +2.

Character developments

• Deng Libuduo follows through on his quest despite embarrassment, but becomes the unwilling face of a restaurant advertisement. His public reputation as a marketer leaves him unable to explain himself.
• Lin Bai enjoys the players’ antics and recognizes that Deng’s performance may even help fool the game system, but remains focused on larger plans.
• Lao Mi and Jing Mi show growing confidence and resourcefulness. Rather than risk a costly direct fight, they exploit their ability to revive as a bluff.
• Liu Quan proves cautious and pragmatic: despite his authority among the beggars, he submits when the threat seems too dangerous to test.

Significant themes and interactions

• Gaming, performance, and embarrassment: Players turn quests into public spectacles, while NPCs misread their motives as deliberate strategy.
• Exploiting game mechanics: Lao Mi and Jing Mi use resurrection—not brute strength—to gain leverage over a gang that would otherwise be difficult to defeat.
• Power through reputation and fear: The beggars submit because they believe the players may be immortal, while Deng’s awkward deed is mistaken for effective business promotion.
• Player–NPC interactions: The chapter repeatedly contrasts players’ private intentions with NPCs’ interpretations, producing both comedy and practical consequences.

• City Lord and the Shadow Guards: A Shadow Guard complains that the newly recruited Heaven-Sent Ones are making a ridiculous spectacle of themselves while imitating the guards’ work. Xu Longyun refuses to dismiss them, insisting they can still be useful. Instead, she orders the Heaven-Sent Ones monitored, with troublemakers arrested and suitable recruits trained as constables. She also instructs the guards to keep watch on Lin Bai. When one asks whether Lin Bai can be arrested to avenge Zhou Jiang, Xu warns that he is no match for him and suggests turning the Heaven-Sent Ones against him instead.
• The four families weigh the new policy: Representatives of the Luo, Song, Gu, and Zhu families discuss Xu Longyun’s plans. Most consider them absurd, but the Luo representative argues that Xu has governed too competently for too long to act foolishly without reason. He suspects the city—and perhaps the world—is changing, and says the Luo family will gamble on supporting her.
• Lin Bai takes up medicine: With his other systems running largely on their own, Lin Bai focuses on his new divine-doctor system. Though he cannot bring himself to experiment on innocent patients, he reasons that treating criminals is acceptable. After rescuing an old man from robbers, he declares the injured men his patients and forcibly feeds them medicine discarded by Zhou Jiang.
• The system’s reward frustrates him: Lin Bai completes a mission to treat three patients and gains a point of constitution. The next mission asks him to diagnose ten patients, but offers only more constitution—not medical knowledge. He worries that his approach may make him a doctor known for killing patients, then asks one injured robber whether his leg is broken.
  Character developments and interactions: Xu Longyun shows pragmatic faith in the usefulness of the Heaven-Sent Ones while remaining wary of Lin Bai; her guards’ resentment toward him is strong but restrained by her warning. The Luo representative emerges as the most observant and politically daring of the family delegates. Lin Bai approaches medicine with genuine reluctance to harm the innocent, but his rough, coercive treatment of criminals exposes the gap between his intentions and his methods.
  Significant themes: The chapter contrasts responsible governance with apparent absurdity, hints that the world is undergoing a major change, and explores Lin Bai’s uneasy mix of compassion and violence. Its title is also played for comedy: Lin Bai claims that the best physicians prevent illness before it strikes, while his “treatment” begins by breaking robbers’ bones.

Plot points

• Lin Bai raises his “diagnose ten patients” task to three by correctly identifying an injured gang member’s condition, then leaves after giving him routine medical advice.
• Shadow Guards secretly following Lin Bai watch him pose as a physician and conclude that he is either foolish or insane.
• Lin Bai’s attempts to diagnose passersby fail, so he pays a clinic physician fifty taels to let him observe consultations. By repeating the physician’s diagnoses, he advances the task and discovers that the system accepts copied diagnoses.
• He spends the day completing clinic tasks involving medicinal herbs, prescriptions, pulse-taking, treating a terminally ill patient, and gathering herbs. These rewards raise his Constitution to ten and grant abilities including Herb Identification Knowledge and Complexion Reading.
• The next medical task requires personally gathering herbs outside the city; herbs taken from the clinic’s drawers do not count. Lin Bai reasons that alchemy—and likely healing pills—will be more useful in the game world than traditional, slow treatments.
• Other systems also progress automatically: Lin Bai gains a Spirit Fruit, Seven Wounds Hand, and twenty-one knife techniques. But the cooking system’s next task requires him to cook personally, so he decides to ignore it rather than devote himself to the restaurant.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Bai is resourceful and opportunistic, exploiting the clinic’s workflow to advance his medical tasks despite lacking real expertise. His casual, often irreverent manner contrasts with his outwardly composed “doctorly” demeanor.
• The clinic physician tolerates Lin Bai’s copying after being paid, while Madam Li jokes flirtatiously with Lin Bai, who responds in kind until the physician intervenes.
• The Shadow Guards remain suspicious of Lin Bai and intend to report his behavior to the City Lord.
• Lin Bai increasingly prioritizes systems that advance without demanding his constant labor, rejecting tasks that would tie him down.

Themes

• Gaming systems and loopholes: Lin Bai treats task requirements as rules to exploit, not as meaningful professional standards.
• Practicality versus vocation: He evaluates medicine and cooking according to their usefulness in the game world, favoring alchemy and efficient rewards.
• Ambition and selective commitment: With many systems competing for his attention, Lin Bai chooses freedom and broader advancement over mastering every craft.

Plot points and events

• The Shadow Guard players worry that ordinary grinding will not give them an advantage before the second wave of beta testers arrives in three days. They plan to seek faster progress by hunting Fierce Beasts in Western Mountain, whose parts can be sold for money.
• The group suspects the City Lord has little intention of helping them advance: two players with a hidden class have been sent on a mission, while the rest are left to grind. They also learn that leaving the Shadow Guards may mean having their martial arts crippled, and that the Mo Family Sword Hall has rejected them.
• The players debate whether to win the City Lord’s trust or leave the novice area and risk becoming wanted criminals. They agree that leveling up comes first and plan to hunt Fierce Beasts the next day, while gathering advice from the forums.
• Lin Bai visits the City Lord’s Residence to eavesdrop on the players and gather intelligence. He learns about the upcoming beta wave, livestreaming, and their resentment toward him. When Xu Longyun hints that they should be candid with each other, he offers a vague assurance and leaves.
• After Lin Bai departs, Xu Longyun asks Li Jin what he may have discovered. Li Jin warns that Lin Bai’s abilities seem uncanny and possibly connected to divination or demonic arts. Xu orders her people to report unusual developments.

Character developments and interactions

• Chronic Laziness emerges as the players’ practical leader, analyzing their predicament and organizing their next steps.
• Bai Yin shifts from discouragement to enthusiasm when he realizes that livestreaming as wanted fugitives—or even wilderness survival—could be profitable.
• The players grow more wary of Lin Bai and of the City Lord’s intentions, but agree to cooperate as fellow outsiders.
• Lin Bai remains calm and self-assured despite the players’ hostility, treating it as an unavoidable consequence of his system-assisted influence.
• Xu Longyun tries to draw Lin Bai into a more open partnership, while Li Jin encourages her to distrust him. Xu remains cautious and orders closer monitoring.

Significant themes

• Power and survival: The players see rapid leveling as essential to avoid being overtaken by newcomers.
• Limited agency: Their Shadow Guard status may be difficult to escape, with severe consequences for quitting.
• Trust and manipulation: Players suspect they have been used, while Lin Bai and Xu Longyun each conceal their motives.
• Opportunity in uncertainty: The prospect of livestreaming turns a dangerous, unfamiliar world into a possible source of profit.

Key plot points and events

• Lin Bai receives the flawed creation system’s reward: Seven Wounds Hand, a close-range technique that targets an opponent’s hands. Its narrow use, questionable value against pain-insensitive players, and missing “seventh” injury leave him furious.
• The next quest requires him to make 2,639 people experience “incompleteness.” Lin Bai realizes this brings the cumulative total to 9,999, and hopes future rewards might improve. He expects Jiamao City’s upcoming changes and his published collection to boost the total.
• He reviews his emotional-reward trees: the negative tree has produced a fruit and begun another bud, though customers’ growing familiarity with the restaurant has slowed negative-emotion gains. Outside, spectators’ cheers for the Haunted House generate a surge of positive points, so Lin Bai welcomes the crowds despite their weakening the scares.
• The players Long Xi and Deng Libuduo clash over the Haunted House. Long Xi believes Deng stole an instance he had planned to conquer, but Lin Bai reveals that the “ghosts” are his employees and refuses to recognize Long Xi’s supposed agreement to exorcise them.
• Long Xi’s master, Qingfeng Daoist, explains the misunderstanding and reveals he owns 10 percent of the restaurant. Seeing its growing profits, he is now fiercely protective of Lin Bai and the business.
• Deng presents his Good Deeds Record Book and asks to become Lin Bai’s disciple. Lin Bai accepts him as the senior disciple of the Righteousness Sect’s seventeenth generation, then lays down strict moral rules. Qingfeng and Deng resent the conditions, while Long Xi begins to grasp the situation’s irony.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Bai remains self-reliant and wary, treating both systems and people pragmatically. He turns the restaurant’s mixed emotional reactions into profit and uses his new sect to recruit Deng, while imposing a deliberately sanctimonious code of conduct.
• Long Xi goes from confidence in his plan to frustration and humiliation: his intended target is not a ghost, his master is aligned with Lin Bai, and his rival becomes Lin Bai’s disciple.
• Deng Libuduo gains the position he wanted, but Lin Bai’s moral requirements immediately frustrate him. His rivalry with Long Xi continues through insults and threats.
• Qingfeng Daoist shifts from master and witness to Lin Bai’s business ally, valuing the restaurant’s earnings enough to defend it.
• The scene’s misunderstandings and reversals fuel resentment, while the restaurant’s crowded spectacle produces positive emotions for Lin Bai to collect.

Significant themes

• Incomplete systems and imperfect rewards: Lin Bai’s martial arts and quests are absurdly flawed, yet he adapts rather than abandoning their benefits.
• Self-interest and trust: Lin Bai believes genuine trust is rare and relies primarily on himself, while cooperation often rests on shared profit.
• Turning reactions into resources: Fear, resentment, and amusement all become measurable gains, making even disruptions useful.
• Irony and hypocrisy: Lin Bai names his sect “Righteousness” and preaches virtue even as his methods and motives invite resentment; the contrast unsettles both his new disciple and Qingfeng.

Plot points

• Lin Bai formally takes Deng Libuduo as his disciple and receives a system reward for doing so. His next reward will come when he teaches Deng a mastered skill.
• Lin orders Deng and Long Xi to treat each other well, despite knowing they are enemies. Both agree politely while privately threatening one another.
• Qingfeng Daoist, now a business partner of Lin’s, leaves with Long Xi. Long Xi and Deng exchange courteous farewells laced with hostility.
• Lin learns that Deng and Long Xi have a feud. He tells Deng to train properly if he wants to settle it, but warns that righteousness must be on his side and criticizes Deng for manipulating the earlier test.
• Lin begins Deng’s training with an incomplete Nine Suns Scripture, insisting that internal cultivation must come before combat techniques. He refuses to teach the Dragon-Subduing Palm until Deng has developed inner force.
• When Deng presses for something practical, Lin agrees to teach him the basic Straight Saber Technique, demonstrating it with a damaged cleaver and a potato.

Character developments

• Lin Bai acts like a benevolent, principled master, but strategically limits what he teaches Deng. He wants to cultivate inner force for his own system’s benefit and distrusts his new disciple.
• Deng Libuduo outwardly plays the respectful student while privately plotting to learn Lin’s secrets and eventually kill him. Despite his resentment, he is thrilled by the prospect of acquiring powerful martial arts.
• Long Xi remains suspicious and confrontational toward Deng, while trying to appear cooperative. His curiosity about Lin and Deng’s relationship suggests he suspects hidden complications.
• Qingfeng Daoist is anxious to protect both his valuable business relationship with Lin and his prized disciple, and quickly removes Long Xi from the tense situation.

Themes and interactions

• The chapter’s humor comes from the contrast between polite speech and murderous private thoughts: Deng and Long Xi promise to care for each other while trading threats.
• Mistrust and manipulation shape the new master–disciple relationship. Lin preaches virtue but withholds knowledge; Deng accepts the arrangement while plotting against him.
• Training is framed as both discipline and leverage: Lin insists on gradual cultivation, while Deng sees each lesson as a step toward gaining power.
• Lin and Deng’s exchanges repeatedly turn moral instruction into comic bargaining, especially over the incomplete scripture and the withheld Dragon-Subduing Palm.

Plot points and events

• After teaching Deng Libuduo a fragment of the Nine Suns Scripture, Lin Bai begins using his Know-It-All Teacher System to encourage the player’s cultivation. Deng spends nearly twelve hours a day training, with vegetable-chopping at the Chef God Restaurant as his only diversion.
• The system rates Deng’s character highly, and Lin Bai receives a small share of the inner force Deng gains. Because players cultivate far faster than NPCs, Lin Bai realizes they could become dangerous if left unchecked. He resolves to maintain firm control over them in Jiamao City.
• Lin Bai teaches Luo Congwen the same scripture, but Luo’s cultivation is far slower—about one percent of Deng’s progress. The contrast confirms the players’ major advantage.
• Lin Bai spends two days handling system tasks, including compiling the Heavenly Fragment Collection for publication and practicing cooking and medical skills.
• Xu Longyun leads a campaign to make Jiamao City physically “incomplete”: signs are damaged, characters are altered, and paving stones are replaced at random. Despite compensation, residents complain. The disruption earns Lin Bai huge numbers of incompleteness and negative-emotion points, but no positive-emotion points.
• Lin Bai uses those rewards to learn five strange martial arts, including a short-burst movement technique, a summer-only sword art, a colorful saber technique, a body shield that leaves his head and feet exposed, and a treetop-traversal skill. He also gains enough inner force to approach a sixty-year cycle.
• Having reached the apparent limit of his incompleteness system in the Novice Village, Lin Bai sees it stall. Just before the second wave of closed-beta players arrives, a new Great Language System activates, tasking him with mastering language.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Bai shifts from treating player cultivation as a useful source of system rewards to recognizing it as a potential threat. He remains ambitious and pragmatic, aiming to control players locally while preparing to rely on his own strength later.
• Deng Libuduo is exceptionally disciplined and accepts a dull routine, reassuring himself that advanced cultivation and even kitchen work may be part of Lin Bai’s hidden test. His faith in the teacher sustains him despite having no combat skills.
• Luo Congwen is also diligent, but his slower progress highlights the gap between NPCs and players.
• Xu Longyun supports Lin Bai’s scheme by personally damaging the city’s signs, prompting the rest of the city to follow her example. Residents’ complaints show the social cost of Lin Bai’s system-driven plans.

Significant themes

• Players versus NPCs: Players’ rapid progression threatens to reshape the balance of power.
• Control and survival: Lin Bai’s systems offer advantages, but he fears losing authority over the players and plans accordingly.
• Grind and sacrifice: Deng’s monotonous practice reflects the effort behind advancement, while Lin Bai’s constant task-completion turns daily work into rapid growth.
• Absurdity and unintended consequences: Lin Bai’s bizarre systems reward literal “incompleteness,” transforming a thriving city into a damaged-looking one—and generating resentment rather than goodwill.

Key plot points and events

• The Great Language System assigns Lin Bai a beginner quest: speak warmly and kindly for twelve hours, without interruption or falling below an average amount of daily conversation. The reward is the martial technique Palm Thunder.
• Eager for the reward—and hoping to improve his reputation—Lin Bai begins praising everyone around him. His encouragement earns small bursts of positive emotion from his employees.
• When Song Jinnan’s family visits, Lin Bai compliments Song Ling and gives her an exaggeratedly poetic pep talk. She becomes happy and flustered, while her parents exchange worried looks.
• A Shadow Guard, Zhao Tong, arrives to summon Lin Bai to the City Lord’s Residence. Lin Bai praises him throughout the journey, leaving Zhao Tong unnerved and suspicious.
• At the residence, Lin Bai praises City Lord Xu Longyun’s leadership and resolve. Xu assumes his flowery language is sarcasm or an attempt to gain a favor. When she challenges him to prove his sincerity by writing a poem, Lin Bai is put on the spot.

Character developments

• Lin Bai treats the quest as an opportunity to earn a powerful reward, but quickly discovers that constant compliments make ordinary conversation—and serious business—awkward.
• Song Ling responds warmly to Lin Bai’s praise, taking his description of her as a “treasure” to heart.
• Zhao Tong remains wary of Lin Bai but is unsettled by his unexpectedly pleasant behavior.
• Xu Longyun shows self-doubt about the city’s costly renovation plan and its effect on her public standing, though she remains composed and tests Lin Bai’s sincerity.

Character interactions

• Lin Bai encourages server Wu San’er and cook Zhang Lin, who respond with excitement and gratitude.
• His personal compliments lift Song Ling’s spirits, while her parents watch the exchange with concern.
• Lin Bai’s nonstop praise makes Zhao Tong tense during their trip, even prompting him to reconsider his opinion of Lin Bai.
• Lin Bai and Xu Longyun trade exaggerated praise and skeptical replies; the scene ends with her demanding a poem.

Significant themes

• Words and their effects: Kindness can raise morale and foster connection, but excessive or insincere-sounding praise can create suspicion and awkwardness.
• Duty and public judgment: Xu Longyun’s concerns reflect the burden of leadership and the risk of being condemned if a public plan fails.
• Cultivation through constraint: Lin Bai’s supernatural quest turns ordinary speech into a test of discipline, forcing him to adapt his usual approach to conversation.

Key plot points and events

• Xu Longyun tells Lin Bai that five major cultivation sects will open recruitment offices in Qian City. She worries that the immortal, unpredictable Heaven-Sent Ones could become dangerous once they learn powerful abilities.
• Lin Bai is compelled by a system quest to offer pleasant words for a full day. He answers Xu Longyun’s serious questions with extravagant, often irrelevant flattery, while writing his practical advice on paper.
• Lin Bai’s written solution is to have Heaven-Sent Ones govern one another, establishing rules before they gain more power. Xu Longyun also reports that her Shadow Guards are growing stronger through coordinated hunting and may soon serve as city guards. She suspects a second wave of Heaven-Sent Ones is approaching and warns Lin Bai to be careful.
• Xu Longyun eventually sends Lin Bai away, exasperated. Meanwhile, online forums buzz with excitement about the closed beta and Jiamao City, with players praising its oddities and plotting to help the celebrated Deng Libuduo.

Character developments

• Lin Bai remains focused on gaining skills and advancing himself. Though his forced compliments frustrate Xu Longyun, he offers useful strategic advice in writing and admires her judgment.
• Xu Longyun shows political insight by anticipating the risks posed by incoming players and organizing the Shadow Guards. Lin Bai’s flattery irritates her, but it also unexpectedly makes her shy and pleased, leaving her conflicted.

Significant themes

• Communication versus performance: The system’s requirement distorts conversation, forcing Lin Bai to speak praise while conveying meaningful ideas in writing.
• Power and governance: The growing abilities and numbers of the Heaven-Sent Ones make rules and self-regulation essential.
• Comedy and concealed feelings: Lin Bai’s relentless compliments clash with Xu Longyun’s irritation, while her reactions reveal an attraction she tries to deny.

Character interactions

• Lin Bai and Xu Longyun clash over his bizarre speech: she seeks practical answers, while he must keep flattering her to satisfy the system.
• Their exchange nevertheless becomes productive when Lin Bai writes his proposal for managing the Heaven-Sent Ones and Xu Longyun shares her plans and warnings.
• After he leaves, Xu Longyun privately broods over his compliments and unfinished poem, mixing embarrassment, delight, and exasperation.

Plot points and events

• On the day a new wave of closed-beta players arrives, Deng Libuduo worries that players will attack Lin Bai over a planned assassination. Lin Bai tells him not to worry and begins speaking in the oddly inspirational manner required by his “A Kind Word Warms Three Winter Months” quest.
• Deng mistakes Lin Bai’s behavior for a game bug and fears he will never learn more martial arts. Lin Bai, meanwhile, is looking forward to obtaining Palm Thunder in ten hours.
• Five players arrive with usernames announcing their intent to kill Lin Bai. They plan to livestream the assassination and hope to take over the Chef God Restaurant afterward, promising Deng a role in its success.
• Lin Bai disarms one attacker with a brutal hand-breaking combination, then praises Deng in a way that makes the players suspect him of betrayal. When Deng curses Lin Bai, Lin Bai’s system penalizes him for insulting his master; Lin Bai then knocks him unconscious with Proud Dragon Has Regrets.
• The remaining players conclude that Lin Bai is a bugged NPC and attack anyway. Lin Bai kills all five with Shocking a Hundred Armors.
• Realizing that tens of thousands of viewers have now seen him act abnormally, Lin Bai worries the game operators may “fix” him—and wonders whether this could expose the truth behind the game and its system.

Character developments and interactions

• Lin Bai remains calculating beneath his quest-mandated cheerfulness: he uses his strange manner to confuse others, frames Deng as a traitor, and retaliates when insulted. He also begins to see the livestream as an unexpected opportunity.
• Deng Libuduo shifts from anxious concern for his master to fear that Lin Bai is malfunctioning and might stop teaching him. He briefly entertains the players’ offer, then desperately denies betraying them, but ultimately suffers Lin Bai’s punishment.
• The five players approach as coordinated, self-assured assassins, confident that killing Lin Bai will advance players’ cause and benefit their business plans. Their confidence collapses when Lin Bai demonstrates his martial arts—though they still attack, treating the encounter as spectacle for the livestream.

Significant themes

• Game reality versus lived reality: Players treat NPCs and violence as part of a game, while Lin Bai and Deng experience the consequences as real.
• Manipulation and misplaced trust: Lin Bai’s forced positivity creates confusion, allowing him to turn both Deng and the players against each other.
• Power and exploitation: The players frame their assassination as resistance to NPC exploitation, yet their plan also involves seizing a business for their own gain.
• Unexpected consequences: A quest-driven behavior that seems harmless to Lin Bai looks like a bug to players—and may draw the developers’ attention.

Key plot points and events

• Clips of Lin Bai defeating the players who attacked him spread rapidly across the game forum. Players mistake his unusual combat abilities and behavior for a fascinating game bug.
• Curious players flock to Lin Bai’s restaurant to see him for themselves. His compulsory stream of flattering compliments turns the shop into a popular check-in spot, and business booms.
• Players launch a petition to keep Lin Bai in the game. Lin Bai realizes the attention may protect him from being patched and hopes that becoming a popular feature will let him survive.
• Deng Libuduo, newly resurrected, resents Lin Bai’s transformation from a foul-mouthed, demanding mentor into a sweet-talking mascot. His bug report receives a dismissive reply that the game is working normally.
• Zhao Tong tells City Lord Xu Longyun that Lin Bai has attracted nearly all the city’s new players and their money. Xu guesses that Lin Bai’s behavior was deliberate and reflects that he prepared ahead of her.

Character developments

• Lin Bai remains fearful of being removed from the game, but adapts pragmatically: he keeps up the compliments, maintains his shopkeeper persona, and hopes his popularity will make the developers leave him alone.
• Deng Libuduo shifts from concern about losing his lucky encounter to frustration at losing the Lin Bai he admired. He tries unsuccessfully to get the developers to intervene.
• Xu Longyun recognizes Lin Bai’s apparent strategic foresight. Her lingering personal interest shows when she remembers the verse he wrote for her, though she admits he has outmaneuvered her.

Character interactions and themes

• Players treat Lin Bai as both a game-breaking combatant and a charming virtual idol; his harmless admirers contrast with the hostility that provokes his violence.
• Lin Bai’s popularity brings practical benefits to the restaurant, impressing his staff and drawing business without bargaining.
• The chapter explores the blurred boundary between game and reality, the power of online attention, and the absurd way popularity can turn a perceived bug into a protected feature. It also contrasts Lin Bai’s survival-driven performance with the more personal reactions of Deng Libuduo and Xu Longyun.