Chapter Summaries

Li Chen defeated and gravely wounded Elder Fang, but a talisman summoned a Primordial Spirit Great Power’s enormous palm, breaking the battlefield barrier and allowing the Immortal Alliance cultivators to escape. Both sides withdrew, and Elder Fang’s group mistakenly concluded that a Grand Confucian had captured Li Chen.

• Li Chen told Elder Fang that his attack had left him near death, while the enhanced demons fought the Immortal Alliance cultivators outside.
• Elder Zhou used a blood-inscribed talisman to summon an enormous palm that crushed demons, broke the Earth-Covering Cloud-Banishing Banner’s barrier, and let Elder Fang escape.
• Li Chen decided not to pursue the fleeing Immortal Alliance cultivators and secretly told Hu Xi that they needed to leave.
• After escaping several thousand li, Elder Fang told his companions to report the Grand Confucian and suggested that the figure had captured Li Chen.
• Xia Ziyi sensed that something was wrong but stayed silent because his relevant memories had been erased.

Li Chen disguised himself as Hu Ze and arranged passage toward the Righteous Qi Continent while secretly coordinating an attack on Whirlpool City. A disturbance aboard the Flying Boat drew his attention to the slave workers maintaining it.

• Li Chen told Hu Xi to contact informants and warned her to stop practicing the Confucian Sect Cultivation Techniques because they could conflict with demonic foundations.
• Hu Xi arranged passage with an informant backed by the Golden Roc Great Sage, and Li Chen boarded a Flying Boat bound for the edge of the Central Sea.
• Li Chen secretly contacted Heavenly Pivot and told him to begin the attack on the Star Gate at Whirlpool City.
• Hu Xi reported that the Flying Boat's slave workers had caused trouble and that overseers had suppressed them, prompting Li Chen to ask about the workers.

Li Chen questioned the steward about the Slave Workers aboard the Flying Boat and learned they were forced to forge Flying Sword blanks. He visited their workshop and judged that Master Qi’s modifications to the Power Furnace were risky and wasteful.

• Li Chen asked the steward why the Slave Workers had caused trouble, and learned that an overseer had beaten one to death after he claimed to be ill.
• The steward explained that the Great Sage Palace controlled over a hundred Slave Workers, who performed crafts including forging Flying Sword blanks amid growing tensions with the Puppet Dao.
• The Slave Workers returned to confinement, where Old Han grieved for his son while fearing for his wife and daughter, who were also held as workers.
• The Slave Workers resumed their labor the next day, and two guards were confined over the previous day's incident.
• Li Chen toured the sword-forging workshop and noticed that Master Qi had redirected excess energy from the Flying Boat’s Power Furnace into its iron-smelting furnace.
• Li Chen suspected the modification was unsafe, increased energy consumption, and might not be justified by the workers’ output.

Li Chen observed the harsh conditions aboard the Flying Boat and noticed that a slave worker named Old Han was consumed by despair. Old Han killed himself in the Spirit Essence Furnace, leaving refined gold lodged inside and forcing the crew to consider shutting down the boat for repairs.

• Li Chen inspected the overheated foundry and noticed that Old Han's mind was shrouded in despair.
• Old Han overturned a tank, struck a guard with a Sword Blank, and jumped into the Spirit Essence Furnace, where he burned to ashes.
• The helmsman and steward returned and discovered that refined gold had melted into the Furnace.
• An artifact Dao expert warned that removing the gold required shutting down and thoroughly inspecting the Furnace.
• Li Chen watched the crew confront the costly danger caused by the Furnace's unsafe modification.

Li Chen rescued Old Han’s wife and daughter from the helmsman’s planned execution in Great Fortune City and brought them to his inn. After learning how Old Han’s family had been enslaved, Li Chen recognized the Outer Dao’s extensive development of the Artifact Dao.

• The helmsman continued the voyage to Great Fortune City, where he ordered Old Han’s wife and daughter and the slaves who had shared his confinement punished.
• Li Chen used his powers to cloud the crowd’s perceptions and alter their memories, then took Old Han’s wife and daughter away.
• At the inn, Li Chen ordered Hu Xi to treat the women’s injuries and summon them to speak with him.
• Old Han’s daughter explained that her father had been captured during the Vast Sea War and that his family had been born into hereditary servitude.
• Li Chen realized that the Outer Dao had developed its Artifact Dao and related crafts extensively.

Li Chen renamed Second Girl Han Li and accepted her as an apprentice, then assessed her aptitude and began teaching her the Puppet Dao. He implanted an Auxiliary Brain Chip and gave her access to cultivation knowledge, leaving her to forge her own path.

• Li Chen named Second Girl Han Li and offered to teach her the Puppet Dao if she advanced from apprentice to craftsman within three years.
• Li Chen taught Han Li, her mother, and Hu Xi about the Puppet Dao and assessed their aptitudes through a Mind-Questioning Illusion.
• Li Chen discovered that Han Li was naturally suited to the Puppet Dao and was especially interested in his Brain Deconstruction Technique.
• Li Chen implanted a three-star Auxiliary Brain Chip in Han Li and uploaded general cultivation methods and texts into her mind.
• Li Chen left Han Li to decide how far she would advance, warning himself that she would need to develop her own path.

Han Li practiced swordsmanship and listened as Li Chen urged her to understand her true heart rather than seek strength alone. Hu Xi then brought Qi Feng to Li Chen, but the Demon God Palace envoy refused to let him pass because his mission remained unfinished.

• Han Li mastered the Twenty Forms of Mortal Swordsmanship and told Li Chen she had chosen the Sword Dao because she wanted freedom and the strength to protect herself and her mother.
• Li Chen praised Han Li’s comprehension and advised her to hold fast to her true heart, warning that cultivation and strength alone could not free her from fate.
• Hu Xi reported that she had found Hall Master Qi, and Li Chen went to meet him in the front courtyard.
• Qi Feng, a Green-Maned Lion Monster serving under the Flaming-Mane Emperor Venerable, questioned whether Li Chen had advanced and barred him from passing because his mission was unfinished.

Li Chen forced Qi Feng to take him and his companions back to the Righteous Qi Continent, using a Demon God Palace route through the Chaos Void to evade his pursuers. After a smooth journey, the Flying Boat emerged above a Gobi desert, and Li Chen confirmed they had arrived.

• Qi Feng refused to guide Li Chen back, but Li Chen subdued him with his fox-tail Dharma Form and made him agree to handle the journey.
• Li Chen told Hu Xi and the others to leave, then ordered Qi Feng to lead them along the route he controlled.
• Aboard the Golden Roc Great Sage’s Flying Boat, Li Chen chose the western passage through the Chaos Void to avoid the heavily guarded eastern border and shake off his pursuers.
• After less than half a month, the Flying Boat emerged above a desolate Gobi desert, and Li Chen recognized the Righteous Qi Continent.

Li Chen reached the Righteous Qi Continent and settled in Wushan City, where he began preparing a base under Hu Ze’s identity. He planned to seek the Demon Empress’s support while watching for a chance to investigate Fang Yuan and avenge his home.

• Li Chen arrived on the Righteous Qi Continent and dismissed Qi Feng’s threat as the man departed by Flying Boat.
• Li Chen sent Hu Xi to ask the Demon Empress to release him from his Demon God Palace assignments, then told her to meet him in Pingqiu Kingdom.
• Li Chen and Han Li traveled to Wushan City, where Li Chen learned more about the tangled ties between Great Qian and the Demon Race.
• Li Chen purchased spirit materials, returned to Hu Ze’s woodland villa, and made bird-shaped puppets to establish defenses.
• Li Chen decided to use his Demon King identity to seek the Demon Empress’s trust and resources, and to look for a chance to find Fang Yuan.

Three months later, Li Chen explored his Mutated Dharma Body and discovered an innate ability to bridge illusion and reality, while resolving to avoid the Sea Emperor’s fate. Back at the mansion, he assessed Han Li’s swordsmanship and prepared to teach her his Long Song Poetry Sword Formula.

• Li Chen used Primordial Spirit Projection to connect with his Mutated Dharma Body and managed the flood of information with Wisdom Cores.
• Li Chen realized his ability involved a law connecting illusion and reality, and that cultivating it risked losing control like the Sea Emperor.
• Li Chen reflected on how the Sea Emperor’s mind had been assimilated by the Chaos Void and resolved to cultivate cautiously.
• Li Chen returned to the mansion and found Han Li had mastered the Twenty Forms of Mortal Swordsmanship and reached the beginnings of Sword Radiance.
• Li Chen told Han Li to forget her old moves and announced that he would teach her his Long Song Poetry Sword Formula.

Li Chen explained to Han Li how sword methods developed from mechanical principles and mortal combat into the cultivation world's Sword-Controlling Art. He left her with a framework for understanding sword techniques as ways to use magic power efficiently against different opponents.

• Li Chen said sword methods applied mechanical principles, combat experience, and the laws governing biological bodies, while techniques applied the Dao.
• Li Chen explained why the straight thrust and rotating-wheel chop were effective through geometry, pressure, circular motion, leverage, and energy conversion.
• Li Chen showed Han Li Ye'e Di Luosha's six-armed Naga techniques and warned that Han Li would be defeated quickly in a technique-only contest.
• Li Chen demonstrated how a Mechanism Automaton's unnatural structure let it attack from unexpected angles beyond the limits of human movement.
• Li Chen explained that the Sword-Controlling Art used qi and intent to transcend mortal limitations, and that its techniques were strategies for applying magic power.

Li Chen taught Han Li poetry and created the Long Song Poetry Sword Formula, combining literary dao with techniques from the Qi and Intent Sects. He demonstrated its four signature moves and entrusted Han Li with the tailored Song of the Sword Dance, leaving her to develop her own path and potentially spread his dao lineage.

• Li Chen explained how sword techniques could be analyzed as strategies for applying energy, then described how the Chess Sword Art, Three Talents Sword Art, Man and Sword as One, and Ten Thousand Swords Return to the Origin used different principles.
• Li Chen created the Long Song Poetry Sword Formula by making literary dao its foundation and drawing on the Qi and Intent Sects' renowned sword moves, then had Han Li study poetry.
• Several days later, Li Chen demonstrated four moves: Yi Shoots Down Nine Suns, The Emperor's Chariot Soars with the Dragon, Thunder's Wrath, and Clear Radiance of Rivers and Seas.
• Li Chen gave Han Li the Song of the Sword Dance, encouraged her to carry forward his dao lineage, and said others could create related methods from celebrated works.
• Li Chen planned to circulate lesser works from the Three Hundred Tang Poems while reserving its classics for those destined to receive them, and intended to have Puppet Masters monitor how the formula spread.

Han Li cultivated literary qi while Li Chen created and spread the Long Song Poetry Sword Formula under the name Azure Lotus Sword Immortal. At Wushan City’s Market Fair, Second Young Master Mu learned the formula’s name and origin after intervening in a dispute over its sale.

• Han Li cultivated literary qi as Li Chen developed poetry-based sword techniques and named himself the Azure Lotus Sword Immortal.
• Li Chen spread the Long Song Poetry Sword Formula and profited by selling it in nearby cities.
• At Wushan City’s Market Fair, Second Young Master Mu heard a commotion and went downstairs to investigate a fight over a secret sword manual.
• Second Young Master Mu ordered his attendants to beat two frontier men who were trying to take the manual from a scholar, and Constable Wang’s runners arrested them.
• Second Young Master Mu befriended the scholar and persuaded him to share a copy of the Long Song Poetry Sword Formula, which the scholar said came from the Azure Lotus Sword Immortal.

Second Young Master Mu discovered that the Long Song Poetry Sword Formula was extraordinary, but learned that copies were already circulating widely. As the formula and its poems spread across Great Qian, Li Chen received a chance to secure his place in the Demon God Palace by passing a test for the Heavenly Fox Demon Empress.

• Second Young Master Mu questioned a young scholar about the sword formula, copied it, and hurried back to report it to a Mu clan elder.
• The clan elder revealed that the Mu Household already knew of the formula and ordered people to investigate its origins and verify that it was safe.
• The clan elder noticed that Second Young Master Mu's copy contained different Tang poems and began comparing the versions.
• Aristocratic clans and powerful families recognized the formula's value as copies and distinct collections of poems spread through Wushan City and beyond.
• The Great Qian authorities flooded the market with counterfeits to curb the formula's spread, making the sword formula and Three Hundred Tang Poems famous.
• Li Chen received the Heavenly Fox Demon Empress's invitation and set out to meet her, hoping to pass a test and gain a foothold in the Demon God Palace.

Li Chen arrived at Zhang Mountain to meet Fairy Zhang Hua and sought to gain her trust while concealing that he was a Puppet Dao Master. He was brought to her bedchamber and found himself affected by the overwhelming allure of her aura.

• Li Chen traveled to Zhang Mountain, hoping to replace Hu Ze and gain a foothold among the demons.
• A giant white dog sent by Fairy Zhang Hua received Li Chen and carried him to the palace.
• The white dog transformed into a woman and led Li Chen through the quiet palace to Zhang Hua's bedchamber.
• Li Chen met Fairy Zhang Hua and sensed that her extraordinary allure was a power of law.

Li Chen, posing as Hu Ze, met Fairy Zhang Hua, who welcomed him as kin and flirted with him. He invoked the Analects and propriety to deflect her advances, and she accepted his explanation before asking about his experiences in the Central Sea.

• Li Chen paid his respects to Fairy Zhang Hua, who claimed Hu Ze as her nephew and recounted his mother’s past.
• Fairy Zhang Hua asked Hu Ze to rub her shoulders, but Li Chen refused by appealing to propriety and the Analects.
• Fairy Zhang Hua asked whether Hu Ze had found the Analects on the Other Continent and connected its teachings to his cultivation and transformation.
• Fairy Zhang Hua asked Hu Ze to describe his experiences in the Central Sea, and Li Chen began telling his prepared account.

Li Chen persuaded Fairy Zhang Hua that Hu Ze had acquired powerful human cultivation texts overseas, then used them to earn her trust. Fairy Zhang Hua gave Hu Ze the Fox Demon Clan’s true transmission of the Heavenly Fox Heart Sutra, and Li Chen left her chamber certain that cultivating this identity could bring great rewards.

• Li Chen explained how Hu Ze found the Analects, a poetry collection, and a sword formula while evading the Immortal Alliance, and offered all three to Fairy Zhang Hua.
• Fairy Zhang Hua recognized the Analects as a sacred Confucian scripture that could strengthen the Fox Demon Clan’s divine souls and praised Hu Ze for seeking a difficult path of cultivation.
• Fairy Zhang Hua warned that Confucian cultivation could conflict with demon nature and personally taught Hu Ze the Heavenly Fox Heart Sutra to balance it.
• Li Chen left Fairy Zhang Hua’s bedchamber convinced he had earned her trust through receiving the Heart Sutra’s true transmission.
• Hu Xi rushed out to embrace Li Chen and told him she had missed him.

Li Chen named four young fox demons on Zhang Mountain, then returned to Pingqiu and began gathering demons and resources to establish and renovate his base. Hu Xi announced his advancement to Demon King and his kinship with the Demon Empress, and ordered the Duke of Pingqiu's Residence to provide craftsmen and materials.

• Li Chen met four shy fox demons on Zhang Mountain, and Hu Xi helped him learn that they had no names.
• Li Chen named the foxes Hu Ying, Hu Bi, Hu Xue, and Hu Shuang before leaving with Hu Xi.
• Li Chen returned to his Pingqiu territory and summoned nearby demons to bring tribute for renovations and the creation of a base.
• A group of wild demons arrived to pay their respects, and Hu Xi announced that Li Chen had become a Demon King and acknowledged the Demon Empress as his aunt.
• Hu Xi ordered a messenger to demand craftsmen and materials from the Duke of Pingqiu's Residence for the palace renovation.

Yan Zheng reluctantly agreed to Hu Ze’s demand to build a mountain palace, hoping Grand Confucian Yang Zhi would soon intervene. Meanwhile, Li Chen completed a communication array and contacted Mei Xuan, who mistook Hu Ze for the caller.

• Yan Zheng gathered the nearby nobles after Hu Ze demanded laborers and craftsmen to renovate his palace.
• Yan Zheng agreed to meet Hu Ze’s demand for now and planned to ask Grand Confucian Yang Zhi to intervene when he visited.
• Yan Zheng returned to the rear courtyard and sought comfort from his new concubine, Mei'er.
• Li Chen built and activated a communication magic array using the Void Waymarkers he had established.
• Mei Xuan appeared in the array and asked Hu Ze how he had obtained their secret communication key, and Li Chen revealed himself through Primordial Spirit Projection.

Li Chen told Mei Xuan and Great Elder Shen that he had established himself in Righteous Qi Continent as the King of Pingqiu and had fooled Demon Empress Zhang Hua. Shen Longcheng warned him that Zhang Hua’s heart-bewitching power had made every spy sent to her defect, leaving Li Chen to face a dangerous threat.

• Li Chen told Mei Xuan that he was using a demon identity to hide in plain sight and had secured a foothold in Righteous Qi Continent.
• Li Chen connected to the Puppet World Heavenly Net and contacted Great Elder Shen through his private communication array.
• Li Chen revealed that he had acknowledged Demon Empress Zhang Hua as his aunt and become the King of Pingqiu.
• Shen Longcheng warned that Zhang Hua’s law-level bewitching power had caused every spy who met her to fall in love and defect.
• Li Chen reasoned that Zhang Hua could sway even powerful figures and joked that the imperial palace might have emerald glazed roof tiles.