Chapter Summaries

Li Chen began building Materialized Heaven, using his Creation Law to construct a resource-rich city for common folk and prepare for a vast population. He left its systems ready for Heavenly Pivot and trusted leaders to organize, educate, and support its future inhabitants.

• Li Chen told Mei Xuan that cultivation mortalization could let him attain the Great Dao without creating spiritual essence.
• After a month of preparation, Li Chen received Heavenly Pivot's creation list and went to the first realm, Materialized Heaven.
• Li Chen planned to bring in an initial million people and eventually expand the population to tens of billions or more.
• Li Chen created millions of Worker Bee Puppets, and Heavenly Pivot assigned them tasks across the realm.
• Over seven days and nights, Li Chen built a large city with energy plants, public facilities, resource sites, and stocked warehouses.
• Li Chen prepared Creation Mother Devices and technical documentation, leaving Heavenly Pivot and Bu Qingyun's group to manage the people and develop the city.

Li Chen oversaw the relocation of millions of people to his ideal society and explained to Bu Qingyun why he centralized power and used artificial intelligence to manage it. He then asked Bu Qingyun and the Array Dao experts to help build a Sacred Spirit Grand Formation across the territory.

• Li Chen told Heavenly Pivot to record the new society’s development, then began moving the slave workers and artisans into it.
• Light Feather Flying Boats transported the population while virtual personalities guided them through their new daily lives.
• Li Chen summoned Bu Qingyun and the Array Dao experts to the Azure Billow Immortal Abode, where Bu Qingyun saw how Heavenly Pivot gathered information through their Auxiliary Brains.
• Li Chen argued to Bu Qingyun that power was necessary to organize society and said he planned to replace bureaucratic management with artificial intelligence.
• Li Chen asked Bu Qingyun and the Array Dao experts to design and build a Sacred Spirit Grand Formation covering the territory.

Li Chen showed Bu Qingyun that Deer Terrace and the Azure Billow Immortal Abode could supply the resources needed to build a sacred spirit grand formation for the Bone Kun Warship. Bu Qingyun agreed to lead the project, and Heavenly Pivot began assigning permissions as Li Chen put the construction underway.

• Li Chen explained his rune script dao and array dao plans to Bu Qingyun, who warned that the formation needed a ritual altar and a source of fortune and immortal energy.
• Li Chen projected an image of Deer Terrace, the four sacred spirits, and the Bone Kun Warship, revealing that he had brought the wonder-class Ritual Altar with him.
• Li Chen proposed using Deer Terrace and the Azure Billow Immortal Abode to create a formation that would protect the Bone Kun Warship and give it an artifact spirit.
• Bu Qingyun agreed to design a Deification Sacrifice Ritual and lead the sacred spirit grand formation project.
• Li Chen appointed Bu Qingyun chief engineer, and Heavenly Pivot established a project channel and issued permissions to the team.

Bu Qingyun and his disciples doubted whether life in Materialized Heaven was truly different from their former circumstances, while Li Chen listened to their conversation and reflected on his plans for Great Unity. Li Chen launched construction of the Sacred Spirit Grand Formation, where advanced machinery and surveying tools impressed the builders and exposed Materials Science as Heavenly Pivot’s main limitation.

• Bu Qingyun’s disciples complained that their new work under Li Chen felt much like their old lives, and Bu Qingyun warned them to watch what they said.
• Li Chen overheard the group through the Heavenly Network and told Mei Xuan that he hoped people would eventually choose to share his vision of Great Unity.
• Mei Xuan questioned whether people might never agree with Li Chen, who replied, “Heaven and Earth are without benevolence; they treat all things as straw dogs.”
• Li Chen ordered construction of the Sacred Spirit Grand Formation, a major project whose initial framework would cost about half as much as Deer Terrace.
• Bu Qingyun’s team used Intelligent Machinery, Void Satellites, and Spirit Wave remote sensing to move materials and survey the construction sites with great precision.
• Heavenly Pivot’s infrastructure was limited chiefly by Materials Science, while Bu Qingyun and his disciples marveled at the construction capabilities they witnessed.

Bu Qingyun and his disciples watched Heavenly Pivot’s Iron Centipedes rapidly excavate and connect the Spirit Canal tunnels, while its engineering intelligence learned to build complex spiritual arrays. Alarmed that intelligent puppets were mastering the Array Dao and could displace ordinary craftsmen, Bu Qingyun ordered his group to stop supplying the machines with data and rely on their own skills.

• Bu Qingyun’s disciples doubted that Iron Centipedes could excavate multiple routes at once without errors, but he admitted he had never seen such machines before.
• Heavenly Pivot showed that the Iron Centipedes and their auxiliary machines could quickly excavate, line, and stabilize tunnels, then connect separate passages precisely.
• Over several days, Bu Qingyun’s group worked on the Spirit Canal’s spiritual guide rails and arrays while Heavenly Pivot’s engineering intelligence learned from their techniques.
• At the end of the year, Bu Qingyun and his disciples saw Flying Discs lay out spiritual arrays and install materials, revealing that the intelligent puppets had learned much of their work.
• Luo Jin praised the potential of artificial intelligence, but Bu Qingyun warned that it threatened the craftsmen’s livelihoods and ordered his group to stop entering data into the terminals.

Li Chen discussed why he was letting Bu Qingyun resist the spread of intelligent machinery while shifting Heavenly Dragon Peak toward autonomous rule and preparing to break from traditional resource models. Meanwhile, Luo Jin grew troubled by his master’s obstruction of artificial intelligence and resolved to investigate Li Zun’s plans through the puppet dao.

• Li Chen told Mei Xuan he would leave Bu Qingyun alone because he posed no threat to the broader shift toward intelligent machinery.
• Li Chen explained that Guangyun Domain did not belong to him alone, though it would pay tribute for decades or longer to support his undertaking.
• On the Giant Kun Body, Luo Jin worried that Bu Qingyun’s restrictions were slowing the artificial intelligence’s training.
• Luo Jin and a fellow disciple ate a meal prepared by puppet servants and admitted that they both thought the resistance was pointless.
• Luo Jin resolved to study the puppet dao to learn what Li Zun intended to do.

Luo Jin studied the Puppet Dao to understand the world around him, impressed by its open education and virtual-reality training. He used a virtual model of his own body to help his friends practice dissection and prepared to attempt a neural-splicing technique to upgrade a Mind Core Chip.

• Luo Jin told the disciple in blue robes that understanding the causes and direction of events could help them judge Li Zun's intentions, then began studying the Puppet Dao.
• Luo Jin discovered that Puppet Masters openly shared knowledge and that virtual reality made practical training far cheaper and easier.
• Luo Jin used his wages to buy a virtual-reality device while outsiders became engrossed in the Virtual World.
• Luo Jin summoned friends to a virtual Dustless Clean Room, where they practiced the Body Deconstruction Great Art on a realistic model of his body.
• Luo Jin announced that he would try the Intracranial Neural Splicing Technique to alter a Mind Core Chip's hardware settings and improve its intelligence.

Luo Jin pursued mechanical foundation establishment by studying his virtual brain and unlocking the auxiliary chip implanted in him. After connecting its hidden interface through surgery, he absorbed a vast store of knowledge and replaced the chip’s restricted system, leaving him feeling reborn.

• Luo Jin argued that mechanical foundation establishment offered a way past the disciples’ limits, while the others worried that modifying their brains was too dangerous.
• Luo Jin compared the Puppeteer Dao Path’s life-science approach with the Martial Dao’s focus on cultivating the body’s innate potential.
• Luo Jin used the Heavenly Network’s digital model to study his neural pathways and clarify the Draw Silk, Rejoin Meridians method.
• Luo Jin explored the restrictions on his implanted Intelligent Chip and prepared to connect its hidden brain-computer interface.
• Luo Jin performed a Craniotomy on himself and linked his nerves to the auxiliary brain interface.
• Luo Jin’s brain absorbed spirit-particle memory memes, loaded knowledge equal to a century-old Master Artisan’s, and installed a customized system.

Luo Jin successfully modified his auxiliary brain, gaining a Foundation Establishment-level store of knowledge and greatly enhanced computational ability, though he still needed to understand advanced material. After he offered to modify his companions, Li Chen intervened and seized him.

• Luo Jin awoke after the modification and told his companions that the Spirit-Particle Memory Meme had loaded knowledge into his brain domain.
• Luo Jin explained that he could recall extensive Foundation Establishment Master Artisan knowledge but still struggled to understand advanced material, while Apprentice- and Craftsman-level subjects came to him readily.
• Luo Jin demonstrated his increased computational capacity by simulating a vast starfield with his magic power.
• Luo Jin offered to perform the same modification on his companions, and one disciple volunteered to go first.
• Li Chen, who had been monitoring Luo Jin, called him reckless and used an invisible force to seize him and bring him over.

Li Chen warned Luo Jin that mastering the Auxiliary Brain’s operating mode and modifying his own brain did not make him a Master Artisan, then offered him a path into Life Domain research. Luo Jin agreed to try, while Li Chen declared that traditional master-disciple relationships would no longer apply.

• Luo Jin arrived before Li Chen and learned that Li Chen knew he had modified himself with the Spirit-Particle Memory Meme.
• Li Chen explained that Luo Jin’s risky self-surgery and limited knowledge did not qualify him to operate on others or make him a Master Artisan.
• Li Chen told Luo Jin that he could become proficient in the Brain Deconstruction Technique but would otherwise remain a skilled Craftsman.
• Li Chen recognized Luo Jin’s talent in the Mysteries of Life and offered to train him as a Life Domain researcher.
• Luo Jin agreed to study the Life Domain, then asked whether his master would approve.
• Li Chen said the master-disciple relationship would no longer exist and that Luo Jin would instead be a Puppet Master of materialized heaven.

Li Chen explained to Mei Xuan that he planned to transform the Great Qian people in his Materialized Kingdom Grotto-Heaven into Puppet Masters, using implanted chips to prepare their minds. After confronting the Grandmaster Artisans about the changes to their followers and families, he began transforming Bu Qingyun, who immediately gained Master Artisan expertise.

• Li Chen told Mei Xuan that the implanted chips contained Puppet Dao knowledge and had been modifying people’s brains in preparation for their transformation into Puppet Masters.
• Li Chen summoned Bu Qingyun, Tie Jin, An Feng, and Mei Yicheng and asked what future they envisioned for themselves and their followers.
• Bu Qingyun accused Li Chen of breaking master-disciple and family bonds, while Li Chen argued that their followers had become independent and revealed he knew they had secretly exchanged knowledge.
• Li Chen lifted Bu Qingyun into the air, unlocked and modified his chip, and converted part of his Brain Domain into spirit particles.
• Bu Qingyun absorbed the incoming information and attained Master Artisan expertise on the spot.

Li Chen used spirit-particle memory transfer to turn Bu Qingyun, Tie Jin, An Feng, Mei Yicheng, and the others into puppet master artisans and explained the Puppet Dao’s knowledge-sharing methods. Bu Qingyun accepted the truth of Li Chen’s approach and agreed to contribute his array Dao knowledge to the Rune Script Dao.

• Li Chen removed the limits on Bu Qingyun’s Auxiliary Brain Chip and transferred master artisan knowledge, overwhelming Bu Qingyun with unfamiliar information.
• Li Chen immobilized Tie Jin and the others, then upgraded their Auxiliary Brain Systems and transmitted knowledge that made them foundation establishment master artisans.
• Li Chen explained that they had become generalist puppet master artisans and would need further effort to specialize, while describing the Puppet Dao’s plans for broader integration.
• An Feng and Mei Yicheng volunteered to join Li Chen’s undertaking, and Tie Jin recognized the advantages of combining the Puppet Dao with his Artifact Dao.
• Bu Qingyun understood how knowledge-sharing differed from transferring cultivation power and admitted that Mind Cores had already compiled much of the array Dao’s knowledge into engineering methods.
• Bu Qingyun declared that he was convinced and offered his array Dao knowledge to help develop the Rune Script Dao.

Bu Qingyun and the other artisans embraced Materialized Heaven’s merit system and began new work, while Han Li continued training with sword puppets and questioned whether traditional practice was worthwhile. She was left reconsidering Li Chen’s view that arduous cultivation could be an inefficient path to improvement.

• Li Chen explained that merit could be earned through contributions such as sharing techniques, developing methods, and helping others integrate knowledge, and Bu Qingyun and the others left to pursue new lives in Materialized Heaven.
• Bu Qingyun used his merit to obtain a high-performance Mind Core and research new methods, while Tie Jin, An Feng, Mei Yicheng, and the other artisans advanced the construction of the Sacred Spirit Grand Formation.
• Han Li sparred with modified sword puppets using only peak Qi refining-level physical ability, but triggered her Gang Edge when one nearly struck her and destroyed its head.
• Little She-Leopard offered Han Li chilled coconut milk and suggested that body modification might be more useful than practice.
• Han Li recalled Li Chen’s argument that arduous training could be wasted effort and began questioning her faith in traditional cultivation methods.

Li Chen activated the sacred spirit grand formation, beginning the fusion of the four sacred spirits into the Bone Kun Warship’s artificial primordial spirit, Kunpeng. He explained to Mei Xuan that giving Kunpeng a portion of his Life Origin was the creation method Breathe Life into Being, a dangerous technique that could exhaust its user’s life.

• Heavenly Pivot reported that the sacred spirit grand formation was complete, and Li Chen ordered it activated.
• The formation manifested the Azure Dragon, White Tiger, Vermilion Bird, and Black Tortoise, then drew their origins toward the Bone Kun Warship.
• The four sacred spirits began fusing into the vessel, and Heavenly Pivot reported the conversion progress as a giant kun’s silhouette emerged.
• Mei Xuan recognized the new artifact spirit, and Li Chen named it Kunpeng and described his plan to share his Dao fruit origin with it.
• Li Chen explained to Mei Xuan that the tenth method of the Creation-Promotion Secret Art, Breathe Life into Being, infused a puppet with Life Origin and could cost its user their life.

Li Chen used Breathe Life into Being to give the Bone Kun Warship a living spirit, despite the severe toll the art took on his life origin. The newborn Kunpeng fused with the warship and its grotto-heavens, leaving Li Chen weakened but with new insights into the creation and transfer of life.

• Mei Xuan warned Li Chen that Breathe Life into Being could damage its user, and he concealed the true cost while explaining how life could be replenished.
• Li Chen reflected on the art’s dangers, including the Puppet Dao’s history of sacrificing and transforming living beings for power.
• After Mei Xuan left, Li Chen turned to the Giant Kun spirit and designated it as the Bone Kun Warship’s artifact spirit, guardian, and formation spirit.
• Li Chen used Breathe Life into Being and sacrificed half of his Life Origin to awaken the spirit, gaining insight into how life was created and transferred.
• The spirit, named Kunpeng, expanded to encompass the nine grotto-heavens and Azure Billow Immortal Abode, fusing with the warship as Li Chen collapsed into his chair, weakened but enlightened.

Li Chen completed Kunpeng’s rebirth as a Sacred Spirit and linked his consciousness to it through Heavenly Pivot. Kunpeng became a regenerating War Fortress, and its capabilities secured its nine-star grade.

• Kunpeng awakened with a new consciousness that reached toward Li Chen with instinctive affection.
• Li Chen ordered Heavenly Pivot to merge a virtual personality into Kunpeng, allowing Heavenly Pivot to control its immense soul.
• Li Chen connected himself, Heavenly Pivot, and Kunpeng through control mode, gaining perception across the warship and access to its vast computing power.
• Li Chen used Kunpeng’s Dao Fruit origin to transform its outer layers into hundreds or thousands of li of regenerating alloy flesh and blood.
• Kunpeng’s Sacred Spirit power, formidable defenses, and internal Puppet Legion established it as a nine-star floating War Fortress.

Li Chen described Kunpeng’s immense armor and his ambition to turn it into a Neutron Warship, while acknowledging that controlling neutron matter well enough for mass production remained beyond him. After testing Kunpeng’s defenses, he began equipping the warship with thermonuclear weapons to protect his kingdom and its people.

• Mei Xuan learned that Kunpeng had armor over a hundred li thick, and Li Chen explained how its Solar Furnaces and mundane alloy supported its fortress role.
• Li Chen described a Neutron Warship as the ultimate goal but said that producing neutron weapons in quantity required control he had not yet mastered.
• Li Chen resolved to pursue other ways of combining mundane and spiritual materials so he and his subordinates could defend their kingdom.
• Li Chen tested Kunpeng and confirmed that its defenses, including its void boundary wall, met the standard of a nine-star fortress.
• Li Chen returned inside Kunpeng to build its weapon systems, starting with a plan to stock a spatial warehouse with thermonuclear weapons.

Li Chen designed thermonuclear weapons and considered how to make them effective against cultivators who could evade ordinary explosions with spatial techniques. He left his original body to Heavenly Pivot for production, then began manufacturing strategic missiles in Kunpeng’s Innate Minor Grotto-Heaven.

• Li Chen refined tactical hydrogen bombs, missiles, and strategic nuclear bombs, then assessed their limits against mobile cultivators and spatial defenses.
• Li Chen concluded that sustained barrages of cluster missiles could destroy fortified sites, while his control of creation law could not produce materials imbued with spiritual essence.
• Li Chen switched into his Seven-Star Mechanical Body and ordered Heavenly Pivot to use the Type-C Idle Command Code to carry out strategic-level production.
• Li Chen entered a partitioned section of Kunpeng’s Innate Minor Grotto-Heaven and began refining strategic missiles for Worker Bee Puppets to carry away.

Li Chen visited his research institute and guided Yu Bao’s team on studying the mysterious Book of Years through its observable inputs and outputs. He explained that he sought to realize his true self and make his ideals endure, while still needing longevity and shortcuts to complete his heavenly kingdom.

• Li Chen inspected the secluded research institute, where craftsmen and scientists analyzed materials and treasures taken from the Great Qian Dynasty.
• Yu Bao told Li Chen that the team had made little progress understanding the Book of Years.
• Li Chen advised Yu Bao to treat the Book of Years as a black box and study its outward behavior, explaining that its power might help him.
• Li Chen explained that mastering many laws one by one would not bring him to his ultimate goal of realizing his true self.
• Li Chen told Yu Bao that longevity was a means to pursue the Great Dao, and that he still needed ways to create spiritual essence to complete his heavenly kingdom.

Li Chen explained to Yu Bao that longevity followed two paths: replacing what decayed or sealing a system against change. He argued that the universe ultimately favored reproduction and adaptation over individual immortality, and that the Puppet Masters reflected Yan Shi’s choice of a path suited to the future.

• Yu Bao questioned Li Chen’s claim that self-realization mattered more than immortality, and Li Chen said immortality might be an ordinary state for beings with longer lives.
• Li Chen described two paths to longevity: replacing old parts with new ones, and sealing a self-contained world to preserve what remained.
• Li Chen connected these paths to cultivation and Puppet Master techniques, saying they shared the principle of changing or preserving matter and energy.
• Li Chen said the universe had abandoned individual longevity in favor of reproduction and civilization adapting to the myriad heavens.
• Li Chen realized Yan Shi had tried to create an immortal individual in Dancing Maiden, then chosen to create the Puppet Master race instead.
• Li Chen told Yu Bao that short-lived species adapted more quickly, while the Great Dao did not permit beings to wield the full authority of the universe.