Chapter Summaries

The Puppet Dao attacked Fu Changsheng and the Immortal Alliance Great Powers by dragging a star into their grotto-heaven, then following with devastating barrages and Battle Puppets. As the survivors tried to escape, Kong Haoyuan was killed, and Immortal Emperor Xuanling’s forces learned of the assault.

• The Puppet Masters displaced a newly born star into the grotto-heaven, killing several Great Powers and trapping the survivors in its flames.
• Pei Bairen, Kong Haoyuan, Fu Changsheng, and the others used their powers to survive, and Fu Changsheng warned them to disconnect from the network.
• Pei Bairen concluded the Puppet Dao had locked onto their waymarkers and said they needed to abandon the grotto-heaven.
• The Sky Cities unleashed a barrage that killed more Great Powers and tore Kong Haoyuan’s body and primordial spirit apart.
• Neutron Battle Puppets and other Battle Puppets arrived as the third wave of attacks.
• Immortal Emperor Xuanling and the Heavenly Court immortals on Immortal Ring Mountain learned of the assault and realized the Puppet Dao had made its move.

The Puppet Dao launched a major attack on the divided Immortal Alliance, and Li Chen used heavenly ghost power to trap Fu Changsheng and the others in a mindscape. He revealed that he had sealed the Peace Treaty’s karmic backlash before defeating Pei Bairen with a sudden projectile.

• Forty-nine Sky Cities deployed as the Puppet Dao exploited the Immortal Alliance’s split between Fu Changsheng’s faction and Xuanling.
• Immortal Emperor Xuanling rejected his possible responses and resolved to use his power of law to reverse space and time.
• Li Chen sent his divine sense and heavenly ghost power across the battlefield, enveloping Fu Changsheng and the others in a mindscape wasteland.
• Fu Changsheng accused Li Chen of tearing up the Peace Treaty, and Li Chen said he had sealed its karmic backlash inside the Immortal Coffins.
• Pei Bairen attacked Li Chen with countless sword strikes, but Li Chen dissolved them and declared that Pei Bairen’s Sword Dao was not the True Dao.
• An unknown projectile pierced Pei Bairen, and he collapsed after spitting blood.

Li Chen defeated the Immortal Alliance’s Primordial Spirit Realm experts in the Mindscape Wasteland, but their attacks weakened his heavenly ghost incarnation. He explained to Mei Xuan that the incarnation’s power was dangerous and that he could neither sever their connection nor safely control it.

• Pei Bairen warned the Immortal Alliance that Li Chen’s law domain was his true body and that only attacks at the level of laws or origins could harm him.
• The Immortal Alliance’s experts attacked Li Chen with law-level powers, but he countered with mind-only transformation and incapacitated them one by one.
• Li Chen announced the battle was over, and Shen Longcheng noticed that his primordial spirit seemed weakened.
• Mei Xuan saw the damage and lingering powers in the Mindscape Wasteland and asked whether Li Chen was all right.
• Li Chen told Mei Xuan that he had deliberately used the experts’ attacks to weaken his heavenly ghost incarnation, whose power he could not safely control or sever himself from.

Immortal Emperor Xuanling prepared to reverse space-time in the Upper Clear Blessed Land while ordering his loyal Immortal Kings to defend it. Across the southern Earthly Immortal Continent, the Puppet Masters crushed the Immortal Alliance’s forces, and their Grandmaster Artisans debated exterminating the followers of the outer Dao.

• Immortal Emperor Xuanling learned that the Puppet Masters had seized most lower-tier territories in the southern Earthly Immortal Continent and resolved to counter Dharma’s Decline by reviving spiritual energy.
• Immortal Emperor Xuanling ordered Immortal King Leiyu and the other old-era loyalists to defend the Upper Clear Blessed Land while he reversed space-time.
• Immortal Emperor Xuanling activated the Supreme Ultimate Plaza array, drawing the last traces of spiritual energy’s Dao essence into himself as space-time twisted around him.
• Puppet Masters overwhelmed the Immortal Alliance’s cultivators with war puppets, guns, and Sun Divine Thunder, forcing some to surrender and killing those who resisted.
• Puppet Masters watching through their communication network lamented the slaughter, while one Grandmaster Artisan proposed exterminating all followers of the outer Dao and banning traditional cultivation.

Li Chen rejected indiscriminate slaughter of the Outer Dao’s followers and set rules for the Puppet Dao’s campaign, balancing military necessity with the value of civilians and captured practitioners. After learning that Xuanling planned to summon more ancient immortals, Li Chen and his forces advanced on Immortal Ring Mountain for a looming battle.

• Shen Longcheng, Wu Fangdao, and Pan Ning opposed a proposal to slaughter all followers of the Outer Dao, and Li Chen ruled that the matter was settled.
• Li Chen ordered the Puppet Masters to target combatants while sparing civilians, recruiting or converting captives, and regulating weapons tests and toxic battlefield substances.
• Li Chen received intelligence that Xuanling still intended to summon ancient immortals from the River of Time.
• Li Chen explained that Xuanling’s power might preserve his influence across ages and summon ancient immortals through marks left on other powerful beings.
• Hundreds of warships descended on Immortal Ring Mountain as Li Chen’s Divine Descentors arrived, bringing the new cultivators to the brink of war with the ancient immortals’ forces.

Immortal Emperor Xuanling lured the Puppet Dao into attacking his stronghold at Immortal Ring Mountain, where its forces overwhelmed the defenders and filled the Upper Clarity Blessed Land with a star. Xuanling restored the grotto-heaven with temporal Dao abilities, but the displaced star reappeared above the mountain, and Li Chen compressed it into a pearl.

• Immortal Emperor Xuanling recalled his forces to Immortal Ring Mountain and tried to reverse time and space to break Li Chen’s calamity of Dharma’s Decline.
• Li Chen sent the Divine Descentors, including nine Neutron Battle Puppets, to attack Xuanling’s position.
• The Puppet Dao bombarded Immortal Ring Mountain with Battle Puppets, Sky Cities, and a captured star, eventually breaching the Upper Clarity Blessed Land.
• The Puppet Masters fired a positioning device into the grotto-heaven, filling it with the star’s heat and radiation.
• Immortal Emperor Xuanling restored the damaged grotto-heaven and expelled the star above Immortal Ring Mountain.
• Li Chen drew the star into his Mindscape Wasteland and compressed it into a pearl with reverse-refining creation Dao.

Li Chen entered the Upper Clarity Blessed Land and fought Immortal Emperor Xuanling, whose Radiant Wheel and temporal law revealed the power of the heavenly ghost. After Xuanling rolled time back, Li Chen recognized the change and spread his law domain to counter it.

• Li Chen contained a star in imaginary number space, stored it, and entered the Upper Clarity Blessed Land, which had been restored through time reversal.
• Immortal Emperor Xuanling attacked Li Chen with the Radiant Wheel, but Li Chen resisted its effects while Xiao Die and Xiao Ying blocked Xuanling's strikes.
• Immortal Emperor Xuanling sent a beam of source power into the void and struck Li Chen's heavenly ghost, but the contact left Xuanling severely weakened and near death.
• Immortal Emperor Xuanling suddenly vanished as time rolled back, returning Li Chen to an earlier state and erasing his memories of their exchange.
• Li Chen detected the rollback through his surveillance network and spread the heavenly ghost's law domain across the Upper Clarity Blessed Land to counter Xuanling's temporal law.

Li Chen killed Immortal Emperor Xuanling repeatedly, then used his mind-only magic power to interfere with Xuanling’s past-based law and uncover his network of anchored pasts. After probing how Xuanling’s incarnations and consciousness might work, Li Chen learned that Xuanling wanted only to survive, leaving their conflict unresolved.

• Li Chen killed Immortal Emperor Xuanling again, but returned to the moment of his previous entry into the Upper Clarity Blessed Land.
• Li Chen killed Xuanling a third time and infused his divine soul with mind-only magic power, disrupting the past-based ability.
• Li Chen found Xuanling hidden in an illusory Celestial Palace above an enormous altar, with multiple pasts anchored across spacetime.
• Li Chen confronted Xuanling and deduced that his incarnations might be independent or connected through chaos, while explaining that the Third-Generation Sea Emperor’s power had helped him understand the mysteries.
• Li Chen concluded that killing one incarnation would not solve the problem and considered hunting Xuanling across many spacetimes.
• Immortal Emperor Xuanling said he only wanted to stay alive and asked why Li Chen kept pursuing him.

Immortal Emperor Xuanling revealed the secret of the Immortal Coffins and the ten true immortals, then urged Li Chen to cooperate. Li Chen saw through Xuanling’s real plan to summon his true body across time and concluded that Dharma’s Decline threatened the future power Xuanling sought to master.

• Immortal Emperor Xuanling told Li Chen that ten immortals could attain true longevity through the Immortal Coffins and that they could be sealed but not destroyed.
• Immortal Emperor Xuanling offered to join forces with Li Chen and help him gain the power of all beings’ true spirits.
• Li Chen recognized that Xuanling’s true aim was to summon his body from the Immortal Kingdom Era and create a reincarnation cycle spanning time.
• Li Chen reasoned that Xuanling sought mastery over the future, but Dharma’s Decline would sever the future from the laws he had established in the past.
• Li Chen concluded that Dharma’s Decline arose from the mind’s power extending into the material world, and that Xuanling had tried to deceive him about his true objective.

Li Chen defeated Immortal Emperor Xuanling, established the Dharma-Ending Age, and prepared to send his heavenly ghost incarnation beyond the myriad heavens. He closed the last Immortal Coffin and began a plan that would make everyone forget the coffins and the heavenly ghost while leaving the future open to mortal exploration.

• Li Chen exposed Xuanling’s fear of dharma’s decline, killed his incarnations, and returned his true spirit to the Immortal Coffin.
• Li Chen subdued the remaining Immortal Coffins, ended the war on the Earthly Immortal Continent, and ordered preparations to replace transcendent power with mortal systems.
• Ten years later, Li Chen comprehended the Dao of dharma’s decline, causing cultivation systems across the myriad heavens to collapse into the Dharma-Ending Age.
• Many years later, Li Chen explained to Mei Xuan, Han Li, Yu Bao, Luo Jin, and the others that he planned to move his heavenly ghost incarnation beyond the myriad heavens and make them forget it and the Immortal Coffins.
• Li Chen closed the tenth Immortal Coffin, promised to remain with his companions and explore the Great Dao of Puppet Masters, and began the final plan.