Chapter Summaries

After the Abyssal Will’s attack, Cheng Yu told the continent’s leaders that he could preserve their souls but not their bodies, and proposed the mechanical ascension plan to save everyone from the world’s destruction. The plan captured the sleeping population in a virtual world, while the Keynes Continent became a metal planet and Cheng Yu prepared to leave for the next world.

• Cheng Yu informed the leaders of the Abyssal Will’s threat and offered to preserve their souls in a virtual world; Help, the Beast Emperor, Mary, the Elf Queen, and others agreed to let their people choose.
• Cheng Yu announced the plan across the continent and named it the mechanical ascension plan, which would use the Planetary Computer to capture souls and the Hyper-Mechanization Device to turn the world into a metal fortress.
• Cheng Yu learned that building the Planetary Computer had nearly exhausted their steel reserves, so he approved dismantling much of the army to construct the nine Hyper-Mechanization Devices.
• Cheng Yu explored the continent for two months and heard a young mother express gratitude for the chance to watch her child grow in the promised Divine Kingdom.
• As the climate deteriorated, Cheng Yu announced that everyone should sleep; the Planetary Computer released its Quantum Soul-Capture Wave, leaving nearly all life dead while the world’s seabed was revealed to be metal.

Help, the Elf Queen, and the Beast Emperor chose to remain on the Keynes Continent and confront the Abyssal Will as Cheng Yu activated the Planetary Fortress and evacuated the world. After earning the World-Destroying Savior title, Cheng Yu learned that his next destination was already nearby in another world.

• Help tricked Karen VI into unconsciousness, took the throne as Karen VII, and died after Yog moved him into the virtual realm.
• Cheng Yu named the Planetary Fortress Keynes and activated it, lifting the continent into a massive fortress structure.
• Yog transported Keynes, Titan, and the virtual residents away, while Help, the Elf Queen, and the Beast Emperor charged at the Abyssal Will.
• Cheng Yu received the Unconventional Savior achievement and the World-Destroying Savior title, then exchanged his achievements for currency.
• Yog told Cheng Yu that their next world was already nearby, and Cheng Yu went to sleep before their departure.

Cheng Yu learned about the horror-ridden San Lorenzo World and its world-consciousness enemy before receiving the Infinite Technique from Yog. After testing the technique and inventing a meditation method to use it safely, he told Yog he was ready, and Yog sent him to the next world.

• The System explained San Lorenzo World's history, factions, Ghost-Tamers, and the Evil God formed from its world consciousness, which had split into thirteen avatars, including one Legendary avatar Yog agreed to destroy.
• Yog gave Cheng Yu the Infinite Technique after Cheng Yu admitted he could not afford it, and the System warned that using it consumed life force according to the strength of the effect and its logical loop.
• Cheng Yu nearly died after trying to increase his strength directly with the Infinite Technique, but his title helped him recover.
• Cheng Yu created a meditation method that gradually strengthened his body and soul, then told Yog he was ready.
• Yog snapped his fingers and sent Cheng Yu from outer space to another planet.

Cheng Yu began his new life as a university student and nominal husband to Lü Xiaoying, while learning that he had been given a wealthy wife in exchange for money. He strengthened himself through meditation and discovered that his fortune remained intact, then settled into an uneasy routine at home as Lü Xiaoying remained suspicious of his changed behavior.

• Cheng Yu learned from the system that he had been assigned an ordinary identity, a beautiful wealthy wife, and a life in which he would act alone.
• His classmates gossiped about him as a kept man, and he nearly summoned his Purger army before the system warned him against attracting the World Consciousness's attention.
• Cheng Yu meditated at home, where Lü Xiaoying returned from work and questioned his sudden change in behavior.
• The next morning, Cheng Yu reached Black Iron Four-Star and found that his 12,400,000 currency had not been spent on the Infinite Technique gifted by the Big Shot.
• Cheng Yu skipped class, cooked dinner for Lü Xiaoying, and continued meditating after she refused the meal.

At A Certain Bookshop, a girl enjoyed free reading while a drunk tried to steal books, and the owner’s strange magic replenished the shelves and altered their contents. Elsewhere, Wan Zhuo awakened five days before supernatural incidents intensified and planned to exploit his foreknowledge, while Cheng Yu used the Infinite Technique to test skills in a virtual space as he meditated.

• A girl visited A Certain Bookshop, read her favorite stories, and learned from the woman behind the counter that the gentleman upstairs owned the shop.
• A drunk saw a book filled with erotic images, stole several books, and left after the woman warned him that the books were not for loan or sale.
• The stolen books reappeared, and the middle-aged owner used a black-covered book to change the writing in books across the shop; a volume labeled “Necronomicon Fragment Manuscript” remained on a shelf.
• Wan Zhuo awoke in his dormitory in Year 70 of the New Calendar, remembered his past-life conflicts, and planned to claim a supernatural item before the Special Affairs Bureau found it.
• Cheng Yu used the Infinite Technique to create a virtual skill-testing space and practiced new moves while meditating.

Cheng Yu secured his adviser’s permission to miss some classes and learned why universities and Ghost-Tamers mattered in a world threatened by weird entities. He experimented with using food to strengthen himself, then left Lü Youying to discover he had emptied the fridge.

• Cheng Yu convinced his adviser to excuse occasional absences by implying his marriage was troubled, while promising to keep his grades up.
• The system explained that university students were prized recruits because they studied Weird Studies, and that most Ghost-Tamers used weird items or borrowed entities’ powers.
• Cheng Yu ignored his classes, relying on his simulated photographic memory for exams, and continued developing techniques as he prepared to reach Gold before confronting the Evil God's avatar.
• Cheng Yu devised a skill that converted food into strength, tested it on cooked and raw meat, and found raw meat offered no extra benefit.
• Lü Youying came home to find Cheng Yu devouring food, declined his invitation to join him, and discovered that he had eaten everything in the fridge.

Cheng Yu’s enormous appetite frustrated Lü Youying and a buffet owner while he struggled to reach Black Iron Five-Star. That night, Lü Youying was nearly kidnapped, but a young man named Wan Zhuo rescued her.

• Cheng Yu ate all the food at home, then devoured twenty extra-large pizzas while Lü Youying watched in disbelief.
• Lü Youying left Cheng Yu money before work, and he spent the afternoon eating an entire buffet before apologizing to the owner with a gold bar.
• Cheng Yu returned home and meditated while thinking about breaking through to Black Iron Five-Star and preparing for supernatural incidents.
• Lü Youying discovered her company’s security guard plotting with a thug to kidnap her, but the thug was knocked down by a thrown rock before they could hurt her.
• At the police station, Lü Youying thanked her rescuer, who introduced himself as Wan Zhuo.

Cheng Yu advanced his strength, developed the Specter-Devouring Pattern to nourish his soul by consuming specters, and learned that specters had begun appearing. The chapter left the Special Affairs Bureau anticipating a specter tide while Yog watched Cheng Yu’s actions and awaited the story to unfold.

• Cheng Yu bought groceries and yogurt, then spotted Lü Youying walking with Wan Zhuo and assumed they were romantically involved.
• The system awarded Cheng Yu the Iron Hat King achievement, which he exchanged for High-Energy Crystal Blocks; eating one raised him to Black Iron Five-Star.
• The system warned Cheng Yu that his soul was lagging behind his body, so he stopped eating the remaining blocks and devised the Specter-Devouring Pattern to strengthen his soul by consuming specters.
• Near midnight on the seventh night, Cheng Yu and the other Ghost-Tamers felt an oppressive sensation as specters began to appear.
• A tattooed man in the Special Affairs Bureau worried that a specter tide was beginning, while Yog watched Cheng Yu in a book and looked forward to seeing what story he would show.

On his way to Sea City University, Cheng Yu encountered a little girl eerie entity and learned how she had died after being abused and abandoned by her family. He used the Eerie-Devouring Mark to absorb her, then continued to school, while Yog secretly sent a speck of light into a fairy-tale book to fulfill Cheng Yu’s wish for the girl.

• Cheng Yu watched the news report that a new Specter Tide had begun as eerie incidents surged around the world, then left home with Lü Youying feeling unwell.
• On a shaded shortcut, Cheng Yu met a little girl eerie entity who asked about her stuffed bear and challenged him for answering her questions.
• The little girl recounted how her stepmother neglected and abused her, how she accidentally caused her mother’s death and ate her baby brother, and how her father locked her in a wardrobe and buried her alive.
• The little girl begged Cheng Yu to stay with her, but he hugged her and activated the Improved Eerie-Devouring Mark, dissolving her into white light and promising she would have a new life.
• Cheng Yu reflected that the world was fucked up, glanced toward the tree where the wardrobe was buried, and hurried to school.
• Inside a certain bookshop, Yog placed a speck of light into a fairy-tale book and said he would make the girl’s world as though it were steeped in honey.

Cheng Yu met Luo Xia, a transmigrator who knew the novel’s future and sought his protection in the specter-infested world. Cheng Yu agreed to keep him alive and took him home after dark.

• Cheng Yu reflected on the suffering caused by human nature and struggled to decide how he should respond to such tragedies.
• Luo Xia arrived late to class and worried that he had transmigrated into a dangerous novel without gaining any special abilities.
• The school moved finals up to three days away, and Cheng Yu stayed in the library memorizing his textbooks.
• Luo Xia approached Cheng Yu, who recognized him as a transmigrator and agreed to do his best to keep him alive.
• Luo Xia explained his situation and asked Cheng Yu for protection, then asked to accompany him because specters were active outside after dark.
• Cheng Yu agreed to take Luo Xia home.

Cheng Yu told Luo Xia about the coming Sea City supernatural incident and the origins of the supernatural world, then demonstrated his power by capturing and devouring a Fog Ghost. He returned home to Lü Youying, while Yog watched from a bookshop and said the show was about to begin.

• As Cheng Yu and Luo Xia walked home, Luo Xia explained how Wan Zhuo would exploit a half-human, half-fish corpse to gain supernatural abilities.
• Cheng Yu told Luo Xia that a great being's authority fragment had driven the world's will mad and revealed that he had come to destroy it.
• A Fog Ghost trapped Cheng Yu and Luo Xia in thick fog, but Cheng Yu used his Pay-to-Win Eye to find it and his Specter-Devouring Pattern to destroy it.
• Cheng Yu arrived home, where Lü Youying questioned him about staying out late, and he went to meditate.
• Inside A Certain Bookshop, Yog opened a book and said the actors were nearly all in place and the show could begin.

Cheng Yu arranged a custom Annihilator 0-6 suit of armor to protect Luo Xia, his new sidekick and walking plot guide. After Luo Xia received the armor, Cheng Yu told him to learn how to use it before they went to fight Weird.

• Cheng Yu told Luo Xia to call him Brother Yu and said Luo Xia would accompany him to Sea City’s beach when the time came.
• Luo Xia discovered Wan Zhuo was in his class and recalled his connection to Luo Xia’s predecessor and Yan Rou.
• Cheng Yu asked the system whether an Annihilator would attract the World Consciousness, then contacted Conductor to request an Annihilator 0-6 for Luo Xia.
• Cheng Yu gave Luo Xia a silver-white watch that deployed into custom armor, and showed him how to disengage it.
• Cheng Yu told Luo Xia to practice with the armor before they went out for live combat against Weird.

Cheng Yu joined Luo Xia to investigate a low-risk anomaly called “Midnight Singing,” listed on the Special Affairs Bureau bounty board. After questioning the homeowner and examining a cropped photograph, Cheng Yu suspected the anomaly was connected to the picture.

• Cheng Yu called Luo Xia and persuaded him to find a weak anomaly so they could test the Annihilator mech.
• Luo Xia explained the Special Affairs Bureau bounty board and showed Cheng Yu the F-rank “Midnight Singing” bounty he had accepted under the username Mecha Exorcist.
• Cheng Yu and Luo Xia met the homeowner, who described hearing a young girl humming at midnight when nobody else could hear it.
• Luo Xia arranged for the homeowner to spend the night elsewhere while he and Cheng Yu waited at the apartment for the anomaly.
• Cheng Yu and Luo Xia examined a photograph of the homeowner as a young man, and Cheng Yu realized it had been cropped and suggested it might be connected to the anomaly.

Cheng Yu and Luo Xia encountered a female ghost whose story revealed her love for the man who had once been her childhood friend, and Cheng Yu helped her find peace before she disappeared. Afterward, Luo Xia ended his relationship, Cheng Yu prepared to break through to Bronze, and Yog preserved the ghost’s soul to give her a story with a different ending.

• Cheng Yu and Luo Xia captured the humming female ghost, and Cheng Yu used his skill to calm her as she realized she had died.
• The ghost recounted her years of love for the man, from their childhood friendship to her death, and Cheng Yu used the Improved Eerie-Devouring Mark to let them share a final embrace and farewell.
• The ghost disappeared at dawn, and Cheng Yu told the man that she had been well and was grateful for his love; the man later found their old photograph and wept.
• Luo Xia called Rourou and broke up with her, while Cheng Yu returned home, earned the Empathetic Listener achievement, and prepared to advance to Bronze.
• Yog revealed that the ghost’s soul contained a rare emotion-formed meme primal element and placed it in a fairy-tale book so she could live a story with a different ending.

After reaching Bronze One-Star, Cheng Yu tried to turn his shed hair into living extensions, but the hair became hostile souls and dragged him into a soul-space. Yog’s true form intervened, and Cheng Yu survived, consumed the souls, and continued training while investigators examined the death of the book thief.

• Cheng Yu used fifteen High-Energy Crystal Blocks to reach Bronze One-Star, gaining a leakless body and a bald head.
• Cheng Yu refined his shed hair with the Smelting Technique, and the strands took root on his head and developed self-awareness.
• The hair’s hostile souls severed Cheng Yu’s consciousness from his body and attacked him in a white space until Yog’s true form shattered the space and sent him back.
• Cheng Yu devoured the black sphere formed from the hair’s souls with the Specter-Devouring Pattern, raising his health to five thousand before resuming his training.
• Yog reflected that choosing Cheng Yu had been right and decided to adjust his plans when a girl with twin ponytails returned to the bookshop.
• Special Affairs Bureau members investigated the suspicious death of the man who had stolen a book from the bookshop and found no traces of a Weird.

Cheng Yu learned that his growing strength was attracting women, then followed Wan Zhuo to the beach and confronted a mysterious tree-wielding stranger. He escaped with her severed arm, having discovered a powerful new exploit, while the stranger fled as a tiny sapling.

• Cheng Yu suppressed the aura that had triggered Lü Youying's instincts to fall for him.
• Wan Zhuo went to the beach to retrieve a reverse scale from a corpse, while Cheng Yu and Luo Xia watched.
• Cheng Yu pursued a mysterious black-robed figure after they remarked that someone had arrived first.
• Cheng Yu fought the green-haired Tree Demon through a forest, using his abilities to evade her attacks and burn the living trees.
• Cheng Yu tore off the Tree Demon's arm and devoured part of her soul, but she escaped as a tiny sapling.
• Cheng Yu used Spatial Movement to return to Luo Xia, carrying the arm and excited about a new exploit.

Cheng Yu used his perfect logical formula to investigate the Fishman corpse and Tree Demon girl's severed arm, uncovering clues about the Weird Tales Enthusiasts' Club and a mysterious masked man. Meanwhile, Wan Zhuo gained water-controlling powers through a ritual, and Yog watched with disdain.

• Cheng Yu used Reach-Behind Grab on the Fishman corpse and saw a masked figure connected to a mission, sacrifice, and the world's favor.
• Cheng Yu examined the Tree Demon girl's severed arm and learned that she had received instructions from a man called Reader on behalf of the Weird Tales Enthusiasts' Club.
• Cheng Yu created Brother Yu's Theorem and a Divination Coin, confirming that the online Weird Tales Enthusiasts' Club was the same organization and had official backing, though not from the Special Affairs Bureau or Shadow Operations Office.
• Cheng Yu's divination indicated that he was no match for the masked man and would eventually encounter him.
• Wan Zhuo performed a ritual with a deep-blue scale, gained the ability to manipulate water, and transformed into water vapor.
• Yog watched Wan Zhuo's transformation, recognized the name Xal'nath, and mocked his choice to imitate Him.

Wan Zhuo used his new Child of Water ability to approach Yan Rou and exploit her breakup with Luo Xia, while Cheng Yu overheard and called Luo Xia to tell him he had been cheated on. The Special Affairs Bureau noticed two promising Ghost-Tamers in Sea City, and the chapter ended as a trench-coat-wearing man entered a mysterious bookshop.

• Wan Zhuo met Yan Rou by the campus lake, impressed her with a flower made of water, and drew out details about her breakup with Luo Xia.
• Wan Zhuo urged Yan Rou to speak with Luo Xia while secretly planning to use Luo Xia to win her over.
• Cheng Yu overheard Wan Zhuo and Yan Rou, called Luo Xia, and mistakenly told him he had been cheated on before learning Luo Xia had ended the relationship himself.
• The Veiled Lady saw two promising Ghost-Tamers appear in Sea City on the Map of Life and ordered a man to inform Yun Tian.
• Wan Zhuo prepared to make Yan Rou lose faith in Luo Xia, while a trench-coat-wearing man entered A Certain Bookshop and heard a mysterious woman welcome him.

Wu Juyan discovered a mysterious bookshop and read a fragment that convinced him the Great Being Tsathoggua could help humanity survive the Specter Tides. After Wu Juyan left, Yog revealed that he had chosen Tsathoggua as part of a plan and acknowledged Wu Juyan as a promising agent.

• Wu Juyan entered a bookshop that had appeared on his way home and met its owner, Yog, whom he identified as a Weird.
• Wu Juyan browsed the shelves and opened a black-bound Necronomicon Fragment Manuscript that revealed secrets about Tsathoggua and Eibon.
• As the text became unreadable, Wu Juyan memorized what he could and concluded that Tsathoggua offered humanity hope against the Specter Tides.
• Wu Juyan left the shop, which vanished when he turned around, and decided to verify what he had learned.
• Yog discussed with another version of himself how Tsathoggua's sacred sloth fit into his plan and how he might make the deity disappear if it crossed a set threshold.
• Yog noted that Wu Juyan was a good agent and wondered whether choosing him had been inevitable.

Luo Xia tested the Mecha Cheng Yu had given him while Cheng Yu used the Breakthrough Array to reach Bronze Two-Star. Wan Zhuo brought Yan Rou to Luo Xia’s apartment, where Yan Rou chose Wan Zhuo and Wan Zhuo used his water-controlling ability to immobilize Luo Xia, who called for the Mecha to suit up.

• Luo Xia questioned Annihilator 0-6 about his permissions, tested its Destroyer right arm on a metal alarm clock, and learned he could control the Mecha semiautomatically.
• Cheng Yu used the Breakthrough Array, failed once, then successfully advanced to Bronze Two-Star.
• Wan Zhuo brought Yan Rou to Luo Xia’s apartment, intending to make her give up on Luo Xia and become his girlfriend.
• Yan Rou called herself Luo Xia’s ex-girlfriend and asked Wan Zhuo to be her boyfriend, while Luo Xia dismissed them and told them to leave.
• Wan Zhuo used his water-controlling ability to freeze Luo Xia in place, and Luo Xia called for Annihilator 0-6 to suit up.