Chapter Summaries

Lou Yunxiao struggled with the possibility that Ning Ke was his sister, but chose to cling to his hatred and revenge. At Ning Family Village, Ning Xiaoxiao urged him to bury her brother, while Lou Yunxiao insisted on keeping A Ke’s body by his side forever.

• Lou Yunxiao dismissed his suspicions about Ning Ke and told Gao Ze he would avoid him until he was strong enough to take revenge.
• Ning Xiaoxiao buried the villagers’ dead, carved her adoptive father’s name into his headstone, and vowed to destroy Demon.
• Ning Xiaoxiao asked Lou Yunxiao whether Ning Ke resembled her brother, but Lou Yunxiao angrily rejected the comparison.
• Ning Xiaoxiao urged Lou Yunxiao to bury Ning Ke’s body, arguing that no one could revive him and that he had not returned her brother’s feelings while he was alive.
• Lou Yunxiao declared that A Ke belonged to him in life and death, then walked away, leaving Ning Xiaoxiao to mourn her brother and call Lou Yunxiao mad.

After his battle with Lou Yunxiao and the villagers’ deaths, Ning Ke accepted his guilt and began the third stage of his mission by disguising himself as a monk. He gained entry to the Buddhist Order as Mingxin, while Wugou recognized that his karma matched Ning Ke’s.

• Ning Ke treated his shoulder wound with foxfire, acknowledged his guilt, and decided to take the tonsure and join the Buddhist Order.
• Abbot Wujue ordered the Buddhist elders to investigate Ning Ke, while Wugou wondered why Ning Ke shared the karma of Benefactor A Ke, whom Wugou had seen die.
• Ning Ke arrived at the Buddhist temple disguised as Mingxin, a monk seeking to join the order.
• Wugou recognized Mingxin’s karma as identical to Ning Ke’s, though he sensed no hostility from him.
• Ning Ke praised the Buddhist Order and presented gifts, persuading Abbot Wujue to accept him and arrange his lodging.

Ning Ke disguised himself as a monk to find the Buddha Lotus Lamp, but Wugou recognized both his true identity and his other disguise. Wugou revealed that he possessed the lamp and offered to give it to Ning Ke on one condition.

• Ning Ke arranged to share a courtyard with Wugou, who admitted he had recognized him as the Demon Venerable.
• Ning Ke threatened Wugou to keep his identity secret, but Wugou saw through the act and revealed he also recognized Ning Ke as A Ke.
• Wugou promised to keep Ning Ke's identity secret and asked to stay by his side as an observer, and Ning Ke agreed.
• Ning Ke told Wugou he sought the Buddha Lotus Lamp, and Wugou revealed that he possessed it.
• Wugou offered to give Ning Ke the lamp if Ning Ke agreed to do as he said from then on.

Ning Ke trained as a monk under Wugou and joined a Demon-Slaying Team bound for Northern Tour City, where he reunited with Lou Yunxiao and his former acquaintances. He introduced himself to Lou as Mingxin, determined to hide his identity.

• Abbot Wujue praised Mingxin and Wugou, then agreed to send them on a Demon-Slaying Team to prepare for the growing attacks across the Human Realm.
• On the Flying Ship, Ning Ke thanked Wugou for helping steady his mind and admitted he hoped to use Lou Yunxiao to return home.
• Wugou revealed that he had seen death in both Ning Ke's and A Ke's futures.
• Ning Ke and Wugou arrived in Northern Tour City, where Zeng Xi and Zhang Chen explained that the Pill Sect was examining demon-affected corpses using Demon-Dissipating Pills to prevent them from becoming living dead.
• Zhuang Yusheng, Ning Xiaoxiao, and Lou Yunxiao arrived; Zeng Xi warned Zhang Chen not to question Lou about his regained sight.
• Ning Ke greeted Lou Yunxiao as Mingxin and asked him to call him by that name.

Ning Ke, disguised as the monk Mingxin, encountered Lou Yunxiao, who was still grieving his supposed death and searching for him. After Lou sensed A Ke nearby through the Red Cloud Sword, Ning Ke concealed himself, but Lou ended the chapter certain that A Ke was beside him.

• Lou Yunxiao sensed the Red Cloud Sword tremble and searched for A Ke, while Ning Ke silently stopped the sword from recognizing him.
• Ning Xiaoxiao wept over her brother's death, and Ning Ke comforted her before returning the Red Cloud Sword to Lou Yunxiao.
• Lou Yunxiao seized Ning Ke's wrist and demanded to know why he had lost everything he loved, then released him after Wugou intervened.
• Zeng Xi told Zhang Chen that Lou Yunxiao's junior brother had died saving him and that people suspected Lou had loved him.
• Zhuang Yusheng confronted Lou Yunxiao on the rooftop, and Lou declared that A Ke was not dead and was right beside him.

Lou Yunxiao killed a demon disguised as a night watchman, then tested whether the monk Mingxin was Ning Ke in disguise. He confirmed that Mingxin’s forehead mark was a seal, leaving him convinced he had found A Ke.

• Lou Yunxiao killed the demon disguised as a night watchman and absorbed it, alarming the city guards.
• Zhuang Yusheng explained to the guards that Lou Yunxiao could absorb demonic energy and identified him as a Sword Sect immortal.
• Ning Ke arrived disguised as Mingxin and performed rites for the dead night watchman while Lou Yunxiao watched him closely.
• Lou Yunxiao repeated Ning Ke’s earlier words about appreciating beauty, making Ning Ke suspect he had been recognized.
• Lou Yunxiao touched Mingxin’s forehead mark, realized it was a seal, and concluded that Mingxin was A Ke.

Ning Ke tried to understand how Lou Yunxiao had recognized him, while Lou Yunxiao grew more convinced that Mingxin might be A Ke. After Ning Ke offered to refine Demon-Dissipating Pills, Lou Yunxiao pressed Wugou for information, and Wugou asked whether he wanted Mingxin to be A Ke.

• Ning Ke wondered how Lou Yunxiao had recognized him, while Lou Yunxiao recalled Mingxin's behavior, the Red Cloud Sword's obedience, and A Ke's familiar scent.
• Ning Ke woke to Zhang Chen's pill furnace exploding, and Zeng Xi explained that the failed Demon-Dissipating Pills threatened the group's preparations for war.
• Ning Ke volunteered to refine the pills, hoping to distract Lou Yunxiao from his suspicions, and the others split up to investigate the city, woods, and Living Dead.
• Lou Yunxiao questioned Wugou about Mingxin's past, but Wugou gave him little useful information.
• Lou Yunxiao asked whether Mingxin was A Ke, and Wugou replied by asking whether he wanted him to be.

Ning Ke recognized that the attacks on Northern Tour City had damaged a massive formation and ordered the city evacuated before its five elemental arrays could be destroyed. Lou Yunxiao ignored Ning Ke’s attempt to send him elsewhere and demonstrated that he could wield fire.

• Wugou urged Lou Yunxiao to discover Mingxin’s identity for himself, while Lou Yunxiao remained troubled by the possibility that Mingxin was A Ke.
• Zeng Xi and the others reported strange growths of ghost soul grass and found that attacks on twelve residences had left traces of arrays arranged around Northern Tour City.
• Ning Ke refined Demon-Dissipating Pills, examined the array rubbing and city map, and realized the twelve locations matched a formation he had seen in the Underground Palace.
• Ning Ke ordered the evacuation of Northern Tour City and assigned himself and four others to guard the five elemental arrays while they called for reinforcements.
• Ning Ke told Lou Yunxiao to guard the water array with Liuli, but Lou Yunxiao stayed beside him and showed that he could play with fire.

Ning Ke and Lou Yunxiao searched the Liu Residence for missing Junjun and learned that Second Concubine was a demon who had eaten a maid. After Second Concubine slaughtered the household and confronted them, Ning Ke and Lou Yunxiao prepared to fight her.

• Ning Ke and Lou Yunxiao found Junjun hiding beneath a bed, where she told them Second Concubine had eaten the maid Huang Ying.
• Master Liu left the residence with his concubines, and Second Concubine killed the concubines, Master Liu, and the other members of the household.
• Ning Ke promised to protect Junjun and Madam Liu, and Junjun gave him a fire-attribute spirit stone that triggered a side quest to reinforce Northern Tour City's Five Elements Formation.
• Lou Yunxiao sensed approaching demonic energy, and Ning Ke and Lou Yunxiao went outside to face Second Concubine.
• Second Concubine revealed herself as a demon and declared that she would sacrifice Ning Ke and Lou Yunxiao to the formation.

Demons attacked Northern Tour City as Ning Ke and his companions struggled to protect civilians and defend the Five Elements Formation. With the city sealed off and Lou Yunxiao facing the demoness, Ning Ke considered removing the seal on his true body but tried to avoid exposing himself.

• Lou Yunxiao confronted the Integration-stage demoness while Ning Ke set up six defensive formations and warned the others to avoid stronger demons.
• Ning Xiaoxiao found the metal-element spirit stone, then attacked a Spirit Transformation-stage demon despite Mingxin's warning not to fight stronger enemies.
• Zeng Xi discovered ghost soul grass attacking the city gate and led the Pill Sect disciples in using fire while civilians evacuated.
• Zhang Chen fought the ghost soul grass beside the city guards, severed his own foot to stop it from draining his spiritual energy, and helped hold the line until the evacuation ended.
• The ghost soul grass sealed the city behind a massive dome, leaving Ning Ke and the others unable to receive help as Ning Ke weighed removing his seal.
• The demoness attacked Ning Ke, but Lou Yunxiao intercepted her with his swords and vowed to protect him.

Lou Yunxiao revealed his demonic power to protect Ning Ke and killed the demon woman guarding the Fire Array, while Ning Ke worked to reinforce the formation. The woman regenerated and summoned the other array demons, but Ning Xiaoxiao arrived and announced she had killed Number Five.

• Lou Yunxiao fought the demon woman with his divine swords, then unleashed demonic energy and began absorbing hers.
• Xiao Yuan told Ning Ke that Lou Yunxiao’s demonized behavior came from trauma and that a future task involved using the Buddha Lotus Lamp to make him more normal.
• Lou Yunxiao wounded and dismembered the demon woman while Ning Ke reinforced the Fire Array, then hacked her body into pieces.
• Lou Yunxiao carried Ning Ke into the air as ghost soul grass erupted from the ground with over a thousand corpses impaled on it.
• The demons guarding the Water, Earth, and Wood Arrays arrived, and the demon woman regenerated from the blood and flesh as she asked where Number Five was.
• Ning Xiaoxiao arrived wounded and declared that she had already killed the demon guarding the Metal Array.

Ning Xiaoxiao revealed that she had killed a demon with the Demon-Sealing Talisman, while Ning Ke struggled to hide his identity from Lou Yunxiao. The remaining demons merged to restore the demon woman to peak integration, but as she attacked Ning Xiaoxiao, two men intervened.

• Zhuang Yusheng checked Ning Xiaoxiao's wounded hand and gave her healing pills, telling her she had done well.
• Ning Xiaoxiao explained that she used the Demon-Sealing Talisman to destroy the fifth demon, stunning the others and Ning Ke.
• Ning Ke insisted that Lou Yunxiao call him Mingxin, but Lou Yunxiao kissed his palm and continued calling him Mouse.
• The demon woman gathered the other demons' power and bodies, restored herself, and reached peak integration.
• The demon woman struck Zhuang Yusheng aside and lunged for Ning Xiaoxiao, but two men grabbed her before she could reach her.

Ning Ke reinforced Northern Tour City's four seals after Demoness triggered the formation, while the group kept her separated from her head and body. Wugou then used his staff and chanting to immobilize the Ghost Soul Grass, leaving Liuli wondering whether he meant to send everyone to the afterlife.

• Ning Ke and Lou Yunxiao beheaded Demoness, and Zhuang Yusheng accidentally got splattered with her blood.
• Demoness regenerated her severed parts with Ghost Soul Grass, but Lou Yunxiao knocked her head away and Zhuang Yusheng, Ning Ke, and Lou Yunxiao kept batting it between them.
• Demoness activated the formations around Northern Tour City, but Ning Xiaoxiao revealed that she had reinforced the metal formation.
• Ning Ke used elemental spirit stones and blood-drawn formations to reinforce the other four seals, thanking Demoness for revealing their locations.
• Wugou used the Buddha Lotus Lamp in his staff to freeze the Ghost Soul Grass, then began chanting and tapping the ground as Liuli wondered whether he was sending everyone to the afterlife.

Lou Yunxiao defeated the demoness by absorbing her demonic energy, then rejected her accusation that he could never be a hero and declared himself a monster who would erase demons. After the array sealed the demon underground and Northern Tour City returned to normal, Zhuang Yusheng wondered whether the demonic energy had changed Lou Yunxiao’s personality.

• The demoness recognized the Buddha Lotus Lamp and a prophecy about the group, but Lou Yunxiao attacked and drained her demonic energy until she weakened.
• The demoness told Lou Yunxiao that absorbing energy from her victims made him a monster, but he said he never wanted to be a hero and vowed to eliminate demons.
• Lou Yunxiao cut down the demoness, and Wugou completed the ritual that sealed her underground and withered the ghost soul grass as dawn broke over Northern Tour City.
• Ning Xiaoxiao smiled with relief after helping defeat the demon, while Liuli complimented her and Wugou refused Lou Yunxiao’s request for his staff.
• Zhuang Yusheng questioned whether absorbing so much demonic energy had changed Lou Yunxiao’s personality.

After Lou Yunxiao defeated the Great Demon, its demonic energy continued to spill from him, and the group learned that an unknown Secret Realm had appeared at the Flowing Cloud Sect’s former site. Lou Yunxiao decided he had to enter it after hearing that his sect leader had already gone inside.

• Lou Yunxiao discovered he could no longer control the demonic energy he had absorbed, while the others mistook his strange behavior for the effects of consuming too much of it.
• Cui Xuecheng and the other Integration disciples arrived, heard how the group had slain the demon, and saw Yongjie fail to persuade Wugou to show him his staff.
• Shen Yan'er concealed Lou Yunxiao’s demonic energy with an illusion, and the Liu Residence’s surviving mother and daughter thanked Ning Ke and Lou Yunxiao for defeating the demon.
• Cui Xuecheng took Ning Xiaoxiao to inspect the stone monument sealing the Great Demon, while Shen Yan'er told Liuli that the Sword Sect’s leader had entered a Secret Realm at the Flowing Cloud Sect’s former site.
• Lou Yunxiao learned that the Secret Realm admitted cultivators at the Spirit Transformation Stage and had no known way out, but he insisted that he had to go there.

Ning Ke accepted the quest to investigate the destruction of the Flowing Cloud Sect and chased after Lou Yunxiao when he left for the dangerous Secret Realm alone. He found Lou Yunxiao hurting himself to suppress his desire to keep Ning Ke safe, and told him to stop hiding what he wanted.

• The system gave Ning Ke a main quest to enter the space that devoured the Flowing Cloud Sect with Lou Yunxiao and uncover the truth behind its destruction.
• Ning Ke told Lou Yunxiao he would accompany him, but Lou Yunxiao refused and flew off toward the Secret Realm.
• Ning Ke chased Lou Yunxiao, and Wugou followed them while Shen Yan'er stayed behind with the others.
• Lou Yunxiao told Ning Ke not to come closer, then hid in the woods and bit his hands to restrain his overwhelming longing for him.
• Ning Ke found Lou Yunxiao, recognized that he was rejecting him out of fear for his safety, and treated his injured hands.
• Ning Ke told Lou Yunxiao to stop saying things he did not mean and promised to do the lying for him.

Ning Ke reassured Lou Yunxiao and disguised the source of his foxfire, then followed him to help Wugou confront Yongjie over a treasured staff. Wugou revealed his hidden cultivation and trapped Yongjie, then offered Lou Yunxiao temporary use of the staff if he sent his demonic energy into Yongjie’s sea of consciousness.

• Lou Yunxiao confessed that he wanted Ning Ke to stay by his side, and Ning Ke agreed while privately wishing the promise were true.
• Lou Yunxiao noticed Ning Ke’s protective blue flames and asked where they came from, so Ning Ke claimed the Fire Lion Clan had given them to him.
• Ning Ke and Lou Yunxiao found Yongjie trying to seize Wugou’s staff, and Lou Yunxiao rushed in to defend Wugou before asking for the staff as payment.
• Wugou revealed that he had been suppressing his cultivation and reached the mid-spirit transformation stage, shocking Yongjie and Ning Ke.
• Wugou trapped Yongjie in his Killing Formation, and Lou Yunxiao held a sword to Yongjie’s neck while Wugou offered to lend him the staff if he sent his demonic energy into Yongjie’s sea of consciousness.

Wugou joined Ning Ke and Lou Yunxiao on their journey into the Secret Realm after helping kill Yongjie. The three entered together but were separated inside, where Lou Yunxiao encountered a vision of his mother and Ning Ke and Wugou were swept through a violent stormy sea.

• Lou Yunxiao turned Yongjie into a demon with transferred demonic energy, and Wugou killed him before Lou Yunxiao burned his body.
• Lou Yunxiao gave Wugou’s staff to Ning Ke, and Wugou confronted Ning Ke for leaving him behind before insisting on joining the trip.
• Ning Ke, Lou Yunxiao, and Wugou reached the Secret Realm entrance and stepped inside together as Ning Xiaoxiao arrived too late to follow them.
• The Secret Realm separated the three: Lou Yunxiao fell into a golden spiritual pool and embraced a water-formed image of his mother, Bai Wanru.
• Ning Ke and Wugou were battered by giant waves in a stormy sea, and Wugou regretted following Ning Ke into the Secret Realm.

Ning Ke and Wugou endured the violent sea before reaching land in a secret realm that Ning Ke recognized as the Demon World. A departing spirit called him the Demon Venerable and asked him to save them, leaving Ning Ke to suspect that the Flowing Cloud Sect’s destruction had been deliberately arranged.

• Ning Ke and Wugou were battered by the storm and waited three days on a reef before setting out again.
• Ning Ke revealed his original appearance, and Wugou said he did not believe Ning Ke had destroyed the Flowing Cloud Sect; Ning Ke admitted he did not know what had happened.
• Ning Ke and Wugou reached land beneath a purple-red sun and found their cultivation suppressed.
• Black-mist demon creatures attacked them, but Wugou used the Buddha Lotus Lamp and chanted a sutra to calm and disperse them.
• Ning Ke realized they had entered the Demon World and suspected someone had deliberately made it swallow the Flowing Cloud Sect.
• A fading spirit recognized Ning Ke as the Demon Venerable and asked him to save them before disappearing.

Ning Ke entered the Flowing Cloud Sect’s main hall and was somehow transported ten thousand years into the past, where he became a powerless white fox. After a swordsman named Immortal Master Lou rescued him, Ning Ke realized the man looked exactly like a grown-up Lou Yunxiao.

• Ning Ke sensed a powerful presence near the vanished Flowing Cloud Sect and separated from Wugou to investigate alone.
• Ning Ke entered the sect’s main hall and woke up in the past as a white fox with no cultivation.
• Two cultivators threatened a mother and daughter, and Ning Ke attacked one of them to protect the pair.
• A swordsman rescued the mother, daughter, and injured Ning Ke, then treated the fox’s wounds.
• Ning Ke recognized Immortal Master Lou as the spitting image of a grown-up Lou Yunxiao.