Chapter Summaries

Chu Sheng led the convoy through a horde of zombies in the Netherbone Car and reached a village where the group could catch their breath. Because stopping after killing an Anomaly would turn the car into gasoline, he kept circling the village while the rest of the convoy struggled to defend itself.

• Chu Sheng charged through the zombies, but the Netherbone Car's speed dropped sharply after its scales fell away and it collided with them.
• Captain Hui told Chu Sheng that a village ahead would offer a chance to rest, and the zombies and most anomalous animals fled toward a graveyard hill.
• Captain Hui recognized the village as a safe place, but Chu Sheng drove past it and explained that the car would turn into gasoline if it stopped after killing an Anomaly.
• Chu Sheng circled the village and ran over Anomalies while A Xin followed, but the rest of the convoy could not keep pace and had to defend itself from the remaining animals.

Zhou Dun left his vehicle to fight an Eerie Cat, convinced that taking the risk was his only chance to prepare for the dangers ahead. Meanwhile, Chu Sheng kept driving the Netherbone Car at high speed, with A Xin following close behind.

• Zhou Dun watched an Eerie Cat keep advancing despite his Tang Dao piercing its skull, while Wu Jie and the Li sisters urged him not to get out.
• Zhou Dun insisted that he had to face hardship, shattered the car window, knocked the Eerie Cat away, and stepped outside to fight it.
• The Eerie Cat landed and approached Zhou Dun, its wounded skull leaking black mist as it prepared to attack.
• Chu Sheng drove the Netherbone Car over field ridges and told Captain Hui that stopping would mean death.
• An Xi saw A Xin racing after them in her upgraded Off-Road Vehicle, while Old Man Li and Zhu Qing looked grim about the convoy's drivers' chances.

An Xi and Zhu Qing reached the convoy in their transformed Sequence 8 forms and killed the remaining Anomalies, but the survivors had suffered devastating losses. After Chu Sheng negotiated with a woman over a supernatural item, he discovered A Xin had awakened an ability that left her unable to hear.

• As the Netherbone Car slowed beside the convoy, Zhu Qing and An Xi leaped out in transformed forms and rushed to help.
• Zhu Qing and An Xi killed the Anomalies attacking the convoy, then Captain Hui counted only seventeen survivors among the ordinary people and twenty-two people total with the Sequence Adepts.
• A middle-aged woman asked Chu Sheng to fuse a Sacrificial Item using an Eerie Dog tooth, and Chu Sheng traded her an iron hoop for a supernatural material and a knife while waiving the fusion fee.
• Chu Sheng found A Xin unresponsive in her vehicle, and she eventually explained that she could not hear him because she had awakened an ability.

A Xin awakened a Sequence but discovered that the price was losing her hearing, while the convoy prepared to head for a village. A Train raced toward them along a dirt road, and Chu Sheng and the others fled toward the village.

• Chu Sheng and Captain Hui realized A Xin had awakened her Sequence and gone deaf, and Captain Hui gave her a notebook and pen.
• An Xi returned, learned what had happened to A Xin, and stayed with her while the convoy prepared to leave for the village.
• Chu Sheng returned to the Netherbone Car and watched its dents repair themselves and its missing scales reattach.
• A Train sounded its horn and charged toward the convoy along a dirt road.
• Chu Sheng drove toward the village, and Zhu Qing, Captain Hui, Old Man Li, An Xi, and the survivors followed in their vehicles.

Chu Sheng and the convoy encountered Xu Aiguo, whose Sequence was Train, and learned that people aboard his Train wanted to leave and join them. Xu Aiguo asked whether the convoy could take them in, leaving Chu Sheng to consider the request.

• Chu Sheng stayed inside the Netherbone Car until Xu Aiguo's Train stopped near the convoy.
• Xu Aiguo introduced himself to Captain Hui and confirmed that his Sequence was Train.
• Several Train passengers got off and asked to join the convoy, baffling Captain Hui and Chu Sheng.
• An Xi warned Chu Sheng not to think he could defeat the Train passengers, and he denied having such intentions.
• Xu Aiguo explained that his crowded Train lacked enough food and asked whether the convoy could take in passengers who wanted to leave.

Chu Sheng agreed to take in Xu Aiguo’s three hundred survivors after Xu explained the capabilities of his self-sufficient Train Sequence. Xu also told Captain Hui about the Anomaly Realm and the road leading out, leaving the convoy with a route and a warning that more than a thousand kilometers lay ahead.

• Xu Aiguo explained that he wanted to transfer the troublesome survivors to another convoy, and Chu Sheng agreed to accept all of them.
• Xu Aiguo described his Train Sequence, which produced food, water, and medicine while carrying more than 3,500 people.
• Xu Aiguo explained that Sequence abilities had different strengths depending on the circumstances and the future environment.
• Xu Aiguo told Captain Hui that the group was in the Anomaly Realm and that settlements there were filled with Anomalies.
• Xu Aiguo said the convoy could leave by following the road straight ahead, but warned that the route continued for over a thousand kilometers.
• Xu Aiguo and Captain Hui exchanged their recorded journals and information.

Chu Sheng learned that A Xin’s Protection Sequence concealed the village and train from Anomalies for six hours a day, though it had cost her hearing. He fused a binding contract from an iron hoop and blood-written paper, creating a new Sacrificial Item.

• An Xi explained that A Xin’s Protection ability hid signs of life from Anomalies within a designated area once a day, and Chu Sheng realized A Xin had lost her hearing as the price.
• Chu Sheng fused a knife, a canine tooth, and a cat claw into a Sacrificial Item with a Rabies ability and increased damage against Eerie Cats.
• Chu Sheng wrote “Master-servant contract” on white paper with his blood and fused it with the iron hoop.
• The fusion produced the Iron Hoop Contract, ranked 6412, with the words on the paper changed to “Binding contract.”

Chu Sheng discovered that the Iron Hoop Contract required fair exchanges for every obligation, so he wrote a set of balanced recruitment terms. After checking his new supplies, he fused seven supernatural materials with the Cat-Slaughtering Knife and began waiting to see what it would become.

• Chu Sheng examined the Iron Hoop Contract and realized its fairness requirement meant every promise he imposed needed a benefit in return.
• Chu Sheng rewrote the contract with four reciprocal clauses covering shelter, food and work, fusion access, loyalty, and obedience.
• Chu Sheng counted An Xi’s remaining supernatural materials and estimated he could fuse items eight times a day.
• Chu Sheng combined the Cat-Slaughtering Knife with a heart, zombie fangs, eyeballs, animal paws, chicken feet, and pig ribs and spine.
• The fusion filled the Netherbone Car with white light as the curious survivors approached without getting too close.

Chu Sheng fused his Butcher Knife into the Cat-Slaying Butcher, which could transform into a living butcher and return to his belt. After the group began a trading session aboard the Train, Li Da Niu displayed his supplies, while Chu Sheng wondered why Captain Hui had declined to trade.

• Chu Sheng fused the Butcher Knife into the Cat-Slaying Butcher and discovered its abilities, including summoning a butcher that turned bitten creatures into zombies.
• Chu Sheng summoned the butcher, which frightened nearby survivors and spoke to him before obediently returning to his belt.
• Li Da Niu and the others prepared a trading session after Xu Aiguo and Captain Hui declined to participate.
• Chu Sheng watched Captain Hui leave and wondered why he had passed up the opportunity to trade.
• Li Da Niu began the trading session by displaying honey, military compressed biscuits, combat clothing, and a handgun that could damage Anomalies.

Chu Sheng and his companions traded with the Train’s Sequence Adepts, exchanging food for equipment and discovering how scarce the Train’s supplies were. Zhu Qing became eager to obtain a pufferfish’s supernatural skin, but Chu Sheng ended the chapter negotiating for Old Xing’s bow.

• Li Da Niu offered a Combat Suit, a Pistol, and other goods, while An Xi traded food for the Pistol and Zhu Qing bought the Combat Suit.
• Chu Sheng watched the trades and saw that most of the Train’s Sequence Adepts had little of value to offer.
• Old Xing laid out a dismantled bow, thirty arrows, and pufferfish skin, explaining where he had gotten them.
• Zhu Qing fixated on the pufferfish skin, hoping it would help him avoid ending up naked when he transformed.
• Chu Sheng offered Old Xing ten packets of instant noodles for the bow, and Old Xing accepted while asking him to store or bury it if he stopped using it.

Chu Sheng and the others finished trading with Zhu Qing and the Train’s Sequence Adepts, then took responsibility for the survivors Xu Aiguo left behind. Li Da Niu built three sacrificial buses and departed with the Train, while Chu Sheng learned the cost and ability of the Human-Powered Bus.

• Zhu Qing traded thirty jin of flour for the pufferfish skin, and the remaining trades ended with Chu Sheng having gained a bow.
• Xu Aiguo asked Captain Hui and the others to protect the survivors, then explained that Li Da Niu would build three vehicles for them.
• An Xi revealed that the traded handgun was a sacrificial item that could harm Anomalies, and Chu Sheng suspected the Train’s people had concealed what they knew about supernatural materials.
• Old Man Li refused Chu Sheng’s suggestion to board the Train, saying he needed reliable protection from life energy and strong defenses before settling anywhere.
• Li Da Niu delivered three sacrificial Human-Powered Buses stocked with a week of food, then returned to the Train as it departed.
• Chu Sheng boarded a Human-Powered Bus and learned that it moved faster when its passengers pedaled, but cost ten milliliters of fresh blood each time someone boarded.

Chu Sheng admired Li Da Niu's ability to create sacrificial items and imagined eventually upgrading the Netherbone Car to fly. After a food dispute broke out in the convoy, he agreed to help Captain Hui make a tortoise-shell fortune-telling sacrificial item, while the argument continued.

• Chu Sheng and Captain Hui inspected Li Da Niu's newly made buses, and Chu Sheng imagined adding wings to the Netherbone Car someday.
• Yang Li accused Li Ling, Wu Jie, and Li Qian of claiming her dried noodles, while a kind girl defended them and argued with Yang Li.
• Captain Hui explained the girl's background and kindness, then admitted he knew so much because of his Sequence ability.
• Captain Hui asked Chu Sheng to fuse a tortoise-shell sacrificial item for fortune-telling, and Chu Sheng agreed to help the next day.
• Chu Sheng considered his friendly conversation with Captain Hui another step toward changing, while Yang Li and the girl continued arguing.

Zhou Dun waited for the people bullying the delicate-featured girl to expose themselves, then killed the woman who threatened her. Chu Sheng treated Zhou Dun’s action as separate from their business, accepted supernatural material as repayment, and headed toward the girl.

• Zhou Dun refused to intervene immediately, choosing to wait for others to reveal themselves, while Chu Sheng watched from the Netherbone Car.
• The woman resembling Fu Seoul insulted the delicate-featured girl and demanded food from Zhou Dun, who killed her with his Tang Dao.
• Several survivors appealed to Chu Sheng to punish Zhou Dun, but Chu Sheng told them they could board the bus and receive a week’s food and water.
• Chu Sheng approached Zhou Dun, who gave him a sheet of fascia from an Eerie Cat to settle his debt.
• Chu Sheng accepted the fascia and walked toward the delicate-featured girl standing with Li Lin and the others.

Chu Sheng declined to help Cheng Xue return to her hometown, but Captain Hui offered her a place in his group after learning she could cook. Chu Sheng returned to his car and decided to prioritize upgrading the Netherbone Car with a ram.

• Chu Sheng ignored the group’s expectations that he would punish Zhou Dun and offered Cheng Xue a contract to join his team.
• Cheng Xue asked Chu Sheng to take her to her hometown so she could look for her grandparents, and he refused.
• Captain Hui offered Cheng Xue a place with him, and she accepted.
• Wu Meng introduced herself and Wu Jie to Cheng Xue, then began explaining the convoy in exchange for hearing about life on the Train.
• Chu Sheng set aside Zhou Dun’s sheet of fascia and decided the Netherbone Car needed a ram more urgently than his bow and arrows.

Chu Sheng used his final fusion of the day to prepare a ramming prow for the Netherbone Car after Captain Hui warned that the convoy had to stay on the road to escape the strange village. The fusion succeeded, while An Xi began considering whether Chu Sheng could make something to restore A Xin’s hearing.

• After the convoy searched the strangely spotless village and found nothing unusual, Captain Hui said the road was their only way out and warned that they would have to face whatever Anomalies appeared along it.
• Chu Sheng hurried back to the Netherbone Car to prepare, gathering rakes, hoes, shovels, nails, and wire from the village.
• Chu Sheng fastened the tool heads to the front of the car, forming a pointed, spiked ramming prow.
• Chu Sheng fused the prow with a leftover chicken beak, producing a blinding white light that drew the convoy’s attention.
• An Xi wondered whether fusing supernatural material from a pair of ears could restore A Xin’s hearing, and Chu Sheng trembled as he stared at the fused item.

Chu Sheng installed the Bone-Beak Ram on the Netherbone Car, turning its extreme speed and durability into a powerful way to attack Anomalies. Meanwhile, Cheng Xue joined Captain Hui’s convoy, and Captain Hui’s cursed dagger reacted to his insults as he worried about future famine.

• Chu Sheng examined the Bone-Beak Ram’s abilities and mounted it on the self-repairing Netherbone Car.
• Cheng Xue and Wu Meng’s group watched Chu Sheng’s upgrade and discussed their wish to awaken Sequence powers.
• Cheng Xue heard Captain Hui cursing himself inside his Off-Road Vehicle before he stepped out and assigned her driving, cooking, and message duties.
• Captain Hui told Cheng Xue to store her food and water in the vehicle as he worried that famine would eventually come.
• Captain Hui insulted his sacrificial dagger, which trembled and sent him an emotion in response.

Chu Sheng’s convoy left the village while anomalies gathered behind them and followed the humans’ lingering life energy out of the Anomaly Realm. Still driving within the realm, Chu Sheng encountered a bizarre procession of wedding and funeral anomalies after Captain Hui warned him of danger ahead.

• Chu Sheng let Captain Hui ride in the Netherbone Car while Cheng Xue drove Captain Hui’s own car, and the convoy set off from the village.
• After A Xin’s concealment wore off, Eerie Cats, Eerie Dogs, zombies, and other anomalies followed the convoy’s life-energy trail toward the human world.
• The anomaly horde crossed from the Anomaly Realm onto a highway, entering the world where civilization had collapsed.
• Captain Hui divined an anomaly two thousand meters ahead, and Chu Sheng accelerated toward it.
• Chu Sheng saw four mourners carrying a coffin topped by a bridal sedan chair as eight wedding-dressed figures scattered red spirit money around them.

Chu Sheng’s group attacked the Red-White Clash after Captain Hui discovered that the coffin and bridal sedan contained the same Anomaly. The strike revealed an intelligent, two-sided water ghost and wedding-dress Anomaly, leaving the group facing its true enemy.

• Captain Hui realized that the coffin and bridal sedan held the same Anomaly, while An Xi and the others destroyed the wedding-clad figures and pallbearers.
• An Xi recalled the Black Jade Bone Spear and blasted the pallbearers apart with Geng Metal Spear Aura.
• Zhu Qing smashed the bridal sedan and coffin lid with his Black Blade Gloves.
• The Red-White Clash emerged from the coffin in black mist, wearing mourning clothes on one half and a wedding dress on the other.
• The Anomaly spoke in a man's and a woman's voices, and the group recognized that it had developed intelligence.

An Xi, Zhu Qing, and Butcher fought the intelligent Red-White Clash outside the Train. An Xi unleashed a thirty-meter Geng Metal spear, driving it into the pit where Zhu Qing had been attacking the Anomaly.

• Captain Hui and Chu Sheng realized that Anomalies had developed intelligence, while Zhu Qing kicked the Red-White Clash and An Xi pierced it with five Geng Metal spear streaks.
• Butcher sent its Eerie Cat after the Red-White Clash, which crushed the cat and restrained Butcher from a distance.
• Butcher’s knife manifested attacks from five Anomalies, wounding the Red-White Clash, while Butcher’s cries weakened its hold on him.
• An Xi struck the Red-White Clash with her Black Jade Bone Spear as Zhu Qing followed with a barrage of punches.
• An Xi transformed into a half-tiger and formed a thirty-meter golden Geng Metal spear, then plunged it into the pit as Zhu Qing dodged aside.

An Xi killed the two Anomalies with a devastating Geng Metal spear attack, while Chu Sheng and Captain Hui discussed the strength of Golden Armored Zombies and Hui's unusual use of the Eight Trigrams Sequence. As the crater came into view, Zhu Qing and An Xi inspected it, and A Xin and Old Man Li drove over.

• An Xi expanded Zhu Qing's crater with a powerful spear thrust, killing the two Anomalies, then leaned on her spear to catch her breath.
• Captain Hui told Chu Sheng that a Golden Armored Zombie could likely survive An Xi's attack and explained its strength and weaknesses.
• Captain Hui revealed that he had used his Eight Trigrams Sequence to divine information about jiangshi from other convoys' journals and legends.
• Captain Hui praised Old Man Li's hidden power, and Chu Sheng teased him about being a sneaky old bastard.
• Zhu Qing and An Xi inspected the crater, while A Xin drove over and Old Man Li approached in his swerving car.