Chapter Summaries

Mu Yi learned that Crystal City had only male and female gender classifications, leaving him as the world's only Alpha with no suppressants for his rut. After studying the city's history and Mutants, he went to the market and got into an argument with an exchange shop owner.

• Mu Yi read that Professor Yin had died at forty-six and wondered why Zhong Xuezhi avoided discussing her.
• Mu Yi searched for secondary genders and concluded that the world had no Alphas or Omegas, then realized Zhong Xuezhi had treated him as the same gender.
• Mu Yi learned about the dangerous Gene Fusion Plan and the risks Mutants faced from rising mutation values.
• Mu Yi used a Teleportation Array to reach the crowded market and entered a small exchange shop.
• The shop owner mistook Mu Yi for someone selling junk and ordered him to leave after Mu Yi teased him.

Mu Yi sold materials from the Dread Gloom Forest to a shopkeeper, turning the shopkeeper’s low offer into a payment of 8,800 by intimidating him. After Mu Yi left the exchange area, three burly men followed him and trapped him in a public restroom.

• Mu Yi revealed a Grade A shard crystal to make the little old man welcome him into the exchange shop.
• Mu Yi offered shard crystals and materials from the Dread Gloom Forest for appraisal, keeping the Grade A crystal and Giant-Bellied Colorful Spider silk off the table.
• The little old man offered increasingly higher prices, but Mu Yi insisted on 8,888 and threatened to wreck the shop.
• The little old man agreed to pay Mu Yi 8,800, and Mu Yi left with his first payment in the new world.
• Three burly men followed Mu Yi into a public restroom and locked the door while he calmly washed his hands.

Mu Yi robbed three men who had tried to rob him, then killed them when they offered to help him spread an infection. He left the restroom with their loot and spotted Team 403’s healer in a nearby park, where the man’s aura of death seemed stronger than before.

• Three men tried to rob Mu Yi in a public restroom, but he revealed himself as a Variant and trapped them with electricity.
• Mu Yi forced the men to hand over sixteen Storage Bags and transfer 996,000 gold from their Identity Bracelets.
• When the men offered to take him to crowded places, Mu Yi changed his mind about erasing their memories and electrocuted them to death.
• Mu Yi left the restroom carrying the stolen goods and wandered into a nearby park.
• Mu Yi spotted Team 403’s healer beneath a banyan tree and noticed that the man’s aura of death had grown thicker.

Mu Yi and Zhong Xuezhi discovered that Team 403's healer had transformed into an unknown S-rank Variant in Central Park, triggering Crystal City's highest-level invasion alarm. With the Variant still clinging to a banyan tree and its behavior unknown, Feng Zhengqing and the emergency responders arrived as the evacuation began.

• Mu Yi watched Team 403's healer climb a banyan tree and told Zhong Xuezhi about it when he called.
• Zhong Xuezhi flew to Central Park, noticed something was wrong, and called Feng Zhengqing to bring people from the Mutation Research Institute.
• Mu Yi and Zhong Xuezhi approached the healer, who clung to the tree and bit its bark before a blood-covered mushroom emerged through his torn clothes.
• Zhong Xuezhi's Identity Bracelet detected the healer as an S-rank Variant, and Zhong Xuezhi sent an emergency notice through the Crystal City Delta System.
• City Defense Force soldiers began evacuating the park while Feng Zhengqing and institute members reached the banyan tree, where Feng Zhengqing reacted with alarm.

Zhong Xuezhi and Feng Zhengqing discovered that a new S-rank Variant had released infectious spores, prompting Crystal City's leaders to impose emergency restrictions. As Mu Yi learned more about the outbreak fourteen years earlier, he realized Professor Yin had died by suicide in front of her adopted son, Zhong Xuezhi, and wondered why she had done it.

• Zhong Xuezhi froze the spore-releasing Variant and its healer, while Feng Zhengqing shielded those nearby, but the wind had already carried spores away.
• Zhong Xuezhi warned Delta's three leaders about the Variant, and they ordered the city sealed, strict isolation enforced, and more resources sent to research and medical facilities.
• Zhong Xuezhi persuaded Mu Yi to return home by extending their deal to ten days, then led Team 404 into the city's densely populated areas.
• Mu Yi overheard Uncle Cheng explain that Professor Yin had been infected during the S-rank Variant invasion fourteen years earlier and had shot herself in front of her adopted son.
• Mu Yi realized Zhong Xuezhi had been eleven at the time and wondered what purpose Professor Yin had concealed in her final actions.

Mu Yi experimented with absorbing shard crystal energy, which strengthened his pheromone current, then shared a video call and lunch with Zhong Xuezhi. Zhong Xuezhi stayed on break and promised to bring instant food home that Mu Yi could eat without cooking.

• Mu Yi reversed his pheromone current, merged it with a Grade A shard crystal, and absorbed the resulting energy.
• Mu Yi absorbed shard crystals of several grades and found that his level-two current had grown as powerful as a level-five current.
• Mu Yi electro-roasted two eggs and heated powdered milk with his pheromones for lunch.
• Zhong Xuezhi called Mu Yi, switched their voice call to video, and chewed Suppressant while taking a short break.
• Mu Yi teased Zhong Xuezhi about his excuse for chewing Suppressant and asked him not to bring food that needed to be cooked.

Zhong Xuezhi accepted Mu Yi’s shard crystals as payment and cooked dinner while explaining the grade S Zombie Fungus threat to Crystal City. The spores could infect the entire city within days, and the pair remained at home as the crisis loomed.

• Mu Yi gave Zhong Xuezhi three Storage Bags of shard crystals, explaining that he had taken them from people who tried to rob him.
• Zhong Xuezhi warned Mu Yi to be careful, then accepted the crystals and prepared a dinner of mutated bass soup and wild shepherd’s purse.
• Mu Yi asked about the grade S Variant, and Zhong Xuezhi explained that the research institute had identified it as a Zombie Fungus that infected Team 403’s healer.
• Zhong Xuezhi said the fungus could use a host to spread hundreds of millions of spores from Central Park and infect Crystal City within days.
• Mu Yi questioned Zhong Xuezhi’s decision to dig up wild greens during patrol, and Zhong Xuezhi defended keeping up his strength by eating and sleeping well.

Mu Yi insisted on accompanying Zhong Xuezhi to the Mutation Research Institute for his night shift, despite the risk of being spotted as a Variant. Zhong Xuezhi agreed after setting strict conditions, and they arrived to find Team 404 already there.

• Mu Yi tried to pay Zhong Xuezhi for washing the dishes with shard crystals, and Zhong Xuezhi accepted them after protesting that the gift made them seem like strangers.
• When Zhong Xuezhi prepared to leave for night duty, he let Mu Yi play with his snow leopard tail, but Mu Yi then insisted on going with him.
• Zhong Xuezhi agreed to take Mu Yi along after deciding it was safer to keep him nearby, and he ordered Mu Yi not to speak to strangers, use his ability, or stray more than three meters away.
• Mu Yi agreed to Zhong Xuezhi's conditions, and the two traveled to the Mutation Research Institute through an emergency passage.
• Qiu Cai panicked when he saw Mu Yi with Zhong Xuezhi, and Mu Yi explained that he had come because he could not stand staying indoors.

Mu Yi accompanied Zhong Xuezhi’s team to watch the Zombie Fungus at the Mutation Research Institute and discovered that absorbing shard crystals had sharpened his ability to see bioelectricity. Feng Zhengqing arrived and questioned why Zhong Xuezhi had brought Mu Yi on a mission, leaving Zhong to promise an explanation later.

• Mu Yi inspected the growing Zombie Fungus and fused corpse until Zhong Xuezhi pulled him away from the observation tank.
• Fu Chuan’s night-watch team arrived, exchanged greetings with Zhong Xuezhi, and left for the front entrance after Fu noticed Mu Yi beside him.
• Mu Yi sat by the tank and secretly absorbed the Grade D shard crystals in his pocket.
• After absorbing the crystals, Mu Yi saw bioelectric networks inside the Zombie Fungus and the people in the room, and observed that his electrical perception had become stronger.
• Feng Zhengqing entered with his junior assistant and asked Zhong Xuezhi why he had brought Mu Yi on a mission; Zhong said he would explain later.

Mu Yi noticed a strange bioelectric signal on Feng Zhengqing’s assistant and tested the institute’s portable sensor, which failed to reveal the signal’s details. The group still faced a one-week deadline to find Zombie Fungus-infected hosts, while Mu Yi’s discovery remained unexplained.

• Zhong Xuezhi asked Feng Zhengqing how long he had gone without sleep, and Feng Zhengqing said he had worked for three days and nights.
• Mu Yi saw scarlet bioelectric signals on Feng Zhengqing’s assistant that intensified near the Zombie Fungus and appeared to interact with it when Mu Yi pushed him toward the chamber.
• Feng Zhengqing estimated that Zombie Fungus spores had an incubation period of about a week and said the institute was developing a detector, which might take another day or two.
• Qiu Cai suggested asking Grandpa Feng to perform a divination, but Feng Zhengqing refused because the attempt could kill his grandfather.
• Mu Yi asked Feng Zhengqing to fetch a portable bioelectric sensor and scanned the Zombie Fungus and the assistant, but the device showed only green signals and missed the scarlet patch’s rhythm.
• Zhong Xuezhi asked Mu Yi what was so interesting about the sensor as Mu Yi continued examining it.