Chapter Summaries

Su Jiu and her companions reached a sealed doorway and discovered an unfamiliar, rapidly shifting formation that even Chu Luohen could only identify from an ancient text. They learned Gu Ningyun and Lie Wushuang had entered the formation, while the two cultivators who had followed them concealed their earlier conflict with Gu Ningyun.

• Silver Snow shattered the enormous door, revealing a red formation curtain that blocked the passage.
• Su Jiu and Chu Luohen examined the autonomous formation disk and realized that breaking it would require adjusting its patterns faster than they changed.
• The man and woman they had encountered earlier appeared, and Ning Fan asked whether Gu Ningyun and Lie Wushuang had passed through the doorway.
• The man confirmed that Gu Ningyun and Lie Wushuang had entered the red curtain, which had been too hot for him and the woman to approach.
• The woman claimed they had fought Gu Ningyun after greed led them to covet something valuable, while Su Jiu inferred that they were hiding the full truth.

Su Jiu discovered that the murals came alive to people with Otherworldly Eyes and nearly lost her Divine Sense before Chu Luohen called her back. As she recovered, she realized the paintings might reveal how to break the red formation, while the chapter recounted how Gu Ningyun and Lie Wushuang had been driven into the space below the arena with two hostile cultivators.

• Su Jiu saw living scenes inside the murals, but Chu Luohen called her awake and Little Gift deactivated her Otherworldly Eyes before the paintings could consume her Divine Sense.
• Su Jiu recovered and concluded that the paintings targeted people with Otherworldly Eyes and that their movements might be linked to the Formation Disk.
• Ning Fan learned that Gu Ningyun and Lie Wushuang had used an ice-blue Magic Treasure to pass through the red curtain, and he recognized it as likely an Ice Jade Ruyi.
• Gu Ningyun and Lie Wushuang fought four cultivators who had lured a wraith toward them, and the battle broke the seals on a row of houses, releasing a swarm of wraiths.
• Lie Wushuang took Gu Ningyun beneath the collapsed arena and persuaded her to spare the surviving man and woman as potential bait.

Lie Wushuang and Gu Ningyun entered a scorching red curtain using the Ice Jade Ruyi, while a woman failed to follow them and later encountered Su Jiu's group. A Demon Hound emerged from a painting and attacked the group before Su Jiu's Ice Spikes forced it back inside, leaving her to consider an ancient art that animated beings trapped in paintings.

• Lie Wushuang tested the red curtain's heat on a man, then Gu Ningyun used the Ice Jade Ruyi to lead her through it.
• The woman could not enter the curtain and later left with the man, who was too injured to continue before they encountered Su Jiu.
• Huang Kuo touched a painting's frame, burned his fingers, and caused the landscape inside it to move.
• A Demon Hound emerged from the painting and attacked Ning Fan and the others.
• Su Jiu's Ice Spikes hurt the Demon Hound, which reverted to black mist and returned to the painting.
• Su Jiu recognized the painting's effect as an ancient art that could animate beings imprisoned within it for a limited time.

Su Jiu and Silver Snow explained how the sealed paintings trapped magic beasts and their prey, and suspected Su Jiu's unusual spiritual qi had altered one beast's behavior. The group remained wary of the paintings as Huang Kuo questioned Shu Wugui about his connection to Su Jiu and the others.

• Su Jiu recognized that the paintings had likely been sealed for ten thousand years and wondered how they had reached this place from the Windforest Star River.
• Silver Snow explained that every painting held a magic beast, which hunted and imprisoned its prey's soul, while unsealed scenery paintings remained dangerous.
• Su Jiu and Silver Snow noticed that a magic beast had returned to a painting in an unusual form, and Silver Snow suspected Su Jiu's strange qi was responsible.
• Silver Snow warned Su Jiu that larger paintings held stronger beasts and that exhausting her spiritual qi could put her in danger.
• Ning Fan recorded the paintings, while Chu Luohen watched Su Jiu and Silver Snow communicate privately.
• Huang Kuo asked Shu Wugui why he had joined Su Jiu and the others, and Shu Wugui bristled at the question.

Shu Wugui agreed to stay at Huang Kuo’s home, while Su Jiu discovered that tearing down paintings revealed parts of the formation and decided to deduce its full pattern. When a released Magic Beast attacked, the woman they had been protecting tried to use Shu Wugui and Huang Kuo as bait, and they shut her out behind a Defensive Barrier.

• Huang Kuo invited Shu Wugui to stay at his home, and Shu Wugui agreed after realizing he had nowhere else to go.
• Su Jiu tore down the painting Huang Kuo had touched and found part of a formation pattern beneath it.
• Su Jiu proposed tearing down a few more paintings and deducing the complete formation pattern, and Silver Snow cautiously accepted the plan.
• Su Jiu and Chu Luohen destroyed a smaller painting, releasing the souls of a Magic Beast and a human.
• The Magic Beast charged at the woman, who tried to lure it toward Shu Wugui and Huang Kuo, but they enclosed themselves in a Defensive Barrier and left her outside.
• Shu Wugui and Huang Kuo accused the woman of trying to use them as bait, while the approaching Magic Beast forced her to flee.

Ning Fan, Su Jiu, and the others defeated the Magic Beast and discovered that the souls trapped in the paintings belonged to a tribe. One soul warned them that the painting of an old fisherman was dangerous and explained that its creator was a powerful heretical cultivator who could trap beings inside his paintings.

• Ning Fan, Su Jiu, and Chu Luohen attacked the Magic Beast after it bit off the former cultivation partner’s arm, and Su Jiu froze its hidden Demonic Qi needles with Thousand-Mile Ice Seal.
• Su Jiu, Chu Luohen, and Ning Fan struck the weakened Magic Beast, dispersing it and leaving an incomplete formation pattern on the wall.
• The soul they had freed asked Su Jiu to save his tribespeople, then reacted with alarm to the painting of an old man fishing and said its subject was not one of his tribespeople.
• The soul told Su Jiu that the old fisherman was a strand of the paintings’ owner’s Divine Sense and that the owner was a gifted heretical cultivator whose paintings could contain anything with lower cultivation than his.

Su Jiu and Chu Luohen rescued members of the Gu Household from the paintings and learned that their enemies were the Zhu Household and the Si Family of the Shangyin Continent. As they worked to construct a formation that might reach Gu Ningyun behind the Red Curtain, they disagreed over how to complete its final layer.

• Su Jiu questioned a soul from the Gu Household, who explained that the Zhu Household and the Si Family of the Shangyin Continent had destroyed his family and that he hoped Gu Ningyun was still alive.
• Su Jiu told the soul that Gu Ningyun was likely inside the Red Curtain formation, then urged him to focus on rescuing his clansmen and young lady.
• Su Jiu and Chu Luohen rescued more Gu Household members, including the Elder Gu Family Head, while gathering formation markings from the wall.
• A Gu Household Disciple told the Elder Gu Family Head that Gu Ningyun might be inside the formation, and he dismissed the disciple’s suspicion that Su Jiu and her companions meant her harm.
• Su Jiu and Chu Luohen debated whether the formation’s key needed an additional layer of variation, then stopped inscribing when they could not agree.

Su Jiu and Chu Luohen tried to break the formation, but their first attempt failed and Chu Luohen began drawing it again. Meanwhile, Ning Fan secretly killed the hostile woman with the Spirit-Inducing Art, prompting the old Gu patriarch to question him about his background and invent a story about his master, Ning Hai.

• Su Jiu agreed to try her formation method, and Chu Luohen completed the formation, but it was overwhelmed by the red light and shattered.
• Su Jiu apologized for the failed attempt, and Chu Luohen began drawing the formation again.
• A woman mocked their failure, and Huang Kuo and a Gu Household disciple rebuked her as the others refused to support her.
• Ning Fan sent a wisp of spiritual qi into the woman's head, killing her with the Spirit-Inducing Art; Silver Snow and the old Gu patriarch sensed his action.
• The old Gu patriarch asked Ning Fan about his sect and master, then imagined that Ning Hai had adopted him after the deaths of his parents.

Su Jiu and Chu Luohen stabilized the red-curtain formation with the Darkness Stone’s demonic aura, then entered it to search for its formation eye. Inside, Gu Ningyun and Lie Wushuang remained unaware that the peaceful courtyard surrounding them was a powerful formation.

• Su Jiu and Chu Luohen’s revised formation failed until Ning Fan gave Su Jiu a Darkness Stone to supply the missing demonic aura.
• Su Jiu used the Darkness Stone to complete the formation, which stopped the red curtain from rearranging but did not reveal its formation eye.
• Su Jiu and Chu Luohen entered the red curtain, followed by Ning Fan, Shu Wugui, the Gu Household souls, and the remaining man and woman.
• The man warned the woman not to rely on others and entered the formation; realizing she might be trapped if she stayed behind, she followed.
• Gu Ningyun and Lie Wushuang wandered into a peaceful courtyard inside the formation without realizing they were trapped.

Gu Ningyun searched a recreation of the Gu Household on Netherworld Mountain and found records hinting that its ties to the Zhu Household and Si Family ended a century before its destruction. After the formation shifted her and Lie Wushuang into another courtyard, a ghostly old man revealed that he was Gu Ningyun’s great-grandfather.

• Gu Ningyun and Lie Wushuang found a portrait resembling Gu Ningyun and bamboo slips bearing the name Gu Ran in the courtyard’s master bedroom.
• Gu Ningyun read the records and discovered that the Gu Household had lost contact with the Zhu Household and Si Family for a hundred years before its extermination.
• Lie Wushuang comforted Gu Ningyun and promised to stand by her, whatever the truth about the Gu Household’s destruction.
• Su Jiu and others arrived as Ning Fan uncovered seven Black Stones beneath a pear blossom tree, triggering the formation and shifting everyone into a second courtyard.
• The Gu Household’s former patriarch explained that the Zhu Household had recreated the place and told Gu Ningyun he was her great-grandfather.

Gu Ningyun learned that the Zhu Household and the Si Family had destroyed the Gu Household to seize its sacred artifact, while Su Jiu and Chu Luohen uncovered the secret of the Windforest Star River’s broken seal. The Elder Gu Family Head revealed that Ning Fan could sense darkness stone, hinting at his connection to a particular lineage.

• The Elder Gu Family Head explained that the Si Family discovered the Gu Household’s sacred artifact and joined with the Zhu Household to massacre the family, while Gu Ningyun’s mother died taking Si Que’s eldest paternal uncle with her.
• Gu Ningyun vowed to reclaim the sacred artifact and seek revenge on the Zhu Household, but promised not to act rashly; the Gu Household spirits planned to become ghost cultivators.
• The Elder Gu Family Head revealed that the Zhu Household had colluded with demonic cultivators and kept the Gu Household souls in a painting to feed its magic beast.
• Su Jiu and Chu Luohen learned that the Windforest Star River’s seal had broken four hundred years earlier and that visitors had been forced to swear secrecy by major sects.
• At the Gu Household’s Council Hall, Ning Fan struck a boulder, and the Elder Gu Family Head recognized that he could sense darkness stone and suggested he belonged to a certain lineage.

Su Jiu and her companions broke through the seven-courtyard formation, only to discover that its formation spirit had set deadly rules for their escape. As Su Jiu warned everyone not to accept those rules, the grieving man who had lost his Dao companion was lured toward the red teleportation array.

• Ning Fan found the darkness stones that collapsed the courtyards, while Chu Luohen killed the ill-intentioned woman with a secret art.
• Su Jiu realized each courtyard contained seven darkness stones, and Ning Fan found the last seven in the final courtyard.
• A formation spirit appeared and explained that the group could leave through three teleportation arrays, but its rules required a volunteer for the Demon-Subduing Land or the death of a person for everyone to use the red array.
• Su Jiu identified the voice as a formation spirit and urged the group not to follow its rules, explaining that it was trying to establish them through its exits.
• The man who had lost his Dao companion doubted Su Jiu and was tempted by the formation spirit, then separated from the others and walked toward the red ring.

Su Jiu exposed the formation spirit hiding in the guise of the Gu Household disciple A Yin and explained why it had urged them to force an injured man into the black Teleportation Array. The spirit had become an evil spirit, and Su Jiu prepared to confront it within its domain.

• An unfamiliar man failed to reach the red Teleportation Array and claimed a strange voice had tempted him to go there.
• When a Gu Household disciple called A Yin urged the others to sacrifice the injured man, Su Jiu and Elder Gu Family Head recognized that something was wrong with him.
• Su Jiu revealed that the formation spirit had replaced a Gu Household disciple and had been hiding among them.
• Silver Snow explained that forcing someone into the black Teleportation Array could trap everyone and shut down the other arrays.
• Su Jiu identified the formation spirit as an evil spirit and drew the Frostbound Purple Ultimate Sword, though the group remained bound by its domain.

Su Jiu and the others fought the formation spirit, which used the space’s laws to slow their attacks while draining their spiritual qi. Su Jiu tricked the laws into withdrawing their support and struck the spirit, leaving it badly wounded and desperate for rescue.

• Su Jiu and the others discovered that the formation spirit could manipulate time in the space, making their attacks easy to evade while it tried to exhaust their spiritual qi.
• Su Jiu deduced that the laws forbade the spirit from killing anyone, while Chu Luohen’s attempt to overpower the laws with his domain caused a backlash.
• The formation spirit attacked Su Jiu, and she let its energy pierce her chest to make the laws believe it had killed her and withdraw their support.
• Su Jiu revealed she was unharmed, then struck the unsupported formation spirit with her Frostbound Purple Ultimate Sword.
• The sword’s energy clashed with the darkness stone’s aura inside the spirit, which feared it would die and wondered why the person who promised to save it had not appeared.

After the Formation Spirit died, Su Jiu and the others discovered that its resentment had tainted the Teleportation Arrays and might have changed their destinations. Su Jiu cleansed the resentful qi, allowing the group to leave, while Gu Ningyun thanked her and Lie Wushuang followed Gu Ningyun.

• The Elder Gu Family Head warned that the Formation Spirit might have cursed the three Teleportation Arrays, and Su Jiu suspected their destinations had changed.
• Chu Luohen examined Su Jiu's meridians and warned her not to risk herself like that again; Su Jiu reassured him that he was beside her.
• A man rushed toward the red Teleportation Array and was drained of his blood and vital energy by resentful qi.
• Su Jiu used the Nine-Star World-Cleansing Pearl to cleanse the resentful qi, but the Teleportation Arrays remained unpredictable.
• Gu Ningyun thanked Su Jiu and left with the Gu Household members, while Lie Wushuang hurried after her and turned back to smile at Su Jiu.

Su Jiu and Chu Luohen prepared to leave the formation seam after the others departed, while Silver Snow tried to persuade Su Jiu to bring him to the Azure Tide Sect. When the red and golden Teleportation Arrays vanished, they jumped into the last remaining black array, not knowing where it would take them.

• Lie Wushuang gave Su Jiu a valuable demon-hunting stone before leaving, and Huang Kuo and Shu Wugui departed after thanking and apologizing to her.
• Su Jiu explained to Silver Snow that she could not set up a Teleportation Array in the seam without the rules' approval.
• Silver Snow asked to return to the Azure Tide Sect with Su Jiu, but Chu Luohen objected and said she had no authority to bring an outsider there.
• Chu Luohen stopped Su Jiu before she entered the array and asked whether she truly intended to take Silver Snow back to the sect.
• The red and golden Teleportation Arrays disappeared, so Su Jiu and Chu Luohen rushed into the remaining black array to escape the seam.

Su Jiu and Chu Luohen were swallowed by a violent teleportation array, and Su Jiu lost consciousness while someone held her. In a remote desert city, Zabu and his family heard about something crashing near a water source, while Zabu wondered what the mysterious old man knew; the old man returned to a room filled with memorial tablets.

• Su Jiu and Chu Luohen entered the array, and its violent spiritual qi suppressed Su Jiu and wounded her until she nearly lost consciousness.
• Someone held Su Jiu in the teleportation passage, and the chapter shifted to a small city in the Azure Realm desert where residents believed God prevented them from leaving.
• Zabu spoke with the old man called God's Messenger and questioned how he survived without eating.
• Zabu's father told the family that something had crashed near the pool of water he found, and he planned to investigate after the sandstorm passed.
• The old man returned to his home, sealed the doors and windows, and entered a bare room with memorial tablets on its table.

Su Jiu woke in a desert without spiritual qi, badly injured and unable to use her cultivation abilities. She carried the unconscious Chu Luohen through the desert and survived a sandstorm and rain, while he showed faint signs of recovery.

• Su Jiu woke on the sand and discovered that her spiritual qi, Storage Bag, and Sea of Consciousness were inaccessible.
• Su Jiu found the badly injured Chu Luohen and carried him on her back, unable to help him with cultivation techniques.
• When Chu Luohen's heartbeat weakened, Su Jiu used her own blood to moisten his lips and urged him to hold on.
• Su Jiu sheltered with Chu Luohen behind a dune during a sandstorm, covering them with their Spirit Artifact robes.
• After the storm, Su Jiu used the rain to revive Chu Luohen and continued onward as his fingers twitched.

After finding an oasis, Su Jiu hid Chu Luohen when a young pair arrived and were threatened by three bandits. She stepped in to help them in exchange for a favor, though she had no spiritual qi and did not know how strong the bandits were.

• On the fifth day after the rain, Su Jiu found a small oasis and fed water to Chu Luohen.
• A girl named Moglis and a boy arrived, and the boy noticed footprints by the pool as they filled their waterskins.
• Three bandits confronted Moglis and the boy, claiming the oasis and threatening to kill them.
• Su Jiu alerted the boy to the approaching bandits, and Chu Luohen slipped against the tree, drawing everyone's attention.
• The boy led Moglis toward Su Jiu, who emerged and offered to deal with the bandits in exchange for a favor.
• The boy doubted Su Jiu could fight in her ragged, bloodstained state, while she concealed Chu Luohen and weighed her options without spiritual qi.

Su Jiu fought off one of the attackers while refusing to help Moglis and Peter after they had tried to use her as a shield. As Peter struggled to protect Moglis, she agreed to three conditions in exchange for Su Jiu saving them.

• Moglis was wounded while shoving Peter out of the way of an attacker’s blade.
• Su Jiu dodged an attacker and drove a branch through his shoulder, then spared his life to avoid karmic consequences.
• The other two attackers focused on Peter and Moglis, and Su Jiu refused Peter’s demand that she help them.
• Moglis agreed to Su Jiu’s demand for two conditions, but Peter rejected the bargain.
• Su Jiu raised her demand to three conditions, and Moglis accepted, believing Su Jiu was a good person.