Chapter Summaries

Su Mo, a transmigrator preparing for the spring examination, struggled to make money in Capital City while pursuing his predecessor’s wish to place on the golden list. He ended the chapter lamenting his lack of special advantages after seeing a cultivator fly into a pleasure boat.

• Su Mo drank beside the Capital River while his maid complained that his calligraphy and paintings had sold at a loss.
• Su Mo told his maid to sell the remaining paintings for five taels each and went ashore to listen to music near the pleasure boats.
• Su Mo’s maid wrote in his journal about their arrival in Capital City, his spending, and his repeated visits to hear songs.
• Su Mo recalled transmigrating into the body of a provincial graduate and decided to aim for first place in the imperial examination.
• Su Mo complained that he had no system or special abilities, then watched a graceful figure fly into a nearby pleasure boat.

Su Mo found a jade flute and, overcome by homesickness, played it while thinking of his parents in his previous life. Elsewhere, Gu Yu visited Luo Yin with a stolen spirit artifact to help her break through, but discovered the Heart Flute was missing.

• Su Mo watched a cultivator fly over Capital City and found a flawless jade flute outside his pavilion.
• Su Mo remembered learning to play the flute in his previous life and played a tune that brought his homesickness to the surface.
• Gu Yu visited Luo Yin as she played the zither, and they teased each other about romance and her Dao of music.
• Gu Yu told Luo Yin he had stolen the Heart Flute to help her attempt a breakthrough.
• Gu Yu reached for the Heart Flute and realized it was gone.

Su Mo played the Heart Flute, first with a playful nursery rhyme and then with a nostalgic piece called Old Dream. His music reached Luo Yin, Gu Yu, and the visitors at the boat pavilion, who recognized him as the academy’s sword cultivator.

• Su Mo reflected on his past life, accepted his new circumstances, and began playing the Heart Flute with Two Tigers.
• Luo Yin and Gu Yu heard the Heart Flute from outside the pavilion and recognized the spirit artifact, while Luo Yin listened with amusement.
• Su Mo played Old Dream, recalling his school days and the longing for home and the past carried by the piece.
• The visitors at the boat pavilion heard the unfamiliar flute music after Luo Yin’s performance and were struck by its direct expression of feeling.
• The visitors learned that Luo Yin’s intimate friend had gone upstairs and concluded that the flute player was the academy’s sword cultivator.

Luo Yin accompanied Su Mo’s flute with her zither and broke through in the Music Dao. Gu Yu returned Su Mo’s attention to the Heart Flute and asked why he studied, leaving Su Mo unable to answer.

• Luo Yin recognized Su Mo’s homesickness in his flute playing and decided to accompany him on the zither.
• Luo Yin and Su Mo played a duet that moved the listeners and stirred spiritual energy around the pavilion boat.
• Luo Yin broke through after the duet, while Gu Yu went to find the flute player.
• Gu Yu found Su Mo playing the Heart Flute, identified himself as the Academy’s third disciple, and explained that the flute was a spiritual artifact from the Academy.
• Gu Yu asked Su Mo why he studied and told him that he could attain the Dao through studying, but Su Mo could not yet find an answer.

Gu Yu explained cultivation to Su Mo and planted a seed of spiritual power in him before reclaiming the Heart Flute. Su Mo returned to his boat and remembered how he had first met the orphaned little girl who now cared for him.

• Gu Yu told Su Mo that cultivation was about cultivating the heart, then planted a seed of spiritual power in Su Mo.
• Gu Yu took back the Heart Flute and returned to the pavilion, where Luo Yin asked about the ordinary person who had played it.
• Su Mo returned to his boat and comforted the little girl when she offered to bite whoever had bullied him.
• Su Mo recalled meeting the little girl as a homeless child, sharing food with her, and inviting her to come with him to Capital City.
• The little girl accepted Su Mo's offer to travel with him.

Su Mo took the little girl to sell a painting, using scarcity and curiosity to draw a crowd outside the pleasure boat's pavilion. The wealthy merchant kept raising his offer, but Su Mo still refused to unroll or sell the painting.

• Su Mo told the little girl he was unsure about becoming an official, then said they would sell calligraphy and paintings the next day.
• Su Mo learned that the little girl had sold two paintings cheaply outside a gambling den and explained how they should target scholars and merchants instead.
• Su Mo brought the little girl to the entrance of the pleasure boat's pavilion and set out one rolled-up painting without displaying it.
• A wealthy merchant offered ten copper coins for the painting, but Su Mo refused, drawing a crowd of curious onlookers.
• The merchant raised his offer to twenty copper coins, and Su Mo still shook his head while the crowd's discussion grew louder.

Su Mo drew a crowd by displaying a sealed painting and explaining that it captured a dream he could never paint again. After Duke Wei persuaded him to reveal it, the painting, titled Lotus Pond Skiff, impressed the onlookers.

• At the Academy, the headmaster ordered Gu Yu to buy a painting in Capital City and threatened to pursue his theft of the Heart Flute if he refused.
• Su Mo declined to unroll or sell his painting, prompting a crowd and several scholars to question him.
• Duke Wei arrived, reprimanded his pupils Zijie and Liu Feng, and asked Su Mo why he would not display the painting.
• Su Mo explained that he had painted a scene from a dream in a moment of inspiration and hoped to find a kindred spirit.
• A maid reported Su Mo's explanation to Luo Yin, who decided to go downstairs and see the painting.
• Su Mo unrolled the painting, and Duke Wei identified its scene as Lotus Pond Skiff, showing a child asleep in a boat among lotus leaves and blossoms.

Duke Wei praised Su Mo’s painting and suggested that a fitting inscription would reveal its meaning, prompting Liu Feng to offer to write one and provoke Su Mo. Su Mo decided to inscribe the painting himself, with Luo Yin offering brushes and ink, while Duke Wei warned him not to ruin his work in a moment of rivalry.

• Duke Wei praised Su Mo’s painting and asked him to inscribe a fitting poem, though he privately doubted Su Mo had painted it.
• Liu Feng offered to compose a verse for the painting, provoking Su Mo by disregarding the artist’s claim over it.
• Gu Yu arrived to buy the painting for the dean and recognized it as the work he had been sent to purchase.
• Su Mo declared that he would write a verse himself and asked for brush and ink.
• Luo Yin brought word that the Riverboat Pavilion had brushes and ink, and Duke Wei urged Su Mo to protect his masterpiece.
• Su Mo told Duke Wei that he could decide whether to destroy his own painting and entered the pavilion to write.

Su Mo defended his claim to the painting by selling it to Luo Yin and then inscribed it with a lyric that impressed everyone present. The chapter ended with Duke Wei praising the lyric and affirming that the day's events would be remembered.

• Liu Feng demanded that Su Mo hand over the painting for examination and questioned whether he had painted it.
• Gu Yu confronted Liu Feng, and Luo Yin stopped him before he could draw his sword.
• Luo Yin bought the painting from Su Mo for a hundred taels of silver, publicly recognizing his claim to it.
• At Luo Yin's request, Su Mo inscribed the painting with the lyric Silk-Covered.
• Duke Wei praised Su Mo's lyric for its natural imagery and expression of homesickness.

Su Mo sold his painting to Luo Yin for a hundred taels after Duke Wei praised his talent and Liu Feng left with a warning look. Gu Yu borrowed the painting for the Dean and revealed that Su Mo had played the flute the previous night, leaving Luo Yin lost in thought.

• Duke Wei learned that Su Mo was taking the Spring Examination, praised him, and left with Liu Feng and the others.
• After the crowd dispersed, Luo Yin refused to take back the hundred-tael payment, and Gu Yu warned Su Mo that Liu Feng might have targeted him deliberately.
• Su Mo took the little girl to get something good to eat, while Gu Yu returned to the Riverboat Pavilion and discussed the painting with Luo Yin.
• Gu Yu borrowed the painting for the Dean by promising to tell Luo Yin who had played the flute the previous night.
• Gu Yu revealed that Su Mo, also called Su Jingyan, had played the flute, then fled as Luo Yin froze in thought.

Su Mo and the little girl returned to their boat in a storm and found the woman who had once helped them, gravely wounded and carrying a baby. Though she warned that helping her would put him in danger, Su Mo refused to leave her behind.

• Su Mo carried the little girl back to the pleasure boat as rain began to fall, and they tied the boat to a mooring post.
• The little girl spotted the woman who had given Su Mo and her money when they first arrived in Capital City.
• Su Mo found the woman kneeling in the rain with a baby, covered in wounds, and learned that bandits had slaughtered her family.
• The woman warned Su Mo that anyone seen with her would die, but he urged her to take shelter on the boat.
• Su Mo turned back and declared that he would not fear a bad end if his conscience was clear.

After witnessing the dying woman and her baby being abandoned to their fate, Su Mo resolved to stop studying and leave after the Spring Examination, though he first planned to investigate the western woods. The headmaster had already chosen Su Mo as a new junior brother and ordered Gu Yu to retrieve him at midnight the next day without interfering in the larger game.

• Su Mo remembered that the woman had once given him and the little girl silver, and he explained that he stepped forward because he could not find peace while ignoring her suffering.
• The woman revealed that an arrow had pierced both her and her dead baby, told Su Mo he could not help her, and directed him to a solitary courtyard west of the city if he still remembered her when he became strong.
• The woman staggered away and later black-robed figures dragged away her and the baby's bodies while Su Mo stood unseen in the rain.
• Luo Yin watched Su Mo from the Riverboat Pavilion and wondered what kind of person sought peace of heart rather than weighing gains and losses.
• The headmaster told Gu Yu to bring Su Mo to the Academy from the western woods at midnight the next day and warned him not to interfere in anything else.
• The little girl stood beside Su Mo as he said he no longer wanted to study, planned to leave after the Spring Examination, and wanted to visit the west of the city first.

After witnessing two people die, Su Mo resolved to make a weapon so he and the little girl could protect themselves. He commissioned parts for a heavy bow, then stood for half the night at the place where the woman had cried, alone in the rain.

• Su Mo sent the little girl to bathe, then sketched designs for a weapon that could let ordinary people fight with Foundation Establishment-level power.
• After dinner, Su Mo left the boat with his drawings and commissioned a blacksmith to make the heavy bow and its mystic beast tendon string.
• Su Mo divided the remaining drawings among several shops so they could make the bow's other components.
• Su Mo returned to the street where the woman had cried, found no trace of what had happened, and stood there alone for half the night.

As relentless rain swelled the river, Su Mo hosted Luo Yin aboard the Painted Pleasure Boat, where his poetry and conversation revealed his extraordinary talent and stirred her to urge him to act. He sent the little girl to safety with Luo Yin and prepared to leave, while Luo Yin sensed a greater storm approaching.

• Su Mo returned to the Painted Pleasure Boat and comforted the little girl, who had waited up for him, then spent the rainy days aboard with her.
• Luo Yin visited to request a painting, read Su Mo’s half-finished lyric, and heard him recite its conclusion, leaving her maid astonished by his talent.
• Su Mo and Luo Yin played a game and discussed cultivation, immortals, and Su Mo’s wish to live freely; Luo Yin told him his heart carried the people and urged him to do something.
• Su Mo gave Luo Yin the lyric and asked her to take the little girl to the Riverboat Pavilion until he returned the next day.
• The little girl gave Su Mo her white stone as a peace charm, and Luo Yin led her away before remarking that a storm was coming.

Su Mo assembled a black Heavy Crossbow and set out at night to investigate the Red-Walled, White-Tiled Courtyard, claiming he would only look. At the Riverboat Pavilion, the little girl told Luo Yin that Su Mo was burdened by the deaths he had witnessed and revealed he had made a weapon.

• Su Mo collected parts from several blacksmiths, assembled a black Heavy Crossbow, and fitted it with an Immortal Object arrowhead.
• Su Mo prepared for the darkness and left the boat at night to head toward the secluded Red-Walled, White-Tiled Courtyard west of the city.
• The little girl told Luo Yin that she could not remember her name or past, and described Su Mo as clever, kind, and homesick.
• The little girl explained that Su Mo had been devastated by the deaths of the woman and baby, and asked Luo Yin to help him.
• The little girl revealed that Su Mo had gone to the courtyard and made a weapon, shocking Luo Yin.

Mude and Zhixuan investigated a blood-soaked compound and discovered black-robed figures carrying out a blood sacrifice. After the black-robed swordsman confronted them, he revealed late-stage foundation establishment power and vowed not to let them leave.

• Mude and Zhixuan approached a secluded compound after sensing heavy resentment and blood energy.
• Mude quietly broke the formation concealing the compound, and the pair saw black-robed figures dragging freshly killed people into a building.
• A sword-bearing black-robed man scolded his followers for letting people escape and threatened to use their blood if it happened again.
• Mude and Zhixuan identified the scene as a blood sacrifice by the demonic path and confronted the swordsman.
• The black-robed man discovered the broken formation, drew his sword, and said he could not let Mude and Zhixuan leave.

Daoist Mude and Monk Zhixuan discovered that a group of black-robed cultivators were refining a blood pill with living people’s blood, then fought them after being trapped. Mude and Zhixuan defeated the lesser fighters but were badly injured by the foundation establishment late-stage leader, leaving their fate uncertain.

• Mude and Zhixuan tried to escape the black-robed figures but were surrounded and questioned about what they had seen.
• The black-robed leader revealed that his group needed their living blood to complete a blood pill, angering Mude and Zhixuan.
• Zhixuan engaged the leader while Mude attacked the lesser cultivators, killing half of them before Zhixuan was knocked down.
• Mude and Zhixuan switched opponents, and Zhixuan finished off the remaining lackeys.
• The leader struck Mude with Sword Qi and dark red energy, sending him flying as Zhixuan, covered in blood, reached his side.

Zhixuan and Mude were trapped beneath the Golden Alms Bowl as the black-robed man attacked, until Su Mo killed him with the Featherless Arrow. Su Mo confronted the dying man about the lives he had taken, then wept over the injustice of the world.

• Zhixuan and Mude used the Golden Alms Bowl to shield themselves from the black-robed man, but its barrier could not hold many more blows.
• A Featherless Arrow shot from the darkness, pierced the black-robed man's chest, and broke against the stone beneath him.
• Su Mo entered the courtyard carrying a Heavy Crossbow and revealed that he had killed the black-robed man to protect the people he called vermin.
• Su Mo described the fear and grief of the man's victims, and the dying black-robed man recognized that he too rejoiced in life and grieved at death.
• Su Mo cried out against the world's injustice after killing for the first time.

Su Mo joined Mude and Zhixuan after killing the last black-robed cultivator with his Heavy Crossbow, then entered the bloodstained house to search for answers about the killing of mortals. Inside, he heard an eerie sound and warned his companions that someone—or something—else might be there.

• Su Mo killed the last black-robed cultivator with his Heavy Crossbow, and Mude and Zhixuan thanked him for saving them.
• Su Mo introduced himself as a mortal scholar and declined Mude and Zhixuan's invitations to join their sects.
• Su Mo said he had come seeking an answer about why cultivators killed mortals, then chose to investigate the bloodstained house.
• Mude and Zhixuan followed Su Mo inside, where they found nothing unusual at first.
• Su Mo heard a sound like crying and laughter and asked whether something else was in the house, prompting Zhixuan to suspect something unclean.

Su Mo, Daoist Mude, and Monk Zhixuan discovered an underground cavern where victims had been killed to refine a blood pill that could help someone enter the Dao. As Su Mo grieved for the dead, the eerie woman’s voice offered to help him avenge them if he begged her.

• Su Mo found a concealed door and followed a strange woman’s voice down the passage, while Daoist Mude and Monk Zhixuan followed him.
• The three emerged into a cavern filled with corpses hanging above a pool of blood, where a pill floated over a bronze cauldron.
• Daoist Mude explained that the blood pill could restore vitality and let an ordinary person enter the Dao, and suspected a clan scion had ordered its creation.
• Su Mo wept and railed against the use of human lives for cultivation, while a fierce anger began to grow within him.
• The woman’s voice spoke clearly in Su Mo’s mind and offered to help him avenge the wronged souls if he begged her.