Chapter Summaries

Su Mo received the Demon Sage’s final Divine Soul thought and asked Revered Master Withered Leaf about a monk whose body became an undecayed Golden Body. Withered Leaf answered with a legend of a monk who entered mortal life for love, learned that life itself was ultimate bliss, and died beneath a tree as a Buddha.

• Su Mo left the Buddhist hall after defeating Withered Leaf in their three days of debate on the Dao, and Withered Leaf refused to conceal his loss.
• The next day, Withered Leaf released the Demon Sage’s final strand of Divine Soul thought, completing the handover of all four strands to Su Mo.
• Su Mo declined to debate and asked Withered Leaf what could cause a monk’s body to become a Golden Body after death.
• Withered Leaf and the Buddhist disciples reacted with shock when Su Mo confirmed that he was asking about a friend.
• Withered Leaf told Su Mo the legend of a monk who became a woman’s partner, learned from her that life was ultimate bliss, and attained Buddhahood after dying beneath a tree.

Su Mo learned that the Bodhi Fruit on Mount Sumeru might awaken Hui Kong’s Divine Soul, and persuaded Withered Leaf to send him into Sumeru. Carrying Hui Kong’s Golden Body, Su Mo began climbing Mount Sumeru while Yanzhi and Withered Leaf kept watch outside.

• Withered Leaf told Su Mo that the Bodhi Tree stood on Mount Sumeru and that its fruit could sustain a Dharma Thought.
• Su Mo asked Withered Leaf to help him reach Mount Sumeru, explaining that he needed the Bodhi Fruit to revive Hui Kong.
• Withered Leaf opened a passage into Sumeru and warned Su Mo that Dao Arts would fail there and that he would have to climb on foot with Hui Kong’s Golden Body.
• Su Mo asked the Book Sage to return to Peach Blossom Haven and Yanzhi to wait at the passage; the Book Sage agreed after hearing Su Mo’s private request.
• Withered Leaf warned Su Mo that the Five Purification Platforms would reveal his Five Poisons of the Heart, but Su Mo entered Sumeru carrying Hui Kong.
• Yanzhi and Withered Leaf remained to guard the entrance as the Book Sage departed, and Su Mo started climbing Mount Sumeru’s red-leaf-covered steps.

Su Mo climbed Mount Sumeru carrying Hui Kong's Golden Body and reached the Doubt-Cleansing Platform, where his doubts took the form of a scholar who looked like his past self. The two discussed whether reality and illusion mattered, and Su Mo admitted that he was exhausted from fearing that everything before him was false.

• Su Mo climbed Mount Sumeru with Hui Kong's Golden Body on his back, unable to use cultivation but relying on his Divine Body's strength.
• The Brush of All Living Beings explained that the Doubt-Cleansing Platform revealed the doubts of anyone who stepped onto it.
• Su Mo stepped onto the platform, which manifested his doubt as a white-robed scholar with ink-black hair.
• The scholar told Su Mo that he was Su Mo's past self and questioned why Su Mo doubted reality and his own past.
• Su Mo said he had asked Gu Yu to guard a dream because he did not want another person's dream to end in regret.
• The scholar asked if Su Mo was tired, and Su Mo admitted that he was very tired.

Scholar explained that Su Mo kept helping others because his actions made him feel connected to a world that otherwise seemed unreal. Su Mo accepted that pain and consequence were part of that reality, then continued toward Mount Sumeru’s summit.

• Scholar told Su Mo that he acted to escape the loneliness of feeling like an outsider in the world.
• Su Mo recalled first feeling real after helping a starving refugee and described the painful consequences of later good deeds.
• Su Mo said he preferred suffering in this world to returning to the loneliness of being an ordinary Provincial Graduate Su.
• Scholar asked whether the world was a dream or a book, and Su Mo replied that he would write it well and make it feel real.
• Scholar praised Su Mo’s understanding, disappeared, and Su Mo continued toward the summit of Mount Sumeru.

Su Mo reached the Slow Purification Platform on Mount Sumeru, where its mirrors revealed the Brush of All Living Beings’ arrogance and the painful history of its separation from Old Codger. After the Brush faced its past, the mirrors cleared and Su Mo crossed the platform carrying Hui Kong.

• Su Mo and the Brush of All Living Beings reached the Slow Purification Platform, which reflected a person’s arrogance.
• The mirrors first showed no arrogance in Su Mo, then filled with countless images of the Brush of All Living Beings.
• The Brush told Su Mo that it had once looked down on all living beings and tried to stop Old Codger from risking his life to save thousands.
• The Brush explained that Old Codger severed their life bond and sealed it in a ruined temple before entering the game alone.
• After the Brush accepted that its former selves filled the mirrors, their images vanished and Su Mo crossed the Slow Purification Platform with Hui Kong on his back.

Su Mo continued climbing Mount Sumeru and learned from the Brush of All Living Beings that his Divine Maiden sister might be a true immortal in the Star-Picking Realm. At the Delusion Purification Platform, he encountered Liu Feng, who addressed him as Su Jingyan.

• Su Mo rested on the mountain path and asked why Mount Sumeru had been isolated; the Brush of All Living Beings said it might suppress a terrifying existence.
• The Brush of All Living Beings explained that Su Mo’s Divine Maiden sister might be a Star-Picking Realm immortal who had forgotten her past and power.
• Su Mo resumed climbing Mount Sumeru, and after what he believed had been three months, he reached the Delusion Purification Platform.
• Su Mo stepped onto the platform carrying Hui Kong’s Golden Body, and a vision of a young man appeared across its tea table.
• The young man greeted Su Mo as Su Jingyan, and Su Mo answered that he had been well and called him Liu Feng.

Su Mo spoke with Liu Feng on the Purification Terrace and learned that the Liu Household had been sacrificed as part of a plan to force him to enter the Dao. Liu Feng explained why he had accepted the scheme, leaving Su Mo to confront the truth behind the Liu Household’s infamy.

• Su Mo met Liu Feng on the Purification Terrace and realized Liu Feng was not merely his obsessive delusion but a dead person whose memories were unclear.
• Liu Feng recognized that Su Mo had become the Human Emperor and hinted that His Majesty had once made a plan involving the Liu Household.
• Su Mo pressed Liu Feng about the West City deaths and his mother’s Blood Pill, and Liu Feng insisted that the events had been part of a scheme to force Su Mo to enter the Dao.
• Liu Feng explained that His Majesty summoned his father and revealed a plan requiring sacrifices, with the Liu Household as the first move and Su Mo as a piece outside the game.
• Liu Feng said he had challenged Su Mo at the Riverboat Pavilion to judge whether he deserved the sacrifice, then agreed after hearing Su Mo’s lyric and later understanding his words about bringing peace to all generations.

Liu Feng revealed how the Liu Household’s plan used his mother and newborn brother as a guide to reach Su Mo, and explained that the household had not killed people indiscriminately. Su Mo realized Liu Feng was an obsession born from his fear that the family’s sacrifice had been in vain; after Su Mo told him the Liu Household’s name had been cleared and the Nine Heavens were at peace, Liu Feng’s obsession dissipated, freeing Su Mo from part of his guilt as he continued up Mount Sumeru.

• Liu Feng told Su Mo that his mother volunteered to guide him into the plan and that the swaddled infant was his newborn younger brother, whose presence was meant to stir Su Mo’s sympathy.
• Liu Feng explained that he swallowed a Blood Pill containing his mother’s and brother’s blood and insisted the Liu Household had not killed indiscriminately, since the other victims were gravely ill or near death.
• Su Mo realized Liu Feng was an obsession revealed through the Delusion Purification Platform, while Liu Feng recognized that he had feared his household’s sacrifice would be forgotten and its name condemned.
• Su Mo admitted his folly was judging the Liu Household as traitors and killing Liu Feng, and said he regretted it deeply.
• Su Mo told Liu Feng that the Nine Heavens were at peace and the Liu Household’s name had been cleared; Liu Feng’s obsession then faded after he accepted Su Mo’s apology.
• Liu Feng’s farewell loosened a shackle within Su Mo, who continued toward Mount Sumeru’s summit, still burdened by sorrow.

Su Mo faced the Aversion Purification Terrace, where accusations from people he had once saved revealed that their hatred still wounded him. Unable to cross, he heard a little girl defend him as the curses stopped.

• Su Mo reached the Aversion Purification Terrace after two months of travel, with two of the five terraces still ahead.
• The terrace showed Su Mo countless people cursing him for alleged crimes and demanding his death.
• Su Mo admitted he had been unhappy at the accusations but said the people feared him rather than resented him, and that he did not blame them.
• The Brush of All Living Beings explained that Su Mo could not leave while a knot of aversion remained in his heart.
• A little girl in a teahouse cried out that the Human Emperor was nothing like the accusations, silencing the crowd.

Su Mo heard little Huanhuan defend him in an illusion, easing the sorrow he carried out of the Aversion Purification Terrace. Exhausted, he reached the Greed Purification Terrace and collapsed at the broken end of its bridge before falling into the abyss, while the Brush of All Living Beings wondered why he had seen no illusions.

• In an illusion, Huanhuan defended Su Mo against people cursing him, recalling how he had saved her and Xixi and sacrificed for the people of the Nine Heavens.
• Su Mo realized that some people still understood and defended him, then left the Aversion Purification Terrace and thanked Huanhuan.
• After traveling for months toward the summit, Su Mo reached a stone bridge that the Brush of All Living Beings identified as the Greed Purification Terrace.
• The Brush of All Living Beings warned that Su Mo’s unrestrained mortal desires could make the terrace difficult to cross, but Su Mo saw no illusions as he walked across the bridge.
• The Brush of All Living Beings warned Su Mo that the bridge ended before the summit, but Su Mo collapsed at the broken edge before he could fall into the abyss.

On the Greed Purification Terrace, Su Mo reunited with the Dean and the Academy, but learned that only his greed had returned and that the others could not see him. He asked about Girl and said he knew where to find a Flower of the Other Shore.

• Su Mo awoke on the Greed Purification Terrace and embraced the Dean, who told him that the terrace reflected his heart and that everything there existed between illusion and reality.
• The Dean explained that Su Mo had entered the Divine Realm to seek the Flower of the Other Shore and had not yet returned.
• Su Mo saw Gu Yu and the other Academy disciples, but passed through Gu Yu and realized they could not see him.
• The Dean told Su Mo that the terrace’s world was real while Su Mo was false, because only his greed had returned; the Dean was false too.
• Su Mo asked where Girl was, learned that her divine soul was shattered and she remained asleep, then said he knew a place with a Flower of the Other Shore.

Su Mo found the flower of the other shore and helped awaken Girl, but she could not see him inside the Greed Purification Terrace’s dream. The Dean took Su Mo away to continue across the terrace, while Girl sensed that her Older Brother had returned and secretly erased the truth from her diary.

• Su Mo traveled to the Floating Life Pool, picked a flower of the other shore, and returned it to the Dean.
• The Dean turned the flower into green light that strengthened Girl’s divine soul and awakened her.
• Girl asked for her Young Master and sensed Su Mo nearby, while the Dean told her he was still in the Divine Realm.
• The Academy disciples welcomed Girl, and Su Mo watched her play with them before the Dean urged him to leave the Greed Purification Terrace.
• The Dean took Su Mo away, and Girl wrote that her Older Brother had found and saved her before erasing the note to protect karma.

Ji Ting learned that the Pei Clan’s inherited Three Questions gave Su Eternal Life a path to Sagehood, while the three powers that helped the Ji Clan seize the world demanded that Ji Ting walk the Ascend to Immortality Ancient Road. The black-clothed elder urged him to seek the remaining Fortune or an Innate Pure Spiritual Root, and Ji Shuang was told she would be married to Ji Ting.

• Ji Ting complained to the black-clothed elder that he had gained only half the world’s Fortune and was inferior to Su Eternal Life despite his greater cultivation.
• The black-clothed elder explained that the Pei Clan’s Life Souls held the answers to the Three Questions, allowing its members to enter Sagehood directly from the Inquiry Realm.
• Ji Ting admitted the three powers that had helped the Ji Clan take the world were now compelling him to walk the Ascend to Immortality Ancient Road, though he lacked confidence with only half the Fortune.
• The black-clothed elder told Ji Ting his remaining options were to obtain the rest of the world’s Fortune or an Innate Pure Spiritual Root, and mentioned that the Ji Clan was arranging a marriage for him.
• Ji Shuang learned that the Ji Clan planned to marry her to an older brother she had never met, and realized her family had hidden her identity as a Ji Clan daughter.

Ji Shuang learned from the Hairpin that the Ji Clan had raised her to exploit her innate spirit body and planned to marry her to Ji Ting. After asking the Hairpin to take her away, she vanished from the Void-Sealing Hall, with nowhere known to go.

• The Ji Clan patriarch ordered Ji Shuang confined and announced plans to marry her to Ji Ting, while Ji Yue was also kept under guard for opposing the marriage.
• The patriarch told the Woman that Ji Shuang was not their biological daughter and defended the marriage as a way to use her innate spirit body for Ji Ting without taking it outright.
• The Hairpin replayed the patriarch's conversation for Ji Shuang, revealing that the Ji Clan had raised her with the intention of using her spirit body.
• Ji Shuang clung to the Hairpin and begged it to take her away from the Ji Clan.
• The Hairpin broke its self-imposed seal and carried Ji Shuang away, marking her third escape.

The Dean explained to Su Mo that the Divine Realm was a hole in the Floating Leaf connected to the Long River, revealing that roughly a thousand years may have passed since Su Mo left. He offered Su Mo a Forget-Worry herb to escape the Greed Purification Terrace, but Su Mo refused because he wanted to pass through it and reach Mount Sumeru.

• The Dean brought Su Mo to the Dark River and explained that the Divine Realm was a hole in the Floating Leaf that connected to the Long River.
• The Dean told Su Mo that he had entered the world at the same point in time rather than traveling upstream, leading Su Mo to realize that about a thousand years may have passed since he left the Nine Heavens and Ten Earths.
• The Dean reassured Su Mo that he might still find the Floating Leaf and the people he cared about if he reached the summit.
• The Dean retrieved a Forget-Worry herb and explained that it could help Su Mo escape the Greed Purification Terrace, though it would not let him pass through it.
• Su Mo refused the herb because he wanted to climb Mount Sumeru and pluck a Bodhi Fruit, then declared that he would show the Greed Purification Terrace his greed.

Su Mo broke free of the Greed Purification Terrace by confronting the changing breadth of his desires, from survival to peace for all living beings. He awakened on the broken bridge and stepped onto the void toward Mount Sumeru's summit.

• The Brush of All Living Beings tried to wake Su Mo, who rose with his eyes still closed and nearly stepped into the abyss beneath the broken bridge.
• In the terrace's true dream, Su Mo told the Dean he was leaving, and the Dean urged him to use his boundless greed to escape.
• Su Mo recalled how his desires had grown through his life, from surviving and staying with Girl to restoring the dead and ending strife.
• Su Mo declared that his greed as emperor was for all living beings beneath heaven, and the true dream collapsed.
• Su Mo awoke on the Purification Terrace and planted his foot on the void.

Su Mo defied Sumeru’s ten thousand Buddhas by using his greed to cross the void while carrying Hui Kong’s Golden Body. He broke through their barrier with a towering Buddha manifestation and reached Mount Sumeru’s summit.

• Su Mo stepped across the void on golden patterns formed by his greed, and the Brush of All Living Beings watched in shock.
• The ten thousand Buddhas of Sumeru appeared and blocked the broken bridge, declaring that the Five Poisons could not ascend.
• Su Mo challenged the Buddhas’ rejection of greed and compared them unfavorably with Hui Kong and Ku Ye, while Hui Kong’s Golden Body grew heavier on his back.
• Su Mo declared that his heart was Buddha’s heart and that he was Buddha, summoning a ten-thousand-zhang golden Buddha manifestation.
• Su Mo’s Buddha shattered the Sanskrit barrier, and he stepped onto Mount Sumeru’s summit.

Su Mo reached Mount Sumeru’s empty summit expecting a Bodhi Tree and fruit that could revive Hui Kong, but he realized the truth lay in perceiving all things rather than seeking emptiness. His insight transformed Hui Kong’s Golden Body into an Ancient Bodhi Tree, and Hui Kong returned as an Old Monk.

• Su Mo carried Hui Kong’s Golden Body to Mount Sumeru’s summit and found no Bodhi Tree or Bodhi Fruit.
• Su Mo recalled Hui Kong’s teachings and recognized that Bodhi meant reflecting all things, not rejecting them as empty.
• Su Mo used the Myriad Spirits Law to perceive the feelings of Mount Sumeru and declared that all dharmas arose from the heart.
• Hui Kong’s Golden Body became a seed that grew into an Ancient Bodhi Tree, while the mountain’s rule of emptiness vanished.
• A golden fruit from the tree became an Old Monk, and Su Mo greeted him as Hui Kong.

Su Mo reunited with Hui Kong beneath the Bodhi Tree on Mount Sumeru, and they reminisced about their old friendship while sharing tea. When Hui Kong explained that he could not leave because he had become the Bodhi Tree, Su Mo uprooted the tree and carried it through a gate.

• Su Mo met Hui Kong beneath the Bodhi Tree and declared that they had tied in their old argument about Buddhist teachings.
• Su Mo and Hui Kong remembered when Su Mo and Girl had first visited Hui Kong’s ruined temple.
• The Brush of All Living Beings tried to drink tea, and Su Mo plunged it into the hot cup after it complained.
• Su Mo suggested that he and Hui Kong visit Jiangnan, but Hui Kong said his Bodhi heart could not leave Mount Sumeru because the tree was his true body.
• Su Mo uprooted the Bodhi Tree and carried it through a pitch-black gate, then returned and invited Hui Kong to drink tea.

Su Mo uncovered a mysterious woman resembling the Divine Maiden beneath Mount Sumeru, and the Divine Maiden arrived to investigate. She transferred divine power into the woman and fell into a deep sleep, leaving Su Mo to care for the woman, who had become a little girl.

• Su Mo uprooted the Bodhi Tree, revealing a crystal coffin containing a woman who resembled the Divine Maiden.
• The Brush of All Living Beings and Hui Kong could not determine whether the woman was dead, though Hui Kong sensed no evil aura from her.
• Su Mo called for the Divine Maiden, who tore through the void and came to him.
• The Divine Maiden recognized a connection between herself and the woman, then warned Su Mo she might be unable to protect him for a while.
• The Divine Maiden poured divine power into the woman and fell asleep, and Su Mo placed her in his Spirit Sea.
• The woman transformed into a little girl bearing the Radiant Mark, and she clung to the coffin while looking at Su Mo.