Chapter Summaries

Over seven or eight years, Wang Quan’s annual Great Sun projections expanded the White Land, where Beitang Xue began refining a new sun with spirit monsters. Meanwhile, Wang Quan focused on his studies and the Underworld’s preparations for a Magic Treasure, and Ying Jiaren finally came to meet him.

• Wang Quan summoned the Great Sun once a year, weakening evil and expanding the White Land by a million li in every direction.
• Beitang Xue used [Big Face] and [Sun Flower Spirit] monsters to create a Great Sun Totem, and she told cultivators she hoped to refine it into a real Great Sun.
• Beitang Xue sold pairs of the spirit monsters to Golden Core Cultivators, who began developing the White Land and studying the evil beings that thrived there.
• Wang Quan continued studying Daoist Scriptures and cultivation methods while ghosts and monsters in City No. 95 gathered materials to refine a Magic Treasure.
• Ying Jiaren came to find Wang Quan when their agreed meeting time arrived.

Ying Jiaren reunited with Wang Quan and gave him a golden-bone combat method called [The Emperor Declares: Four Faces Look Down Upon the Eight Directions of Heaven]. Wang Quan determined that it was an incomplete Daoist Scripture, which allowed both of them to learn it.

• Wang Quan told Ying Jiaren about his years of study, his stalled progress, and his plans to refine Magic Treasures for his Three Heads and Six Arms form.
• Ying Jiaren described building eight model cities to spread Wang Quan’s approach to foundational development, and explained that Stone City’s dangers made it a poor place for newcomers to learn.
• Ying Jiaren gave Wang Quan a chest containing a golden skeleton inscribed with [The Emperor Declares: Four Faces Look Down Upon the Eight Directions of Heaven].
• Wang Quan recognized the inscription as an incomplete Daoist Scripture and explained that its incompleteness meant Ying Jiaren could learn it and pass it on.
• Wang Quan studied the scripture and found it was a complex combat method with principles resembling Three Heads and Six Arms.

Wang Quan mastered an incomplete Daoist Scripture and discussed future development plans with Ying Jiaren before she departed to seek its missing portion. After Ruo Jinghong confirmed that the necessary materials had been gathered, Wang Quan decided to begin refining a Magic Treasure immediately.

• Wang Quan mastered the incomplete Daoist Scripture and found that its multidirectional combat technique complemented [Three Heads and Six Arms].
• Wang Quan and Ying Jiaren examined the Fire Mulberry Tree and settled plans for their different approaches to developing the layered worlds.
• Wang Quan asked Ying Jiaren to look for bump-covered Spirit Monsters in Bitter Cold City and have them cultivate the [Way of Idiocy] Fundamental Method.
• Ying Jiaren agreed to meet Wang Quan every five or ten years and took the golden skeleton to search for the missing portion of [The Emperor Speaks: Gazing Imperiously upon the Four Sides and Eight Directions of Heaven].
• Ruo Jinghong reported that the Underworld had gathered enough materials, and Wang Quan decided to start refining a Magic Treasure immediately while she watched.

Ying Jiaren refined [Fire Crow Soldiers] with the Fire Mulberry Trees and investigated reports of Bump Spirit Monsters across the cities. She gathered more than a thousand of them to cultivate the [Way of Idiocy], leaving some eager and others resisting.

• Ying Jiaren used the Fire Mulberry Trees and incense cloud to refine [Fire Crow Soldiers] that would grow into ten battle formations and help wear away the Bitter Cold Land’s abnormal weather.
• After learning that Bump Spirit Monsters had appeared in Bitter Cold City, Ying Jiaren found that they were mostly present in cities with completed internal cycles.
• Ying Jiaren asked the rulers of those cities to send her Bump Spirit Monsters, and they delivered more than a thousand without requesting repayment.
• Ying Jiaren declared the Bump Spirit Monsters the foundation of the [Way of Idiocy] and ordered them to cultivate it.
• When one Bump Spirit Monster refused and killed herself, Ying Jiaren dismissed her corpse and taught the remaining monsters the method; some welcomed it while others sensed something was wrong.

The Officiant Daoist Nun and Dream Nun oversaw preparations across three thousand li to refine Wang Quan’s treasures, directing tens of millions of ghosts, monsters, and descendants of ghost gods. When the laborers grew tired, they called on Fairy Qin, who sent out a bronze courtyard filled with centaurs.

• Ghosts and monsters built deep trenches and pits, then covered towering steel constructs with flesh and fascia to create enormous working machines.
• The Officiant Daoist Nun fired cannons to begin the ceremony, while spirit monsters led the crowds in cheering for Lord Flower-Scatter and brought out materials for the treasures and weapons.
• The Officiant Daoist Nun directed the living beings as they laid bone ropes, planted banners, and gathered shadows across three thousand li.
• After three days and nights of organizing the work, Dream Nun contacted Fairy Qin for help when the ghosts and monsters grew tired.
• Fairy Qin said her troops were ready, enlarged a bronze courtyard in the air, and opened its gates as alluring centaurs charged out.

Wang Quan began refining several treasures with twelve thousand Water-Filled Crystal Brains attached, despite the Dao Seal Cultivators’ worries about his condition. Ruo Jinghong persuaded him to remove some, and he started the long refinement with ten thousand brains still connected.

• Fairy Qin’s centaurs spread secret medicine among the ghosts and monsters, energizing them to work harder.
• Wang Quan assembled the Five-Colored Altar and attached twelve thousand Water-Filled Crystal Brains, including Inverted Wisdom, before preparing to refine treasures.
• Mei Niang, Ruo Jinghong, and the other Dao Seal Cultivators warned Wang Quan that the brains were harming him, but he dismissed their concerns and claimed he could finish refining in little more than ten years.
• Ruo Jinghong persuaded Wang Quan to keep spare brains ready, then removed seven or eight hundred; Wang Quan put two thousand brains away and recovered his color.
• Wang Quan lit incense, prayed, and began refining his treasures with ten thousand brains still attached.

Wang Quan began a vast treasure-refining operation across three thousand li, using spells, ghosts, and ritual arrays to prepare the materials and invoke the four seasons. He declared that four great Magic Treasures and two divine weapons would be completed in a little over ten years, but the watching cultivators doubted his judgment.

• Wang Quan used Dharma Power, paper figures, ghosts, and steel creations to prepare and repair the treasure-refining site while Ruo Jinghong and the others studied his methods.
• After seven days and nights, the site was operating, and Wang Quan told the departing cultivators that the treasure refinement had only just begun.
• Wang Quan signaled the Officiant Daoist Nun, the Dream Nun, and Fairy Qin to fire cannons and lead sacrifices that spread the essences of spring, summer, autumn, and winter across the site.
• Wang Quan set his Foundation Establishment Dao Platform above the site and connected its seasonal power to the ritual, causing time to flow unnoticed as the ghosts and monsters worked.
• Wang Quan announced that four great Magic Treasures and two divine weapons would emerge in a little over ten years, while the other cultivators suspected his brain had been damaged by attaching too many external brains.

Wang Quan used [Manifest the Four Seasons] to accelerate the assembly and refinement of four Magic Treasures and two weapons across three thousand li of land. The treasures began transforming under wind, fire, ice, water, and his dharma power, while the [Seventy-Two Pentads Lamp] revealed images of his life and seemed connected to the [Chronicle of the Flower-Scatter Daoist's Struggles].

• Wang Quan sustained [Manifest the Four Seasons] with dharma power as ghosts, spirit monsters, and martial artists assembled four Magic Treasures and two weapons over five years.
• Wang Quan sent the exhausted workers back to City No. 95, where they were immediately made to take medicine, burn incense, and continue worshipping the four seasons.
• Wang Quan summoned fierce winds, fires, ice, and snow to temper the completed treasures and weapons across three thousand li.
• Wang Quan transformed into his Three Heads and Six Arms form and poured vast quantities of dharma power into the [White Bone Ring] until it rose into the air.
• Wang Quan refined the [Light-Splitting Mirror], [All-Heavens Banner], [Immobilization Pearl], [Twenty-Four Maces], and [Seventy-Two Pentads Lamp] in turn.
• Wang Quan saw images of his past on the [Seventy-Two Pentads Lamp] and sensed its connection to the [Chronicle of the Flower-Scatter Daoist's Struggles].

Wang Quan spent decades refining Magic Treasures in the Underworld while hearing how the Drowning Dao Lower Court and Stone City’s safe zones were faring. He promised to return home in a few years with his finished treasures, but those relying on him doubted his timeline and prepared to endure much longer.

• Wang Quan heard from Ying Jiaren that Qian Xiuyue had unified and strengthened the Drowning Dao Lower Court, and he said he would return home to bring calamity to his enemies rather than prove his talent or reclaim what he had lost.
• The Round-Faced Daoist Nun wrote to Wang Quan asking him to use his name to help clear out her enemies, and he told her to seek Qian Xiuyue’s help until he returned with Magic Treasures.
• In the seventeenth year of refining, Wang Quan’s [White Bone Ring] and [Twenty-Four Maces] exchanged places with his other treasures and weapons.
• In the twentieth year, Ruo Jinghong and the others found Wang Quan still refining, while Mei Niang tried to hurry him; he said he expected to finish in three to five years.
• In the twenty-second year, Ruo Jinghong reported that Mei Niang had turned the pavilion’s evil beings to their side and made its floors and special rooms safe zones, while attacks continued outside.
• Wang Quan promised to finish within two or three years and leave a Magic Treasure to protect the safe zones, but Mei Niang and the others doubted him and resolved to hold out for far longer.

After twenty-eight years of refining, Wang Quan completed his treasures and discovered that the [All-Heavens Banner] could draw minds and spirits into its vivid worlds even without being activated. He left it to help guard the Second-Layer World’s safe zone, where Ruo Jinghong and the others continued fighting endless evils.

• Ruo Jinghong and the others reported that White Land in the Third-Layer World was safe but dominated by Golden Core Cultivators, and Wang Quan continued refining his treasures.
• Wang Quan finished refining the four great Magic Treasures and two great weapons, then gained complete control of them.
• The [All-Heavens Banner] drew the minds and spirits of nearby ghosts and spirit monsters toward its world, and Wang Quan startled them back into their bodies.
• Wang Quan set an incantation allowing others to use the [All-Heavens Banner], returned to the Present World, and went to the Second-Layer World to leave it guarding the safe zone.
• Ruo Jinghong and other Dao Seal Cultivators continued using the [People-Crossing Scripture] to strengthen the safe zone and kill evils, while Mei Niang called for water and vowed to keep fighting.

Wang Quan’s newly refined Magic Treasure pulled the cultivators’ Yang Spirits into strange reincarnation-like experiences, then drew them into its sealed box. After Wang Quan left to study the uncontrollable treasure, Ruo Jinghong persuaded the others to accept his success and go congratulate him.

• Ruo Jinghong and the other cultivators’ Yang Spirits were pulled from the Inner Landscape and experienced strange lives that Mei Niang identified as a powerful reincarnation-type spell.
• Wang Quan arrived with a golden, heavily sealed box, and the cultivators’ Yang Spirits were drawn into it before he shook them back out.
• Wang Quan said his Magic Treasure was too powerful to control and returned to the Present World to study it.
• The cultivators debated how Wang Quan had obtained the treasure, while Ruo Jinghong argued that he had refined it himself in just twenty-eight years and two months.
• Ruo Jinghong convinced the others that Wang Quan’s success could benefit them, and Mei Niang urged everyone to go congratulate him.

Wang Quan revealed that his All-Heavens Banner could extract souls and Yang Spirits, then used it to kill the evil beings attacking the tower. After exhausting his Dharma Power, he returned inside and invited the Dao Seal Cultivators to test the banner as the evil beings charged again.

• Wang Quan returned to the Second-Layer World carrying the All-Heavens Banner, which drew the Yang Spirits of Ruo Jinghong and the others into orbit around it.
• Wang Quan explained that the banner specialized in extracting souls and Yang Spirits, then left the safe zone to test its power.
• Wang Quan shook the banner and instantly killed every evil being within three or four li, leaving their bodies behind without their thoughts or ability to revive.
• Wang Quan ran out of Dharma Power, returned to the tower, and asked who wanted to test the banner.
• The Dao Seal Cultivators volunteered while the evil beings recovered from their shock and charged the tower again.

Ruo Jinghong and other cultivators used the [All-Heavens Banner] to kill waves of evil beings in the Second-Layer World near Stone City. The evil beings eventually fled beyond the safe zone, though the older ones still watched helplessly as reckless young groups charged toward it.

• Ruo Jinghong lit Sandalwood Incense, worshiped the [All-Heavens Banner], and killed the evil beings rushing toward the safe zone.
• Mei Niang took the banner outside and killed another charging swarm, then a Dao Seal Cultivator used it to slay more evil beings.
• The phrase [Please, treasure, give a shake] became a warning that made evil beings flee from the safe zone.
• The pavilion-like evil being drove warped buildings, plants, and other creatures to leave the region and posted warning signs a thousand li away.
• Older evil beings created trials to keep young ones from attacking, but the young still charged toward the safe zone and were killed by the humans.

Mei Niang rallied the Dao Seal Cultivators to expand their safe zone and fight back against the evil beings, while Ruo Jinghong decided to wait until she opened her Purple Mansion before returning home. On an aerial cruise ship bound for the Liang Kingdom, Wang Quan watched a band of would-be robbers realize they were about to be run over.

• Mei Niang urged the Dao Seal Cultivators to expand the safe zone by recruiting allies and attacking evil beings.
• Ruo Jinghong decided to delay her return home until she could show off her Purple Mansion cultivation.
• Wang Quan boarded an aerial cruise ship bound for the Liang Kingdom instead of visiting the Drowning Dao Lower Court.
• Wang Quan turned down several women who tried to approach him aboard the ship.
• Masked cultivators and spirit monsters tried to rob the cruise ship, then screamed for it to stop as it bore down on their cloud.

Wang Quan witnessed the Mountain Reliance Sect staging scripted bandit attacks for wealthy passengers, then escaped the women who wanted to help him exact his vengeance. The women planned to find him again in Great Liang, where the Clear Spirit and Clear Wind sects were preparing for a spell duel on Sleeping Dragon Mountain.

• The ship’s guards allowed masked cultivators and spirit monsters aboard, where they performed scripted robberies for wealthy passengers.
• Wang Quan learned that the Mountain Reliance Sect ran the staged attacks and met its master, who recognized him as the sect’s supposed founding ancestor.
• Female cultivators lured Wang Quan into their company, and he rejected their advances by claiming he had vengeance to pursue.
• The women gathered dozens of female cultivators to help Wang Quan, but he fled the ship rather than let them interfere with his vengeance.
• The women decided they would look for Wang Quan in Great Liang and attend the spell duel between Clear Spirit and Clear Wind on Sleeping Dragon Mountain.

Wang Quan returned to Great Liang and confronted his former instructor, who had sold his place at the Great Void Gate to an aristocratic clan. After learning the clan’s name but not the identity of the person who took his place, Wang Quan killed the instructor and his family, leaving his search unresolved.

• Wang Quan arrived in Great Liang while Clear Wind and Clear Spirit prepared to duel over a spirit stone mine near Sleeping Dragon Mountain.
• Wang Quan entered the Immortal-Tutoring Bureau and found his former instructor refining his dharma in seclusion.
• Wang Quan revealed his identity, and the instructor admitted he had sold Wang Quan’s place at the Great Void Gate to benefit the Northern Deep aristocratic clan.
• The instructor explained the Northern Deep clan had long placed descendants in the ten sects of the Five Primordial Supremes and Five Postnatal Supremes, but he did not know who had taken Wang Quan’s place.
• Wang Quan killed the instructor and his blood relatives within three generations, then remarked that the instructor would have no next life.

Wang Quan investigated the Northern Deep Aristocratic Clan and discovered that it controlled a powerful domain in both the Present World and the Underworld. After realizing he could not use the Underworld to trap its members, he returned to the Present World and set out for the clan’s residence.

• Wang Quan surveyed the Northern Deep Aristocratic Clan’s residence and used a water curtain and magical eyeballs to analyze its restrictions.
• Wang Quan observed a lavish banquet attended by New Method cultivators, orthodox cultivators, monsters, and other guests, then planned to prevent the clan from escaping into the Underworld.
• Wang Quan entered the Underworld and found that the Northern Deep city and its surroundings were mirrored there, with ghost gods bearing the clan’s aura holding the region in place.
• Wang Quan realized the Underworld was controlled by the clan and that its deceased members made it even stronger there, so he returned to the Present World.
• Wang Quan released the burly men and palace maidens from the Plain Moon Paper-Cutting Box and traveled in a sedan chair toward the Northern Deep household’s residence.

Wang Quan infiltrated the [Northern Deep] Household’s banquet and inspected its vast Second-Layer safe zone, where he discovered powerful cultivators worshiping a statue of the [Great One]. He left with a beacon and records of the guests’ spiritual traces, while the estate’s festivities continued on the brink of destruction.

• Wang Quan entered the [Northern Deep] estate in a flower-scattering procession, rewarded the guards, and enchanted guests with tricks that made the banquet livelier.
• Wang Quan’s subtle influence led a guest to ask to see the [Northern Deep] Household’s Second-Layer safe zone, and the household head gave permission for the cultivators to enter.
• Wang Quan followed the crowd into the Second-Layer World and saw the household’s forty-two buildings, along with cultivators using sunlight to open a sixth building.
• Wang Quan discovered a hidden hall where powerful cultivators worshiped a statue marked [Great One] and wondered whether the [Northern Deep] Household meant to recreate it.
• Wang Quan dismissed his suspicions, examined the buildings, derived a beacon, collected the cultivators’ spiritual traces and scents, and returned to the Present World.

Wang Quan launched a surprise attack on [Northern Deep] City, using the [White Bone Ring], the [Light-Splitting Mirror], and a hundred and eight prepared spells to disable and tear apart the cultivators inside. The city’s experts struggled to reach their sealed ancestral treasures as even a Golden Core ancestor fell from the sky.

• Wang Quan prepared a hundred and eight spells on the Five-Colored Altar, then activated [Three Heads and Six Arms] and [The Emperor Decreed: Four Faces Looked Down Upon the Eight Directions of Heaven].
• Wang Quan expanded the [White Bone Ring] around [Northern Deep] City and sent the [Light-Splitting Mirror]’s light over every living being, separating their [Nature Cultivation] and [Life Cultivation] power.
• Wang Quan released spell pearls that targeted bloodlines, auras, souls, Dharma Power, and other traits throughout the city.
• The [White Bone Ring] scattered cultivators’ Dharma Power, leaving them unable to control it, cast spells, or activate magical implements.
• Top Foundation Establishment Grand Cultivators hurried to open the ancestors’ sealed defenses, but their separated powers and the restrictions delayed them.
• A Half-Step Golden Core New-Method Cultivator’s limbs broke as he fled, and a Golden Core ancestor fell nearby with shattered bones.

Wang Quan used the [Seventy-Two Pentads Lamp] to destroy the spirits of the [Northern Deep] aristocratic clan and its reinforcements, then confronted the clan’s surviving experts over how they stole his place in the Orthodox Mystic Sects. After their shameless excuses failed to persuade him, he prepared to answer with his magic treasure instead of his tongue.

• The half-step Golden Core patriarch crawled toward the new method Golden Core patriarch and tried to kill him as the strange mirror’s light shone down.
• On the fifth breath, Wang Quan’s Yang Spirit appeared beneath the mirror and illuminated [Northern Deep] City with the [Seventy-Two Pentads Lamp], destroying spirits and souls across the city and in the second-layer world.
• A cultivator in his physical body sent Yang Spirit experts back from the second-layer world to reinforce the Present World, where Wang Quan’s lamp killed them as soon as they arrived.
• Surviving Foundation Establishment Grand Cultivators accused Wang Quan of attacking their clan, then defended stealing his place in the Orthodox Mystic Sects as a favor to him and to humanity.
• Wang Quan condemned the clan’s hypocrisy and said his magic treasure was sharper than their tongues, leaving its surviving experts stunned.