Recaps

Zeng Mu, Yenaier, and Qidunston reached a hunter village to gather medicinal ingredients and seek information about the rare Three-Stripe Purple Tiger Claw. Qidunston reunited with Victor, who offered herbs but said the village had never encountered the tiger and mentioned a stranger who might be tracking one.

• Yenaier, Zeng Mu, and Qidunston left the waystation early and traveled toward a hunter village.
• Zeng Mu and Yenaier tracked down and killed a Jueweisi Gemole Hedgehog, which startled Zeng Mu by spraying him with urine.
• The group reached the secluded village, where its residents recognized Qidunston and welcomed him.
• Qidunston reunited with Victor, learned that Victor’s father had died five years earlier, and visited Victor’s home.
• Qidunston explained that he needed a Three-Stripe Purple Tiger Claw for his medicinal soup, and Victor said the village had never seen one.
• Zeng Mu asked about unusual visitors, and Victor mentioned a recent stranger who might be tracking a Three-Stripe Purple Tiger.

Victor told Zeng Mu, Yenaier, and Qidunston about a mysterious man who had bought ingredients for tracking the Three-Stripe Purple Tiger and left behind a riddle. After Zeng Mu decoded the meeting place, Victor revealed that the villagers planned to hunt the Ox-Snake Fish Monster that had killed his father, and Zeng Mu offered to handle it.

• Victor described the mysterious man and showed the group his cryptic note about where to meet him.
• Zeng Mu interpreted the note as directions to a tree southeast of the village, about three hundred meters away, at evening.
• Victor recounted how an Ox-Snake Fish Monster had killed his father and said the villagers planned to hunt it the next morning.
• Zeng Mu warned that the monster could be dangerous and offered to handle it if its cultivation was below the third tier.
• Zeng Mu asked Victor to take them to find the mysterious man and learn where the Three-Stripe Purple Tiger was.

Zeng Mu agreed to help Victor hunt the dangerous bull-snake-fish monster, then discussed the Hundred Years' War and the Soul-Returning Cult's claim about its origins with Yenaier. As they reached the mysterious figure in the rain, Zeng Mu recognized him as the Beast Claw Collector.

• Victor gratefully accepted Zeng Mu's offer to help hunt the monster and promised him a feast.
• Zeng Mu and Yenaier discussed his studies, their uncertain future, and whether the war could ever end.
• Zeng Mu told Yenaier that the Soul-Returning Cult connected the war's origins to the words "Earth, people, water."
• Victor led Zeng Mu and Yenaier through the rain toward the place where the mysterious person had been seen.
• The three found a man standing atop a tree, and Zeng Mu recognized him as the Beast Claw Collector.

Zeng Mu, Yenaier, and Victor met the Beast Claw Collector, who offered to trade them a Three-Stripe Purple Tiger Claw for the water monster’s Purple Flood Dragon Claw. After the Collector vanished, the three returned to the village, with Victor recounting an intimate story about his wife on the way.

• The Beast Claw Collector revealed himself to Zeng Mu, Yenaier, and Victor and explained that he had left the riddle for Zeng Mu.
• The Collector clarified that he was tracking a Fine Grade Two-Element Blackwood Spirit Ape and was also interested in the approaching water monster.
• The Collector offered the Three-Stripe Purple Tiger Claw he already possessed in exchange for the water monster’s Purple Flood Dragon Claw.
• The Collector privately told Zeng Mu that he was seeking an Elemental Beast several times more powerful than an Elementalist in the return to truth realm, then disappeared into the rain.
• Zeng Mu agreed to complete the trade, and the three headed back to the village as Victor told them a story about a rainy night with his wife.

Victor and the hunters prepared to ambush the Jiao Monster in the rain-swollen Rushing River while Yenaier suggested ways to improve their trap. As they waited, Victor sensed something large approaching from upriver.

• Victor found the Beast Claw Collector’s note describing the Ox-Snake Fish Monster and hurried with Nameless and Yenaier to Rushing River.
• Victor and Zeng Mu discussed how the heavy rain might help the Jiao Monster enter the tributary, and Yenaier wondered whether the creature caused the rain.
• Victor introduced his younger brother Vic to Zeng Mu and Yenaier, and Vic reported that the hunters had prepared a barrier net and boats.
• Yenaier proposed reinforcing the net, using powders to disorient the monster, and obstructing the riverbed; Zeng Mu praised her practical plans.
• Victor shared his hunting history while the group waited, then stood and said that something large was approaching upriver.

The hunters confronted the Jiao Monster, but their arrows and spears could not pierce its defenses, and it unleashed deadly poison on the men in the river. Zeng Mu trapped the toxin and monster inside a Golden Barrier long enough for the hunters to escape, then urged everyone to flee as his strength faltered.

• Victor, Zeng Mu, Yenaier, and the hunters spotted the Jiao Monster approaching through the rain-shrouded river.
• Vic ordered the hunters to fire arrows, but the Jiao Monster’s scales deflected them without injury.
• Victor ordered the hunters to raise a net and attack with spears and harpoons, which also failed to harm the creature.
• Zeng Mu warned the hunters to retreat as the Jiao Monster raised its brightly colored tail and released lethal, water-soluble poison.
• Zeng Mu formed a Golden Barrier that contained the poison and the Jiao Monster while Vic and his brother helped the hunters escape the river.
• As the barrier weakened, Zeng Mu ordered everyone to flee.

Zeng Mu fought the Jiao Monster inside its deadly colored poison mist, using metal elemental power to wound its body but failing to pierce its neck scales or sever its claws. As the wounded monster charged again, Zeng Mu put away his sword and revealed a Purple Mark that joined his Golden Mark.

• Yenaier, Victor, and Vic fled the spreading poison mist after Zeng Mu urged them to go.
• Zeng Mu held his breath against the poisonous gas and watched the Jiao Monster emerge from the river onto the bank.
• Zeng Mu's metal-infused sword failed to pierce the Jiao Monster's neck but penetrated the softer scales along its body, and the monster blasted him backward.
• Zeng Mu dodged the Jiao Monster's claws and bites, then inflicted more than two hundred wounds with repeated sword strikes.
• The Jiao Monster charged again despite its injuries, so Zeng Mu put away his sword and revealed a Purple Mark beside his Golden Mark.

Zeng Mu used his newly awakened lightning mark to defeat a Jiao Monster and exchanged its claws with the Beast Claw Collector for the Three-Stripe Purple Tiger Claw. He then asked the collector about Okelo and learned that she was his younger sister.

• Zeng Mu tested his lightning power, struck down the Jiao Monster, and killed it after it fled toward the river.
• Zeng Mu took the Jiao Monster's Scarlet Long Claws, while Victor and the village hunters later harvested its carcass.
• After resting, Zeng Mu, Yenaier, and Victor met the Beast Claw Collector, and Zeng Mu exchanged the Crimson Jiao Claws for the Three-Stripe Purple Tiger Claw.
• Zeng Mu stayed behind and asked the Beast Claw Collector about Okelo, who revealed that she was his younger sister.

Zeng Mu learned that the Beast Claw Collector was an Elf and received a warning about the Blackstone Necklace before the collector vanished. At Victor’s village, Qidunston prepared a medicinal soup overnight, and the gathered villagers watched as it was ready by dawn.

• The Beast Claw Collector revealed that he was Okelo’s older brother, sensed Zeng Mu’s metal and lightning elements, and warned him that someone wanted the Blackstone Necklace.
• The collector advised Zeng Mu to seek Okelo’s protection, then disappeared into the darkness.
• Yenaier gave Qidunston the Three-Stripe Purple Tiger Claw, and Qidunston added herbs and Elemental Beast Chunks to a giant pot of boiling water.
• Zeng Mu explained that Qidunston’s frequent sleep came from a lingering Kampus Elemental Beast poison, then stayed up tending the soup with Yenaier.
• Yenaier fell asleep against Zeng Mu’s shoulder as the soup simmered through the night, and Qidunston served them coffee and Black Rye Loaves at dawn.
• The villagers gathered to watch the finished medicinal soup gleam over the dying embers.

After the villagers drank the nourishing medicinal soup, Yenaier and Zeng Mu consumed the concentrated Earth Spirit Essence and fell into deep sleep. When they woke, Qidunston found Zeng Mu unchanged, but a sudden gale from Yenaier's room sent them rushing to check on her.

• Qidunston served the villagers the nourishing soup, and they thanked him before returning home and falling asleep.
• Yenaier and Zeng Mu scraped up and shared the white essence left in the pot, then went to sleep in separate rooms.
• Yenaier dreamed of a purple grassland and a giant flower that engulfed her in intense heat, while Zeng Mu slept in a dreamless void.
• Qidunston woke first and found that Zeng Mu felt no change, leading them to wonder whether the medicinal effects had taken hold.
• A sudden gale battered the trees outside Yenaier's room, and Qidunston hurried there with Zeng Mu following.

Yenaier’s embryonic elemental mark appeared while she slept, and Qidunston sent Zeng Mu to massage her, concealing his real motive. After she woke and kissed Zeng Mu, they parted three days later, unaware they would not meet again for two years.

• Qidunston recognized the faint whirlpool on Yenaier’s forehead as an embryonic elemental mark that meant she was close to becoming an Elementalist.
• Qidunston told Zeng Mu to massage Yenaier to help her wake, while privately knowing that channeling elemental power would work better and hoping to encourage their intimacy.
• Zeng Mu massaged Yenaier for two hours, and she woke from her nightmare and kissed him.
• Three days later, Yenaier and Zeng Mu said goodbye beneath a waterfall in Trissa Territory, each promising to meet again.
• Yenaier and Zeng Mu parted without knowing their farewell would last two years.

Zeng Mu settled into life in Qidunston's secluded village and discovered that his apprenticeship involved far more chores and blacksmithing than he expected. After three months of constant work, he began to doubt whether Qidunston was truly an Elemental Artifact Master.

• Qidunston showed Zeng Mu around the village and explained how refugees and others had gathered there over the years.
• Qidunston revealed that the village had no blacksmith and that Zeng Mu would help repair and make tools for the residents.
• Zeng Mu spent his first day sweeping and cleaning, then learned to feed the chickens and ducks and clear their droppings.
• Qidunston taught Zeng Mu the basics of smithing, and Zeng Mu forged a crude small knife that Qidunston praised as useful for simple tasks.
• Zeng Mu spent the next three months doing farm, poultry, cleaning, and smithing work until he began doubting Qidunston's claim to be an Elemental Artifact Master.

After three months of chores and studying theory, Zeng Mu passed Qidunston’s test and was finally promised practical instruction as an Elemental Artifact Master. Qidunston began explaining why artifact masters were rare, but had not yet revealed the reasons acquired masters were uncommon.

• Zeng Mu spent three months helping Qidunston while memorizing the Elemental Artifact Master's notebook and waiting to be taught practical skills.
• Qidunston summoned Zeng Mu, tested his knowledge over breakfast, and found that he could answer every question correctly.
• Qidunston officially began teaching Zeng Mu about Elemental Artifact Masters and asked why they were so rare.
• Zeng Mu explained that few people qualified as Elementalists, and Qidunston added that masters were divided into innate and acquired categories.
• Qidunston described innate masters as extremely rare geniuses, then began explaining why acquired masters were also uncommon.

Qidunston explained elemental spirit and transferred it to Zeng Mu, enabling him to begin learning how to refine Elemental Artifacts. Zeng Mu started practicing his first inscription with a leaf and continued working through the afternoon.

• Qidunston told Zeng Mu that Acquired Elemental Artifact Masters received elemental spirit energy through a transfer from another master.
• Qidunston transferred elemental spirit energy to Zeng Mu, who felt no pain and fell asleep during the hour-long process.
• Qidunston explained how elemental spirit formed inscriptions and told Zeng Mu to begin practicing with a leaf.
• Zeng Mu returned to his room and attempted to carve his first inscription as the rain stopped and afternoon arrived.
• Qidunston sensed that Zeng Mu was still practicing upstairs and realized he would have to make dinner himself.

Zeng Mu spent more than ten days condensing his first Elemental Artifact while Qidunston anxiously watched over him. He completed a droplet-shaped Wood Elemental Artifact, and Qidunston identified it as an imperfect but finished Half-Tier Elemental Artifact.

• Qidunston watched the elemental spirit energy in Zeng Mu's room and worried that the long condensation process might harm him.
• Zeng Mu remained motionless for more than ten days, absorbing energy from heaven and earth as Qidunston kept vigil.
• Zeng Mu awakened and formed thirty-six inscriptions, condensing the purple-and-gold leaf into a droplet-shaped Wood Elemental Artifact.
• Zeng Mu activated the artifact twice and discovered that its effects produced strangely oversized surroundings.
• Qidunston examined the artifact and told Zeng Mu it was a finished but imperfect Half-Tier Elemental Artifact.

Zeng Mu and Qidunston examined Zeng Mu’s unusual Wood Elemental Artifact, which Zeng named the Magnifying Glass, before Zeng settled into months of training and chores. A delayed letter from Ma Linya reached him, revealing that Malena was her birth mother and explaining why she had not come to see him.

• Qidunston found that Zeng Mu’s Wood Elemental Artifact worked despite having too few inscriptions, tested its enlarging effect, and agreed to call it the Magnifying Glass.
• Zeng Mu continued his daily chores and practiced controlling his elemental spirit without casually attempting to refine more artifacts.
• Two months later, a letter carrier delivered an old, unsigned envelope to Zeng Mu at the Blacksmith Shop.
• Zeng Mu ruled out Kanni and Yenaier as the sender, then opened the letter and recognized Ma Linya’s handwriting.
• Ma Linya wrote that Malena was her birth mother, explained that she had been unable to visit, and urged Zeng Mu to keep learning from Qidunston.

Zeng Mu attempted the near-impossible process of Artifact Fusion using inscriptions from Xia Bojin's five-pound Ceramic Plate and two broken Elemental Artifacts. After the fusion exploded and left him badly injured, the inscriptions unexpectedly began converging on his Four-Sided Porcelain Zun Box.

• Zeng Mu wrote Ma Linya a letter, and Qidunston took it with him when he left for Vites Town.
• Zeng Mu began experimenting with Artifact Fusion, dismantling the Ceramic Plate and two broken Elemental Artifacts to extract their inscriptions.
• Zeng Mu struggled to control and combine the inscriptions, but they burst free and blasted him through the room and downstairs.
• Zeng Mu returned upstairs and used his elemental powers to keep the fading inscriptions from dispersing as his injuries worsened.
• Zeng Mu brought out his Wind Elemental Artifact, but its enhancement stopped; the inscriptions then streamed toward the Four-Sided Porcelain Zun Box hovering above his head.

Zeng Mu discovered that the Wind Elemental Artifact had spontaneously become the dual-element Rainbow Artifact, and he found that its inscriptions had caused Ma Linya’s elemental embryo to grow. After hiding the embryo and repairing his room, he began meditative cultivation on the mountain, newly convinced that his journey home might be closer than he had thought.

• Zeng Mu watched inscriptions gather onto the unused Wind Elemental Artifact until it held ninety-seven, then activated it and discovered it wielded both wind and earth.
• Zeng Mu renamed the artifact the Rainbow Artifact and realized it might eventually carry all six elements, bringing him closer to finding a way home.
• Zeng Mu sensed movement in Ma Linya’s Clay Jar and found that its elemental embryo had grown; he concluded that inscriptions made it grow while an Elemental Spirit made it tremble.
• Zeng Mu placed the Clay Jar on the balcony, decided to keep the embryo secret from Qidunston, and repaired the damage in his room.
• Zeng Mu climbed the mountain behind the village and meditated, considering that his return home might come within a few years.

After three years of forging and cultivating elemental power in the village, Zeng Mu said goodbye to Qidunston and set out to answer Yetos’s recall to Black Ink City. He rode toward the coming war with his three elemental marks and evolved Rainbow Artifact.

• Zeng Mu looked back on three years of village life, during which he gained a fire mark and the Rainbow Artifact evolved with a wood inscription.
• Zeng Mu and Qidunston prepared a farewell meal and said goodbye at the fork where they had parted with Yenaier.
• Zeng Mu left the village on Abyss, and Qidunston urged him to treasure his bonds without letting grief control him.
• Zeng Mu reread Yetos’s letter, which summoned him to Black Ink City to discuss covert operations before the great war.
• Zeng Mu fed elemental meat to Abyss and used the Rainbow Artifact’s wind energy to speed toward Black Ink City.

Zeng Mu returned to Black Ink City after three years away and reunited with Kanni, Yetos, and Aikimu. After learning that William had died in battle, he heard that the Temple Master had assigned them a dangerous assassination operation that could affect the coming war.

• Yetos welcomed word that Nameless had returned to Black Ink City and went to meet him with Aikimu.
• Zeng Mu arrived with a White-Striped Saber-Toothed Tiger and reunited with Kanni after three years apart.
• Zeng Mu greeted Yetos and Aikimu, and Yetos recognized that his strength had grown beyond what he could gauge.
• Yetos told Zeng Mu that Xibizete was away in Moy Territory and that William had died in the Battle of the Ambushing Snake.
• Zeng Mu learned that Yetos had killed Zhao Tian, the commander responsible for William's death.
• Yetos explained that the Temple Master had ordered a perilous secret assassination operation ahead of the coming war.

Yetos tasked Zeng Mu with assassinating seven major figures across the Seven Kingdoms, beginning with Zhao Huai, the prince of the Zhao State. He gave Zeng Mu letters identifying hidden spies and lent him a Phantom Spirit Beast Hide to disguise himself, promising he might keep it if the operation succeeded flawlessly.

• Yetos explained that the Temple Master had chosen Zeng Mu to lead the covert assassinations because he was powerful, trustworthy, and inconspicuous.
• Yetos identified Zhao Huai, the prince of the Zhao State, as the first target and gave Zeng Mu seven letters containing information about spies in each kingdom.
• Zeng Mu decided to leave that night and recognized that his Holy Temple appearance would make infiltration difficult.
• Yetos presented a Phantom Spirit Beast Hide that could alter Zeng Mu’s appearance and voice, explaining that the Temple Master had lent it for the mission.
• Yetos said the Temple Master might let Zeng Mu keep the hide if he completed the assassinations without leaving evidence, and Zeng Mu confidently accepted the challenge.

Zeng Mu left Black Ink City and crossed the forbidden land into the Zhao State, where he learned that his next contact was the bard Zhao Mingyin. He changed his appearance with a Phantom Spirit Beast Hide and rode toward Kuo City to find him.

• Yetos, Aikimu, and Kanni bid Zeng Mu farewell as he departed Black Ink City on Abyss.
• Zeng Mu crossed the junction of the Three Great Territories and entered Zhao State through its deadly Black Wraith forest barrier.
• Zeng Mu read a letter identifying the bard Suoliya, whose name in Zhao State was Zhao Mingyin, and learned he lived in Kuo City.
• Zeng Mu burned the letter, used the Fine Grade Phantom Spirit Beast Hide to alter his face and voice, and set off toward Kuo City.

Zeng Mu gathered information in Kuo City about Yuan Qian’s arranged marriage to Shen Yun and the bard Zhao Mingyin’s connection to her. He found Zhao Mingyin’s secluded house and, on seeing him, confirmed Malena’s description of the bard’s irresistible charm.

• Zeng Mu overheard that Yuan Luo planned to marry Yuan Qian to Shen Yun to settle a debt and save the Yuan family, while rumors linked Yuan Qian to the bard Zhao Mingyin.
• Zeng Mu questioned a tavern patron, who revealed where Zhao Mingyin lived and warned that Shen Yun might soon learn of the bard’s connection to Yuan Qian.
• Zeng Mu rode to Zhao Mingyin’s house on the southern outskirts and knocked at the door.
• Zhao Mingyin opened the door, and Zeng Mu recognized the charm Malena had described in her letter.

Zeng Mu met the spy Suoliya and joined him in planning an assassination of Zhao Huai to destabilize the Seven Kingdoms. They finished their detailed plan before dawn, and Zeng Mu stayed behind to handle chores while Suoliya slept.

• Zeng Mu visited Suoliya in disguise and followed him to his secret basement, where Suoliya explained how he encoded intelligence in poems and scripts.
• Zeng Mu revealed his Phantom Spirit Beast Hide disguise and told Suoliya that the Temple Master had sent him to help assassinate Zhao Huai.
• Suoliya shared information about the Zhao royal succession struggle and said Zhao Huai would attend Kuo City's three-hundredth anniversary celebration in three days.
• Zeng Mu and Suoliya devised a plan to use Zhao Wei and Zhao Huai against their target, then spent the night refining the assassination details and contingencies.
• At dawn, Suoliya went to sleep, while Zeng Mu rode to the market for meat and gathered vegetables from the garden for lunch.

Zeng Mu and Suoliya shared a meal before Shen Family men arrived to take Suoliya for questioning over his meeting with Yuan Qian. Zeng Mu refused to let him go and defeated their first attacker, while seven more surrounded him.

• Zeng Mu cooked lunch with Suoliya, and they discussed their lives and the coming assassination plan.
• Nine Shen Family men arrived and accused Suoliya, also known as Zhao Mingyin, of meeting Shen Yun’s fiancée, Yuan Qian.
• Suoliya claimed Zeng Mu was his underling and said the Shen Family would have to get past him to take Zhao Mingyin away.
• Zeng Mu refused to let the Shen Family men take Suoliya and dislocated the first fighter’s hand while avoiding his attack.
• The steward ordered seven more fighters to attack Zeng Mu as Suoliya watched to judge his abilities.