Chapter Summaries

Su Ming approached the Nuwali to recruit them against the Beyonders, using Pterodactyl People hide bags as trade samples. He left the Nuwali convinced that humans had also been cheated by the Beyonders, making the two groups feel like allies.

• The Nuwali’s love of trade and history of being swindled by the Beyonders made Su Ming see them as a useful potential ally.
• A mustached Nuwali supervisor inspected Su Ming’s Pterodactyl People hide bags and asked how humans had obtained the material.
• Su Ming used a loudspeaker to claim that the Beyonders had bankrupted a Savage Land zoo and paid its workers with bags instead of wages.
• The Nuwali wept with Su Ming and cursed the Beyonders, believing humans had suffered the same deception.

Deathstroke won the Nuwali’s trust by posing as their comrade and telling them a fabricated history of humanity’s suffering, persuading them to reopen trade routes and accept his cooperation proposal. After receiving riches and honors, he helped Squirrel Girl sell roasted chestnuts and buy a house on Nuwali Planet.

• Deathstroke embraced a Nuwali and explained comradeship, prompting the aliens to welcome him and his companions with tears, food, and flowers.
• Deathstroke addressed the Nuwali Consortium’s directors and billions of Nuwali, telling an embellished story about generations of the Wilson family struggling in the Savage Land.
• The Nuwali stopped Deathstroke’s tale, accepted his trade request, reopened teleportation and shipping routes, and made him an honorary Board of Directors member.
• The Nuwali gave Deathstroke a scenic house, a medal, and gold for his handbags, which they treated as historic collectibles.
• Deathstroke told Squirrel Girl to sell roasted chestnuts as limited-edition memorabilia, and she bought a house on Nuwali Planet.

Su Ming waited in a Nuwali house while he arranged investigations into the Celestials and planned to use them against the Beyonders. He explained his theory about the Celestials’ purpose and intended to draw them toward the greatest threat to the universe.

• Su Ming relaxed in the Nuwali house while Squirrel Girl ate nuts and Little Rich studied an enormous flower arrangement.
• Su Ming said the Adjutant and the Nuwali were investigating the Celestials, while he awaited Doctor Doom’s experiments and Scarlet Witch’s work on Earth.
• Su Ming discussed collecting the Symbiotes that had fallen onto Earth and joked with Strangle about replacing it with another Symbiote if it died.
• Su Ming told Squirrel Girl and Little Rich that he believed the Celestials served the universe by eliminating potential dangers.
• Su Ming planned to identify the civilization posing the greatest threat to the universe and steer the Celestials toward it.

Su Ming gathered Wanda on Nuwali Star and explained the alliance and weapons being prepared against the Beyonders. Wanda questioned whether her Chaos Magic would work in the Beyond Realm, and Su Ming pointed to the Lovecraft Manuscript as a source of Chaos.

• Wanda arrived through the Spider Totem's Webway and reported that the Symbiotes found on Earth had been captured, while their possible spores remained under watch.
• Su Ming discussed Agatha's studies of genies with Wanda and warned her that some genies might be demons in disguise.
• Su Ming told Wanda that Nuwali Star's inhabitants would aid humanity against the Beyonders and showed her their Adrenaline Ray Emitter, a weapon designed to use human adrenaline against them.
• Franklin explained that infecting the Beyonders with human emotions could draw them into humanity's story and make them vulnerable.
• Wanda asked whether she could use Chaos Magic in the Beyond Realm, and Su Ming indicated that the Lovecraft Manuscript could provide a source of Chaos.

Su Ming gathered his team to prepare for a mission against the Beyonders, recruiting Deadpool and Dracula as tanks and arranging for Doctor Doom to lead the group while he approached the Celestials. Doom arrived with the Cosmic Cube and Zero Matter, and the team prepared to meet at a concealed location.

• Deadpool arrived at Su Ming’s base in a foul-smelling, loud performance, and Su Ming knocked him unconscious when he slipped inside.
• Dracula arrived with Deadpool, received Su Ming’s introduction to Squirrel Girl and Franklin, and was assigned to help fight the Beyonders.
• Su Ming explained that he would deceive the Celestials while Doctor Doom took the team to a location and waited for him.
• Doctor Doom arrived with the required items, recognized Franklin as his son from a parallel world, and noticed Franklin’s grief at seeing him.
• Su Ming took the Cosmic Cube and left, while Doctor Doom agreed to explain the plan and keep the team hidden.

Su Ming traveled to Xient to investigate why the Celestials were targeting a civilization that studied Dark Matter. After infiltrating the planet, he found no obvious threat and continued searching for the reason as the Celestials approached.

• Su Ming learned that the Nuwali had obtained the route of a team of Creator Lords and chose to investigate Xient first.
• Su Ming arrived on Xient and observed that its warm, life-filled environment belonged to an artificial planetary system.
• Su Ming and Strangle hid near an alien residence, and Strangle captured a passerby to copy the Xient People’s appearance and knowledge.
• Su Ming disguised himself as a red-skinned local and ordered the Adjutant to investigate the planet’s information network.
• The Adjutant found no major technological breakthroughs, while Su Ming found no sign that the Xient People posed an obvious threat.
• The Adjutant reported that the Celestials would arrive in about half an hour, and Su Ming continued searching for the reason they were coming.

Su Ming investigated underground on the Xient planet and discovered that its depths held many apparently dead Dark Celestials. He began probing whether living Dark Celestials might lie deeper within and asked Strangle to analyze one with Adjutant.

• Su Ming disguised himself as a red-skinned man, found an entrance to the underground maintenance tunnels, and had Strangle dig deeper while Cloak searched through the rock.
• Strangle found a smooth black alloy layer seven thousand meters underground and recognized it as material from a Celestial.
• Su Ming concluded that the Creator Lord had detected Dark Celestials buried beneath the planet rather than the Xient People's Dark Matter research.
• Cloak found another dead Dark Celestial dozens of kilometers away, leading Su Ming to suspect the planet's core might contain many of them.
• Su Ming considered whether living Dark Celestials could be protected in the center of the buried cluster, then told Strangle to eat one and asked it to work with Adjutant to read its data.

Su Ming watched Strangle devour a Dark Celestial and used Knull’s likeness to plan a scheme against the Celestials. He kept Knull and the injured Shadow King captive while preparing to lure Celestials into a trap and bargain with OAA.

• Strangle gnawed through the Dark Celestial’s corpse while Su Ming showed the scene to Knull inside a sphere.
• Su Ming explained that the Dark Celestials had been driven into hiding by the Colored Celestials and revealed his plan to use Knull’s face to lure Celestials into a trap.
• Su Ming transformed into Knull, mocked his silent protests, and put his sphere away.
• Su Ming brought out the Shadow King, and Knull pretended to try to free him before promising to rescue him later.
• Knull put the Shadow King’s sphere away, and Su Ming prepared to wait for the Celestials, planning to leave one alive to report to OAA.

Su Ming investigated the underground Dark Celestial corpses and learned they held no useful intelligence, then heard Adjutant’s plan to move Xient Star and lure the Creator Lord squad into a trap. The chapter ended with Su Ming praising her suggestion and preparing to carry it out.

• Su Ming asked Cloak whether it had any connection to the Absolute Protoss, but Cloak could not remember its origins.
• Strangle and Adjutant found no usable memories or information in the dead Dark Celestials, and Su Ming concluded that no living ones remained underground.
• Su Ming told Adjutant that the Xient People might have been created by the Dark Celestials and that he did not intend to protect them.
• Adjutant proposed taking Xient Star and using the Colored Celestials’ pursuit of the corpses beneath it to lure them into a fight with the Beyonders.
• Su Ming enthusiastically praised Adjutant’s plan, making her feel more confident in her abilities.

Su Ming dragged Xient Star across space as bait, leaving Dark Celestial fragments and markers to lure the Creator Lords toward the Beyond Realm. The planet’s inhabitants froze to death, and Su Ming continued toward Gods’ Graveyard, where he planned to open the passage.

• Su Ming left a Dark Celestial finger marked with a direction and distance to guide the Creator Lords toward Xient Star.
• Su Ming used The Force to drag Xient Star across space, stripping away its atmosphere and killing its inhabitants.
• Su Ming had Strangle collect a block of ice containing a woman’s corpse, then continued the journey and left more markers.
• The Adjutant reported that the Creator Lords had not yet reached Xient Star’s original location, but were likely to follow the trail.
• Su Ming decided to open the passage to the Beyond Realm at Gods’ Graveyard, where Doom and the Three Witches were waiting.

Su Ming explained Gods' Quarry and its deadly trials to the Adjutant while the group traveled, then brought them to the realm ahead of the pursuing Celestials. Doctor Doom reported that the Three Witches barred non-gods from the trial, but Su Ming said he would negotiate.

• Su Ming told the Adjutant that Gods' Quarry was a realm where gods sought power and relics, and failed challengers became stone statues whose souls fed the Three Witches.
• The Adjutant reported that the Celestials had followed Creator Lord to the first marker, and Su Ming accelerated toward Gods' Quarry while scattering breadcrumbs.
• Su Ming arrived at Gods' Quarry with the planet and found Doctor Doom and the others waiting near the basin.
• Doctor Doom warned Su Ming that the Three Witches would not allow anyone who was not a god to take the trial.
• Su Ming reassured Doctor Doom that he had anticipated the restriction and would negotiate with the witches.

Deadpool volunteered to approach the Three Witches at Gods' Quarry, but instead of negotiating, he provoked them with lewd advances. The Witches wrapped him in a Blood Cocoon and vanished with him, leaving the quarry empty.

• Deadpool dramatically volunteered to face the Three Witches, and Su Ming reminded him to use the Plot Continuity Gem and keep things suitable for minors.
• Deadpool fell down the quarry's sheer wall and landed on a stone statue, but his Healing Factor let him recover while the Three Witches watched.
• The Three Witches offered Deadpool a trial, promising him anything in the quarry if he succeeded and threatening to merge his soul with theirs if he failed.
• Deadpool made sexual advances toward the Three Witches and lay down before them, prompting them to bind him in a Blood Cocoon.
• The Three Witches and Deadpool vanished, leaving the Gods' Quarry empty except for its stone statues.

After Deadpool distracted the Three Witches and vanished with them, Su Ming’s group began preparing to open a passage to the Beyond Realm using Zero Matter. While Doom and Little Rich worked, Su Ming shared drinks with Dracula and discussed letting Vampires join humanity’s coming age of space exploration.

• Wanda asked why the Three Witches had stopped guarding the quarry, and Deathstroke and Doom explained that Deadpool had used the Plot Continuity Gem and psychological tricks to distract them.
• Su Ming ordered Doom and Little Rich to use Zero Matter to simulate the instant heaven and earth first opened and create a passage to the Beyond Realm.
• Su Ming assigned Wanda and Squirrel Girl to search the quarry for useful valuables, then sat with Dracula atop a stone statue to drink dragon blood.
• Su Ming told Dracula that Vampires could take part in humanity’s planned age of space exploration, provided they chose sensible Scions.
• Dracula thanked Su Ming, and the two continued drinking together while the team prepared to deal with the Beyonders.

Doctor Doom used Zero Matter to create a route toward the Beyond Realm, and Su Ming baited the Celestials with a planet partly absorbed into the light. The group hid in Gods' Quarry and waited as the Creator Lords arrived but kept their distance.

• Doctor Doom and Little Rich prepared an apparatus that stabilized the Zero Matter and froze its light in place.
• Doctor Doom explained how rotating Zero Matter's cube-like structure could lift them into higher dimensions, and Su Ming lowered a frozen planet partly into the beam.
• Su Ming concealed the group with Cloak and Wanda's magic, and they waited in Gods' Quarry while Squirrel Girl shared sunflower seeds.
• The Creator Lords arrived but paced outside the quarry, and Deathstroke decided to give them a reason to approach.

Su Ming used Knull’s appearance to provoke the Celestials and discovered that the pink Zero Matter absorbed their Cosmic Energy. He slaughtered most of them with All-Black the Necrosword, then faked an illness and let the survivors knock him into Xient Star, where both disappeared into the pink light.

• Su Ming appeared as Knull and danced and sang to bait the Celestials into attacking.
• The Creator Lords fired Cosmic Energy at him, but the pink Zero Matter swept the beams through to the other side.
• Su Ming and Strangle fought the Celestials with All-Black, and the weapon proved devastatingly effective against them.
• Su Ming slowed his attack and pretended to suffer a grave illness, prompting the remaining Celestials to strike.
• A Celestial’s colossal fist sent Su Ming crashing into the exposed part of Xient Star, and both vanished into the pink light.

After tricking the Celestials and sending the Nuwali fleet into the Transcendence Dimension, Deathstroke entered the Beyond Realm with his companions but arrived alone in an American-style small town. A little girl led him into an empty house, then revealed that she recognized him as her father.

• Deathstroke revealed that Wanda's illusion helped him fool the Celestials into entering the Transcendence Dimension, then ordered the Nuwali fleet and Synthezoids to go ahead.
• Deathstroke left a message carved into a statue, and Dracula, Wanda, Squirrel Girl, Doom, Little Rich, and Deathstroke entered the pink spatial ripple.
• Deathstroke arrived alone in a small town, where his armor had changed into ordinary clothes and Strangle said it could not transform freely in the Beyond Realm.
• A nervous little girl beckoned Deathstroke into an empty house, then sarcastically asked why her father did not recognize her.

Su Ming learned from Little Guy that the Beyond Realm was a ring-shaped domain where the greatest and smallest points joined, and that those he had thrown into it were both present and absent. Wanda returned using a mysterious book, and Little Guy created nuts to draw Squirrel Girl to them, while Doom and Franklin had yet to arrive.

• Little Guy revealed herself as Su Ming's Cosmic Cube and explained that the Beyond Realm was a ring whose houses could contain countless multiverses.
• Wanda appeared through a Teleportation Portal and said a mysterious book had let her use stronger magic in the Beyond Realm.
• Su Ming predicted that Doom and Franklin could find their way to them by adapting their abilities to the realm's rules.
• Su Ming asked Little Guy to make nuts so they could locate Squirrel Girl, and she filled the living room floor with them.
• Squirrel Girl appeared outside the window after smelling the nuts and happily reunited with Su Ming and Wanda.

Su Ming and Little Guy explained that the Beyond Realm was a subjective, higher-dimensional space whose limits depended on its observers. As they discussed the Beyonders’ experiments and the layers above them, Deathstroke wondered why Doom, his son, and the Vampire Grand Duke had not arrived.

• Su Ming considered how the Beyond Realm’s spatial limits could loop into their opposites and concluded that identifying its observers was key to understanding it.
• Squirrel Girl came inside and immediately began eating the pile of nuts while Little Guy explained the Beyond Realm to Wanda.
• Deathstroke said the Beyond Realm was at least fifth-dimensional and compared the Beyonders to prank-loving Fifth-Dimensional Beings such as Mister Mxyzptlk.
• Wanda questioned the purpose of the Beyonders’ experiments, and Su Ming said the Beyonders were themselves pieces in The One Above All’s larger game.
• Wanda asked Su Ming why the number seven seemed to bother him, but he changed the subject and asked why Doom, his son, and the Vampire Grand Duke had not arrived.

Su Ming, Wanda, and the Little Guy planned to find and control CCU to gain an advantage in the Beyond Realm. Since they lacked a way to locate it directly, Deathstroke decided to seek out the Constructors, whose special methods could help them track people.

• The Little Guy advised Su Ming to avoid the Ivory Kings and search for CCU, the powerful Cosmic Cube governing the Beyond Realm.
• Su Ming explained that CCU would be difficult to find and considered summoning Azathoth or provoking a war between the Celestials and Beyonders as backup plans.
• Wanda rejected summoning Azathoth, warning that it could destroy their sanity and possibly the Omniverse.
• Deathstroke proposed finding the Constructors, who had entered the Beyond Realm and possessed methods for locating people.
• Deathstroke asked where the most recent incident in the Beyond Realm had occurred so they could track down the Constructors.

Su Ming led his group to find the Constructors, following Little Guy into a house that opened onto a selection space for Multiversal Systems. They spotted the Constructors’ golden system and prepared to enter it to ask for help against the Beyonders.

• Su Ming decided to search for the Constructors with Wanda and Little Guy, while Deathstroke instructed Squirrel Girl to scratch enemies from behind.
• Little Guy guided the group to a red house where the Constructors and Beyonders were fighting across Multiversal Systems.
• Su Ming opened the door, and Little Guy used her blue light to transport the group into a void filled with bubbles representing Multiversal Systems and their universes.
• Su Ming spotted the Constructors’ golden Multiversal System and said they would enter to ask the Constructors for help.