Chapter Summaries

Cheng Jianxue woke in a frozen, snowbound world, fell through its icy ground, and absorbed a mysterious potion that revealed she had become a Sequence 9 Corpse-Eater. She found herself in a dark wilderness behind a barrier of frozen fog, with lightning overhead.

• Cheng Jianxue awoke in an endless snowy world where snowflakes froze in midair and realized she might have transmigrated.
• Cheng Jianxue dug through the shallow snow, broke through the ice beneath it, and heard a voice name a series of potion ingredients.
• The ingredients formed a deep-blue gel that dissolved into Cheng Jianxue, sending her back into the frozen white world as she focused on a snowflake.
• Cheng Jianxue heard the murmur "World... forget me..." and discovered information in her mind identifying her as a Sequence 9 Corpse-Eater.
• Cheng Jianxue woke beside a cold, blank canvas in a sunless wilderness, saw a barrier of frozen gray-white fog behind her, and shouted, "Shift!"

After confirming she had transmigrated into the Forsaken Land of the Gods, Cheng Jianxue tested the blank canvas and discovered it connected to a snowy white space shaped by her memories. She found that the space could produce remembered objects, but the food was only a memory, leaving her with no real nourishment.

• Cheng Jianxue called Amanises and confirmed that concealment swallowed the name, proving she was in the Forsaken Land of the Gods.
• Cheng Jianxue used her spirituality to enter and leave the white space through the blank canvas, discovering that travel between the spaces consumed spirituality.
• Cheng Jianxue found that the white space remained cold even when she recreated her cozy bedroom, and suspected the cold reflected her Pathway's authority.
• Cheng Jianxue directed memories of food toward the canvas, which produced food but rapidly drained her spirituality.
• Cheng Jianxue tasted bread from the canvas and realized it had only the taste and texture of a memory.

Cheng Jianxue discovered that an unknown influence made the Moon City exploration team unable to see her, and realized that the world had forgotten her. Stranded and hungry in the Forsaken Land of the Gods, she considered praying to one of the few powerful beings whose honorific names she knew.

• Cheng Jianxue confirmed that her potion’s effects were real, while her body remembered eating food that was not there and left her painfully hungry.
• Cheng Jianxue waited near the border for Moon City’s exploration team, hoping to find shelter and learn the current date.
• Captain Zaphir’s team passed Cheng Jianxue without seeing her, and Zaphir reacted only when she threw stones at them.
• Cheng Jianxue touched Ali, who sensed the contact, but the team still could not see or hear Cheng Jianxue.
• Cheng Jianxue realized that the influence protecting her from danger also made the world forget her, and she considered praying to Kotar, Amon, Klein, Ouroboros, or the True Creator.

Cheng Jianxue offered the True Creator a bargain to make the world perceive her again, using the Blank Canvas as leverage, but collapsed after a struggle over a black ink dot. Moon City patrol members found her near the barrier, and she awoke in a dark room with Zaphir nearby.

• Cheng Jianxue prayed to the True Creator, offering to become His emissary in exchange for the world remembering and perceiving her.
• The True Creator’s attention stirred ink on the Blank Canvas, and Cheng Jianxue guided it into a black dot before the canvas’s cold forced her to drop it.
• The ink dot faded to a pale mark as the Blank Canvas’s frost receded, and Cheng Jianxue collapsed while clutching the canvas.
• Ali, Yayi, and Bartel found Cheng Jianxue unconscious during their patrol, and Zaphir sent Ali, Yayi, and Bartel to summon the High Priest while the others investigated.
• Cheng Jianxue awoke in a dark room with the Blank Canvas in her arms and recognized Zaphir’s voice from the wall.

Cheng Jianxue, calling herself Neph, awoke in quarantine beneath the Black Tower in Moon City and used a reference to the Lord that Created Everything to test Zaphir's beliefs. After rejecting the city's corrupted monster meat, she found edible leaves in the Blank Canvas, then considered how to escape surveillance and survive in the Forsaken Land of the Gods.

• Zaphir told Cheng Jianxue that she was beneath the Black Tower in Moon City and had been unconscious for over ten hours.
• Cheng Jianxue introduced herself as Neph and asked whether Moon City's people still served the Lord that Created Everything, leaving Zaphir shaken.
• Neph received a foul piece of roasted monster meat for breakfast and decided she could not bring herself to eat it.
• Neph searched the Blank Canvas for edible plants, found a specimen whose leaves could be eaten raw, and took it for her first meal in the Forsaken Land of the Gods.
• Neph began planning to escape surveillance, find a route across the Forsaken Land of the Gods, and learn more about her situation and the Blank Canvas.

Neph tried to convince Moon City that she was the True Creator’s messenger, and High Priest Nim came to meet her. She told Nim the Lord had brought her there and began testing whether Moon City’s people matched a message she claimed the Lord had given her.

• Neph decided to strengthen Moon City’s suspicions that she was an exalted servant of the True Creator without openly claiming to be an angel.
• Neph refused the food left at her door and braided her hair while waiting in her room.
• Zaphir told Neph that High Priest Nim wished to meet her, and Neph agreed to see him.
• Neph supported Nim when he entered and said she felt ashamed that the Lord had left Moon City’s people waiting so long.
• Neph confirmed to Nim that the Lord had brought her to Moon City, then said the Lord had promised she would hear a certain sentence from his people.

Neph promised Nim that a miracle would reach Moon City in two years, then learned that Klein had arrived in the Forsaken Land of the Gods and was due to resurrect the next day. She followed Nim to meet Davy, Moon City's Evernight Priest, who questioned her lack of need for food despite her low standing in the Beyonder world.

• Nim mistook Neph for someone who had come to rescue Moon City, and Neph promised that a miracle would arrive in two years.
• Nim told Neph that Moon City had guarded the Gray-White Fog for 3,720 years.
• Neph learned that a hill had vanished two months and seventeen days earlier and that an investigation team had encountered an original Demon Wolf, placing Klein's arrival before his first resurrection.
• Neph told Nim she no longer needed to eat and followed him to meet Davy, Moon City's Evernight Priest.
• Davy scrutinized Neph and asked how she could stop needing food despite her low standing in the Beyonder world.

Neph settled into a room in Moon City and investigated the Blank Canvas, discovering how it connected to the pure-white space and wondering whether she had once been part of someone’s collection. She concluded she was more like a thief who had taken the key while the owner was away, but the Canvas’s Sequence 5 entry left her questioning her past.

• Neph asked Davy and Nim about their pathways and learned that Moon City kept time with a clock given by the Angel of Time.
• Nim showed Neph to a room, and she considered the True Creator’s interest in her and the risks of praying to Klein.
• Neph used the Blank Canvas to examine information about the Ghoul pathway and brought a frost-passing flower out of the Canvas to explore its memories.
• Neph realized the Blank Canvas let her influence the pure-white space, but concluded she was not its owner and had instead stolen its key.
• Neph found the pathway entry for Sequence 5, Collector of Memories, and wondered if she had once been an item in the collection.

Neph explored her unusual Spirit Vision and considered how to use the Blank Canvas’s resources, while Klein slowly began to revive in his coffin. The chapter ended with Azik discovering that someone living was pushing open Klein’s grave.

• Neph brought a chair into the Pure White Space, completed her meditation, and discovered that her Spirit Vision showed a patch of pure white.
• Neph learned that the unusual Spirit Vision came from the Sequence 6 Faded Painter and considered whether it could reveal or erase traces of corruption.
• Klein awoke to overlapping prayers, remembered his death, and feared that he was inside a coffin.
• Neph returned to the Pure White Space, investigated her Spirit Vision, and decided to wait for a response before testing corruption traces.
• Klein struggled to move and felt one of his fingers twitch as he wondered whether a week had passed since his death.
• Azik visited Klein’s grave and saw the stone slab begin to move, sensing that a living person was inside.

Klein woke from the dead and sought advice from Azik before discovering a modern-dressed woman praying to Zhou Mingrui. After confirming it was safe, he brought Neph to Sefirah Castle, where she greeted him by both names.

• Klein climbed out of his grave and met Azik, who advised him to avoid the Church of Evernight and begin a new life elsewhere.
• Klein went to Sefirah Castle and found an unfamiliar crimson star carrying a prayer from a modern-dressed young woman who called him Zhou Mingrui.
• Klein entered the woman's dream to investigate her origins, but the frozen snowy realm nearly turned him into an ice sculpture.
• Klein used divination to confirm that summoning the woman was safe and brought her to Sefirah Castle.
• Neph examined the palace and greeted Klein, first as Klein and then as Zhou Mingrui.

Klein questioned Neph about her identity, her knowledge of him, and whether she knew how to return home. Neph revealed that she had foreseen the apocalypse and promised to explain more when she left the Forsaken Land of the Gods, then asked to join the Tarot Club in exchange for information and potion formulas.

• Neph identified herself as Cheng Jianxue and said she had learned about Klein and Sefirah Castle by seeing memories of the past, present, and future.
• Neph told Klein that the apocalypse was a prophecy and said she could not yet reveal its details or information about Sefirah Castle.
• Neph promised to explain the truth about transmigration when she left the Forsaken Land of the Gods, while Klein suspected the answer would be bad news.
• Neph explained that she was stranded in the Forsaken Land of the Gods, where she lacked food, and asked Klein to let her join the Tarot Club.
• Neph offered information and potion formulas, including Klein's later formulas, in exchange for food until the next Tarot Club meeting.
• Neph said she did not long for her family because remembering their past kept them alive to her.

Klein and Neph discussed her place in the Tarot Club, and she chose the name Pure White and requested the twenty-third seat. Neph gave Klein potion formulas for Sequences 7 through 5, then asked whether he knew who was behind the Megose incident.

• Neph explained that she kept former friends alive in her memories, and Klein asked how he could get food to her before the next Tarot Club meeting.
• Neph suggested a sacrificial ritual, then asked Klein to prepare a twenty-third chair and call her Pure White so she would not have to draw a Tarot card in front of Miss Spectator.
• Neph claimed that Pure White meant White Angel and said her Sequence 9 was Ghoul, prompting Klein to ask whether she knew about the Acting Method.
• Klein told Neph about his divination, and she explained that something like Sefirah Castle on her had triggered a self-defense mechanism.
• Neph wrote down potion formulas for Sequences 7 through 5 and told Klein she would provide demigod formulas later.
• Klein told Neph how to prepare for the Tarot Club meeting, and she asked whether he knew who had really been behind the Megose incident.

Neph told Klein that Ince Zangwill had stolen 0-08 and explained the danger it posed, while withholding the deeper truth about the events in Backlund. In Moon City, Neph met Narani, Zaphir’s wife, and learned that the Artisan she sought was being treated in the Black Tower.

• Neph told Klein that Ince Zangwill had used 0-08 to script the events in Tingen City and had gone to Backlund seeking Saint Selena’s Ashes.
• Klein verified Neph’s information and the potion formula through divination before returning to the real world.
• Neph met Narani and her child in Moon City, recognized Narani as Zaphir’s wife, and explained why the name reminded her of a creature that called humans “Nara.”
• Narani told Neph that Moon City had an Artisan named Arula, but Arula was receiving treatment at the bottom of the Black Tower.

Neph learned that Moon City's Artisan Arula was close to losing control and could not make the demigod-level Mystical Item Neph needed. Nim then explained that the Blank Canvas Neph carried was difficult for most people to perceive, even with a Sealed Artifact.

• Narani told Neph that Arula was seriously unwell and led her to the Black Tower to meet High Priest Nim.
• Neph noticed the ordinary-looking clock bestowed by the Angel of Time before asking Nim about Arula.
• Nim explained that Arula was in grave condition and that Moon City had lost the Artisan pathway's formulas and characteristics.
• Nim confirmed Arula could not make demigod-level Mystical Items and was unlikely to finish making any item in her current state.
• Nim asked about the Blank Canvas and said most children overlooked it, while it vanished entirely under a Sealed Artifact's investigative field of vision.

Neph learned that the Blank Canvas made her difficult to notice and told Nim it was the Wordless Heavenly Book, bestowed on her by the Lord. In Moon City's library, she explored how to digest her Ghoul potion before joining the Tarot Club, where she teased Audrey.

• Nim told Neph that he and Davy had found her presence difficult to notice, especially for ordinary people and Middle-Low Sequence Beyonders, and said they had not dared touch the Blank Canvas.
• Neph wondered whether the apparently physical Blank Canvas could be taken from her, then told Nim it was the Wordless Heavenly Book, which only the chosen could read.
• Nim offered to take Neph to Moon City's library and suggested she attend a class; Neph accepted after suspecting he questioned her level of mysticism knowledge, not her identity as an Oracle.
• Neph read Moon City's histories and wrote that a Ghoul was a seeker of traces of the past, reasoning that this might help her digest the potion beyond eating corpses.
• Neph arrived at the Tarot Club gathering and asked Audrey why she was not standing to say good afternoon.

At the Tarot Club, Klein introduced Neph as Pure White, and Alger offered nineteen pages of Roselle’s Diary as payment for the Fool’s help against Qilingus. When Neph offered information about the Secret Order in exchange for an answer, she asked Klein for a precious memory and suggested he give her part of his body.

• Klein introduced Neph as Pure White and announced that she would join the Tarot Club gatherings.
• Alger offered Klein nineteen pages of Roselle’s Diary as payment for the help that had eliminated Qilingus.
• Klein explained the laws governing Beyonder characteristics, and Alger asked why conservation applied within neighboring Sequences.
• Neph offered to answer Alger’s question with information about the Secret Order and asked Klein what he would give in exchange.
• Klein asked what Neph wanted, and she requested a precious memory, proposing that he give her an object—or part of his body—as a way to share it.

Neph explained what she knew about the Secret Order and arranged a trade with Audrey for food and possibly mummy powder. Her request for mummy powder unsettled Audrey and Derrick, while Klein recognized that Neph intended to use it for acting as a Ghoul.

• Neph told Klein that the Secret Order followed the Seer pathway, had ties to Intis, and was led by the mad Young Zaratul, whose madness had been caused by someone else.
• Neph offered Audrey information about adjacent sequences in exchange for half a year’s worth of food, with any shortfall in value made up with mummy powder.
• Neph claimed she wanted mummy powder for male vitality, then explained that she liked the secrets hidden in corpses and used it as food.
• Derrick asked whether monster corpses could substitute for human ones, and Neph reminded him that she was trapped among polluted human corpses and could not obtain food.

Neph discussed her hopes of leaving the cursed land and worshipped a being she called the God of Winter. She arranged payment with Derrick and asked Alger how to turn a Sequence 3 Beyonder characteristic that purified corruption into a Mystical Item.

• Derrick asked whether Neph expected to leave within six months, and she said she could not take anyone with her but suggested he wait for her lord’s return.
• Neph called her lord the God of Winter, a name unfamiliar to Derrick, Audrey, and Alger.
• Neph asked Derrick for Black-Faced Grass, its recipes, and cultivation guidelines, explaining that she wanted to collect them.
• Neph asked Alger whether Demigod-level Artisans were easy to find, then explained she wanted to preserve a Sequence 3 characteristic’s purification ability in a Mystical Item.
• Alger suggested letting the characteristic form a Sealed Artifact on its own or using a luck-enhancing Mystical Item to improve the result.

Neph explained neighboring pathways to the Tarot Club and alarmed its members by revealing her reverence for the True Creator and her regret at missing the occasion when He was devoured. After the trading ended, Audrey asked Mr. Fool whether two potential members could join the gatherings.

• Neph realized she could not afford to commission a luck-enhancing Mystical Item and considered saving money and taking combat lessons.
• Audrey asked how to deliver Neph’s requested food, and Neph told her to consult Mr. Fool and send the supplies gradually.
• Neph explained which pathways neighbored Justice, Hanged Man, and Sun at High Sequences, then urged them to join the Aurora Order.
• Neph called the True Creator her Lord and described His believers feasting on His flesh and blood, horrifying Klein, Audrey, and Derrick.
• Derrick asked whether the True Creator’s symbol was a cross, but Neph declined to answer and the members continued trading.
• Audrey asked Mr. Fool whether two discreet Beyonder women in Backlund could join the Tarot Club.

Neph reassured Klein that the True Creator could not directly reach her through Blank Canvas, then agreed to request ingredients for Klein’s next potion at the Tarot Club. In exchange for a promise that Klein could not yet fulfill, she recited a cryptic account of the gods’ betrayal and the Ancient Sun God’s downfall.

• Neph explained that Blank Canvas blocked the True Creator’s ravings, and Klein realized that the True Creator might notice him because of Neph’s prayers.
• Klein asked Neph to request Sequence 7 potion ingredients at the Tarot Club, and she agreed to ask at the next meeting.
• Neph said she could tell Klein part of the story behind Holy Communion if he gave her a future promise, then asked to taste his corpse once he became the master of Sefirah Castle.
• Neph told Klein that he could revive four times and had already used two.
• Neph recited a poem describing the saints’ schemes, the Ancient Sun God’s downfall, and the inverted cross above a sea of blood.