Chapter Summaries

Xia Shou and Su Weiyu entered the pitch-black second floor to fight the Ear Doctor, coordinating their attacks while Xia Shou carried her on his back. After a failed counter to a distant throwing knife, Xia Shou used Blood Rampage to spread blood threads through the room and deliberately deafened himself, hoping to sense and touch his opponent.

• Xia Shou and Su Weiyu settled on a system of leg pinches to signal attacks while she rode on his back.
• Xia Shou entered the dark room and cautiously moved along the wall, waiting for the Ear Doctor to attack.
• The Ear Doctor struck Xia Shou in the throat with a throwing knife, and Su Weiyu's counterattack hit nothing.
• Xia Shou realized the Ear Doctor had known about both of them and was attacking from a distance.
• Xia Shou spread blood threads through the room with Blood Rampage and punctured his eardrums so he could rely on his other senses.

Xia Shou and Su Weiyu defeated the Ear Doctor, but Shared Misery left Su Weiyu deaf and mute while Xia Shou recovered his sight and hearing. They gained the Ear Department Key and began planning for the next doctor, though they still needed three more keys to escape the domain.

• Xia Shou used [Shared Misery] and [Everlasting Wound] after the Ear Doctor kicked him, transferring his injuries and deafness to the enemy.
• Su Weiyu killed the Ear Doctor while Xia Shou was incapacitated by pain, and Xia Shou healed his eye and ears afterward.
• Su Weiyu passed Xia Shou two keys, then became deaf and mute as his sight and hearing returned.
• Xia Shou returned the Ophthalmology Key to Su Weiyu and used Alice to see through her eyes.
• Xia Shou wrote his guesses about the next doctor on the floor, and Su Weiyu asked whether he remembered what Liu Guangyao had said.

Xia Shou discovered that his shadow could seal the keys left by the Doctors, suppressing their sensory curses but accelerating his descent into the sea. After sealing the Auditory Key and the Eye Key, he and Su Weiyu opened the door to the third-floor corridor, where they found it strewn with corpses.

• Xia Shou tested the Hearing Key with his shadow and found that it could interact with the key.
• Xia Shou used the Vision Key in the first-floor lock and learned that each key unlocked its section permanently.
• Xia Shou attempted to devour the Auditory Key, but his shadow sealed it instead, restoring hearing while increasing his sinking speed.
• Xia Shou saw that his depth gauge had passed 1,200 meters and warned that sealing more keys would make him sink faster.
• Xia Shou and Su Weiyu returned to the second floor, sealed the Eye Key, and opened the third-floor door onto a corridor full of corpses.

Su Weiyu and Xia Shou encountered a doctor who offered them two vacant chief physician positions and claimed they could not defeat him. Su Weiyu attacked, but her weapons and limbs passed through him, and he wounded her with a scalpel.

• The doctor offered Su Weiyu and Xia Shou keys and positions as chief physicians at the sanatorium.
• Su Weiyu identified the doctor as a nonhuman part of the sanatorium’s rules and attacked him with the Boy Cutter.
• The doctor remained unharmed by Su Weiyu’s rapid sword strike and countered with a scalpel.
• Su Weiyu’s sword, hands, and kick all passed through the doctor, while his scalpel cut her calf.
• Xia Shou realized the doctor controlled both the hand and foot keys, leaving them unable to attack him by ordinary means.

Xia Shou and Su Weiyu discovered that the Hand Doctor could not be harmed by attacks made with hands or feet, so Xia Shou sacrificed his limbs to make the doctor lose control of his own. As Su Weiyu fought the fallen doctor, Xia Shou realized the Heart Doctor was hidden among the corpses—and it rose behind her to attack.

• Xia Shou and Su Weiyu found that weapons and limbs passed harmlessly through the Hand Doctor, leaving them trapped in the narrow corridor.
• Xia Shou asked Su Weiyu to cut off his hands and feet and throw him at the Hand Doctor, causing the doctor's limbs to lose their strength.
• Su Weiyu used Boy Cutter in her mouth to stab the fallen Hand Doctor while Xia Shou endured excruciating pain.
• Xia Shou pieced together that there was no top floor and that the Heart Doctor had been concealed among the corpses.
• The Heart Doctor rose behind Su Weiyu and thrust a scalpel toward her neck.

Xia Shou and Su Weiyu collected the remaining keys, opened the iron doors, and found Idrisu treating a little girl in the ward beyond. Idrisu silently demanded that they leave, leaving them to face the creature and decide how to stop the treatment.

• Xia Shou’s blood attack accidentally helped Su Weiyu dodge the disguised Heart Doctor, and she cut down the corpses and collected the last three keys.
• Su Weiyu retrieved Xia Shou’s severed limbs, and he sealed the Heart Key in his shadow to keep Wang Long alive.
• Su Weiyu used the Hand, Foot, and Heart Keys to open the iron doors after the Eye and Ear locks had already been opened.
• Xia Shou and Su Weiyu entered a ward filled with floating organs and found Idrisu cutting a tumor from a little girl.
• Idrisu silently conveyed that Xia Shou and Su Weiyu should leave while it treated the patient.

Xia Shou attacked Idrisu while it treated Su Weiyu, and his shadow subdued and imprisoned the creature behind a white bone door. With Idrisu sealed and the keys under his control, Xia Shou and Su Weiyu waited as the ward's domain collapsed.

• Su Weiyu asked Xia Shou to stop Idrisu's treatment, and Xia Shou took the Limb Key and tried to pull the creature away from her.
• A surge of guilt stopped Xia Shou from dragging Idrisu away, so he repeatedly slashed it with the Boy Cutter.
• Xia Shou's shadow bound Idrisu, which transformed into a powerful birdlike creature before the shadow swamp subdued it.
• A white bone door rose from Xia Shou's shadow and imprisoned Idrisu, and the keys' effects on Su Weiyu ended.
• Xia Shou learned that Idrisu could cure illnesses at the cost of making another living being of the same species endure the illness, and he gained control of the five keys.
• The ward began to distort as its domain collapsed, and Su Weiyu told Xia Shou to wait for them to return to the original hospital.

Xia Shou returned from the closed domain and learned that the Containment Bureau planned to cover up the hospital disaster. Back at his dorm, he discovered that Su Weiyu had moved into his room, only to realize she had misread his reaction and become mortified.

• Xia Shou woke after escaping the closed domain, and Dr. Modis questioned him until Shangguan Yan took him away.
• Shangguan Yan told Xia Shou that more than fifty people had survived the hospital incident and that the Containment Bureau would alter their memories and demolish the building.
• Shangguan Yan ordered Xia Shou to report for overtime that evening, gave him a gym key card, and sent him back to his dorm.
• Xia Shou found Su Weiyu's pink-sheeted bed in the formerly empty half of his room and learned that she planned to live there.
• Su Weiyu recalled how online answers had convinced her Xia Shou would welcome her move, then panicked when his shock showed she had miscalculated.

Su Weiyu asked to stay with Xia Shou, but Alice’s warning forced him to offer her the empty room next door instead. Later, Xia Shou entered the Deep Sea Dreamscape and spotted a dark outline in the distance.

• Su Weiyu claimed she needed to stay near 678 so she could read to it and keep her belongings from being discarded.
• Xia Shou nearly lost consciousness when Alice tightened her grip around his neck, so he told Su Weiyu to stay next door and offered to watch her things.
• Alice helped Xia Shou undress, washed his clothes, and gave Su Weiyu the bedding before locking her out of the dormitory.
• After locking Idrisu behind the door, Xia Shou stored the five keys in his shadow and swam horizontally through the Deep Sea Dreamscape.
• Xia Shou noticed an even darker outline emerging from the surrounding darkness.

Xia Shou read the Death Record Notebook to learn about the root sea, its rulers, and the dangers of touching its manifestations. He also learned how to weaken Idrisu and potentially devour its power, but the notebook refused to reveal its own goal.

• Xia Shou woke from an ordinary dream and found that the Death Record Notebook’s writing had become clear.
• Xia Shou asked the notebook about the root sea, and it warned him against touching its manifestations and explained that the Blood God ruled the Sea of Unceasing Blood below 1,300 meters.
• The notebook explained that Xia Shou could survive the root sea by rising, preventing himself from sinking, or safely sinking, and warned him to conceal his shadow-devouring ability.
• Xia Shou asked the notebook about its goal, but it refused to answer and told him to ask more worthwhile questions.
• The notebook explained that Alice would open the doors when the time was right and that touching the White Bone Door would reveal Idrisu’s craving and information about maintaining its seal.
• The notebook advised Xia Shou to use the Blood Demon’s desire to slaughter against Idrisu’s desire to heal, weakening both powers so he could potentially devour Idrisu.