Chapter Summaries

Shi Xuan explained the severe costs of the Orthodox Dao Primordial Spirit path and invited cultivators to choose whether to follow it. Most rejected the dangerous path, but Xia Jing and Zhao Xingfan reached the summit, where Shi Xuan questioned Xia Jing’s resolve before accepting her into his sect.

• Shi Xuan explained that Orthodox Dao cultivation offered less lifespan and greater danger than Outer Dao methods, then swept the crowd away from Zhushan’s summit and invited those willing to join his sect to come forward.
• True Person Haori turned back after questioning his chances of surviving the path, while True Person Wumu, Zhan Tang, Ying Zi, and Yellow Mountain Lord chose to remain with their current methods.
• Xia Jing and Zhao Xingfan climbed toward the summit despite the crowd’s ridicule, while Zhuang Yukun also set out toward Zhushan because he had no other cultivation method.
• Zhao Xingfan told Shi Xuan he sought only reincarnation, and Shi Xuan agreed to help him after questioning Xia Jing.
• Xia Jing told Shi Xuan she had come to pursue the Great Dao rather than extend her lifespan, and Shi Xuan warned her of the path’s suffering before asking whether she could hold fast.

Xia Jing accepted Shi Xuan’s orthodox Primordial Spirit inheritance despite its hardships, and Shi Xuan established the Penglai Lower Courtyard on a newly raised mountain range. The chapter ended with two overseas cultivators watching Six-winged Young Lord face a Heavenly Tribulation and questioning whether he could survive it.

• Xia Jing firmly accepted Shi Xuan’s three challenges, and auspicious phenomena celebrated her inheritance of the orthodox Primordial Spirit path.
• Shi Xuan raised a mountain range outside Anxi City and named its summit the Penglai Lower Courtyard, while the departing sects thanked him and left.
• Shi Xuan told Zhan Tang and the Zhushan Sect disciples to settle on the new peaks, then invited the waiting cultivators and mortals, including Zhuang Yukun, to live there and attend his monthly teachings.
• Shi Xuan warned Xia Jing that the sects might face disaster because of the great fortune gathered upon her, but he did not explain what he meant.
• At Golden Wings Mountain, an Azure-haired Elder with Green Dragon Horns and a strange cultivator watched Six-winged Young Lord undergo a Heavenly Tribulation and discussed the past failures of Great Demons.

Six-winged Young Lord passed the Heavenly Tribulation, and the Demon Race began its invasion of the mainland by destroying the Dharma Flower Sect and killing True Person Jinluo. As the major sects panicked, their leaders fled toward Zhushan to seek Shi Xuan's protection.

• Six-winged Young Lord survived the Heavenly Tribulation, and the Azure-haired Elder with Green Dragon Horns and the Myriad Eyes Demon King pledged to follow him back to the mainland.
• Shi Xuan and Granny Yu discussed Xia Jing's training, Granny Yu's rapid cultivation, and Shi Xuan's need to gather Human Killing Intent before traveling.
• The Myriad Eyes Demon King shattered the Dharma Flower Sect's protective formation, and Six-winged Young Lord killed and swallowed True Person Jinluo.
• True Person Haori, True Person Ming Xia, True Person Jingyue, True Person Wumu, Wen Nianxi, and others learned of the Demon Race's attack and hurried to Zhushan to seek Shi Xuan's protection.

The sects fleeing the Demon Race sought refuge at Zhushan, where Xia Jing announced that Shi Xuan would protect them if the demons attacked. As the demons advanced using an outdated map, Six-winged Young Lord mistook Zhushan for another mountain, but human traitors discovered the mistake and recognized their destination.

• Wen Nianxi told the Penglai Lower Courtyard disciples that the Demon Race had destroyed the Dharma Flower Sect and asked them to report the crisis to Shi Xuan.
• Xia Jing relayed Shi Xuan's offer to shelter the sects and defend Zhushan, then allowed the refugees to settle on its peaks.
• True Person Haori and the other leaders wondered about Xia Jing's apparent age and her account of Old Woman, while their disciples feared that Shi Xuan might not defeat the Great Demons.
• Six-winged Young Lord, Poison Dragon King Ao Tu, Myriad Eyes Demon King, and several dozen demons advanced toward the mountain shown on their rat demon's map, planning to investigate before attacking.
• Human traitors near Anxi City recognized the mountain as Zhushan and exclaimed that the demons had reached it.

Wang Shiba warned Six-winged Young Lord, Poison Dragon King Ao Tu, and Myriad Eyes Demon King that Bamboo Mountain Immortal Venerable guarded Zhushan, and the demons attempted to withdraw from Anxi City. Shi Xuan stopped them, demanded a punishment for their crimes, and destroyed Six-winged Young Lord when he tried to flee, leaving everyone stunned by his power.

• Wang Shiba told Six-winged Young Lord, Poison Dragon King Ao Tu, and Myriad Eyes Demon King that Bamboo Mountain Immortal Venerable had transformed Zhushan and would return to the Immortal Realm in just over ten years.
• The three Demon Kings decided to retreat from Anxi City and return after Shi Xuan left, but Shi Xuan halted them with the laws of heaven and earth.
• Wen Nianxi and the cultivators on Zhushan watched the demon clouds stop as Shi Xuan confronted the demons.
• Shi Xuan named trespassing on Zhushan and slaughtering Dharma Flower Sect cultivators as the demons' crimes, then ordered them to leave their leader behind and stay off the mainland for fifteen hundred years.
• Six-winged Young Lord transformed and tried to escape, but Shi Xuan trapped him in a mysterious expanse and reduced him to dust.

Bamboo Mountain Immortal Venerable spared the remaining demons after killing Six-winged Young Lord, leaving the cultivators to debate the Demon Race’s future and whether to adopt the Orthodox Dao Sect path. Eighteen years later, Shi Xuan collected Human Killing Intent from a battlefield and descended toward a mortal kingdom to seek what was missing.

• Poison Dragon King Ao Tu and Myriad Eyes Demon King begged Bamboo Mountain Immortal Venerable for mercy and agreed to withdraw overseas for fifteen hundred years, while Wang Shiba was left to the cultivators.
• True Person Haori and the other True Persons worried about the Demon Race’s eventual return, while Wen Nianxi suspected the agreement was meant to pressure Xia Jing and her companions.
• After the cultivators debated whether to switch to the Orthodox Dao Sect Primordial Spirit path, the senior True Persons returned to their sects, hoping Xia Jing would achieve Primordial Spirit and survive the Heavenly Tribulation.
• Xia Jing asked Shi Xuan why he had not wiped out the Demon Race, and Shi Xuan explained that he intended to leave pressure and challenges for her.
• Eighteen years later, Shi Xuan gathered Human Killing Intent from a mortal battlefield but found it incomplete, suspected mortal killing intents were the missing part, and descended toward a nearby kingdom.

Shi Xuan visited the Zhang Family Inn, where Zhang Yuan and Madam Zhang tried to drug and rob him for the gold they thought he carried. After they beheaded him and discovered the bundle held spirit money, Shi Xuan restored his head and frightened them to death, collecting their Human Killing Intent.

• Madam Zhang noticed Shi Xuan’s heavy bundle and persuaded Zhang Yuan that it contained gold.
• Zhang Yuan drugged tea with Meng Han Powder, but Shi Xuan drank two pots without showing any effect.
• After Shi Xuan appeared to collapse, Zhang Yuan chopped off his head while Madam Zhang watched.
• Madam Zhang opened the bundle and found white spirit money instead of gold as a yin wind extinguished the lamp.
• Shi Xuan reattached his head and frightened Zhang Yuan and Madam Zhang to death, then played with the Human Killing Intent he had collected.

Shi Xuan gathered Human Killing Intent while traveling and gave Hao Changshou a talisman after predicting a life-threatening calamity. The talisman stopped Madam Hao Xiao when she transformed into a wolf demon, and Hao Changshou let go of his intertwined love and hatred; the couple searched the city the next day to thank Shi Xuan.

• Passersby reported the bloody deaths at Zhang Family Inn, where investigators uncovered the Zhang couple’s murders of travelers and buried victims.
• Shi Xuan traveled through cities to gather Human Killing Intent and met Hao Changshou, predicting a calamity within three days.
• Shi Xuan gave Hao Changshou a talisman and told him to hold it if he encountered wine after a meal.
• On the third night, Madam Hao Xiao transformed into a wolf demon and approached Hao Changshou, but the talisman restrained her and restored her human form.
• Hao Changshou struggled between fear and memories of their marriage, then discarded the talisman as his love-and-hatred Killing Intent flowed into it.
• The next day, Hao Changshou and Madam Hao Xiao searched the city with their attendants to thank Shi Xuan.

Shi Xuan helped Jian Yun save his mother after the boy killed a corrupt shopkeeper, then refused Jian Yun and Hao Changshou’s requests to become his disciples. He traveled to the Ancient Tomb of Desolate Beasts to study the laws of life and death, where his attempt to influence the tomb’s evolution was interrupted by an unexpected change.

• Jian Yun killed the goateed shopkeeper and took the hundred-year-old ginseng, then met Shi Xuan, who erased the corpse and helped him save his mother with Divine Rain.
• Shi Xuan told Jian Yun his name and declined Jian Yun and Hao Changshou’s pleas to join his sect, asking each what they could give up.
• Shi Xuan left for the Ancient Tomb of Desolate Beasts and reached the core beside a murky yellow river.
• Shi Xuan used Six Paths of Reincarnation to comprehend the laws of life and death and began influencing the tomb’s evolution, but an unexpected change occurred.

Shi Xuan’s use of the Six Paths of Reincarnation accelerated the Ancient Tomb of Desolate Beasts into a sudden transformation, opening a passage to the Nine Nether and trapping him near its black hole. After killing the greedy Black Impermanence Fan Xiaotong, Shi Xuan followed the murky river upstream into the Nine Nether to escape the force pursuing him.

• Shi Xuan’s Six Paths of Reincarnation triggered the Ancient Tomb’s rapid evolution, forming the Ghost Gate Pass, a black hole, and a passage to the Nine Nether.
• Shi Xuan used the Other Shore Golden Bridge and Xuanhuang Merit Pagoda to resist the black hole’s pull, but he could neither escape nor move freely.
• Black Impermanence Fan Xiaotong emerged from the passage, coveted Shi Xuan’s Heaven and Earth Mountain River Diagram, and attacked him with a Mourning Staff and Ghost Locking Chain.
• Shi Xuan used the Other Shore Golden Bridge to freeze Fan Xiaotong, then killed him with Sword Qi that shattered his True Spirit.
• Shi Xuan entered the passage and traveled upstream through the murky river toward the first layer of the Nine Nether, evading the force pursuing him.

Shi Xuan escaped the Yellow Springs with the help of his Xuanhuang Merit Pagoda and Taiji Diagram, then accepted a ride from the Ferryman of the Yellow Springs. The ferryman steered toward the Left Saint Ghost Capital, and Shi Xuan asked whether its inhabitants hated the living.

• Shi Xuan used his Xuanhuang Merit Pagoda and Two Forms Dust Sword Qi to fight through the Yellow Springs while its water eroded his defenses.
• A water ghost transformed from a fallen Heavenly Immortal seized Shi Xuan, so he sacrificed the pagoda’s Merit Qi and used the Taiji Diagram to escape its grasp and break the surface.
• As Shi Xuan began falling back into the river, the Ferryman of the Yellow Springs arrived in a small black boat and offered him passage.
• Shi Xuan accepted the ride, asked the ferryman to take him to the Left Saint Ghost Capital, and explained that he possessed two Treasures of Five Virtues.
• The Ferryman praised Shi Xuan for escaping the river, then rowed toward the Nine Nether First Layer as Shi Xuan asked whether the Left Saint Ghost Capital hated the living.

Shi Xuan disguised his living aura and asked the old boatman how to escape the Nine Nether Great World. He learned that the missing Left Saint Imperial Sovereign’s absence had left the first layer without a reliable way out, and the boatman brought him to Left Saint Ghost Capital with a warning about the fare.

• Shi Xuan merged the Hell Path into himself to conceal his living aura, and the old boatman judged the disguise adequate unless he encountered a Ghost Lord.
• The old boatman explained that outsiders with powerful backing had once been escorted out of the Nine Nether, but the Left Saint Imperial Sovereign had been missing for twenty-three thousand years.
• Shi Xuan learned that Other Shore Boats carried only Yin souls and that the first layer’s ghost soldiers had grown lax since the Imperial Sovereign disappeared.
• The old boatman listed four possible escape methods: his River of Oblivion Boat, waiting for Shi Xuan’s powerful ally, waiting for the Left Saint Imperial Sovereign, or seeking clues in the Imperial Palace.
• The old boatman revealed that Celestial Immortals and higher had been bound to the Nine Nether after an upheaval, then warned Shi Xuan that advancing to Heavenly Human there would bind him too.
• The River of Oblivion Boat reached Left Saint Ghost Capital, and the old boatman demanded three Sin-Absolving Flowers within a year or one hundred years of service.

Shi Xuan entered Left Saint Ghost Capital, found a place to stay, and helped the Purple Sheath Sword pass its Nine Fires Burning Heart Tribulation. After the sword awakened memories that let it speak to him, they set out for Yin Mountain to search for Sin-Absolving Flowers and other rare flowers.

• Shi Xuan promised the old boatman he would bring back Sin-Absolving Flowers, then left for Left Saint Ghost Capital as the old man joked that the colored-clothed boy could travel with him.
• Shi Xuan passed through the ghost capital's gates, explored its punishment road, and rented a coffin-shaped cave dwelling from Zhilan.
• After a month in the cave dwelling, Shi Xuan helped the Purple Sheath Sword survive the True Heart Glazed Fire, and the sword began speaking to him after recalling memories of a past life.
• Shi Xuan left for Yin Mountain with the curious Purple Sheath Sword and reached the barren mountain, where the sword noticed ghost souls clinging to its slopes.

Shi Xuan entered Yin Mountain to search its caves for rare flowers, while three Ghost Path cultivators recognized his concealed aura and secretly moved to act against him. After sensing that someone had obscured the heavenly secrets, Shi Xuan fled deeper into the cave, where he prepared to face the approaching danger.

• Shi Xuan resisted Yin Mountain’s magnetic force, entered its depths, and froze the Yin Ghosts that tried to seize him.
• Mang Ya and Mo Gui recognized Shi Xuan from a jade pendant’s phantom aura, then performed a ritual to conceal their plans before racing back toward Yin Mountain.
• Shi Xuan let the Purple Sheath Sword battle nearby ghostly creatures while he gathered another Sin-Absolving Flower and continued searching for a Karma-Eradicating Flower.
• Shi Xuan sensed that someone had obscured the heavenly secrets and realized danger was about to strike.
• Shi Xuan merged with the Purple Sheath Sword’s light and fled deeper into the cave, choosing to remain hidden within Yin Mountain rather than escape to Left Saint Ghost Capital.

Shi Xuan waited in the Yin Mountain cave and sprang a trap on Mang Ya and Mo Gui, who had hunted him using a concealment technique. After the Void Reflecting Mirror exposed them, Shi Xuan trapped Mang Ya in his sword formation and struck at Mo Gui.

• Mang Ya and Mo Gui tracked Shi Xuan into the deepest part of the Yin Mountain cave, relying on Yin Qi Concealment Escape to approach unseen.
• The two Ghost Path True Persons found Shi Xuan by a pool and launched a surprise attack.
• Shi Xuan activated his prepared Eight Trigrams, Five Elements Dirt Cleansing Bell, and Taiji Diagram, but could not locate his concealed enemies.
• Shi Xuan spread the Minor Heavenly Star Dou Sword Formation to search for and contain the attackers.
• Shi Xuan used the Void Reflecting Mirror to reveal Mang Ya and Mo Gui and formed the Two Forms Dust Formation, weakening the local laws’ suppression.
• The Minor Heavenly Star Dou Great Formation trapped Mang Ya as Shi Xuan’s violet sword light descended toward Mo Gui.

Shi Xuan isolated Mang Ya and Mo Gui with two formations, killed Mo Gui, and fought Mang Ya while the Ghost Lord’s power approached. Shi Xuan escaped into the spacetime mist of the Yin Mountain cave’s Origin space just before Mang Mountain Ghost Lord’s attack could reach him.

• Mang Ya used Death’s Eye and his other techniques to resist Shi Xuan’s formations while Mo Gui blocked Shi Xuan’s Purple Sheath Sword with the Heaven-Rending Ghost Hands.
• Shi Xuan suppressed Mo Gui with the Other Shore Golden Bridge and crushed him beneath the Earth Trapping Seal, then captured fragments of his Primordial Spirit in the Yin-Yang Two Qi Bottle.
• Shi Xuan turned his full strength against Mang Ya, who transformed into a giant Ghost Crow and used the Mang Mountain Ghost Lord Soul Descending Talisman to summon a powerful ghost hand.
• Shi Xuan blocked Mang Ya’s attacks and fled as Mang Mountain Ghost Lord’s aura approached, drawing Mang Ya toward the cave’s Origin space.
• Shi Xuan entered the white spacetime mist, and Mang Mountain Ghost Lord’s ghost claw could no longer lock onto his aura.

Shi Xuan survived in the Nine Nether Great World’s dangerous origin space while Mang Mountain Ghost Lord waited for him to emerge. After freeing several lost souls, Shi Xuan sensed a powerful trace of Six Paths of Reincarnation deep within the origin space and chose to investigate it, though a string of coincidences made him suspect that events were being guided.

• Mang Mountain Ghost Lord learned that Shi Xuan had escaped into the origin space, then changed his plan and sent an incarnation to watch while Mang Ya returned to face the wall for a hundred years.
• Shi Xuan found refuge on a shattered Lesser Thousand World, discovered from Mo Gui’s memories that Mang Mountain Ghost Lord had ordered the attack, and learned that the attackers had sought Karma-Eradicating Flowers.
• When dense spacetime mist forced Shi Xuan from his refuge, three lost Ghost Path True Persons attacked him, and he used the Six Paths of Reincarnation to free them and gain three wisps of Yin Virtue Aura.
• Shi Xuan sensed a distant trace of a far more powerful Six Paths of Reincarnation technique and considered whether Fengdu Imperial Sovereign or Left Saint Imperial Sovereign had left it behind.
• Shi Xuan decided to approach the trace through the dangerous layered Lesser Thousand Worlds, while growing suspicious of the coincidences that had led him there.

Shi Xuan reached a hidden Lesser Thousand World and deciphered fragments of a Six Paths of Reincarnation message that appeared to point toward the Imperial Palace Main Hall and the Book of Life and Death. After leaving the Origin space, he confronted Mang Mountain Ghost Lord and used his knowledge to test what the Ghost Lord wanted.

• Shi Xuan detoured around collapsing Lesser Thousand Worlds, crossed the spacetime mist with the Taiji Diagram, and narrowly avoided a nearly adult World-Devouring Beast.
• Shi Xuan used the Six Paths of Reincarnation to hear a message on a barren mountain summit about the Book of Life and Death, the Imperial Palace Main Hall, and the Hell Path.
• Shi Xuan suspected the message might have been left by Left Saint Imperial Sovereign and decided to leave the Origin space after nurturing the Taiji Diagram.
• Mang Mountain Ghost Lord waited near the rift and warned Shi Xuan to surrender, while Shi Xuan concealed himself in the mist and hinted that the Ghost Lord needed him.
• Shi Xuan said “Six Paths of Reincarnation,” prompting Mang Mountain Ghost Lord to demand who had sent him and how he knew of the matter.

Shi Xuan struck a deal with Mang Mountain Ghost Lord to cooperate in entering the Left Saint Imperial Palace, but learned he would have to remain on Mang Mountain for 714 years. He then began his one-year ferrying service on the Yellow Springs River, where the colored-clothed boy treated him coldly.

• Shi Xuan claimed a Half-step Golden Immortal elder had given him a way to hide in Origin space, and said his deadline to deliver three Sin-Absolving Flowers forced him to seek Mang Mountain Ghost Lord’s cooperation.
• Mang Mountain Ghost Lord agreed to a Karmic Oath and negotiated a share of the Imperial Palace’s treasures with Shi Xuan.
• After swearing the oath, Mang Mountain Ghost Lord revealed the Left Saint Imperial Palace could only be entered in 714 years and confined Shi Xuan to Mang Mountain until then.
• Mang Mountain Ghost Lord used a Supervisory Immortal Technique on Shi Xuan and left, while Shi Xuan headed to the Yellow Springs River.
• The old boatman reduced Shi Xuan’s ferrying sentence to one year for being only a day late, and his colored-clothed grandson reluctantly guided Shi Xuan onto the River of Oblivion Boat.

Shi Xuan crossed Yellow Springs by River of Oblivion Boat and used the more than seven hundred years before entering the Left Saint Imperial Palace to plan ways to survive. He arrived at Mang Mountain under Mang Mountain Ghost Lord’s invitation and began secluding himself to cultivate and devise protective secret treasures.

• Shi Xuan followed the colored-clothed boy’s advice to pour yin-nature Dharma Power into River of Oblivion Boat, protecting it from the water ghosts.
• Shi Xuan assessed the dangers of reaching the Left Saint Imperial Palace and resolved to use his remaining preparation time to improve his Yin-Yang Mixed Cavern Divine Light and derive a protective secret treasure from Yin Virtue Aura.
• Shi Xuan used the Six Paths of Reincarnation to release water ghosts and gather Yin Virtue Aura, while Mang Mountain Ghost Lord allowed him to continue.
• After half a year on the river, Shi Xuan left the boat and accepted Mang Mountain Ghost Lord’s invitation to stay at Mang Mountain.
• Shi Xuan entered a side hall, set up formations to block probing, and began cultivating and deducing.