Chapter Summaries

The Youth explained that the Turtle Prime Minister was a Relic Phenomenon whose destruction summoned the real Dragon King, which subdued the Water Person. As Mo Ling and the Little Sprite heard the Water Person’s final words, it revealed that Wishless Ones could never have wishes of their own, leaving the Little Sprite shaken.

• Shrimp Soldiers and Crab Generals attacked the Water Person with machine guns and a cannon, until the Turtle Prime Minister carried the Water Person and an unconscious Crab General onto its shell.
• The recovering Water Person pierced the turtle’s shell, summoning the Dragon King, whose storm and pressure forced the Water Person to kneel helplessly.
• The Youth explained that the Turtle Prime Minister attached itself to ordinary turtles and summoned the Dragon King whenever its host was attacked.
• Mo Ling and the Little Sprite heard the Water Person beg for help and admit it had no wish of its own.
• The Water Person told the Little Sprite that Wishless Ones could grant others’ wishes but could never have wishes themselves, calling that fate a curse and its price.

Voice of God tried to make its kin gain wishes by gathering their shared desires, but Little Sprite challenged its idea of what a wish was. The dying god was left wondering whether its wish had already been fulfilled.

• Voice of God explained how Slothful One surrendered to apathy and Joyful One escaped confusion through pleasure.
• As the Dragon King's pressure and lightning battered it, Voice of God revealed its plan to use shared wishes to let its race possess wishes of their own.
• Voice of God asked Little Sprite to help it fulfill that plan, but Little Sprite refused to let others create its wish.
• Little Sprite explained that wishes arose from living beings' desires and suggested that Voice of God's wish was already to help its kin possess wishes.
• Voice of God questioned whether its wish had truly gone unfulfilled, while Olive remained silent.

God fulfilled the wishes of the Shrimp Soldiers, Crab Generals, and the turtle before surrendering to Dawn City’s authorities. Back in Creation God Sea, the Little Sprite reflected on how the wish-granting bargain trapped Gods and their people in different ways.

• God revived the fallen Shrimp Soldiers and Crab Generals and healed the turtle, then the Dragon King withdrew and the storm cleared.
• The Youth arrested God, who accepted the ruling, and told Olive to wait until the judgment was over before returning God’s authority.
• Olive returned to Creation God Sea with Mo Ling and the Little Sprite, which realized it would have to act as a God until God returned.
• The Little Sprite wondered whether it would have resisted the fate of its race and reflected on the costs of granting wishes.
• The Little Sprite considered how Gods and their people lived in separate cages, each pursuing transcendence.

Mo Ling and the Little Sprite entered a Mirror Crack where reality overlapped with a simulated world, and their views seemed to occupy different planes. Mo Ling discovered that the glass figure visible only to him was his own reflection, leaving him facing an unexplained connection between the two worlds.

• The Little Sprite noticed that Li Luo and the Lego Bird were trapped in a Mirror Crack and took Mo Ling into it.
• Mo Ling and the Little Sprite found a cube-shaped space that overlapped with a simulated world and reality.
• Mo Ling saw a human-shaped Glass Sculpture in the mirror, but the Little Sprite could not see it.
• Mo Ling tested the figure's movements and realized it followed his field of vision.
• Mo Ling concluded that the Glass Sculpture was himself.

Mo Ling discovered that he had become a glass sculpture in a simulated world and learned to communicate with a lonely rabbit trapped in a mirrored cylinder. After explaining that the rabbit’s supposed subjects were only reflections, he agreed to take it along, and they passed into another mirrored space together.

• Mo Ling realized he was a glass sculpture in a simulation, and the Little Sprite guessed that the Creation God Sea had selected him as a container.
• Mo Ling followed the Little Sprite through a mirror and used vibrations to communicate with a rabbit inside a cylindrical mirrored world.
• The rabbit told Mo Ling that it had been trapped alone in the cylinder and had mistaken its reflections for subjects it ruled as a god.
• Mo Ling explained mirrors to the rabbit, which felt relieved to learn it had no subjects to abandon and begged him to take it away.
• Mo Ling traveled through another mirror with the rabbit clinging to the sculpture’s leg, and the rabbit celebrated its freedom.

Mo Ling and the rabbit encountered a glass dog in a vast triangular Mirror Space, where the dog first attacked them and then interpreted their explanations as contamination. The dog eventually embraced Mo Ling as its master and resolved to follow him toward transcendence.

• Mo Ling entered a large triangular Mirror Space and was charged by a glass dog that mistook him for an invading Outer God.
• Mo Ling told the Little Sprite that the dog had attacked him, and the dog refused to hear his attempts to explain.
• The rabbit explained the mirror reflections and tried to reassure the dog, but the dog decided the rabbit had been contaminated and betrayed its people.
• The dog collapsed in despair after seeing its reflections as its people, then sprang up and declared itself Mo Ling's loyal slave.
• The dog asked to follow Mo Ling and pursue transcendence, deciding that gods and people were illusions to be shattered.

Mo Ling, the rabbit, and the dog encountered a talking Glass Tree in a spherical Mirror Space. After the dog taught it about transcendence, the tree told a story that identified Outer God as transcendence.

• Mo Ling led the rabbit and the dog through a mirror to a spherical space where a Glass Tree stood at the center.
• The dog urged the tree to surrender to Outer God, while the rabbit questioned how they knew what trees, dogs, and rabbits were.
• Mo Ling told the rabbit that thinking too much was not good, and the Glass Tree agreed by speaking for the first time.
• The Glass Tree told a story about a little horse that was eaten by a crocodile and declared that the tree was transcendence.
• The dog welcomed the tree and taught it about the world, while the rabbit corrected the dog's explanations.
• The Glass Tree told another story about the dog, rabbit, and Mo Ling, then declared that Outer God was transcendence.

Mo Ling and his companions left the simulated world inside the mirror fragments, while the storytelling tree remained behind and continued its tale. In the Creation God Sea’s Junkyard, Mo Ling found Li Luo and the Lego Bird, who revealed that the place was where its species had been born.

• The dog promised the storytelling tree that it would return for it, then left with Mo Ling as the Glass Sculpture entered the mirror.
• The tree told how it had lived alone in a strange sphere and could not move when the dog, rabbit, and Outer God invited it to leave.
• Mo Ling heard only fragments of the tree’s final words as he passed through the mirror and emerged in a canyon of Glass Shards.
• The Little Sprite explained that the canyon was the Creation God Sea’s Junkyard and that the fragments had once simulated worlds.
• Mo Ling and the Little Sprite spotted the Lego Bird carrying Li Luo through the canyon and moved closer to them.
• The Lego Bird told Li Luo that the Junkyard was where its species had been born.

The Lego Bird told Li Luo how its kind escaped their mirror fragments, sacrificed companions to build a moving machine, and eventually reached Creation God Sea. The chapter ended as their assembled giant bird rose into the sky, their call for transcendence ringing through its components.

• The Lego Bird explained that its kind once believed their mirror-bound world was vast and real until an Outer God revealed the truth.
• The Outer God led many of them through worlds and sacrificed its energy to bring them into reality, where they found themselves unable to survive apart from the fragments.
• The companions returned to the fragments and became components of a machine, allowing their kind to move through the canyon and study the Fragment Mountain.
• They discovered passages to the Outside World whenever fragments appeared and escaped through a Mirror Crack into Creation God Sea.
• They assembled a giant bird from fragments, crashed during its first flight, then gathered its components and tried again as they shouted, “Transcendence!”

Lego Bird recounted how its people came from simulated fragment worlds and learned to restore them with color, then explained why they believed Cube was the Divine Object of their race. As Li Luo traveled through the canyon, she began sensing Cube’s presence everywhere and noticed a strange gaze watching her from the sky.

• Lego Bird explained that its people were remnants of simulated worlds and that adding color restored their companions’ forms and memories.
• Lego Bird said its people had returned to the Creation God Sea to create a god that could fulfill their purpose and bring transcendence to their companions.
• Li Luo questioned whether Cube was truly the Divine Object, and Lego Bird insisted its people could recognize transcendence by instinct.
• Li Luo noticed square shapes and glimpses of Cube among the canyon fragments, then felt Cube’s presence all around her despite seeing nothing.
• Li Luo sensed a strange gaze watching her from the distant sky.

Mo Ling used the Little Sprite’s power to speak with the Lego Bird’s head, whose wish was for its companions trapped in the fragments to attain transcendence without causing others to suffer the same fate. The Little Sprite granted the wish, and Mo Ling became a godlike figure over Creation God Sea, leaving Li Luo watching him with concern and loss.

• The Little Sprite gave Mo Ling control of a golden projection, and the Lego Bird’s head rushed over to ask him to grant its wish.
• Mo Ling learned the Lego Bird’s head wished for its companions trapped in the fragments to attain transcendence.
• The bat explained it chose a simple wish to avoid creating another simulated world where a new Fragment Race might suffer the same imprisonment.
• Mo Ling agreed to grant the wish, and the bat returned to the Lego Bird to celebrate.
• The Little Sprite’s power transformed Mo Ling into a godlike figure whose projections spread across the fragments, while Li Luo watched uneasily.
• Beside the puddle, the Little Sprite explained that it had made the transformation dramatic because it was imitating gods from the xianxia novels it had read.

Mo Ling helped the Little Sprite break through the barriers between the simulation and reality while the Lego Bird’s companions transcended. The Lego Bird transformed into a great tree beneath Mo Ling’s golden light, leaving its companions’ new beginning in the canyon.

• The Lego Bird told Li Luo that its companions would soon reach reality, while she watched Mo Ling’s motionless figure with worry.
• The Little Sprite explained that it needed energy to break the barrier between reality and the simulation, and Mo Ling used teleportation to open a hole in the mirror surface.
• The Little Sprite and Mo Ling returned to the microscopic world to break more barriers as Mo Ling’s projection gathered divine golden light over the canyon.
• The Lego Bird’s bricks cracked and dimmed as its companions were branded with square marks and argued about their past and their commander.
• The Lego Bird transformed from a phoenix into a great tree, its roots spreading through the fragments as the canyon’s light gathered around it.

Mo Ling and the Little Sprite shattered the remaining mirrors and discovered that the great tree was the Glass Tree, now leading an effort to rescue its companions. As Mo Ling surveyed the layers of existence, laughter came from somewhere above the Text Canopy.

• Mo Ling and the Little Sprite shattered the final barriers, revealing the golden Glass Tree in the canyon.
• Li Luo questioned the great tree, which explained that it had become the Big Tree Commander and was spreading its Root System to rescue companions trapped in fragments.
• The great tree said that its companions’ transcendence had only begun and that keeping promises mattered more than transcendence.
• Mo Ling surveyed beings trapped by the things they had transcended, including Slaughter, the stones in the time vortex, and the Wish-Granting Races.
• Mo Ling looked beyond the Text Canopy as a burst of laughter reached his ears.

After briefly experiencing a godlike perspective, Mo Ling followed the Blue Olive back through the Cube to Li Luo in the Glass Shard canyon. He reunited with her and reflected on his time as a god while sharing the cola she had offered to the great tree.

• Mo Ling left the Little Sprite and followed the Blue Olive toward the passage to the Abyss Fourth Layer.
• Mo Ling woke inside the Cube, packed away the teleportation waste, and followed the olive through the reflective canyon.
• Li Luo offered cola, snacks, and pens to the great tree while wishing for the Cube to return.
• The Cube appeared before Li Luo, and she placed her offerings on it and poured cola beside the tree.
• Mo Ling drank the cola that had been teleported into the Cube and remembered how it felt to wield divine power.

Li Luo and Mo Ling followed the Blue Olive through a hidden fissure in Fragment Canyon, where strange mirror duplicates appeared and phantom conversations repeated. They reached an artificial glass-domed plaza filled with diverse phantoms apparently discussing the creation of something.

• Li Luo examined the Blue Olive and learned that it could lead them to the Abyss Fourth Layer.
• The Blue Olive guided Li Luo and Mo Ling through a hidden fissure, where fragments gradually became intact mirrors.
• Li Luo realized the mirror figures copied her movements instead of reflecting her, while Mo Ling focused on following the Blue Olive.
• Mo Ling heard two phantoms repeat the same conversation about a Synchronization Rate and suspected they were recordings.
• Li Luo and Mo Ling reached a glass-domed plaza, where many different phantom figures appeared and gathered as if discussing the creation of something.

Mo Ling and Li Luo discovered that the plaza was an ancient Synchronization Device built to send living beings from the Abyss Third Layer to the Fourth Layer. The olive led them to a concealed button at the center of its eye-shaped design, where its guidance ended.

• Mo Ling learned from the plaza's phantoms that species from the Fourth Layer had joined together to build a device that could send them home.
• Li Luo found an introductory article explaining how synchronization matched a creature to the Fourth Layer's speed, time flow, and space.
• Li Luo explained that humans had created most of the current passages between the Third and Fourth Layers.
• The olive drifted to the plaza's center, sank into a concealed button, and vanished.
• Li Luo identified the button, while Mo Ling saw that the surrounding patterns formed an eye entwined with vines and smaller eyes.

Li Luo researched the Sprawling Eye pattern and learned that it illustrated a myth about a vine that gained intelligence by stealing eyes and became an evil god. The Cube believed the Perception Evolution Theory was true, while Mo Ling wondered whether the Vine Evil God might still exist somewhere in the Abyss.

• Li Luo used a detector and the Database to discover that the pattern on the mirror was the Sprawling Eye, shared by isolated Abyss civilizations.
• Li Luo read the Perception Evolution Theory, which held that perception created intelligence, and learned the myth of a vine that stole eyes to increase its perception and intelligence.
• Li Luo learned that humans had found no proof the Vine Evil God existed and had halted their research into the theory and pattern.
• Li Luo asked the Cube whether the theory was real, and the Cube answered that it was true.
• Mo Ling considered how his perception affected the Cube's space and wondered whether the Vine Evil God might be hiding in the Abyss.

Li Luo activated the Sprawling Eye Pattern and discovered it used the sun to synchronize heat, time, and space. As she fell through the flames, she synchronized with a phantom of herself and merged with it, becoming a Fourth Level Hunter.

• Li Luo found no Database information linking the Sprawling Eye Pattern to the synchronization of the third and fourth floors, so she recorded the pattern before activating the plaza button.
• The Sprawling Eye Pattern rose into a relief as the dome focused sunlight onto its central eye, igniting the vines and engulfing Li Luo in flames.
• Li Luo realized her temperature had synchronized with the flames, while suspended sweat revealed that time had synchronized and nonexistent steps showed that space had synchronized.
• A phantom told Li Luo to jump into the abyss of fire and count to ten, and their voices gradually synchronized as they fell together.
• Li Luo opened her eyes to find the phantom was herself, and the two embraced and merged, their nameplates overlapping as she became a Fourth Level Hunter.

Li Luo and Cube arrived at the Abyss’s Fourth Layer, the Sky Island Fault, and learned that knowledge of the lower Abyss was restricted because it could contaminate people who had not experienced it. Li Luo remained determined to descend further, though a sudden sorrow made her wonder whether they would make it.

• Li Luo woke on a patch of grass in the Fourth Layer while Mo Ling organized Cube’s expanded interior.
• Li Luo searched the electronic screen for information and learned the Fourth Layer was called the Sky Island Fault, a dangerous region of floating islands and aberrant clouds.
• Li Luo found that information about the lower half of the Abyss was hidden and explained to Mo Ling that learning about it could itself cause contamination.
• Mo Ling reconsidered how dangerous the Abyss was, despite Cube’s abilities.
• Li Luo said they would eventually reach the deepest layers, then asked sorrowfully whether they would get there.

Li Luo and Mo Ling explored an unrecorded floating island and discovered its dangerous cloud mist and strange creatures. A masked man appeared at the forest edge and killed a shrub that had attacked Li Luo.

• Li Luo searched the Database while Mo Ling surveyed the floating island and found violent lightning hidden in the Cloud Sea.
• Mo Ling watched a rolling stone kill an insect and absorb its fluids before a shrub crushed the stone and scattered its dust over itself.
• The shrub moved toward the Forest Edge, spotted Li Luo, and charged at her.
• A masked man burst from the forest, knocked the shrub down with a Stone Longsword, and beat it until it stopped moving.