Chapter Summaries

Mo Ling observed strange synchronization residue floating around the airship in the Abyss Fourth Layer and discovered vines that collected and fused with objects trapped inside it. The Investigation Team did not mention the vines, leaving Mo Ling to wonder whether they could see them at all.

• Mo Ling saw jelly-like masses filled with bizarre, incomplete objects appear and vanish around the airship.
• The Investigation Team identified the masses as synchronization residue gathering in the Turbulence Zone near a Circulation Node.
• Mo Ling spotted spliced, writhing vines inside the residue and watched one fuse a pair of mucus-covered ox horns into its body.
• Mo Ling found the vines throughout the residue, each seeming to search a particular area for parts to incorporate.
• Mo Ling listened to the Investigation Team discuss the residue without mentioning the vines and wondered if they had failed to notice them.

Mo Ling’s attempt to collect and discard a Synchronization Residue triggered a violent explosion that sent the airship spinning through the Turbulence Zone. The Pipeline Fortress rescued the Investigation Team, but a soldier asked them about the very blue-painted iron rod Mo Ling had disturbed.

• Mo Ling secretly collected an iron rod that looked like a Synchronization Residue, causing the soft object around it to collapse and disrupt the airship’s flight.
• After Mo Ling threw the rod back into the Cloud Sea, it roared, melted, and erupted in a heatwave that sent the airship spinning through turbulent currents.
• Black pipes caught the airship and pulled it to the Pipeline Fortress, where a soldier confirmed the Investigation Team’s identities.
• The soldier asked the team about the explosion and showed them a screen displaying the blue-painted iron rod, while the team claimed they had seen nothing unusual.

Li Luo arrived at the Pipeline Fortress and learned from Zhou Chao that she needed time to anchor herself in the Fourth Layer before she could enter the Fifth. She searched the fortress database and found an article comparing newcomers to the Fourth Layer to a nonexistent cup.

• Li Luo and the others descended to the Pipeline Fortress, where Zhou Chao explained its history and monitoring systems.
• Li Luo asked about reaching the Fifth Layer, and Zhou Chao explained that she needed time to stabilize her existence in the Fourth Layer.
• After Zhou Chao left, Li Luo found the Data Center and connected her electronic screen to the fortress database.
• Li Luo searched for the requirements to reach the Fifth Layer, and the database opened an article titled “The Nonexistent Cup—The Road to the Fifth Layer.”
• The article explained that interactions in an event establish the existence of the people and objects involved, then described those who had fallen into the Fourth Layer as nonexistent cups.

Li Luo learned that major events in the Abyss Fourth Layer could anchor her existence and help her reach the Fifth Layer. After Zhou Chao suggested Danger Island as a place to find such an event, she decided to seek a way there.

• Li Luo read Zeus’s article explaining how experiences and impactful events anchored a person’s existence in the Abyss Fourth Layer.
• Zhou Chao summoned Li Luo to the restaurant and told her that he had been assigned to another mission and would soon leave Pipeline Fortress.
• Zhou Chao treated Li Luo to Synchronization Cuisine and described the unusual ingredients used in the dishes.
• After Li Luo explained her search for a major event, Zhou Chao told her about Danger Island and warned her of its hazards.
• Li Luo searched the Database for nearby Danger Islands and asked Zhou Chao how she could reach one.

Li Luo traveled from Pipeline Fortress toward the Danger Island of Hua Sheng Islands after learning that its Healing Creatures had begun detaining visitors. She accepted a relic and supplies, but the fortress staff’s eagerness to send her there left her suspecting a larger scheme.

• After tasting the Abyss’s food, Mo Ling judged it mediocre before revising his rating upward because supplies were scarce.
• Li Luo registered to travel to Hua Sheng Islands, and the clerk warned her that the island was now an extremely dangerous red zone.
• Li Luo explained that Hua Sheng Islands’ Healing Creatures had started detaining visitors, and the clerk revealed that contamination might be twisting their personalities.
• The clerk recommended a Pain Transfer Tablet relic, which Li Luo accepted along with free equipment and supplies.
• Li Luo boarded the airship, unsettled by the clerk’s eagerness and suspecting that both Hua Sheng Islands and Pipeline Fortress concealed secrets.

Li Luo learned how the Healing Creatures of the Hua Sheng Islands had once cured humans, then turned the islands into a dangerous forbidden zone. After landing on Hundred Flowers Island, she found a lifeless wasteland where the records described a flower-filled forest.

• Li Luo reviewed reports about the Healing Creatures, who had once cured human injuries, diseases, curses, contaminations, and Relic side effects before becoming dangerous and imprisoning visitors for treatment.
• As the airship approached the Hua Sheng Islands, Li Luo studied a blurry image of a Healing Creature and questioned whether it had truly been friendly.
• The airship landed on a barren plain, and Li Luo brought Cube outside while Mo Ling searched the area for signs of life.
• Li Luo found that the dead trees crumbled to dust and the ground had hardened into rock, with no living creatures or plants nearby.
• Li Luo checked the map and records, confirmed they had landed on Hundred Flowers Island, and wondered why the island had no flowers.

Li Luo and Cube crossed the Hua Sheng Islands’ wasteland, where Mo Ling noticed that rain was being prevented from falling. Li Luo’s experiment with a drop of water awakened a parasitic Red Flower, which she chose to keep because it seemed to be guiding her onward.

• Li Luo led Cube deeper into the wasteland as violent winds and clouds gathered and vanished without bringing rain.
• Mo Ling showed Li Luo that droplets were forming in the clouds but being held back, leaving the air stifling and damp.
• Li Luo poured a drop of water onto the ground, triggering a plant to grow rapidly and release pollen that caused a Red Flower to take root in her hand.
• Little Purple shielded Li Luo from the pollen, while the Red Flower’s roots remained in her blood vessels and seemed to improve her circulation.
• Mo Ling offered to remove the flower, but Li Luo decided to keep it after sensing its connection to the Hua Sheng Islands.
• The Red Flower turned toward a particular direction as Li Luo moved her arm, seemingly guiding her onward.

Guided by the self-aware Red Flower on her hand, Li Luo and Mo Ling entered a valley overrun by Red Flowers. The flowers opened a path for Li Luo, whom they mistakenly revered as humanity’s strongest ruler, and she continued toward the center to find the person she was meant to save.

• Li Luo learned that the Red Flower on her hand could speak and wanted her to save someone, then chose to follow its directions with Mo Ling.
• As they neared the valley, the mist thickened and a vast patch of Red Flowers began to regrow.
• The Red Flowers recognized Li Luo as a Purple Human, spoke to her in a way only she could hear, and opened a path through their thorny wall.
• Li Luo asked who she had to save, but the flowers fell silent and let her proceed into the valley.
• As Li Luo traveled deeper, the flowers spread exaggerated rumors that she was humanity’s strongest ruler and the Overseer of Human Civilization.

Li Luo found a dying Healing Creature in the Flower Patch and learned that the Red Spirit Flowers called him their father. Their memories revealed that he was Healer Xi, whose words once inspired a companion to leave the Hua Sheng Islands and save a race threatened by Parasitic Plants.

• Li Luo found a shriveled Healing Creature surrounded by Red Spirit Flowers, which said he was the father of the Flower Patch.
• The Red Flowers shared the story of Healer Xi, who identified a Parasitic Plant as the cause of a patient's illness and helped his companion cure him.
• Healer Xi warned his companion that the patient would be reinfected unless the Parasitic Plant was eradicated from the patient's homeland.
• Healer Xi's companion decided to leave the Hua Sheng Islands and save the patient's people, then set off the next day with the recovered patient.

Healer Xi experimented with the Parasitic Plant pollen and created Red Spirit Flower, a symbiont that protected its host and could resist parasitic plants. He cultivated a valley full of the flowers on Hundred Flowers Island, and their crimson pollen spread across the island in a wind noticed by every healer.

• Healer Xi tested the Parasitic Plant on himself and used his healing ability to turn it into a harmless symbiont that strengthened and protected its host.
• Healer Xi's healed flower repelled an untreated parasitic flower, and he kept it despite its calling him Father, naming it Red Spirit Flower.
• Healer Xi destroyed the remaining pollen and parasitic flowers, then stayed on Hundred Flowers Island to treat patients and cultivate Red Spirit Flowers.
• Healer Xi taught the Red Spirit Flowers to sway together, stirring a gust of wind through the valley.
• Red pollen drifted across Hundred Flowers Island in a scarlet storm, and every healer noticed the crimson wind.

The Elder Council confronted Healer Xi over the Red Spirit Flowers, warning that their unchecked spread had devastated Hundred Flowers Island and that they had become a plague rather than an antidote. After learning the Parasitic Plant had been eradicated, Xi still refused to destroy the flowers because they were intelligent and had feelings, leaving him surrounded by the elders.

• The Elder Council arrived at Red Spirit Flower Valley and warned Healer Xi that his Red Spirit Flowers could become a poison despite their use as an antidote.
• The elders showed Xi how the flowers had spread across Hundred Flowers Island, crowding out its other plants, and argued that he had created a new parasite.
• The elders demanded that Xi remove every Red Spirit Flower and revealed that the Parasitic Plant had been eradicated.
• Xi's companion confirmed the Parasitic Plant was gone, leaving Xi with no medical reason to preserve the flowers.
• Xi refused to destroy the Red Spirit Flowers because they had intelligence and feelings, and he vowed to guide them instead.

Xi tried to change the Red Spirit Flowers so the Elder Council would not destroy them, but his experiments either killed them or made them ordinary. After his companion suggested that Xi had added personal feelings to his healing, Xi became convinced that the flowers had parasitized and controlled him.

• The Elder Council gave Xi time to change the Red Spirit Flowers and left a companion to watch him.
• Xi healed some flowers so they could no longer produce pollen, but they withered and died.
• Xi reduced another group’s vitality, making them ordinary flowers without intelligence or vigorous descendants.
• Xi’s companion reminded him that the flowers had been created to defeat the Parasitic Plants and accused him of adding personal feelings to his healing.
• The Red Spirit Flowers protected Xi from his companion, while Xi doubted whether his feelings and their voices were real.
• Xi concluded that the Red Spirit Flowers had parasitized and controlled him, and that he was the one who was sick.

Healer Xi sacrificed himself to stop the Red Spirit Flowers from spreading across Hundred Flowers Island, but his distorted healing power also sealed away the rain and left him trapped in an endless drain of strength. Li Luo learned what happened and searched for a way to awaken him, while Mo Ling entered Xi’s orb of light to investigate.

• Xi rejected his companion’s pleas and plunged into the Red Spirit Flower patch, telling him to inform the elders that he had failed them.
• Xi used his healing power to wither the Red Spirit Flowers across Hundred Flowers Island and sealed those in the valley so they could no longer spread.
• Xi’s healing power blocked rain from falling, turning Hundred Flowers Island into a drought-stricken wasteland while the flowers preserved his body in the valley.
• Li Luo learned from the Red Spirit Flowers that Xi’s companions and the other healers had left to treat a grave illness elsewhere, and she realized she did not know how to wake him.
• Mo Ling grew alarmed by Li Luo’s strange behavior and entered Xi’s orb of light.

Mo Ling entered a Healing Space and helped a withered being contain a spreading Flower Patch so rain could return. The being watched the flowers grow safely behind a wall of soil, while Mo Ling’s simple method of bringing soil from outside left it stunned.

• Mo Ling found a withered being in a Flower Patch and learned it had stopped the rain to prevent the flowers from spreading.
• Mo Ling suggested enclosing the flowers, then realized he could bring soil into the Healing Space from outside.
• Mo Ling brought in large blocks of soil, and the withered being shaped them into a wall around the Flower Patch.
• The withered being cleared the pollen with a breeze, and rain fell over the flowers without letting them spread beyond the wall.
• The withered being asked how Mo Ling brought in the soil, and Mo Ling explained that he found it, packed it, and dumped it inside.

Li Luo witnessed the rain awaken Xi, a healer who had been trapped in the Healing Space, and learned that a mysterious senior healer had saved him. Xi knew little about the danger on the Hua Sheng Islands, but feared something had happened on Central Island.

• Red lightning struck the valley, rain fell, and the Red Spirit Flowers celebrated as their father, Xi, awakened.
• Xi asked Li Luo about a senior healer with a Cube on his head, and she concealed Iron Block’s identity while hearing how the senior had helped him escape the Healing Space.
• Li Luo confirmed Xi’s name and ordered Little Purple to release Mo Ling’s Cube.
• Li Luo told Xi why she had come to the Hua Sheng Islands and asked what danger the beacon was warning of.
• Xi admitted he knew nothing about events beyond the valley and grew worried that something had happened on Central Island.

Xi discovered that an invisible barrier contained the Red Spirit Flowers without blocking unaffected beings, resolving the threat they posed. After the flowers freed him and Li Luo from their parasitism, Xi set out with Li Luo for the Central Archipelago to find his companions and atone for his mistakes.

• Xi found that the invisible wall blocked the Red Spirit Flowers and anyone parasitized by them, but let Li Luo's unaffected hand pass through.
• Xi realized the barrier protected the Red Spirit Flowers by keeping them contained in the valley.
• Xi told the Red Spirit Flowers he would leave to find his companions, and they detached from him and Li Luo, healing Li Luo's wound.
• Xi admitted he still needed to atone for his actions and prepared to leave the valley.
• Li Luo gave Xi her name, and the two agreed to travel together toward the Central Archipelago.

Xi guided Li Luo through a dried underground river cave as a shortcut toward Central Island and explained how healers viewed pain and disease. He demonstrated that healers could heal anything they defined as a disease, even turning a stalactite fragment into gold.

• Xi promised to return and restore Hundred Flowers Island, then led Li Luo through a hidden cave route toward Central Island.
• Xi explained that drought had dried the cave’s underground river, allowing them to follow its riverbed to the next sky island.
• Xi described how healers once traveled the fierce river by boat and casually snapped off and regrew his own hand, frightening Li Luo.
• Xi explained that healers experimented on themselves and discussed how chronic illness and nerve disorders could cause extreme suffering.
• Xi told Li Luo that healers’ powers came from their definition of disease and transformed a stalactite fragment into gold by declaring it sick.

As Xi and Li Luo walked along the dried-up riverbed, Xi wrestled with whether healers could define disease without deciding which living things deserved to survive. Mo Ling entered Xi's Healing Space and discovered that Xi could transform stalactite fragments into various objects, then began showing him unfamiliar human inventions.

• Xi questioned whether curing patients by killing pathogens made healers destroy entire races, and Li Luo realized he had to reach his own conclusions.
• Mo Ling followed Xi and Li Luo in the Cube, disturbed by the glow around Xi's head, then entered Xi's Healing Space to escape its gaze.
• Mo Ling found Xi in a mountain-cave Healing Space, where Xi turned a stalactite fragment into gold while pondering what disease was.
• Mo Ling asked Xi to transform the fragment into a diamond, then requested Turquoise, and Xi created both for him.
• Mo Ling fetched an electronic screen and showed Xi objects such as sofas, gaming chairs, and televisions, leaving Xi confused as Mo Ling wondered about finding a Diesel Generator.

Mo Ling visited Xi’s Healing Space, where Xi learned to create cola that intensified his healing light. Xi and Li Luo reached a cliff on Hundred Flowers Island overlooking Senluo Island, and Xi proposed jumping down, promising to revive Li Luo if she was smashed to pieces.

• Mo Ling gave Xi cola to taste, and Xi created many cans from broken stalactites for Mo Ling to take back to the Cube.
• Mo Ling left Xi’s Healing Space after asking him to make human furniture and praising his abilities.
• While traveling through a mountain cave, Xi told Li Luo that Mo Ling had entered his Healing Space from far away and wondered why the senior had asked him to create so many things.
• Xi poured cola over his light, making it blaze and illuminate the cave as he and Li Luo pressed on.
• Xi and Li Luo reached the cave exit on Hundred Flowers Island’s cliff and saw clouds below, where Xi identified Senluo Island.
• Xi told Li Luo they should jump down, assuring her he could bring her back even if she was smashed to pieces.

Li Luo and Xi reached Senluo Island, where Mo Ling discovered that its creatures and forest were composed of bizarre mixtures of living things. The chapter left Mo Ling wondering whether this grotesque abundance was the island’s defining feature.

• Xi leaped through the Cloud Sea into the lake below, while Li Luo used Cube and Little Purple to descend safely.
• Li Luo found Xi floating face-down in the lake, and Xi recovered on shore while repairing his shattered organs.
• Mo Ling examined a strange stitched creature in the lake and found its mismatched organs functioning normally.
• Mo Ling searched the shoreline and found more stitched creatures whose familiar habits contrasted with their grotesque bodies.
• Mo Ling looked into the forest and saw branches hung with green scales, shells, flesh, feathers, and eyeballs instead of leaves.