Chapter Summaries

Mo Ling discovered that the Black Ball Weapon could transform between rigid behavioral modes, then recorded what he learned. Outside the Cube, Li Luo and Xi followed a captured Black Rabbit into the mist, where a huge shadow awaited them.

• Mo Ling repeatedly broke down the Headless Giant until its black balls reformed into a fleeing Black Rabbit, and he concluded that the weapon changed modes according to how many balls remained.
• Mo Ling recorded information about the Black Ball Weapon and sent it to Li Luo and Xi.
• Xi explained that healing powers had seeped out of the Healing Space and were interfering with reality, causing abnormalities such as a stone turning into strange coal.
• Li Luo used the Purple Hand Rope to capture the Black Rabbit, then loosened its limbs so it could reveal the direction it wanted to flee.
• Li Luo and Xi followed the struggling rabbit into the mist, where a huge shadow flickered ahead of them.

Li Luo and Xi followed a Black Rabbit through the fog and discovered that the towering black walls formed a maze. Believing the maze might contain Xi’s missing companions and the Hua Sheng Islands beacon, they entered and followed the rabbit deeper inside.

• Li Luo observed that the bound rabbit kept kicking in one fixed direction, while Mo Ling destroyed approaching Black Ball Aggregates by studying their patterns.
• Mo Ling found that the aggregates appeared as giant attackers, rabbits, and dense, motionless high walls.
• Cube told Li Luo to follow the rabbit, which led her and Xi through a narrow gap in the walls to a maze entrance.
• Xi recognized the area as the former location of the Elder Council and decided to enter in search of her companions; Li Luo believed the Hua Sheng Islands beacon was inside.
• Li Luo followed the rabbit through the maze while Xi marked the forks with gems, unaware that the passages were growing wider.

Xi and Li Luo found a White Meatball bound by chains in a maze plaza, where Xi discovered it had been damaged by improper medication. Mo Ling cleared the medicine’s interference from Xi’s Healing Space and offered to remove the wrong treatment so Xi could heal the creature correctly.

• Xi and Li Luo noticed that the maze’s paths widened and its medicinal scent grew stronger as they went deeper.
• Li Luo found a White Meatball chained to the walls, and Xi comforted it before using his healing power to enter the Healing Space.
• Xi discovered that strange fragments from the medicine outside had seeped into his Healing Space, and Mo Ling cleared them away.
• Xi identified the patches on the White Meatball as harmful effects of incorrect medication and condemned the treatment as modification rather than healing.
• Mo Ling offered to remove the incorrect medicine while Xi applied the proper treatment, and Xi agreed.

Mo Ling and Xi removed the mismatched patches from the fleshball and healed its body, revealing Big Eye, Bo Ke’s pet One-Eyed Pig. Big Eye woke in the maze but remained frightened of Li Luo’s captured Black Rabbit.

• Mo Ling used the Teleportation Frame to remove the fleshball’s patches while Xi filled and healed the cuts with medicine.
• Xi adjusted the fleshball’s condition until it returned to its original form as the knee-high One-Eyed Pig, Big Eye.
• Xi told Mo Ling that Big Eye was Bo Ke’s pet and had helped search for herbs on Hundred Flowers Island.
• Big Eye woke in the maze, saw Li Luo’s Black Rabbit, and hid behind Xi despite his reassurance that they had caught it.

Xi healed Big Eye and learned that it had been captured with Bo Ke by the giants, though Big Eye could not explain who had healed it. As Xi and Li Luo followed a rabbit through the maze, Li Luo discovered that its shifting passages kept them circling the same area instead of reaching deeper inside.

• Xi questioned Big Eye, who indicated that the giants had captured it and Bo Ke but could not say who had healed it.
• Xi invited Big Eye to follow him as they continued through the maze with Li Luo and the rabbit.
• Li Luo used her route recording to show Xi that they had repeatedly passed through the same locations despite the changing corridors.
• Li Luo concluded that the maze changed faster than they could progress, continually redirecting the rabbit toward paths that became unreachable.

Li Luo realized the black walls changed whenever they were unobserved, and Cube used the Relic to hold the maze still so she and Xi could move forward. Meanwhile, Mo Ling observed the maze and discovered many imprisoned, apparently mentally unsound creatures, leaving him with more questions about the walls and the effects of the medicine.

• Li Luo explained that the maze had changed faster as they went deeper, though neither she nor Xi had witnessed it happening.
• After Cube displayed “Observation,” Li Luo deduced that the walls changed outside their field of view and stayed fixed when observed.
• Cube said it would observe the maze, and Li Luo led Xi and the rabbit onward while Mo Ling spread his vision across the walls.
• Mo Ling found that looking too closely caused the black spheres to collapse and wondered whether they were really weapons.
• Mo Ling discovered other imprisoned creatures with signs of having been healed, many behaving erratically, and planned to ask Xi about them once they reached the maze’s depths.

Li Luo and Xi followed Big Eye through a hidden passage in the maze and found Bo Ke and more than ten healers chained together and buried in the ground. Xi entered their Healing Space to investigate, leaving Li Luo to guard him.

• Big Eye led Xi and Li Luo down a fork toward Bo Ke’s scent and herbs.
• Xi identified the scattered plants as Hallucinogenic Herbs that could expose memories when burned.
• Big Eye guided them to a hidden area where more than ten healers were buried and pierced through the chest by black-ball chains.
• Xi recognized Bo Ke among the motionless healers and found that his light cluster flickered before going dark again.
• Xi asked Li Luo to guard him and entered the healers’ Healing Space, while Li Luo suspected the maze was a prison made for healers.

Xi entered Bo Ke's Healing Space and found him treating creatures infected by the Parasitic Plant in their rainforest homeland. When chaotic elixir fragments contaminated Bo Ke's lake-based remedy, Xi realized Bo Ke could not perceive the fragments and rushed to investigate what had happened downstream.

• Xi searched the rainforest and found Bo Ke among a population of creatures that Bo Ke had freed from the Parasitic Plant.
• Bo Ke explained that the plants had infected the creatures' food chain and habitat, and that he planned to eradicate them by treating the lake at the source of the rainforest's streams.
• Xi advised Bo Ke to limit the remedy's extermination effect and add a measure to dry up existing pollen.
• As Bo Ke began mixing the remedy in the lake, the surrounding elixir fragments plunged into the water and threw the formula into chaos.
• Xi tried to stop Bo Ke, but Bo Ke said he could not see the fragments or sense that the formula had changed.
• Xi realized the contaminated lake could have terrible consequences and hurried downstream with Bo Ke.

Bo Ke’s attempt to cure the Parasitic Plants with the Chaos Elixir caused the rainforest’s living things to swell and explode, and he plunged into the lake to use the Root Cause Healing Method. Xi followed him into the lake and emerged back at the beginning, where Bo Ke repeated his plan to eliminate the plants.

• The Chaos Elixir contaminated the lake and streams, causing plants and other creatures across the rainforest to swell and explode.
• Bo Ke blamed himself for the disaster, doubted his abilities as a healer, and told Xi he had always looked up to him.
• Bo Ke tried to use the Root Cause Healing Method to erase the Parasitic Plants from the timeline by channeling the lake’s power.
• Xi plunged into the lake after Bo Ke, and a flash of light returned him to the forest at the beginning of their plan.
• Bo Ke again explained his plan to pour medicine into the lake, while Xi asked whether he intended to erase the plants from the timeline.

Xi realized that Bo Ke was trapped in a Healing Space loop and that chaotic fragments kept distorting his attempts to destroy the Parasitic Plant. After Xi explained the loop to Bo Ke, Mo Ling appeared, leaving Xi hopeful that his Senior could help.

• Bo Ke's healing power again made the lake's effects chaotic, and the plants downstream burst into flames.
• Bo Ke blamed himself and tried to heal the lake, then plunged into it to erase the Parasitic Plant from the timeline; Xi followed him into the power vortex.
• Xi returned to the jungle, found Bo Ke at the start of the loop, and explained that the patients and Parasitic Plant had already been dealt with outside the Healing Space.
• Bo Ke said he could not leave until his healing was complete, while Xi explained that chaotic fragments kept sabotaging every attempt.
• Mo Ling appeared, and Xi introduced him to Bo Ke as the Senior who could save him; Mo Ling examined the peaceful surroundings.

Mo Ling entered Bo Ke's Healing Space and discovered that a contaminated lake's water transformed each surrounding region into a different environment. After following passages through the lake's fragment vortices, he realized the effects grew weaker in each new area and suspected he was traveling backward in time.

• Mo Ling found a desert lake whose water turned a Cola Can into sand, then removed its fragment vortex with teleportation and discovered a passage to an icy region.
• Mo Ling crossed the passage, found another lake and fragment vortex, and opened a route to a region spreading with black Purulent Fluid.
• Mo Ling continued through numerous passages and reached a Tropical Rainforest where the lake's effects were limited to plants near the streams.
• Mo Ling crossed into another rainforest, discovered the lake water caused self-immolation, and noticed its effects were weaker than in the previous areas.
• Mo Ling concluded that each passage led to an earlier point in time and wondered whether he could reach a region the lake had not yet affected.

Mo Ling uncovered how Bo Ke's repeated use of the Root Cause Healing Method created cycles that erased his memories, then protected Bo Ke's treatment from corrupted medicine fragments. The Parasitic Plant was eliminated, but Bo Ke's success brought his buried fear to the surface.

• Mo Ling learned from Xi that Bo Ke's healing attempts had created repeating cycles, and he found no vortex in the lake after clearing its fragments.
• Mo Ling suspected something had tampered with Bo Ke, then had Xi teach him an altered formula so he could heal the Parasitic Plant.
• When hidden medicine fragments surged toward the lake, Mo Ling destroyed them and cleared away the surrounding rainforest to keep them from interfering.
• Bo Ke completed the healing without interference, and the healers confirmed that the Parasitic Plant's pollen and parasitized plants were withering away.
• Bo Ke thanked Mo Ling and confessed how useless and afraid he had felt while trying to help patients on Hundred Flowers Island.

Mo Ling and Xi helped Bo Ke recover memories of repeated failed cures, revealing how his fear and inferiority had grown and shaped his healing. Bo Ke regained some calm, but the black-walled maze triggered another shock that cracked open his sealed memories.

• Mo Ling suspected Bo Ke’s fear came from the black spheres, but Xi reported finding no unusual emotions or black spheres in the Healing Space.
• The collapsing scenes of Bo Ke’s past returned, and Bo Ke remembered the repeated disasters and failed cures that had fostered his self-doubt.
• Bo Ke realized that he had avoided making decisions and relied on Xi to share responsibility because he feared failing.
• Xi reassured Bo Ke that companions could share each other’s fears and responsibilities, and Bo Ke said he had recovered somewhat despite gaps in his memories.
• A black-walled maze emerged as the surrounding scenes collapsed, and seeing it caused Bo Ke’s sealed memories to crack open.

Xi freed Bo Ke from the maze, and Mo Ling destroyed the chain and black mud that had suppressed Bo Ke’s memories. Bo Ke remembered how the Black Ball Aggregates had captured the healers on Central Island and trapped them in a maze to steal their knowledge and memories.

• Xi woke Bo Ke and melted the ground around him to pull him free.
• Mo Ling destroyed the chain piercing Bo Ke, and Xi removed the black mud embedded in his chest; Bo Ke recognized its emotion as fear and regained his memories.
• Bo Ke recalled that elders had summoned him to Central Island, where Black Ball Aggregates had taken over the island and imprisoned the healers in a maze.
• The voice in the maze questioned the healers about healing and other subjects, then used Hallucinogenic Herbs when they stopped answering.
• When the herbs failed, the voice pierced the healers with chains that drained their power and erased their memories, trapping them in their Healing Spaces.
• Bo Ke became especially deeply lost after using the Root Cause Healing Method, which left him caught in endless cycles.

Xi and Mo Ling freed Bo Ke and the other healers from memory-trapping Healing Spaces, but Xi suspected their captor had learned to use healing power. He and the awakened healers remained trapped in the maze, uncertain who was interrogating them or how it had healed Big Eye.

• Xi questioned Bo Ke about the voice that had interrogated the healers and learned it sounded like a simulated broadcast coming from the walls.
• Mo Ling shattered the chains in the healers’ chests, restoring their memories and freeing them from their Healing Spaces as Black Mud poured out.
• Xi and Bo Ke rescued the awakened healers, who said the voice had broadcast questions, including targeted ones about Demon Mountain Island, without knowing who was listening.
• Xi realized other healers might be imprisoned elsewhere in the maze and wondered why their captor was questioning them.
• Xi suspected the captor had learned to use healing power after healing Big Eye, but the healers could not explain how it had done so.
• Xi told the others that black balls could awaken negative emotions and cause healers to become obsessive, as he believed had happened to him on Hundred Flowers Island.

Xi and the healers learned that black mud had magnified the regrets of healers and triggered disasters on their islands, revealing an Emotional Plague aimed at their kind. They suspected the voice behind the maze and set out to find the elders, with Xi leading the group alongside Li Luo.

• A healer recounted how his companion used time travel to restore a patient's consciousness, then went insane after realizing he had caused the patient's original loss of consciousness.
• The storyteller said black mud had likely amplified the companion's regret and caused his madness.
• The healers shared similar disasters from their islands and recognized them as an Emotional Plague targeting healers.
• The healers suspected the black sphere aggregates and the questioning voice behind the maze were responsible, and Xi urged them to search deeper for clues and the elders.
• The healers agreed to follow Xi, and Xi told Li Luo to go as the rabbit continued running along the rope.

Li Luo, Xi, and the healers reached a plaza where the elders’ bodies lay in Black Mud beneath a mass of light formed from their gathered power. Xi led a team into the light, where they discovered that the black balls could form dangerous giants with limited programmed behaviors.

• Li Luo and the healers followed the Black Rabbit into a plaza filled with Black Mud, unstable medicines, and black balls circling a huge mass of light.
• Xi recognized the mass of light as the elders gathered together and assigned Bo Ke to rescue their bodies while she led a team inside; Li Luo stayed behind and sent Little Purple to help Bo Ke.
• Inside the merged Healing Spaces, the healers found a vast black plain made of black balls, and one healer’s warning caused the balls to form a Headless Giant.
• Xi’s team fled when the giant pursued them, then scattered to make it freeze and shoved it over.
• The healers learned that the giant could not get back up because its settings allowed it to run and capture but not rise after falling.

In the healers’ Healing Space, the Black Ball Aggregates formed a gigantic Wall Maker and imitated the elders, trapping the healers between walls and a mudslide. Mo Ling told them to turn off their senses, causing the black constructs to collapse, and concluded that the black balls transformed according to what observers believed they were.

• A healer explained that the Black Ball Aggregates could merge into a Wall Maker, and the ground began shaking as the giants combined into a colossal black lizard.
• The Wall Maker spat out black walls that formed a towering barrier, while the healers were driven toward a corner by the collapsing ground and growing giants.
• Xi recognized the black figures emerging from the earth as copies of the elders, and the figures melted the walls into a mudslide.
• Mo Ling appeared overhead and told the healers to turn off their senses; Xi relayed the instruction, and the others obeyed.
• The mudslide, Black Elders, walls, and Wall Maker collapsed, and Mo Ling concluded that the black balls’ forms depended on what observers believed they were.

Mo Ling discovered that the black balls changed according to observers’ thoughts, then woke the healers and explained their nature. As the Black Earth began writhing again, Xi realized the elders might be trying to cure the black balls.

• Mo Ling realized that the black balls took the shapes and behaviors observers imagined and reverted when observation stopped.
• Mo Ling found the healers frozen after shutting off their senses, and Xi woke them by making their spheres of light resonate.
• Mo Ling explained how observation caused the black balls to change, and the healers recognized that their thoughts could trigger further transformations.
• The black ground began writhing as the healers discussed the black balls, while Xi asked where the elders were.
• Mo Ling asked what the elders would do after learning the black balls’ nature, and Xi concluded that they wanted to cure them.

Mo Ling found a mysterious healer who showed him that the black spheres’ disease originated in the planet’s past, where Mercury Beings attacked the planet and were overwhelmed by a tentacle made of black spheres. The healer let Mo Ling witness the battle from inside a Silver Spaceship as its surviving pilot fled.

• Mo Ling flew above Black Earth to search for the elders and discovered that the black spheres covered an entire planet.
• A mysterious healer appeared beside Mo Ling and explained that the black spheres were patients whose disease originated in the distant past.
• The healer transported Mo Ling to the planet’s past, where Mo Ling saw Mercury Beings attack the planet with Silver Spaceships.
• A gigantic tentacle made of black spheres emerged from the planet and destroyed most of the Silver fleet.
• The Mercury Being piloting Mo Ling’s ship escaped the tentacle and retreated behind wreckage.