Chapter Summaries

Jack and his companion agreed to move their families into the Mutual Aid Society’s residential compound, surrender their weapons, and trade them for rice. Zhang Tianyuan and Wu Yisi planned to use the food exchange to build local support for the Society’s order, then send the survivors to work on the Newt Gang’s old plantations once the rice ran out.

• A white man persuaded Jack and his companion that the Mutual Aid Society would protect them, and they agreed to move into its compound and give up their weapons for food.
• Zhang Tianyuan watched the stalled exchange with Wu Yisi, who explained that food would give survivors a stake in stable order and make them supporters of the Society.
• Zhang Tianyuan said the Society would stop distributing rice after the five-day exchange and have Robert arrange plantation work for the survivors.
• Jack’s family, his companion’s family, and the rest of their group arrived with their belongings on a homemade cart.
• After Jack traded more weapons for rice, the watching survivors hurried to fetch their own weapons to trade.

After the Mutual Aid Society sheltered most of downtown San Francisco’s survivors, they formed a self-governing community led by Jack. When Robert revealed the Society’s mission and showed Jack the Spacetime Tunnel, Jack and the rescued former slaves began treating Zhang Tianyuan as a divine avatar, and the belief spread throughout the safe zone.

• The Mutual Aid Society’s exchanges and armored patrols brought most survivors into its safe zone, where Jack and his family recovered after days of eating rice.
• Robert organized an election, and Jack won the community representative position by an overwhelming margin.
• Zhang Tianyuan inaugurated the community organization and gave the survivors dried earthworms imported from Wandering Spacetime.
• Robert told Jack that the Mutual Aid Society rescued humanity across parallel spacetimes and showed him the Spacetime Tunnel as rescued former slaves returned from No. 4 Spacetime.
• Jack knelt and prayed before Zhang Tianyuan, then called him an avatar of a god, prompting the rescued former slaves to join him.
• Jack and the former slaves spread their account, and many believers in the safe zone became Zhang Tianyuan’s followers.

Zhang Yuantian and Jack dealt with the Newt Gang’s prisoners and prepared to liberate Golden Horse County, while Jack organized survivors to support the campaign. Zhang Yuantian then returned to the otherworld, where Zhen Senzi revealed a 67-meter nuclear-fusion mecha and began explaining its capabilities.

• Jack helped unite the survivors, who largely revered Zhang Yuantian, while Zhang Yuantian continued atmospheric research and considered the situation in Golden Horse County.
• Jack rejected retaliatory torture and arranged a public execution of Halun and the other Newt Gang members after their crimes were read aloud.
• Jack rallied survivors to support the liberation of Golden Horse County, and Zhang Yuantian sent a reconnaissance plane that spotted nettle fields, enslaved workers, and tanks positioned around the area.
• Jack assigned most of the Newt Gang’s men to farm work as the community faced the need to secure more food.
• After four months of research, Zhen Senzi showed Zhang Yuantian a 67-meter, 1.45-million-ton nuclear-fusion mecha equipped with a massive retractable axe.

Mako Mori introduced the new jaeger's extensive weapons and explained that its greatest unresolved issue was the neural strain its systems would place on pilots. Zhang Tianyuan brought the blueprints to the No. 2 Spacetime design institute, where they were enchanted into a siege unit with powerful bonuses, and proposed naming it Pangu.

• Mako Mori described the jaeger's advanced plasma cannons, auxiliary weapons, plasma vents, and reverse-thrust jets, then identified its drift system as its main problem.
• Zhang Tianyuan took Mako Mori and the team through a Spacetime Tunnel to the design institute in No. 2 Spacetime with the jaeger blueprints.
• The design institute enchanted the blueprints, producing an unnamed siege unit whose attributes boosted its effectiveness against nonhuman life-forms and strengthened its first giant-axe swing.
• Zhang Tianyuan asked Mako Mori whether the jaeger had a name, then suggested calling it Pangu.

Zhang Tianyuan approved Mako Mori’s massive new Jaeger, Pangu, and arranged for its construction while the Pacific Rim leaders investigated the kaiju’s unexplained absence. In Finch Spacetime, the Mutual Aid Society confronted the Golden Hand Gang, whose forces were caught in a drone strike as they prepared to fight.

• Zhang Tianyuan named Mako Mori’s 156-meter Jaeger Pangu and secured Ning Jihua’s agreement to provide a site and materials for its construction.
• Dr. Hermann reported that the kaiju had been absent for over two months despite predictions of an all-out attack, and the meeting ordered continued wormhole surveillance and Jaeger research.
• Taylor felt sidelined by the PPDC leadership and wondered whether Zhang Tianyuan’s remarks offered him an opportunity to regain influence through the Mutual Aid Society.
• In Finch Spacetime, Lewis mobilized the Golden Hand Gang’s tanks after learning that an armored force from San Francisco was approaching across the Golden Gate Bridge.
• Zhang Tianyuan and Wang Lei monitored the gang with drones, marked the slave quarters as off-limits, and prepared to destroy the gang’s armored forces.
• As Lewis waited to ambush the approaching force, a thunderous blast and shock wave struck the area.

Lewis and the Golden Hand Gang were routed by an unseen air attack, while the Mutual Aid Society captured their remaining fighters and moved toward their camp. At the camp, Zhao Ge tried to escape the slaves’ enclosure, and the chapter ended as the gate fell and someone announced their liberation.

• Lewis ordered his men to retreat after bombs destroyed the Golden Hand Gang’s tanks, and he escaped by vehicle.
• The Mutual Aid Society convoy surrounded the gang’s remaining vehicles, forced the fighters to surrender, and took them prisoner.
• Zhang Tianyuan sent the logistics convoy and soldiers toward the Golden Hand Gang’s camp while Wang Lei helped process the prisoners.
• Zhao Ge urged the enslaved people to escape, but no one joined him, and some tried to restrain him when they heard vehicles approaching.
• A power saw cut through the enclosure gate, which fell outward, and a person told the slaves they had been liberated.

Zhang Tianyuan’s group liberated Zhao Ge and the other slaves from the Golden Hand Gang and promised to help them return to China. In St. Louis, Finch continued scavenging amid severe shortages, but a massive dust storm forced him to head back to his base.

• Zhang Tianyuan told Zhao Ge and the other slaves that the Golden Hand Gang had been defeated and they were free.
• Zhang Tianyuan arranged for the liberated slaves to leave the camp and receive medical examinations, and promised Zhao Ge that his group could send him to China.
• Zhang Tianyuan had Robert stop Jack from preaching to the freed slaves and warned the others to keep Jack from influencing them.
• Finch returned from an unsuccessful scavenging trip, fed Goodyear, and worked on assembling a robot without taking food from his nearly empty refrigerator.
• Finch found dog food and tools on a later scavenging trip, but an enormous dust storm forced him to turn back toward home.

After the Golden Hand Gang was destroyed, Zhang Tianyuan arranged for the freed slaves to manage Marin County and sent teams east, north, and south to map the safer regions. Meanwhile, Finch and Jeff escaped a coming superstorm and reached sunlight, where Finch finally broke down.

• Zhang Tianyuan appointed Zhao Ge to help educate and manage the freed slaves, while the enslaved survivors decided the Golden Hand Gang members’ fate and executed them.
• Zhao Ge thanked Zhang Tianyuan, who promised to help him return home and search for his family.
• The Mutual Aid Society sent nearly a thousand armed escorts with meteorological teams out from San Francisco to survey North America’s sheltered area.
• Finch recalled fleeing St. Louis with Jeff and Goodyear after learning a forty-day superstorm was approaching, surviving a tornado, losing Dewey, and escaping a pursuing vehicle.
• Finch stepped into the sunlight on a Nevada highway and, after reaching the world of butterflies and flowers, felt he could no longer hold on.

Finch died in the RV after asking Jeff to care for Goodyear, leaving Jeff alone with his body as a convoy approached. Jeff fled, then stopped when the convoy identified itself as the Parallel Spacetime Mutual Aid Society, and Robert and Wang Lei approached the RV.

• Finch asked Jeff to keep caring for Goodyear, then suffered a coughing fit and returned to the RV to die.
• Jeff realized Finch’s brain waves had stopped and waited outside as dusk fell.
• Jeff spotted a convoy approaching and drove away with Finch and Goodyear in the RV.
• The convoy caught up and announced that it was the Parallel Spacetime Mutual Aid Society, offering help.
• Jeff stopped the RV and faced the convoy as Robert and Wang Lei saw a tall figure approaching the door from inside.

Wang Lei and the Mutual Aid Society rescued the dying Finch and sent him through a spacetime tunnel to a hospital. Jeff and Goodyear were left outside the RV, and Jeff was bewildered when Finch disappeared with the medical team.

• Wang Lei and Robert cautiously approached Jeff, who introduced himself as Finch’s robot and said Finch was dying inside the RV.
• Wang Lei entered the RV with an emergency team, and Jeff was sent back outside with Goodyear while doctors treated Finch.
• Jeff told Robert that Finch and his companions had found Denver Hospital closed and that their intelligent vehicle, Dewey, had been destroyed.
• When Finch’s condition worsened, Wang Lei contacted Zhang Tianyuan, who opened a tunnel to a hospital in the Pacific Rim Spacetime.
• The doctors carried Finch through the tunnel, and Zhang Tianyuan recognized Jeff and Goodyear outside the RV.
• Jeff asked where Finch had gone after Zhang Tianyuan and Wang Lei emerged from the RV alone.

Jeff learned that Finch had been taken to a hospital in a parallel spacetime and agreed to wait until he could visit him. It joined Zhang Tianyuan’s convoy back to San Francisco, while worsening weather research left the group concerned about the sheltered zone.

• Robert and Zhang Tianyuan told Jeff about Finch’s treatment in a parallel spacetime and explained the Mutual Aid Society’s purpose.
• Jeff asked how it could see Finch and worried that Goodyear would not eat; Zhang Tianyuan said it could travel with survivors being sent to the hospital in San Francisco.
• Jeff asked about human meals, and Robert explained human society to help prepare it for life in the Pacific Rim Spacetime.
• Meteorologists concluded that the sheltered zone reached only California and part of Nevada, then divided up to investigate its boundary and recover instruments.
• Jeff chose to follow Zhang Tianyuan’s convoy to San Francisco so it could see the Golden Gate Bridge, and promised to obey traffic rules.
• The meteorologists reported worsening conditions during the return journey, and Zhang Tianyuan warned Tan Mingda to prepare before the convoy reached San Francisco in the morning.

Jeff overcame the children’s initial fear and played with them, while Zhang Tianyuan and the Mutual Aid Society discussed the coming freeze threatening No. 5 Spacetime. The meeting ended with plans to gather again next month after more data was collected, and Zhang Tianyuan waited for Jeff to return from the Golden Gate Bridge with the children.

• Zhang Tianyuan reassured the children that Jeff was friendly, and Jeff used Goodyear to draw them into play.
• The children crowded around Goodyear and climbed on Jeff, who enjoyed having companions despite their chaotic games.
• Zhang Tianyuan contacted the Mutual Aid Society branches, and Tan Mingda reported that toxic atmospheric gases were rapidly obscuring sunlight in No. 5 Spacetime.
• Sun Deyi offered to send No. 5 Spacetime another hundred thousand tons of dried earthworms, and the group agreed to meet again next month to discuss preparations for the coming freeze.
• Zhang Tianyuan finished the meeting and learned Jeff had taken the children to the Golden Gate Bridge for a commemorative photo, so he waited for them.

Zhang Tianyuan sent Jeff, Goodyear, and critically ill survivors through the Spacetime Tunnel to receive treatment, while public debate over North American civilization’s failures eased Taylor’s political pressure. At the hospital, reporters discovered that one of the arriving patients was a robot.

• Jeff showed Zhang Tianyuan photos of itself, Goodyear, and the children, then gave him a postcard of the Beipanjiang Bridge as thanks for saving Finch.
• After medical staff and patients had gathered, Zhang Tianyuan opened the Spacetime Tunnel and sent the group through to the hospital.
• Doctors received the patients for examination while reporters documented the transfer for publicity.
• Public discussion of gun control and the perceived flaws of Western civilization eased the pressure on Taylor as his country treated critically ill survivors.
• Reporters spotted black, bone-like structures in one patient and realized the patient was a robot.

Jeff reached the hospital and learned that Finch had been resuscitated but remained unconscious, while sensational reports about the robot drew Taylor’s attention. Taylor arranged priority medical care for Finch and then staged a hospital visit and interview, leaving Jeff asked whom he most wanted to thank.

• Reporters surrounded Jeff at the hospital, but Robert intervened and led him to Finch, who remained unconscious and badly injured.
• News outlets published sensational claims about Jeff, and Taylor learned that Finch had built the robot to care for his puppy.
• Taylor ordered Finch given priority access to medical technology and planned a hospital visit with publicity reporters.
• Taylor arrived with reporters, presented Finch’s story to the cameras, and a reporter asked Jeff whom he wanted to thank.

Jeff’s interview made it a sensation, while Taylor tried and failed to win its gratitude. Zhang Tianyuan arrived to begin building the Pangu mecha, only to find Taylor had brought freighters and planned to construct it in his own country.

• Jeff thanked the president, Robert, Wang, and the doctors, but publicly told Taylor he was not on its list, embarrassing him.
• Jeff told reporters that humans were not necessarily dangerous, showed photos from the Golden Gate Bridge, and said it did not know whether it had gained intelligence.
• Jeff and Finch’s story spread through Pacific Rim Spacetime, and Zhang Tianyuan told Ning Jihua that they would eventually return to their own spacetime.
• Zhang Tianyuan arrived at the assembly site on the agreed construction date and learned that Taylor had come with a team and freighters.
• Taylor said he had restarted his country’s mecha factory and intended to ship the materials there to build the Pangu mecha.

Zhang Tianyuan used the system blueprint to begin automatically building the Pangu mecha, while Tan Mingda’s group in Finch Spacetime hesitated to announce the coming ice age. They decided to ask President Zhang for apples to give people hope before sharing the news.

• Zhang Tianyuan used the blueprint, and the system absorbed the materials Taylor had gathered to begin building the Pangu.
• Zhang Tianyuan told Ning Jihua that construction was fully automated and would take one month, while Taylor mourned the effort he had spent reviving the mecha industry.
• Tan Mingda, Liang Zhengping, and A Juan discussed gradually warning the public that an ice age might be approaching.
• Tan Mingda postponed the announcement and decided to ask President Zhang to import apples for distribution.
• A Juan calculated that 1.1 billion apples would weigh at least 240,000 tons, and Tan Mingda ordered 250,000 tons.

A national emergency broadcast warned that atmospheric changes could push Earth into a decades-long ice age, leaving survivors who had endured fifteen years of heat facing another catastrophe. Tan Mingda and his companions rejected relocation as an unreliable solution and decided they would have to prepare and rely on themselves.

• Zhou Tao watched an urgent news broadcast with Xue Liangping and their families as the anchor reported that atmospheric changes might bring an ice age.
• The broadcast warned that temperatures could plunge below zero for decades, frightening Zhou Tao, his wife, and people throughout the country.
• The old woman suggested that they apply to relocate to No. 2 Spacetime if necessary.
• Liang Zhengping argued that limited time, scattered population, and insufficient industrial capacity made relocation difficult, and that No. 2 Spacetime might refuse them.
• Tan Mingda told his companions to stop relying on other spacetimes and to prepare to survive the coming crisis themselves.

After news reported that expanding atmospheric shielding zones might restore normal conditions or worsen the climate, Zhou Tao and the residents received apples distributed by the authorities. Zhou Tao recognized the Mutual Aid Society’s influence in the changing world and returned home with his family, hopeful about the future.

• The news reported that shielding zones had appeared over San Francisco and the Pacific, leaving open the possibility of either a climate recovery or further deterioration.
• Zhou Tao and his wife decided to return home to pay respects to their ancestors after hearing the residents discuss the possible outcomes.
• The building manager announced that each person would receive an item from newly delivered boxes, with extra items for people holding special honors.
• When the boxes were opened, residents recognized the fragrance of apples and eagerly lined up to receive them.
• Zhou Tao collected three apples, believing the Mutual Aid Society had brought changes beyond the fruit, and took them home with his family to offer to their ancestors.

Zhou Tao’s family treasured apples while the Mutual Aid Society debated how to help No. 5 Spacetime survive the coming ice age. The meeting ended with offers of underground-city expertise, nuclear fusion power stations, construction help, shelter capacity, and a donation of thirty million tons of fruit.

• Zhou Tao’s family shared three apples, and his wife planted the seeds in their household vegetable planter.
• Zhou Tao encouraged his coworkers to keep hope despite their fears about the approaching ice age, pointing to the apples as evidence that the Mutual Aid Society was helping them.
• Tan Mingda told Zhang Tianyuan and the other branch presidents that No. 5 Spacetime wanted technology and trade rather than evacuation if it could remain on Earth.
• Sun Deyi offered underground-city expertise and nuclear fusion power stations, while Tan Mingda promised five hundred million shelter places for Wandering Spacetime once the cities were built.
• Ning Jihua offered Pacific Rim Spacetime’s help constructing underground cities, and Zhang Tianyuan asked for the completed city’s blueprints after inspection.
• Elder Zhou announced that “2012” Spacetime would donate thirty million tons of fruit to No. 5 Spacetime, leaving Tan Mingda and his companions astonished.

Elder Zhou offered No. 1 Spacetime’s surplus fruit and abandoned equipment to help Tan Mingda prepare for the coming disaster, while the Mutual Aid Society planned to make No. 2 Spacetime the hub for interspacetime trade and communications. Zhang Tianyuan then learned that a powerful Finch Spacetime faction had air-defense missiles and might control a nuclear arsenal.

• Elder Zhou offered Tan Mingda thirty million tons of fruit and a catalog of surplus equipment, and Tan accepted the aid on behalf of his spacetime.
• Zhang Tianyuan and Tan Mingda agreed to use road transport to move supplies before the disaster reached No. 1 Spacetime.
• The representatives chose No. 2 Spacetime as the transit hub for interspacetime trade, and they prioritized reliable communications between spacetimes.
• Wang Lei told Zhang Tianyuan that an eastward expedition had encountered a faction that shot down a reconnaissance drone with a man-portable air-defense missile.
• Wang Lei reported that the faction was connected to the Cleveland family, which allegedly controlled an army unit, an arsenal, and intercontinental missile silos.
• The Cleveland faction examined the downed drone at a hidden underground base.