Recaps

Mei Yiqiu explained why the second-generation Space Box required costly advanced materials: it had to carry a user's consciousness and memories. He and Bian Ziyuan described how Möbius strips could provide immense information storage, leaving Mei Ziqing and Bian astonished by the scale of the technology.

• Mei Ziqing questioned the expensive helmet materials and argued that the high price would keep ordinary players from the game.
• Bian Ziyuan and Mei Yiqiu explained that the Space Box would be sold rather than given away and needed advanced materials to carry consciousness and memories.
• Mei Yiqiu said the brain's information capacity might be infinite, prompting Bian Ziyuan to ask how a computer could achieve comparable storage.
• Mei Yiqiu introduced the Möbius strip, and Bian Ziyuan explained how repeatedly cutting it could make the strip longer.
• Mei Ziqing realized that repeated divisions could create vast storage space, and Mei Yiqiu said the resulting strip could circle the Milky Way twice.

Mei Yiqiu explained how the Space Box used two Möbius strips joined into a Klein bottle to store information, and Bian Ziyuan considered bringing Kronos into it. Mei Ziqing reported the Dream Guide production and release plans, while Mei Yiqiu aimed to expand the game to five billion players.

• Mei Yiqiu gave Bian Ziyuan the Space Box and explained how its Möbius strip could be folded into the helmet.
• Mei Ziqing explained that joining two Möbius strips formed a Klein bottle, which could enclose a space with seemingly infinite capacity.
• Mei Ziqing wondered whether the human brain might use a Klein-bottle-like information storage mechanism, and Bian Ziyuan connected the idea to Kronos.
• Bian Ziyuan considered entering Dream Guide with the Space Box so he could bring Kronos into it.
• Mei Ziqing reported that production lines and distribution agreements were ready, with plans for ten million sets that year and one billion players within five years.
• Mei Yiqiu decided that he wanted Dream Guide to reach five billion players, despite the difficulty.

Su Huilan and Qingmu investigated how mental power altered the strange space around them, theorizing that it resembled a Klein bottle. They connected the island’s distortions to the Discovery’s lost voyage, then resolved to rescue Mrs. Larry.

• Su Huilan pushed the island’s mental force field away and enclosed Qingmu in a white vacuum, where they appeared like two-dimensional sketches.
• Su Huilan confirmed the place was genuinely strange, and Qingmu asked whether she had felt like they were two-dimensional beings.
• Qingmu theorized that mental power had formed a Klein bottle and that pushing away its force field split it into two Möbius strips.
• Su Huilan suggested the Discovery had entered the same warped space and might have reached Christmas months later by passing through its neck.
• Qingmu wondered whether Boss Coal had traveled through the bottle’s space and whether they could save the ship’s crew, then insisted they had to rescue Mrs. Larry.

Qingmu and Su Huilan planned to find the island’s mental force field opening and investigated an injured savage for information about the antidote and his tribe. Su Huilan’s hypnosis revealed the savage’s home, where a river and waterfall flowed backward toward another misty lake.

• Su Huilan theorized that the rising fog opened a rift in the island’s Klein-bottle force field, and Qingmu agreed to search for it with Boss Coal.
• Qingmu isolated Su Huilan and the injured savage from the force field, allowing her to hypnotize him easily.
• Su Huilan watched the savage dream of fishing in a lake and inferred that fishing helped sustain the islanders.
• Su Huilan used a dream arrow to wound the savage, prompting him to reveal white flowers that healed the injury when eaten and applied to it.
• The savage followed a howl to a tribe of wooden huts beneath a waterfall, where Su Huilan saw the river and waterfall flowing backward toward a mist-covered lake.

Su Huilan learned the antidote and the location of the savages’ tribe from a dream, and she and Qingmu saved Anderson with the white flowers. After Anderson and Alice confessed their love, Qingmu and Su Huilan waited outside the cave until Hanran returned.

• Su Huilan left the savage’s dream and told Qingmu about the tribe’s river and backward-flowing waterfall.
• Su Huilan and Qingmu woke Alice, and Alice treated Anderson’s wound with the white flowers and fed him water.
• Anderson woke after his fever broke, and he confessed his love to Alice and asked her to travel the world with him.
• Su Huilan took Qingmu outside the cave and held his arm, saying she feared losing him.
• Hanran appeared from the darkness and hurried around Qingmu and Su Huilan’s feet.

Hanran discovered that the island's mental power let her sense her surroundings and that her dream imagery overlapped with a desert tied to the Awakening Sacred Land. Qingmu left the mystery unresolved, and the chapter ended with Hanran and Crow guarding their breakfast while Qingmu and Su Huilan ate compressed biscuits.

• Hanran escaped the old man's mental-power attack, then followed the savages and learned they had taken Petru and his weapons back to their canyon settlement.
• Hanran returned through the dark by sensing the island's mental-power field, which gave her an extra, negative-like view of her surroundings.
• Qingmu found an image of the desert forbidden zone from Yao Jingjing's mother's brain blended into Ruxue's dream, but he and Su Huilan could not explain the connection to the island.
• Qingmu reopened the Dream Corridor and entered the desert, recalled Old Madam Cuan's claim that it was the Awakening Sacred Land or held its key, then abandoned his confused thoughts and rested.
• At breakfast, Hanran and Crow shared the ham and dried fish, while Qingmu and Su Huilan settled for compressed biscuits.

Qingmu and Su Huilan prepared to rescue Petru and Mrs. Larry while Alice killed the wounded savage who had attacked them. After Qingmu and Anderson disposed of the body, the group set out, leaving Anderson and Alice to wait in the cave.

• Qingmu left Alice and Anderson with food and pistols, instructing them to stay in the cave unless fog covered the island.
• After Crow discovered the savage was alive, Alice insisted on killing him and stabbed him repeatedly until he died.
• Su Huilan comforted Alice as she cried and begged them to bring Mrs. Larry back.
• Qingmu and Anderson dragged the corpse away and cleaned the cave before Alice and Anderson accompanied the group outside.
• Anderson encouraged Qingmu to rescue Petru and Mrs. Larry without risking himself, then felt hopeful as Qingmu joked about buying the island for fishing.

Qingmu, Su Huilan, Hanran, and Crow followed the river from the central lake toward the savages’ tribe while investigating the island’s strange geography. They discovered the river was flowing uphill, leaving them with an unexplained physical anomaly.

• Hanran led Qingmu and the others across two hills to the lake, where Crow confirmed he had fallen into it the night before.
• Crow teased Su Huilan about her feelings for Qingmu, and Su Huilan wondered whether Qingmu and Crow had deliberately manipulated the conversation.
• Su Huilan examined the river and explained how the lake and sea might be connected while remaining distinct bodies of water.
• Qingmu and the others followed the river through the ravine and into more open jungle, guided by the direction of its current.
• Crow told the group to look behind them, and they saw that the river flowed uphill toward higher ground.

Qingmu and his companions discovered savages near the river and split into teams to stop them from reporting their presence. As Su Huilan and Boss Coal confronted two savages, the crow unleashed a powerful whirlwind to break through the island’s mental force field.

• Boss Coal spotted savages hunting birds, and Qingmu led the group into hiding after telling them to avoid unnecessary conflict.
• The savages found footprints by the river and split up, with two heading back to report and the others following the tracks toward the lake.
• Qingmu divided the team, sending Hanran with him after the larger group and pairing Su Huilan with Boss Coal to intercept the two scouts.
• As the scouts approached, Boss Coal took flight and tore at the island’s mental force field with a wild whirlwind.

Crow and Su Huilan killed two savages with their combined powers, then reunited with Qingmu and continued toward the tribe. The group reached a rocky overlook and saw a large settlement in a valley beneath a strange skyward waterfall.

• Crow and Su Huilan trapped two savages in a dazzling white space and destroyed their souls, killing them.
• Crow and Su Huilan joked about naming their team, while Qingmu emerged after finishing his own fight with Hanran.
• Qingmu, Su Huilan, Crow, and Hanran headed toward the savages’ tribe as Crow argued about being called a beast and then chose Hanran as his partner.
• Crow and Hanran raced ahead and stopped on a tall rock, where Qingmu and Su Huilan joined them.
• Qingmu and the others saw a cleared valley filled with thatched huts and savages, where a river rose into a waterfall that appeared to flow toward a lake in the sky.

Petru was held captive by island tribespeople and forced to submit to their shaman’s ritual, while Mrs. Larry urged him to survive and revealed her resolve to keep studying their language and culture. Petru obeyed by imagining his imprisoned love, Lawiye, but afterward collapsed in tears.

• Petru remained tied up in a hut after the tribespeople seized his weapons and used his knowledge to fire their guns.
• The shaman’s scepter selected Petru during a ritual, and the tribespeople forced him onto the straw with Mrs. Larry, a captive archaeologist from the Discovery.
• Mrs. Larry told Petru that she had learned to understand the tribespeople’s language and had found symbols suggesting their people descended from an ancient civilization.
• As the tribespeople threatened Petru, Mrs. Larry urged him to comply and live, explaining that the shaman’s choice had to be honored.
• Petru thought of Lawiye while obeying the ritual, then looked at Mrs. Larry and broke down crying.

Mrs. Larry explained the tribe’s routines and a route out of the settlement, and Petru escaped his bonds to rescue her from the savage guarding her. Carrying the injured Mrs. Larry, Petru followed her directions toward the village outskirts, with their escape still underway.

• Mrs. Larry told Petru about the tribe, warned him to avoid the chief and the upward-flowing waterfall, and described a safer route out.
• Petru cut through his thorny vine restraints with the military dagger and entered the room where Mrs. Larry was held.
• Petru killed the savage attacking Mrs. Larry, then refused to leave her behind despite her injuries.
• Petru carried Mrs. Larry through the settlement as she guided him around danger and toward the outskirts.
• Petru and Mrs. Larry passed the crops and stone altar, with a rocky wasteland beyond it.

Petru carried Mrs. Larry through the savage village, killing several villagers as they escaped and then hiding near an altar while the searchers gathered at a sugarcane field. When the savage chief approached the altar, they considered hiding among the stones in its central pit.

• Petru kicked a savage woman down, killed the child beside her, and carried Mrs. Larry onward.
• Petru killed two men near a sugarcane field, then hid their bodies there to mislead the searchers.
• Petru took Mrs. Larry to a trapezoidal altar and climbed to its top as the savages searched the field.
• Petru spotted the savage chief approaching the altar and drew back from the edge.
• Mrs. Larry suggested they hide among the stones in the altar pit, and Petru agreed.

Petru and Mrs. Larry hid among the stones beneath the altar, which Petru suspected was forbidden Tapu ground. After the savages left the summit, a large black snake appeared on Mrs. Larry.

• Petru carried Mrs. Larry to the altar’s lower chamber and hid her among the stones.
• Petru and Mrs. Larry discussed whether the structure was a tomb and whether it was a Tapu site.
• Petru saw the chief and several savages on the summit, then hid until their voices faded.
• Petru realized the savages had stayed away from the forbidden ground, but remained hidden in case they were waiting above.
• A large black snake appeared on Mrs. Larry’s body as Petru sensed danger.

Petru rescued Mrs. Larry from a snake-filled hallucination and realized they were trapped in a dream created by the old shaman. They escaped the illusion, only to find themselves surrounded by savages beneath a rising full moon.

• Petru seized a snake behind Mrs. Larry and cut off its head, then protected her as more snakes appeared.
• Petru and Mrs. Larry retreated through a snake-free path toward the altar steps while the snakes encircled them.
• Petru realized the snakes were hallucinations and told Mrs. Larry they were dreaming and should go back down.
• Mrs. Larry helped Petru descend and stamped on the apparent snakes, causing the illusion to vanish.
• Petru and Mrs. Larry saw savages surrounding the altar as their chief raised his scepter, a crow crossed the sky, and a full moon rose.

Bi Shenghua prepared Ruhua Bar for the children’s Lantern Festival visit and hoped Qingmu and Crow would return, but the children arrived to find them still absent. As they waited for a hoped-for supermoon beneath cloudy skies, Xia Tian told them about a game called Dream Guide.

• Bi Shenghua set up a rooftop telescope and kept Qingmu’s room clean while wondering when he and Crow would return.
• Yao Jingjing, Hou Biao, Xiao Qi, and Mo Yu came to Ruhua Bar as Hu Xing, Shi Dazhuang, and the children prepared to gather there.
• Hu Xing brought Xia Tian and Meimei to pick up Yu Meiren, and the children hurried into Qingmu’s studio calling for Qingmu and Crow.
• The children became sulky when they could not find Qingmu or Crow, then grew interested when Bi Shenghua offered to show them the supermoon.
• Xia Tian said he had been playing a fun helmet-based game called Dream Guide.

Dream Guide’s expensive Space Box sold out as the game sparked worldwide excitement and calls for a cheaper release. Xia Tian then told Xia Chujue and Yu Meiren that the game let him live with his mother in a persistent dream world, leaving both girls eager to visit their own families and build homes there.

• Dream Guide’s first fifty thousand Space Boxes sold out, and black-market prices rose above one hundred thousand US dollars.
• Players praised Dream Guide online but gave no detailed reviews, while scientists described the Space Box as an epoch-making invention.
• The second batch of three million Space Boxes was announced at the same price, and preorders sold out in less than a day.
• Xia Changzheng bought Xia Tian a Space Box through the black market for nearly two million yuan.
• Xia Tian told Xia Chujue and Yu Meiren that he had reunited with his mother in the game and built her a castle.
• Xia Chujue and Yu Meiren imagined visiting their families in the game and talked about the pets they would keep.

The children saw strange things through a telescope while looking at the moon, and Petru watched an enormous red moon rise over the savages’ altar. He carried Mrs. Larry toward a deserted part of the altar, hoping the spectacle would give them a chance to escape.

• After the rain stopped, Bi Shenghua and the children watched the moon through a telescope, and Xia Tian explained its craters and lack of life.
• Meimei, Yu Meiren, and Xia Tian each saw something impossible through the telescope: a tree, water and a waterfall, a crow, and Meimei’s father on the moon.
• Hu Xing checked the telescope and saw an ordinary moon, so the adults took the children inside as the clouds gathered around the darkening sky.
• Bi Shenghua looked back and saw a crow fly beneath a huge dark red moon, while Petru watched the same enormous moon rise over the mountain and altar.
• The savages bowed and prayed to the moon, and Petru carried Mrs. Larry toward a deserted part of the altar to try to escape.

Petru left Mrs. Larry at the altar and continued his escape while Qingmu and Su Huilan entered the village to search for them. As an enormous moon appeared overhead, Su Huilan concluded that the island was moving through warped space, and the chapter ended with Qingmu and Su Huilan heading into a house to continue their search.

• Petru set Mrs. Larry down at the altar and promised to return for her after finding his weapons and companions.
• Qingmu and Su Huilan spotted most of the tribespeople gathering near an altar and decided to search the village for Petru and Mrs. Larry.
• Qingmu sent Boss Coal to scout the altar from above and Hanran to provide support on the ground.
• An enormous dark red moon appeared and expanded across the sky, leading Su Huilan to suggest that the island was moving through warped space.
• A powerful chant drew the tribespeople to the altar, where they prostrated themselves before the moon, while Qingmu and Su Huilan entered a nearby house to search.

Petru escaped the shaman’s dream with the crow’s help and reunited with Qingmu and Su Huilan, then hurried with them to rescue Mrs. Larry. At the altar, the rising moon triggered bizarre floating stones and an approaching tsunami, leaving the group and the praying savages facing imminent disaster.

• Petru escaped the village after finding his clothes and weapons, then ran into Qingmu and Su Huilan, who explained that the crow had helped him break free of the dream.
• Petru told Qingmu and Su Huilan that Mrs. Larry was beneath the altar, and Qingmu planned to isolate the shaman’s mental force field so Petru could shoot him.
• Su Huilan warned that the moon’s gravity was causing a tsunami as the ground began to tremble.
• Petru, Qingmu, and Su Huilan reached the altar and found Boss Coal and Hanran frozen in strange poses beneath stones floating above the altar.
• The savages stopped chanting as a towering wall of water rose over the distant mountains and surged toward the island.

As the moon drew near and enormous waves surged through the warped space, Qingmu realized the shaman was using the island’s psychic power to keep it stable. He joined the shaman in a desperate effort to hold the space together while Petru entered the altar to rescue Mrs. Larry.

• Petru and the others watched the moon’s gravity pull seawater along the curved space, and Su Huilan warned that it would eventually pour back toward them.
• Qingmu saw the shaman’s despair and sensed him drawing on the island’s psychic power to keep the space from collapsing.
• Petru raised his gun against the tribespeople, but Qingmu stopped him and said they might need their help to survive.
• Qingmu ordered Petru to rescue Mrs. Larry and asked Su Huilan, Crow, and the cat to help him support the shaman’s psychic field.
• Petru rushed into the altar and found Mrs. Larry searching beneath the floating stones in a shaft of moonlight.

Mrs. Larry watched an enormous moon and floating stones form two interlocking pyramids above the altar. She deciphered symbols in the moonlight and uncovered a carved totem, but its meaning remained unclear.

• Mrs. Larry stayed on the altar as the moon appeared to grow larger and distant rumbling suggested massive tides.
• Rocks rose into the air around Mrs. Larry while she remained grounded, and the stones arranged themselves into a pyramid.
• More stones formed an inverted pyramid interlocked with the first, with Mrs. Larry standing at its tip.
• Mrs. Larry read ancient symbols made by moonlight shining through the stones and memorized their patterns.
• Mrs. Larry found a familiar geometric symbol and uncovered a carved totem depicting a towering tree, mountains, clouds, a circle, and a bird on its highest branch.

Petru and Mrs. Larry discovered that moonlight passing through the floating stones revealed a mechanism in the altar’s hourglass symbol. After Petru knocked aside the stone pillar blocking the light, the formation overhead collapsed, and a white mist rose around them.

• Petru found Mrs. Larry studying the altar and urged her to leave as the disaster approached, but she said she had discovered secrets in its writing and patterns.
• Mrs. Larry noticed that a stone pillar blocked the moonlight from reaching the hourglass symbol and asked Petru to shoot it down.
• Petru’s bullets bounced off the pillar, so he threw a grenade that knocked it into the other floating stones and cleared the shaft of light.
• Mrs. Larry examined the illuminated symbol as Petru rescued her from a falling boulder, and the stones overhead began crashing down.
• A white mist rose over the altar’s patterns while Petru leaped through the falling stones with Mrs. Larry on his shoulder.

Qingmu joined the savage shaman in using the island’s psychic energy to stabilize the warped space under the moon’s growing gravity. After the shaman urged him to enter the Divine Wooden Staff, Qingmu connected to the island’s psychic field with unexpected ease, but the space remained in danger.

• Qingmu sensed the moon’s force warping the space and realized the savage shaman was using the island’s psychic energy to resist it through his wooden staff.
• Qingmu released his full psychic strength to help the shaman hold the space together.
• Su Huilan, Crow, and Hanran joined Qingmu and the shaman, bringing the space closer to stability but still lacking enough power to protect the whole island.
• The savage shaman told Qingmu to enter his Divine Wooden Staff, and Qingmu focused his psychic energy on the wood.
• Qingmu’s consciousness entered the staff and expanded through the island’s psychic field, letting him perceive the whole island as the warped space continued to stretch and twist.

Qingmu and the old savage worked together to keep the island’s mental space from collapsing, but the savage fled with the Divine Wooden Staff when the mist appeared. Qingmu rescued Petru and Mrs. Larry, then followed the savages toward an upward-flowing waterfall that carried them into a crater on the moon.

• Qingmu joined the old savage in stabilizing the island’s mental space, while Su Huilan and Hanran protected the space around them and Boss Coal shielded the sky.
• Gunfire and an explosion shook the altar, falling rocks filled the air, and mist appeared, prompting the savages to cheer and run toward the mountain with the upward-flowing waterfall.
• The old savage withdrew his mental power and took the Divine Wooden Staff, destabilizing the space as he fled with the savages.
• Qingmu and Su Huilan went after Petru and Mrs. Larry, and Petru carried Mrs. Larry on his back as they escaped the collapsing altar.
• Qingmu, Su Huilan, Boss Coal, Petru, and Mrs. Larry followed the savages through the rain and mist and saw them leap into the waterfall, which carried them toward a crater on the moon.