Chapter Summaries

Qingmu and the others deciphered the higher-dimensional writing in their dream and witnessed a vision of Gaia’s birth and its connection to Earth. The chapter ended as a tendril entered a primitive human, opening an emerald eye above his brows.

• Hanran transformed into a colossal white cat in the dream, while Crow shielded it from the sun with his wings.
• Mrs. Larry realized the symbols were projections of higher-dimensional writing and tested her theory by expanding Chinese characters and hieroglyphs in the dream.
• Qingmu and the others expanded the symbols into a nebula that revealed a holographic vision of the Milky Way and the birth of Gaia, a Boltzmann brain.
• Qingmu saw a tendril from Gaia’s cortex enter a black hole, while tendrils spread across Earth and one entered a primitive man’s forehead, opening an emerald eye above his brows.

After experiencing a vision that confirmed Ronald Cohen's account, the group decided to seek an agreement with the Itza People or activate the altar while their leaders were occupied. Boris and the others brought a modified M230 autocannon onto the deck, and Boris urged them to attack.

• The group emerged from the vision and discussed how the altar's higher-dimensional writing had appeared in their dreams.
• Situ proposed negotiating with the Itza People, and Su Huilan suggested sneaking to activate the altar if negotiations failed.
• Boris, Anderson, Ivan, and Petru brought a hand-cranked M230 autocannon and its ammunition onto the deck.
• Anderson helped Alice to the cabin to rest, while Mrs. Larry told Petru that Ronald Cohen's account had been confirmed.
• Boris declared that the group should attack the Itza People.

The group tested their autocannon and prepared to negotiate with the Itza People. Qingmu, Situ, and Duwa met the tribal priests in the valley, while the rest stayed behind to guard the cannon and ship.

• Petru, Boris, and Ivan helped test the autocannon, whose explosive shells struck the opposite hillside with great force.
• The group celebrated with grilled fish, and Hanran saved a pile for Crow, who returned from scouting.
• Duwa reported that the Itza People would meet them in the valley but would allow only three visitors, so Situ, Qingmu, and Duwa went while others guarded the ship and cannon.
• The three reached the valley and met priests from the three tribes, including Kubota, the leader of the Sangqi Tribe.
• Qingmu reflected on the Sangqi Tribe’s past violence and questioned what the altar’s destruction meant for humanity, while holding on to the hope of returning home.

Qingmu and the others tried to persuade the Itza priests that entering the altar could lead their people to a better life, showing them visions of Earth’s advanced civilization. The priests remained bound by their traditions and decided to consult their tribes and seek an oracle before choosing what to do.

• Qingmu and the others learned from the priests that the Itza tribes feared the Swordfish and believed demons caused the disasters around them.
• Situ challenged the priests’ belief that life had been better before the demons came, pointing to the calamities they had already witnessed.
• Situ showed the priests visions of Earth’s cities, technology, and comforts, prompting them to chant Unabu and prostrate themselves.
• Situ offered to take their people to that world if they were allowed into the altar, but the priests could not immediately accept the offer.
• The priests argued and decided to return to their tribes and seek an oracle’s decision.

Su Huilan weighed the risks of negotiating with the Itza People while hoping to activate the altar and return to Earth. Alice screamed after seeing the dead captain, and Su Huilan heard footsteps beneath the cabin floor.

• Su Huilan considered her group's chances of defeating the Itza People and concluded they needed to activate the altar to get home.
• Alice screamed and said she had seen Captain Halsey sitting in his chair, though Mrs. Larry and Su Huilan thought she had dreamed it.
• Su Huilan examined the collapsed chair and felt a cold breeze despite the still cabin.
• Alice heard someone walking, and Su Huilan crouched down to listen to faint footsteps beneath the floor as Hanran arched its back and bristled.

Su Huilan investigated strange tapping aboard the ship while Mrs. Larry tried to calm Alice, who feared the dead had returned. A sudden flash left Mrs. Larry and Alice temporarily blind, and their lifeboat drifted to the wrong shore, where savages rushed toward them.

• Su Huilan decided to search the lower decks after hearing tapping and left Mrs. Larry with Alice on deck.
• Alice told Mrs. Larry that she had seen Lieutenant Colonel Halsey and feared ghosts had possessed the Russians.
• Mrs. Larry and Alice rowed toward shore to find Anderson, but a sudden flare of light temporarily blinded them.
• The lifeboat drifted to the wrong shore, where a group of savages rushed out of the woods.

Su Huilan explored the warship alone and found that the sailors’ corpses had died with their eyes open, while something seemed to follow her footsteps and heartbeat. In the captain’s cabin, she discovered that Ronald Cohen’s body had shifted, then turned to find someone sitting on the sofa.

• Su Huilan went below deck with Hanran and felt that an unseen presence was matching her movements and heartbeat.
• She examined the sailors’ corpses and noticed that most had died with their eyes open despite appearing to have died peacefully.
• Su Huilan found Ronald Cohen’s arm and head in different positions from before and noticed a thin film on his hand.
• Su Huilan checked beneath Cohen’s desk but found nothing, then heard her heartbeat echo and felt a chill.
• Su Huilan turned around and saw someone with hollow eyes sitting on the sofa opposite her.

Su Huilan searched the Swordfish for Hanran after the cat vanished, then followed its cries and strange footsteps back to the captain’s cabin. There, a powerful surge of Mental Power stopped her from firing at two figures, and one accused her of trying to murder her lover.

• Su Huilan identified the seated mummy as Halsey and left the captain’s cabin to search for Hanran.
• Su Huilan searched the passageway and the deck below, where she heard Hanran meow through a bulkhead.
• Su Huilan heard irregular footsteps overhead and hurried back up to find Hanran.
• Su Huilan saw two human shadows outside the captain’s cabin and raised her gun to fire.
• A surge of Mental Power nearly stunned Su Huilan, and the figure wearing half a cap spoke, calling her a woman trying to murder her lover.

Su Huilan reunited with Situ and Qingmu aboard the Swordfish, but Mrs. Larry and Alice were missing, and eerie sounds and shadows left her questioning what she had experienced. After learning that gunshots had come from the shore where the women’s boat was found, Situ suspected the Itza People’s mental formation was affecting them from afar.

• Qingmu and Situ found Su Huilan below deck, where she told them about the strange events and the bodies of Ronald Cohen and Halsey.
• Su Huilan heard familiar footsteps and glimpsed a figure in the darkness, while Situ suspected a negative mental field was interfering with their consciousness.
• The group returned to the deck and learned that Mrs. Larry and Alice had taken the lifeboat, while Ivan and the others had gone to investigate gunshots from the opposite shore.
• Qingmu sent Boss Coal to search the shore, and the bird found both boats but could not locate Mrs. Larry and Alice in the woods.
• Situ concluded that the Itza People’s enormous mental formation might be reaching the ship and causing hallucinations or dreams.

Su Huilan, Situ, Qingmu, and Duwa considered the Itza People’s strange mental power and decided to go ashore for help. Boss Coal reported that Mrs. Larry and Alice had been tied to posts at the altar, and Situ realized the Itza People were preparing to sacrifice them to the gods.

• Su Huilan questioned how the Itza People could influence people’s minds, and Situ suspected the altar connected them to another source of mental energy.
• Qingmu handed Su Huilan the Soul of Wood and a willow twig before swimming to shore to fetch a raft.
• Su Huilan felt the willow twig’s warmth and thought of her home on Earth as Qingmu returned with the raft.
• Qingmu brought Su Huilan, Situ, and Duwa aboard the raft and headed toward shore to find Mrs. Larry and Alice.
• Boss Coal reported that Mrs. Larry and Alice were tied to tall posts at the altar, and Situ said the Itza People planned to sacrifice them to the gods.

Qingmu and his companions split up to prepare an attack on the Itza People while rescuing Mrs. Larry and Alice. They reunited with the two women, who had been released by the three priests, and left the group facing the priests in the woods.

• Ivan, Petru, Boris, and Anderson set out to transport the autocannon by boat while Qingmu, Situ, Duwa, and Su Huilan headed toward the valley as a distraction.
• Qingmu sent Boss Coal ahead to watch over Mrs. Larry and Alice, and the crow reluctantly flew off despite fearing the Itza People's Mental Power Formation.
• Situ reasoned that the motionless three suns and mild temperatures could not be explained by an ordinary star system, but the group continued toward the Huracan Tribe.
• Boss Coal returned and announced that Mrs. Larry and Alice were coming, though he evaded Qingmu's questions about how he had helped.
• Mrs. Larry and Alice arrived with the three Itza priests following behind them, and Alice cried as Mrs. Larry comforted her.

Qingmu and the others won the Itza priests’ trust and headed toward the Huracan Tribe, but autocannon fire erupted nearby before they could reach the village. Crow returned with the news that everyone there was dead.

• Mrs. Larry and Alice explained how the Huracan People had captured them and how Mrs. Larry persuaded the priests to release them.
• The priests resumed negotiations, accepted the group as divine messengers, and agreed to lead them toward the altar.
• Qingmu learned from Kubota that the priests could use the altar and a united tribe to form a defense against Gaia’s invasion.
• Qingmu recognized autocannon fire near the Huracan village and realized Anderson, Petru, and Boris might be attacking because they believed Alice and Mrs. Larry were dead.
• Qingmu ordered Crow to stop the attackers, and the group raced toward the village as the autocannon fired near the altar.
• Crow returned and told Qingmu that everyone was dead.

Anderson, Boris, and Petru used the autocannon to slaughter most of the Itza People guarding the altar. The surviving Itza People rallied around their priests and unleashed a surge of Mental Power at the newcomers.

• Anderson and Boris operated the autocannon, firing its remaining shells into the Itza People while Petru watched the carnage through binoculars.
• The autocannon killed hundreds of Itza People, and Anderson and Boris stopped firing only after they had nearly exhausted the ammunition.
• Qingmu arrived at the altar square and saw that fewer than a tenth of the Itza People had survived, many of them badly wounded.
• Kubota, Batus, and Bigwendi grieved among the dead and called out to their god, while Anderson, Boris, and Petru recoiled at the massacre.
• The surviving Itza People gathered around their priests, formed a united force, and sent an immense surge of Mental Power toward the newcomers.

Qingmu realized the Itza People were charging their formation with enough Mental Power to create a devastating mental bomb, and he and the others braced for the blast. After the bomb and grenades exploded together, Su Huilan struggled back from the darkness and confirmed she was alive when she heard Qingmu’s familiar footsteps.

• Qingmu and Situ used the Souls of Wood and Stone to resist the Itza People’s weakened mental formation.
• Qingmu recognized that the Itza People were storing Mental Power inside their formation to unleash it as a bomb.
• Qingmu warned the others, and they formed mental defenses while Petru protected Mrs. Larry and Alice and Ivan, Boris, and Anderson threw grenades.
• The Itza People’s mental bomb and the grenades detonated together, shattering the defenders’ mental constructs and sweeping them away.
• Su Huilan regained consciousness, spat out blood, and asked Qingmu to walk so she could recognize his footsteps.

After the mental explosion, most of the group recovered, but Anderson and Boris were left with irreversible damage to their consciousnesses. The Itza People appeared dead until Tafiti emerged alive and faced the survivors alone.

• Qingmu, Situ, and Duwa maintained the dream after the mental explosion, while Su Huilan and the others gradually woke.
• Alice tried to comfort Anderson, but he remained vacant and joined Boris in acting like a fool; Boris ran toward the altar, and Ivan followed him.
• Situ told Ivan that Anderson and Boris could not recover, while Qingmu reflected on coincidence, causality, and the laws of the universe.
• The group found the Itza People apparently dead, but one of them grabbed Boris and attacked him with a broken arrow.
• Boris dodged the attack, and Qingmu and Su Huilan recognized the surviving savage as Tafiti, who faced the surrounding survivors alone.

Situ ordered Ivan to end Tafiti’s suffering, and Ivan shot her while Boris and Anderson dragged her through the corpses. After the men dug up a grenade and Anderson pulled its pin, it exploded as Alice, Ivan, Situ, and Qingmu tried to stop them.

• Boris and Anderson grabbed Tafiti and spun her around while she struggled, and Ivan asked Situ whether to shoot her.
• Mrs. Larry reflected on how the survivors should treat the last Itza person, then walked away with Petru.
• Situ told Ivan to let Tafiti suffer less, and Ivan shot her between the eyebrows.
• Boris and Anderson searched the corpses for another fish and found a grenade; Anderson pulled its pin as Alice shouted a warning.
• Su Huilan restrained Alice while Situ and Qingmu tackled Ivan, and the grenade exploded.

After burying the dead, the survivors found Boss Coal and Hanran in a hut and explored the altar. They discovered that the sky showed one sun outside the altar but three from its upper steps, leaving them uncertain whether the altar contained another world.

• Alice stopped grieving and asked the others to bury Anderson; they buried him, Boris, Tafiti, and the tribal chiefs, while Duwa recited scripture among the bodies.
• Su Huilan asked where Boss Coal and Hanran were, and Qingmu led the group to find them inside a hut, bloated from eating the stored food.
• Qingmu took Boss Coal, and Su Huilan carried Hanran as the group returned to the altar and noticed the two men were missing from the party.
• The group explored the altar's weedless interior, where Boss Coal pointed out that there was not even a speck of bird droppings.
• Situ suggested that the altar's space might not exist when birds flew overhead, and the group discovered that three suns appeared from the top of the altar while only one appeared below.

Su Huilan, Qingmu, and the others investigated the altar’s strange spatial effects and searched for its center. Mrs. Larry identified the stones as distorted projections of a three-dimensional writing system left by Gaia, which might reveal its information when the stones rose into the air.

• Su Huilan urged Crow to fly above the altar, and everyone saw him vanish at one edge and reappear at the other while Crow insisted he had flown normally.
• Situ proposed that a hidden, folded space above the altar explained Crow’s disappearance, and Mrs. Larry described two overlapping pyramids she had seen when the giant moon descended.
• The group returned to the altar steps, where Qingmu spotted the central drumlike stone inside a ring of stones.
• Qingmu recognized a formation-like pattern among the stones, but Mrs. Larry explained that they were three-dimensional writing whose current ground projection was distorted.
• Mrs. Larry said the stones would rise into the space of the two pyramids at a special time, revealing the writing’s true arrangement and information.

Qingmu and the others activated the Altar of Wind and revealed its three-dimensional code, which showed a fuller account of Gaia, the Gendaya Civilization, and the Itza People. The code still contained unexplained gaps, and Ivan spotted something new as the altar continued to glow.

• Qingmu and the others failed to move the heavy stone covering the altar’s center until Duwa used the Soul of Wind to raise it with a tornado.
• Duwa inserted the Soul of Wind into the symbol beneath the stone, stopping the wind and causing the carved lines to shine.
• The altar’s stones rose into their positions overhead, and Mrs. Larry realized that their arrangement formed a three-dimensional code projected as patches of light on the ground.
• Qingmu read the code and saw a more complete account of Gaia’s birth, the Gendaya Civilization, and the Itza People, but the image still had extensive dark gaps.
• Ivan suddenly called everyone’s attention to something new while the symbol’s radiance continued to flow.

The altar revealed a map of the South Pacific that Mrs. Larry recognized as Ludwig’s chart, while its symbols and stones shifted into a vast model of the Solar System amid a storm. As a Stasis Spacetime Zone approached, Situ warned everyone to run.

• Petru identified the silver lines on the altar floor as a nautical chart and pointed out islands he had surveyed.
• Mrs. Larry recognized the chart as one Ludwig had drawn and wondered why the Itza People guarded Gendaya remains.
• The Alliance emblem rotated, the hourglass restarted, and the tornado lifted the floating stones into a ring around a glowing central boulder.
• Qingmu saw eight stones orbiting the boulder like planets, while the altar floor transformed into a stormy sea and Petru spotted his boat.
• A dark line appeared on the horizon, and Situ recognized it as the Stasis Spacetime Zone and shouted for everyone to run.