Chapter Summaries

Wu Youren and the Red Pine instructors fought Corpse Weirds after barbarians lured them into the area, but Namuzha disappeared while pursuing a fleeing Knight. At dawn, they found Namuzha dead, and Wu Youren stayed behind to pursue his own plans as the others agreed to help him retaliate against the barbarians.

• Namuzha’s explosives wounded the barbarians, and Red Pine’s group fought them before confronting the pursuing Corpse Weirds.
• Wu Youren used three Weird-Exterminating Grenades to break apart the Weird Qi, then led the group in killing the scattered Weirds and collecting several items.
• When Namuzha failed to return, Manna and Kenpa searched for him while Wu Youren and the female archer guarded their camp.
• Kenpa found Namuzha’s body two kilometers away, where a barbarian Knight had apparently self-detonated before Namuzha died from a broken rib cutting his neck.
• The group decided to burn Namuzha’s body and return to Red Pine, but Wu Youren chose to stay in the wilderness and hinted that he would pursue the barbarians.
• Manna and the female archer offered to help Wu Youren take revenge, while Kenpa agreed to assist with seizing barbarian weapons.

After a mysterious stranger appeared at their camp, Wu Youren and the Red Pine fighters planned a night raid on nearby barbarians by drawing Weird Qi toward their camp. They used Little Ha as bait, and the chapter ended as the barbarians emerged from their tents after a grenade blast.

• Wu Youren and the female archer discussed Namuzha’s suspicious death while they burned the Corpse Weird’s remains, and Manna and Kenpa returned with crystals.
• Wu Youren suggested the barbarians might have deliberately drawn out the Corpse Weird, and Manna and Kenpa debated whether to retaliate against nearby tribes.
• A masked stranger overheard them, challenged Red Pine’s authority, and vanished before Manna could identify him.
• Kenpa and Wu Youren scouted eight barbarian locations, then joined Manna and the female archer in choosing a small camp for a test raid.
• Wu Youren used Little Ha, baited with meat and Weird lure, to draw a mass of Weird Qi toward the sleeping barbarians, while the group set a trap nearby.
• After a grenade blast redirected the Weird Qi toward the camp, the barbarians rushed from their tents and took up defensive positions.

Manna and her companions raided a barbarian camp, then learned that tensions with the barbarians and the mystery of the Corpse Weird were worsening. Kelvin, a masked foreign Ability User Knight, approached them seeking information about a proposal for Knights and agreed to help them once, while Wu Youren planned to return to the Martial Academy.

• Manna and her companions used Weird Qi, arrows, and explosives to wipe out a barbarian camp and conceal the evidence.
• Instructor Hong questioned Manna and Wu Youren, discussed the suspected cause of the Corpse Weird crisis, and led the group on patrol.
• Instructor Hong confronted the masked Kelvin, who revealed that he came from the far west and wanted to learn about a proposal for Knights to acquire fixed assets.
• Kelvin demonstrated that he was an Ability User Knight, and Wu Youren said he planned to return to the Martial Academy.
• Kelvin gave Manna a token offering his help for ten days, and agreed to join one raid against the barbarians if they were not too strong.

Wu Youren spoke with Chen Quanxu through a small snake, learned that Chen believed his unusual luck was behind his cultivation and bond with Little Ha, and agreed to keep the snake. The group then hunted Weird Qi in the rain without finding any rewards, leaving Manna frustrated by their poor luck.

• Kelvin left after offering to take action for a fee, and Wu Youren's companions declined to examine his strange token.
• Chen Quanxu warned Wu Youren not to touch Kelvin's token, claimed he had killed Namuzha, and urged Wu Youren to leave the Martial Academy more often.
• Chen Quanxu said Wu Youren was exceptionally lucky and explained that Wu Youren and Little Ha shared the same energy, though he could not explain Wu Youren's cultivation.
• Chen Quanxu brought Namuzha's identity tag to Wu Youren, who crushed it and let the little snake coil around his wrist guard.
• The next morning, Wu Youren refused to feed Little Ha the snake, while Manna and the others guessed that Wu Youren might have an affinity for animals.
• Wu Youren's group destroyed ten masses of Weird Qi over three rainy days without gaining anything, and Manna complained about their lack of rewards.

Wu Youren followed Chen Quanxu to a nearby Dark Night outpost and attacked the Life and Death Knot members who had tormented him. He captured Salim and prepared to torture him, while Salim remained paralyzed and unable to plead for his life.

• After a large barbarian party passed near their campsite, Hong Da took Manna, the female archer, and Kenpa to investigate, leaving Wu Youren behind.
• Chen Quanxu told Wu Youren where Dark Night's observation posts were and agreed to help conceal him, but declined to fight for him.
• Wu Youren killed the sentries at one observation post and buried their bodies, then infiltrated Salim's post and incapacitated its occupants.
• Wu Youren captured Salim, took a Resentment Qi Crystal, and destroyed a sleeve crossbow before leaving the outpost.
• Wu Youren buried Salim up to his chest at a secluded spot and considered using parasitic wasps to torture him, while Salim tried unsuccessfully to communicate.

Wu Youren killed Salim by burying him alive with a Quicksand Spell and parasitic wasps, then struggled to conceal the sudden surge in his power. After returning to camp and spending two more days clearing Weird Qi, he faced questions from the Court of State Ceremonial about Salim’s disappearance.

• Wu Youren and Little Snake used parasitic wasps and a Quicksand Spell to bury Salim alive, while Chen Quanxu helped with the attack.
• Wu Youren felt his power surge as he headed back to camp, destroyed his wristwatch, and told Instructor Hong he had hunted a Weird Race creature.
• Instructor Hong questioned Wu Youren about his aura and whereabouts, then arranged for the group to clear Weird Qi for two more days before returning to Red Pine.
• Wu Youren’s group cleared seven clusters of Weird Qi and obtained two more crystals before returning to Red Pine and entering quarantine.
• Court of State Ceremonial Knights arrived during the group’s dinner and named Wu Youren a prime suspect in Salim’s disappearance, while Ranxue and Manna defended him.

Wu Youren resisted the Court of State Ceremonial’s new efforts to manage him, then left Red Pine to cultivate in the Rust Zone as his Daoist aura neared a breakthrough. He emerged three days later transformed but ravenously hungry, with Little Ha missing and his supplies exhausted, and began searching for someone to rob.

• Daiqisi and the others rejected the Court of State Ceremonial’s accusations and defended Wu Youren, while a visiting group from Duke Heng’s household questioned them about Namuzha’s death.
• Wu Youren spotted Shi Linyuan and Lei Lixing among the spectators at a clash between Liang and barbarian squads, and the little earth snake left his wrist guard that night.
• Wu Youren returned to Red Pine, tended the greenhouse, and dismissed Talis when she arrived as his new liaison from the Office of Protocol.
• Wu Youren left Red Pine for the Rust Zone to cultivate, prepared a remote house with food and defenses, and entered deep cultivation with Little Ha beside him.
• Wu Youren woke three days later with a transformed body and extreme hunger, discovered that Little Ha had eaten its food and disappeared, and repeatedly ate and suffered cramps as he recovered.
• After exhausting his food supplies, Wu Youren searched the desolate Rust Zone for someone to rob and considered turning highway robber.

Wu Youren returned to Red Pine after reaching Qi Refining and learned that an immortal cultivator’s memories had revealed a path forward. When Instructor Hong invited him on a paid mountain mission, he refused because it might entangle him in the conflict between the two major camps, leaving Liu Jingming to marvel that Wu Youren could afford to say no.

• Wu Youren robbed a convoy for martial practitioners’ food, recognized Huo Laer and others from Earl Shengming’s Residence, and let them go after warning them to keep quiet.
• Wu Youren returned to Red Pine, found Liu Jingming in his room, and learned that Instructor Daiqisi and Talis had come looking for him.
• Wu Youren realized that an immortal cultivator’s memories had helped him enter Qi Refining and understand his cultivation path.
• Wu Youren warned Liu Jingming to keep his distance from Talis, then declined Manna’s invitation to visit Bellflower Mountain because he did not want to see the New Army again.
• Instructor Hong offered Wu Youren a paid mountain mission, but he declined after learning it might involve the conflict between the two major camps.
• Manna accepted Wu Youren’s reasoning that people from Liang could not avoid taking sides, and Liu Jingming remarked that Wu Youren was now in a position to say no.

Wu Youren left Red Pine to test his ideas in the wilderness, evaded Talis’s attempt to escort him, and advanced toward the mountains before turning back. On his return, he confronted Sister Hua and her companions over her unpaid debt, leaving a standoff poised to begin.

• Daiqisi teased Cynthia while feeding Little Ha, and Wu Youren sensed a terrifying presence when he tried climbing over the Martial Academy wall again.
• Wu Youren asked Hong Da for permission to leave Red Pine, and she charged him three thousand silver dollars in tax before he set out with supplies and weapons.
• Talis and her companions caught up with Wu Youren, but he warned them off and continued toward the mountains while they followed at a distance.
• Wu Youren camped cautiously, buried supply caches near the mountain foothills, then decided the time was not right to approach the ridge and headed back.
• Sister Hua ordered her companions to leave Wu Youren alone, but he fired a warning shot and confronted her about the debt she owed him.

Wu Youren stayed away from Red Pine, confronted people who tested him, and learned that Hong Da had warned him not to get involved in Tianjing. While hunting anomalies in the Rust Zone, he discovered that Little Ha’s strange dropping attracted Weird Qi, then reunited with Chen Quanxu, who questioned his tactics.

• Sister Hua and the other Knights identified Wu Youren and agreed to stay away from him after he fired a shot at them.
• Wu Youren camped outside the quarantine site, threatened a burly man who tried to take his food, and turned down an offer to advise the hereditary nobility.
• Ranxue visited Wu Youren, and Hong Da warned him to stick to killing anomalies and avoid getting involved in Tianjing.
• Wu Youren traveled to the Rust Zone, where Little Ha produced a strange dropping that attracted Weird Qi when Wu Youren opened its pouch.
• Wu Youren fled the area and moved his camp, then encountered Chen Quanxu, who noted that Wu Youren had advanced and questioned why he had waited at the isolation point.

Wu Youren and Chen Quanxu compared what they knew about Ability Users and weird items, then agreed to test the mysterious item Little Ha had produced by luring Weirds into a wasteland battle. Wu Youren was still fighting when the chapter ended, while several observers watched from a distance.

• Wu Youren told Chen Quanxu that he had obtained Ability User materials from Hong Da, and they exchanged what they knew about supernatural systems and weird items.
• Chen Quanxu identified the honeycombed pale blue-green item as a Marching Stone and learned Wu Youren knew Storage Eagles could produce them.
• Wu Youren showed Chen Quanxu the egg-shaped item Little Ha had produced, and Chen Quanxu warned him not to treat it as the Refinement and Analysis Pearl sought by the Hall of Extraordinary Masters.
• Chen Quanxu lured a huge mass of Weird Qi into the wasteland, and Wu Youren fought it with his saber while collecting Weird items.
• Wu Youren killed several Knight Weirds and thinned the mass of Weird Qi as three distant observers watched and considered moving in.

Wu Youren and Chen Quanxu hunted Weirds around the Rust Zone, collected Weird objects, and hid supplies while Wu Youren’s unusual cultivation gains continued. After Wu Youren returned to the quarantine checkpoint, the guard captain came looking for him, and a group from Jin Garden approached the gathering where he was eating with Red Pine instructors.

• A greedy martial artist approached Wu Youren’s battle, but fled after Wu Youren’s Knight sonic attack revealed his strength; Wu Youren then escaped the area.
• Wu Youren and Chen Quanxu buried supplies near the mountain and hunted Weirds in the wasteland and Rust District, gathering several Weird objects as Chen Quanxu watched over him.
• Wu Youren admitted that killing Weird objects improved his cultivation, and he lent Chen Quanxu the tangerine seed before returning to the quarantine checkpoint.
• Manna and Daiqisi met Wu Youren at the checkpoint, where he paid Hong Da’s tax and joined them for a meal with Luo Xi and other Red Pine instructors.
• Wu Youren learned that the guard captain had come looking for him, while the guard captain received a screenshot of Liu Jingming’s message and set out to find Wu Youren.
• Three vehicles arrived near Wu Youren’s gathering, and Luo Xi stood up to demand that their occupants approach without their headlights on.

Wu Youren confronted Jin’s chief guard, rejected his demand to go to Suotu, and warned him not to interfere in his life. After returning to Red Pine, Wu Youren resumed dealing with Liu Jingming, but the chief guard appeared again as the chapter ended.

• Jin’s chief guard approached Wu Youren at dinner and asked him to return to Jin Garden and accompany him to Suotu, but Wu Youren stayed silent and refused.
• Wu Youren challenged the chief guard over the neglect he had suffered in Jin Garden and threatened to expose sensitive information if the man kept pressuring him.
• The chief guard probed Wu Youren about Chen Quanxu, Little Ha, and the tax-exemption proposal, then left after Wu Youren told him not to bother him.
• Wu Youren told the Red Pine instructors that he had refused to join the Suotu investigation, citing the danger and their limited strength.
• After quarantine, Wu Youren returned to Red Pine, collected the proceeds from his crystal, and warned Liu Jingming not to use his wristwatch for confidential matters.
• The chief guard appeared at a distance while Wu Youren and Liu Jingming were talking.

Wu Youren rejected the Duke of Wei's concubine-born son's offer of investment unless it included ten march stones, while the chief guard tried to persuade him to cooperate. Their discussion revealed the existence of legacy weapons and deepened Wu Youren's despair about the power that could keep the hostages trapped; the chief guard then offered information about the relevant power levels.

• The chief guard asked to speak with Wu Youren alone and urged him to consider working together to prevent Jin and Liang from fighting again.
• Wu Youren demanded ten march stones as the price of accepting the chief guard's investment, but the chief guard said he had none.
• The chief guard offered intelligence and material assistance, while Wu Youren warned him that Red Pine might have people capable of overhearing them.
• The chief guard revealed that Jin had a legacy weapon too and explained that only a narrow circle could receive its protection.
• Wu Youren suspected that escaping the hostages' predicament would require power beyond Foundation Establishment, and the chief guard offered information about the various power levels.

Wu Youren negotiated an information-sharing arrangement with the guard captain, then set out into the wilderness and met Chen Quanxu in the Rust Zone. After Wu Youren recounted the guard captain’s visit, Chen Quanxu said the captain had been truthful and hinted that Wu Youren had once caused him considerable trouble.

• Wu Youren agreed to consider working with the guard captain, who gave him a wristwatch for secure communication and promised not to visit again.
• The guard captain spared Liu Jingming from joining the mountain trip, and Wu Youren left Red Pine the next morning after selling Manna a golden-yellow weird object.
• Wu Youren traveled into the wilderness, handled several minor threats, and met the scops owl, which had brought him a motorcycle and asked him to dispose of a corpse.
• Wu Youren told Chen Quanxu that the guard captain, Hao Wei, had visited and discussed Chen Quanxu with him.
• After hearing the details, Chen Quanxu said Hao Wei had broadly been truthful and remarked that Wu Youren had put him through the wringer.

Wu Youren and Chen Quanxu discussed the risks of trusting powerful people before Chen gave him a silent motorcycle and brought him to the wasteland to hunt weird entities. After Chen lured a huge horde toward Wu Youren, he took Little Ha away, leaving Wu Youren to face the approaching monsters alone.

• Chen Quanxu and Wu Youren discussed a calculating guard captain and agreed they should learn from his shamelessness without entrusting him with anything.
• Chen Quanxu offered Wu Youren a silent motorcycle, and Wu tested it before riding to the wasteland with supplies.
• Wu Youren hid in a cave during the day, then waited in the wasteland at night for Scops Owl to lure monsters toward him.
• After a commotion and gunfire on a distant ridge, Scops Owl returned and told Wu Youren to fight the horde while he carried Little Ha away.
• Wu Youren drew his saber as a vast tide of Weird Qi approached, revealing more than a hundred gray globes containing human body parts.

Wu Youren fought through a vast swarm of Corpse Weirds, burning through his internal breath while collecting Weird objects and crystals. When an enormous icy hand appeared amid his traps and explosions, he slashed at it as it reached for him.

• Wu Youren discovered that the Weird Qi contained a vanguard of Knight Corpse Weirds and began cutting them down with his saber.
• Wu Youren released his fire-element internal breath to kill the approaching Weirds, but realized that fighting at that intensity drained him faster than he could replenish his strength.
• Wu Youren accidentally shattered a crystal, releasing energy that stirred the surrounding Weird Race into a frenzy.
• Soldiers at a military outpost noticed Wu Youren's red saber Qi and wondered whether he was the Weird-Hunting Maniac.
• After fighting for nearly an hour and a half, Wu Youren collected twelve Weird objects and crystals and decided he would retreat after ten more minutes.
• Wu Youren detonated his traps as a sudden danger approached, then swung his saber three times at a gigantic icy hand reaching down to seize him.

Wu Youren destroyed the Corpse Weird’s enormous hand, escaped a powerful pursuer, and met Scops Owl at a prepared trap zone. He learned the pursuers were from the Hall of Extraordinary Masters and that their Ability User had been poisoned, so they left without confronting them.

• Wu Youren shattered his saber to destroy the phantom hand, then burned and weakened the black shadow before collecting several strange items.
• Wu Youren escaped on his motorcycle while the pursuer chased him, using explosives that disrupted the pursuer and led him to accuse Wu Youren of using poison.
• Wu Youren reached his trap zone and waited, then began burying the motorcycle when Scops Owl appeared and explained that Little Ha was unconscious in the basement.
• Scops Owl identified the pursuers as an Ability User from the Hall of Extraordinary Masters and a Great Knight bodyguard, then suggested taking them down.
• Wu Youren refused to fight them, and Chen Quanxu explained that the poisoned Ability User and his bodyguard had stopped pursuing them.

Wu Youren recounted killing a Great Knight Weird and gave Chen Quanxu the Weird item Shadow-Splitting Yue, which could prolong Chen Quanxu’s life. After recovering and dividing their remaining loot, Wu Youren discussed replacing his shattered saber and asked Chen Quanxu about the Intelligence Agency.

• Wu Youren told Scops Owl that he had killed the Great Knight Weird and described the battle, including the enormous hand and his shattered saber.
• Chen Quanxu identified the Weird item as Shadow-Splitting Yue and said it could strengthen his ability to control people and beasts, helping prolong his life.
• Wu Youren gave Shadow-Splitting Yue to Chen Quanxu, and they agreed to divide the other Weird items and crystals after Wu Youren rested.
• Wu Youren woke in the afternoon, and Chen Quanxu took four crystals and one Weird item from the remaining loot.
• Chen Quanxu offered to help find a saber like Wu Youren’s shattered weapon, and Wu Youren asked how familiar he was with the Intelligence Agency.

Wu Youren returned to Tianjing with Scops Owl after they found no Intelligence Agency agent matching Sister Hua and stole a saber. While exploring the city, he was swept into a celebration for a young man’s awakening and ended up entering the family’s courtyard, where he gave two silver dollars and asked them to put down Liu Jingming.

• Wu Youren trained Little Ha while Scops Owl searched three Intelligence Agency locations but found no one matching Sister Hua.
• Wu Youren asked Scops Owl to steal a saber, then escorted him toward Tianjing with Shadow-Splitting Yue.
• After hiding his motorcycle outside the city, Wu Youren slipped past the checkpoint and wandered Tianjing, eating at a roadside stall.
• Wu Youren learned that a family was celebrating their son’s awakening and followed the crowd to their open banquet.
• The middle-aged host insisted that Wu Youren enter the courtyard, where Wu Youren gave two silver dollars and asked them to put down Liu Jingming.