Chapter Summaries

Ji Yuan took Hu Yun to Flower Port after teaching him about the hardships of cultivation, while Yin Qing settled into life at Huiyuan College. On the college’s day off, Yin Qing joined Ji Yuan by the river and read from his father’s book, drawing the Old Turtle’s attention with his clear and upright qi.

• Ji Yuan told Hu Yun about the Chunmu River God’s painful failures to transform into a True Dragon, then rewarded the fox with a late-night meal at Flower Port.
• Yin Qing overcame his first-night unease at Huiyuan College and quickly befriended his roommates and the college’s students and masters.
• On the college’s day off, Yin Qing declined his roommates’ invitation to visit the Examination Hall and went alone to meet Ji Yuan by the river.
• Yin Qing sat beside Ji Yuan and read aloud from Yin Zhaoxian’s book, “Meaning of Knowing.”
• The Old Turtle listened to Yin Qing and sensed the extraordinary purity and clarity of the qi around him.

Yin Qing impressed Ji Yuan and the river spirits with his reading before leaving Chunhui Prefecture. Afterward, Wu Chong began recounting how his old acquaintance Xiao Jing rose to power and became involved in a bloody court purge.

• Yin Qing spent the day explaining "Meaning of Knowing," captivating Wu Chong, Luo Biqing, Hu Yun, and the nearby onlookers.
• Ji Yuan praised Yin Qing's performance, and Wu Chong introduced himself before Ji Yuan named the Big Green Fish Luo Biqing.
• Yin Qing exchanged farewells with Ji Yuan and left for the city, with Ji Yuan encouraging him to write from Huiyuan College.
• Ji Yuan asked Wu Chong to recount a memorable event from his past, and Wu Chong told him how he had befriended scholar Xiao Jing and advised him to study rather than rely on fortune-telling or Heretical Teachings.
• Wu Chong recalled that Xiao Jing became Censor-in-Chief within several years and that, as Great Zhen's founding emperor neared death, Xiao Jing's rise was tied to bloodshed among the old ministers.

Ji Yuan heard Old Turtle recount how the Old Emperor used Xiao Jing to entrap and eliminate unruly officials, then advised him to live peacefully and keep pursuing the Dao. In Chunhui Prefecture, Ji Yuan visited Garden Shop, bought new Thousand Day Spring, and left his old bottle behind; when an assistant opened it, a fresh, invigorating fragrance spread through the shop.

• Old Turtle told Ji Yuan how Xiao Jing’s New Year’s Eve drinking trap helped set off the purge of unruly officials, which ended after the New Emperor restored justice to a few loyal men.
• Ji Yuan encouraged Wu Chong to avoid crooked schemes and told the spirit monsters that cultivation’s hardships need not frighten them.
• Ji Yuan and Hu Yun checked out of their inn and went to Garden Shop, where Ji Yuan quietly cleared the cold energy from Zhuo Tao’s lungs.
• Zhuo Tao explained that he still charged customers with one-jin bottles the same low price he had once offered to a special customer.
• Ji Yuan bought a new bottle of wine and gave Zhuo Tao his old bottle before leaving; an assistant opened it, releasing a clean, refreshing fragrance.

Shopkeeper Zhuo discovered that an old bottle left by a strange customer might be a treasure after pouring Thousand Day Spring into it, and he realized his cough had stopped. At the Chunmu River, Ji Yuan taught Old Turtle “Free and Easy Wandering,” leaving him overwhelmed and convinced his fortune had finally turned.

• Shopkeeper Zhuo found that the empty wine bottle retained an unusual fragrance, which vanished when he stoppered it.
• Shopkeeper Zhuo poured half a scoop of Thousand Day Spring into the bottle and noticed the wine’s aroma growing stronger, but he chose not to taste it.
• Shopkeeper Zhuo realized his cough had stopped and suspected the old bottle was a treasure.
• Ji Yuan returned to the Chunmu River and asked Old Turtle whether he wanted to hear “Free and Easy Wandering.”
• Ji Yuan recited “Free and Easy Wandering” while revealing its artistic realm, and Old Turtle listened intently through the night.
• Ji Yuan told Old Turtle to come listen to stories with Biqing, then departed as Old Turtle thanked him and declared that his fortune had turned.

Ji Yuan reflected on karmic opportunities before returning to Ning'an County and studying how to reverse the Method of Heaven and Earth Transformation. He considered drawing Samadhi True Fire out through his Elixir Chamber Golden Bridge, but worried it might burn him.

• Ji Yuan considered how timing and affinity had shaped his encounters with Old Turtle and Lord Lu.
• Ji Yuan took Hu Yun from Huiyuan College and returned with him to Ning'an County, where Hu Yun spent most of his time in Niu Kui Mountain under Lord Lu's instruction.
• When winter arrived, Ji Yuan reread the Qi Guiding Technique and worked on a Reverse Operation Method to manifest his inner realm outside himself.
• Ji Yuan realized the method might let him draw Samadhi True Fire from his elixir furnace and identified the Elixir Chamber Golden Bridge as a possible route.
• Ji Yuan worried the true fire would reach his body and burn him, though he hoped Old Dragon's wine and Dragon Saliva Incense might protect him.

Ji Yuan successfully drew out a wisp of Samadhi True Fire and tested it on a stone, reducing it to cold ash. After receiving letters at Ju'an Pavilion, he read Du Heng's account of a deadly demoness and her Ghost Children, leaving him concerned about a strange threat beyond the mortal world.

• Ji Yuan spent days preparing a safe route and incantation to draw the Samadhi True Fire from his Intent Cauldron.
• Ji Yuan drew out a tiny wisp of true fire, guided it through his body, and blew it onto a stone, which turned to ash.
• A young officer delivered letters from Yin Qing, Master Yin, and Du Heng to Ji Yuan at Ju'an Pavilion.
• Ji Yuan read Du Heng's letter describing a demoness who devoured human hearts, seven slain Ghost Children, and the deaths of several of Du Heng's companions.
• Ji Yuan wondered whether the local deities had ignored the incident or whether the demoness had been a person practicing an evil art.

Ji Yuan left Ning'an County and traveled to Jinzhou, following the resonance of his chess piece. He reached Tingshui County, where Du Heng and his companions were trapped with poisoned, worsening allies, just as an eerie sound came from the inn roof.

• Ji Yuan read Du Heng's letter and learned from Yin Zhaoxian that the Yin family was expecting a child.
• Ji Yuan took a Fire Jujube, left a message at Ju'an Pavilion, and flew away from Ning'an County.
• Ji Yuan reached Jinzhou and followed the vital-energy resonance to Tingshui County.
• Du Heng and his companions guarded their injured friends at the Welcome Inn while discussing the demoness, the poison, and their hopes for help.
• Du Heng reassured the group that a letter to one of his master's elders might bring aid, but a creaking sound from the roof made everyone look up.

The demoness attacked the martial artists at the inn with her Ghost Children, but Ji Yuan arrived and destroyed them with Samadhi True Fire. The demoness fled, and the chapter ended with Ji Yuan’s fire turning the seven Ghost Children to ash.

• The martial artists woke their companions, prepared torches and black dog blood mixed with lamp oil, and waited for the rooftop intruders.
• The demoness and her Ghost Children attacked the inn, and the martial artists fought back, burning one Ghost Child with the mixture.
• The burned Ghost Child turned into an invisible shadow instead of dying, and the demoness threatened to kill everyone in Tingshui County.
• Ji Yuan arrived, swept the Ghost Children back toward the demoness, and asked what vile art she practiced.
• The demoness ordered the Ghost Children to attack Ji Yuan and fled, but Ji Yuan’s Samadhi True Fire revealed and burned the seven creatures to ash.

Ji Yuan pursued the fleeing woman after rescuing the poisoned martial artists, using her trail to find the person who had taught her sinister arts. The woman reached her master in a remote valley, but his questions about Ji Yuan’s methods made him realize that danger had followed her home.

• Ji Yuan extinguished the inn’s flames, sent the Green Vine Sword after the fleeing woman, and helped Du Heng tend to the survivors.
• Ji Yuan cleared the four poisoned martial artists of most of their sinister qi and used Fire Jujube to restore their strength, though he warned that their recovery would take months.
• Ji Yuan left the inn to pursue the woman, while Du Heng and the other martial artists stayed behind to recover and handle the inn’s affairs.
• The Green Vine Sword drove the woman onward as Ji Yuan followed her across northern Jinzhou for two days and three nights, until she reached a mountain valley.
• The woman ran into a wooden hut and begged her master to avenge her ghost children, describing how a man in white had burned them to ash with a breath of smoke.
• The black-robed elder questioned the woman about Ji Yuan’s abilities and grew alarmed when he learned she had felt persistent panic after fleeing.

Ji Yuan confronted the old man who had taught the pregnant woman wicked arts, then fought him when he tried to kill her and flee. Ji Yuan pursued the surviving old man, who called on Tingqiu Mountain’s Mountain God for help.

• Ji Yuan arrived at the hut and exposed that the pregnant woman had refined seven Ghost Children and planned to slaughter a county.
• The old man attacked the woman with fire, but Ji Yuan cut through the flames with the Green Vine Sword.
• The old man collapsed the hut and raised a wave of earth to cover Ji Yuan, then fled underground using an evasion talisman.
• Ji Yuan split the earth wave with his sword and used the power of decree to freeze the fleeing woman in place.
• Ji Yuan discovered that the old man had escaped in a false body and pursued him through the air.
• The old man crushed a yellow stone and repeatedly begged Tingqiu Mountain’s Mountain God to save him.

Ji Yuan pursued the evil cultivator old man into Tingqiu Mountain, where the Mountain God intervened to save him from the Green Vine Sword. As Ji Yuan confronted them, he discovered a new way to wield sword momentum like Heavenly Momentum, leaving both opponents under crushing mental pressure.

• The old man fled through the mountains using talismans and the Mountain God Stone, but the Green Vine Sword’s first strike wounded his mind despite his Substitute Talisman.
• Ji Yuan tracked the old man’s faint aura and sent another sword-light after him as he escaped through a mountain.
• Tingqiu Mountain’s Mountain God blocked the sword-light with a giant rocky arm, then demanded to know what trouble the old man had caused.
• Ji Yuan refused to let the evil cultivator go, citing his accumulated evil karma and his use of the Nine Sons Ghost Mother art.
• Ji Yuan combined the Green Vine Sword’s momentum with Heaven and Earth Transformation, discovering a new sword art that bore Heavenly Momentum.
• The Mountain God endured the oppressive sword momentum while the old man was pressed to the ground, unable to straighten himself.

Ji Yuan forced Tingqiu Mountain’s Mountain God, Hong Shengtin, to withdraw from protecting the demonic cultivator, then incapacitated the old man without killing him. After securing the prisoner, Ji Yuan summoned Hong Shengtin for another conversation.

• Ji Yuan withdrew his Sword Momentum and gave Hong Shengtin a chance to step aside, and Hong Shengtin admitted he had done all that righteousness required before saluting Ji Yuan and leaving.
• Ji Yuan struck the demonic cultivator with a precise sword attack that cut away most of his mind and left him unconscious but alive.
• Hong Shengtin merged his mountain-body incarnation into Tingqiu Mountain while Ji Yuan noticed demonic auras fleeing the area.
• Ji Yuan sealed the old man’s acupoints and struck the character “Bind” into his body to keep him restrained.
• When Hong Shengtin did not answer Ji Yuan’s request to speak, Ji Yuan used the Deity Restraint Technique to summon him, and Hong Shengtin appeared beside him.

Ji Yuan enlisted Mountain God Hong to watch Tingqiu Mountain for suspicious cultivators, then returned to the inn with the evil cultivator and the ghostly woman he had captured. After showing them to the gathered martial artists, he left with them, allowing everyone to relax and sleep soundly.

• Ji Yuan explained his concerns about evil cultivators to Mountain God Hong and asked him to keep watch over Tingqiu Mountain.
• Mountain God Hong agreed to pay closer attention to the mountain and warn travelers whose intentions seemed improper.
• At the inn, Du Heng and the others worried about Ji Yuan while waiting through the snowstorm.
• Ji Yuan arrived with the bound ghostly woman and her Master, assuring everyone they had no other accomplices.
• Du Heng gave Ji Yuan wine and roast chicken, and Ji Yuan carried the prisoners away on a fishing rod.
• Du Heng recognized the fishing rod and line, and the inn's occupants relaxed and prepared to sleep.

After telling his comrades what little he could about Ji Yuan, Du Heng left Ji Yuan to carry the captured Evil Path Cultivators to the Chunhui Prefecture Underworld Bureau. The old cultivator awoke in the Punishment Department’s prison and quickly agreed to confess under torture.

• Du Heng explained that Ji Yuan had likely received his letter only days earlier and had traveled a vast distance to reach Tingshui County.
• Ji Yuan carried the Evil Cultivator Master and Disciple toward the Chunhui Prefecture Underworld Bureau while eating and drinking on the clouds.
• Ji Yuan presented the Chunhui Prefecture City God's Darkwood Plaque and handed the captives over to the Underworld Bureau.
• The old cultivator awoke in the Punishment Department's prison and learned that the officials intended to punish him without interrogation.
• After enduring the tortures of Purgatory, the old cultivator screamed that he would confess.

Ji Yuan burned the evil cultivation manual and practiced the Great Sleep Dream Method, remaining asleep for months as the seasons passed. He awoke when Hu Yun visited, then wondered whether Yin Qing had gone to see Master Yin’s second child being born.

• The Punishment Department tortured the evil cultivator while its officials delayed questioning him, and the Underworld Bureau found little useful information from the pregnant woman.
• Ji Yuan returned to Ju'an Pavilion, examined the seized talismans and Great Ghost Mother Refining Method, then burned the manual as harmful.
• After receiving word that the evil cultivator had little connection to the True Demon but had pursued rumors about the Heavenly Secrets Pavilion, Ji Yuan returned to sleep and dreamed for months.
• Hu Yun visited Ju'an Pavilion in spring, sensed that Ji Yuan was waking, and fled in alarm after the paper crane slipped into the house.
• Ji Yuan awoke after a long dream, noticed Hu Yun had run away, and decided he could not sleep longer because he might miss Master Yin’s second child’s birth.

After six months of cultivation, Ji Yuan left Ju'an Pavilion for Wanzhou Prefecture to visit Yin Zhaoxian and attend the celebration for his newborn child. On the mountain road to Lishun Prefecture, Yin Qing and his three companions took shelter in a desolate post station with a group of wary traveling merchants as thunder announced a coming storm.

• Ji Yuan collected two letters from Yin Qing and one from Yin Zhaoxian, learned that Yin Qing had already set out for Wanzhou, and decided to travel there himself.
• Ji Yuan packed a few belongings and departed Ju'an Pavilion with the Little Paper Crane, leaving Hu Yun and Lord Lu without telling them where he was going.
• Yin Qing, Lin Xinjie, Lei Yusheng, and Mo Xiu struggled along the damaged mountain route after a road collapse forced them to abandon their planned journey by carriage.
• The four scholars reached a desolate post station and found more than a dozen traveling merchants gathered inside, with knives close at hand.
• The traveling merchants allowed Yin Qing and his companions to rest in the post station just as thunder sounded outside and mountain rain approached.

Yin Qing and Mo Xiu gathered firewood before a storm trapped them and the other travelers in an abandoned post station, where three suspicious women arrived seeking shelter. When one woman asked Yin Qing for clothes, he used Ji Yuan’s old letter to reveal the women’s fear of its spiritual power, leaving their intentions exposed.

• Yin Qing persuaded Lei Yusheng and Lin Xinjie to preserve the post station’s furniture, then took Mo Xiu to gather firewood before the rain began.
• Elder Lu offered the scholars dry firewood and hot coals, and they settled in for the storm while Lei Yusheng fell asleep during his watch.
• Three drenched women entered the post station, and Yin Qing moved his companions away from them after sensing something suspicious.
• One woman knocked over Mo Xiu’s book chest and asked to borrow clothes, prompting Yin Qing to retrieve Ji Yuan’s old letter from among his belongings.
• The letter’s spiritual gleam frightened the three women, and Yin Qing picked it up while claiming it had fallen from his clothes.

Yin Qing recognized the three alluring women at the abandoned post station as fox spirits, while Mister Ji’s glowing letter helped expose their supernatural nature. As the fox spirits pressed their attack, Elder Lu led the traveling merchants in their Saber Song, driving the women back and leaving a clash imminent.

• Yin Qing noticed Mister Ji’s letter glowing as he and Mo Xiu moved away from the three women and joined the traveling merchants.
• The three women changed clothes provocatively, but Elder Lu’s rebuke and the letter’s glow helped the group notice their green eyes and suspect they were fox spirits.
• Yin Qing saw tails and smoke-like wisps around the women and asked Elder Lu whether the traveling merchants had any folk methods for dealing with them.
• Elder Lu told the traveling merchants to prepare the Saber Song, and they struck their knives against the ground as they sang.
• The merchants’ song raised a fierce baleful aura and intensified the letter’s radiance, forcing the three women to retreat.

Yin Qing’s Letter helped the traveling merchants overcome their fear and drive three Fox Spirits from the abandoned post station. The merchants grew friendly with the scholars afterward, while the escaped foxes watched the station from the rainy mountainside.

• Yin Qing watched the merchants draw courage from the Saber Song and his glowing Letter, then charge the three Fox Spirits.
• The Fox Spirits fled from the merchants’ attack and revealed their true forms, while Yin Qing warned the group they were foxes.
• Elder Lu grabbed a fox by its tail and smashed it against the ground, but the foxes used their Farting Technique to escape through a gap by the gate.
• The merchants treated their wounds and thanked Yin Qing, then welcomed him and the other scholars to share food and drink.
• The three drenched Fox Spirits watched the abandoned post station from a nearby mountain ridge.

After surviving the night at the abandoned post station, Yin Qing and the scholars joined Old Man Lu’s merchants on a shortcut through Datong Mountain. A Little Paper Crane led Yin Qing away from the resting group, where he briefly encountered Datong Mountain’s mountain god before it vanished.

• The three fox spirits argued on the ridge, then fled in different directions when lightning struck nearby.
• Yin Qing stayed awake much of the night, and the group ate breakfast before setting out with Old Man Lu’s merchants.
• Old Man Lu led the group off the post road and across Barren Gully Ridge, while the merchants helped the struggling scholars.
• During a rest, Yin Qing asked Old Man Lu about a Great Beast and listened to his story about nearby villages seeking divine protection.
• A Little Paper Crane pecked Yin Qing three times, then led him away from the group; he found a fur-covered figure who called itself the mountain god of Datong Mountain and said it had come by order of the Immortal Master.
• When Mo Xiu called from behind, Yin Qing turned back and the mountain god vanished.