Chapter Summaries

During Zhang Zhiyun's trial at White Tiger Gate, Chen Ye entered Su Changqing's illusionary mist and prepared to defend himself from an attack. Chen Ying arrived with the gravely injured Nie Youyun and revealed that Su Changqing was dead, while Lu Ming's corpse appeared nearby holding Su Changqing's severed head.

• The capital's great families recognized Lu Ming's corpse in Zhang Zhiyun's hands and questioned how it had come into his possession.
• Su Changqing spread a thick illusionary mist around White Tiger Gate, and Chen Ye unleashed his bloodline and prepared for danger.
• Chen Ye used his ultimate yin flames when someone approached, but the flames could not touch Chen Ying or the injured Nie Youyun she was carrying.
• Chen Ying warned Chen Ye through voice transmission that Su Changqing was already dead, and Nie Youyun confirmed she had arrived too late to save him.
• Chen Ye spotted Lu Ming standing in the thinning mist with Su Changqing's severed head in his hand.

Chen Ying used her spells to evade Lu Ming and study the flying zombies’ speed, while Chen Ye struggled to understand her methods. She deliberately teleported herself, Chen Ye, and Nie Youyun into the midst of four zombies, where Nie Youyun realized she intended to hunt them.

• Lu Ming crushed a flying zombie’s head and attacked Chen Ye, but Chen Ying pulled him away as Lu Ming’s movements slowed near them.
• Chen Ying warped space and moved the group through the fog, then calculated the speeds of Lu Ming and the other flying zombies.
• As the zombies converged, Chen Ying identified one approaching from the southwest and teleported the group a short distance away.
• Chen Ye panicked when they found themselves surrounded by four flying zombies, but Nie Youyun recognized that Chen Ying had approached them deliberately to attack.

Chen Ying used carefully calculated spatial arrays to immobilize the Flying Jiangshi and explained her method to Chen Ye and Nie Youyun. She confronted Lu Ming, the last remaining Jiangshi, and revealed how he escaped and chose to join Cloud Capital.

• Chen Ying used spatial arrays to trap the Flying Jiangshi, while spectators outside the White Tiger Gate realized she had calculated their movements and positions.
• Chen Ying released Chen Ye and Nie Youyun and explained that her calculations relied on guesses and repeated attempts rather than perfect predictions.
• Chen Ye regretted not continuing his arithmetic studies, but Chen Ying told him that spell calculation required talent.
• Chen Ying identified the last Flying Jiangshi as Lu Ming and said he had escaped from prison during the battle in Liuzhou before fleeing north and choosing to join Cloud Capital.
• Lu Ming asked whether Chen Qing would arrive in time to save her, and Chen Ying replied that she did not need her lord to save her.

Chen Ying outmaneuvered Lu Ming after he broke the ground beneath her formation, trapping him inside a folded space. She explained that she had predicted his movements and force, leaving Lu Ming helpless as the elders watched.

• Lu Ming recognized Chen Ying as Mu Hongqing's adopted disciple and mocked her for confronting him instead of retreating.
• Chen Ying condemned Lu Ming for allowing Madam Lu to abuse his mother and sister, while Lu Ming dismissed her as sharp-tongued.
• Lu Ming broke the ground beneath Chen Ying to destroy the formation protecting her and rushed in to attack.
• Chen Ying revealed that she had designed the broken formation to transform into a new one, then folded space around Lu Ming and compressed him into a small box.
• Chen Ying said she had calculated Lu Ming's speed and strength, and that his thoughts were easy to guess.

Chen Ying defeated Lu Ming with a network of prepared spatial arrays and passed the White Tiger Gate with Chen Ye and Nie Youyun. The Azure Dragon Gate then opened for its assessment, where the applicants found only Zhang Xiaoyun waiting for them.

• Chen Ying trapped Lu Ming in a spatial barrier, and Zhang Zhiyun declared that she had passed the White Tiger Gate's test.
• Chen Ying claimed Lu Ming as Jiangnan's prisoner, and Zhang Zhiyun let her take him back.
• The guard announced that Chen Ying, Chen Ye, and Nie Youyun had advanced through the White Tiger Gate.
• The Su Family patriarch regretted how his family had treated Mu Hongqing after seeing the fate of his son.
• The Azure Dragon Gate opened, and applicants cautiously entered but found no apparent defenses beyond Zhang Xiaoyun standing at the palace steps.

At the Azure Dragon Gate, Su Changgui tried to seize a graceful victory by intimidating Zhang Xiaoyun, but a terrifying presence emerged from the supposedly powerless young man. The chapter left Su Changgui fleeing and the spectators and elders unable to intervene as the red-clad woman identified Zhang Xiaoyun’s technique.

• The sorcerers crowded toward Zhang Xiaoyun, while Su Changgui recognized their intent to capture him and claim a candidate’s place.
• Su Changgui activated his true dragon bloodline, frightening the other sorcerers, then asked whether he had passed after Zhang Xiaoyun sat with his eyes closed.
• A chilling voice from the gate made Su Changgui’s dragon scales withdraw, and Zhang Xiaoyun opened abyss-black eyes and spoke of having seen a dragon bloodline sorcerer before.
• Su Changgui realized the figure before him was not Zhang Xiaoyun and fled, while the elders found themselves unable to move or intervene.
• The red-clad woman from the Divine Martial Guild recognized the technique as Spirit Restraint and General Dispatch.

After Shen Qi reported that Zhang Xiaoyun had killed everyone at the Azure Dragon Gate, Chen Qing concluded that Zhang Xiaoyun was using the deleted shaman class to wield a powerful spirit body. The appearance of other techniques and events that should not exist left Chen Qing questioning who the people of the Warlock Dynasty had really been.

• Shen Qi told Chen Qing that Zhang Xiaoyun had killed all the contestants at the Azure Dragon Gate.
• Chen Qing explained that Zhang Xiaoyun might be a shaman who hosted a powerful spirit body, and Shen Qi questioned whether such a descent was possible.
• Chen Qing recalled that he had fought to remove the shaman class from the open beta and recognized signs of a powerful spirit body around Zhang Xiaoyun.
• Chen Qing connected Zhang Xiaoyun's class to Ziyue's forgotten death and the Azure Dragon Gate's deleted Flying Jiangshi technique.
• Chen Qing wondered who the people of the Warlock Dynasty had really been.

After leaving the White Tiger Gate, Zhang Zhiyun discussed Chen Ying with Murong Ziyi, while Zhang Xiaoyun emerged from the Azure Dragon Gate after slaughtering its challengers. At the Vermilion Bird Gate, Chen Ying arrived to watch Ziyue’s trial and ran into Zhang Xiaoyun.

• Zhang Zhiyun told Murong Ziyi that Chen Ying was strong in an unusual way, and Murong Ziyi said she wanted to see for herself.
• Zhang Zhiyun invited Murong Ziyi to the Vermilion Bird Gate, then dismissed concern for his younger brother at the Azure Dragon Gate.
• Zhang Xiaoyun left the blood-soaked Azure Dragon Gate and brushed aside the angry elders, including the Su Family’s great elder.
• Zhang Xiaoyun said he was heading to the Vermilion Bird Gate to watch the trial and showed interest in the woman the Celestial Master Mansion had failed to capture for ten thousand years.
• Chen Ying arrived at the Vermilion Bird Gate to watch Ziyue, but encountered Zhang Xiaoyun, whose presence made her uneasy.

At the Vermilion Bird Gate, Su Changqing mocked the Chen Household brothers for wasting the South Sea Dragon Palace’s resources, until Ziyue began the trial by drawing hundreds of connected formations in the air. The Jiangnan students recognized the challenge as one of their teacher’s tests, and Ziyue ordered them to enter the palace within half an hour or return to Jiangnan and repeat the year.

• Su Changqing taunted the Chen Household brothers over their poor aptitude and the resources they had consumed, and they angrily prepared to answer him.
• An icy voice announced the trial and a safe exit as a line of fire appeared from the palace gate.
• Ziyue drew hundreds of powerful formations in the air, linking them into a vast network that stunned the sorcerers watching.
• Su Changqing and the other scions abandoned any thought of challenging Ziyue’s standing as Great Jin’s foremost court sorcerer.
• Ziyue told the Jiangnan students to break through the formations and enter the palace within half an hour or return to Jiangnan and repeat the year.

Ziyue set the Jiangnan students the challenge of breaking hundreds of complex formations within half an hour, astonishing Shen Qi and the observers. When the Chen Household scions tried to intimidate the students, they discovered that the entire group had reached the Transcendent realm, and Shen Yuan warned them their recent Dragon Transformations were unstable before sending his students into the formations.

• Shen Qi realized Ziyue could draw hundreds of intricate formations using elements from far away, while Chen Qing remarked that her test was strict.
• Ziyue's students faced disbelief from the observers, who recognized Shen Yuan among the Jiangnan group.
• The two Chen Household scions confronted Shen Yuan and unleashed their draconic pressure, but the Jiangnan students remained unaffected.
• Shen Yuan identified the brothers' recent secret Dragon Transformation and advised them to consolidate their strength before damaging their foundations.
• Shen Yuan urged the Jiangnan students to begin the test, and they activated their spells and charged into the formations.

Jiangnan’s disciples worked through the tangled formations at the Vermilion Bird Gate while the Chen brothers accused Ziyue of helping them cheat. Su Changqing recognized their skill, joined Yun Ke’er, and followed her through a shattered formation and the gate.

• Jiangnan’s disciples drew formations and fed them into the barrier, prompting the Chen brothers to accuse Ziyue of cheating.
• Su Changqing reasoned that the barrier changed with every formation and that the disciples were racing to break through different paths.
• Su Changqing asked Shen Yuan which disciple was best at formations, and Shen Yuan pointed him to Yun Ke’er.
• Su Changqing joined Yun Ke’er and watched her keep drawing formations while speaking with him.
• Yun Ke’er shattered the formation before her, then she and Su Changqing ran through the Vermilion Bird Gate, leaving the onlookers stunned.

Su Changqing’s group failed to enter the trial after the barrier repaired itself, while students who mishandled the arrays were eliminated and barred from returning. As the trial moved toward one-on-one duels, Shen Qi worried that Jiangnan’s array students could not match proper spellcasters, but Chen Qing questioned his doubts.

• Shen Yuan explained that Ziyue’s interwoven arrays could repair a breach and form a new barrier, discouraging the South Sea spellcasters from confronting the Jiangnan students.
• The South Sea spellcasters chose students to follow, but some students disrupted the arrays and were eliminated along with the people following them.
• Zhang Xiaoyun warned the eliminated contestants not to attack the Jiangnan disciples, and Chen Ying led the students away under the protection of her spatial array.
• Central Plains elders watching the Vermilion Bird Gate trial recognized Jiangnan’s advantage in arrays and expected the second round’s one-on-one duels to favor dragon-bloodline spellcasters.
• Shen Qi worried that Jiangnan’s array students were being matched too early against the great clans’ direct descendants, but Chen Qing challenged his belief that they could not compete with proper spellcasters.

In Cloud Capital, people discussed Zhang Xiaoyun’s performance at the Four Saints Gates while Zhou Yuntao reflected on Chen Ying and Ziyue’s skills. The Celestial Master Mansion summoned Zhou Yuntao, and the chapter revealed the old rivalry between the Zhang Family and the Five Color Families.

• Cloud Capital residents debated Zhang Xiaoyun’s strength and the deaths at the Azure Dragon Gate, while discussing Chen Ying’s spell formations at the White Tiger Gate.
• Zhou Yuntao praised Chen Ying’s methods and described Ziyue’s control of more than a hundred linked formations as unfathomable.
• A Four Saints Guard summoned Zhou Yuntao to the Celestial Master Mansion for the old Celestial Master’s promised explanation about the contest.
• The chapter explained that the Cyan, red, blue, purple, and black families had passed down their legacies for generations, with the Celestial Master’s position usually rotating among them.
• The chapter revealed that the Ziyi Household had once been the orthodox lineage of thunder arts and regarded the Zhang Family as usurpers and this generation’s Ziyi as a traitor.

Zhou Yuntao met the old Celestial Master and agreed to take part in the second round, the Sorcerer Labyrinth, while Chen Qing studied its rules and considered the arrival of the Four Saints Sorcerers. After learning that Fei Jun had withdrawn from public life and could not be reached, Chen Qing grew suspicious that the selection was tied to a larger plan.

• Zhou Yuntao visited the old Celestial Master, who predicted Chen Ying’s arrival and arranged for Zhou to take part in the second round.
• Zhou Yuntao was captivated by the woman-shaped puppet the old Celestial Master was carving, but the old man covered its eyes and sent him away.
• Chen Qing and the others learned that the Sorcerer Labyrinth would pair competitors, offer Four Saints Talismans, and let successful challengers command divisions of the Four Saints Guard.
• Chen Qing considered the risks of taking the Four Saints Guard and focused instead on the Four Saints Talismans and the presence of both the Azure Dragon and White Tiger Sorcerers.
• Chen Qing asked Chen Baifeng about Fei Jun and learned that Fei Jun had resigned, was observing mourning, and had refused visitors.
• Chen Qing noticed Fei Jun was absent from the second-round list and wondered whether the Celestial Master selection was connected to the Four Saints Sorcerers.

Chen Qing and Chen Baifeng watched the second contest in Cloud Capital’s palace, where Chen Qing wondered whether the city’s plentiful gold came from alchemy and suspected the Celestial Master trial concealed political tensions. The contestants’ matchups appeared on the crystal, including Chen Ying against Zhou Yuntao and Chen Ye against White Plain.

• Chen Qing and Chen Baifeng discussed Cloud Capital’s scholar-gentry, its academic honors, and the large supply of gold coins that funded its bureaucracy.
• Chen Qing considered whether Cloud Capital could create gold through alchemy and wondered if Kagura had come to investigate it.
• Chen Qing reviewed the contestants who had advanced, noting that White Plain was the only northern contestant and that Shangguan Qingyi had also passed Murong Ziyi’s test.
• Chen Qing and Chen Baifeng watched the matchups appear on the crystal, including Chen Ying facing White Tiger warlock Zhou Yuntao and Chen Ye facing White Plain.

Chen Ye faced White Plain in the White Plain trial space and cautiously tried to account for her demon abilities, but attacked when she appeared unwilling to fight. His powerful flames destroyed the surrounding buildings, leaving Chen Baifeng and Chen Qing worried that White Plain was far more dangerous than she seemed.

• Chen Ye activated his dragon bloodline and spread flames around himself to detect any approaching enemy.
• A spatial gate appeared, and Chen Ye suspected White Plain had found the key and might be luring him into a trap.
• Chen Ye cautiously approached the gate and found White Plain, who said she had hoped to avoid a fight.
• Chen Ye unleashed a vast innate flame spell that reduced the nearby steelstone buildings to ashes.
• Chen Baifeng and Chen Qing recognized White Plain's perceptiveness and feared Chen Ye had underestimated her.

White Plain revealed her deadly instincts during her fight with Chen Ye, whose attacks could not keep up with her speed. The observers recognized her extraordinary talent and danger, and Ziyue disclosed that she had met and fought White Plain before.

• Zhang Zhiyun watched White Plain face Chen Ye and learned from Murong Ziyi that White Plain was formidable.
• Chen Ye realized his attacks could not hit White Plain and grew frustrated as their fight approached the time limit.
• White Plain explained that she had survived by killing prey quickly since she began hunting alone, and Kagura revealed she was the youngest native core member of the Divine Martial Guild.
• White Plain asked Chen Ye if he truly did not need her to show mercy, and her killing intent left him unable to respond.
• Murong Ziyi said she had avoided a fight with White Plain because it was not worth the risk, and Ziyue revealed that she had met and fought White Plain.

Ziyue recalled a dangerous encounter with a sealed Transcendent from her travels with Liu Yu and A Li, while White Plain defeated Chen Ye and helped him recover his resolve. The chapter ended with Murong Ziyi and Zhang Zhiyun discovering that the other duels had produced unexpected results.

• Ziyue told Zhang Zhiyun that she had fought the woman about seventy years earlier, when she, Liu Yu, and A Li explored places where Transcendents were sealed.
• Ziyue recalled that one sealed woman attacked despite their attempt to leave, and that their single exchange had brought her closer to death than ever before.
• Chen Ye yielded to White Plain after her aura overwhelmed him, and she withdrew her pressure and thanked him for yielding.
• White Plain told Chen Ye that he was young and still alive, restoring his resolve; he bowed and thanked her for sparing his life.
• Zhang Xiaoyun expressed interest in fighting White Plain, while Murong Ziyi and Zhang Zhiyun turned their attention to Chen Ying and Zhou Yuntao's still-unresolved duel.
• Murong Ziyi and Zhang Zhiyun saw that most of the other groups had already chosen winners, but the results were unexpected.

Su Changqing and the other contestants gathered on the second level as the South Sea suffered heavy losses, and Chen Yun provoked the Jiangnan disciples after Chen Ye lost to Bai Su. The final spatial door began to tremble, leaving the contestants waiting to learn whether Chen Ying had survived her battle.

• Su Changqing was surprised to find Chen Yun among the survivors and noted that Yun Ke'er had also advanced.
• Su Changqing observed that five of the ten contestants advancing to the next level came from Jiangnan, while Chen Ye had yet to emerge.
• Bai Su came out of the southeast door, confirming that she had defeated Chen Ye and worrying Su Changqing and Chen Yun.
• Yun Ke'er pointed out that only the northern door remained, and Chen Yun insulted Chen Ying and the Jiangnan disciples.
• Shen Yuan challenged Chen Yun to face him alone, promising that the Jiangnan disciples would not attack if Chen Yun won.
• The final spatial door trembled, signaling that Chen Ying's battle was ending.

Chen Ying trapped Zhou Yuntao in a Mirror Image Formation, but the White Tiger Sorcerer used the wind to locate her and began attacking. The chapter ended as Chen Ying realized his mastery of wind could expose her position inside the folding formation.

• Cloud Capital sorcerer families heavily favored Zhou Yuntao over Chen Ying in the betting pools because he had defeated a descendant of the Five Color Families.
• Zhou Yuntao spent half an hour trapped in Chen Ying's Mirror Image Formation and praised her skill with formations.
• Zhou Yuntao unleashed his full speed, creating afterimages and astonishing the watching sorcerer families.
• Zhou Yuntao used the wind to pinpoint Chen Ying, then found himself unable to cross the final distance through her folding formation.
• Chen Ying realized that Zhou Yuntao could use the wind to find her because he could hear her voice.