Chapter Summaries

Chen Qing used the white mist’s power to restore Chen Ying after Shen Yiyun’s Ghost King’s Arm killed her, then explained the living corpses and the formation trapping them. The chapter left Shen Yiyun asking whether his brother Shen Laojiu could be saved, and Chen Qing confirming that he could.

• Shen Yiyun’s Ghost King’s Arm crushed Chen Ying, but Chen Qing restored her unharmed through the white mist’s strange power.
• Chen Ying flew to Chen Qing’s boat, and Shen Yiyun conceded defeat after questioning Chen Qing about what had happened.
• Chen Qing explained that the formation trapped living corpses and people together because it needed outside forces to reduce the corpses’ numbers and prevent them from evolving.
• Shen Yiyun realized the living corpses could infect people, that Jiangnan was affected, and that Shen Laojiu had been contaminated.
• Shen Yiyun asked whether Shen Laojiu could be saved, and Chen Qing said he could.

Wei Gongcheng and the soldiers defended Liuzhou City against thousands of living corpses, aided by the gate god’s powers. After the gate god shattered the corpses’ human wall, Chen Qing appeared on the battlements, while the Shen Family group saw another Chen Qing outside the city.

• Wei Gongcheng rallied the city’s defenders as thousands of red-eyed living corpses gathered outside the gate at dusk.
• Maozi and the other guards used Windwalking Archery to kill more than a thousand charging corpses, but the creatures piled themselves into a human wall beneath the battlements.
• Boiling dung and rocks failed to stop the corpses from climbing, so Wei Gongcheng feared the defenders would be overwhelmed.
• The gate god manifested a white wolf and unleashed wind spikes from the gate, destroying the human wall and making the corpses retreat.
• Three black, vapor-shrouded figures approached after the living corpses scattered, and Wei Gongcheng worried they led the horde.
• Chen Qing appeared beside Wei Gongcheng on the wall, while Murong Yunji and Shen Lao'er saw another Chen Qing with the Shen Family group outside the gate.

Chen Qing used his door god’s power to defend Liuzhou City against a strengthened horde of living corpses. The corpses retreated toward the docks, leaving Chen Qing to face the danger they could pose to the towns downstream.

• Chen Qing explained that his External Incarnation could command invested gods and serve as an anchor for his rebirth.
• The three living corpse leaders howled, driving the horde into a faster, more agile charge up the city walls.
• Chen Qing made the gate sprout metal wolf heads that bit apart the climbing corpses, though the effort drained his incarnation.
• The higher-level living corpses ordered the surviving horde to retreat toward the docks.
• Chen Ying asked whether the defenders should pursue, while Shen Er warned that the corpses could infect towns downstream.

Chen Qing explained that the living corpses were part of a failing formation that contained powerful insects, while attacks spread across Jiangnan. As Shen Yiyun realized someone might control the insects, Shen Laojiu vanished from his restraints.

• Chen Qing told Chen Ying and Shen Er that killing the escaped living corpses would cause the formation to release more, and Shen Er deduced that it was testing each prefecture’s resistance.
• Chen Qing explained that living corpses would grow stronger over time, while attacks at docks across Jiangnan overwhelmed soldiers and carried corpse poison into cities.
• At Liuzhou’s prefectural office, Chen Qing told Wei Gongcheng, Shen Yiyun, and Murong Yunji that a breach had let a monster escape and that the living corpses came from the seventeen kingdoms of the West Sea.
• Chen Qing described how the formation divided a terrifying venomous insect into many insects that used living corpses as hosts, and how the formation made them fight to keep them suppressed.
• Shen Yiyun asked what would happen if someone controlled the insects, then noticed Shen Laojiu had disappeared from Murong Yunji’s wind lock.

Chen Qing realized Shen Laojiu’s Gu Insect Art inheritance might make him a target in a larger plan, while Yuchi Feihong secretly served a mysterious beauty beneath the mist. After gathering Liuzhou’s residents, Chen Qing urged them to rescue their families outside the city, intending to use the crisis to rally the people and expand his protection.

• Murong Yunji found no sign of Shen Laojiu, and Chen Qing ordered Zhou Haitao to patrol Liuzhou and gather its residents.
• Shen Yiyun revealed that Shen Laojiu had inherited the Shen Family’s Gu Insect Art, leading Chen Qing to fear the ancient insect could use him as a host.
• Chen Qing suspected Yuchi Feihong had deliberately bitten Shen Laojiu, while Yuchi met a mysterious beauty underwater and promised to bring her the insect sorcerer.
• Zhou Haitao reported that all 2,753 residents had been gathered, and Chen Qing reassured them that Liuzhou was protected from the living corpses.
• Chen Qing reminded the crowd that their families remained outside the city and persuaded them to leave Liuzhou to rescue them.

In Nanming Prefecture, Zhou Hanyang struggled to contain the living corpses and rejected Mu Hongqing’s plan to evacuate the surrounding counties, until news of infected wounded soldiers suggested the corpse poison was spreading inside the city. In Liuzhou, Chen Qing organized recruits for rescue missions while preparing the city’s defenses and hoping Nanyang could survive the outbreak.

• Zhou Hanyang ordered grain merchants who raised prices arrested and described how successive waves of living corpses had overwhelmed his exhausted troops.
• Mu Hongqing urged Zhou Hanyang to evacuate the surrounding counties by day, but Zhou refused because he feared the refugees would worsen the food shortage and admitted he planned to leave the countryside to its fate.
• A bailiff reported that wounded soldiers had gone mad and bitten people, and Mu Hongqing suspected the living corpses’ poison could infect others as he hurried after Zhou Hanyang.
• In Liuzhou, Chen Qing assigned 1,539 recruits to rescue people but ordered them to serve outside their own hometowns, and sent five hundred to guard the south gate.
• Chen Qing planned to use the rescue effort to bring in able-bodied people and strengthen the door gods’ forces, while Shen Lao’er worried that Nanyang might be in worse danger than Liuzhou.

After Nanyang City’s defenders repelled a massive attack by living corpses, the Shen Family discovered that multiplying worms controlled and infected the dead, while Chen Qing prepared to leave Liuzhou with Chen Ying. The chapter left the Shen brothers scrambling to save the river’s densely populated counties and Chen Ying wondering why Chen Qing’s mirror looked familiar.

• Hong Rui watched the living corpses retreat from Nanyang City, and Shen Yimiao joined the other Shen Family heads by the river.
• Shen Yixin showed Shen Laosan and the others worms taken from the corpses and explained that they could multiply, infect people, and transform them into demons.
• Shen Laosan ordered his brothers to split up and save as many people as possible, while insisting that the outbreak must not be linked to their father.
• Chen Qing refused Chen Ying’s offer to help, explained that he was taking her out of the city to protect her from Shen Laojiu, and greeted the newly awakened Ghost Child.
• Chen Qing placed his mirror on the desk before Wei Gongcheng brought in the people selected for the expedition, and Chen Ying thought the mirror looked familiar.

Chen Qing used the Mirror Demon to assess 1,539 recruits and assign them to the Door God and Mountain God systems or a rescue expedition. As he prepared Liuzhou and neighboring counties for the living corpses, Spirit Deer County's magistrate Gu Beiquan dismissed his warning.

• Chen Qing used the Mirror Demon's updated data to evaluate recruits' fortunes and aptitudes, revealing how it could identify talent for the Divine Path system.
• Over six hours, Chen Qing assessed all 1,539 recruits and found most suited to the Door God system, while others fit roles in the Mountain God system.
• Chen Qing gave Wei Gongcheng the marked roster and ordered him to assign recruits to the city gates, South Mountain, and the rescue expedition.
• Chen Qing sent warnings about the living corpses to nearby counties, including Whitewater County and Spirit Deer County.
• Gu Beiquan mocked Chen Qing's warning in public, and Spirit Deer County's officials dismissed the danger approaching them.

Officials in Spirit Deer County mocked Chen Qing’s warning about living corpses until the creatures crawled ashore beside their riverside banquet. The chapter ended with the revelers seeing the undead crowd staring up at the restaurant.

• Gu Beiquan read Chen Qing’s warning aloud at a banquet, and Liu Yiqi and the other officials ridiculed him.
• The guests complained that Chen Qing’s policies had drawn laborers and teachers away from Spirit Deer County, while the teachers remained wary of his warning about the dead.
• When the teachers tried to leave, Liu Yiqi challenged their excuse, and one teacher rebuked him before leading them out.
• A cold gust swept through the restaurant as darkness fell, and Liu Yiqi joked that he wanted to see the living corpses Chen Qing had described.
• Gu Beiquan warned Liu Yiqi to stop talking, and Liu saw a crowd of rotting corpses crawl ashore and stare at the restaurant.

An outbreak of living corpses devastated Spirit Deer County as officials fled and residents sought shelter. The old tutor reached the academy with his grandson, but a monster and dozens more corpses surrounded the tutors and children, leaving them trapped.

• The old tutor told his family to hide in the cellar and rushed to the academy to rescue his grandson, meeting Master Yang on the way.
• Living corpses slaughtered people on West Street and North Street while Liu Yiqi led fleeing officials away after sacrificing two women to distract the monsters.
• The old tutor and Master Yang found their grandsons at the academy, but learned living corpses had spread to South Street and blocked their escape.
• A pale woman with scarlet eyes appeared in the academy courtyard, and the children screamed, drawing dozens of corpses to the courtyard wall.

Chen Qing led soldiers through the devastated Spirit Deer County, where he found Xu Hu guarding a well while transformed into a living corpse. After suppressing the insects inside Xu Hu with Spirit liquid, Chen Qing discovered the county magistrate and several other officials hiding in the well.

• Master Yang remembered Chen Qing’s lookalike, who warned him that Chen Qing was an anomaly and urged him to remember who he was before vanishing.
• Chen Qing ordered his soldiers to search Spirit Deer County in groups while reassuring them that their families were being prioritized for rescue.
• Chen Qing and Chen Ying found Xu Hu, who had killed dozens of living corpses while protecting people hidden in a well.
• Chen Qing used his mirror to identify Xu Hu as a mortal with exceptional potential, then gave him Spirit liquid to suppress the insects inside him.
• Xu Hu regained some awareness and asked Chen Qing to save those in the well, where Chen Qing found Liu Yiqi and seven or eight other officials.

Chen Qing rescued the officials and civilians trapped in a well, then took the officials’ seals after condemning their failure to protect Spirit Deer County. The seals transferred their power of divine investiture to him, giving him a possible path to carve out a domain in Jiangnan.

• Chen Qing ordered the woman and her child pulled from the well before Gu Beiquan, then gave her his outer robe and promised to save her injured husband.
• Chen Qing directed Chen Ying to prepare food and water, then ordered the remaining people rescued from the well.
• Chen Qing confronted the seven officials over ignoring his warnings and drinking while Spirit Deer County suffered, and they admitted their guilt.
• Gu Beiquan argued that only the court could try them, but Chen Qing confiscated their official seals after declaring them unfit to administer the county.
• Chen Qing sensed that taking the seals had stripped the officials of their official fortunes and transferred their divine investiture power to him.

Chen Qing considered pursuing separatist rule as Jiangnan faced disaster, then rescued survivors and reunited with his former teacher, Master Yang. After learning that Chen Yuan and his eldest brother had gone to Chen Household Village, he ordered his men to head for the northern slope.

• Chen Qing weighed the risks of separatist rule, believing that saving Jiangnan's people from the venomous insects could win him the faith needed to establish an independent domain.
• Chen Ying reported that the soldiers had rescued a little over six hundred survivors, and Chen Qing ordered everyone examined for bites or scratches before they left.
• Chen Qing recognized Master Yang among the survivors and thanked him for helping him through hardship when he was young.
• Master Yang told Chen Qing that Chen Yuan and his eldest brother had traveled ahead to Chen Household Village to pay respects to their ancestors.
• Chen Qing urgently ordered everyone to assemble and head for the northern slope.

Chen Ye defended his sister Chen Yuan from the Pan Household’s attempt to force her into marriage, but Chen clansmen struck him down as Chen Qing arrived at the stronghold. The Pan clan chief feared Chen Qing’s retaliation, while the attacker proposed completing the forced marriage anyway.

• Chen Ye refused to let the Pan Household take Chen Yuan as a bride, despite the villagers’ pressure and the monsters trapping everyone in the mountain stronghold.
• Chen clansmen seized Chen Ye, and one of them smashed a stone into his head as Chen Yuan cried out.
• At the foot of the mountain, Chen Qing heard what he thought was Chen Yuan’s voice and led his soldiers toward the Pan Household Stronghold to rescue the survivors.
• Chen Qing reached the guarded entrance and identified himself as Liuzhou’s prefect, but the guards whispered that their clan chief had given them instructions not to reveal anything.
• Chen Yuan wept over the dying Chen Ye as the Pan clan chief blamed the Chen clansmen for causing a feud; the attacker then urged them to finish forcing the marriage.

Chen Qing reached the stronghold and discovered that the Pan Household and some Chen clansmen were hiding the truth about his family. After learning that Chen Ye had been killed and finding Chen Yuan alive beside his body, Chen Qing broke down as a terrifying power began to stir within him.

• A Chen Household woman tried to stall Chen Qing, but he pushed past her and confronted Pan Qinghe and the gathered clansmen.
• When Pan Qinghe lied about seeing Chen Qing’s siblings, Chen Qing used his magic to twist his legs and then crushed his body.
• Chen Qing seized five fleeing men, including Zhaohui and Zhaohai, and killed them when they refused to answer his questions.
• The women confessed that Zhaohui and Zhaohai had bludgeoned Chen Ye to death and that the Pan Household had forced Chen Yuan into marriage.
• Chen Qing rushed to the cellar, where Chen Yuan embraced him beside the lifeless Chen Ye.
• As Chen Qing stared at Chen Ye’s body, a terrifying power began to emerge, alarming Chen Yuan, Chen Ying, and the Mirror Demon.

Chen Qing rushed his gravely wounded elder brother back to Liuzhou and sought to keep him alive, while preparing to offer Wei Gongcheng a new path of advancement. The chapter ended with Chen Qing asking whether Wei Gongcheng would become the god of a domain.

• Chen Qing learned that Chen Ye was still barely breathing and ordered Chen Ying to take them back to Liuzhou.
• Chen Qing ordered Gu Bei to continue the rescue operation and escort every Chen and Pan clan member back to Liuzhou, killing anyone who tried to flee.
• Chen Ying warned that Chen Ye could survive only about half an hour, even with the golden needle life-extension technique, and Chen Qing told her to buy as much time as possible.
• Wei Gongcheng observed how the door god's blessing had transformed the new recruits and wondered whether it could help him overcome his limited potential.
• Chen Qing told Wei Gongcheng that he could heal his legs and offer him a new path of advancement, then asked whether he would become the god of a domain.

Chen Qing persuaded Wei Gongcheng to become Liuzhou’s City God, offering him the chance to govern human reincarnation despite the severe risks and short lifespan if he failed to advance. Wei Gongcheng accepted, and his investiture caused Liuzhou’s section of the Yin-Yang Road to vanish as ancient beings reacted to the underworld’s return.

• Wei Gongcheng questioned Chen Qing about the demonic nature of the gods and learned that Chen planned to appoint him City God of Liuzhou.
• Chen Qing explained the benefits and costs of the divine office, including a five-year limit to gain enough worship and advance to yellow grade.
• Wei Gongcheng accepted the appointment, reasoning that the gamble was better than remaining helpless in his wheelchair.
• Chen Qing proclaimed Wei Gongcheng City God of Liuzhou, charged with governing reincarnation and judging souls.
• The investiture triggered a violent response on the Yin-Yang Road, and Liuzhou’s section shattered and disappeared.
• A withered old man and immense beings in the sky recognized that the underworld had come alive and declared they would kill it again.

Chen Qing introduced Wei Gongcheng to the newly established underworld administration and explained how its karmic power, faith, and evil Spirits worked. Wei Gongcheng learned that the administration was still rudimentary and would need to grow through faith and the purification or reform of evil Spirits.

• Wei Gongcheng saw the cramped underworld administration and questioned Chen Qing about how far it fell short of the plans.
• Chen Qing showed Wei Gongcheng how to control karmic power to build the administration, but Wei Gongcheng quickly became exhausted and realized there was too little power for everything.
• Chen Qing explained that faith from the living and the dead could provide resources, with dream visitations helping the living believe in the underworld administration.
• Chen Qing revealed that captured evil Spirits could yield corrupted karmic power, which had to be purified through the virtue of good Spirits or by reforming the evil Spirits.
• Wei Gongcheng saw the Chen Household members hiding among the evil Spirits, and Chen Qing resolved not to let them escape punishment for harming his eldest brother.

Chen Qing’s eldest brother, Chen Ye, became Liuzhou’s Day Wandering God and began gathering the souls of people killed by living corpses. Shen Lao’er realized that Chen Qing’s Underworld had changed what happened to the dead and wondered how the young prefect had done it.

• Chen Qing explained that Chen Ye had received the Day Wandering God appointment, giving him divine authority to collect souls for the Underworld.
• Chen Ye found a dead mother and daughter in Ma Erniang’s shop and gently explained what awaited them in the Underworld.
• Chen Qing watched Chen Ye comfort the souls and decided he would need to teach his brother to be more efficient at collecting them.
• Shen Lao’er connected the lingering souls and the Underworld to Chen Qing’s work and wondered how he had altered the laws of the Yin-Yang Road.

Chen Qing dealt with the underworld administration’s shortage of spirit dwellings by designing temporary capsule-like rooms, while Wei Gongcheng pressed him to appoint Xu Hu as martial judge. Zhou Haitao then reported the needs of the newly rescued refugees, and Chen Qing learned that the Door God also wanted Xu Hu.

• Wei Gongcheng told Chen Qing that more than thirty thousand departed souls had entered Liuzhou and the underworld administration lacked karmic power, spirit dwellings, and staff.
• Chen Qing designed temporary spirit dwellings and advised Wei Gongcheng to house the souls there while judging them for better accommodations and dream visits.
• Wei Gongcheng asked Chen Qing to appoint Xu Hu as martial judge, but Chen Qing said he would consider it and answer that night.
• Zhou Haitao reported that 23,461 survivors needed work, along with accounting clerks, criminal clerks, and bailiffs.
• Chen Qing planned to use the lull in living corpse attacks to prepare Liuzhou’s defenses, reclaim surrounding settlements, and expand the city.
• Zhou Haitao told Chen Qing that the Door God had asked him to give Xu Hu to it, revealing another claimant for the warrior.