Chapter Summaries

Ye Jiang and Rong Yin accepted the townspeople’s request to collect medicine and forced the Guard to provide ten days’ worth for everyone in town. After they left, Hao Ping turned a wooden chair into a stick figure armed with gun-shaped limbs.

• Ye Jiang offered to collect medicine for the townspeople in exchange for payment, and Rong Yin revealed that he was an A-rank ability user too.
• Ye Jiang and Rong Yin broke into the Guard’s base and quickly subdued the uniformed members there.
• The Guard captain and Hao Ping arrived, but Rong Yin restrained them while Ye Jiang demanded medicine for the whole town.
• Ye Jiang secured ten days’ worth of medicine for everyone, and she and Rong Yin left carrying cases of it.
• After the outsiders departed, Hao Ping transformed a wooden chair into a stick figure with gun-shaped arms.

Zou Dongrong and Hao Ping planned to retaliate against the outsiders after the Weird Snow crisis, while townspeople sheltered by Grandpa Mu prepared to risk the snow to obtain medicine. A mysterious visitor appeared at their door and asked whether they needed medicine to treat corruption.

• Zou Dongrong stopped time to catch rubble thrown by Hao Ping, then warned a new Guard member to remain loyal after he witnessed the outsiders overpower the Guard leaders.
• Zou Dongrong told Hao Ping to wait until the Weird Snow crisis ended before carrying out a plan involving the young A-rank visitor from the Ability Control Bureau.
• A young townsman tried to leave to collect medicine for Grandpa Mu, whose eyes showed that corruption was taking hold.
• Several townspeople volunteered to go out for medicine after the young man said the snow would eventually kill them all.
• A pale-faced visitor appeared at the door and asked whether the townspeople needed medicine to treat corruption, prompting someone to open the door.

Ye Jiang sold medicine to the residents of Shuiling Town and learned why the town had no children: modified humans passed their defects on to their children. She returned to Hua Ling’s courtyard with Rong Yin, gave him a willow leaf from the tree at Mei Ti’s home, and admired the snowman he had altered.

• Ye Jiang sold each Shuiling Town resident ten pills of medicine for a ten-yuan collection fee, then traded medicine with Hua Ling and her companions at the agreed mission price.
• Hua Ling explained that Mei Ti was the town’s only child, born with black markings fifteen years earlier, after which the residents stopped having children because defects were inherited.
• Ye Jiang questioned Hua Ling about Mei Ti and learned that the townspeople had searched for her but believed she might have gone outside town.
• After the residents gathered indoors to avoid the Weird Snow, Ye Jiang and Rong Yin left and walked past Mei Ti’s home, where Ye Jiang collected another energy willow leaf and gave it to Rong Yin.
• Ye Jiang praised Rong Yin for changing her two snowmen into one snowman and one ball, then crouched to admire his work.

The Weird Snow began dropping into Shuiling Town’s houses and swallowing townspeople, driving the residents to search for those who vanished. As Ming Xia joined the search, Ye Jiang reversed the Guard’s transformation of a cat person, leaving her about to say more.

• The Weird Snow broke through a roof and swallowed two townspeople, then began bouncing across Shuiling Town and taking people from inside their homes.
• A woman rushed into the snow to search for her friend, inspiring other townspeople to venture out and look for the missing residents.
• Ming Xia left the Guard’s quarters to help search, while Zou Dongrong and Hao Ping reacted angrily to the townspeople going outside.
• Ye Jiang learned from Rong Yin that townspeople had disappeared and saw residents searching throughout the streets.
• Ye Jiang offered to restore the cat person’s human form and used her ability to reverse Hao Ping’s Transformation Technique.

Ye Jiang searched Shuiling Town for Mei Ti and the missing residents before visiting the gravekeeper, a bitter old man who had once begged the townspeople to resist the Guard. He refused to help Hua Ling and the others, leaving the search for the missing residents without a lead.

• Li Feng restored her human appearance, then struck Dong Song with a dust blast before forgiving him and urging him to continue searching for missing residents.
• Ye Jiang searched the town for Mei Ti and the missing residents but found no one, then returned to Hua Ling’s building and learned about a gravekeeper with tracking abilities.
• Ye Jiang went to the gravekeeper’s cabin and saw the graves of polluted people in his courtyard as Hua Ling and the townspeople arrived to ask for his help.
• The gravekeeper recalled how the townspeople had refused to help him oppose the Guard and accused them of only acting now because the Weird Snow frightened them less.
• The gravekeeper refused to help and said he hoped the snow would swallow more people, leaving Hua Ling and the others with no answer.

Ye Jiang persuaded the gravekeeper to search for the missing townspeople, who were revealed inside invisible snowballs in the pharmaceutical factory warehouse. As the townspeople celebrated their rescue, an A-rank polluted one appeared and attacked them.

• Ye Jiang healed the gravekeeper’s finger and revived flowers on a grave, prompting him to use his search ability.
• The gravekeeper located the missing townspeople in the pharmaceutical factory warehouse, and Ye Jiang passed the news to Hua Ling.
• Hua Ling gathered the townspeople at the warehouse, where Ye Jiang saw the unconscious people sealed in transparent snowballs.
• The snowballs became visible, and the townspeople began waking as the crowd celebrated their survival.
• An eight-tentacled A-rank polluted one appeared on the factory roof, and Hua Ling warned everyone to scatter as it attacked.

Ye Jiang left her playful confrontation with the eight-armed contaminant to search for her mission target, while the townspeople fought the A-rank contaminant without the Guard. Ming Xia joined the battle and brought her gravity-enhanced longsword down toward its head.

• Ye Jiang blocked the contaminant’s first tentacle strike, tested its soft skin, and evaded its relentless attacks before spotting a figure in her mission target’s courtyard and rushing there.
• Ye Jiang found the courtyard empty and searched the small building while the contaminant turned its malice toward the townspeople.
• A dozen unusually silent and determined townspeople attacked the contaminant, and Hua Ling urged the others to stop standing aside and join the fight.
• The townspeople rallied together and coordinated their abilities against the contaminant, while Ming Xia arrived from her fight with Weird Snow.
• Ming Xia used gravity manipulation to rise above the contaminant and swung her broad-bladed longsword toward its head.

Ming Xia and the townspeople killed the snow-contaminant, revealing that it had caused the weeklong snowfall. Ye Jiang then captured Little Pink, who claimed it had been badly injured, though she could see no sign of wounds.

• Ming Xia was struck by the contaminant, and the townspeople overwhelmed it with their abilities until it exploded into snow and the town’s snow melted.
• The townspeople celebrated killing the contaminant while Ming Xia left without revealing her injuries.
• Ye Jiang returned to the factory and found the townspeople mourning the contaminant she had hoped to use as a masseur.
• Little Pink realized Ye Jiang could see it hiding in an alternate space, but she reached in and grabbed it by a tentacle.
• Ye Jiang shook Little Pink until it stopped cursing, and it claimed the townspeople had injured it, though Ye Jiang saw no wounds.

Ye Jiang reunited with Hua Ling after secretly capturing the supposedly defeated polluter, while Shuiling Town celebrated defeating an A-rank threat without knowing the creature was alive in her pocket. The Guard’s arrival dampened the townspeople’s victory, and they warned Ye Jiang to stay away from the Guard as the chapter ended.

• Ye Jiang pocketed the speaking polluter, and Hua Ling found her alive and reported that the townspeople had killed the A-rank polluter.
• The townspeople crowded around Ye Jiang in relief, while a dozen withdrawn residents watched and then left in silence.
• Zou Dongrong and Hao Ping arrived with the Guard, credited Ye Jiang for the victory, and invited her to visit the Guard.
• The polluter secretly watched the townspeople and the departing Guard until Ye Jiang pushed it back into her pocket.
• After the Guard left, the townspeople lost their celebratory mood and repeatedly warned Ye Jiang not to visit the Guard.

Ye Jiang returned to Shuiling Town after the polluter died and investigated new pollution at Mei Ti's house. There, she found a pink, eight-legged creature that claimed to be a human transformed by an ability.

• Ye Jiang returned to town, where the Weird Snow had melted and the townspeople had resumed their routines.
• Ye Jiang hid Little Pink from Rong Yin, who seemed suspicious of the polluter in her pocket.
• Ye Jiang and the polluter fought in her room until they sensed new pollution coming from Mei Ti's house.
• Ye Jiang distracted Hua Ling with an excuse while the polluter concealed itself, then left to investigate Mei Ti's house.
• Ye Jiang found a pink, eight-legged creature in Mei Ti's bedroom, and it insisted that it was human and had been transformed by an ability.

Ye Jiang caught Hao Ping’s ambush, asked him to transform her arms into pink tentacles, then punished him for attacking her. Back at Hua Ling’s house, she tested her new tentacles and traded an energy willow leaf for apples with the young man next door.

• Ye Jiang recognized Hao Ping as the Guard member who transformed people and asked him to turn her arms into pink, retractable tentacles.
• After transforming her arms, Hao Ping tried to leave, but Ye Jiang dragged him into the courtyard wall and demanded to know why he had ambushed her.
• Hao Ping fled after wiping his bloody spit from the wall, while Ye Jiang kept the strange sheet he had sent toward her neck.
• Ye Jiang returned to Hua Ling’s house, found Little Pink gone, and practiced using her new tentacles around her room.
• When the young man next door offered her apples, Ye Jiang used a tentacle to take the bag and offered him an energy willow leaf in return.

Ye Jiang learned that the Guard’s “hunt” was not a trip into the wilderness but a forced selection of townspeople to hunt corrupted expected to appear in Shuiling Town. As Zou Dongrong prepared to announce the hunting party, Ye Jiang watched from outside the crowd, connecting the previous hunt to her missing mission target.

• Ye Jiang noticed the Guard patrolling Shuiling Town, then overheard townspeople angrily discussing how soon another hunt had come after the last one.
• Ye Jiang followed a townsman home and learned that the Guard’s patrols signaled an imminent hunt, but he refused to explain its details.
• Ye Jiang suspected her mission target had disappeared during the hunt held ten days earlier and tried to ask about the previous hunting party and its location.
• Ye Jiang could not find Hua Ling, who had vanished, and waited at home until the Guard summoned every townsperson to an assembly.
• Zou Dongrong announced that the hunt would begin and claimed a prophet had foreseen corrupted approaching Shuiling Town.
• Ye Jiang watched from outside the crowd as Zou Dongrong prepared to announce the selected hunting party, realizing the townspeople would be made to hunt corrupted in town.

Ming Xia confronted the Guard after discovering that Shuiling Town’s hunts targeted people for entertainment, while Ye Jiang had been framed as a corrupted one. Zou Dongrong admitted the truth and blamed Ye Jiang for disrupting his plan, as Little Pink watched unseen above him.

• Ming Xia demanded to know what the Guard had been hunting, and the townspeople’s shame made her realize they knew the truth.
• Zou Dongrong learned that Ye Jiang and Ming Xia knew each other and that Ye Jiang had not transformed, then moved onto a raised platform to face them.
• Zou Dongrong admitted that the Guard hunted humans for entertainment and explained how they created mutants and contamination to stage the hunts.
• Ye Jiang watched Little Pink appear unseen above Zou Dongrong, while he accused her of failing to follow local customs by not becoming the hunt’s target.
• Zou Dongrong revealed that the hunt had originally been planned for the townspeople, but he had added Ye Jiang because she displeased him.

Hua Ling revealed that the Willow Mother Tree had been a human mother hunted down by townspeople, while Zou Dongrong used willow leaves to become an S-rank ability user. Before he could attack, an unseen force killed him, and Hua Ling urged the townspeople to attack Hao Ping as he fled.

• Hua Ling told Ye Jiang that the Willow Mother Tree had been a mother who disguised herself as a contaminated creature to protect her baby and was hunted down by the townspeople.
• Hua Ling fired a flare and called the townspeople to action, while Zou Dongrong crushed energy-infused willow leaves and rose from A-rank to S-rank.
• Zou Dongrong shattered Ming Xia's saber and challenged the townspeople, who hesitated before Hua Ling ordered them to attack.
• An unseen force severed Zou Dongrong's head, and Hua Ling urged the townspeople to kill Hao Ping.
• Hao Ping panicked at Zou Dongrong's death and fled rather than fight the townspeople.

Hao Ping fought Shuiling Town’s townspeople and Hua Ling, then battled Ming Xia after she ambushed him. As the townspeople gained ground, Ye Jiang healed the gravely wounded Hua Ling.

• Hao Ping attacked the townspeople with a stone giant, while Ye Jiang chose not to join their fight.
• Ye Jiang accidentally kicked the Guard captain’s headless corpse off the platform and repeatedly tugged at the airborne polluter’s tentacles.
• A blast collapsed part of the town wall, and Hua Ling emerged to fight Hao Ping with air bombs.
• Hao Ping wounded Hua Ling, but Ming Xia struck him from behind with her gravity-enhanced saber, and they became locked in combat.
• Hua Ling lay gravely injured among the rubble as the townspeople held their own against the Guard.
• Ye Jiang reached Hua Ling and began healing her, while Hua Ling protested that she was not worth the effort.

Ye Jiang learned that Mei Ti had been hunted and killed by Hua Ling and the other townspeople after she secretly made medicine for them. Hua Ling ended the quest, told Ye Jiang where to collect the medicine, and urged her to leave Shuiling Town.

• Ye Jiang revealed that she had known Hua Ling was Townsperson A and asked what had happened to Mei Ti.
• Hua Ling confessed that she and the hunting party had hunted Mei Ti, whom they had mistaken for a contaminated being.
• Hua Ling recounted how the Guard had let the supposed contaminated being settle in the factory before ordering the hunt, and how the party found medicine boxes bearing townspeople’s names after killing it.
• Hua Ling explained that Mei Ti had secretly been making medicine and that Shuiling Town had long hunted its own people while townspeople pretended not to know.
• Hua Ling refused Ye Jiang’s healing, declared the quest complete, and directed Ye Jiang to the hundred boxes of medicine in her storage room before telling her to leave town.

After the townspeople overthrew the Guard, Hua Ling explained why they rebuilt Shuiling Town’s walls instead of celebrating: they believed oppression awaited modified humans outside the town as well. Ye Jiang learned that the walls were both a cage and their refuge, leaving her and Ming Xia silent as Hua Ling described the townspeople’s rejection beyond them.

• Ye Jiang asked Hua Ling why Shuiling Town’s residents offered medicine as a mission reward, and Hua Ling admitted they hoped outsiders would notice their suffering and save them.
• The stone giant struck down the town’s wall during the battle, and the townspeople defeated the Guard, but then silently began rebuilding the wall.
• Hua Ling told Ye Jiang that the Guard was the second regime the townspeople had overthrown, and that they expected new oppression to arise as long as they remained isolated.
• Ming Xia told Ye Jiang that the government had created Shuiling Town as a relief effort and did not prevent its residents from leaving.
• Hua Ling recounted how Yuan De returned after people outside recoiled from him despite his saving them, explaining that the walls had originally protected modified humans from discrimination.
• Hua Ling told Ye Jiang and Ming Xia that outsiders feared and rejected modified humans, making Shuiling Town their only refuge.

After the Moon Tree erased the black markings from Shuiling Town’s residents, it departed, leaving the town joyful and changed. Ming Xia prepared to return to the Ability Control Bureau with the surviving Guards, while the young man watched Ye Jiang but said nothing.

• The Moon Tree’s crescents went dark one by one, and the tree shattered as the darkness lifted.
• The townspeople stopped repairing the wall and celebrated the change the Moon Tree had brought them.
• The young man appeared beside Ye Jiang and watched her intently, but did not speak.
• Ming Xia left to take the surviving Guards back to the Ability Control Bureau and report the truth about Shuiling Town.
• Ming Xia visited Ye Jiang at Hua Ling’s house to say goodbye and calmly told her about her plans.

Ming Xia left to train in City M, while Ye Jiang stayed in Shuiling Town for a month before deciding to leave. At the town’s broken wall, Ye Jiang learned from the pink corrupted creature that Mei Ti had become a corrupted creature and mutated more than two months earlier.

• Ming Xia told Ye Jiang she was going to City M for training and promised to give Xiao Pei Ye Jiang’s energy willow leaf; someone secretly replaced the leaf in Ming Xia’s pocket with an A-rank item.
• A month later, Ye Jiang learned that Rong Yin had left town after giving her a box containing twenty-six moons from the Moon Tree.
• Ye Jiang told Hua Ling she was leaving, and Hua Ling found a route map carved into her courtyard flagstones linking Shuiling Town to City A.
• Ye Jiang visited the Willow Mother Tree, received a falling leaf, and then sat beside the pink corrupted creature on the town wall.
• The corrupted creature denied being Mei Ti but admitted it had known her, then revealed that Mei Ti had become a corrupted creature long ago and mutated more than two months earlier.

Ye Jiang learned how the monster had shared Mei Ti’s body and helped fulfill the girl’s wish before giving the monster the name Shi Li. As Shi Li accepted the name, a Blood Moon formed on her tentacle and a new light appeared in Ye Jiang’s Domination storage, linking them.

• The monster recalled Mei Ti’s mutation and death, then explained that she had tried to help the townspeople leave so the girl’s wish could come true.
• Ye Jiang recognized that the corruptee was a monster who had descended using Mei Ti’s body.
• When the monster asked for a name, Ye Jiang called her Shi Li, and the newly named monster decided to treat that day as her birthday.
• A Blood Moon began forming on Shi Li’s tentacle while Ye Jiang watched.
• The Blood Moon fully emerged as a dark red point of light appeared in Ye Jiang’s third Domination storage slot, linking Ye Jiang and Shi Li.