Chapter Summaries

Wen Jing broke Trial Tower records on the first four floors, earning S ratings before the fifth-floor guardian’s overwhelming stats slowed her down. Meanwhile, at Qinglang Academy, Ochre Soil exchange students endured the Operations Department’s contempt until news of Wen Jing’s achievement reached them.

• Wen Jing earned S ratings and broke historical records on the third and fourth Trial Tower floors, astonishing the lobby and Ji Shuang.
• Wen Jing cleared the fifth floor with a D rating because her attacks could not quickly penetrate the guardian’s sixteenfold-enhanced defense, but she unlocked a 65% discount on a combat technique course.
• At Qinglang Academy, Operations Department members complained about accommodating Ochre Soil exchange students and dismissed their standing and resources.
• Song Zhi visited the Operations Department team leader with a gift for the injured Xiao Wu, while a Qinglang member mocked the gift and the exchange students.
• Qinglang students and the Ochre Soil exchange students received news that first-year Wen Jing had earned an S rating and broken Ochre Soil Academy’s first-floor Trial Tower record.

Wen Jing earned S-rank ratings on four Trial Tower floors and broke records, bringing attention from Qinglang and Xuanhuang academies. Dean Bai took her to the academy treasury, while Song Zhi learned the personnel department had mistreated her and ordered Tan Junhao’s entire team dismissed.

• Wen Jing’s four S-rank Trial Tower results spread to Qinglang and Xuanhuang, filling both academies’ towers with students trying to break records.
• Dean Bai congratulated Wen Jing and took her to the academy treasury.
• Song Zhi learned that Ochre Soil’s personnel department had offended Wen Jing and that Dean Bai had taken her away.
• Song Zhi ordered Tan Junhao and all twelve members of his team removed from their posts.
• Tan Junhao protested as robots packed the team’s belongings and demanded to see the president.

Wen Jing visited the academy treasury with Dean Bai and Xie Ming, where she learned about Empowerment Stones made from the Superpower Cores of Awakeners who suffered Genetic Collapse. She discovered that the stones could grant unpredictable benefits, and Dean Bai explained that the points shop’s inventory varied with an Awakener’s compatibility level.

• Song Zhi ordered the HR department to stop approaching Wen Jing about a contract and said he would sign her himself after returning from the exchange.
• Wen Jing checked her results and saw that she had risen to class rank 1 and year rank 2785, bringing her closer to the top ten.
• Dean Bai took Wen Jing to the academy treasury beneath Xie Ming’s research institute and led her to choose from the outermost ring of stored treasures.
• Dean Bai identified the most valuable items in that section as Empowerment Stones, which were created from Superpower Cores recovered from Awakeners who suffered Genetic Collapse.
• Xie Ming explained that Empowerment Stones could grant a range of unpredictable benefits, while Dean Bai said the points shop’s available inventory depended on an Awakener’s compatibility level.

Wen Jing chose to save her Empowerment Stone reward for use in the Ancient Wilderness, while Dean Bai and Xie Ming discussed the academy’s finances and their hopes for her. Back in her dorm, Wen Jing rejected a flood of long-term job offers and found messages from Kewo Life Company and Gaia still unread.

• Wen Jing decided to keep the Empowerment Stone in the vault until her next visit, planning to try using it in the Ancient Wilderness.
• After Wen Jing left, Xie Ming worried that her promise to choose rewards next month meant she would break another record, while Dean Bai looked forward to her future success.
• Xie Ming explained that Ochre Soil Academy was spending beyond its means, and he later used Wen Jing’s results to strengthen an insect research proposal.
• Wen Jing sorted through her inbox, found more than a hundred recruitment contracts with terms of at least 100 years, and rejected them all.
• Wen Jing found a recruitment offer from Kewo Life Company that would cancel her life loan and interest, along with an unread message from Gaia.

Wen Jing received her first-in-class points and bought the Energy-Shaping Weapon course, then discovered her title made her appear dazzling to classmates. In the course, she grasped the technique’s principle and formed an energy shield almost immediately, leaving the instructor startled.

• Wen Jing received 15 points for ranking first in her class and spent 28 points on the discounted Energy-Shaping Weapon course.
• Wen Jing learned that her First in Class title made her glow on classmates’ retinal displays, with the effect lasting three days and shining especially brightly because her score far exceeded the class average.
• Wen Jing attended Joel’s Energy-Shaping Weapon class, where he explained that shaping weapons required forming an inverse energy mapping inside the body.
• Wen Jing understood the technique and condensed a shield in her hand before Joel finished telling her to try.

Wen Jing overwhelmed her classmates in combat training, then harvested nectar and hunted vine lizards in the Ancient Wilderness. After disguising herself as an ant, she entered the colony’s nest and began decoding its complex pheromone network.

• Wen Jing formed a radiant energy sword that easily shattered the weapons of the second- and third-ranked students, and her combat skills gained new progress.
• Wen Jing traveled to the fluorescent flower field, where she harvested nectar and hunted three vine lizards, pushing her life and strength attributes past 20.
• Wen Jing avoided exploring deeper into the mist after sensing a danger greater than the red-and-white bird, then noticed ants returning to their nest.
• Wen Jing mimicked ant pheromones and used Basic Mimicry to disguise herself as a giant mutant ant before entering the colony’s nest.
• Wen Jing analyzed the nest’s dense pheromone signals as she tried to bypass the colony’s alarms and defenses.

Wen Jing infiltrated the ant nest, stole emerald crystal grains from workers, and consumed enough to greatly increase her attributes. She reached the queen’s hall, where the queen’s overwhelming mental influence took control of her and forced her to approach.

• Wen Jing entered the nest after its alarm system lowered its alert level and followed workers carrying emerald crystal grains.
• Wen Jing used Gravity Silk to steal a grain, discovered it increased all her attributes, and followed the worker toward a mine.
• Wen Jing excavated and ate dozens of emerald crystal grains, raising her Life and Strength to 26, Speed to 7, and Spirit to 16.
• Wen Jing tracked the workers’ signals to the emerald crystal warehouse and found the blood-red ant queen laying eggs in the ant hall.
• The queen’s influence overwhelmed Wen Jing despite her Abnormal Status Immunity, and she crawled toward the queen under its command to devote everything to it.

Wen Jing remained under the queen ant’s control until nightfall, when she was suddenly transported out of the nest and spat from a Shadow Wolf’s mouth. She landed in an unfamiliar place, disoriented and bouncing across the ground.

• The queen ant tried to make Wen Jing mate, then ordered worker ants to eat her, but they could not pierce her body.
• The queen ant ordered Wen Jing to work, and she became an exceptionally efficient miner, hauler, and defender in the ant nest.
• At night, Wen Jing vanished from the nest as the Ancient Wilderness’s return time arrived.
• A staff member at Ochre Soil Academy noticed Wen Jing had missed the six o’clock return deadline and activated the emergency protocol.
• A Shadow Wolf tried to howl, choked, and coughed Wen Jing out into the night.
• Wen Jing regained her awareness as she spun through the air and bounced across the ground.

Wen Jing returned to the place where she had first entered the Ancient Wilderness and realized the ant queen’s mind control had nearly trapped her in its nest for life. After fighting the Shadow Wolf in both physical and shadow form, she found a way to wound it and resumed her attack when it returned to three dimensions.

• Wen Jing recognized the location and remembered how the ant queen’s control had made her believe she was a worker ant, prompting her to consider developing resistance to mind control.
• The Shadow Wolf pounced on Wen Jing, but she evaded it and attacked one of its eyes with her Energy-Shaping Weapon.
• The Shadow Wolf became a two-dimensional shadow and bit Wen Jing’s shadow, causing her real health to drop until she escaped by moving her shadow’s position.
• Wen Jing formed an enormous, paper-thin sword and struck the wolf shadow, discovering that overlapping their shadows could injure it.
• The Shadow Wolf returned to physical form, and Wen Jing fastened Gravity Silk to it and continued her assault.

Wen Jing fled a Shadow Wolf pack and reached an ancient altar with blue flames that burned away her skill points and drained her attributes. After spending all her points trying to evolve resistance, she gambled on the flames’ subtle attraction and reached toward them, only for them to destroy her Gravity Silk.

• Wen Jing abandoned her hunt and fled when a Shadow Wolf summoned its pack, but the wolves pursued and began surrounding her.
• Wen Jing escaped through the pack’s attacks, advanced her Movement Technique three levels, and reached an ancient altar with deep-blue flames.
• The Shadow Wolves stopped at the altar’s boundary, while pale flames appeared on Wen Jing and her skill points began to vanish.
• Wen Jing spent all her remaining skill points trying to evolve resistance, but her attributes began steadily falling instead.
• Wen Jing chose to approach the blue flames, and the invisible fire destroyed the Gravity Silk she extended toward them.

Wen Jing discovered that the altar could only be reached by imitating the human figures in a sacrificial dance, then entered its blue flames despite their accelerating degeneration curse. She devoured the glowing character on a bone fragment within the flames, and her lost abilities began to return.

• Wen Jing noticed stick-figure images on the altar floor and realized they depicted a sequence of human movements.
• Wen Jing imitated the figures in a sacrificial dance and crossed the spatially folded ground to reach the altar.
• Wen Jing entered the blue flames, where the degeneration curse rapidly stripped away her evolved organs and abilities.
• Wen Jing used her springtail to reach a glowing character engraved on a bone fragment and began devouring it.
• Wen Jing regained her compound eyes, antennae, size, and abilities as she ate nearly half the character, then began to wake on the material plane.

Wen Jing discovered that devouring an oracle-bone character in the Ancient Wilderness restored her skill points and ultimately destroyed the region, forcing her to escape. She returned safely to Ochre Soil Academy, where Dean Bai and Xie Ming had been waiting, and began researching the writing's origins.

• Wen Jing realized the oracle-bone inscription meant “fire” and that it resembled writing from her previous life; she gained the Digestion V trait and ??? Devouring.
• Wen Jing found that consuming the inscription increased her skill points, then devoured the entire character and earned 285 points.
• The altar and its surrounding space collapsed, and Wen Jing used the algorithm to leave the Ancient Wilderness before the region vanished.
• Wen Jing reappeared at Ochre Soil Academy's transit registration center, relieving Dean Bai and Xie Ming, who had waited for hours.
• Wen Jing returned to her dormitory and opened the online library to research what she had encountered.

Wen Jing learned how scholars classified Ancient Wilderness civilization traces and heard how financial groups had monopolized research into them. After declining Song Zhi’s offer to join the student council’s Operations Department, she proposed joining its civilization-focused exploration missions as outside support in exchange for a share of the rewards.

• Wen Jing asked Xie Ming about the stone structure she had encountered, and he explained the academy’s classifications of civilization traces and their associated dangers.
• Xie Ming told Wen Jing that financial groups on Xuanhuang Star had monopolized research on Ancient Wilderness civilization, using reference materials from before the Stellar Calendar.
• Xie Ming urged Wen Jing to clear the Trial Tower and collect her Empowerment Stone, saying he was counting on her to finish their research project.
• Song Zhi introduced himself to Wen Jing, apologized for the human resources department’s mistreatment of her, and invited her to a Wilderness Beast banquet at the Deep Space Vortex.
• Song Zhi offered Wen Jing an S-rank contract to join the Operations Department, but she declined the position and offered to join its Ancient Wilderness civilization exploration missions for a share of the rewards.

Wen Jing set new Trial Tower records through the fifth floor, earning S-rank ratings and mastering Energy-Shaping Weapon. Song Zhi secured her a larger consulting subsidy, while students at other academies began watching her closely ahead of the league competition.

• Song Zhi faced opposition over Wen Jing's consulting contract, but her new S-rank record persuaded the Student Council to approve a ten-percent subsidy for each S-rank floor.
• Wen Jing defeated the sixteenfold gatekeeper on the fifth floor in 23 seconds and mastered Energy-Shaping Weapon.
• Song Zhi updated Wen Jing's contract to grant a fifty-percent additional subsidy for her Operations Department exploration earnings, and the Student Council accepted the terms.
• News of Wen Jing's records reached Xuanhuang Academy and Qinglang Academy, where older students failed to match her results and freshmen hoped to challenge her in the league competition.
• Wen Jing learned that Energy Rain Burst was available only as an online course, checked her limited points, and decided she could wait to buy it.

Wen Jing used two Empowerment Stones in the Ancient Wilderness and evolved her digestion ability to absorb them completely, gaining two superpowers and a major boost to her attributes. She tested Wind Blade and then turned to examine Isolation Layer.

• Wen Jing received a 100,000-credit sponsorship and updated her academy ranking, setting her sights on first place in the upcoming competition.
• Wen Jing collected two Empowerment Stones with Dean Bai and Xie Ming, then brought them into the Ancient Wilderness.
• Wen Jing spent 100 skill points to evolve Digestion V and acquired Complete Empowerment Stone Digestion.
• Wen Jing ate both Empowerment Stones, gaining Wind Blade and Isolation Layer and raising all four attributes by ten points.
• Wen Jing tested Wind Blade, found that its strongest attack consumed a third of her energy, and began examining Isolation Layer.

Wen Jing evolved her Isolation Layer into an ability that hid her energy and scent, then used it with improved mimicry to sneak up on a red-and-white bird. She pierced its eye and burrowed toward its brain as it thrashed through the branches.

• Wen Jing discovered that the Isolation Layer blocked the molecular signals creatures used to sense her.
• Wen Jing spent 60 points to evolve the Isolation Layer into Energy Isolation Layer, improve Basic Mimicry to Intermediate Mimicry, and gain Basic Invisibility.
• Wen Jing used her new stealth abilities to approach a red-and-white bird while it ate black worms.
• Wen Jing pierced the bird through its eye with her Energy-Shaping Weapon and attacked its brain.
• The injured bird flapped and tumbled between the branches while Wen Jing held on with Gravity Silk and continued burrowing into its skull.

Wen Jing killed a lightning-wielding red-and-white bird in the Ancient Wilderness, ate it to boost her attributes, and evolved her digestion before returning to the laboratory with its beak. She told Xie Ming she had gained Wind Blade from an Empowerment Stone, and Dean Bai appeared just as he reacted with surprise.

• Wen Jing used Wind Blade and a bite to the brain to kill the red-and-white bird, then survived the electricity it released.
• Wen Jing hid from the bird’s companions, ate the corpse in stages, and evolved her digestion to Intermediate Rapid Digestion so she could finish it quickly.
• Eating the bird raised Wen Jing’s health and speed and brought her Wilderness Body species level to 7, after which she returned to the laboratory carrying the bird’s beak halves.
• Xie Ming realized Wen Jing had killed a natural insect predator, and Wen Jing said she had obtained Wind Blade from an Empowerment Stone.
• Dean Bai suddenly appeared in the laboratory and reacted with surprise when she heard Wen Jing had gained an ability.

Wen Jing learned that her ability was biological-mimicry invisibility and discovered that her tiny Wilderness Body held nearly a thousand times more energy than at her previous test, though it still rated F-rank. She then climbed to the giant tree’s canopy, set her sights on devouring the tree, and used invisibility and Wind Blade to kill three red-and-white birds.

• Dean Bai revealed she was C-rank, while Xie Ming said he was B-rank but could not defeat her.
• Wen Jing described her emerging Wind Blade ability and identified her main ability as invisibility based on biological mimicry.
• Xie Ming retested Wen Jing and found her energy had risen nearly a thousandfold, though her Wilderness Body still rated F-rank.
• Wen Jing hunted red-and-white birds while climbing to the giant tree’s highest reaches and decided to devour the tree.
• Wen Jing used invisibility and Wind Blade to kill three red-and-white birds in the canopy, then began eating them.

Wen Jing grew stronger by hunting red-and-white birds, eating their eggs, and gaining Basic Lightning Immunity. She then explored the poisonous mist below the canopy and began weakening the venomous snake that ruled it by killing and removing its prey.

• Wen Jing’s speed and body changed after weeks of hunting red-and-white birds, and she ate three birds and four eggs from a nest.
• Eating the eggs raised all her attributes, and the panel granted her Basic Lightning Immunity; she theorized that consuming more closely related species might let her acquire their abilities.
• Wen Jing considered eventually eating the ant queen to gain mind control, but decided she needed to improve her Abnormal Status Immunity first.
• She descended into the mist, avoided a toxic scarlet mushroom, and killed the poisonous frogs she found without eating them.
• Wen Jing dragged the frogs away as part of her plan to cut off the venomous snake’s food supply.

Wen Jing completed her Energy Amplification Method and Level One Energy Shield assessments, then rose into the year’s top hundred and enrolled in Level Two Energy Shield. After learning the new technique, she entered the Ancient Wilderness to confront the venomous snakes in the giant tree’s lower levels, where a hungry snake emerged from its hollow.

• Louisa tested Wen Jing, whose Energy Amplification Method result reached 510 and whose skill reached perfection.
• Wen Jing passed her Level One Energy Shield assessment, and Yu Yang and Wan Ling told her the year ranking tournament might have a new format and better rewards.
• Wen Jing’s ranking rose from 104 to 96 after her credits were processed, placing her on the year leaderboard.
• Wen Jing spent 20 points to enroll in Level Two Energy Shield and mastered it in her first class with Joel.
• Wen Jing entered the Ancient Wilderness, found the venomous snakes’ prey depleted, and lured a sluggish, hungry snake out of its hollow with a wind blade.