Chapter Summaries

Buddhist investigators exposed thirteen spies among the Arhats, and a Bodhisattva forcibly converted them into devoted followers in the Purifying Karma Hall. Qi Yun witnessed the conversion and sensed that the Crown Prince was watching him.

• Buddhist patrols searched the Spirit Mountain Sacred Realm for connections to the missing Arhats and uncovered thirteen impostors.
• A gray-robed Bodhisattva used the World-Saving Buddha Sound to erase the impostors’ beliefs and memories and remake them as devoted Arhats.
• The newly converted Arhats vowed to spread Buddhist teachings and left the Purifying Karma Hall.
• Qi Yun, watching from the crowd as Fahai, judged the conversion more terrible than soul searching and spirit refining.
• Qi Yun sensed a gaze on his back, traced it to a retreating figure, and recognized the watcher as the Crown Prince.

Qi Yun concluded that he could strengthen his Supreme Dao Foundation only by forging his own Dao, and Cai Kun realized he intended to refine other Supremes. Meanwhile, the Southern Yin crown prince revealed his imperial domain and gathered his surviving officials, where Lin Wenyuan brought news of the emperor’s whereabouts.

• Qi Yun told Cai Kun that the disguised Southern Yin crown prince had recognized him at Spirit Mountain and was likely hiding there for his own purposes.
• Qi Yun reasoned that no external spiritual object could match a Supreme Dao Foundation and declared that he would forge his own Dao.
• Cai Kun realized Qi Yun intended to refine other Supremes and reacted with alarm.
• The Southern Yin crown prince entered his dwelling, transformed it into Imperial Supreme Creation Heaven, and resumed his identity in black-and-gold robes.
• The Southern Yin crown prince received his gathered officials, and Lin Wenyuan reported that there was news about His Majesty’s whereabouts.

Fahai refined the gathered Arhat sariras in [Great Luo Heaven] and, after the Law Technique Panel revealed a new Primordial Spirit mechanism, transformed his Divine Soul with a surge of Immortal Qi. His breakthrough triggered a sweeping gaze across the Xuanhuang Home Realm, alerting True Lords and bodhisattvas.

• Qi Yun gave Fahai the last of the sariras and warned him to refine them inside [Great Luo Heaven].
• Fahai used the sariras to update the [Great Radiance Mahasthamaprapta Dharma Body], but the Law Technique Panel stalled before revealing the new mechanism: Primordial Spirit.
• Fahai opened a gateway and sent his Divine Soul into a mysterious current, which tempered it into a bright-yellow Primordial Spirit.
• Qi Yun recognized Fahai’s transformed spirit as a Primordial Spirit.
• A vast gaze swept across the Xuanhuang Home Realm, and True Lords and bodhisattvas opened their eyes in response.

Qi Yun tested Fahai’s newly created Primordial Spirit and discovered its potential for survival through countless divine thoughts and perhaps a path to Golden Nature without a Fruition Status. Back at Cloud-Resting Chan Monastery, Arhat Huijue gave Fahai an invitation to the World-Honored One’s Chan Assembly at Little Thunderclap Temple, scheduled for three days later.

• Qi Yun temporarily took control of Fahai’s Primordial Spirit to examine its abilities, then returned control to Fahai.
• Qi Yun concluded that the Primordial Spirit was weaker than an Immortal Aspect but possessed exceptional vitality and might be reconstituted if even one of its 129,600 divine thoughts survived.
• Qi Yun speculated that the Primordial Spirit path might eventually reach Golden Nature without relying on a Fruition Status, and decided to investigate it further.
• Arhat Huijue noticed Fahai’s improved cultivation at Cloud-Resting Chan Monastery, and Fahai attributed his progress to the sacred realm and its teachings.
• Arhat Huijue gave Fahai a Spirit Mountain Dharma Invitation and told him to follow it to Little Thunderclap Temple in three days for the World-Honored One’s Chan Assembly.

Qi Yun’s clone ascended Spirit Mountain for the World-Honored One’s Chan Assembly and encountered the disguised Southern Yin Crown Prince, his former enemy. The Crown Prince proposed an alliance and promised access to the assembly’s greatest prize, leaving Qi Yun asking him to explain what he knew.

• Worshippers across the Southern Yin Buddha Kingdom gathered faith and celebrated as the Chan Assembly began at Spirit Mountain.
• Qi Yun’s Fahai clone climbed toward Little Thunderclap Temple among nearly five hundred Arhats, concealing his newly condensed Primordial Spirit and formidable cultivation.
• The disguised Southern Yin Crown Prince joined Qi Yun on the stairway and recognized him, prompting an exchange about their changed fortunes and their reasons for attending.
• The Crown Prince proposed that they set aside their feud and join forces, but Qi Yun recalled the Crown Prince’s attempt to destroy his Dao Foundation and refused.
• The Crown Prince offered to swear a Dao Oath and claimed Qi Yun could not reach the Chan Assembly’s greatest prize without his help.
• Qi Yun considered whether the Crown Prince was bluffing or held secret information, then asked him to explain the prize.

The Southern Yin Crown Prince revealed that the Southern Yin sovereign and the True Lords had pursued the World-Honored One’s handwritten Heart Sutra for its possible secrets beyond the True Lord realm. As Qi Yun reconsidered the crown prince’s ambitions, the Arhats reached Little Thunderclap Temple, where six Bodhisattvas appeared and ordered the invited guests to await the Chan Assembly’s decree.

• The Southern Yin Crown Prince told Qi Yun that the sovereign had renounced his throne to gain access to the World-Honored One’s handwritten Heart Sutra.
• Qi Yun realized that the True Lords had permitted the overseas Buddhists to establish a Buddha kingdom in Southern Yin because they wanted the scripture’s secrets about a higher realm.
• The Southern Yin Crown Prince mocked his father’s sacrifice, prompting Qi Yun to reconsider the former prince’s ambitions.
• Qi Yun and the other Arhats reached Little Thunderclap Temple and witnessed its vast, magnificent grounds.
• Six Bodhisattvas manifested around the temple and warned the invited Arhats to await the decree, threatening to erase anyone who acted rashly.

At the World-Honored One’s Chan Assembly, Qi Yun learned that the genuine Heart Sutra could overwrite anyone who understood its Dao, including powerful Buddhist cultivators. As he resisted its temptation, he realized the other True Lords’ silence about the scripture suggested a deeper secret.

• A bodhisattva announced the Chan Assembly’s strict rules and warned that anyone who disrupted it would be expelled from Spirit Mountain forever.
• A seven-colored bodhisattva revealed the World-Honored One’s handwritten Heart Sutra, whose light and Dao resonance spread across Spirit Mountain.
• Zhao Yin warned Qi Yun not to look at the scripture, and Qi Yun sealed his senses while resisting voices that exploited his desires to tempt him.
• Qi Yun demanded an explanation from Zhao Yin, who revealed that hearing the World-Honored One’s Dao caused living beings to be assimilated through All Minds as One.
• Zhao Yin explained that his bodhisattva father had passed on this warning before his spiritual awareness was assimilated, and Qi Yun questioned whether even True Lords could resist the Heart Sutra.
• Qi Yun’s true body deduced that the True Lords’ silence about the dangerous scripture made no sense, and he realized something was deeply wrong.

Qi Yun realized that a True Lord stood behind the Southern Yin crown prince as the World-Honored One emerged from his handwritten scroll and spread his dominion across Xuanhuang. The World-Honored One’s claim to supremacy was met by towering figures appearing above the Spirit Mountain, leaving the two sides in a tense standoff.

• Qi Yun asked which True Lord stood behind the Southern Yin crown prince, and the crown prince tacitly admitted that one did.
• The World-Honored One’s handwritten scroll sent its Dao resonance across the Southern Yin Buddha Kingdom and the wider Xuanhuang Home Realm.
• The World-Honored One appeared on a twelve-tiered golden lotus and proclaimed, "Above the heavens and beneath the earth—I alone am supreme!"
• The World-Honored One’s golden light suppressed other Dao resonances, while Qi Yun resisted its pressure by drawing on his Primordial True Body and Primordial Spirit.
• Blazing white lightning revealed towering figures above the Spirit Mountain, who remained watching as the World-Honored One’s dominion faced their silent challenge.

The True Lords confronted the Buddhist Bodhisattvas at Spirit Mountain as the World-Honored One manifested, revealing that both sides had been waiting for this moment. The six Bodhisattvas attacked, ten more emerged to form a larger formation, and a battle between the two factions threatened to begin while Qi Yun and the other Arhats remained caught below.

• The True Lords descended above Spirit Mountain and suppressed the World-Honored One's golden light as Qi Yun realized the Chan Assembly and Heart Sutra display had been part of a larger plan.
• The Dragon Elephant Prajna Bodhisattva welcomed the True Lords, while Fuyan acknowledged the World-Honored One's Dharma and Qi Yun recognized him as the True Lord who had once detected his secret study of a talisman.
• The Prison-Subduing Vajra Bodhisattva and the Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva challenged the True Lords, but Fushi Xingyan and Qingyuan True Lord Wendao refused to enter the Buddhist holy land or accept its authority.
• The six Bodhisattvas unleashed their Dao fruits and attacked the True Lords, creating a Buddhist domain above Spirit Mountain.
• Ten more True Lord-level Buddhist cultivators emerged from the pagodas and began forming a larger formation as the opposing powers collided and Qi Yun and the other Arhats faced the danger of the coming battle.

Fourteen righteous-path True Lords and sixteen Buddhist Bodhisattvas clashed over the World-Honored One's Handwritten Scripture as Qi Yun realized both sides had planned the confrontation to seize advantage. The demonic-path True Lords Nine Nethers Sun-Devouring True Lord and Wudao Extreme Dharma True Lord suddenly attacked the scripture's guardians, leaving it unprotected.

• Qingyuan True Lord Wendao and the other righteous-path True Lords launched an attack on the Buddhist Bodhisattvas, who met them with their own Great Dao powers while two Bodhisattvas guarded the scripture.
• Qi Yun deduced that the righteous and Buddhist sides had each orchestrated events to bring the scripture into play, believing their own numbers and preparations would secure victory.
• Nine Nethers Sun-Devouring True Lord and Wudao Extreme Dharma True Lord appeared behind the scripture's guardians and attacked Jeweled Tree Adornment Bodhisattva and World-Purifying Deliverance from Calamity Bodhisattva.
• The two Bodhisattvas were gravely injured and thrown away, leaving the World-Honored One's Handwritten Scripture without anyone to guard it.

A hidden Dragon Lord tried to seize the World-Honored One's Handwritten Scripture, but the World-Honored One transformed his scales and bloodline with a Buddhist conversion force. The Dragon Lord's struggle shattered Spirit Mountain, and Cai Kun told Qi Yun that his original was beneath the fissure.

• A Dragon Lord disguised as an Arhat revealed himself and charged for the scripture while the True Lords and Bodhisattvas remained locked in battle.
• The Dragon Lord used the dragons' Four Seas Seal to suppress the scripture, but the World-Honored One pointed at him and began transforming him into a Buddhist heavenly dragon.
• The Dragon Lord resisted the conversion, revealed his enormous true form, and unleashed a roar that tore open Spirit Mountain and destroyed its temples.
• Qi Yun endured the devastation with his Great Radiance Mahasthamaprapta Dharma Body and Primordial Spirit.
• Cai Kun told Qi Yun that his original was beneath the fissure in Spirit Mountain.

The Crown Prince of Southern Yin used a sheet of white paper to unleash a supreme Sword Intent against the World-Honored One, disrupting the Buddha light converting the Dragon Lord. A mysterious swordsman emerged beside the golden lotus, took up the sword, and challenged the World-Honored One.

• Qi Yun abandoned his cooperation with the Crown Prince of Southern Yin and slipped into a fissure in Spirit Mountain.
• The Crown Prince of Southern Yin watched the World-Honored One convert the Dragon Lord and drew out a sheet of white paper containing Sword Intent.
• The Crown Prince of Southern Yin summoned an ordinary three-chi sword, suffering severe injuries from the Sword Intent's backlash.
• The sword pierced through the World-Honored One's Buddha light and pointed at his brow.
• An indistinct figure emerged from the void, grasped the sword, and asked the World-Honored One if he was courting death.

A mysterious sword-bearing figure erased the World-Honored One and shattered the scripture containing the secret of reaching above True Lord, scattering its fragments across the battlefield. Meanwhile, Qi Yun found Cai Shen’s sealed true body beneath Spirit Mountain and agreed to borrow an Imperial Weapon’s full power on credit, risking his Dharma Body if he failed to repay the debt within a hundred years.

• The sword-bearing figure destroyed the World-Honored One and split the World-Honored One's Handwritten Scripture into forty-nine streams of golden light.
• The True Lords and Bodhisattvas abandoned their battles and fought fiercely to seize the scattered scripture fragments.
• An immense divine tree erupted from Spirit Mountain’s fissure, revealing the Great Tang Imperial Weapon, Wealth Connects to the Divine.
• Qi Yun followed Cai Shen’s guidance to an underground cavern and found Cai Shen’s true body sealed inside a Great Wheel Wisdom King Demon-Suppressing Pagoda.
• Cai Shen offered to lend Qi Yun an Imperial Weapon’s full power in exchange for collateral, with fivefold repayment due within a hundred years or the loss of Qi Yun’s Dharma Body.
• Qi Yun accepted Cai Shen’s credit deal.

Qi Yun used the Wealth Connects to the Divine to trap the World-Honored One’s scattered golden light, provoking an assault from thirty-two True Lords and Bodhisattvas. As the attackers turned on one another over the possibility of the World-Honored One bringing down the Dharma, Qi Yun’s Great Radiance Mahasthamaprapta Dharma Body seized a strand of golden light and began refining it.

• The Wealth Connects to the Divine formed a golden domain that enclosed all forty-nine rays of the World-Honored One’s scattered golden light.
• Qingyuan True Lord Wendao and the other peak figures recognized the Great Tang’s missing Imperial Weapon and attacked its domain together.
• Qi Yun’s Great Radiance Mahasthamaprapta Dharma Body appeared inside the domain and claimed that he could become a vessel for the World-Honored One to bring the Dharma to Xuanhuang.
• Dragon Elephant Prajna Bodhisattva redirected his attack against True Lord Fushi Xingyan, while Wudao Extreme Dharma True Lord wounded him and called for the barrier to be broken.
• The attackers resumed fighting among themselves as Qi Yun’s Dharma Body reached out and clasped a strand of golden light in his palm.

Qi Yun refined all forty-nine streaks of the World-Honored One's golden light, transforming his Great Radiance Mahasthamaprapta Dharma Body into a Great Sun Radiance King Bodhisattva. Newly empowered but still short of a True Lord's Fruition Status, he sensed a vast will descending from above the heavens and resolved to take the final step.

• Qi Yun overcame the World-Honored One's resisting golden light and absorbed it, convincing the Buddhist Bodhisattvas that he was the chosen vessel of the World-Honored One.
• Dragon Elephant Prajna Bodhisattva and Mind Lamp Reflection Bodhisattva rallied the other Bodhisattvas to protect Qi Yun, while the True Lords grew doubtful and wary.
• Qi Yun continued capturing and refining the golden light, rapidly filling the Law Technique Panel's progress bar as the battlefield raged outside the Imperial Weapon's domain.
• After Qi Yun absorbed the forty-ninth streak, the Law Technique Panel replaced Great Radiance Mahasthamaprapta Dharma Body with Great Sun Radiance King Bodhisattva, merging his Primordial Spirit with the Bodhisattva Golden Body.
• Qi Yun recognized that he still lacked a Fruition Status, then sensed a vast will descending through a darkening sky and declared that he would take the final step.

Qi Yun faced Xuanhuang's Heaven's Will as it summoned Heaven and Earth's Long River of Time to engulf him. After swallowing his Great Light Manifestation, he emerged from the gray mist in a blaze of Great Sun True Intention, leaving his fate transformed and unresolved.

• Heaven's Will manifested above Spirit Mountain, unsettling the True Lords and Bodhisattvas and contradicting the Buddhists' claim that the World-Honored One was favored by heaven.
• Qi Yun took nine measured steps out of the Imperial Weapon's domain and stood in the void as Heaven and Earth's Long River of Time descended upon him.
• The True Lords and Bodhisattvas fled the river's waters while Qi Yun held a Pure Land of light against the torrent, which began to erode his body and domain.
• Qi Yun swallowed the Great Light Manifestation, and the Long River engulfed him as his presence vanished and the observers sensed that his karma had been severed.
• A point of white light erupted from the gray mist, and Qi Yun emerged in Great Sun radiance, proclaiming his Great Sun True Intention.

After revealing that he was a Daoist who had used a Buddhist guise to deceive the heavens, Qi Yun faced the furious Bodhisattvas. Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva attacked with his Divine Court, but Qi Yun’s Dharma Idol Heaven and Earth met it in an even clash, leaving Qi Yun poised to use a stronger technique.

• Qi Yun appeared in a plain white robe and greeted the assembled True Lords and Bodhisattvas as a Daoist, exposing his earlier Buddhist disguise.
• Qi Yun apologized for borrowing a Buddhist guise, but the Bodhisattvas accused him of stealing the World-Honored One's legacy and threatened to kill him.
• Qingyuan True Lord Wendao and the other righteous and demonic True Lords blocked the Bodhisattvas from attacking Qi Yun together.
• Dragon Elephant Bodhisattva sent Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva to challenge Qi Yun, and Wrathful Wisdom King unleashed his Divine Court, Wisdom King Heaven.
• Qi Yun summoned his Dharma Idol Heaven and Earth, a radiant white sun that collided with Wisdom King Heaven and reached an even deadlock.
• Qi Yun realized his technique matched the Divine Court in raw power and said he would need to reveal more of his skills to defeat Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva.

Qi Yun led the Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva into All Wonders Heaven and declared a fight to the death, then rammed his Fruition Status into the Bodhisattva’s. Their collision shook the Great Dao and killed people across the Xuanhuang Home Realm, while the Bodhisattva’s Fruition Status trembled and Qi Yun’s continued attacking unabated.

• Qi Yun and the Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva entered All Wonders Heaven, where their Fruition Statuses hung above the Long River of Time.
• The Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva asked Qi Yun what he intended, and Qi Yun said they were fighting to the death.
• Qi Yun drove his blazing white sun Fruition Status into the Bodhisattva’s azure-fire Fruition Status.
• The collision tore fissures through All Wonders Heaven, snapped nearby karma strands, and caused Foundation Establishment cultivators in the Xuanhuang Home Realm to die.
• Qingyuan True Lord Wendao witnessed the collision and tried to calculate why Qi Yun seemed so confident.
• The Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva roared as his Fruition Status shook, while Qi Yun’s kept striking with greater force.

Qi Yun forced the Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva to concede defeat in their Fruition Status Collision and demanded a wisp of Golden Nature as the price of peace. The bodhisattva surrendered it, diminishing his status, while Qi Yun declared their conflict settled.

• The Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva called on Dragon Elephant Prajna Bodhisattva and the other Buddhist figures at Spirit Mountain to help him.
• Qingyuan True Lord Wendao warned the bodhisattvas that intervening could expose their own Fruition Statuses to Qi Yun, and most held back.
• Dragon Elephant Bodhisattva urged the Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva to endure while they sought Qi Yun's weakness, leaving him to fight alone.
• Fearing his Azure Flame Buddha Land's Fruition Status would escape, the Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva admitted defeat and offered to make peace.
• Qi Yun demanded one wisp of Golden Nature, and the Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva yielded it, causing his status to diminish.
• Qi Yun absorbed the Golden Nature and declared the karma between them settled.

Qi Yun left the ruined Spirit Mountain after defeating the Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva and intimidating the Nine Nethers Sun-Devouring True Lord. At the West Sea, he revealed his new power by creating a world from a mote of dust and named himself the Great Sun Purple Ultimate True Lord.

• Qi Yun spared the Wrathful Wisdom King Bodhisattva, who withdrew to the other bodhisattvas, weakened and resentful of their inaction.
• Qi Yun challenged the Nine Nethers Sun-Devouring True Lord to exchange pointers, and the True Lord held back rather than face him.
• Qi Yun laughed, recited a verse, and departed Spirit Mountain as Wudao Extreme Dharma True Lord remarked that the barefoot feared not those who wore shoes.
• Qingyuan True Lord Wendao ordered the Buddhist cultivators to withdraw overseas within one year or be killed without mercy, then left with the other True Lords.
• Qi Yun crossed space to the West Sea and used the Grotto-Heaven Mote Two-Worlds Dharma to create a world from a speck of dust.
• Qi Yun declared that from then on he would be called the Great Sun Purple Ultimate True Lord.