Chapter Summaries

Zhou Yang tried to protect Sangsang from Luodu, who summoned a terrifying ghost through an esoteric mantra. As Zhou Yang struggled to keep Sangsang safe and drive Jiekan from the dream, Aji began reciting a cultivation method that stirred Zhou Yang’s mindfulness and seemed connected to forging an upright heart.

• Zhou Yang realized Luodu was trying to devour Sangsang’s emanation right consciousness, so he transferred her into a clay figure and severed their connection.
• Luodu summoned a bloody ghost arm that attacked Sangsang’s clay figure, and Zhou Yang used his ghost ruler to stop it.
• Jiekan struck Zhou Yang’s head with a ritual-wrapped leg bone, disrupting the ghost’s hold and allowing a Dakini to carry Sangsang away.
• Zhou Yang struck the crown of his head with his cracked ghost ruler, giving Zeweng and Zhima time to take Jiekan out of the dream.
• Luodu intensified his mantra as ghost rhyme engulfed Zhou Yang, while Aji recited a cultivation method that stirred Zhou Yang’s mindfulness.

Zhou Yang used Aji’s formula to begin forging his mindfulness into an Upright Heart, repeatedly joining his nine strands against Luodu’s Ghost Rhyme until the bloodfire faded and the dream broke. He woke to find that Sangsang and Zhuoma had gained mindfulness, and Aji’s voice revealed that part of his soul had returned.

• Aji’s formula helped Zhou Yang twist his nine strands of mindfulness into a rope, letting his Fat Mirror Lamp resist the Ghost Rhyme bloodfire.
• Luodu’s secret mantra intensified the bloodfire, shattered Zhou Yang’s mirror light, and pulled Zhuoma and the Sangsang clay figure back toward him.
• Zhou Yang repeatedly rejoined his scattered mindfulness, strengthening it each time until the Ghost Rhyme bloodfire weakened and went out.
• Gonpo and Gemei called for Aji as the dream collapsed, and Zhou Yang used the Ghost Ruler to strike an unusual fluctuation before waking.
• Zhou Yang’s Knife Credit Ledger showed that Sangsang and Zhuoma had developed mindfulness, while Aji’s entry changed and Aji said that some of his soul had returned.

Zhou Yang learned that Aji’s soul had partly returned and that the Esoteric Treasury Domain’s influence was connected to Luodu’s Terma. Aji revealed that he himself carried its footprint, leaving Zhou Yang to help him resist its influence by strengthening his Mindfulness.

• Aji called Zhou Yang his father-like savior and explained that his plea for rescue had been answered when Zhou Yang saved him.
• Zhou Yang questioned Aji about Luodu, the golden stupa, and the Esoteric Treasury Domain after learning that Aji’s Mindfulness had begun to return.
• Aji recounted rumors about Luodu’s death, the Spirit-Roaming Guru, and a woman called Auspiciousness, and confirmed that Luodu’s Terma, including its cultivation formula, came from the Esoteric Treasury Domain.
• When Zhou Yang asked how Aji knew Maji’s family carried the Domain’s footprint, Aji realized he had never seen it and said he carried the footprint himself.
• Zhou Yang promised to save Aji and told him to recite and understand passages from the sages, beginning with “The Art of the Mind.”

Zhou Yang reunited with Sangsang’s clay figure, resolved the danger at Narong Mountain, and returned home with Gonpo. After obtaining a visualization ritual from Aji, he felt the fog returning and warned Zhuoma how to distinguish his real return from anyone impersonating him.

• Jiekan brought Zhou Yang the clay figure of Sangsang, whose spirit flowed back into Zhou Yang’s soul when he took it.
• Zhou Yang assured Zeweng and his family that Sangsang would no longer trouble them, then invited people to bring him other dangerous corpses so he could help them depart in purity.
• Zhou Yang asked Jiekan to visit often and planned to test whether Jiekan had Mindfulness.
• Zhou Yang returned home with Gonpo and told Zhuoma that Zeweng would bring enough food for several days.
• Zhou Yang obtained a visualization ritual from Aji and studied it before falling asleep.
• When the Ghost Head Averting God warned Zhou Yang that he needed to leave the Karmic Retribution Body, he told Zhuoma to tie him up and trust only the return confirmed by Dakini, then collapsed.

Zhou Yang struggled to hide Sangsang and Zhuoma’s consciousnesses from the Human-Skin Ghosts and devised a way to give them crude bodies. He prepared purified fat with Zhou Heigou’s living breath for a Binding Offering, setting up his next move against Heigou.

• Zhou Yang woke to find a malicious eye watching him through a hole in his window, then realized his conflict with Zhou Heigou was becoming harder to conceal.
• Zhou Yang discovered that Sangsang and Zhuoma had followed his soul to Guan Village, but their exposed consciousnesses attracted Huang Shaozi like something tasty.
• After Huang Shaozi left, Zhou Yang reasoned that he needed pure fat and suitable materials to make bodies that could shelter Sangsang and Zhuoma.
• Zhou Yang got fat from Huang Shaozi and returned to his room, where he used the Fat Mirror Lamp to remove its Ghost Rhyme.
• Zhou Yang put Zhou Heigou’s living breath into the purified fat, covered the stove, and placed the Ghost Ruler over it to prepare a Binding Offering.

Zhou Yang used a Binding Offering to summon the strange stomach in Zhou Heigou, while Zhou Laogou brought Heigou to the fields and demanded organs from him. When Heigou tried to force the Choked-to-Death Puppet’s stomach out, the offering in Zhou Yang’s room began to react beneath the cloth.

• Zhou Yang prepared a Binding Offering with Zhou Heigou’s aura and covered it with a cloth and the Ghost Ruler.
• The offering produced growing hair that vanished, leaving a strange field around the clay stove.
• Zhou Laogou told Zhou Heigou that he and his wife would gain a new family member after eating Blessing Rice, and warned him not to provoke the Liu Family, whose rice flourished thanks to its Seedling Mother.
• Zhou Laogou demanded organs from Zhou Heigou, who prepared to cut open his abdomen and feed him.
• The Choked-to-Death Puppet’s stomach withdrew, so Zhou Heigou used his tongue to pull it back out.
• Something pushed against Zhou Yang’s covering; he forced the Ghost Ruler down, and the clay stove began shaking violently.

Zhou Yang used the Binding Offering to draw Zhou Heigou’s Choked-to-Death Puppet stomach into the stove and seized it, leaving Heigou unable to feed his father. Zhou Laogou caught Heigou as he tried to flee and killed him.

• Zhou Heigou used the Puppet-Taming Medicine hidden in his molars to call the Choked-to-Death Puppet stomach back, but it vanished again before he could cut it out.
• Zhou Yang reinforced the shaking stove and struck Heigou’s face through the cloth with the empowered Ghost Ruler, sealing the disharmonious aura and drawing the strange stomach into the stove.
• Zhou Yang removed the cloth and took the stomach, while Zhou Heigou realized its Puppet Threads had snapped and he could no longer sense it.
• Zhou Laogou demanded that Zhou Heigou feed him, then threatened to gut him when Heigou pleaded to postpone it.
• Zhou Heigou ran, but Zhou Laogou transformed from a thread-covered shadow and caught him, inflicting unbearable pain that killed him.

Zhou Yang used the incomplete Puppet stomach to protect his chest and abdomen, then learned that Zhou Heigou had supposedly gone on a long journey and would not return until after the Revelation Ceremony. He suspected Zhou Laogou had killed Heigou and that someone might take Heigou’s place in Guan Village after the ceremony.

• Zhou Yang wrapped the incomplete Puppet stomach around his chest and abdomen, giving himself protection for the Revelation Ceremony’s first three steps.
• Zhou Yang planned to teach Luan Xiaofeng and You Chuntian the Lord of the Charnel Ground Homa Offering’s Visualization Method so they could resist evil ghost habits.
• At breakfast, Zhou Baigou said he was helping the Xiao Family prepare Xiao Fei’s coffin, mourning hall, and bridal chamber, prompting Zhou Yang to fear Xiao Fei might return through the River Floater Ghost assigned as his bride.
• Zhou Yang asked Huang Shaozi for cotton cord to replace his oil-lamp wick and left for work with Zhou Baigou.
• Zhou Laogou said Zhou Heigou had gone on a long journey and would return after the Revelation Ceremony; Zhou Yang suspected Laogou had eaten Heigou’s living innards and that a new Zhou Heigou might arrive afterward.
• Zhou Yang left without investigating the fields, though he wondered whether any trace of Zhou Heigou remained there.

Zhou Yang met Elder Sister Liu, who claimed the Liu Family were his maternal relatives and tried to persuade him to leave Guan Village. She gave him a strange straw mantis, and he hid it as he continued on, where A Fu’s skin vanished from a locust tree.

• Zhou Yang greeted villagers while circulating the Fat Mirror Lamp’s ripples, which made them seem more human.
• In an alley, a blind old woman called Elder Sister Liu recognized Zhou Yang and claimed he had been sent away from his real, noble family outside the village.
• Elder Sister Liu tried to influence Zhou Yang into leaving Guan Village, but he refused and threatened to call his father.
• Elder Sister Liu gave Zhou Yang a straw mantis containing purplish-blue light and said it would identify him to the Liu Family.
• Zhou Yang hid the straw mantis and left the alley, then saw that A Fu’s skin had disappeared from the great locust tree.

Zhou Yang learned from A Fu about the Upright Heart and the dangers of methods entangled with an Evil Karma Puzzle, while hiding his suspicions about A Fu’s knowledge and motives. A Fu paid him generously and asked him to keep working at the forge after the Revelation Ceremony, leaving Zhou Yang to weigh the danger against his other concerns.

• Zhou Yang arrived late at A Fu’s forge, and A Fu questioned him about Heigou’s supposed long journey and invited him to learn about the world outside the village.
• While forging iron, Zhou Yang opened the Ghost Mouths on his arms and used Breathing of the Ghost to keep pace with A Fu before pretending to collapse from exhaustion.
• A Fu told Zhou Yang that an Upright Heart could protect someone from ghosts, then explained that special methods and ghost medicine were needed to use one safely.
• A Fu warned Zhou Yang that cultivation methods could carry an Evil Karma Puzzle, in which a ghost tied to a method might pursue later practitioners.
• Zhou Yang worked through the afternoon forging sickles, and A Fu gave him over six taels in paper money to buy ointment for the Revelation Ceremony.
• A Fu asked Zhou Yang to keep forging iron with him after the ceremony, and Zhou Yang agreed conditionally while privately considering the danger.

Zhou Yang taught Luan Xiaofeng and You Chuntian a visualization method, then prepared a family dinner using offerings meant to calm the ghosts beneath his relatives’ skins. The meal briefly restored their human appearance, and Zhou Yang’s family agreed to pay him for cooking, with Huang Shaozi proposing that he borrow Heigou’s old chain for his upcoming Revelation Ceremony.

• Zhou Yang taught Luan Xiaofeng and You Chuntian the essentials of the Charnel Ground Homa Offering’s Visualization Method and asked Luan Xiaofeng to make small, sturdy figurines for him.
• Zhou Yang returned home with Luan Xiaofeng’s dough-wax tiger and found fresh meat and other ingredients waiting in the woodshed.
• Zhou Yang prepared three offerings and soup, and the Zhou family ate them together, quieting the ghosts beneath their skins and briefly making the family appear lively and human.
• Zhou Yang told Zhou Laogou that he needed to earn more money for his Revelation Ceremony, and Zhou Laogou agreed to pay him when he cooked for the family.
• Huang Shaozi suggested that Zhou Laogou lend Zhou Yang Heigou’s old chain for the ceremony, with Zhou Yang returning it after Heigou came back.

Zhou Yang persuaded Zhou Laogou to let him use the Zhou Family's Old Chain after his Revelation Ceremony, then prepared defenses and rituals in his room. He ended the night planning to seek Heigou's deathly aura and investigating the strange light inside Elder Sister Liu's grass mantis.

• Zhou Yang convinced Zhou Laogou to let him use Old Chain temporarily after the Revelation Ceremony, though he would have to return it when Heigou came home.
• Zhou Yang built a mani pile to shelter Zhuoma and Sangsang's Primordial Right Consciousnesses and to practice fire offerings.
• Zhou Yang created a Square Offering around his bedroom, tested its protective effect, then deactivated it to avoid alerting his family.
• Zhou Yang soaked his waxed-dough tiger in purified fat paste, allowing Zhuoma to reside inside it, and sent the Ghost Head Averting God to keep watch.
• Zhou Yang decided to seek Heigou's deathly aura in the fields so he could cultivate the Gate of Rest Averting God.
• Zhou Yang examined Elder Sister Liu's grass mantis and wondered why its purplish-cyan light affected Zhuoma and Sangsang but not him.

Zhou Yang discovered that Fat Mirror Lamp light could not purify the purple-blue mass inside the grass mantis and stopped before making it more dangerous. He then woke in Aji’s body after three days unconscious, reassured Ajia Zhuoma that he was her brother, and learned that a monk from Zongcha Gompa planned to visit him.

• Zhou Yang’s Fat Mirror Lamp light forced the purple-blue mass to shrink and darken, so he withdrew the light and put the grass mantis away.
• Zhou Yang checked the Knife Credit Ledger, sold a knife on credit, and awoke in Aji’s body after being unconscious for three days.
• Zhou Yang wiped away the medicinal paste, asked for food, and ate tsampa and butter tea while the sky burial masters and relatives watched.
• Zhou Yang told everyone he could sense when the fog in his head might return and proved to Ajia Zhuoma that he was Aji by summoning Little Zhuoma the Dakini.
• Zeweng told Zhou Yang that a monk from Zongcha Gompa, who also had Lung Disease, would return to see him.

Zhou Yang learned that Deqin and the Naren Brothers’ bodies had vanished, then discovered that Jiekan had knocked Luodu unconscious when he briefly took over Aji’s body. After arranging safeguards against future episodes, Zhou Yang invited Jiekan to stay and began testing whether he could sense Mindfulness.

• Gonpo told Zhou Yang that Queji Jiacuo, a student monk from Zongcha Gompa, planned to visit, and Zhou Yang judged that the monk was unlikely to be investigating Little Zhuoma.
• Gonpo reported that Deqin’s family had searched Narong Mountain for Deqin and the Naren Brothers but had found no trace of their bodies.
• Jiekan revealed that he had seen someone wake in Aji’s body, chant a strange sutra, and mock him, so he had knocked the person unconscious with a stick; Zhou Yang realized the person had been Luodu.
• Zhou Yang praised Jiekan for stopping Luodu and told Zhuoma Ajia to restrain him and verify a password if he woke again in a confused state.
• Zhou Yang invited Jiekan to stay for lunch, then showed him how to focus on his pulse and notice fluctuations that might indicate Mindfulness.
• Jiekan closed his eyes and began counting as he tried to sense the unusual fluctuations.