Chapter Summaries

At the White Cloud Minor Gathering, the Sun Clan made a fortune selling its goods, and Sun Bo'an reinvested the proceeds into the clan’s future. White Cloud Temple’s master Zhao Qing summoned Shi Jian and offered him a prestigious position as the temple’s guardian protector, leaving Shi Jian to consider the offer.

• Sun Bo'an sold out the Sun Clan’s Pathfinding Rats and talismans, and the clan’s stalls earned nearly two thousand low-grade Spirit Stones in half a day.
• Sun Bo'an ordered Sun Xing to buy a defensive formation, Pill Furnaces, cultivation pills, and spirit medicine seeds for the clan.
• Yunsong arrived with the temple master’s invitation for Shi Jian to attend a private banquet on White Cloud Mountain’s main peak.
• Zhao Qing tested Shi Jian with Golden Core pressure, then praised his strength and acknowledged his victory over seven Devil Cultivators.
• Zhao Qing offered Shi Jian the role of White Cloud Temple’s guardian protector, with access to resources, scriptures, and a generous stipend.

Shi Jian refused Zhao Qing’s offer to join the White Cloud Temple, insisting that he owed the Sun Clan for saving his life and could better serve the temple by guarding Hongtian City. After accepting a Blood Bodhi, he suspected Zhao Qing was gravely injured and sensed trouble brewing within White Cloud Commandery.

• Zhao Qing offered Shi Jian generous rewards to become a protector of the White Cloud Temple.
• Shi Jian declined, claiming his debt to the Sun Clan required him to guard Hongtian City and that his work there would also protect the temple’s lands.
• Zhao Qing accepted Shi Jian’s decision and gave him a second-tier high-grade Blood Bodhi for guarding the city.
• After leaving the hall, Shi Jian sensed signs that Zhao Qing’s Golden Core foundation and lifespan had been damaged.
• Shi Jian concluded that White Cloud Commandery faced turmoil and decided Sun Bo'an needed to speed up the Sun Clan’s efforts to produce Foundation Establishment cultivators.

Shi Jian directed Sun Bo'an to spend the Sun Clan's money on valuable foundations, and Sun Bo'an bought several inheritances at the White Cloud Immortal Market auction, including the Beast Essence Pill Formula. After witnessing the ruinous bidding for a Foundation Establishment Pill, the clan prepared to return to Hongtian City, while Shi Jian sensed trouble around White Cloud Mountain.

• Shi Jian told Sun Bo'an to bid on inheritances, Pill Formulas, and formation plates that could strengthen the Sun Clan.
• At the White Cloud Immortal Market auction, Sun Bo'an won a formation plate, spirit seeds, talisman and artifact-refining materials, and the Beast Essence Pill Formula.
• Sun Bo'an watched cultivators bid fifteen thousand five hundred Spirit Stones for a Foundation Establishment Pill and warned Sun Changping against risking the clan's fortune for a slim chance at advancement.
• Sun Bo'an returned with his purchases after spending over two thousand Spirit Stones, and Shi Jian ordered the clan to return to Hongtian City and develop steadily.
• Shi Jian sensed powerful Spiritual Qi fluctuations from White Cloud Mountain and suspected the Golden Core Old Ancestor could no longer suppress his injuries.

After three years of secluded cultivation, Shi Jian emerged to find the Sun Clan’s market and training grounds greatly expanded, with new cultivators and thriving trades in alchemy, beast taming, talismans, and spirit plants. He left impressed by the clan’s progress, while his own path beyond the Foundation Establishment Middle Stage still depended on a rare opportunity to transform his bloodline or body.

• Shi Jian emerged from three years of seclusion after refining the Blood Bodhi and consolidating his cultivation at the Foundation Establishment Middle Stage.
• Lord Rat told Shi Jian that the market had doubled in size and the clan had gained four young cultivators.
• Shi Jian visited Sun Mao in the Alchemy Chamber and learned that he and Sun Changping had developed inexpensive Lesser Beast Essence Pills for raising low-level Demon Beasts.
• Shi Jian saw that Hongtian Market had expanded to four streets, with thirty-two shops and a First-Tier Superior-Grade grand formation.
• Shi Jian watched Sun Bo'an train the Sun Clan children and their spirit beasts in the modified Beast-Luring Instruction.
• Shi Jian saw that the former Ye Clan peak had become the Talisman Hall and that Sun Caiya’s herb garden had also expanded.

Shi Jian and the Sun Clan were summoned by the White Cloud Temple to help defend Cangshi Valley after a demon-beast tide destroyed Pingyang County. Shi Jian led the clan’s forces to the crowded defensive camp, where guards stopped their carriage at the entrance.

• Sun Bo'an brought Shi Jian a White Cloud Temple summons announcing that a demon-beast tide had destroyed Pingyang County and ordering the clans of nine counties to assemble at Cangshi Valley.
• Shi Jian ordered Sun Bo'an, Sun Kezheng, Sun Xing, forty immortal slaves, and members of the eight minor clans to prepare for the defense, while skilled clan members stayed behind.
• The Sun Clan worked through the night to prepare pills, talismans, and supplies, and Sun Mao gave Shi Jian six pills before the group departed.
• Shi Jian traveled with the Sun Clan’s forces to Cangshi Valley, where they found more than three thousand gathered cultivators, including fewer than thirty Foundation Establishment cultivators.
• As the Sun Clan approached the camp gate, two guards challenged them, and a member of the group demanded that they let the ancestor’s carriage pass.

Shi Jian and the Sun Clan reached their assigned camp in Cangshi Valley, where Shi Jian warned them to avoid the front lines. A midnight beast tide broke through the defenses and attacked their position, leaving Sun Bo'an facing a giant wolf's deadly blast.

• Shi Jian intimidated a gatekeeper with his Foundation Establishment-level Yao Qi, and Elder Yun He led him and Sun Bo'an to the Sun Clan's assigned camp.
• Sun Bo'an warned Shi Jian that the camp's elders seemed grim and that few survivors had escaped the disaster in Pingyang County.
• Shi Jian ordered the clansmen and immortal slaves to stay back, use Spirit-Seeking Rats as a warning perimeter, and avoid playing heroes if battle began.
• At midnight, a beast tide struck Cangshi Valley, shattered the first defensive barrier, and overwhelmed the front-line cultivators.
• Sun Bo'an and the Sun Clan fought the beasts from behind barricades, but a giant blue-gray wolf targeted their position and fired a huge cyan blast at him.

Shi Jian protected the Sun Clan during the beast tide while pretending to struggle against a giant wolf, until the White Cloud Temple elders drove the beasts back. He realized their retreat was organized and suspected a powerful Demon General had begun commanding the beast tide.

• Shi Jian blocked the giant wolf’s attack and fought it while secretly holding back his strength.
• Shi Jian protected the Sun Clan’s defensive line for an hour, keeping Sun Bo'an and the other core clan members safe.
• The White Cloud Temple’s three late-stage Foundation Establishment elders formed the Heavenly Gang Demon-Slaying Formation and turned the battle around.
• A roar from the darkness halted the attacking beasts, and the giant wolf accused Shi Jian of betraying its kind before fleeing.
• Shi Jian recognized that the beasts’ retreat was orderly and suspected a Demon General was directing them.

After True Person Luanyuan blamed the White Cloud Temple for the beast tide, he ordered it to suppress the tide and clear the Great Maple Mountain Range. Shi Jian faced leading human cultivators into the mountains where he had become a demon, risking rejection by both humans and Demon Beasts.

• Sun Bo'an learned that seven immortal slaves had been injured but that none of his people had died.
• Yun Du told the assembled Foundation Establishment cultivators that the beast tide remained near Cangshi Valley as they argued over the previous night's losses and delayed formation support.
• True Person Luanyuan of the Supreme Purity Sect arrived and revealed that the Great Maple Mountain Range was a beast-raising ground under the White Cloud Temple's care.
• True Person Luanyuan ordered the White Cloud Temple to quell the beast tide within three months and kill every Demon Beast above level three within six months.
• Yun Du ordered the conscripted clans to enter the mountains in three days and threatened those who avoided battle with execution.
• Shi Jian left the meeting and considered how obeying the order could make him a traitor to Demon Beasts, while refusing could make him a scapegoat for the White Cloud Temple.

Shi Jian joined a mountain-clearing team and hid his strength while guiding it through familiar territory. After killing a level-three Azure-Scaled Python, he secretly soothed orphaned bear cubs and left them alive as the team continued its expedition.

• Lü Fangzhi assigned Shi Jian to a support role because of his supposed injuries, and the team entered the outskirts of the Great Maple Mountain Range.
• The team cleared dozens of low-level Demon Beasts without casualties, while Sun Bo'an's workers gathered their materials.
• The Spirit-Seeking Rats sensed a level-three Azure-Scaled Python, and Shi Jian stepped forward to fight it instead of letting Lü Fangzhi call for reinforcements.
• Shi Jian killed the Azure-Scaled Python by striking a weakness in its scales, leaving Lü Fangzhi impressed by his skills.
• Shi Jian secretly soothed three bear cubs beside their dead mother, then continued using the same method to protect eleven cubs he found over the following days.

Lü Fangzhi’s clearing party defeated the first beast tide, but a level 5 demon general appeared and began battling Zhao Qing, master of White Cloud Temple. As the cultivators fled, Shi Jian judged that Zhao Qing was near death and began considering how to protect the Sun Clan if White Cloud Temple fell.

• Lü Fangzhi trapped and slaughtered the charging beast horde with a formation, while Shi Jian protected the Sun Clan and killed a rhinoceros that threatened Sun Bo'an.
• After the party gathered spirit materials from the fallen beasts, a giant ape demon arrived and overwhelmed the cultivators with its Golden Core pressure.
• Zhao Qing confronted the giant ape, but it shattered his sword attack and caught the White Cloud Seal as the battle devastated the mountains.
• Shi Jian shielded the Sun Clan and immortal slaves as they fled, then realized Zhao Qing was weakening while the giant ape remained powerful.
• The giant ape sent the White Cloud Seal flying and struck Zhao Qing, who coughed black blood and declared that he would die with the beast.

Zhao Qing sacrificed his life to grievously wound the giant ape, but a Supreme Purity Sect True Person arrived afterward, killed it, and claimed its Demon Core. With Zhao Qing dead, the Supreme Purity Sect placed the White Cloud Temple under Yun Du’s temporary control, while Shi Jian saw an opening to act more freely.

• Zhao Qing burned his remaining lifespan and merged his cultivation and the White Cloud Seal into a final strike that devastated the giant ape and killed all forty immortal slaves nearby.
• A nameless Supreme Purity Sect True Person arrived, killed the barely living giant ape, took its Demon Core and corpse, and declared that Zhao Qing had given his life for the Dao.
• Three days later, a Foundation Establishment disciple delivered the Supreme Purity Sect’s order appointing Yun Du to lead the White Cloud Temple temporarily, with twenty years to produce a new Golden Core cultivator.
• Shi Jian realized that White Cloud Commandery no longer had a Golden Core cultivator to restrain him and volunteered to lead the Sun Clan’s party deep into the mountains.
• With the giant ape’s forces scattered, the mountain-clearing operation became easier, and Shi Jian used his position to move more freely.

Shi Jian led the Sun Clan through the devastated Great Maple Mountain Range, gathering spirit treasures from abandoned lairs and rescuing orphaned bear cubs. At the Cangshi Valley camp, Sun Bo'an concealed most of their haul while reporting a small portion, and Shi Jian prepared to keep the clan’s gains hidden.

• Shi Jian led Sun Bo'an, Sun Kezheng, and Sun Xing into the mountain depths and found over a dozen second-tier Purple-Vein Ginseng plants in a dead Black-Line Python's lair.
• Over twenty days, Shi Jian used his scent-tracking ability to guide the Sun Clan to the lairs of dead Demon Beasts, where they gathered valuable spirit plants and materials.
• Shi Jian rescued four bear cubs from beneath their dead mother, and the clan took them in to raise as potential beasts to tame.
• Shi Jian collected more than thirty orphaned bear cubs during the mountain-clearing operation, including Iron-Backed Bears.
• At Cangshi Valley, Sun Bo'an submitted a small haul and bribed the deacon, who accepted the Sun Clan's claim that Shi Jian had been injured.
• Shi Jian concealed the most valuable items in his stomach and laughed as the clan kept the bulk of its gains hidden.

Sun Bo'an and the survivors returned to Hongtian City after a costly expedition, and Shi Jian directed the Sun Clan to replace its devastated vassals. The clan recruited three new minor forces, restoring its network of eight vassals as Shi Jian prepared to wait for future opportunities.

• Sun Wanqing and the others welcomed the returning group, and Sun Mao saw that Shi Jian had been badly scorched.
• Sun Bo'an reported that all forty expeditionary immortal slaves and many members of the minor clans had died.
• Shi Jian ordered the Sun Clan to absorb the remnants of the Zheng Clan, give the Feng and Qian clans time to recover, and recruit new vassals on reduced initial terms.
• More than fifty rogue cultivators arrived in Hongtian City, and Sun Bo'an assessed applicants for the vacant vassal positions.
• Sun Bo'an accepted the Fang Clan, the Qin Clan, and Shen Po's household, restoring the Sun Clan's eight minor vassals.

After four months of recovery, Shi Jian assessed the bear cubs he had raised and used his Enlightenment ability to awaken the minds of three promising ones. He named them Shi Pan, Shi Mo, and Shi Yin, and began building a future bear clan within the Sun Clan’s valley.

• Shi Jian visited the valley where the Sun Clan had been raising the 123 bear cubs he brought back from the Great Maple Mountain Range.
• Shi Jian singled out three unusual cubs: a powerful Iron-Backed Bear, a black bear with strong spiritual awareness, and a Grayback Bear with a mutated bloodline.
• Shi Jian used all three of his saved Enlightenment uses on the cubs, bringing greater clarity and self-awareness to their minds.
• Shi Jian taught the three cubs the Tyrant Bear Qi-Devouring Method.
• Shi Jian named the cubs Shi Pan, Shi Mo, and Shi Yin, and resolved to raise them as the founders of a bear clan rather than as spirit beasts for the Sun Clan.

Shi Jian entered seclusion while Sun Bo'an sold the clan’s recovered treasures and used the proceeds to strengthen the Sun Clan. Over the next two years, the clan expanded its cultivation, crafts, and influence through resources and marriage alliances, and its members awaited Shi Jian’s awakening.

• Shi Jian consumed spirit medicines, entered seclusion, and gave Sun Bo'an authority over clan affairs while forbidding anyone from visiting the back mountain unless the clan faced extermination.
• Sun Bo'an secretly sold Demon Beast materials and spiritual items across Qingzhou Commandery, earning five thousand low-grade Spirit Stones and supplies for the clan.
• Sun Wanqing reported progress making talismans, while Sun Changping revealed that he had refined two Barrier-Breaking Pills; Sun Bo'an assigned them to Sun Xing and Sun Caiya to help them advance.
• Over the next two years, Sun Caiya reached the Qi Refining Seventh Layer, Sun Tieshan became an artifact refiner, and the younger Sun Clan members advanced as the clan grew stronger.
• Sun Bo'an used marriage alliances to bind the eight vassal clans to the Sun Clan, explaining to Sun Kezheng that the alliances would help govern the territory and expand the clan’s manpower.
• The Sun Clan remained peaceful and prosperous as its members waited for Shi Jian to awaken on the back mountain.

After Yun Du entered seclusion to attempt Golden Core, cultivation forces across White Cloud Commandery formed alliances, while the Sun Clan kept its distance and quietly recruited guards. Shi Jian’s breakthrough to Foundation Establishment Middle Stage began as Sun Bo'an waited for him to emerge.

• Yun Du announced his retreat, and White Cloud Temple canceled the White Cloud Minor Gathering as the commandery’s factions began maneuvering.
• Chen Yu’s clan formed an alliance with two other northern forces, while southern clans and Han Qing separately approached the Sun Clan.
• Sun Bo'an rejected the invitations cautiously, burned Han Qing’s letter, and ordered the Sun Clan to remain neutral and keep a low profile.
• Following Shi Jian’s advice, Sun Bo'an recruited twenty-one Rogue Cultivator guest elders, including Zhou Sun, whom he hired on generous terms.
• Sun Bo'an watched the sealed rear mountain as Spiritual Qi surged around Shi Jian, whose barrier to Foundation Establishment Middle Stage began to loosen.

As White Cloud Commandery descended into chaos, White Cloud Temple lost cultivators to Rogue Cultivators, internal conflict, and a Devil Cultivator, while the Sun Clan stayed out of the fighting. The chapter ended with Sun Bo'an watching as Shi Jian's barrier to the Foundation Establishment Middle Stage began to crack.

• Han Qing challenged White Cloud Temple over a mineral vein, and Song He led elders to hunt him down; Han Qing disappeared into the Cang River after killing an elder.
• Chen Yu's alliance collapsed into betrayal and violence, leaving a Chen Clan cultivator dead and Chen Yu injured after he destroyed the traitor clan.
• A Devil Cultivator using the Ten Thousand Laughs Yin Corpse Art killed cultivators from three small clans before Song He and his elders defeated him at heavy cost.
• Sun Kezheng told Sun Bo'an that Lü Fangzhi had been ambushed and killed by Han Qing's brothers, and that Daoist Master Yunsong had also died.
• Sun Bo'an sent a gift to White Cloud Temple in remembrance of its kindness, while Sun Kezheng reported unknown Rogue Cultivators arriving from the south.
• Sun Bo'an waited outside Shi Jian's cave as the barrier to Shi Jian's Foundation Establishment Middle Stage breakthrough began to crack.

Shi Jian failed to break through to the Foundation Establishment Late Stage because his ordinary black bear bloodline drained away the medicinal power, though he strengthened his Demon Power and body. After emerging from five years of seclusion, he learned how the Sun Clan and White Cloud Commandery had changed and ordered the clan to prepare for unfamiliar Rogue Cultivators scouting Hongtian City.

• Shi Jian pushed his cultivation toward the Foundation Establishment Late Stage, but his bloodline deficiency consumed the remaining medicinal power and stopped the breakthrough.
• Shi Jian emerged from seclusion at the Foundation Establishment Middle Stage Peak, with increased Demon Power and a tougher body.
• Sun Bo'an and Sun Kezheng welcomed Shi Jian, and Sun Bo'an reported on the Sun Clan's growth and the upheaval across White Cloud Commandery.
• Shi Jian praised Sun Bo'an's leadership and ordered the Sun Clan to keep a low profile while strengthening its defenses.
• Sun Kezheng reported that unfamiliar Rogue Cultivators had been scouting Hongtian City, and Shi Jian threatened anyone who caused trouble on the clan's territory.

Zhou Sun discovered that two Rogue Cultivators had taken the bait in Sun Bo'an's false rumors about the Sun Clan's weakness. When Wei Chen and Jiao Lei led an attack on Hongtian City, Shi Jian and the clan's forces ambushed them, leaving Wei Chen dead and Jiao Lei crippled as Shi Jian demanded to know who had Lü Fangzhi's flying sword.

• Zhou Sun overheard two Rogue Cultivators discuss the Sun Clan's supposed weakness and reported their plans to Sun Bo'an.
• Wei Chen and Jiao Lei led dozens of Rogue Cultivators to attack Hongtian City and broke through its southern gate.
• Shi Jian's demonic might pinned the attackers while Zhou Sun, Sun Kezheng, and the Sun Clan forces surrounded them.
• Shi Jian killed Wei Chen and crippled Jiao Lei in their brief fight.
• Shi Jian questioned Jiao Lei about who had Lü Fangzhi's flying sword and began crushing him when he refused to answer.

Shi Jian learned that the Fenghe Sect was secretly destabilizing White Cloud Commandery to prepare for an invasion. Rather than flee, he sent the White Cloud Temple the evidence and gambled that it would help them survive the threat.

• Jiao Lei confessed that Yan Qiu of the Fenghe Sect had sent him, Han Qing, and other agents to weaken White Cloud Commandery before taking control.
• Shi Jian realized Yan Qiu would likely learn of the battle and come after him, but he refused to abandon the Sun Clan’s holdings and bear cubs.
• Shi Jian ordered Sun Bo'an to record Jiao Lei’s confession, include Lü Fangzhi’s flying sword, and select spirit medicines as offerings for the White Cloud Temple.
• Shi Jian told Sun Bo'an to send Kezheng to deliver the evidence directly to Song He and present it as help for the temple’s predicament.
• After Sun Bo'an left to prepare the mission, Shi Jian reflected that the White Cloud Temple had little choice but to prevail, though he remained uncertain whether Yun Du could form a core.