Chapter Summaries

Qin Ming began selecting the Imperial Fighting Team’s seven-person lineup through assessments, and the first formation-recovery test exposed how the team struggled to reconnect after their positions broke apart. Dong Jian and Li Man were identified as potential central coordinator and formation support, while the next step was to find Yu Tianheng’s Fourth Soul Ring.

• Qin Ming set seven nameplates in the lineup area and announced five assessments that would determine which of the nine fighters played in each match.
• Qin Ming tested the seven selected fighters by disrupting their formation around five flags, and the team lost three flags because its members failed to coordinate their movements and hand off responsibilities.
• Li Man and Dong Jian explained that the team needed someone to track how each fighter’s force transferred to the next; Qin Ming assigned Dong Jian a possible central role and Li Man a supporting role, with Yu Tianheng remaining captain.
• Qin Ming suspended the next day’s formation assessment and announced that the team would enter Sunset Forest to hunt for Yu Tianheng’s Fourth Soul Ring.
• Dong Jian’s Divine Dragon Secret Realm registered his changed role and recommended observing how power transferred between teammates.

Yu Tianheng chose a 6,800-year Thunder Spine Dragon Lizard for his fourth Soul Ring and gained Thunder Dragon Body, which let him channel lightning through his whole body. A brief spar with Dong Jian revealed a new direction for combining Dong Jian’s self-created techniques through continuous momentum.

• Qin Ming led the Imperial Fighting Team into Sunset Forest, where Yu Tianheng compared the Thunder Spine Dragon Lizard with the Thunder Horn Rampage Lizard before choosing the former for its potential to circulate lightning through his body.
• The team worked together to expose the Thunder Spine Dragon Lizard’s vulnerable spinal connection, and Yu Tianheng killed it with a strike to its fourth spinal section.
• Yu Tianheng absorbed the 6,800-year Soul Ring, gained Thunder Dragon Body, and reached level forty-one as a Soul Ancestor.
• Yu Tianheng and Dong Jian sparred, and Dong Jian used momentum from one redirection to flow into his next movement, landing a quick strike without resetting his stance.
• Dong Jian recognized that his techniques might be unified through continuous momentum, while the Divine Dragon Secret Realm identified the idea as an unstable technique worth researching.

Dong Jian developed a continuous momentum-redirection technique by carrying his own movements into each next action instead of storing an opponent’s force. After linking several attacks and redirecting two teammates into each other, he saw how his skill could reconnect the Imperial Fighting Team, and Qin Ming placed him back at the formation’s center for the next day’s training.

• Dong Jian studied his past techniques in the Divine Dragon Secret Realm and realized that his body’s own residual momentum, rather than an opponent’s force, could power his next movement.
• Qin Ming had Dong Jian seal off Mountain Shifting, the Dark Gold Spine Armor, and his Fourth Soul Skill so he could train continuous combat with Shi Mo, Yu Feng, and Osler.
• Dong Jian linked Yu Feng’s passing movement into Osler’s charge, then used turns, retreats, and shifts to redirect successive attacks from Yu Tianheng.
• Li Man showed Dong Jian that he should use his own momentum rather than try to store an enemy’s attacks, and his successful consecutive redirections improved during training.
• Dong Jian redirected Shi Mo and Osler into each other, realizing that he could link teammates’ movements as well as his own.
• Qin Ming moved Dong Jian’s nameplate back to the center of the seven-person formation for the next day’s training.

Dong Jian trained as the Imperial Fighting Team’s central axis, coordinating teammates’ movements while learning to leave tactical decisions to Yu Tianheng and route-setting to Li Man. A fire-based exercise overloaded his observations and split the formation, leaving the team to prepare for an official exchange match against Blazing Fire Academy the next day.

• Qin Ming placed Dong Jian at the center of the formation, where he coordinated teammates’ movements during mock battles.
• Yu Tianheng and Dong Jian divided their responsibilities, with Yu Tianheng making pursuit decisions and Dong Jian identifying where the formation was at risk of breaking.
• Li Man joined the tactical division by ensuring that the routes Yu Tianheng chose could be formed, while Qin Ming labeled Yu Tianheng the edge, Li Man the net, and Dong Jian the axis.
• Dong Jian coordinated further drills with Yu Feng, Osler, Shi Mo, Dugu Yan, and Ye Lingling as the team improved its handoffs.
• A fire-based drill overwhelmed Dong Jian’s observations, burned through Li Man’s formation routes, and split the team into three groups.
• Qin Ming announced an official exchange match against Blazing Fire Academy for the next day, and the Divine Dragon Secret Realm warned that Dong Jian’s central role risked overload.

Huo Wu used persistent flames to contaminate Li Man’s formation routes and split the Imperial Fighting Team into disconnected groups, exposing how Dong Jian’s central role had made everyone rely on his calls. After the team lost, they agreed to abandon contaminated routes and narrow Dong Jian’s attention to the few events that could immediately break their formation.

• Huo Wu studied the Imperial Fighting Team’s lineup and began the seven-on-seven battle by spreading flames across the ground while the teams engaged.
• Huo Wu and her teammates heated Li Man’s connected formation routes until automatic route switching carried the heat through the network, while Dong Jian struggled to process every battlefield detail and coordinate the team.
• Huo Wu’s Fourth Soul Skill raised walls of fire that divided the Imperial Fighting Team into three groups, and Qin Ming stopped the battle after the team failed to regroup.
• Li Man concluded that persistent elemental contamination required abandoning formation nodes instead of switching routes, while Yu Tianheng, Yu Feng, and Osler told Dong Jian not to direct every teammate’s move.
• Dong Jian decided to focus on formation-breaking threats, handoffs between teammates, and enemy actions that could change the battlefield, while Li Man removed the burned formation cores without reclaiming their Soul Power.

Dong Jian and the Imperial Fighting Team defeated Blazing Fire in their second match by adapting their formation and fighting independently instead of relying on his constant direction. Huo Wu warned that their next opponent, Godwind Academy’s Feng Xiaotian, might never come down to the ground.

• Huo Wu found the Imperial Fighting Team using the same formation, but Dong Jian stayed silent while his teammates judged and answered threats on their own.
• Li Man introduced Scorched Bamboo Abandoned Path by destroying overheated formation eyes and abandoning burned nodes instead of trying to preserve every route.
• Dong Jian redirected Huo Wushuang’s charge into Shi Mo’s Black Tortoise shell, letting Yu Tianheng, Li Man, and Yu Feng turn the impact into a coordinated counterattack.
• When Huo Wu’s flames threatened to split the team, Yu Tianheng took command, Li Man narrowed the formation, and Dong Jian held the final connecting point so the team stayed together.
• Yu Feng and Yu Tianheng helped secure the win, and Qin Ming stopped the match; afterward, Huo Wu warned that an airborne opponent could negate the team’s ground-based tactics.
• Qin Ming received the next exchange schedule, which named Godwind Academy and Feng Xiaotian, leaving Dong Jian uneasy about facing an opponent who might stay in the air.

Dong Jian challenged Feng Xiaotian and lost when he could not keep up with the flying Soul Master's rapid attacks. After Li Man pointed out that Feng Xiaotian had to make contact to attack, Dong Jian began considering how to exploit those moments in a rematch.

• Feng Xiaotian challenged Dong Jian to a one-on-one match so he could test Dong Jian's ten-thousand-year Fourth Soul Ring.
• Dong Jian used Yin-Yang Mountain Domain and Force Observation to read Feng Xiaotian's attacks, but could not reliably react to his aerial changes of direction or maintain contact for Yin-Yang Force Redirection.
• Feng Xiaotian used Gale Demon Wolf Thirty-Six Consecutive Slashes to drive Dong Jian out of the arena, ending the match with Dong Jian's defeat.
• Dong Jian reviewed the fight and recognized that he could endure Feng Xiaotian's attacks but had no reliable way to pursue him in the air.
• Li Man advised Dong Jian to focus on the moments when Feng Xiaotian had to make contact rather than chase his flight path, and Dong Jian agreed to recover and try again the next day.

Dong Jian and Li Man tested a tactic against Feng Xiaotian, using temporary Green Jade Dragon Bamboo nodes to redirect Dong Jian after contact and break Feng Xiaotian’s Thirty-Six Consecutive Slashes. The team prepared for its next exchange against Skywater Academy, where Dong Jian expected the ground itself to be unreliable.

• Qin Ming arranged a training session where Li Man gave Dong Jian three formation nodes to test against Feng Xiaotian.
• Dong Jian used Li Man’s temporary bamboo node to alter his direction after contact, though repeated attempts showed the node could not bear much weight or last long.
• Feng Xiaotian avoided the pre-placed nodes, so Li Man and Dong Jian changed tactics and waited for him to attack before creating one.
• On Feng Xiaotian’s twentieth slash, Li Man formed a bamboo vine at the moment of contact, letting Dong Jian pivot and break Feng Xiaotian’s Thirty-Six Consecutive Slashes.
• Qin Ming revealed that Skywater Academy would arrive in three days, and Dong Jian anticipated facing Shui Bing’er on ground that might not be trustworthy.

Skywater Academy defeated the Imperial Fighting Team by exploiting the ice and water to disrupt Dong Jian’s Yin-Yang Mountain Domain and Li Man’s ground-based formation. After the match, Dong Jian and Li Man decided to fight without relying on their strongest methods in the next match.

• Shui Bing'er froze, melted, and shifted layers of ice and water, confusing Dong Jian’s Mountain Domain and displacing Li Man’s formation anchors.
• Skywater Academy trapped Shi Mo and split the Imperial Fighting Team with an ice wall, prompting Qin Ming to stop the match and award Skywater Academy the win.
• Dong Jian admitted he had relied too much on his Fourth Soul Skill, while Li Man recognized that she had relied too much on the ground remaining stable.
• The Divine Dragon Secret Realm reminded Dong Jian that his basic combat techniques worked independently of Mountain Domain.
• Dong Jian vowed not to use his Fourth Soul Skill in the next match, and Li Man said she would avoid using a main ground formation.

Dong Jian led the Imperial Fighting Team to victory over Skywater Academy without using his Fourth Soul Skill, relying on observation and coordination as the team learned to reconnect its forces. After Qin Ming defined Yu Tianheng as the spearhead, Li Man as the net, and Dong Jian as the pivot, the next exchange roster named Thunder Academy and Yu Tianxin, setting up a test for Yu Tianheng.

• Dong Jian kept his Fourth Soul Ring and Yin-Yang Mountain Domain inactive while Li Man adapted her formation into mobile nodes attached to teammates.
• Dong Jian guided Yu Tianheng, Shi Mo, and Osler through Shui Bing'er's icy terrain, intervening only when the team's central line or healing route was threatened.
• The Imperial Fighting Team regrouped as a unit and forced Skywater Academy's defensive line apart, winning the second exchange match and leaving the series tied at one win apiece.
• The Divine Dragon Secret Realm recorded Dong Jian's Fourth Soul Skill participation as zero and marked Yin-Yang Force Redirection as initially mastered.
• Qin Ming arranged the tactics wall with Yu Tianheng as the spearhead, Li Man as the net, and Dong Jian as the pivot.
• A new exchange roster listed Thunder Academy and Yu Tianxin, suggesting Yu Tianheng would face the next major test.

Yu Tianheng sparred with Yu Tianxin and conceded that his cousin had a slight edge in a one-on-one head-on fight. Yu Tianheng then challenged him to a team battle the next day, with Dong Jian and Li Man sitting out, to prove what made him a captain.

• Thunder Academy arrived at Heaven Dou Royal Academy, and Yu Tianheng agreed to spar with Yu Tianxin.
• Yu Tianxin’s relentless attacks pushed Yu Tianheng back, and Yu Tianheng admitted Yu Tianxin had a slight edge in a head-on duel.
• Yu Tianxin questioned whether Yu Tianheng led the Imperial Fighting Team or relied on Dong Jian and Li Man, and Yu Tianheng challenged him to a team battle the next day.
• Yu Tianheng said Dong Jian and Li Man would not participate, and Yu Tianxin accepted the challenge.

Thunder Academy lost its exchange match against the Imperial Fighting Team despite Yu Tianxin repeatedly winning his individual clashes with Yu Tianheng. Yu Tianxin realized that his aggressive advances had separated him from his teammates, while Yu Tianheng’s coordination kept his team intact.

• Yu Tianxin led Thunder Academy in repeated charges, gaining the upper hand in several clashes while the Imperial Fighting Team defended and regrouped.
• Yu Tianheng gave up a chance to press his advantage and ordered his teammates to restore their formation.
• Dugu Yan, Yu Feng, Osler, and the Shi Brothers exploited gaps in Thunder Academy’s formation, forcing its members apart as Yu Tianxin kept pushing forward.
• Yu Tianxin won the final head-on clash with Yu Tianheng, but Thunder Academy’s formation had already collapsed, so its teacher stopped the match and declared the Imperial Fighting Team the winner.
• Yu Tianxin asked Dong Jian what he had seen, and Dong Jian pointed out that Yu Tianxin had won many exchanges but his teammates could not keep up with him.

After Thunder Academy’s exchange match, Yu Tianheng explained to Yu Tianxin why he had learned to pause and coordinate with his team, while accepting that Yu Tianxin might still choose a more aggressive path. With the tournament registration deadline ten days away, Qin Ming ended academy exchanges and shifted the team’s training toward refining and concealing their abilities.

• Yu Tianheng told Yu Tianxin that repeated team-battle failures had taught him to wait for his teammates rather than seize every opening, and Yu Tianxin accepted that their approaches differed.
• Yu Tianxin challenged Dong Jian about serving under Yu Tianheng, and Dong Jian explained that he trusted the captain to make the final decision while each teammate handled a distinct role.
• Thunder Academy departed, and Qin Ming announced that the Imperial Fighting Team would stop exchanges and spend the remaining ten days organizing what to reveal and what to conceal.
• Qin Ming told Dong Jian and Li Man to make their fusion skill’s twelve-breath duration appear to be only eight.

Qin Ming trained Dong Jian and Li Man to conceal the twelve-breath complete Mountain-Suppressing Dragon Bamboo as a weaker public version lasting about eight breaths, while Ye Lingling discovered that Dong Jian’s Dark Gold Spine Armor was becoming harder to hide. The chapter ended with news that Crown Prince Xue Qinghe would visit the academy the next morning, prompting Li Man to warn Dong Jian to conceal his Soul Power carefully.

• Qin Ming ordered Dong Jian and Li Man to redesign their fusion skill so outsiders would see only a plausible eight-breath version without the Dark Gold Spine Armor.
• Dong Jian’s Dark Gold Spine Armor activated faintly on its own, and Ye Lingling explained that Soul Power had begun naturally flowing through its nine embedded locations.
• Dong Jian and Li Man developed a Sealed Spine version of Mountain-Suppressing Dragon Bamboo that lasted seven and a half breaths and allowed only a one-step adjustment.
• Ye Lingling sensed that the Dark Gold Spine Armor was integrating more deeply with Dong Jian’s body and might be detectable by powerful Soul Masters familiar with Soul Bones.
• An academy teacher announced that Crown Prince Xue Qinghe would visit the next morning, and Li Man warned Dong Jian to keep his Soul Power tucked away.

Xue Qinghe visited the Imperial Fighting Team and asked Dong Jian about his rare Soul Ring and the Dark Gold Earth Vein Bear, prompting Li Man to suspect he had noticed Dong Jian’s hidden armor. After Xue Qinghe left, Qin Ming prepared the team to conceal its tactics by replacing their names with numbered calls.

• Xue Qinghe questioned the team about their tournament preparations and asked Dong Jian about his ten-thousand-year Soul Ring and the Dark Gold Earth Vein Bear’s back plates.
• Qin Ming explained that all nine members would register and rotate through matches, with Dong Jian linking their tactics and no one guaranteed a place.
• Li Man noticed Xue Qinghe glance at Dong Jian’s back as he left and warned Dong Jian to keep his Soul Power away from the armor’s most conspicuous spots.
• Dong Jian used the Divine Dragon Secret Realm to review Xue Qinghe’s behavior, but it could not determine his intentions from the available evidence.
• Qin Ming gave the team numbered tactical calls and told them to stop announcing the full names of their formations during matches.

Qin Ming taught the Imperial Fighting Team to coordinate through numbered formations and recover when their plans broke down, then destroyed the written record of their secret trump card. After Dugu Yan received word that she needed a final poison check at Sunset Forest, Dong Jian and Li Man were assigned to accompany her, and Dong Jian prepared to revisit the Ice and Fire Yin Yang Well.

• Qin Ming organized the team's existing tactics into five numbered formations and taught them to use numbers and hand signals instead of shouting specific instructions.
• Qin Ming explained that anyone could initiate part of the Yin-Yang Axis formation, while Dong Jian only needed to judge whether its stages connected.
• The team practiced formation transitions, and after a communication breakdown they independently recovered into a complete formation without following any numbered tactic.
• Qin Ming burned the manual's final page, which recorded the team's secret twelve-breath formation involving Dark Gold Spine Armor and Mountain-Suppressing Dragon Bamboo.
• A staff member delivered Dugu Yan a letter from Sunset Forest, and she told the team her grandfather wanted her back for a final poison check before the tournament.
• Qin Ming sent Dong Jian and Li Man with Dugu Yan, while Dong Jian thought about returning to the Ice and Fire Yin Yang Well and the white flower still waiting there.

Dong Jian, Li Man, and Dugu Yan returned to the Ice and Fire Yin Yang Well so Dugu Bo could assess Dugu Yan’s poison storage before the tournament. As they prepared to leave, Dong Jian cut his palm on a piece of ore, and the Lovesick Heartbreak Red glowed more clearly in response.

• Dong Jian, Li Man, and Dugu Yan entered Sunset Forest and met Dugu Bo at the Ice and Fire Yin Yang Well.
• Dugu Bo examined Dugu Yan and found that she had stored too much poison in her Right Arm Soul Bone, so he guided her through releasing some of it safely.
• Dong Jian and Li Man discussed the limits of Dugu Yan’s Soul Bone and Dugu Bo’s unresolved need for a compatible poison-attribute Soul Bone.
• Dong Jian and Li Man visited the Lovesick Heartbreak Red, which briefly glowed after they turned away, but they chose not to investigate it.
• Dugu Bo asked Dong Jian to straighten an old herb rack, and Dong Jian cut his palm on nearby ore as Li Man hurried to check the wound.
• The Lovesick Heartbreak Red’s red markings glowed more clearly after Dong Jian’s palm began to bleed.

Dong Jian and Li Man watched the Lovesick Heartbreak Red respond to them, then acknowledged their feelings without confessing or picking the flower. After they returned to Heaven Dou Royal Academy, a participant list revealed that Tang San and the rest of the Shrek team would compete in the Soul Master Tournament, prompting Qin Ming to warn Dong Jian not to rely on old information.

• The Lovesick Heartbreak Red glowed and lifted slightly from the Black Perish Stone, and Dugu Bo suggested it responded to what Dong Jian and Li Man kept in their hearts.
• Dong Jian and Li Man admitted they understood some of their feelings but left the confession and the flower untouched.
• Dong Jian, Li Man, and Dugu Yan left Sunset Forest and returned to Heaven Dou Royal Academy, where Yu Feng gave them the latest tournament participant lists.
• Dong Jian recognized Tang San, Xiao Wu, Dai Mubai, Oscar, Ma Hongjun, Ning Rongrong, and Zhu Zhuqing on Shrek's roster.
• Qin Ming cautioned Dong Jian that the Shrek he knew was from the past, while the reliability of the old combat model in the Divine Dragon Secret Realm began to decline.

The Imperial Fighting Team reviewed the outdated information they had on Shrek and agreed to retain past observations without treating them as current answers. On the Soul Master Tournament’s opening day, Dong Jian waited with the team while Qin Ming held the first-round lineup, leaving his participation undecided.

• Yu Feng argued that the team should prioritize Tang San, but Li Man and Dong Jian warned that their old knowledge of Shrek might no longer apply.
• Dong Jian used the Divine Dragon Secret Realm to check the old battle models, found their reliability low, and shut them down as current tactical analyses.
• Qin Ming organized cautious notes on Shrek’s members, and the team agreed to update its information after seeing them fight.
• An education committee assistant asked Qin Ming to consider fielding Dong Jian for publicity because of his ten-thousand-year Fourth Soul Ring, but Qin Ming made no decision without knowing the opponent.
• At the tournament’s opening, the Imperial Fighting Team gathered in the waiting area as Qin Ming held the first-round lineup and Dong Jian waited to learn whether he would compete.

The Imperial Fighting Team opened the tournament with a decisive win using its traditional seven members, while Dong Jian sat out and kept his black Fourth Soul Ring hidden. The next draw matched them against an opponent Qin Ming approved for Dong Jian to face, leaving him ready to reveal part of his power.

• Huo Wu studied the Imperial Fighting Team's formation, Feng Xiaotian greeted Dong Jian from afar, and Shui Bing'er examined the fighting platform as the academies gathered.
• The draw paired Heaven Dou Royal Academy with a weaker local academy, but Qin Ming rejected the education committee's request to use Dong Jian as a spectacle and selected the traditional seven-member lineup.
• Yu Tianheng, Dugu Yan, Ye Lingling, Yu Feng, Osler, Shi Mo, and Shi Mo defeated their opponents cleanly without Dong Jian taking the field.
• Dong Jian watched the match without using his observation or simulation abilities, while Tang San noted that the Imperial Fighting Team's fundamentals had remained intact.
• After the day's draw ended, Qin Ming told Dong Jian he would fight in the second match and could use his Fourth Soul Ring, but only to show what was necessary.