Recaps

Su Mu accepted Ye Qingxue’s offer to buy the A-rank Golden Lion Beast card, promising to repay the difference later. Ye Qingxue secured her grandfather’s authorization and sent the card to Su Mu’s account.

• Su Mu found that the Golden Lion Beast card could help him create a powerful demon king, but he lacked the money to buy it.
• Ye Qingxue offered to cover the cost beyond Su Mu’s funds, and he agreed to owe her the difference.
• Ye Qingxue asked her grandfather to authorize the purchase, explaining that she was buying the card for a friend.
• Ye Qingxue told her grandfather that she had reached level sixteen after clearing the hell-level Land of Buried Bones with Su Mu.
• Ye Qingxue’s grandfather granted access, and she sent Su Mu the card’s extraction code.

Qingxue’s grandparents discussed her request to buy an A-rank Golden Lion Beast card for a boy who helped her clear a hell-difficulty dungeon. They agreed to let Qingxue judge his character herself, though her grandfather left open the possibility of investigating him later.

• Qingxue’s grandfather told his wife that Qingxue wanted to buy an A-rank Golden Lion Beast card for a boy who helped her level up in a hell-difficulty dungeon.
• Qingxue’s grandmother argued that Qingxue’s lengthy explanation showed she cared about the boy, and revealed that her husband had already asked someone to learn about him.
• Qingxue’s grandfather considered the boy’s dungeon feat and decided that investigating him might put Qingxue in an awkward position.
• Qingxue’s grandparents agreed not to investigate the boy for now and to let Qingxue judge his character herself.

Su Mu collected the A-rank Golden Lion Beast card and a random Soul Skill book that Ye Qingxue had secured for him, then awakened the S-rank World-Cleansing Radiance skill. He ended the chapter resting before embedding the beast card, since his Soul Power had not recovered.

• Su Mu changed the pickup location to the Professional Service Hall and thanked Ye Qingxue for obtaining the A-rank beast card and Soul Skill book.
• Ye Qingxue explained that she wanted to compete with Su Mu fairly rather than beat him while he lacked resources.
• Su Mu collected the two items from the Professional Service Hall and returned home, where his aunt teased him about Ye Qingxue.
• Su Mu channeled mental power into the random Soul Skill book and obtained the S-rank World-Cleansing Radiance, which removed any negative status from an ally regardless of rank.
• Su Mu put the Golden Lion Beast card back into his Soul Space and lay down to rest because his Soul Power was depleted.

Su Mu summoned the Golden Lion Beast to Lion Camel Ridge and named him Green Lion King, greatly increasing his attributes while he remained half-embedded. Green Lion King’s rank stayed A, and Su Mu suspected his concept was incomplete without his sworn brothers; Little Drill Wind cautiously accepted the newcomer.

• Su Mu used 200 Soul Power to summon the half-embedded Golden Lion Beast to Lion Camel Ridge.
• Little Drill Wind confronted the unfamiliar beast until Su Mu reassured him through their Soul Link that it was a companion.
• Su Mu named the Golden Lion Beast Green Lion King, boosting his attributes and granting him Lion Camel Ridge Pressure, though his displayed rank remained A.
• Su Mu suspected Green Lion King’s rank had not risen because his concept lacked his sworn brothers, White Elephant and Golden-Winged Great Peng.
• Little Drill Wind put away his blade and respectfully saluted Green Lion King.

Su Mu prepared for the college entrance exam after reflecting on his rapid progress and the unfinished state of the Green Lion King. He arrived at Rongcheng No. 1 High School, where students and staff gathered around the teleportation array as the exam was about to begin.

• Little Drill Wind greeted the Green Lion King but seemed confused by his appearance and incomplete state, leading Su Mu to conclude that the Green Lion King was not yet fully realized.
• Su Mu read Li Ming’s messages about military academy training, wished him luck, and then went to sleep ahead of the exam.
• Su Mu woke at six, ate noodles prepared by his aunt, and took the bus to Rongcheng No. 1 High School.
• Students gathered on the playground around a large teleportation array while school administrators, teachers, and staff prepared for the college entrance exam.

Teachers at Rongcheng’s school assessed the students’ levels and expected Ye Qingxue to reach level fifteen, while Wang Hao surprised them by reaching level fifteen. Ye Qingxue arrived at level sixteen on the seventh day after awakening, leaving Zhao Jianguo and the teachers stunned and delighted.

• Teachers discussed level thresholds and predicted that Ye Qingxue and other top students might reach level fourteen or fifteen.
• Lin Yuan and Chen Zimo arrived at level fourteen, while another expected student registered level thirteen.
• Wang Hao was scanned twice and confirmed at level fifteen, impressing the teachers.
• Teachers said level sixteen had never been reached in Rongcheng within a week and expected Ye Qingxue to reach level fifteen.
• Ye Qingxue arrived and was confirmed at level sixteen, a result Zhao Jianguo said would rank in the province’s top ten.

Rongcheng No. 1 High School’s teachers expected Ye Qingxue and Wang Hao to lead the college entrance exam, while dismissing Su Mu’s prospects because of his F-grade stone core card and lack of resources. Su Mu arrived at level seventeen, stunning the teachers and forcing Zhao Jianguo to reconsider how far he could go.

• Teachers praised Ye Qingxue’s level sixteen and discussed her chances of entering Tsinghua or Peking University.
• A young teacher asked about Su Mu, and the teachers and Zhao Jianguo argued that his F-grade core card, unusual theme, and limited family resources made high achievement unlikely.
• Students continued arriving for the exam, and teachers noted that the overall levels were lower than the previous year’s.
• Su Mu walked onto the athletic field, where the identification device repeatedly confirmed that he had reached level seventeen.
• Zhao Jianguo realized Su Mu had reached level seventeen on the seventh day after awakening and concluded that his earlier accomplishments had only been a starting point.

As the students gathered to teleport, Zhao Jianguo recognized Su Mu as a potential dark horse, while Su Mu and Ye Qingxue exchanged thanks and wished each other luck. The teleportation array activated, carrying the students away.

• Zhao Jianguo praised Su Mu’s level and skill, calling him a possible dark horse among the students.
• Su Mu thanked Ye Qingxue for the Golden Lion Beast card and random soul skill book, and she said she had been the one to benefit from their dungeon run.
• Su Mu and Ye Qingxue discussed his chances of entering Tsinghua or Peking University and wished each other luck.
• Zhao Jianguo asked the gathered students if they were ready and signaled the staff to activate the teleportation array.
• The array enveloped Su Mu and the other students in white light as they were teleported away.

Su Mu and Ye Qingxue arrived at the vast college entrance examination plaza, where Su Mu saw the legendary Dragon Gate floating above the crowds. He considered how he might acquire a similar structure and adapt it into the South Heaven Gate for his dungeon.

• Su Mu surveyed the plaza and realized that hundreds of thousands of dungeon-master candidates had gathered for the examination.
• Ye Qingxue drew Su Mu's attention to the Dragon Gate floating among the clouds above the plaza.
• Su Mu recalled that the examination site was a specially adapted Heroic Spirit Secret Realm that could not cause real harm to humans.
• Su Mu considered whether he could someday build a similar floating gate in his dungeon and turn it into the South Heaven Gate.

Su Mu learned the Dragon Gate Trial’s place in the college entrance examination and heard the rules for its first three trials. He entered his Dungeon Space for the Nest Trial, where the countdown began before the first wave.

• Ye Qingxue explained that crossing the Dragon Gate required an exceptional evaluation and that only a tiny fraction of examinees ever attempted it.
• A bell sounded, and an emotionless voice announced that the examination had begun and only the top 0.13 percent after three trials could advance to the fourth.
• The voice explained that the first trial would send examinees into separate Dungeon Spaces to fight increasingly numerous, refreshing waves of monsters for points.
• Su Mu calculated that he would need to balance killing quickly for a higher points coefficient with preserving his strength for later waves.
• Su Mu was teleported into his Dungeon Space and saw the Nest Trial panel begin its preparation countdown.

Su Mu used Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit to clear the first ten waves of the dungeon trial, killing 1,023 monsters in under four minutes. As the tenth wave brought a Goblin Warlord and the coming waves threatened to overwhelm his defenses, Su Mu prepared for the escalating onslaught.

• Su Mu ordered Little Drill Wind to attack monsters head-on and prioritize elites and bosses while White Bone Spirit provided ranged coverage.
• Little Drill Wind killed the first goblins as they emerged, and Su Mu observed that each kill triggered a three-second countdown before the next spawn.
• As the waves grew to 128 monsters, Little Drill Wind fought at the rift while White Bone Spirit's flames stopped goblins from flanking them.
• Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit cleared the ninth wave of 256 monsters and the tenth wave of 512, which included a Goblin Warlord.
• Su Mu checked that they had killed 1,023 monsters with the core card intact and calculated that later waves could reach hundreds of thousands of monsters.

Proctors overseeing the exam discussed Jiang Province’s strong cohort and the prospects of its three examinees with special themes. They assessed Su Mu’s Journey to the West theme as difficult to develop because his core card was only an F-grade stone, then turned their attention back to the top ten.

• The old man noted that more than a thousand examinees had reached the sixth wave in Limit Time, while a teacher described Jiang Province’s record numbers of high-grade core cards.
• The old man asked about the three examinees with special themes, and the teacher outlined Lin Zhao’s Cthulhu Mythos dungeon and Chen Fei’s Strange Tales dungeon and their early difficulties.
• The teacher identified the third examinee as Su Mu, reminding the old man that Su Mu had won last year’s provincial dungeon design competition.
• The teacher revealed that Su Mu’s theme was Journey to the West and his core card was an F-grade stone with no attributes or skills.
• The old man lamented that Su Mu’s weak core card limited his prospects and looked back at the top-ten examinees on the screen.

Teachers discussed how the seventh and eighth waves favored SSS-rank dungeon masters, then watched a B-rank Stone user named Su Mu suddenly surge to first place. The old man realized the live feed showed a different Su Mu from the one he knew, but the rankings continued shifting as Su Mu reached 148 kills in the eighth wave.

• The old man and the teachers explained that the seventh wave separated SSS-rank dungeon masters from weaker ranks and that the eighth wave was difficult to clear within the time limit.
• Su Mu of Rongcheng No. 1 High School appeared in seventh place with a B-rank Stone core card and had reached wave eight.
• The teachers wondered whether Su Mu was the dungeon designer with the same name, while the old man brought up the live feed and saw an unfamiliar young man.
• The rankings shifted dramatically, placing Su Mu first with 148 kills in the current wave.

Su Mu’s record-breaking dungeon run drew the platform’s attention, and the teachers discovered that his dungeon spanned over a hundred kilometers despite his having awakened only seven days earlier. The old man recognized Su Mu as a former dungeon design competition winner and suspected his Soul Power recovery was extraordinary, but lamented that his stone core card and unfamiliar theme might limit his prospects.

• Su Mu cleared the eighth wave of 128 level-twelve monsters within the time limit, leaping from seventh place to first.
• The old man asked to view Su Mu’s dungeon and recognized him as the winner of last year’s provincial dungeon design competition.
• The teachers saw that Su Mu’s dungeon stretched over a hundred kilometers and marveled at its size.
• A teacher revealed that Su Mu had started with 210 Soul Power points, and the old man suggested his recovery rate could be far beyond that of ordinary people.
• The old man lamented that Su Mu’s stone core card and unfamiliar theme left him without the benefit of predecessors’ experience.
• The scene on the light screen suddenly changed.

Su Mu’s yaoguai swept through the ninth wave while invigilators discovered that his dungeon held several extraordinarily powerful, high-rank cards. The chapter left them baffled by how he had assembled and cultivated such a roster in only seven days.

• Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit cut down the level-13 goblin horde with coordinated melee and ranged attacks.
• Invigilators appraised Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit and found both were level-17 SSS-rank cards with combat indexes far beyond normal limits.
• The invigilators realized the two SSS-rank cards could not be Su Mu’s core cards and struggled to explain how he had embedded and raised them so quickly.
• An invigilator spotted Benbo'erba and Babo'erben hidden in Jade Wave Pool and confirmed both were SS-rank cards.
• The teachers found a partially embedded Green Lion King at Lion Camel Ridge and marveled at his high attributes.
• The invigilators counted Su Mu’s two SSS-rank cards, two SS-rank cards, and partially embedded A-rank card, but could not determine how he had built his dungeon.

The proctors recognized Su Mu’s extraordinary talent and alerted the Dungeon Master Association. Elder Xiu arrived and placed a Silencing Curse on everyone present to keep information about Su Mu from reaching foreign races.

• Elder Zhao ordered the proctors to record Su Mu’s battle and remain within a hundred-meter radius while he contacted the association.
• Elder Zhao reported Su Mu’s exceptional cards, Dungeon Space, Soul Power recovery, and monster-clearing speed to the association.
• Elder Xiu appeared on the platform and warned that foreign races must not learn about Su Mu before he matured, recalling the killing of Lin Hao after a leak.
• Elder Xiu cast a Silencing Curse on everyone present, causing any attempt to disclose what they had seen of Su Mu to trigger a backlash.
• Elder Xiu stayed with the proctors as they watched the light screen in silence.

During the tenth through fifteenth waves, Su Mu rearranged his dungeon so the monsters had to cross Lion Camel Ridge before reaching the Stone Left Over from Mending Heaven. Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit cleared each increasingly powerful wave, and the fifteenth wave ended with the core card intact.

• Su Mu moved Flower-Fruit Mountain behind Lion Camel Ridge, making the eighty-kilometer mountain a barrier between the monsters and the core card.
• Su Mu ordered Little Drill Wind to guard the rear pass and White Bone Spirit to burn monsters along the middle mountain path.
• White Bone Spirit and Little Drill Wind wiped out the eleventh and twelfth waves as more monsters began bypassing the curtain of fire.
• In the thirteenth and fourteenth waves, stronger goblins and ranged attackers advanced through Lion Camel Ridge, but Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit killed them before they could damage the core card.
• The fifteenth wave sent 16,384 level-nineteen goblins, elite warlords, and a goblin lord through the rift; after nearly an hour, Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit wiped them out, leaving the core card intact.

Su Mu and his monsters fought through the nineteenth wave as the Stone Left Over from Mending Heaven nearly fell. The first stage ended with 512,347 kills and 973,459 points, and Su Mu was teleported out of the Dungeon Space.

• The eighteenth wave overwhelmed Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit's defenses, and Su Mu ordered them to unleash their full power as the Stone Left Over from Mending Heaven's HP fell to 220,000.
• The nineteenth wave sent more than 520,000 level-23 monsters into the valley, and Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit struggled to kill them before the next wave began.
• As the core card's HP plunged, Su Mu ordered Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit to attack with everything they had.
• The first stage ended when Su Mu's kill count reached 512,347, earning him a points multiplier of 1.9 and a total of 973,459 points.
• Su Mu thanked Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit, and white light teleported him out of the Dungeon Space.

Elder Xiu and the invigilators were astonished by Su Mu’s record-breaking exam results and recognized his ingenuity in building his dungeon. Fearing that publicizing his score would draw the Nest Cult’s attention, Elder Xiu ordered the scores of the top fifty candidates blocked.

• Elder Xiu and the invigilators examined Su Mu’s score of 973,459, earned by reaching wave nineteen and killing over 512,000 monsters.
• The teachers compared Su Mu’s result with Zhao Wuji’s second-place score and marveled at how Su Mu’s dungeon design let his cards defeat stronger monsters.
• Elder Xiu reflected on Su Mu’s rapid progress with the unfamiliar Journey to the West theme and concluded that the student’s abilities were exceptional.
• The invigilators warned Elder Xiu that publicizing Su Mu’s overwhelming score could attract the Nest Cult, an organization that infiltrated human society and targeted geniuses.
• Elder Xiu ordered the scores of the top fifty candidates blocked, citing a new association policy intended to reduce exam-related pressure.

Elder Xiu placed Su Mu’s records under the Great Xia Dungeon Master Association’s highest-level control as Su Mu returned after more than five hours in the dungeon. The first-round rankings appeared with Su Mu in first place, though his points remained hidden.

• Elder Xiu ordered Su Mu’s battle recordings sealed and transferred control of his file from local authorities to the association headquarters.
• Examinees waiting in the square speculated about why the second round had not begun, while Ye Qingxue worried that Su Mu was still in the dungeon.
• Su Mu appeared in the square calm and composed, and Ye Qingxue decided to wait for the rankings rather than question him.
• The rankings refreshed with Su Mu in first place, Zhao Wuji second, Lin Qingyin third, Zhou Zekai fourth, and Ye Qingxue thirteenth; Su Mu’s points were hidden.

The leaderboard revealed Su Mu in first place, while the exact scores of the top fifty remained hidden. Wang Hao saw Su Mu’s ranking and, despite his jealousy, held on to the hope that he could outperform him in the remaining rounds.

• The examinees learned that the top fifty scores had been hidden under a new policy, and speculated that the leaders had earned between 25,000 and 40,000 points.
• Wang Hao spotted Su Mu of Rongcheng No. 1 High School in first place and struggled to believe that someone with Su Mu’s core card had beaten the top-ranked awakened.
• A lackey recognized Su Mu’s name, but Wang Hao cut him off before he could question Su Mu’s core card.
• Wang Hao accepted that Su Mu had outperformed him in the first round, then reminded himself that three rounds remained and turned away from the leaderboard.

After Su Mu took first place in the monster-clearing round, Ye Qingxue and Zhao Wuji wondered how he had scored so highly, while Su Mu avoided telling Ye Qingxue his score. The second round began with candidates facing increasingly powerful waves of bosses, leaving Su Mu to prepare Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit for a new challenge.

• Ye Qingxue told Su Mu that she had scored 131,068 points and placed thirteenth, and Su Mu estimated that the scores above hers were not far higher.
• Zhao Wuji and other SSS-rank students from Provincial Capital No. 1 High School questioned Su Mu’s first-place finish and expected later rounds to show whether he was truly stronger.
• Ye Qingxue asked Su Mu for his score, but he hesitated because his 970,000 points dwarfed her result and he did not want to discourage her.
• A bell announced the second round, interrupting their conversation and revealing that candidates would face waves of bosses in individual Dungeon Spaces.
• Su Mu read that boss levels would rise through the eleventh wave before their numbers and combat capabilities increased, and considered the challenge ahead for Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit.

Su Mu’s Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit cleared the first ten boss waves in under three minutes without taking significant damage. The proctors watched as the next waves promised coordinated groups of bosses that would test the dungeon’s real combat strength.

• Su Mu ordered Little Drill Wind to attack from the front and White Bone Spirit to flank each boss.
• Little Drill Wind killed the level-ten Goblin Warlord with a single strike, beginning a string of fast boss clears.
• Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit defeated all ten bosses in two minutes and forty-seven seconds while keeping the score multiplier at 1.0.
• The proctors noted that Su Mu’s cards had lost almost no health and attributed their performance to superior base stats.
• Elder Xiu and the teachers explained that later waves would pit Su Mu against increasingly numerous, coordinated groups of bosses.

Su Mu cleared waves eleven through fourteen with Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit, reaching a 500-point multiplier with his core card intact. The fifteenth wave began with five powerful Crimson Crown Royal Court bosses emerging from an expanded rift.

• Su Mu identified the eleventh wave's Ironclad Warlord and Shadow Priest as coordinated opponents and ordered Little Drill Wind to kill the priest while White Bone Spirit held off the warlord.
• Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit killed both bosses in under a minute, raising the point multiplier to 200.
• Su Mu cleared waves twelve through fourteen as the boss groups grew larger and more tactically coordinated, reaching 26 total kills and a 500-point multiplier.
• Su Mu judged that the fifteenth wave would mark a new dividing line and watched the rift expand across the ground before him.
• Su Mu appraised five level-twenty Crimson Crown Royal Court bosses, including an SS-rank Crimson Crown Commander.

Su Mu watched Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit defeat the coordinated bosses of the fifteenth wave, whose intelligence and abilities approached those of Hell-difficulty bosses. The wave’s completion revealed that the points multiplier had doubled to 1000, leaving Su Mu to anticipate even greater difficulty.

• The Crimson Crown Commander led four other bosses against Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit, while Su Mu told his allies to break up their coordination.
• The bosses combined shields, curses, healing, ranged attacks, stealth, and commands, but Little Drill Wind and White Bone Spirit targeted the links that sustained their teamwork.
• White Bone Spirit broke the Blood Curse Shaman’s staff, and Little Drill Wind shattered the Golden Armor Imperial Guard’s shield before killing the Shadow Fang Assassin; White Bone Spirit then burned the Rock-Splitting Thrower, and Little Drill Wind killed the Crimson Crown Commander.
• Su Mu saw the fifteenth wave marked complete with 29 bosses killed and the core card intact, while the points multiplier jumped from 500 to 1000.