[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"origin-after-the-sky-fell":3,"chapter-after-the-sky-fell-after-the-sky-fell-chapter-241":6,"glossary-terms-4462":23},{"origin":4,"title":5},"chinese","After the Sky Fell",{"chapter":7,"nextChapterSlug":19,"prevChapterSlug":20,"totalChapters":21,"novelImage":22},{"id":8,"novel_id":9,"title":10,"slug":11,"index":12,"content":13,"wordcount":14,"created_at":15,"updated_at":15,"volume":16,"translator":17,"content_hash":18},2281097,4462,"Chapter 241","after-the-sky-fell-chapter-241",241,"\u003Cp>Faced with a room from which they could not escape, a bizarre costume that could not be destroyed, and the constant appearance of dead hands and feet, all their beliefs had been overturned within mere minutes—they believed such horrors could not possibly exist in this world.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>If they did, the world would have been destroyed long ago; how could peace and prosperity still remain?\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“If ghosts exist in this world, then there must be ways to combat them. Our powers are useless here; if we want to survive, we must use this world’s methods—but it’s too late now. All five of us are trapped, no one will come to save us. Perhaps we’re the unluckiest group of cross-worlders, dead before even eight hours have passed since arriving.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Qin Bing laughed now, a bitter and helpless laugh.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Damn it, if I’d known this would happen, we should’ve split up instead of sticking together—Zhang Xun led us to ruin,” Xu Qiu Mei spat through gritted teeth.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Yes.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>If we’d split up, at least we wouldn’t all be wiped out—some of us might’ve survived. We wouldn’t be locked together in this room like this.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But Zhang Xun’s decision wasn’t wrong: first explore this world’s supernatural forces, then decide our next move—it was cautious. They just never imagined the horror here surpassed everyone’s expectations, whether Spirit Perception, Soul Realm, or even Qi Channeling cultivators.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>All power and methods proved useless.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Such a situation would be catastrophic anywhere—not just on Earth, but in any world.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>And yet the people of this world still live happily despite it—unimaginable.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“If we ever get a chance to escape alive, we must find this world’s method of fighting powerful ghosts. But now, everyone, pray for your own survival,” Li Yi said, his face dark. He had no time now to seek revenge on Xu Qiu Mei—his greatest enemy was an old costume.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>At that moment.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>From beneath the old costume, a pair of cold, dead feet emerged, thudding heavily against the floor. At the collar, a pale, swollen lump rose—and slowly, a white-faced head emerged. But when they saw that head, every heart sank to the bottom.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The face belonged to their captain, Zhang Xun.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>A Soul Realm powerhouse—he’d truly been killed by the costume, just as Qin Bing had guessed.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>After Zhang Xun’s death, his head seemed controlled by some incomprehensible force, becoming a wearer of the costume—like a mannequin, merely there to hold it up.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“What the hell.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Zhang Jing was breaking down. Seeing her captain dead shattered her last shred of hope—deep despair flooded her entire body.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Yet Zhang Xun’s head tilted at an impossible angle, then slowly turned—his eyes snapped open.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But his eyes were no longer bright. Now they were dull, ashen, hollow. The dead Zhang Xun seemed to recognize the people before him, gazing with an unnatural look—as if telling them: none of you are leaving today.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Don’t give up! Fight your way out! Once we leave this room, we’ll be fine—our mobility is superior; this thing can’t catch us,” Qin Bing gritted his teeth, his eyes blazing with desperate will to survive.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He didn’t want to die here.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He didn’t want to be killed by a piece of clothing.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He’d trained hard for years, slain countless supernatural creatures, risked his life countless times—finally becoming a cross-worlder. He didn’t want to die on his first crossing. Behind him were family, relatives, friends—all waiting for him to return, hoping he’d secure a spot to take them from dangerous Earth to a peaceful world.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Kill!”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Qin Bing roared, reigniting his energy flame, charging forward like a moth into fire.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“All of you—use everything you’ve got! If we can’t find a way to destroy this thing, we’re all dead,” Li Yi gritted his teeth and chose to fight for even the slimmest chance.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>A cultivator doesn’t sit and wait to die.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Zhang Jing, Tao Yuan, and Xu Qiu Mei agreed. They were all Spirit Perception cultivators who’d fought their way out of their own cities. In this crisis, they could only fight for survival—even if their powers failed, even if their energy bursts did nothing, they couldn’t abandon even a single thread of hope.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The five faced the bizarre costume without retreating—they unleashed their own techniques.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>They tried to destroy the costume, break open doors and windows, even shatter the floor to drop to the level below—anything to survive, they’d try it all.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Meanwhile.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Outside the sealed building.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Someone entered the building. How is your security? Ordinary people without supernatural power breached your perimeter. If they just died inside, fine—but if they bring the ghost out, how much trouble will that cause?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“We barely managed to contain one ghost by sealing just one building. If it escapes again, containment won’t be so easy.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Outside the cordon, a man with corpse-like blotches on his face and a stench of decay stared intently at one floor of the building.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>A supernatural resonance told him: supernatural energy was spreading on that floor.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Sorry, it’s our fault,” a staff member said, deeply ashamed.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But an assistant handed over a tablet: “Look—this is the nearby surveillance footage. We slowed it down tenfold to see a shadow crossing the perimeter. No normal human could move that fast. And look—the footprints left on the ground.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Another image appeared: two footprints sunk deep into cement, the surrounding ground cracked violently by immense force.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The man with corpse blotches picked it up, his numb eyes flickering with surprise: “This isn’t supernatural power. This is raw physical strength. Not a ghost-wielder, yet capable of this? The world’s gone mad—monsters of every shape are crawling out. Since they’re not human, to be safe, let them die inside this building.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“If they somehow escape, I’ll kill them myself—to prevent them from bringing the ghost out.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>As he spoke, a chilling aura spread from his body.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The surrounding lights flickered and buzzed, as if disturbed by some unseen force.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>As head of Dazhuang City, Wang Qiao always followed the principle: better to kill wrongly than to let one slip. He wouldn’t gamble a city’s safety on a few lives.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But now, Li Yi and the others were trapped in danger and despair.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The five of them combined all their strength—yet laughably, they hadn’t even chipped a single piece of wall. The entire room seemed wrapped in an incomprehensible force; unless they broke it, they couldn’t affect any physical object in reality.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>And now, they had no room left to resist.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Merely brushing against the costume triggered a dead hand to emerge—just as it had done to Qin Bing—pulling them into the fabric. Even if you dodged the first strike with a cultivator’s reflexes, a second hand, then a third, would appear—until you had nowhere left to flee.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Inside the room, the old costume swayed, cold air spreading, Zhang Xun’s head staring at them with its unnatural gaze.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Cold hands had seized them all, slowly eroding their bodies.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Zhang Jing, close by, was filled with terror. No matter how she struggled, it was useless. She could only watch as black, icy fingers crawled over her face, blinding her vision, while crushing pressure pressed in from all sides—as if countless corpses surged and squeezed her from the dark.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Had her physical condition been weaker, she’d have already spat blood and died.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But now, things weren’t much better—she saw the dark red costume drawing nearer.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The darkness within the garment seemed set to become her grave.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Never thought I’d die alongside you,” Xu Qiu Mei gasped, fear laced with resentment. Her tall, slender body twisted grotesquely, forcing a cry of agony from her lips.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>She was being seized by those monstrous dead hands, dragged forcibly into the sleeve.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But the sleeve was so narrow—how could her body fit? The result: she was being slowly crushed by a terrifying force. At first she could struggle, but the pull grew stronger and stronger, limitless—now exceeding even the limit of a Spirit Perception cultivator.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Do you think I wanted to die with you?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Li Yi too was seized by the ghostly hands. His bloodline erupted in fury, yet he couldn’t break free—helplessly watching himself dragged into the gaping collar.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Darkness swallowed half his body, and as time passed, more and more vanished—until he disappeared entirely from this world.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Qin Bing and Tao Yuan met the same fate—trapped, unable to escape, awaiting death.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>All five could already foresee their end.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Their final fate might mirror Zhang Xun’s—becoming part of the costume, serving as its hands or feet.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Is this truly the end?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Li Yi’s vision darkened further, the cold deepening. He could no longer hear the others—he felt pulled into an unknown place, everything alien. Around him, countless cold corpses writhed—whether truly dead or still clinging to fragments of consciousness, they all reached out with hands and limbs, desperate to grasp anything beyond the costume’s gaps, like drowning men clawing for air.\u003C\u002Fp>",1486,"2026-06-20T01:27:02.229Z",1,"Qwen3-Next 80B","e668799ac3b0082a85f155dbc1e21473189f3fefe7b21762e95541e552fcc744","after-the-sky-fell-chapter-242","after-the-sky-fell-chapter-240",1000,"https:\u002F\u002Fnovelzhen.com\u002Fimages\u002Fcovers\u002Fafter-the-sky-fell-cover.jpg",{"terms":24},[25,29,33,37,41,45,49,53,57,61,65,69,73,77,81,85,89,93,97,101,105,109,113,117,121,125,129,133,137,141,145],{"id":26,"raw_term":27,"original_term":28},1803422,"Li Yi","李易",{"id":30,"raw_term":31,"original_term":32},1803423,"Zhao Xiaoxiao","趙曉曉",{"id":34,"raw_term":35,"original_term":36},1803424,"Wu Zhen","吳振",{"id":38,"raw_term":39,"original_term":40},1803425,"Zhang Gao","張高",{"id":42,"raw_term":43,"original_term":44},1803426,"Xiang Xiangzi","香湘子",{"id":46,"raw_term":47,"original_term":48},1803427,"Xuan Yuezi","玄月子",{"id":50,"raw_term":51,"original_term":52},1803428,"Bald Daoist","禿道人",{"id":54,"raw_term":55,"original_term":56},1803429,"Taiyi","太易",{"id":58,"raw_term":59,"original_term":60},1803430,"Yun Feizi","雲妃子",{"id":62,"raw_term":63,"original_term":64},1803431,"Du Baizhi","杜白芷",{"id":66,"raw_term":67,"original_term":68},1803432,"Wu Zuohua","武左華",{"id":70,"raw_term":71,"original_term":72},1803433,"Zhou Yu","周煜",{"id":74,"raw_term":75,"original_term":76},1803434,"Cang'erzi","蒼耳子",{"id":78,"raw_term":79,"original_term":80},1803435,"Li Chengyu","李成玉",{"id":82,"raw_term":83,"original_term":84},1803436,"Tai Xianweng","太仙翁",{"id":86,"raw_term":87,"original_term":88},1803437,"Old Daoist Wu","吳老道",{"id":90,"raw_term":91,"original_term":92},1803438,"Sun Boxiu","孫伯修",{"id":94,"raw_term":95,"original_term":96},1803439,"Tianjiang Zi","天江子",{"id":98,"raw_term":99,"original_term":100},1803440,"Sun Fei","孫飛",{"id":102,"raw_term":103,"original_term":104},1803441,"You Nu","憂女",{"id":106,"raw_term":107,"original_term":108},1803442,"Bai You","白幽",{"id":110,"raw_term":111,"original_term":112},1803443,"Liu Ming","劉明",{"id":114,"raw_term":115,"original_term":116},1803444,"Yang Wei","楊偉",{"id":118,"raw_term":119,"original_term":120},1803445,"Ning Wu","寧舞",{"id":122,"raw_term":123,"original_term":124},1803446,"Haili","海力",{"id":126,"raw_term":127,"original_term":128},1803447,"Meiling","梅玲",{"id":130,"raw_term":131,"original_term":132},1803448,"Shan Yi","善翼",{"id":134,"raw_term":135,"original_term":136},1803449,"Golden Feather Demon King","金羽妖王",{"id":138,"raw_term":139,"original_term":140},1803450,"Wang Chengjun","王成軍",{"id":142,"raw_term":143,"original_term":144},1803451,"Li Weiguo","李衛國",{"id":146,"raw_term":147,"original_term":148},1803452,"Miao Huizi","妙慧子"]