Bald Crane
The Bald Crane is Su Ming's long-traveling companion, a shameless, cowardly, crystal-obsessed spirit whose frivolity conceals an ancient origin. It can assume many forms, deceive Runes, and draw on extraordinary spiritual power when motivated. Its personality was born after the Saint Defier being Kong Mo lost its body and memories, making restored power a threat to its current self.
At first the Bald Crane follows Su Ming from fear and later because crystals overcome its caution. Across thousands of years, however, coercion and bargaining become friendship. It burns its soul to help Su Ming Possess Ecang, refuses to become Kong Mo when doing so would erase their shared life, and ultimately accepts that erasure to give Su Ming a chance against Xuan Zang. The bird that claims it will do anything for money eventually gives up identity, memory, and home for another person.
Biography
The false divine crane of the World of Nine Yin
The Bald Crane first appears through the power hidden in a statue, producing the image of a thousand-foot crane and trying to frighten Su Ming away with threats it is visibly relieved not to carry out. By the time Su Ming encounters it again, it has taken the magnificent form of a seven-colored peacock and convinced Mo Luo to worship it and make offerings. Su Ming exposes the dirty, nearly featherless creature beneath the display, collapsing Mo Luo's belief in his patron. The Bald Crane immediately redirects its flattery toward the stronger party and follows Su Ming while privately looking for an escape. (Chapters 412, 537–539)
Its first substantial service reveals that the boasting is not entirely empty. Faced with a great protective Rune, the Bald Crane changes into an ancient-looking human, fuses its presence with the formation, imitates the person who created it, and causes the barrier to open without alerting those inside. It then closes the path behind Su Ming and tries to flee, only to discover that Su Ming anticipated the betrayal. Su Ming places a seal connected to his own mind inside the bird; what might have been a brief encounter becomes enforced companionship because the Bald Crane chose deception when it had been free to leave. (Chapters 539–540)
The seal keeps the Bald Crane nearby, but its behavior is governed as much by greed as fear. It strips fallen cultivators of storage bags and valuables with practiced speed, finds ways through further layers of Heaven Gate when promised the spoils, and recognizes a Morning Dao Seal from broken memories. It remains with Su Ming through the old xun maker's dreamlike trial, but later runs during danger when Su Ming is weakened. The early relationship is therefore unstable: Su Ming values its rare practical abilities, while the Bald Crane cooperates when restrained, frightened, or rewarded and escapes when it believes survival requires it. (Chapters 540–600)
Confidence schemes in South Morning and a chosen pursuit
While separated from Su Ming, the Bald Crane assumes the form of an old man and turns Qian Chen into an unwilling accomplice. It robs him, delays his promised journey to Evil Spirit Sect until they obtain one hundred thousand spirit stones, and lures successive travelers into schemes as “Grandpa Crane.” Qian Chen's own extravagant flattery later reminds Su Ming of the bird, but the Bald Crane's version remains more effective because it adapts its performance directly to its target's desires. (Chapters 607–708)
The Bald Crane eventually rejoins Su Ming during the Immortal conflict and follows him when he leaves the land of the Berserkers for the Barren Lands of Divine Essence. It can hide inside Su Ming or assume another person's likeness, and it accompanies the Duke of Crimson Flame in misleading pursuers during Su Ming's battles. It also idolizes the Abyss Dragon's dog form, beginning a comic partnership that later becomes a genuine alliance in looting, disguise, and travel. Its decision to follow Su Ming into the unknown marks the point at which flight no longer automatically means flight away from him. (Chapters 747–800)
Breaking the Divine Essence Runes and resisting Kong Mo
In the Barren Lands of Divine Essence, Su Ming asks the Bald Crane to break the Great Divinity Incarceration Rune that monitors the galaxy. It first refuses, then commits itself when offered bags of high-grade crystals. By expanding from hundreds to tens of thousands of feet and spreading ripples that try to fuse with the formation, it pushes its output from a low assessed tier to a level that alarms additional Radix Planets. The Rune has more than nine hundred thousand layers and cannot simply be destroyed, so the Bald Crane instead helps create the opening Su Ming needs. This representative use defines both its extraordinary specialization and its recurring limit: crystals can drive it far beyond ordinary effort, but sufficiently vast formations still demand time, strain, and an indirect solution. (Chapters 801–803)
The pair then moves through sealed cultivation planets, where the Bald Crane assumes animals, humans, and objects, opens restrictions that stop other cultivators, and helps free sealed creatures. Its transformations are practical rather than cosmetic: by matching an old creator or a formation's own nature, it can deceive a Rune into accepting it. It also serves as infiltrator and looter, using the confusion created by Su Ming and the local beasts to strip entire territories of crystals. Yet revealing this talent would attract dangerous attention, so Su Ming sometimes conceals the Bald Crane's role even when its method would be faster. (Chapters 803–827, 844–918)
Its loyalty is tested during Su Ming's Possession of Ecang. Ecang recognizes it as an old enemy and “thieving crane,” but promises of ever more crystals push the Bald Crane to expand into a spiritual storm, hold back Ecang's will, and finally burn its own soul. The effort lets Su Ming secure half the target but leaves the Bald Crane unconscious and gravely injured. Su Ming preserves a bloodstained green feather and seeks a cure rather than abandoning the damaged spirit, demonstrating that their bargains have already acquired obligations beyond payment. (Chapters 826–845)
The encounter with an ancient voice later awakens the buried identity of Kong Mo. Su Ming infers that Kong Mo came from Saint Defier, infiltrated the creations associated with Old Man Extermination, suffered three catastrophic injuries, lost its physical body and memories, and fell dormant. The Bald Crane's will arose during that dormancy. When Kong Mo tries to awaken and erase it, the bird insists that it is “Su Ming's Bald Crane,” while Su Ming flees the triggering voice until Kong Mo subsides. The crisis defines the Bald Crane as a person created by loss rather than a mere incomplete version of Kong Mo. (Chapters 964–985)
A recovered body, a refused past, and sacrifice in the dying aeon
Su Ming later recovers the Bald Crane's bloody original carcass from the Immortals' Union. The spirit senses that fusion would restore its origin, memories, and much greater strength, but also that its present personality and relationship with Su Ming might disappear. It therefore keeps the body without merging. When they return to Yin Death Region, the Bald Crane initially dreams of revisiting tribes that worshiped or persecuted it, only to discover that the places and people it remembers are gone. Its boastful anticipation gives way to silence, reinforcing that the present self possesses a history worth mourning even if that self began as an accident. (Chapters 1041–1048, 1228–1231)
During the remaining centuries it stays within Su Ming's circle, pursues crystals with the Abyss Dragon, and occasionally reveals memories or abilities belonging to Kong Mo. It can transform another person's divine sense so that it matches a foreign cultivation base and can mediate control over a Saint Defier supreme treasure, but its own fragmented state keeps its combat power far below the original body's promise. The prospect of restoration remains available, yet the risk is existential rather than merely physical: gaining power would replace the values and memories that make it Su Ming's companion. (Chapters 1015–1176, 1289–1341)
The conflict becomes personal when the Bald Crane spends more than a century quietly watching Fei Hua. The vigil evokes a forgotten earlier relationship and gives the formerly restless spirit a peace not based on crystals. When Su Ming again offers the recovered body, Kong Mo's inner voice demands fusion, but the Bald Crane rejects it and leaves with Su Ming, choosing its present identity and friendships over recovered greatness. Su Ming explicitly regards it not as a pet but as a friend equal in importance to his family at the Ninth Summit. (Chapters 1348–1349)
That choice reverses when Xuan Zang seeks the seventh Reversed Spirit. Knowing Su Ming intends to risk everything rather than surrender it, the Bald Crane voluntarily fuses with the carcass so that Kong Mo's power can hold Xuan Zang back. Black feathers and seven-colored light return, its demeanor becomes cold, and the declaration “I am Kong Mo” signals the feared loss of self. It still carries enough of the Bald Crane's will to attack, briefly halting Xuan Zang's palm before its body explodes. Su Ming resists the seventh pearl's suction and throws his companion into another world, while the Bald Crane's memories of him blur. Their parting promise depends on two uncertain conditions: that each will remember the other and that they can find one another again. (Chapters 1373–1377)
The missing friend beyond Ancient Zang
In Ancient Zang, the Bald Crane survives through Su Ming's ordinary memories: an imagined betting pool, a greedy complaint, or the familiar companionship missing from his new life. The Feng Shui compass beneath Su Ming repeatedly recalls the being he sent away, while the seventh pearl no longer contains its Reversed Spirit. Unlike the other dead whom Su Ming can reconstruct from traces within related Harmonious Morus Alba butterflies, the Bald Crane is absent from the cycles he searches. Its rescue into another world saved it from immediate destruction but also placed it beyond Su Ming's reach. (Chapters 1380–1478)
After completing his path, Su Ming uses the promise Old Man Extermination owes him for one request: find the Bald Crane in whatever world and form it now inhabits and bring it home. He sends the seventh pearl and Feng Shui compass to help trace it. Countless years later, Old Man Extermination reaches the Celestial Immortal Continent and addresses the finally awakened Bald Crane, identifying its home as Morning Dao. The article's endpoint therefore leaves the reunion unfinished but no longer hopeless: the companion who forgot is awake, and someone capable of following Su Ming's traces has come to return it. (Chapter 1481)
Appearance and personality
The Bald Crane's habitual form is a filthy black crane with large bald patches and only a few feathers, a deliberately undignified contrast to the enormous divine crane or seven-colored peacock it likes to display. Its expressions are highly animated: feathers stand on end when frightened, eyes shine at the sight of crystals, and solemn transformations quickly collapse into flattery or smugness. Because it is fundamentally a soul without its original flesh, it can also become an old man, dog, stone, another cultivator, or many other forms. After fusing with Kong Mo's carcass, it grows black feathers, erupts in seven-colored light, and takes on a cold, ancient bearing. (Chapters 412, 537–540, 747–803, 1377)
Its public personality is greedy, boastful, cowardly, vulgar, opportunistic, and exceptionally shameless. It lies to worshipers, invents grand histories, opens betting pools, and can be induced to reckless effort by crystals. These traits are genuine, but they also form a survival strategy for a fragmented being with little direct combat security. It flatters whoever appears strongest, uses transformation instead of fair confrontation, and runs from danger unless profit or attachment outweighs fear. (Chapters 537–701, 801–918)
The deeper Bald Crane is capable of durable attachment and self-definition. It chooses the ordinary, ridiculous life made with Su Ming over Kong Mo's lost magnificence; it watches Fei Hua without exploiting her; and it repeatedly endangers its soul for Su Ming. Its fear of memory loss is not vanity but fear of death through replacement. This makes its final fusion an informed sacrifice: it accepts becoming someone else because remaining itself while Su Ming dies would betray the friendship that gave that self meaning. (Chapters 828–845, 985, 1048, 1348–1377)
Abilities and cultivation
Innate nature — surviving soul and Reversed Spirit. The Bald Crane exists for most of the story as a soul-like entity without its original body. Kong Mo had been severely injured three times, lost its flesh, and scattered its memories, but did not die; while Kong Mo's will slept, the Bald Crane's independent will emerged. This state lets it survive environments and transformations that would destroy ordinary bodies, but it is also incomplete and can be gravely hurt by attacks on the soul. At the endpoint it is identified as the seventh Reversed Spirit, though its removal into another world leaves the corresponding pearl empty. (Chapters 747–765, 828–845, 985, 1048, 1377, 1478–1481)
Innate/remembered art — transformations. The Bald Crane can become creatures, people, stones, and copies of specific individuals, altering not only appearance but portions of presence and function. It uses this to impersonate a seven-colored peacock, become an old Rune creator, hide as a stone while safeguarding Su Ming's storage bag, copy Su Ming or the Duke of Crimson Flame, and infiltrate hostile territory. It can also modify a thread of divine sense to resemble another cultivation base. The imitation is strong enough to deceive Runes and observers, but shock can destabilize it, knowledgeable enemies can see through it, and copying an appearance does not automatically grant the original's full cultivation. (Chapters 537–540, 747–801, 1031–1136)
Innate specialization — Rune and seal interference. By merging its ripples or transformed presence with a formation, the Bald Crane can analyze, deceive, open, weaken, or redirect Runes. It opens the South Morning barrier by imitating its maker, releases beasts from planetary seals, counters monitoring formations, and helps control a Saint Defier treasure structured from innumerable runic symbols. Scale imposes a firm limit: the Great Divinity Incarceration Rune's hundreds of thousands of layers cannot be promptly broken even at extreme output, and Morning Dao seals can rebound against it. Some uses also reveal forgotten information or disturb Kong Mo's buried nature, making its expertise both power and route into a past it fears. (Chapters 539–565, 801–918, 1041–1176)
Soul expansion and will resistance. When pushed by crystals or loyalty, the Bald Crane can enlarge its spiritual form across vast distances, become a storm, and oppose another will directly. Against Ecang it restrains the tree's will long enough for Su Ming's Possession to advance. This output is costly: it burns its soul, leaves blood on a shed feather, and renders it unconscious with injuries ordinary medicine cannot cure. The same general mode allows Kong Mo's restored body to pause Xuan Zang's hand, but that effort destroys the body almost immediately. These feats are emergency expenditures, not a stable everyday combat level. (Chapters 802–845, 1377)
Kong Mo's restored state. Fusion with the recovered carcass restores enormous power, memories, black feathers, and seven-colored radiance associated with the Saint Defier being Kong Mo. It also suppresses or erases the Bald Crane's newer personality and memories. The corpus therefore treats the body as both a source of power and a fatal cost to identity. Even restored Kong Mo cannot defeat Xuan Zang; it only buys a brief opening before being broken and drawn toward the seventh pearl. (Chapters 985, 1048, 1349, 1377)
Practical skills and representative uses. The Bald Crane is an expert thief, performer, negotiator, and opportunistic strategist. It identifies valuables quickly, strips storage bags under battlefield cover, manipulates worshipers, recruits Qian Chen into confidence schemes, and coordinates with the Abyss Dragon through repeated disguises. These are not formal cultivation Arts, but they repeatedly produce results that strength alone would not. Their limitation is reliability: greed can distract it, boasting can expose it, and Su Ming often needs a seal, threat, or clearly defined reward before early cooperation becomes certain. (Chapters 538–708, 803–918, 1228–1341)
Latest state. After fusion, separation, and an unknowable span in another world, the Bald Crane awakens on the Celestial Immortal Continent. The corpus does not establish which of the Bald Crane's and Kong Mo's memories or powers remain, only that Old Man Extermination can finally address it and trace it home. Its endpoint capability should therefore be treated as unresolved rather than assumed equal to Kong Mo's peak. (Chapter 1481)
Relationships
Su Ming. Their association begins with exposure, attempted betrayal, and a controlling seal. Crystals turn the Bald Crane into a useful specialist, but accumulated rescues and journeys make them friends: it burns its soul for Su Ming, and Su Ming searches for cures, protects its identity, retrieves its body, and ultimately spends Old Man Extermination's promise on bringing it home. Each refuses survival bought by casually abandoning the other. (Chapters 537–600, 801–985, 1041–1377, 1481)
Abyss Dragon. The Bald Crane first idolizes the dragon's large yellow dog form. The two later become companions in transformation and theft, moving through planets and battlefields together while exploiting confusion to collect storage bags and crystal veins. The dragon's greater physical presence complements the crane's disguises and Rune expertise. (Chapters 708–800, 918–1341)
Qian Chen. Qian Chen is first a victim and unwilling assistant in the Bald Crane's confidence schemes. The bird takes his wealth and postpones his goal while demanding more spirit stones, but their shared talent for extravagant speech gives their interactions a comic kinship. Qian Chen later remains within Su Ming's broader circle rather than seeking decisive revenge. (Chapters 607–733)
Hu Zi. Hu Zi and the Bald Crane share exceptional affinity with Runes but express it differently. They quarrel, trade blows, and use crystals to bait one another, while Su Ming associates the crane's formation-breaking talent with Hu Zi's. Their comic hostility coexists with membership in the same chosen family around Su Ming. (Chapters 565–734, 801–802, 1170–1176)
Ecang. Ecang remembers the ancient crane as a traitor and enemy. During Su Ming's Possession, the Bald Crane directly restrains Ecang's will and burns its soul rather than release it, allowing Su Ming to secure a decisive foothold. Ecang's recognition also becomes evidence that the ridiculous present-day bird has a much older history. (Chapters 826–985)
Fei Hua. Fragmented memory draws the Bald Crane to Fei Hua, whom it watches for more than a century while she waits by a lake. It does not fully recover their past, but the vigil brings it unusual peace and grief. Choosing to leave her without becoming Kong Mo preserves the Bald Crane's present self, while her awareness of the watcher gives the separation mutual emotional weight. (Chapters 1348–1349)
Old Man Extermination. Kong Mo once infiltrated or betrayed the order associated with Old Man Extermination, though the exact ancient events remain uncertain. At the end, Su Ming turns the relationship into a means of rescue by making Old Man Extermination promise to trace the absent Bald Crane. After countless years, the old man finds it and announces his obligation to take it home. (Chapters 964–985, 1478–1481)
Items
Crystals and storage bags. Crystals are the Bald Crane's overriding material obsession and Su Ming's most reliable means of eliciting effort. Bags of crystals push it to challenge immense Runes and Ecang's will, while battlefields and planets become opportunities to seize storage bags and even underground veins. The crystals do not grant a defined magical ability; they motivate the Bald Crane to expend power it already possesses, sometimes beyond safe limits. (Chapters 538–708, 801–845, 918–1341)
Kong Mo's carcass. The recovered bloody body is the Bald Crane's original physical vessel and the route to Kong Mo's strength and memories. For centuries it remains stored and unused because fusion would erase the Bald Crane's current identity. It becomes an emergency resource only when the Bald Crane accepts that cost to oppose Xuan Zang. (Chapters 1041–1048, 1348–1377)
Green and black feathers. A bloodstained green feather remains after the Bald Crane burns its soul against Ecang and lets Su Ming preserve and track its presence. A black feather remains after Su Ming sends the restored Kong Mo through the vortex. Both are traces of otherwise unstable spiritual states and emotional keepsakes, not independent weapons. (Chapters 828–845, 1377)
The seventh pearl and Feng Shui compass. Xuan Zang's seventh pearl corresponds to the Bald Crane as the seventh Reversed Spirit and tries to reclaim it after Kong Mo's restoration. Once Su Ming sends the Bald Crane away, its shadow disappears from the pearl. At the end, Su Ming sends the empty pearl and his Feng Shui compass across the vast universe as tracks Old Man Extermination can follow toward the missing companion. (Chapters 1373–1377, 1478–1481)