Canto VIII: The Surrendered Witnessing

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"Wait!"

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“

His watching Jade eye sees beyond where our visions lie. Not yet knowing where the eye gazes, I walk still, into where buildings make mazes.

”

The Surrendered Witnessing is the eighth Canto in Limbus Company, and Hong Lu's focus chapter. It was released on Season 6: Zàng Huā Yín, and takes place after Intervallo V: Nocturnal Sweeping.

This Canto was released in three parts, with Part 1 releasing on May 15th, 2025 and Parts 2 and 3 releasing in the following two weeks.

Summary

The morning after Intervallo V: Nocturnal Sweeping, the Sinners continue their way through the District 8 Backstreets, alongside Jia Xichun, Wei, Pilot, and Saude. Before boarding a palanquin to get to their next location, Jia Xichun makes it clear that she feels betrayed by the LCB's retracting of their offer to assist her in the Family Hierarch "war". When Hong Lu sticks to the company's decision to have him participate, she formally ends their alliance and criticizes him for his perceived lack of free will before leaving with Wei. From there, Saude pulls some strings to get herself on the palanquin with the LCB. She explains a plan for the Sinners to follow on the way there, and the group leaves behind Pilot as they enter Daguanyuan, Hong Lu's old home within the Nest. If all goes according to plan, Hong Lu will score second place in the Family Hierarch Evaluation and claim the Golden Bough as his prize.

In the Daguanyuan's Dahuating Banquet Hall, Hong Lu reunites with his mother Lady Wang and father Jia Zheng, who refer to him by his birth name, Jia Baoyu, and are relatively moved by his sudden appearance, but soon begin asking him when he'll depart again. He is also greeted by his highly respected grandmother, Jia Mu, the Family Hierarch (and Chief Executive Director) of H Corp. A friendly woman named Xue Baochai also makes an appearance before the Sinners, lovingly explaining that she's "Jia Baoyu"'s betrothed, a relationship which Hong Lu takes much more lightly in comparison.

The group then heads back to Hong Lu's section of the Daguanyuan, known as Yihongyuan. They meet Hong Lu's maidservant Xiren and fight a few wooden training dummies before again departing, now for round 1 of the evaluations at the Tubitang stadium. Here, contestants must present their own findings of a way to achieve immortality to the Jia elders: Jia Mu, Jia Zheng, and Hong Lu's older sister Jia Yuanchun. A high number of contestants enter and strike out, plummeting to their deaths upon failure. Jia Xichun, Xue Baochai, and Jia Qiu all pass, alongside an erratic and crazed man named Xue Pan, who unleashes violent Jar Monsters upon the contestants during his reveal, causing a great number of casualties in the process. Jia Huan also makes his first appearance since Canto I, fitted with E.G.O Gear along with his work partner Gubo. The two of them present Abnormalities as their key to immortality. At one point, the group also runs into a high-ranking member of the Thumb named Lei Heng, who alludes to a background with Ryōshū and sparks an extreme reaction from her. The Sinners must keep their composure, however, and Hong Lu goes on to announce his participation in the Family Hierarch war, much to the crowd's surprise. He demonstrates his own immortality by having himself bisected by Ryōshū and resurrected by Dante in front of the elders, ultimately passing round 1.

Back in Yihongyuan, Xiren blankly greets the Sinners upon their return. It is explained that extensive use of Life Insurance has led to the numbing of her memories and therefore personality, making her a mutated husk of her former self. Jia Xichun also stops by at one point to wish Hong Lu the best, trying to be considerate of him despite their strained relationship. The Sinners are eventually attacked by a group of assassins led by the Night Drifter, who successfully kills Hong Lu and departs afterwards, unaware of Dante's revival abilities. The next morning, everyone reaches the arena of round 2, a location based on the old H Corp. once led by the now-extinct Kong Family. Here, Hong Lu runs into an old "brief connection" of his named Lin Daiyu who expresses her hurt before taking her leave.

Within Story Dungeon

For round 2, the Sinners are forced to fight against the remaining Family Hierarch candidates within the old Kong family building, tasked with amassing coins from the other contestants. The group enters a series of battles and temporary alliances, getting to know the observant Wang Zhao, and squaring up against Wang Dawei, Wang Qingshan, Shi Huazhen, Shi Sijing, Xue Pan, and a newly-revived Shi Yihua. The LCB also works with Lin Daiyu after she is separated from her clan. After experiencing a series of flashbacks of her and Hong Lu's childhood through Golden Bough resonance, Daiyu realizes that the grudge she held against him resulted from a misunderstanding, and she mends her broken relationship with him. Near the end of the tournament, Gubo attempts to shoot Hong Lu using his N Corp. E.G.O, but Lin Daiyu takes the hit for him as a way to make amends for said falling out. Due to her injury, she is then forced to retire from the competition.

Throughout the Story Dungeon, the extent of Hong Lu's troubled past comes to light. At birth he was chosen to act as the Xianren's (family elder's) "precious jade", and was implanted with a mysterious camera-like eye meant to transmit his life's events to the Xianren and stimulate their endless existences with adventure. At a young age, he bore witness to Jia Mu's planned destruction of the Kong family through having them break a City taboo. It was a gory, devastating, and traumatizing event led by an Arbiter of the Head, one which Hong Lu failed to convince anyone other than Lin Daiyu to avoid falling victim to. One of the victims included his and Daiyu's friend, a younger Jia Huan, the brother of N Corp.'s Jia Huan who would eventually take his name. Following the incident, Hong Lu would go on to lose all perception of control over his life and become a passive nihilist, unabashedly accepting the world's miseries and alienating everyone around him in the process.

The final showdown of the competition is ultimately between "Jia Baoyu", Jia Qiu, and Jia Huan. Jia Qiu's true goal is not to win or to beat sense into Hong Lu, but to help reawaken the earthly desires and emotions he's learned to push down. The foreboding man demands Hong Lu speak earnestly about what he thinks District 8 needs. Hong Lu is at first evasive, and only offers empty answers. However, he eventually allows himself to be vulnerable, and admits that what he truly thinks Hongyuan needs is kindness. Jia Qiu, satisfied, hands Hong Lu all of his coins before forfeiting and convincing Jia Huan to forfeit alongside him. The Sinners initially panic over Hong Lu ending up in first place, but remember that Jia Xichun is still in the running, and decide to give her the coins needed to win first place while keeping enough coins to secure second. The Family Hierarch war then comes to an end, Jia Xichun in first place, Hong Lu in second, and Jia Huan in third.

Post-Story Dungeon

The LCB goes on to merrily celebrate Jia Xichun's victory. However, Xue Baochai arrives with a nervous expression, eventually followed by Jia Qiu and Zigong. Both parties express the same warning—a war is about to break out, and Jia Xichun is in danger until she can properly secure the position as Family Hierarch and command her new Heishou packs. Jia Qiu requests that Hong Lu participate in their efforts to prevent the war, to which Hong Lu agrees, motivated to save his precious little sister's life. As the Sinners rush down to Tientan Temple, they run into and fight off various factions, including the Thumb. This culminates into a confrontation against Lei Heng, who holds Wei's life hostage. He agrees to let Wei go if Zilu (who had arrived on Jia Qiu's orders) allows him to lay a direct blow on her, to which she agrees after Hong Lu admits he wants Wei to live. Zilu suffers a nasty blow from the Capo IIII, but does not die. Lei Heng lets Wei go as promised, but then engages in battle with the Sinners. Lei Heng is extremely powerful and has no reason to hold back, leaving the Sinners at a desperate impasse as they are unable to defeat him. Fueled by their situation, Hong Lu then helps Dante to unlock a new ability, which weakens Lei Heng to the point that the group can fight him on even ground. The LCB still lose, however, and Jia Qiu shows up in the nick of time to fight off foes while Hong Lu and the group enters to the Tientan Temple to meet with Jia Xichun. They are stopped by Jia Huan and Gubo at the entrance, who know that only Hong Lu can enter the temple uninvited, using his jade eye as a key. Running low on time, the Sinners let the New League members in, who claim their intention is only to nonviolently secure their third place prize.

The two teams encounter the Xianren, as well as Jia Mu and Jia Xichun. The Sinners and Xichun are horrified upon meeting the Xianren: the elders have a variety of mutated, monstrous forms resulting from their own pursuits of immortality, and greet the Sinners by informing they have been watching their adventures through Hong Lu's eye, sadistically commenting on how much they enjoyed witnessing their pain and tragedies. In the meantime, Jia Mu explains that the crowning of the new Family Hierarch involves passing down "the Xianhuang Worm" from one Hierarch to the next. If Jia Xichun accepts the worm, she will receive the accumulated knowledge of the Hierarchs, but it will corrupt her and force her to take on the Xianren's mindsets and wishes, guiding her towards immortality as those before her have been. Jia Mu peacefully offers Hong Lu the Golden Bough the LCB sought, but the Sinner hesitates knowing that he can't leave his sister to take on the worm. Jia Huan and Gubo then fight the group, frustrated that Hong Lu won't obediently accept his prize and allow the two of them to claim the Anamnaworm they were seeking for Hermann. The Sinners manage to fight them off, but are unable to kill them due to a protective force field given to them by their E.G.O Gear.

The Xianren elders become upset with their "jade"'s rebellion, and demand that Jia Mu force Hong Lu back into his intended role. She stabs herself with the Golden Bough and consumes a Bolus, which causes her to distort. Hong Lu manages to tap into his long-suppressed emotions and fight back against the elders' control, assaulting Jia Mu and the Xianren with a grand flood of water that separates her from the Bough and from the Xianhuang Worm. Hong Lu chooses to spare the Xianren, instead confining them into their sanctum for the remainder of their long days. Jia Huan chooses to smash the camera feed from Hong Lu's eye, wrecking the screened view of his life they'd been peering into all of these years and leaving the elders in dark, quiet boredom, as Gubo grabs the dying Xianhuang Worm before retreating to reconvene with Nelly.

With Jia Xichun saved from her fate, the Sinners rush back to watch as Jia Qiu ends his battle against Lei Heng. It is revealed that they and Zilu were all agents of the Pinky, although Jia Qiu and Lei Heng were not aware of each other's allegiance. Lei Heng ultimately has his head blown clean off. Later, Jia Qiu thanks Dante for helping Hong Lu before setting off to Q Corp. for his next move, ending with a warning regarding Ryōshū's path. Hong Lu also has a moment of closure with Lin Daiyu, where he admits that flying kites was his favorite game to play, a question he'd been unable to answer her during their childhood years. The Canto closes on the Sinners enjoying a great feast alongside Jia Xichun, Wei, and Lin Daiyu, where Jia Xichun is again congratulated for her ascension to Hierarch. Meanwhile, Jia Yuanchun (revealed to be the mastermind behind the attempts on Jia Xichun's life) is shown to have kidnapped Xue Baochai and goes on to blackmail the woman into an allegiance with her.

Enemies

• Strangers
• Wooden Dummies
• Jar Monsters
• Podao Assailants
• Night Drifter
• Shi Family Candidates
• Wang Qingshan
• Deathrite Monks
• Xue Pan
• Heishou Pack - Mao Branch
• Jia Qiu
• The Thumb
• Lei Heng
• Jia Huan and Gubo
• Muddled Heishou of the Corpse Palanquin [混覺轀輬黑獸]

Trivia

• This is the first Canto to have a Story Dungeon in the second part of the Canto, rather than in the third.
• For Stage 8-30, Hong Lu and Ryōshū have unique status effects, which are My Heart, My Own Thoughts… My Heart, My Own Thoughts…[Hong Lu Exclusive Effect]
  - For this Encounter: after using a Skill Attack, gain 2 additional E.G.O resources of the Skill's Affinity (once per turn) and Mutilated Memory Mutilated Memory[Ryōshū Exclusive Effect]
  - Deal +(Current Turn Count x 2.5)% damage against Lei Heng in this Encounter (max 30%) respectively.
• For Stage 8-32, Hong Lu and Yi Sang have unique status effects, which are The Will to Confront The Will to ConfrontIn Clashes against Jia Huan, Clash Power +2 and Responsibility ResponsibilityIn Clashes against Gubo, Clash Power +2 respectively.