Chapter Summaries

Laina fought the Eternal Old Sect's Bald Man and his men until the bloodied boy returned and killed the Bald Man. After rescuing the unconscious boy, Laina escaped with him through an abandoned factory, but he warned her away from Storm Building and toward a possible church.

• A bloodied boy left the White Robe Priests behind and headed in the opposite direction.
• The Bald Man cornered Laina and demanded she reveal what she knew, offering her money to betray her companion.
• Laina drank the red liquid from a mithril test tube, advanced to C-class, and killed four of the Bald Man's fighters before he overpowered her.
• The Bald Man tried to recruit Laina for one hundred million Federal currency, but she refused; the boy returned and split the Bald Man in two.
• Laina caught the unconscious boy, carried him through an abandoned factory, and escaped into an alley as White Robe Figures searched nearby.
• The boy warned Laina not to head toward Storm Building, saying there might be a church in that direction.

Vili told Endier she would run for city council and change Winter City. After learning why United Industries had betrayed her father’s reforms, she resolved to rely on the city’s voiceless people rather than the conglomerate, and Endier gave her his records and experience to help her find a new path.

• Vili told Endier she wanted to run for city council and change Winter City.
• Endier explained that United Industries’ shareholders had removed Vili’s father because his reforms favored the city and its workers over profits.
• Endier described how United Industries and Rockville Energy Group had gained influence while the Municipal Government lacked the money and power to make changes.
• Vili recalled He Ao’s question about whether her father’s rule had relied on the poor or on United Industries, and realized she could not depend on the conglomerate to help them.
• Vili told Endier she would do her best to change things, and he gave her a book of district investigations and his experience.
• In Storm District, Laina stood before the open church doors with the young man on her back.

Laina disguised herself and brought the unconscious He Ao into a church near Storm Building to hide from the Eternal Sect. When the sect’s searchers arrived, an Old Man distracted them and claimed Laina and He Ao were his relatives, leaving their escape uncertain.

• Laina disguised herself and He Ao as poor residents, then entered the church and settled with him in a warm, sheltered corner.
• An Old Man quietly directed Laina to the sheltered spot, then switched seats to sit nearby.
• A White Robed Man preached that one church member would be chosen to enter the Divine Kingdom, and the congregation praised Eternal Radiance.
• White Robe Figures entered to search for Laina, and one approached after catching the smell of blood.
• The Old Man dropped a bag of bloody rat meat, drawing the searcher’s attention and claiming Laina and He Ao were his distant grandniece and grandnephew.

Laina and He Ao tried to follow Ke Lin through a mysterious door in the church, but a clash with the Eternal Sect’s guards exposed them as wanted fugitives. As Laina fought the cultists, a powerful White Robe Figure charged at the weakened He Ao.

• A White Robe Figure suspected Laina was the target but stayed behind to watch her until the sermon ended.
• He Ao woke and explained that Ke Lin knew him through his father, just as the sermon chose Ke Lin to enter the Eternal Divine Kingdom.
• After the believers left, He Ao and Laina followed Ke Lin toward a sealed door, but Scarface accused them of being wanted criminals and ordered the gathered Eternal Sect members to attack.
• Laina killed Scarface with her black dagger and fought the other cultists while a White Robe Figure charged at He Ao, intending to seize him as leverage.
• Laina sensed the White Robe Figure’s C-rank strength and warned He Ao, but the attacker had already reached him.

He Ao and Laina broke into the church’s sealed room, where White Robe Priests prepared a ritual to send Ke Lin to the Divine Kingdom. He Ao stopped the ritual by smashing through a wall and attacking the White Robed Man.

• He Ao used the crystalline eyeball to erase the White Robed Man’s power, then stabbed him while Laina fought off the attackers.
• Laina concluded that the church’s members cared more about ascending to the Divine Kingdom than helping the Eternal Sect’s manhunt.
• He Ao found voices behind a concrete wall and decided to break through it instead of forcing open the sealed Iron Gate.
• The White Robed Man and the priests activated a ritual and dragged Ke Lin into the unlit place in the array, where he became trapped in pain.
• He Ao burst through the wall and kicked the White Robed Man across the room.

He Ao stopped the ritual, stripped the white-robed man of the Eternal Radiance’s blessing, and defeated him despite his injuries. After helping Laina survive the last priest’s ambush, He Ao pulled the still-glowing glass ball from the air and took out the Knocking Stone.

• He Ao shattered the skull that served as a ritual prop, extinguishing the array and freeing Ke Lin as Laina rushed to rescue him.
• The white-robed man attacked He Ao and drew power from the glass ball, but He Ao used the Eye of Dissipation to erase the external blessing.
• He Ao fought the white-robed man with his knight sword, feigned difficulty against his arc waves, and fatally pierced his heart.
• Laina defeated most of the white-robe priests, while He Ao killed the last priest as he tried to stab her from behind.
• He Ao pulled the still-radiant glass ball from the air and retrieved the Knocking Stone from his bosom.

He Ao broke the glass ball and used the recovered radiance to activate the Finger Bone Fossil, then interrupted a ritual that had begun pulling his soul toward the Eternal Divine Kingdom. After escaping the Eternal Sect’s church with Laina and Ke Lin, he accepted the fossil’s fading guidance while riding toward Laina’s hideout.

• He Ao shattered the glass ball, and the Finger Bone Fossil and Radiant Corona absorbed the radiance released from it.
• He Ao restored the ritual array, took the position of the missing skull, and used the Finger Bone Fossil to begin contacting the Eternal Divine Kingdom.
• He Ao grabbed the fossil and leaped from the array, breaking the ritual before it could pull his soul away; the force drawing him toward the divine kingdom remained but weakened.
• He Ao accessed the church computer, then led Laina and Ke Lin through a breached wall and escaped using Ke Lin’s route, while Eternal Sect pursuers were misdirected toward Storm Building.
• He Ao reunited with Eve in the off-road vehicle and, as the group headed for Laina’s hideout, closed his eyes and accepted the fossil’s fading guidance.

He Ao entered the Eternal Divine Kingdom through an abnormal passage and explored its virtual spaces, which appeared to fulfill each user’s desires. He then reached a scene where Kaven angrily rejected what he found, as He Ao’s Finger Bone Fossil dimmed and the kingdom’s distortion increasingly eroded him.

• He Ao used the Finger Bone Fossil to pass through a distorted door and entered a sunrise landscape, where he watched two visitors discuss the divine kingdom as a virtual reality.
• He Ao followed another door into the woman’s private hall and observed that the kingdom’s distorted radiance was trying to assimilate him, though his B-rank soul resisted it.
• He Ao used the Finger Bone Fossil to visit several users’ spaces, including a snow mountain, a bathhouse, a stormy sea, and a corridor filled with flattering portraits of Vincent.
• He Ao considered whether the divine kingdom’s fulfillment of desires concealed a cost, recalled the imprisoned undead in the Inner Church, and continued exploring as the fossil’s light faded.
• He Ao arrived amid roaring machinery and heard Kaven insist that he would not serve the church, protesting that the supposed Eternal Divine Kingdom was not what he had sacrificed everything to reach.

He Ao entered the Eternal Divine Kingdom and witnessed the dead being forced to work for time, which they spent on food, rest, and other goods. As the Old Man was punished for attacking the kingdom’s property, He Ao rescued him and escaped with him, though a powerful gaze swept across the space.

• He Ao watched a new arrival learn that he was dead and would have to work to extend his limited remaining life.
• He Ao passed through another door and saw the dead redeem food, liquor, and rest by spending time earned through work.
• The Old Man said the Eternal Divine Kingdom drove souls to work until they were destroyed, then attacked the hall’s pillars with a Short Sword.
• The kingdom restrained the Old Man with golden light and projected his punishment into its workspaces.
• He Ao used Mental Impact to shatter the golden force, suppress the twisted light in the Old Man, and strip it away.
• A powerful gaze swept through the space, and He Ao used the Finger Bone Fossil to vanish with the Old Man.

He Ao returned the Old Man’s soul from the Eternal Divine Kingdom and left it to recover inside the Paper Butterfly, then woke after six or seven hours and went with Laina to meet the FBI agents. Meanwhile, Vincent agreed to help the Eternal Sect search for He Ao while keeping the boy’s whereabouts from them, and He Ao surprised Gaster by admitting he had destroyed the Sky Behemoth.

• He Ao carried the Old Man’s soul through the Dark Space and placed it in the Paper Butterfly, where Alice’s power stabilized it.
• He Ao considered how the Eternal Divine Kingdom sustained its souls and how outsiders might log in and out, then left the Paper Butterfly and woke beside Laina.
• Laina told He Ao that the FBI agents and Ke Lin were staying in another Secret Base, and He Ao went with her to see them.
• The White Robe Priest told Vincent that a young B-rank had escaped after the previous night’s battle and asked him to help find the boy; Vincent agreed but ordered his aide to report any discovery to him first.
• He Ao met Gaster and the other FBI agents in Storm District, then told Gaster that he had piloted the Mecha that destroyed the Sky Behemoth.

He Ao discussed the battle against the Sky Behemoth and the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s delayed response to United Industries’ attack on Winter City. As a blizzard approached, he weighed the Eternal Sect’s recent expansion and the timing of the incoming investigative team, sensing that something was still missing.

• He Ao admitted that piloting the Mecha and destroying the Sky Behemoth had been his first time, astonishing Gaster, Laina, Ke Lin, and the young agent.
• Gaster offered to recommend the young agent to the Federal Military Academy, while He Ao encouraged him to approach difficult tasks with confidence and preparation.
• Gaster explained that United Industries had blamed the attack on its Security Director and the Eternal Sect, using a Bureau mole and official procedures to delay a full investigation.
• He Ao and Gaster discussed how United Industries might exploit the conflict with the Eternal Sect to take control of Winter City and later shift the blame.
• Ke Lin reported that the Eternal Sect was expanding in Storm District, recruiting gang members and sending more people to its supposed divine kingdom.
• Gaster said the headquarters investigative team was expected before the blizzard arrived the next night, and He Ao studied his Character Cards while considering what he had not yet understood.

He Ao gathered intelligence on the Eternal Sect and United Industries, then identified a connection between several Eternal Divine Kingdom figures and Rockville Energy Group. As the group assessed Winter City's factions, He Ao learned that the City Defense Army’s only B-ranker had disappeared after Skorn’s assassination attempt, raising new questions about the city’s long-running power struggle.

• He Ao asked Gaster, Laina, and Ke Lin to collect intelligence on the Eternal Sect and United Industries, then went to find a tablet and stylus.
• He Ao drew portraits of people he had encountered in the Eternal Divine Kingdom and had Eve identify them, learning that several were Rockville Energy Group directors and one was a United Industries board member.
• He Ao asked Vili to have Twilight Society members investigate trade caravan activity around Winter City over the past six months and compare it with previous years.
• Laina recognized He Ao’s portrait of Captain Nissen, and He Ao told her he had visited the Eternal Divine Kingdom the previous night.
• He Ao, Laina, and Gaster reviewed Winter City’s factions and military strength, while Laina explained that the City Defense Army’s lone B-ranker had vanished on a wilderness assignment about fourteen years earlier.
• Eve reported that the missing B-ranker had apparently encountered trouble after Skorn’s assassination attempt, and He Ao focused on the timing.

He Ao and Gaster planned to spread rumors that United Industries would move against the Eternal Sect, hoping to unsettle its subordinate forces. He Ao and Laina then raided churches across the Storm District to rescue sacrifices and collect charged glass balls, before an unfamiliar boy’s cry interrupted them near the coast.

• He Ao told Laina to spread a rumor that United Industries was preparing to deal with the Eternal Sect, and Gaster agreed to cooperate with him.
• Laina drove He Ao to suspected Eternal Sect churches across the Storm District, where he defeated priests, rescued sacrifices, and collected sealed blessings from glass balls.
• The Eternal Sect ordered its churches to halt activities and remove their valuables, but He Ao had already fully recharged the Radiant Corona and Finger Bone Fossil.
• He Ao and Laina watched United Industries salvage the Sky Behemoth wreckage at sunset, and He Ao asked about nearby fleets before hearing a boy shout for someone to release his mother.

He Ao rescued a mother and her son from Eternal Sect thugs in a poor alley, then offered to find the boy a teacher who could help him protect others. After Laina arranged shelter and work for the family, He Ao stayed behind and summoned a humanoid phantom from his awakened butterfly.

• He Ao followed Laina into an alley and found Eternal Sect men threatening a woman and her son.
• He Ao killed the thugs, rescued the mother and boy, and explained that his apparent teleportation was a movement technique.
• The boy asked He Ao to teach him so he could protect his family and others, and He Ao offered to introduce him to a teacher.
• The boy showed He Ao a pendant containing a black-and-white mask connected to someone named K, but He Ao declined to take it.
• Laina learned the family had lost their home and money, then offered the mother a job and temporary shelter at her Secret Base.
• After the mother and son left with Laina, He Ao awakened the soul in his butterfly and summoned a humanoid phantom.

Captain Kevin faced pressure from United Industries and the loss of his crew when his former teacher, Nissen, appeared with He Ao. Meanwhile, Vincent agreed to let Captain Lutz’s mercenaries guard United Industries, and He Ao briefly reunited with the spirits of Nissen and a woman before Vili found him alone in the cold.

• Captain Kevin marked crew members dead as sailors urged him to stop risking their lives for United Industries, then prepared to resist before Nissen and He Ao arrived at his cabin.
• Vincent agreed to Captain Lutz’s security terms, and Lutz promised to protect United Industries from the Eternal Sect until Federal Central’s troops arrived.
• He Ao explained that Paper Butterfly’s grudges let Nissen’s soul temporarily take form, and Nissen reflected with him on exploration and the future.
• After Nissen’s form dispersed, He Ao played a match-three game until a woman’s spirit appeared to help him before the wind scattered her mist.
• Vili stepped out of her red sports car and found He Ao standing alone in the cold night.

He Ao and Vili deduced that a large force of mercenaries had secretly entered Winter City disguised as Trade Caravans, while Vincent handed United Industries’ security to Lutz. Vincent was then killed by a disguised Eternal Sect Archbishop, leaving the city’s balance of power uncertain.

• He Ao and Vili inferred from food shortages in Wilderness Wanderers Camps that extra Trade Caravans were bringing hidden people into Winter City, possibly mercenaries hired by United Industries.
• Vili reasoned that the Eternal Sect had refrained from attacking United Industries because of its concealed mercenary force, but He Ao said United Industries had not necessarily won.
• Vincent hired Lutz’s Mercenary Group to take command of United Industries’ security forces and chose to remain in Winter City until the conflict ended.
• Vincent ordered his men to keep Mayor Endier isolated, but a middle-aged man stabbed Vincent with a golden Short Knife and revealed his Gold Thread White Robe as an Archbishop.
• Lutz bowed to the Archbishop as Vincent died in Mayor Endier’s former chair.
• A hand picked up an old photograph showing Skorn, Endier, Vincent, and Jie Ke together when they were young.

He Ao pieced together the Eternal Sect’s hidden chain of command and the threats gathering in Wente City while reviewing the clues about the White Robed Man. He opened the cabinet containing “Baptism” and found it empty.

• Vili explained the old painting of her father, Endier, Jack, and Vincent, and He Ao discussed Vincent’s loyalties and Jack’s retreat from public life.
• While Vili called the Municipal Government, He Ao reviewed Eve’s report and estimated that several B-rank threats and the Eternal Divine Kingdom still endangered Wente City.
• He Ao read that the White Robed Man had worked with mineral-survey vessels and explored the Storm Sea, connecting that information to the missing clue.
• He Ao shouted for everyone to close their eyes, forced open the cabinet containing “Baptism,” and discovered it was empty.

He Ao uncovered that the vanished painting, “Baptism,” was connected to the Origin of the Eternal Sect, then learned United Industries had surrounded the Mayor’s Residence. He led Vili out to contact allies and set off to find Laina while activating The Usurper.

• He Ao endured the painting’s contamination until its reflection vanished from the glass cabinet, then concluded that the original painting had been stolen long ago.
• Vili recalled that her father had stored the painting wrapped in black cloth, and He Ao identified it as “Baptism,” connected to the Origin of the Eternal Sect.
• Vili learned that United Industries had surrounded the Mayor’s Residence and wanted to gather the Twilight Society to rescue Uncle Endier, but He Ao urged her to stay calm.
• He Ao and Vili left through the underground passage, and He Ao warned that forces beyond United Industries and the Eternal Sect might be involved.
• He Ao drove off with Vili and said they would first find Laina, while exchanging for The Usurper and considering how to obtain more of its usage time.

Gaster met Captain Kevin and boarded his boat to cross the dangerous Storm Sea. In the Snowy Plains, He Ao regained partial control of his body, discovered he could draw on the dead God of War’s power, and recognized himself as its Usurper incarnation.

• Gaster met Captain Kevin on the shore and boarded his boat to travel into the stormy sea.
• A prospector and a driver discussed improving living conditions in Rock City as they drove through the Snowy Plains.
• A white tiger sensed a terrifying awakening in the mountains and fled with the crows as beasts cowered beneath the pressure.
• He Ao awoke inside a ruined building, resisted the mad will in his body, and identified the hollow in his chest as damage caused by the God of Knowledge’s projection.
• He Ao learned that moving his fused body would destabilize his balance, but discovered he could borrow the dead God of War’s power while retaining his own will.

He Ao used the God of War’s power to create an offspring that could leave the contaminated building, then sent it toward Rock City. The offspring found Third Brother and Fourth Brother at the First Mine, where it greeted Third Brother after nearly two years away.

• He Ao carefully controlled the God of War’s power and molded an offspring, giving it a humanlike appearance, clothing, and the strength to shatter a pillar.
• He Ao sent the tailcoated offspring out of the building while he remained behind and began drawing patterns on the floor.
• At Rock City’s First Mine, Third Brother and Fourth Brother discussed a beast riot in the wilderness and noticed it came from the direction of the contaminated mining headquarters building.
• Third Brother discussed supplying equipment to the City Defense Army and planned to visit Neil’s grave with Fourth Brother.
• The offspring arrived at the cabin and greeted Third Brother, who dropped the chocolate in his hand.