Recaps

Sevillan and her Knight Order watched a Sky Fleet pass overhead and began their return journey, while King Oleus and the twelve dukes confronted the kingdom’s overstretched defenses. Though Okra Kingdom had raised an army of over five million, most new recruits were untrained and no troops could be spared for the northeastern front.

• Sevillan learned that the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Floating Fleets had arrived and watched them advance toward Okra Province.
• Sevillan reassured her subordinates, advised them to protect their families if the kingdom fell, and led the Knight Order home after the fleet passed.
• King Oleus met with the twelve dukes as the kingdom faced invasions on multiple fronts and had lost contact with the Silver Wing Sky Fleet and Babula Fortress Group.
• Oleus reported that the kingdom had recruited 1.6 million soldiers, most of them untrained civilians who needed months of preparation.
• The dukes recognized that Okra Kingdom’s forces were committed across the kingdom, leaving no large force available for the northeastern front.
• Oleus insisted that the 1.6 million recruits had to be put to use rather than left as an army for the enemy.

Oleus and the twelve dukes prepared to reorganize Okra Kingdom’s 1.6-million-strong army as an enemy Floating Fleet approached the Royal Capital. The fleet’s repeated spell attacks battered the Holy Blood Shield, which remained intact as the capital’s people watched in terror.

• Oleus asked the twelve dukes and the Mage Association to provide thirty thousand qualified officers, and they pledged the full number.
• Oleus said the reorganized army would form twenty legions, with six under royal command and fourteen belonging to the dukes.
• The enemy Sky Fleet appeared over the Royal Capital, and Oleus ordered the Holy Blood Shield activated, martial law imposed, and the Bloodstone Sky Fleet halted.
• Silas ordered the Sixth Floating Fleet to launch seven coordinated spell attacks before withdrawing with his fleet as rear guard.
• The 177 Floating Battleships fired repeated volleys at the Royal Capital, collapsing houses and terrifying its inhabitants, but the Holy Blood Shield held.

After the Floating Fleets retreated, Olenis prepared to abandon several provinces and defend the Okra Kingdom’s capital. Elissina uncovered widespread treason and began moving people and supplies to safety while planning to build a power of her own; elsewhere, Velin discussed Hebrew’s future military role with Kyle.

• Olenis accepted that the Babula Fortress Group was likely lost and ordered troops reorganized to defend the capital, abandoning Demol Province, eastern Xinia Province, and Morgana Province.
• Elissina’s Red-haired Woman reported thirteen suspected traitors, including Zohir Saloto, and described Duke Messi’s suspicious meeting with his eldest son.
• Elissina ordered personnel and supplies secretly transferred to a stronghold in Muon Province, and instructed her agents to offer information to Zohir Saloto and retrieve buried treasures.
• Elissina told her Red-haired Woman to summon Owl to the royal capital by offering information about his niece, then invited her to come to her room that night.
• Velin and Kyle discussed Hebrew’s placement after the war, and Velin decided to send him to the First Corps as a logistics officer before forming a separate Aeran corps for him to command.

At White Crow City, the exhausted defenders awaited relief as Ryan and Zelos discussed their morale, reinforcements, and a possible attack on the Okra Kingdom’s camp. The chapter then shifted to Cask Province, where the armies of the Eleventh Corps and the Okra Kingdom formed up for battle.

• A young Aeran soldier kept watch at White Crow City, longing for home while praying for his family’s safety.
• Zelos told Ryan that the troops had few complaints, though prayers to the Goddess of Life were becoming more frequent.
• Ryan and Zelos discussed the expected arrival of one hundred thousand reinforcements and decided to test the strength of the enemy camp.
• On December 28, 9797, the Fourteenth Legion and Eighteenth Legion faced the Okra Kingdom’s army on the central plains of Cask Province.

Cassius led the Fourteenth and Eighteenth Legions against the larger Okra Kingdom army at Cask Plain, where cannon bombardments and brutal fighting caused heavy losses on both sides. After the Okra forces withdrew for the night, Cassius summoned Talion and announced that he planned to raid their camp.

• Cassius ordered the Fourteenth Legion and Black Asia Orc warriors to advance while the Magic Energy Cannons prepared to fire.
• Both armies exchanged cannon fire, killing thousands before their troops met in a fierce close-quarters battle.
• Sonarion Okra sent another twenty thousand soldiers into the fight as the Okra Kingdom forces began to falter against the Fourteenth Legion.
• The battle ended at nightfall, with the Fourteenth Legion losing more than six thousand dead and the Okra Kingdom army suffering an estimated forty thousand deaths.
• Cassius summoned Talion and told him he intended to raid the Okra Kingdom camp that night.

Talion received Cassius’s orders to lead the Eighteenth Legion and two battalions from the Fourteenth Legion in a raid on the Cask Province Allied Army camp. After scouts discovered that the enemy reacted unusually quickly to a probe, Talion ordered another test before committing to an attack.

• Cassius ordered Talion to use small units to probe the enemy camp and raid it if the defenders were unprepared.
• Talion told Titus that the Eighteenth Legion would lead the operation with assistance from two battalions of the Fourteenth Legion, and the two agreed to cooperate for victory.
• Titus left to assemble the troops while reflecting on the tension between Talion and the Black Asia orcs under his command.
• At midnight, more than a thousand Black Asia orcs split into squads to scout the Cask Province Allied Army camp, where Sonalion Okra had prepared tens of thousands of soldiers to respond to an attack.
• After the enemy reacted within moments to flames at the camp’s edge, Talion questioned the scouts’ report and ordered them to probe the camp again.

Talion’s forces launched a dawn assault on the exhausted Okra Kingdom Cask Province coalition camp, and the coalition’s vanguard collapsed into a rout. Sonalion ordered the central army to retreat and regroup despite a young general’s warning that the withdrawal could make the defeat irreversible.

• Talion ordered his troops to continue harassing the coalition through the night while the main army rested.
• After dawn approached, Talion had more than thirty thousand warriors eat dry rations and then ordered an attack under cover of fog.
• The Eighteenth Legion and the Fourteenth Legion’s Eighth Battalion charged the coalition camp from the east and north.
• The exhausted coalition soldiers began fleeing, and routed troops turned on and killed the supervisory troops blocking their way.
• Sonalion ordered the central army to retreat thirty kilometers and reorganize, but a young general warned that the withdrawal would cause the vanguard to collapse.

Sonalion abandoned the central camp and left Baja to pose as commander while the Okra Kingdom’s coalition forces surrendered to Talion’s army. Talion recruited Baja by promising to rescue his family, and Zohir Saloto began arranging a covert substitution for them in the Royal Capital.

• Sonalion ordered Baja to remain in the central camp with five thousand soldiers while the rest of the army withdrew toward East Rock City.
• As the fog cleared, coalition soldiers realized the camp had been abandoned and tens of thousands surrendered to the Eighteenth Legion and the Fourteenth Legion.
• Talion met Baja in the central camp and offered to spare him and help him if he cooperated; Baja agreed in exchange for his family’s rescue.
• Talion sealed off the camp tent as rumors spread among the prisoners that their commander had been captured or had abandoned them.
• Three days later, Zohir Saloto ordered Kalan to investigate Baja’s family and replace them with corpses, preferably Gang Members from the Royal Capital.

Eze, a captured Aeran soldier, persuaded Coriolan to give him half a month to turn two thousand prisoners into a fighting force and capture an Okra Kingdom-held city. After Priest Lucina healed him, Eze described the long chain of retreats and conscriptions that had brought him to the camp.

• Coriolan gathered the prisoners after dozens escaped and prepared to punish them, but Eze asked to speak with him.
• Eze offered to turn the prisoners into a force, and Coriolan gave him half a month to capture a city or die.
• A High-rank Silver warrior arranged for Priest Lucina to heal Eze and warned him that Coriolan's terms were serious.
• Lucina questioned Eze, who said he was from Bados City and recounted years of fleeing, serving in armies, and being captured in Cask Province.

Eze survived Priestess Lucina’s interrogation and was assigned to organize and train more than two thousand prisoners at the mine. Meanwhile, rumors about the allied commander’s capture destabilized Cask Province, where many city lords began considering defection, leaving Cassius with a chance to take most of the province.

• Eze told Priestess Lucina about his escape, then endured three hours of her lessons on the Goddess of Life and thanked her before she left.
• After Eze fell asleep, a High-Silver Warrior was ordered to take him to the prisoners and supplies behind the mine once he woke.
• Eze reached the clearing, inspected the supplied armor and equipment, and reorganized the prisoners using the Okra Kingdom’s military structure.
• Escaped prisoners spread rumors that the allied commander had been captured and replaced, prompting Cask Province’s garrison commanders and royalists to question their orders.
• Fence-sitters in Cask Province secretly contacted the Fourteenth and Eighteenth Legions, while factions in the Royal Capital sent agents to investigate and moved their assets.
• Cassius reviewed the situation: forty-three of the ninety Okra-held cities were willing to defect, seventeen more would surrender, and only thirty remained firmly loyal to the kingdom.

Cassius delayed a new offensive until his forces had cleared Aurien Province, while Eze settled into his role in the Qixing Army and said farewell to Lucina. As foreign armies gathered to support the Okra Kingdom, Kyle proposed attacking the Holy Blood Papal State.

• Cassius told Talion to prepare prisoner Auxiliary Army units and investigate surrendered nobles and city rulers, including whether some should be purged or used in a covert operation.
• Eze learned that his prisoner force had been officially recognized as a temporary Auxiliary Army under the Sixth Battalion of the Fourteenth Legion.
• Lucina taught Eze from the Life Bible, then told him she was leaving and that Laris would take over his instruction.
• Eze thanked Lucina and promised to seek her out after the war if he survived, while wondering whether his feelings for her were respect or affection.
• Velin received a report that Parambria, Skellion, Seraphitaine, and the Holy Blood Papal State were assembling forces to support the Okra Kingdom.
• Kyle proposed that the Qixing Army plan a direct attack on the Holy Blood Papal State.

Ignis led a 195-ship expedition called Holy Blood's Sweep toward the Holy Blood Papal State, with Tiberius City as the looming target. The chapter outlined the Church's three rival factions and ended with the fleet nearing the city before its residents knew the danger.

• Velin assigned Ignis to lead a first strike against a city in enemy territory, and Kyle approved.
• Ignis ordered seven Floating Fleet commanders to prepare an expedition using 195 Floating Battleships, codenamed Holy Blood's Sweep.
• Three days later, Ignis's fleet departed Sixth Teleportation Array Island and sailed east toward the Holy Blood Papal State.
• The chapter described the Original, Nature, and Purification factions and the Holy Church Army's decline after the God of Holy Blood fell.
• The fleet approached Tiberius City, whose residents began their day unaware that an attack was imminent.

Ignis led the Seventh Floating Fleet in a surprise attack that destroyed Tiberius City and killed most of its residents, then ordered the fleet north toward Jialue City. Three days later, an old man arrived at the ruins and mourned the city his father had died protecting.

• Fishermen fleeing the approaching fleet sent their sons toward an island before planning to return for their families.
• Ignis ordered the 195 Floating Battleships to attack Tiberius City before it could raise its Holy Blood Shield.
• The bombardment burned the city, killed seventy percent of its population, and reduced the Square Tower to rubble.
• Ignis killed a ninth-rank Paladin who charged the fleet after his family died, then sent twenty-three Soul Intent Tier Transcendents to eliminate the remaining Transcendents.
• After the sweep, Ignis ordered the fleet north toward Jialue City.
• Three days later, an old man arrived at Tiberius City's ruins and wept as he remembered its past.

General Ignis redirected his fleet to Xinia Province to reinforce the Third Corps against the Kingdom of Paramshiria, while Iden took over Cassius’s campaign in Cask Province. Cassius marched to join the assembling Third Corps, and the chapter ended with Paramshiria’s officers gathered around a map in Demol Province.

• General Ignis received orders to reach Xinia Province by March 9798 and assist the Third Corps against Paramshiria’s army.
• Ignis assessed Paramshiria’s advance into Okra territory and expected the Eternal Dawn Knight to build enough strength to conquer the kingdom within five years.
• Iden took command from Cassius in Cask Province, where the First Corps would continue the plan to annex the province and encircle Okra Province.
• Cassius departed with his troops to join the Third Corps, which was assembling 600,000 soldiers to face Paramshiria’s one million troops.
• Paramshiria’s officers met in their army’s main camp in Demol Province and studied a map.

Airedes ordered Parambria’s forces to fortify their occupied territories in the Okra Kingdom, then received news that an enemy Sky Fleet had destroyed two cities in the Holy Blood Papal State. He concluded that every defensive plan risked either losing the front or exposing the Royal Capital, leaving the generals with no reliable way to stop the enemy.

• Airedes assigned legions and Noble Allied Army troops to defend Demol Province and regions of Xinia Province, authorizing fortifications and a scorched-earth policy.
• Airedes received an urgent dispatch reporting that Tiberius City and Kasfan City had been destroyed, with over a million casualties.
• Airedes recalled the generals and redrew possible enemy attack routes on the Parchment Map.
• Airedes told the generals that the enemy Sky Fleet had destroyed the two cities in the Holy Blood Papal State, and they reacted with shock.
• Airedes explained that dispersing troops could delay the enemy for at most six months, while concentrating the Sky Fleet at the front would leave the kingdom’s airspace exposed.

Airedes ordered a retreat from contested territories while Angus prepared the Third Corps to encircle and destroy the Parambria army in Okra. Cardinal Sid demanded that King Damian continue the war, and Damian rejected Airedes’s proposed withdrawal under pressure from the Church.

• Airedes ordered his generals to carry out a Scorched Earth Policy and said he would issue precise orders within five days.
• Angus organized the Third Corps into northern and southern armies and ordered a coordinated assault to trap the Parambria forces in Okra.
• Cardinal Sid told King Damian that the Pope demanded the war continue and warned him that the Church controlled the Buria Family’s rule.
• King Damian reflected on his family’s dependence on the Church, then vetoed Airedes’s proposal to withdraw.

The Parambria Kingdom divided its forces and advanced on three targets while Angus deduced that Airedes was drawing him into battle at Black River Ford. The two commanders faced each other across the ford as their armies assembled for battle.

• Lancaster left Airedes after their conversation, and an officer covered the sleeping commander-in-chief with a blanket.
• Seven days later, Airedes, Moen, and Lancaster led separate forces toward Blackwater Ford, Twilight City, and Tyrannus Fortress.
• Angus learned that more than two hundred thousand enemy troops were approaching Tyrannus Fortress and concluded that Airedes was using himself as bait.
• Angus issued orders to his forces and prepared to fight with fewer than one hundred and twenty thousand troops at Black River Ford.
• Angus and Airedes met each other's eyes across the plain as both armies formed their battle lines.

Airedes and Angus committed their armies to a brutal battle at Black River Ford, escalating from infantry clashes to orders for heavy weapons and elite units. As night approached, both sides prepared for a decisive assault.

• Airedes and Angus sent their vanguards forward, with the Qixing Army's Baimu Province troops advancing against Parambria Kingdom soldiers.
• The armies collided at Black River Ford, where berserk-potion soldiers charged into shield lines and both sides suffered heavy casualties.
• After two hours, Airedes and Angus committed additional battalions and generals to the fighting while keeping their long-range weapons in reserve.
• After eight hours and the deaths of twenty-one generals, Airedes ordered the Iron Cobalt Roarers to bombard the battlefield center with Elemental Core Bombs.
• Angus ordered the Knight Legion to attack the enemy left wing, Soul Intent Tier Transcendents to hold off their counterparts, and Magic Energy Cannons to bombard the enemy center in ten minutes.

The battle at Blackford River reached its decisive stage as both armies committed elite fighters and suffered devastating losses from cavalry charges, cannon fire, and Elemental Core Bombs. After the Third Corps broke through the Parambria Kingdom's left wing, Airedes took up his greatsword and prepared to lead a charge himself.

• Both sides sent elite combatants into battle, while thirteen thousand Parambria Kingdom knights charged the Third Corps' right wing.
• The Third Corps' crossbows struck the charging knights, and the two cavalry forces collided in a brutal melee.
• Eighty Magic Energy Cannons bombarded Parambria Kingdom's central command, while several hundred Elemental Core Bombs devastated the battlefield's center.
• The blasts killed thousands on both sides, with Parambria Kingdom suffering the greater losses, and some soldiers began fleeing as disciplinary squads moved against them.
• More than four thousand Third Corps knights broke through the defenses on the left wing, prompting Airedes to arm himself and call for volunteers to charge with him.

Angus and Airedes met in single combat as the Battle of Black River Crossing reached its final clash. Angus killed Airedes after revealing that the war had served his youngest son’s larger plans, and he promised to honor Airedes’s burial wish as the Parambria Kingdom army collapsed.

• More than thirty thousand Parambria Kingdom soldiers chose to follow Airedes, while the rest remained in place.
• Angus put Ravenna Exes in charge of the troops and led the Twenty-second Legion’s First and Second Battalions into battle himself.
• Angus and Airedes fought in the air, and Airedes explained that Angus’s youngest son had prolonged the war to preserve the Okra Kingdom’s territory, army, and talent.
• Angus pierced Airedes’s heart, and Airedes asked to be buried with his children atop Hanging Moon Peak.
• Angus promised to remember Airedes’s wish as the Parambria Kingdom army began to collapse.

After the Battle of Black River Ford, Eze accepted the surrender of more than a thousand routed soldiers while Angus reviewed the devastating casualty reports. Ravenna confronted Angus over his reckless pursuit of honor, leaving Angus calmly listening as his subordinate cursed him.

• Eze led his surviving soldiers to block a valley and demanded that more than a thousand routed Parambria Kingdom soldiers surrender.
• The routed soldiers killed their officer, laid down their weapons, and were bound and escorted to the main camp.
• Five days after the Battle of Black River Ford, Angus reviewed the army’s heavy casualties and the large number of enemy prisoners.
• Ravenna arrived to meet Angus after handing over his sword and heard Angus ask him to gather orphans to replace soldiers lost from the force transferred from Baimu Province.
• When Angus tried to end the meeting, Ravenna realized he had been diverted and angrily berated him for risking the army for honor.

After learning that Airedes had died, Lancaster used Xiu Hun Lu to force forty-eight generals into obedience and accelerated his plan to move troops through the mountains. At Tyrannus Fortress, Doxius, Cassius, and Ignis prepared for an expected Parambria Kingdom offensive.

• Angus subdued Ravenna with wine and left to inspect wounded soldiers, while news of Airedes's death reached Lancaster.
• Lancaster resolved to control the generals and secretly transfer more soldiers into the mountains before the fortress was encircled.
• Using Xiu Hun Lu, Lancaster's men enslaved forty-eight generals, and Lancaster ordered a renewed siege and further transfers into the mountains.
• Doxius, Cassius, and Ignis discussed reports that Tyrannus Fortress was the true breakout route and that a large Parambria Kingdom force was advancing through Tucas Province.
• Ignis trusted the Floating Fleet to defend the fortress, and Doxius agreed to follow the original plan and await the enemy's next move.

Velin sought Duke Moravia’s help finding a Legendary powerhouse so he could deal with the Third Corps commander’s battlefield mistake. Angus feared Velin and Duke Moravia would move against him, sent a secret letter to Elisa through Ailong, and the chapter ended with Lancaster reviewing reports beneath Tyrannus Fortress.

• Velin asked Duke Moravia to connect him with a lone Legendary powerhouse, and Moravia named Alerian, a Legendary Dragon Blood Warlock.
• Velin agreed to meet Alerian after Duke Moravia said she liked strong men.
• Angus suspected Velin and Duke Moravia were coming after him and wrote Elisa a letter in their old secret language.
• Angus tasked Ailong with secretly delivering the letter to Elisa and said he would send him to the Supreme Command the next day with an official document.
• Ailong left for the Griffin Knight camp while hiding his unease about being caught between his uncle and cousin.
• Lancaster examined a casualty report and a transfer report at the Parambria Kingdom army camp beneath Tyrannus Fortress.

Lancaster faced the collapse of his army and prepared to abandon most of his troops so some could escape. At Twilight City, Moen rejected his generals’ call to surrender and chose to fight to the death, prompting Rolf Ex to ask who would face him the next day.

• Lancaster assessed the dwindling forces at Tyrannus Fortress and decided he had to retreat before nightfall the next day, leaving most of his remaining troops behind.
• Lancaster reflected on the casualties and the soldiers he had designated as expendable pawns as dawn approached.
• At Twilight City, eight generals urged Moen to surrender so their troops and families could be spared.
• Moen refused to let the generals decide for him and announced that he would fight to the death outside the camp at noon the next day.
• Rolf Ex asked the Twenty-third Legion commanders who would see Moen off on his final journey.

Rolf Ex arranged an anonymous vote to choose who would face the enemy commander, and Aymond was selected. The next morning, Moen went alone to meet him beneath Twilight City and was killed by Aymond’s strike.

• Rolf Ex had the commanders vote anonymously and announced that Aymond would face the enemy the next day.
• Aymond told Yuna and Lilian he would fight, and they agreed not to tell Velin about the rumors against him.
• Moen prepared for battle, left his general’s seal behind, and walked alone through the Parambria Kingdom camp toward Twilight City.
• Moen introduced himself to Aymond and charged at him with his sword.
• Aymond struck Moen with a flash of light, leaving only Moen’s broken sword on the ground.