Chapter Summaries

Ang surveyed the volcanic region of Mount Tuska, captured two Demons, and used soul power to learn their language and gather information. After discovering that Mount Tuska belonged to the fourth-rank lord Tus and that the mountaintop held the strongest dark power, he killed the Demons and prepared to act on what he had learned.

• Ang climbed to higher ground and observed a volcanic region populated by Demons, hellhounds, and other monsters.
• Two Demons, Tuk and Tuka, attacked Ang, but he subdued them and trapped them underground.
• Ang connected to Tuk and Tuka’s thoughts with his soul power and learned enough of their language to question them.
• Tuk and Tuka told Ang that Mount Tuska was part of Lord Tus’s territory and that the mountaintop was the source of its dark power.
• Ang killed Tuk and Tuka with Earth Spears after questioning them.

Ang reached Mount Tuska and absorbed enough pure dark energy to become a Rank 2 Archmage, while discovering that water magic was nearly impossible in the Abyssal Prison. He returned through the Gate of Foul Spirits, closed it, captured the Four-armed Foul Spirit, and left with his companions as he considered further experiments.

• Ang climbed Mount Tuska and used his Six-armed Momentum to absorb dark energy, breaking through to Rank 2 Archmage.
• Ang found that holy light was rapidly devoured by darkness and that he could not sense water elements in the Abyssal Prison.
• Ang returned through the Gate of Foul Spirits and used a Spatial Blade to close it, cutting off the gathered Demons from the passage.
• Ang flooded and froze the Four-armed Foul Spirit, sealed it inside a Metal Box, and withdrew from Lizardmen City with his forces.
• Ang showed Dana and the others a recording of Mount Tuska and explained his discovery of the Abyssal Prison's elemental imbalance and his new Dark Archmage rank.
• Ang told Natiya that each opening of the Gate of Foul Spirits connected to a different region of the Abyssal Prison, and recounted how Tuka and Tuk had ambushed him.

Ang returned from the Abyssal Prison with the captured Four-armed Foul Spirit, then learned that the Empire might abandon the Archipelago Plane as Demon threats spread. After Ang’s warning prompted a mass flight to his territories, he organized relief for the arriving civilians and promised they could eventually reclaim their land.

• During the flight, Ang taught Dana and Gweny basic Demon language after explaining that the Abyssal Prison was an endless world filled with Demons.
• Ang brought the Four-armed Foul Spirit to Amnath City, chained it in the Magic Prison, and assigned guards while it failed to activate the Gate of Foul Spirits.
• Ang traveled to Fortress of Will and told Pute that more than ten thousand Demons had been eliminated in Lizardmen City and that the Gate of Foul Spirits might appear elsewhere.
• Pute warned that the Empire would not open the Plane Portal to the Archipelago Plane and explained that its nobles might be preparing to abandon the islands.
• Pute sent Demon warnings across Imperial-controlled regions, and more than eight hundred thousand displaced people arrived in Ang’s territories, where Ang’s officials registered and resettled them.
• Ang established reception points for the civilians and promised that their land would eventually be returned to them.

Ang prepared to open the Gate of Foul Spirits, forcing the imprisoned Four-armed Foul Spirit to consider his demand while breaking Joandi’s resistance through deprivation and humiliation. Three days later, after Foul Spirits appeared near Fortress of Will, Ang arranged a witnessed expedition to Viscount Clemens’s territory, where defeating them could let him claim the land.

• Ang told Quintina the plan would begin the next day, then visited Magic Prison and demanded that the Four-armed Foul Spirit open the Gate of Foul Spirits.
• Ang brought Joandi out of the Anti-Magic Field, gave her water and food, and watched as hunger drove her to devour meal after meal before returning her to her cell.
• The Four-armed Foul Spirit offered to open the gate if Ang let him eat Joandi, but Ang refused, beat the bound spirit, and sealed him in ice for transport aboard an airship.
• Three days later, Foul Spirits appeared on the Litchfield Plains, and Pute sent a hundred witnesses from Fortress of Will to Amnath City after Ang requested observers for an operation in Viscount Clemens’s territory.
• Quintina assembled two hundred Flame Swordsmen to escort the Witness Group by airship to the Foul Spirits’ reported location.

Ang led an officially witnessed campaign to clear Demons from abandoned fiefdoms, securing territory and inspiring hope at Fortress of Will. As other nobles tried to imitate his forces, their independent attack ended in a costly defeat, while Ang prepared to advance toward southern Volgograd.

• Ang reassured the airship’s witnesses, explained how the Demons’ movements had been investigated, then led his troops to expose and slaughter more than twenty Demons as officials recorded the battle and witnesses confirmed the remains.
• Over the next two days, Ang’s army killed more than three hundred Demons in Clemens Viscount’s Fiefdom, and under Imperial Code Ang and the Empire divided the abandoned territory.
• Ang cleared Demon strongholds across more than thirty fiefdoms over the following month, killing over three thousand Demons; Pute announced the results at Fortress of Will, where the news sparked celebrations.
• Nobles formed their own Allied Forces and followed Ang into the Litchfield Plains, but their attempt to seize a stronghold independently ended with more than three hundred dead and nearly a thousand wounded after they killed just over a hundred Demons.
• Ang dismissed the nobles’ ambitions and said he would advance toward southern Volgograd, while officials recorded the defeated Allied Forces’ battle for future review and the distribution of merits.

Ang cleared the Demons from southern Volgograd and destroyed the Gate of Foul Spirits, after which an imperial investigation team confirmed the threat in the Archipelago Plane had ended. The investigators tried to recruit Ang’s powerful subordinates, but they remained loyal to him as he prepared to distribute the newly controlled lands.

• Ang published a map of Demon activity, prompting adventuring parties to harass isolated Demons across southern Volgograd.
• Ang’s forces entered southern Volgograd, defeated the Demons, and destroyed the Gate of Foul Spirits while witnesses and adventurers watched.
• Pute informed Ang that an imperial investigation team had arrived, and Ang reassured his allies that the evidence would not reveal their concealed plans.
• The investigation team examined the valley, the battle records, and the Four-armed Foul Spirit’s corpse before confirming the Demons had been eliminated.
• Imperial investigators offered Ang’s powerful subordinates positions, but Puri and the others refused and reaffirmed their loyalty to Ang.

At a banquet in the Fortress of Will, Count Ang learned why the Empire’s nobles needed Black Magic Crystals and heard how Level 2 warriors and mages avoided the God-Demon Battlefield. He agreed to consider the investigators’ request to sell them crystals, while they privately recognized that he had concealed the strength of his army.

• Nobles in the Empire’s northern territories doubted reports that the Demons on the Archipelago Plane had been eradicated, while displaced Lesser Nobles waited for confirmation.
• At a banquet, Count Feldman praised Ang for helping wipe out the Demons, and Abel asked whether he would sell some of his Black Magic Crystals.
• Feldman and another noble explained that hereditary nobles paid Black Magic Crystals to retain their titles, and Abel revealed that Level 2 warriors and mages who avoided the God-Demon Battlefield had to pay fifty Tier 2 crystals every two years or die.
• Ang asked why the investigators’ younger relatives could not maintain their titles through military achievements, prompting Abel to explain their fear of returning to the battlefield and its corrupting effects.
• Ang agreed to consider the investigators’ request, and they privately concluded that he had concealed the fact that many soldiers under his command had reached Level 2.

After the investigation confirmed that Ang and his allies had reached Level 2, they prepared to enter the God-Demon Battlefield, while Ang learned that Imperial nobles tolerated cooperation with the Black Magic Society. When the Plane Portal reopened, Ang’s takeover of abandoned fiefs sparked a dispute with their former owners, and he defended his claim before the Imperial council.

• Ang learned from Abel and Feldman that Level 2 combat professionals had to serve on the God-Demon Battlefield, where the Management Committee enforced year-round deployment.
• Pute thanked Ang for saving the Archipelago Plane, handed him an Imperial reimbursement approval, and hinted that nobles were tacitly allowed to cooperate with the Black Magic Society.
• Ang returned to Amnath City, told his followers to prepare for the battlefield, and watched the people return to lands now governed by his forces.
• After the Empire reopened the Plane Portal, noble attendants found that Ang controlled the former fiefs, prompting more than fifty nobles to petition the Imperial Noble Affairs Management Committee.
• Ang sent a reply arguing that his troops had lawfully taken over the lands after their lords fled, while the former nobles publicly accused him of seizing their property.

Ang faced a hearing after returning nobles accused him of illegally taking their territories, then won the council’s unanimous ruling that his acquisitions were lawful. The case ended with the lands secured under his control.

• Former landowners secretly discussed how to challenge Ang, but feared accusing him of colluding with Demons.
• Ang accepted the Nobles Affairs Management Council’s hearing, and Quintina accompanied him to support him.
• At the hearing, the nobles presented old records while Ang countered them with takeover documents, witness reports, and villagers’ testimony.
• At a ball, nobles asked Ang about Black Magic Crystals, but learned the investigation team had already taken them.
• Three days later, the council ruled that Ang’s territorial takeovers were lawful and rejected further appeals without authoritative evidence.

Ang developed a potion made from Joandi’s succubus essence and used it to help Ade summon and contract a nightmare, while planning a secret cavalry force. He pressured Joandi to summon more succubi and began investigating the imprisoned Black Mages, who started revealing their backgrounds in hopes of freedom.

• A nobleman in Akreli ordered his agent to contact Ang about buying the Mithril Ore veins in Ang’s territory.
• Ang refined Joandi’s essence into Tears of the Succubus, a potion with powerful seduction and mental-subjugation effects.
• Ade used the potion to subdue and contract a nightmare, and Ang began planning a Nightmare Cavalry Regiment of at least two thousand mounts.
• Ang demanded that Joandi teach him to summon succubi and provide ten thousand liters of succubus urine, threatening to let the Black Mages visit her if she refused.
• Ang questioned the Black Mages about their identities and offered possible service and freedom in exchange for Magic Contracts; three days later, they began disclosing their histories.

Ang prepared to investigate the Black Mages and negotiated the sale of the Mithril Ore lands with the southern nobles. After the Northern Council and Magic Guild confirmed the strength and purity of his forces, Ang ordered everyone to prepare to leave for the God-Demon Battlefield within a week.

• Ang sent warriors and mages to verify the Black Mages’ backgrounds and wrote to Candice and Leon asking what they knew about the Black Magic Society summoning Demons on the Archipelago Plane.
• Ang agreed to sell the southern nobles only the Mithril Ore lands under strict terms, earning more than seven million magic crystals.
• Ang demonstrated his Six-armed Momentum to envoys from the Northern Council and Magic Guild, confirming that he was a Level 2 Great Warrior.
• The envoys tested Ang’s subordinates and discovered that his forces included three Great Warriors and thirteen Archmages.
• Ang told Puli to have everyone prepare to depart for the God-Demon Battlefield within a week.
• A Magic Guild Archmage reexamined Ang’s subordinates and confirmed their magic power was free of dark contamination, then announced that another Archmage would arrive to explain their imperial obligations and placement.

Ang forced Joandi to explain how to summon succubi, then summoned and confined more than twenty of them for their magical supplies. After Duke Edmond arrived in Amnath City, he told Ang and the others that their rank required them to serve at the God-Demon Battlefield or pay a steep alternative.

• Ang revived Joandi, threatened her into explaining the succubus-summoning ritual, and learned that her mother had been a succubus imprisoned and bred in the Abyssal Prison.
• Ang summoned more than twenty succubi, bound them, and arranged for them to provide milk and urine in a guarded prison outside the city.
• Duke Edmond arrived at the Governor's Mansion and introduced himself to Ang, Dana, Gweny, Quintina, and the others.
• Duke Edmond explained that Archmages and Great Warriors had to serve at the God-Demon Battlefield for one year every two years or pay fifty Tier 2 Black Magic Crystals.
• Duke Edmond described the battlefield as a place of opportunity and danger, leaving everyone to consider their choices.

Ang and his companions learned how they would reach the God-Demon Battlefield and prepared for their departure, while Ang spent time with Natiya and worried about bringing everyone home safely. As the group reunited with loved ones before leaving, Gweny received farewells from the Rose Warband, though Margherita did not appear.

• Duke explained that a Tier 4 Teleportation Magic scroll would take the group to the battlefield’s controlled entrance, described the dangers and assignments there, and warned them to arrive within a month.
• Ang bought thirty high-tier Magic Waist Pouches for the team, and he and Quintina remained behind after the meeting; Ang said he would not return to North Wind Territory because Aisha had already gone back.
• Ang spent several days exploring the Archipelago Plane with Natiya, admitted he feared he could not bring everyone back, and heard that the Wilderland Empire was stationed on the third line of defense.
• Dana prepared to leave and took Beibei and Tassai on a trip, while the other team members returned to their families and Ang’s political rivals waited for him to disappear.
• Janice, Maya, and other Rose Warband warriors came to Amnath City to see Gweny off and encourage her, but Margherita did not appear.

Ang and his companions traveled from Amnath City to the entrance of the God-Demon Battlefield, where they registered and learned about the defenses and merit system. As they waited to enter, Hicks Megan recognized Ang for his role in stopping the Foul Spirit invasion of the Archipelago Plane.

• Ang used a Tier 4 Teleportation Scroll to take his group from Amnath City to the God-Demon Battlefield entrance, leaving Natiya and the Minotaur chieftain to manage the city.
• Barret Roskin welcomed Ang's group, and Sabrina registered them and issued them identity tags.
• Barret explained that the group might be assigned to different defense lines, described the danger near the Abyssal Prison, and discussed the uses of merit.
• Dana revealed his Noble Emblem after Barret disparaged beastmen, then questioned whether Barret had truly earned five hundred merit points.
• Hicks Megan and Cynthia Wilde spoke with Ang in the line, recognized his reputation for quelling the Archipelago Plane's Foul Spirit invasion, and asked about his past battles.

Ang and his fifteen companions were assigned to the Second Defense Line at Indy Mountain Pass and arrived at Fokas Fortress, where they learned they would travel to their post with a supply convoy the next morning. The fortress’s warriors treated the newcomers with disdain, leaving Ang’s group to wait in camp under suspicious scrutiny.

• Ang agreed to form a squad with Hicks and Cynthia if they were assigned together, then learned that the mages in his group might be sent to support positions.
• The officer offered Ang’s group a choice between splitting up at the Third Defense Line or staying together at Indy Mountain Pass; Quintina, Pri, Ade, and the others chose to go with Ang.
• The officer assigned all sixteen to the Second Defense Line and teleported them to Fokas Fortress, where a guard called them newcomers and mocked Dana.
• Lindon told Ang’s group they could travel to Indy Mountain Pass with a supply convoy the next morning and showed them the corrupted battlefield surrounding Fokas Fortress.
• A warrior ordered Ang’s group to rest in camp and warned them to keep up during the journey, while Ang told his companions to ignore the disrespect.

Ang and his companions were denied food and shelter at the camp, so they made a temporary home on a cliff platform and prepared for the dangers of the God-Demon Battlefield. The chapter ended when Level Four Chaos Demon Spiders attacked their camp.

• Ang warned his companions not to absorb the battlefield’s dense, corrupted magical elements and learned that the camp required Merit Points or Tier 2 Black Magic Crystals for food and lodging.
• A camp warrior demanded a thousand magic crystals from Ang and taunted the newcomers, so Ang led his group to a cliff platform instead.
• Ang and his companions erected tents, prepared a meal, and set up a temporary protective magic array on the exposed platform.
• Ang and Quintina discussed the camp’s cold treatment of newcomers before Ang sensed seven or eight magical beasts approaching.
• The magic array was torn apart, and Level Four Chaos Demon Spiders leaped onto the platform as Ang ordered everyone into battle formation.

Ang and his companions defeated six Chaos Demon Spiders on the cliff platform, then joined a supply convoy bound for Indy Mountain Pass. On the journey, they learned that Jack had spent nearly eleven years on the God-Demon Battlefield and remained there despite his injured leg.

• Ang, Dana, Gweny, and the mages fought off the Chaos Demon Spiders, killing six and driving the survivors away.
• Ang harvested the spiders' tough shells and legs, and the group took turns keeping watch through the night.
• Ang's group met Eric in the morning and followed him to the real Fokas Fortress, where they joined a westbound supply convoy.
• Ang and his companions met Jack, a veteran soldier traveling with the eighth vehicle, and learned they were headed to Indy Mountain Pass.
• Jack explained that his leg had been injured three years earlier and that he had stayed in the God-Demon Battlefield for almost eleven years, unable to afford to leave.

Ang and his companions traveled with Jack’s convoy across the God-Demon Battlefield, where Jack explained its dangers and the Merit Point system. Shared food and wine softened Jack’s guardedness and revealed how difficult life was for the veteran escort.

• Jack warned Ang’s group that ordinary magic crystals quickly lost power on the battlefield, and Mons tested Ang’s Chaos Demon Spider crystal on his Magic Broom.
• Jack stopped the convoy for breakfast and explained that eating helped protect travelers from mist that drained their life force.
• Ang offered Jack White Apricot Fruit Wine and white bread, stirring memories of home and revealing that Jack could not afford refined bread with his Merit Points.
• Ang quietly placed extra bread in Jack’s backpack before the convoy resumed its journey.
• Jack explained that Merit Points came from fighting Demons, turning in Black Magic Crystals, and escort missions, and that he earned only six points each month.

Jack explained the dangers and defenses of the God-Demon Battlefield as the group traveled to Indy Mountain Pass, where commander Red welcomed them to the garrison. Ang’s group settled in, learned how the fortress operated, and spent their starting Merit Points on meals.

• Jack warned the group to fight Demons during the day and never undertake missions alone, then explained the battlefield’s defensive lines and their destination at Indy Mountain Pass.
• The group reached Indy Mountain Pass and met Red, the garrison commander, who led them up to the fortress suspended between the cliffs.
• Red said the newcomers could remain together as a temporary squad, and Ang chose not to split up the group.
• Red gave the recruits two Merit Points through their Identity Tokens and explained that meals and services cost merit.
• Kael delivered the group’s first meals, and their Identity Tokens’ balances fell to zero after they registered for food.

Ang and his companions settled into Indy Mountain Pass, learned about the fortress and its people, and prepared their caves for the night. The next morning, Ang confronted a warrior who stared at the women, while the group’s provisions drew attention in the dining hall.

• Red showed Ang’s group the fortress facilities, introduced them to Hansen, and explained that Hansen had remained on the God-Demon Battlefield since entering it.
• Red assigned the group vacant caves, and Ang equipped their rooms with rune tablets, mattresses, and blankets.
• The group slept poorly, then encountered warriors staring at Quintina, Gesang, and the other women in the dining hall; Ang warned them, and Red made one sit down.
• Ang added shredded ram meat and white bread from his supplies to the group’s breakfast, prompting Red to discover that Ang was both a Level Two warrior and a Level Two mage.
• The other warriors complained that they had no white bread, but Red told them to earn Merit Points if they wanted food Ang had brought himself.