Chapter Summaries

Inna helped Earl Aiding’s forces take Longhowl Fortress, where Milgan was killed in a barrage of axes after Inna switched armor with him. Inna left with the Heroine Warriors, now intent on killing the Three Prophets for murdering his mother, and prepared to swear allegiance to Li Ang.

• Inna and Milgan found Longhowl Fortress abandoned and planned to join Fieltzwe, but Inna warned Milgan that Earl Aiding might see him as a rival over Queen Angus.
• When Aiding’s troops approached, Inna refused to raise a white flag, and Milgan ordered the fortress defended; the two switched armor before the battle.
• The Heroine Warriors and Queen’s Guard stopped fighting, but the Queen’s Guard mistook Milgan for their target and killed him with thrown axes while Inna remained unharmed.
• Inna brushed Milgan’s eyes shut, then left Longhowl Fortress with the Heroine Warriors after Earl Aiding praised him and made him a lord of Fieltzwe.
• Inna revealed that he wanted revenge on the Three Prophets for killing his mother, and told Li Ang he intended to swear allegiance to him rather than King Vidis.
• Inna said he believed he could persuade Gondor to join Li Ang, and Ols offered to accompany him to meet his adoptive father.

Li Ang explained that King Vidis had seized Lion Lake City without realizing it was surrounded by a vast army of Fallen Ones led by the Devourer. Li Ang persuaded Gondor to leave Fieltzwe and join him in rescuing Vidis, while Vidis faced the monster outside the city with little hope of help.

• Gondor refused Li Ang's offer because he would not betray his friend, King Vidis, and Li Ang assured him that saving Vidis would not require such a betrayal.
• Inna explained how Vidis had taken Kaineburg and Lion Lake City after Forster pledged allegiance to Fieltzwe, while Vidis hoped to expand his kingdom amid the fighting around Cliff Bay.
• Li Ang revealed that the Devourer and countless Fallen Ones had appeared in Lion Lake City, and he asked Gondor to help rescue Vidis in exchange for leaving Fieltzwe.
• Vidis entered Lion Lake City and discovered that more than ten thousand Fallen Ones surrounded it, leaving his sixteen hundred warriors trapped with few possible allies.
• Vidis saw the leader of the Fallen Ones, an extremely terrifying monster.

The Devourer transformed more than a hundred rogues outside Lion Lake City into Fallen Ones, forcing King Vidis to consider Li Ang’s offer of an alliance. At Payne Village, Andongjia and Kelvin told Li Ang that the Slaughterer was massacring Misty Mountain people and might be Raven Sir Boris, not the legendary Omen Wolf.

• The Devourer used black mist and whispers to make the rogues outside Lion Lake City tear off their skin and become Fallen Ones.
• Earl Airi delivered Li Ang’s letter offering to protect Fieltzwe’s lands and join forces against the Devourer, and Vidis ordered troops summoned and a messenger sent to Payne.
• Andongjia brought the captive Raven Territory knight Kelvin to Li Ang, and Kelvin said the monster he had seen was a slaughtering demon rather than the Omen Wolf.
• Andongjia explained that the legendary Omen Wolf appeared in winter to unite the Misty Mountain tribes, unlike the monster now killing them in summer.
• Kelvin told Li Ang that the monster resembled Raven Sir Boris, a seven-foot-tall traitor with one black eye and one blue eye.

Li Ang realized the massacres near three cultural centers were likely part of one heretical uprising that used different evil gods as cover. With the Devourer threatening Lion Lake City, he sent Sigismund and Andongjia to lure Boris into the fight and ordered Risadiran to drive Oswood’s forces toward the city.

• Kelvin and Andongjia identified Boris, the Raven Sir, and reported that he rode a demonic warhorse like the Devourer’s.
• Li Ang connected the massacres and monsters near Brettwen, Gosbur Village, and Vulpine Town to a single group that was exploiting the names of different gods.
• Li Ang released Kelvin and ordered Sigismund to take him and Andongjia to Raven Territory to lure Boris toward their forces.
• Risadiran reported that Roland had found Oswood heading toward Lion Lake City, and Li Ang ordered Risadiran to set a fire south of the woods to drive Oswood’s troops toward the city.

Godric and Duke Adarian's exhausted forces were ambushed by risen corpses at Cliff Bay, forcing them to retreat as the Three Prophets' prayer sounded. In the forest east of Vulpine Town, Roland joined forces with Renard and former Dawn Knight Order members to hunt Oswood, while Elano suspected Renard was a thief.

• Godric and Duke Adarian realized Brennus was forcing civilians to fight in Lion Retainer gear to delay the allied army's advance.
• Fallen Ones rose among the dead on the hill, killed an archer, and forced Godric to order a retreat to Amil Village.
• Godric recognized the Three Prophets' prayer and feared the outbreak had reached Cliff Bay as it had Lion Lake City.
• Roland led his trained troops through the forest to hunt Oswood after witnessing atrocities committed by Oswood's men.
• Elano spotted Renard's hidden companion and suspected Renard was a thief, while Renard revealed his group had once belonged to the Dawn Knight Order.
• Renard knelt before Roland, offered him a stolen object, and asked to follow him.

Renard explained how he abandoned the corrupt Dawn Knight Order and stole Light Choice to pursue true justice, then joined Roland in tracking Oswood. Roland’s forces found Oswood trapped between a forest fire and the Fallen Ones, but Oswood fled and ran into an even larger group of them.

• Renard gave Roland Light Choice and recounted how he had opposed the Dawn Knight Order’s abuses, escaped its prison, and taken the seal to serve justice as a wandering knight.
• Elano spotted smoke to the south, and Roland led his troops after Oswood.
• Oswood fled south from the Fallen Ones but was driven back into the forest by a fire that blocked the southern exit.
• Roland arrived as Oswood fought the Fallen Ones, but Oswood abandoned his troops and escaped with his trusted followers.
• Oswood recalled his role in covering up the Lion Knight Order’s crimes and the losses that had left him with only a small force.
• Oswood escaped the forest with several dozen survivors, only to charge into a huge mass of Fallen Ones.

Roland and his followers were trapped between Fallen Ones in the forest until Risadiran guided them to safety. Meanwhile, Li Ang worked to evacuate nearby villagers and draw the Devourer Aigrem away from populated areas, while Aigrem captured Oswood and began tormenting him.

• Oswood’s men abandoned him as Fallen Ones surrounded him, while Roland caught and killed the fleeing remnants before his force encountered more Fallen Ones in the forest.
• Roland, Renard, Elano, and the villagers who followed Roland formed a defense against the Fallen Ones, and Risadiran arrived to lead them out of the forest.
• Risadiran explained that fire and smoke would not stop the Fallen Ones, while Roland asked how Li Ang planned to deal with Aigrem’s growing army.
• Li Ang and King Vidis coordinated attacks to distract Aigrem as Li Ang’s cavalry evacuated villagers near Lion Lake City and Payne, but Vidis could not break out of the city.
• Aigrem captured Oswood alive, recognized the resentful souls caused by his crimes, and stripped and wounded him with its battle axe.

Li Ang learned the history of Aigrem, the demon called the Gloomy Eye, and the Heretic Codex from Roland. He suspected the Dawn Knight Order had never truly defeated Aigrem and planned to use its approaching knights to test the Devourer.

• Roland told Li Ang that the demon Aigrem had once caused the rise of the Fallen Ones, and recounted how the Dawn Knight Order's purge of heretics had become a pretext for its own abuses.
• Roland revealed that the Three Prophets had once been priests of the Temple of Justice, had escaped his attempt to capture them, and had stolen the Heretic Codex linked to Aigrem's summoning.
• Li Ang argued that the Dawn Knight Order had kept the Heretic Codex because it let the Order define heresy and justify its privileges.
• Roland explained that Aigrem drew in people with evil thoughts and devoured the souls of skilled warriors, but admitted that the Order had no record of how it supposedly defeated the demon.
• Li Ang proposed letting the Dawn Knight Order confront Aigrem first, and told Roland that he had sent word to Light Roar Bay that Roland was in Lion Lake City so the Order would come after him.

Li Ang’s plan to lure Aigrem away interrupted its ritual and sent Roland and the Fallen Ones east, while Elano escaped with the Heretic Codex. Risadiran found the mutilated Oswood still alive and recognized him, ordering his men to save him.

• Li Ang chose Roland to lure Aigrem east of Lion Lake City while grenades distracted it, and Roland led an elite squad toward the altar.
• Aigrem’s ritual using Oswood was interrupted by explosions, which scattered the black mist and blasted the Heretic Codex away.
• Roland charged for the Heretic Codex as Aigrem attacked, then threw the book to Elano and led Aigrem and the Fallen Ones east.
• Elano carried the Heretic Codex south while Oswood regained movement on the altar and called for help.
• Risadiran’s Noldos found Oswood, and Risadiran ordered them to stop his bleeding after Oswood gave his name.

Roland lured Aigrem away from Lion Lake City, but the Devourer turned back and began besieging the city. At Payne Village, Li Ang discovered clues linking the Heretic Codex to the Abyssal Gate, then faced an attack from Elano, who seemed to be possessed or transformed.

• Roland bombarded Aigrem with grenades and arrows, damaged its warhorse, and withdrew after the Devourer stopped pursuing him.
• Aigrem led the Fallen Ones to besiege Lion Lake City, where Vidis's defenders destroyed the ladders after a day of fighting.
• Li Ang studied the Heretic Codex and found two matching spiral patterns on its black metal pages while Elano guarded the barracks.
• Li Ang questioned the mutilated Oswood, who described Aigrem attempting to summon a demon through a pitch-black gate with eye-like doors.
• Li Ang recognized the codex's metal pages as the Abyssal Gate, then saw Elano approach him with a short spear.
• Elano caught the codex, broke Li Ang's spear with her arm, and hurled a heavy table at him as he shouted that she might be one of the Three Prophets.

Li Ang confronted Media, who had taken over Elano’s body, and learned that the Three Prophets were gatekeepers serving Goddess Eredar and that Aigrem had stolen the Abyssal Gate. Media explained that Aigrem intended to summon other Gloomy Eyes, and the chapter ended with Li Ang learning how their souls could enter the world in physical bodies.

• Li Ang had Risadiran pull the guards back and lit the barracks, revealing that the woman in Elano’s body was the prophet Media.
• Media asked where Anna and Cersi were, and Li Ang told her that Anna was in Ulrich’s grave and Cersi was imprisoned in the form of a fat cook.
• Media explained that her Divine Art could suppress weak souls but could not affect Li Ang because of his Noldo blood, and she recognized him as Chosen of God.
• Media offered to return Elano and have the three prophets work for Li Ang if he freed Anna and Cersi, but Li Ang questioned her about Aigrem and the Heretic Codex.
• Media said the Heretic Codex was the Abyssal Gate, which the prophets had taken to keep the Gloomy Eye sealed, and claimed that Goddess Eredar guarded the world against abyssal demons.
• Media revealed that Aigrem had stolen the Abyssal Gate to summon other Gloomy Eyes, who could gain physical bodies through sacrifices of evil souls and pure flesh.

Media revealed that the gods were power-hungry spellcasters and explained how Astaria and the Temple of Justice had betrayed Eredar, then Li Ang agreed to cooperate with the three prophets against Aigrem. After Media left Elano’s body and possessed Oswood, Li Ang asked how they could send Aigrem back to the abyss.

• Media told Li Ang that the Temple of Justice had summoned Aigrem and that Astaria had betrayed Eredar to seize followers and power.
• Li Ang concluded that the gods acted like selfish rulers and that they would oppose anyone trying to reunite Pendor.
• Li Ang and Media swore to cooperate against Aigrem, with Li Ang promising to reunite Media with Anna and Cersi.
• Media left Elano’s body and entered Oswood’s body, then exiled Oswood’s soul into the Blood Prison Abyss.
• Li Ang closed the Heretic Codex’s Abyssal Gate and asked Media how to send Aigrem back to the abyss.

Li Ang learned how Aigrem could be defeated and planned to use lightning against it before Media expelled its soul. Meanwhile, Sigismund lured Boris’s force into Aigrem’s army, creating an opening for the Dawn Knight Order and Aiding to retreat into Lion Lake City.

• Media explained that Aigrem devoured souls, revived through nearby corpses, and could be banished by a pure-hearted person once its army was eliminated and its body restrained.
• Li Ang concluded that lightning might weaken Aigrem and told Risadiran to watch over Media while he arranged to draw a storm.
• The Dawn Knight Order and Aiding reached Lion Lake City to aid Vidis, but Roland and Aigrem’s pursuing army trapped them outside the city and forced them to retreat inside.
• Sigismund impersonated Wolfberd and drove Boris south across the grasslands, then led him toward Lion Lake City.
• Boris’s force blundered into Aigrem’s army east of the city while Sigismund escaped southeast to Li Ang’s troops with loot taken from Boris.
• The Fieltzwe troops and the Dawn Knight Order seized the eastern battle as an opportunity and broke out from the west into Lion Lake City.

Li Ang studied Aigrem’s battlefield control and chose a lightning-prone hill as the site of a plan to destroy it, while waiting for the storm his plan required. Wendy arrived with Noldo reinforcements, and Aigrem continued to besiege Lion Lake City without attacking Li Ang’s camp.

• Boris held off the Fallen Ones outside Lion Lake City, then entered the city with just over two hundred men after Vidis’s western breakout failed.
• Li Ang watched Aigrem use Fallen Ghosts to direct its forces, and concluded that its control of the battlefield made conventional attacks costly and dangerous.
• Li Ang and Gondor selected a hill between Payne Village and Lion Lake City where giant trees had repeatedly been struck by lightning, then prepared iron chains and sent riders to watch for storm clouds.
• Wendy arrived with over four hundred Noldo warriors after Forster and Eric had crushed the heretic Seekers around Long River Town.
• Wendy told Li Ang that Dalion’s knight order in Kewen Village and Charles had both disappeared, but Li Ang chose not to investigate Charles’s absence yet.
• Aigrem discovered Li Ang’s camp at Payne Village but did not attack it, continuing to focus on Lion Lake City.

Li Ang prepared a plan to lure Aigrem into a lightning-strike zone, using Wendy’s ancestral ritual and an approaching summer storm to create the chance to kill it. He and Risadiran rode out to support Roland, who baited Aigrem with the Abyssal Gate, as Aigrem pursued with a newly strengthened cavalry force.

• Li Ang trimmed the surrounding trees and arranged for Wendy to conduct an ancestral ritual, hoping lightning would strike the tallest tree.
• Wendy’s ritual coincided with a south wind and gathering storm clouds, and Li Ang urged her to pray for lightning while ordering the troops to prepare.
• Li Ang explained that Roland would lure Aigrem with the Abyssal Gate while he and Risadiran guided Aigrem toward the planned strike zone.
• Roland appeared before Aigrem with the Abyssal Gate, and Aigrem immediately pursued him with more than a hundred Fallen Ghosts and many Fallen Warriors on flesh horses.

Li Ang led the Noldo forces in a charge to rescue Roland, then used the Heretic Codex to draw Aigrem away from the battlefield. He lured Aigrem to a burning giant tree beneath an approaching storm, but Aigrem called the Abyssal Gate “Heaven’s Gate” just as lightning neared.

• Roland’s men were badly mauled by the Fallen Ones, so Li Ang charged with the Noldo forces to break through and reach him.
• Li Ang rescued Roland’s position, but Roland’s horse was killed, and Li Ang took the Heretic Codex to draw Aigrem away.
• Aigrem’s soul-shaking roar affected Li Ang and Roland’s men, while the Noldos remained unaffected and used mounted archery to hinder the encirclement.
• Li Ang led the Noldos through erratic turns that left the Fallen Horses behind, while Roland and his survivors escaped in the opposite direction.
• Li Ang set a giant tree alight and had the Heretic Codex wedged high in its branches to lure Aigrem beneath it before the storm arrived.
• Aigrem warned Li Ang not to destroy the object, calling it “Heaven’s Gate” instead of the Abyssal Gate.

Li Ang lured Aigrem’s Fallen One army into a trap, using the burning giant tree to draw lightning while his allies fought to keep the enemy contained. The lightning struck the tree and electrified the connected chains, enveloping Li Ang and Aigrem as their battle reached its climax.

• Li Ang resisted Aigrem’s soul magic, then had Risadiran ignite the oil barrels and set the giant tree ablaze.
• Grenades collapsed the narrow passage, trapping Aigrem’s forces in the U-shaped mountaintop enclosure, while Li Ang discovered that Aigrem’s spell had incapacitated Gondor’s human troops.
• Wendy and the Noldo Elves used volleys, grenades, and obstacles to defeat a company of Fallen Ones, but Aigrem’s assault left them locked in a desperate battle.
• Roland, Renard, and Li Ang attacked Aigrem as Risadiran and the Twilight Knights intercepted the Fallen Ghosts; Renard, Roland, and Wendy were knocked down or injured.
• Aigrem charged Li Ang, who grabbed an iron chain, and lightning struck the burning tree, electrifying the chains around them both.

A devastating lightning strike stopped the battle and left Li Ang and Aigrem missing, while Wendy refused to give up searching for Li Ang. Li Ang awakened as a spirit beside Aigrem in an unfamiliar place, learned about the Blood Prison, and was carried off by Kualis with Althea.

• A second bolt of Heavenly Lightning split the giant tree, scattered the fighters, and stopped the Fallen Ones.
• Wendy survived the blast, but Li Ang and Aigrem vanished beneath the fallen tree, and Wendy searched the slope in grief.
• Li Ang awoke in a disembodied state and discovered that Aigrem was beside him as a spirit.
• Aigrem explained that the Blood Prison was once the Goddess's Divine Kingdom, but became a hell where spirits heard one another's thoughts and fought to survive.
• Althea and the little white dragon Kualis found Li Ang and Aigrem on a beach, then Kualis carried them into the sky.

After Althea revived Li Ang on the island, he told her about the Noldo Elves and learned she could not send him back to the Pande Continent. As Li Ang worried about how to return, a voice from a black flame in the temple offered to help if he came to it that night.

• Kualis and Althea recognized Aigrem as a demon that had devoured countless souls and sealed it inside the temple.
• Althea used runes to restore Li Ang's senses, then pushed him underwater after he accidentally squeezed her.
• Li Ang told Althea about Wendilf and his plans for the Noldo Elves, and she was pleased by their future prospects.
• Li Ang discovered that Althea and Kualis had no way to send him back to the Pande Continent, so he stayed on the island.
• A voice from a black flame in the temple offered to help Li Ang return if he came to it that night.

Li Ang learned from Kualis and Althea about the temple’s hidden god and the powerful souls within it, then discovered Kavala could help him return to the Pande Continent. Kavala revealed that the codex was likely destroyed and recounted how Li Ang’s disappearance had reshaped the wars at home, where Amy was searching for him with the strength of the nation.

• Kualis told Li Ang that a god had occupied its consciousness and Althea’s, granted them eternal life, and brought Kavala’s soul to the temple centuries earlier.
• Li Ang realized that Kavala, Ulrich, and Aigrem were among the temple’s souls and considered asking Kavala how to return to the Pande Continent.
• Althea teased Li Ang about Wendy, while Kavala confirmed that Li Ang was his descendant and said he knew a way home if the codex remained intact.
• Li Ang said lightning had probably destroyed the codex, and Kavala laughed that Li Ang had accomplished what he could not in a lifetime before telling him Amy was searching for him.
• Kavala recounted that Aigrem’s Fallen Ones had run amok, the city defense army and Vidis’s forces had clashed, and Gondor’s surprise attack had routed the Dawn Knight Order.
• Kavala explained that Wendy and Risadiran had returned to Noldo Forest, Godric was besieged at Misty Marsh Fortress, and Amy had renewed the war against Cliff Bay while ordering a nationwide search for Li Ang.