Recaps

Serika Wood sent Response Bureau forces to capture the United States president and assault the Magical Congress, which Lucius Malfoy confronted with an ultimatum to join Lord Murphy. As the Congress prepared to defend itself, Serika ordered her troops to fire anti-magic bullets.

• Serika Wood sent a special operations group to find the United States president, seize the nuclear briefcase, and eliminate the nuclear threat.
• Serika ordered the remaining forces to assault the Magical Congress and establish a Floo Network portal for deploying soldiers.
• The Magical Congress debated whether to aid the president or resist Murphy, while Lucius Malfoy revealed himself and demanded that the wizards submit to Lord Murphy within ten seconds.
• Response Bureau troops appeared outside the Congress, and its president ordered the wizards to prepare their defenses.
• Lucius escaped the Congress as Serika ordered the soldiers to fire anti-magic bullets.

Murphy's Response Bureau captured the Magical Congress of the United States and connected its magical node to Soviet networks, enabling a massive invasion of the United States. The chapter ended as a Floo portal between Moscow and Washington opened and Soviet forces received orders to advance.

• Murphy's Anti-Magic Bullets shattered the spatial magic hiding the Magical Congress, and Serika's Response Bureau troops captured its President and seized the building.
• Serika's teams took control of the Magical Congress's magical node and built Floo portals in major American cities.
• The Soviet Union mobilized more than five hundred thousand troops and assembled a force exceeding one million in equivalent manpower while American communications collapsed under Murphy's interference.
• Response Bureau wizards built a Floo portal between Moscow and Washington, and its flames revealed the other country beyond the arch.
• Murphy's command rang in the minds of the soldiers and unmanned machines, ordering them to advance and crush the enemy nation.

Soviet drone swarms crippled Fort Hood before mechanical troops arrived to announce that Texas had fallen and the American soldiers were prisoners. The surviving officers were left facing an enemy they could only describe as demonic.

• A soldier reported that several areas of Fort Hood had been destroyed and nearby friendly forces were nearly wiped out.
• A colonel ordered Nathan to tell the soldiers to hold their positions and avoid fighting, but a hive drone killed Nathan outside the bunker.
• Swarm drones breached the bunker, then withdrew with the rest of the airborne swarm into large carrier drones that flew north.
• A mechanical big dog announced that the Soviet 32nd Mixed Brigade had taken Texas and declared the Americans prisoners.
• Mechanical troops and armed Soviet soldiers entered Fort Hood, leaving the American officers stunned and grieving.

David Watson, Morris Kent, and their Response Bureau team advanced through an underground bunker to capture President William, using temporary powers granted by Lucas through the war system. William revealed his supernatural identity, killed the bunker’s occupants, and called out to Murphy Darkholme as the team reached him.

• Lucas granted the Response Bureau team temporary abilities through the war system, and Morris Kent selected Lightning Reflexes.
• David Watson and the team followed the mission route into the bunker and fought through its defenses with their powers.
• President William refused to flee or authorize another nuclear strike and declared that the United States should surrender.
• William unleashed holy radiance that killed everyone in the bunker, while the Response Bureau team resisted the mental assault and gained temporary Mental Protection.
• The bunker doors opened, and William called out to Murphy Darkholme to talk.

William offered Murphy a place beside him as a god, but Murphy rejected him and declared that he would destroy him. The two remained enemies, with their opposing views of faith and human struggle laid bare.

• The Response Bureau members were teleported away, leaving William alone with Murphy, who entered in a transforming mechanical body.
• William offered Murphy the Key of Faith and equal divine authority as one of the Trinity.
• William warned Murphy that humanity’s faith would sustain him, while Murphy argued that people’s desires made his religion enduring.
• William explained that he soothed people by offering effortless salvation, but Murphy condemned this as a fraud that destroyed the struggle needed for growth.
• Murphy declared that their paths were incompatible and vowed to destroy William.

After defeating the United States, Murphy imposed the Earth Federation, seized control of global institutions, and crowned himself emperor while preparing humanity for the gods’ return. With time running short and the Seed of the Mind virus unable to shift faith quickly enough, he traveled into the distant past to seek the prophet Miriam and the truth behind the gods’ sealing.

• Murphy took control of the United States after William surrendered, then established the Earth Federation and brought the world’s Ministries of Magic under his Wizard Alliance.
• Murphy used magic-powered intelligent machines and the OGAS Plan to dismantle national governments, consolidate major industries, and monitor citizens and the birth of wizards.
• Murphy distributed the Seed of the Mind virus as a Physical Enhancement Vaccine, using it to strengthen people, awaken magical abilities, and influence their beliefs toward him.
• Murphy abolished the Earth Federation’s republican system on February 24, 1999, declared the Human Empire, and crowned himself emperor, while resistance was crushed.
• As the gods’ return drew near and he could do no more to prepare in the present, Murphy used the Time Magic Box to travel back more than a thousand years and seek Miriam.

Murphy tested time travel in the Spirit World, then used the Time Magic Box and the power of the Magic Web to travel a thousand years into the past. He arrived in Camelot, where a serf told him that Arthur Pendragon ruled the city.

• Murphy entered a stable rift in the Spirit World and confirmed that his connection to the magic nodes remained strong.
• Murphy traveled back ten days, appeared between himself and Gungnir, and took the spear into the Spirit World, where it vanished.
• Murphy gathered magic from hundreds of nodes and sent it through the Time Magic Box to attempt a journey across a millennium.
• The Time Magic Box melted and exploded, but Murphy seized its molten gold and used its power to reach another time and place.
• Murphy arrived outside a castle in Camelot City, where a serf identified the ruler as the Knight King, Arthur Pendragon.

Murphy traveled to Camelot to find Archmage Merlin, hoping to learn whether Merlin could explain a prophecy and the Magic Web. After discovering that spells relying on the Magic Web failed in this era, Murphy met Merlin and asked whether he had made the prophecy.

• Murphy learned that Archmage Merlin was in Camelot and used Commanding Enchanting Voice to persuade a guard to take him to Merlin.
• While traveling through the city, Murphy found that Legilimency and Lumos did not work, though his innate magical abilities remained intact.
• Murphy realized that magic in this era operated without the Magic Web and wondered whether Merlin had created it.
• The guard led Murphy to Merlin, whose magical power appeared comparable to Dumbledore's.
• Murphy introduced himself to Merlin, handed him a slip of paper, and asked whether Merlin had made the prophecy written on it.

Murphy discovered that Miriam was imprisoned in Camelot and confronted Merlin, who recognized him as the person destined to ruin his plan. The chapter ended as Murphy struck Merlin with lightning.

• Merlin denied making the prophecy and lied when Murphy asked whether he knew Miriam.
• Merlin sent his apprentice Godric Gryffindor to follow Murphy, but Murphy caught and immobilized him.
• Murphy read Godric's memories and learned that Miriam was Merlin's apprentice, had accused him of a great crime, and was imprisoned in Camelot's dungeon.
• Murphy followed Merlin to the underground cavern, where Merlin confronted him and threatened to kill him.
• Murphy blasted Merlin with lightning, leaving him collapsed and smoking.

Murphy entered the cavern beneath Camelot and discovered Salazar sacrificing people to a chained dragon called Nidhogg. After rescuing Miriam, Murphy encountered Merlin’s strange revival, and Merlin ordered the ritual to release Nidhogg.

• Murphy petrified Merlin and descended into a cavern filled with prison cells, where he saw a dragon devour people offered as sacrifices.
• Murphy saw Salazar direct soldiers to push captives into the Abyss and heard Miriam condemn him for sacrificing ordinary people to gain power.
• Nidhogg roared and struggled against golden spears pinning its wings while Murphy used lightning to rescue Miriam and the captives.
• Murphy attacked Salazar and the soldiers, but Merlin revived and stretched out his arm to pull Salazar away from the Abyss.
• Murphy vanished to question Miriam, while Merlin recovered and ordered Salazar to prepare the ritual and release Nidhogg.

Murphy reunited with Miriam, who explained that she and Sophia shared one soul across a thousand years and recounted the persecution that began in her childhood. Miriam ended her story just as the knights were about to burn her, and Murphy had appeared to save her.

• Murphy found Miriam tending injured prisoners, sent the prisoners to a nearby village, and followed her to a secluded hut.
• Miriam explained that Sophia visited her from the future, and that they were the same soul reincarnated across a thousand years.
• Miriam said Sophia’s warnings had frightened her parents, leading them to call an exorcist who tried to nail her hands to a cross.
• Miriam’s magic awakened as the priest prepared to pierce her palm, and she hurled him into a tree, killing him.
• Church knights killed Miriam’s parents and burned their village, then prepared to burn Miriam before Murphy appeared.

Murphy learned from Miriam that he himself had driven the gods out in the future, though no one knew how he had done it. He accepted that only he could resolve his private conflict with the gods and began considering a journey further into the past.

• Miriam explained that the Merlin Murphy had encountered led the Order of Merlin and was secretly carrying out a plan for a god involving the imprisoned dragon Nidhogg.
• Miriam told Murphy that he had driven out the gods in the future, but had kept his plan secret because the gods could learn through their believers.
• Murphy reflected on the gods’ immense power and questioned whether returning to the past could help him defeat them.
• Murphy rejected the idea of escaping to the future and concluded that resolving the conflict was his own responsibility.
• Murphy suspected his uniqueness as a visitor from outside time might be key and decided to look further back in time.

Murphy sought a god whose divine power could fuel a Time-Turner, and Miriam led him to the isolated ancient god Cernunnos in a swamp. After Murphy attacked him, Cernunnos revealed that he had existed since the gods were first born, leaving Murphy eager to take his power and test whether it could send him further back in time.

• Murphy asked Miriam to identify an isolated god with enough divine power to serve as a battery for his Time-Turners.
• Miriam led Murphy to a remote swamp and warned him that the god could observe everything in its territory.
• Murphy struck the sleeping god with a plasma spear, but the god emerged unharmed and offered to grant his wish instead.
• The god revealed that he had once been called Pan and now called himself Cernunnos, the god of the forest and animals.
• Cernunnos claimed to have existed since the gods were first born, and Murphy realized his power might help him travel to a time before the gods existed.
• Murphy recalled reports that a god named Pan had died and decided Cernunnos was a vulnerable target worth killing.

Murphy killed Cernunnos and absorbed his divine power, using the god’s genetic and magical data to repair the flaws in his Animagus form. With his body restored, he used the remaining divine power to open a tunnel through time and set out for the era before the gods’ birth.

• Murphy discovered that the goatskin behind his Animagus form had come from Pan, then pierced Cernunnos with a lightning spear and absorbed his divine power.
• Murphy sequenced Cernunnos’s genes and analyzed his magic while revising his Animagus form.
• Cernunnos revealed that angels had hunted him because they believed he would become Satan, then died after Murphy cut off his head.
• Murphy used Cernunnos’s tissue, reagents, and magic to repair his genetic disorder, returning to human form without fear of transforming.
• Murphy poured Cernunnos’s remaining divine power into a Time-Turner and opened a tunnel toward the time before the gods were born.

Murphy traced Cernunnos’s past and discovered how ancient gods had been killed and replaced before using the world’s main timeline to leap into a prehistoric era. There, he found shamans nurturing the first gods in living stone steles and began destroying them with lightning.

• Murphy witnessed Cernunnos’s history, including his origins as Khnum and Pan, and saw how other gods had seized his names and divine power.
• As his Time-Turner melted, Murphy sensed the world’s objective timeline and plucked its string to leap thousands of years into the past.
• Murphy arrived at a prehistoric stone circle where shamans were conducting sacrifices around magical steles, and he used a Seed of the Mind to communicate with their old shaman.
• The old shaman explained that tribes’ ancestors became guardian spirits and that the spirits dwelled in carved stone steles.
• Murphy recognized the steles as the bodies of the first gods and summoned a storm to smash them with lightning.

Murphy discovered that destroying the newborn gods only led people to worship him, so he rejected the power of faith and tried teaching wizards knowledge and magic instead. Two hundred years later, he found that the shamans he had taught had become gods themselves, and he feared he could never defeat humanity’s enduring belief in gods.

• Murphy returned to the valley and found worshipers had erected a statue of him, whose collected faith gave him vast mental power and magic.
• Murphy rejected the idea of becoming the one true god, recognizing that faith could pollute him and make humanity dependent on authority.
• Murphy learned that wizards’ prayers and imagination created gods, then used Memory Duplication to teach selected shamans basic knowledge so people could learn magic themselves.
• After half a year ensuring the knowledge had spread, Murphy used the third Time-Turner to travel two hundred years into the future.
• Murphy returned to the valley and found a giant city with statues of gods, including the shamans he had taught, who had become gods themselves.
• Murphy understood that people’s belief in gods would endure and concluded that he might have no chance of winning his war against them.

Murphy killed the Three-Headed God and traveled two centuries forward to assess his attempt to spread the Path of Self-Awareness, only to find it had become a religion that worshiped him. Concluding that humanity could not yet eliminate the gods, he decided to seek ways to restrain them by exploiting their rivalries and shaping them through legends.

• Murphy used his Blade of Fate to kill the Three-Headed God and drain its divine power.
• Murphy traveled through time and tried spreading scientific thinking among Muggles, but their knowledge of science faded into ignorance and magic.
• Murphy spent years promoting the Path of Self-Awareness, then jumped two centuries ahead and found his teachings had turned into a religion that worshiped an Awakened God resembling him.
• Murphy killed the Awakened God and concluded that humanity needed greater productivity and technological advancement before it could eliminate gods.
• Murphy realized he should focus on restraining the gods for a time and considered manipulating their rivalries and spreading legends to influence their behavior.

Murphy gave Homer the vision of the Ring of the Nibelung, hoping the blind poet would adapt and spread the epic. More than ten years later, Murphy found Homer’s tomb without hearing the story sung, and Apollo appeared to meet him.

• At a Theban banquet, Murphy offered Homer wine and asked about the blind poet’s songs and travels.
• Murphy sent the story of the Ring of the Nibelung into Homer’s mind, including Siegfried’s death, Brunhild’s sacrifice, and the fall of Valhalla.
• Shaken by the epic, Homer decided to preserve and pass it on, despite not knowing who Murphy was.
• More than ten years later, Murphy searched Thebes for the epic and found Homer’s tomb beside a ruined temple.
• Murphy left wine at the tomb, and Apollo appeared, saying Homer’s epic would make him immortal and that he had waited for Murphy.

Apollo revealed that Zeus had created Wotan as an avatar to guard against a prophecy of betrayal and asked Murphy to spread the Nibelung story so Apollo could destroy it and claim Olympus’s throne. Murphy demanded one-third of Apollo’s divine power, then demonstrated magic whose quality stunned the sun god.

• Apollo explained that Zeus had used poisoned Nectar to silence the poet whose long poem had alarmed the gods.
• Apollo told Murphy that Wotan was Zeus’s hidden avatar, created to avert Cronus’s prophecy that Zeus would be betrayed by his children.
• Apollo asked Murphy to spread the Nibelung story through several city-states so he could use its power to eliminate Wotan without openly confronting Zeus’s allies.
• Murphy agreed in principle but demanded one-third of Apollo’s divine power in exchange for taking the risk.
• Apollo grew furious at the demand, but Murphy revealed his extraordinary magic power, leaving Apollo shaken by its quality.

Murphy accepted Apollo’s divine power and Golden Fleece, then reconsidered how legends might let him restrain the gods as a whole. As he began forming a plan based on deception and control of divine power, Hades appeared before him.

• Murphy explained that his apparent divinity was actually magic and accepted half of Apollo’s divine power in exchange for keeping Apollo’s affairs secret and spreading the Nibelungen Epic.
• Apollo gave Murphy a Golden Fleece that Murphy suspected had belonged to Khnum, prompting him to wonder about the gods’ hidden identities and incarnations.
• After Apollo left, Murphy concluded that legends could influence gods but would not control them unless he created an information gap and deceived them.
• Murphy began to consider using divine power, rather than divinities, to restrict and isolate the gods, but Hades appeared as the sky turned dark.

Murphy agreed to help Hades pursue Zeus in exchange for all the divine power they gained. More than a century later, Odin’s gods confronted altered omens of Ragnarok, and a mysterious brother arrived at Valhalla claiming to have brought everything.

• Murphy questioned Hades about Apollo’s betrayal, and Hades admitted he wanted Zeus dead.
• Hades offered Murphy all the divine power gained after their plan succeeded, and Murphy agreed to cooperate.
• In Asgard, Heimdall presented a singing head that recited the Song of the Nibelungs, alarming the gods with its prophecy of Valhalla’s ruin.
• Frigg warned that the omens of Ragnarok had changed, while Balder described a dream of darkness consuming the Nine Realms.
• Odin declared that war could not be avoided and that the gods must prepare.
• A strange red-haired god entered Valhalla, knocked the singing head aside, and dropped a sack before Odin, saying he had brought everything.

Loki returned to Asgard with magical treasures for the gods, including the Ring of the Nibelung, and Odin accepted the ring despite Frigg's warning. As the ring filled Odin with power and greed, Loki declared that its destruction would be the beginning of a new world.

• Loki returned to Asgard and gave Odin a spear, Freyr a ship, Thor a hammer, and Sif a magically restored head of golden hair.
• Loki revealed that he had found the Ring of the Nibelung in a dwarf's cave beneath the Rhine and offered it to Odin.
• Odin hesitated over the ring's destructive legend but took it after seeing the gods drawn to its power.
• The ring drained Odin's divine power briefly, then greatly expanded his perception and ability to wield his power across Asgard and the mortal world.
• Frigg urged Odin to destroy the ring, but Odin refused, believing it could help the gods survive Ragnarok.
• Frigg accused Loki of bringing destruction, and Loki called it the beginning of a new world.

Loki explained how the Ring of the Nibelung and the legends around it had fueled a curse ritual that set Asgard ablaze. As Apollo transformed into Siegfried and attacked Valhalla, Loki revealed that the ritual was meant to bring about a son killing his father.

• Loki told Hades that the Ring of the Nibelung had become a powerful wishing vessel and curse medium through legend, enabling the wildfire ritual.
• Loki and Hades discussed how they had helped create Siegfried from Balder and how Fenrir's attack on Sól had exposed Hades to Apollo.
• A blazing giant emerged from the forests, split Valhalla Temple with his sword, and challenged Odin.
• The gods recognized the giant as Siegfried, and Hades realized Apollo had become him.
• Loki explained that Apollo had mixed half his soul into Siegfried and taken the role of Odin's son killing his father.

Surtur’s attack on Asgard ended when Odin destroyed the Ring of the Nibelung, but Hades immediately launched an invasion with Hela and the Underworld army. After a giant wolf tore Odin apart, Hades led his forces into Asgard, intent on killing the gods and claiming them as his own.

• Surtur wounded Odin while fighting under the curse, and Loki explained that the Ring of the Nibelung was the source of Surtur’s power.
• Sol impaled Odin alongside Surtur, but mistletoe sprouted from Surtur’s back and exposed the Ring of the Nibelung in his heart.
• Odin used Gungnir to split the ring, causing Surtur to explode and the ring to fall back into the Rhine.
• Hela arrived with the Underworld fleet, and Odin’s spear failed to stop her; a giant wolf then tore away half of Odin’s body.
• Hades announced Odin’s death and ordered the Underworld army and its monsters to slaughter the gods and conquer Asgard.

Thor reclaimed the Eyes of Horus, transformed into Ra, and defeated Hades, then urged the Aesir to wage war against Olympus. Loki left Asgard unharmed, shed his disguise, and vanished toward the next era to prepare another lie for the gods.

• Loki watched Thor defeat Surt, Jörmungandr, and Fenrir, then take Mimir’s eye and Odin’s intact head.
• Thor placed the Eyes of Horus in his sockets, revealed his connection to Ra, and destroyed Hades with help from a flaming sword.
• Thor absorbed Hades and transformed into Ra before leading the Aesir to rout the underworld army.
• Thor declared that Zeus and Hades had plotted Ragnarok and called for war between the Aesir and the Olympian Gods.
• Loki left the battle, crossed Asgard’s cursed flames unharmed, and shed his God of Tricks disguise.
• Loki used a pocket-watch-shaped object to disappear and travel to the next era.