Chapter Summaries

A portal brought black-armored Qin soldiers to Xiang Yu, who let a strange figure extract his life before revealing that the figure was a mechanical body carrying his consciousness. After Xiang Yu destroyed a giant Water Serpent with a thrown halberd, he sent his followers through the portal and stayed behind to face a swarm of Demon Beasts.

• A team of black-armored Qin soldiers emerged from a portal and saluted Xiang Yu.
• Xiang Yu broke open a box, and the hooded figure inside pierced him with cables and extracted his life.
• The figure tore off its robe, revealing a mechanical body resembling Xiang Yu, and Brunhilde realized Xiang Yu had transferred his soul into it.
• A giant Water Serpent charged through the river, and Xiang Yu killed it with a single throw of his halberd.
• More Demon Beasts rushed toward Xiang Yu, and he ordered his people through the portal while preparing to fight alone.

Brunhilde watched Xiang Yu defeat the Demon Beasts and enter a portal she could not follow through, then witnessed his abandoned body repel Liu Bang's army before crumbling to dust. Her attempt to summon Fan Zeng failed because the Akashic Records could not detect his soul, so she turned to Xiang Yu's companion Long Ju.

• Xiang Yu killed the Demon Beasts drawn to the portal, answered their dying question by saying the Qin Empire lay beyond it, and entered the portal.
• Brunhilde repeatedly tried to follow Xiang Yu through the portal but passed through its image without being transported.
• Liu Bang's army surrounded Xiang Yu's abandoned body, but its force repelled their arrows before the body collapsed into dust.
• Brunhilde tried to summon Fan Zeng and learned that his soul could not be detected, suggesting it had been completely erased.
• Brunhilde chose to try summoning Long Ju, who had stayed by Xiang Yu's side before he entered the portal.

Brunhilde discovered that many souls from the Qin and Warring States eras could not be detected, then attempted to investigate the Great Wall’s construction. Instead, she and Lantigreese found themselves in a 202 BC altered history with steamships and a locomotive, cut off from the Akasha System and surrounded by armed soldiers.

• Brunhilde found that the souls of summoned soldiers and many people from the era of the First Emperor and Xiang Yu could not be detected, including more than a million who vanished around the time the Great Wall was built.
• Brunhilde selected the Great Wall’s construction period, but the time jump seemed to fail and returned her and Lantigreese to the Wujiang bank.
• Brunhilde and Lantigreese saw steam-powered ships and a locomotive in 202 BC, an industrial revolution two thousand years earlier than expected.
• Brunhilde realized she could no longer contact the Akasha System, while Lantigreese noticed black-armored soldiers approaching with muskets.
• Brunhilde ordered Lantigreese to fall back as the soldiers surrounded them.

Brunhilde and Lantigreese were confronted by Xiang Yu in a version of Qin that existed outside Brunhilde’s history, and he claimed the Akasha System had sent them to him. He banished both women as a towering World Tree appeared near Xianyang.

• Xiang Yu welcomed Brunhilde to the Qin Empire, and she realized the Akasha System had likely been tampered with.
• Xiang Yu teased Brunhilde by saying she had been given to him as Yu Meiren, then demanded that Lantigreese stay behind in exchange for Brunhilde’s return.
• Lantigreese stepped forward to stay, but Xiang Yu struck both sisters with mysterious marks and made them disappear.
• The clouds parted above Xianyang, revealing a towering tree as the chapter described the Fusang Tree, Yggdrasil, and the Kabbalah Tree of Life as World Trees.

Bai Yue explained how he created a small Parallel World using the World Tree and hid his relocation of millions of people while ruling as the First Emperor and Xiang Yu. Brunhilde’s arrival offered a way to connect to the Main World’s Akasha System, but he had to keep her in the present to preserve the timeline in which he had already disguised the Qin Dynasty.

• Bai Yue used the Immortal Realm’s Fusang Tree and empty space to grow a World Tree and create a small Parallel World.
• Bai Yue operated as the First Emperor and Xiang Yu at the same time, secretly relocating about three million people while concealing the Qin Dynasty’s unusual development from other mythologies.
• After unifying the Six Nations, Bai Yue developed technology through immortal arts and planned to transfer the results into his small Parallel World.
• Bai Yue decided Brunhilde could serve as a connection between his Parallel World’s Akasha System and the Main World’s Akasha System.
• Bai Yue marked Brunhilde so the World Tree would recognize her, and revealed that he had previously used her arrival in 221 BC to disguise the Qin Dynasty.
• Bai Yue kept Brunhilde in the current era because sending her directly to the future could kill her and erase the events that had already occurred.

Bai Yue planned to use Xiang Yu's artificial body to maintain the Qin Empire after moving to his next character, while Brunhilde and Lantigreese arrived in Xianyang during the First Emperor's era. The sisters witnessed the World Tree seize two foreign gods and then felt the First Emperor's terrifying attention as his parade approached.

• Bai Yue learned that his next character could control both his current body and Xiang Yu's artificial body, which he intended to use to finish the First Emperor's body and suppress threats within the Qin Empire.
• Brunhilde and Lantigreese arrived in Xianyang with identification marks that Xiang Yu said would protect them from being treated as enemies.
• Two gods from the Far Eastern Island Nation appeared over Xianyang, but branches from the World Tree bound them, drained them, and dragged them away.
• The sisters noticed Xianyang's unusually precise stonework and watched the Black-Armored Soldiers escort the First Emperor, Ying Zheng, from the palace.
• Ying Zheng's gaze and aura terrified Brunhilde and Lantigreese, so Brunhilde pulled her sister aside as the Dragon Carriage approached.

Brunhilde and Lantigreese watched the First Emperor’s military parade and discovered that old Six Nations operatives planned to provoke a riot and attack him. One assassin began to suspect that ordinary-looking spectators were hidden soldiers, while the First Emperor’s gaze left him shaken.

• Brunhilde noticed that the First Emperor’s Black-Armored Soldiers seemed inhuman as she and Lantigreese followed his procession to the parade grounds.
• Brunhilde and Lantigreese spotted armed operatives among the crowd and inferred that they intended to cause panic during the ceremony, with assassination as a possible opportunity.
• An assassin from Yan State weighed the deaths of Qin’s citizens and former Six Nations people as justified, then focused his hatred on the First Emperor.
• The assassin worried that nearby spectators might be disguised soldiers and struggled to identify which people around him were allies.
• The First Emperor silenced the assembled crowd with a gesture and swept his gaze over it, leaving the assassin drenched in cold sweat.

Brunhilde and Lantigreese watched the First Emperor’s military parade and suspected the silent civilians were controlled living dead. When assassins attacked, the wounded civilians revealed mechanical bodies, but Brunhilde urged Lantigreese to consider a faint distortion in the scene, leaving her questioning whether the people around them had changed.

• Lantigreese and Brunhilde noticed that the civilians had fallen silent in perfect unison and suspected the First Emperor was controlling them.
• Brunhilde watched the First Emperor’s army march and sing alongside the king, ministers, and civilians.
• Six Nations assassins attacked civilians, but their victims continued singing despite fatal wounds that revealed machinery instead of flesh.
• Lantigreese realized that many civilians appeared to be mechanical puppets, while some genuine spectators remained among them.
• Brunhilde told Lantigreese to recall whether the scene had changed, and Lantigreese remembered a brief ripple before questioning the height of the person who had been standing before her.

Brunhilde realized the First Emperor had transferred suspicious spectators into a parallel Qin world, where a World Tree supported a technologically advanced city. After Ying Zheng sensed the Valkyrie sisters and left, another unseen gaze still held Lantigreese in terror.

• Brunhilde explained that the First Emperor had moved suspected assassins and insincere spectators into a parallel space, replacing them with mechanical actors in the real world.
• The fleeing assassins reached Xianyang City and froze in terror at its enormous, unfamiliar buildings.
• Brunhilde recognized the World Tree beneath Xianyang Palace and wondered how the First Emperor had made the world independent from the Main World Tree.
• Ying Zheng's powerful gaze found Brunhilde and Lantigreese, immobilizing them until he boarded his war chariot and returned toward the city.
• After Ying Zheng looked away, another unseen gaze locked onto Lantigreese and left her near collapse.

Brunhilde and Lantigreese entered the First Emperor’s vast, advanced Qin Empire and waited to be granted an audience. Brunhilde asked him to represent humanity in Ragnarok, and he questioned how she intended humans to fight gods; she began explaining her method for joining humans with divine weapons.

• The puppet citizens transformed into Black-Armored Soldiers, while living soldiers escorted Brunhilde and Lantigreese into Xianyang City.
• The sisters saw the enormous city and its structure built upon the World Tree, while Brunhilde worried that the First Emperor might keep them from returning before Ragnarok.
• After half a day of waiting, the sisters were summoned and entered the palace to meet the First Emperor.
• Brunhilde explained Ragnarok and asked the First Emperor to fight as one of humanity’s representatives.
• The First Emperor asked how Brunhilde expected humanity to defeat the gods, and she said humans needed compatible divine weapons and a way to unite with them.

Brunhilde agreed to become the First Emperor’s divine weapon, but the forging left her unable to tell what had happened to her. Back in Akasha’s Chamber, she chose Lu Bu Fengxian for Ragnarok’s first match and asked Lantigreese to become his divine weapon.

• The First Emperor agreed to participate in Ragnarok if Brunhilde became his divine weapon.
• Brunhilde began the forging and felt the First Emperor’s power examine and break down her body and soul before she lost consciousness.
• Brunhilde woke in Akasha’s Chamber with Lantigreese beside her, but neither knew what the forging had changed.
• Brunhilde considered which candidate to send against Lord Thor and chose Lu Bu Fengxian for the first match.
• Brunhilde told Lantigreese she was counting on her, and Goll realized Lantigreese would become Lu Bu Fengxian’s divine weapon.

Brunhilde’s attempt to summon Lu Bu Fengxian was interrupted when the Hegemon King appeared and declared that he would represent humanity in the first match. As Thor was announced as the gods’ fighter, Goll worried whether the Hegemon King could defeat him.

• Goll protested Brunhilde’s choice of Lu Bu Fengxian, but Brunhilde assigned Lantigreese to him anyway.
• The summoning panel turned black, and the Hegemon King emerged, seized Brunhilde, and demanded to know who had given his chosen person to someone else.
• The Hegemon King said that His Majesty had sent him to represent humanity in the first battle, while Lantigreese recognized him as her lord.
• Brunhilde and Goll entered the arena viewing area, where Brunhilde insulted Zeus after he made a lewd remark toward her.
• Heimdallr announced the no-surrender rules and revealed Thor as the gods’ vanguard, leaving Goll anxious about humanity’s chances.

Xiang Yu entered Ragnarok as humanity’s first fighter, while Emperor Gao of Han revealed that the First Emperor had yielded him his realm and could have united the world if the gods had not interfered. Xiang Yu’s ordinary spear shattered against Thor, but Brunhilde saw that the attack had drawn a trace of blood and believed humanity could win.

• Heimdallr introduced Xiang Yu and declared that the Hegemon King had withdrawn from history on the First Emperor’s orders.
• Emperor Gao of Han confirmed that the First Emperor had bestowed his realm on him and could have ruled all humanity if the gods had not interfered.
• Zeus, Hermes, and Odin discussed Xiang Yu and the mysterious preparations behind humanity’s challenge to the gods.
• The horn sounded, beginning the first battle of Ragnarok between Xiang Yu and Thor.
• Xiang Yu struck Thor with an ordinary spear, which shattered on impact, but Brunhilde celebrated because the attack had slightly wounded him.

Xiang Yu dispersed Thor's lightning strike with a spear thrust and met Thor in a rapid weapon clash. Their fight left Thor struggling, and Xiang Yu knocked Mjolnir into the air.

• Zeus and the other gods considered Xiang Yu's wound on Thor and wondered what hidden strength Brunhilde's fighter possessed.
• Thor unleashed a pillar of lightning, but Xiang Yu struck first and dispersed it before it reached the arena floor.
• The gods and spectators reacted in shock as Brunhilde watched Xiang Yu's unexpected feat.
• Xiang Yu and Thor clashed at tremendous speed in the arena, generating powerful shockwaves and heat.
• Xiang Yu struck upward and knocked Mjolnir out of Thor's hands.

Xiang Yu destroyed Thor’s Járngreipr and challenged him to unleash his true power, only for Zeus to reveal that the gauntlets had actually suppressed Thor and protected Mjolnir from him. As Thor and Mjolnir awakened, Xiang Yu summoned a metal box and allowed its cables to pierce and suspend him, leaving the arena stunned as his own trump card began.

• Xiang Yu broke Thor’s gauntlets, discarded his spear, and urged Thor to show his true strength.
• Xiang Yu realized Járngreipr had restrained Thor’s power and prepared to use his own mechanical ascension for a full-strength battle.
• Mjolnir began to crack open and beat like a living creature, while Zeus explained that Járngreipr had protected Mjolnir from Thor’s strength rather than protecting Thor from the hammer.
• Xiang Yu summoned a metal box, whose cables bound and lifted him before piercing his body, stunning the spectators.

Xiang Yu vanished inside the metal box and emerged in a transformed state, then fought Thor evenly after both revealed their full power. The chapter ended with the arena shaking from their clashes as the spectators wondered which of them would win.

• A halberd pierced Xiang Yu as he was hoisted by the cables, and his body vanished as the metal box cracked apart.
• A transformed Xiang Yu emerged from the shattered box, his aura cold and deathlike and his power comparable to Thor's.
• Thor raised Mjolnir while Xiang Yu took a combat stance, and both charged at terrifying speed.
• Thor and Xiang Yu exchanged blows, producing shockwaves that cracked the arena, created a vacuum, and drove Heimdallr to dodge.
• Shiva became excited by Xiang Yu's power and decided he wanted to join the Ragnarok battle.
• Liu Xuande asked Guan Yu whether Xiang Yu could win, while Goll and Brunhilde watched the evenly matched fight with hope and uncertainty.

Bai Yue, fighting as Hegemon King Xiang Yu, pushed Thor into a fierce exchange of increasingly rapid attacks, but Thor’s black-lightning strike shook the arena and left the outcome uncertain. As the smoke cleared, both Thor and Xiang Yu were still standing.

• Brunhilde and Zeus observed Xiang Yu’s artificial body as the battle continued.
• Thor accelerated his Mjolnir swings, and Xiang Yu used predictive calculations to disrupt his rhythm while matching his speed.
• Thor charged Mjolnir with black lightning and unleashed a devastating strike that filled the arena with dust and shockwaves.
• The gods’ spectators cheered when Thor appeared through the smoke, believing Xiang Yu had been defeated.
• Heimdallr spotted Xiang Yu standing alive beside Thor and realized the battle was not yet decided.

Xiang Yu’s mechanical body survived Thor’s devastating hammer strike, and a replay revealed how he had wounded Thor with a hidden sword. Both fighters declared that they had only one strike left, leaving the match’s outcome undecided.

• The smoke cleared to reveal Thor badly wounded and Xiang Yu apparently charred, but Xiang Yu’s outer layer peeled away to expose a transformed mechanical body with four arms and a sword.
• Brunhilde identified the mechanical warrior as Xiang Yu, while the gods reacted with shock and suspicion at the human-like divine weapon.
• Shiva grew eager to fight and urgently applied to participate in a later match after watching the clash.
• Heimdallr replayed the final exchange, showing Xiang Yu reveal a sword hidden inside his halberd, wound Thor, and lose two arms while holding off Mjolnir.
• Thor and Xiang Yu each said they had only one strike left, and the arena fell silent as everyone awaited their decisive attack.

Thor and Hegemon King Xiang Yu unleashed their ultimate forms and collided in a devastating final exchange. Xiang Yu appeared defeated, but Heimdallr realized the clash had decided the victor in a way the spectators had not seen, leaving the outcome unannounced.

• Thor fused Mjolnir with his arm, transforming the hammer into an axe-hammer, while Xiang Yu shifted into a four-armed Mechanical Demon Form.
• Thor and Xiang Yu charged at each other, their black lightning and azure flames erupting in a collision that filled the arena with light, mist, and shockwaves.
• The light and mist cleared to reveal Thor apparently unharmed and Xiang Yu grievously damaged, struggling to remain standing.
• Heimdallr learned through the Akashic Records that the clash had not ended as the spectators believed, while Thor remained motionless.
• Ares celebrated what he assumed was Thor's victory as the gods cheered and some human spectators lost hope.

Humanity won the first Ragnarok match when Xiang Yu killed Thor with a sword fragment clenched in his teeth. Brunhilde celebrated the victory, but Loki warned that Thor’s death had angered Odin and could accelerate humanity’s destruction.

• Ares and the other gods sensed the oppressive mood among the pantheons, while Brunhilde urged Goll to celebrate humanity’s victory.
• Heimdallr’s slow-motion replay showed Xiang Yu bite a fragment of his shattered sword and cut Thor’s throat as they crossed paths.
• Thor’s body shattered, and the human spectators celebrated as Heimdallr announced Xiang Yu as the winner of the first match.
• Some gods protested that the duel was unfair, but Odin’s threatening voice made Heimdallr silence them and confirm the result.
• Shiva resolved to push for a place in the next match, while Loki left Odin and visited Brunhilde and Goll.
• Loki congratulated Brunhilde, then warned that Thor’s death had enraged Odin and could hasten Ragnarok.