Chapter Summaries

Ryan used his remaining million spirituality to plan Nidhogg’s recovery and witnessed the world’s instability after the Dragon Emperor’s power and Surtr’s flames shook it. He brought Arryris into Nidhogg, learned about Isabella and the conflict among the Great Beings, and recruited the Frost Dragon to fight the world’s dragons for revenge and valuable resources.

• Ryan realized the Dragon Emperor’s blessing had consumed the first million spirituality and ordered Brandt to move the North’s population south so they could plant crops before spring ended.
• Ryan learned that the sea had caught fire, then watched the Tidal Dragon extinguish Surtr’s flames; afterward, disasters and frightened magical beasts spread across Nidhogg.
• Arryris awakened in the Northlands, flew to Rhino Horn Mountain, and followed Ryan through a gateway into Nidhogg.
• Ryan explained the conflict with Surtr and the Dragon God, while Arryris told him that Isabella had once been the first Dragon Chosen and had gained authority over the tides.
• Ryan invited Arryris to seek revenge on the dragons, and the Frost Dragon immediately joined Raglov’s battle against the Legendary Frost Dragon Doyle.
• Ryan ordered Grand Mage Macken to prepare sealing and storage tools for dragon spoils, then called for Borgeld to return with the Armored Bear.

Ryan faced the prospect of relocating two million people from a failing Nidhogg and planned to expand settlement and begin the Northern Great Wall. He confronted Viscount Walter over a marriage alliance with the Mayers Family, then learned that Walter’s son Payton had died at Winged Gorge, leaving Walter terrified of Ryan.

• Ryan learned from Arryris that Nidhogg’s world origin was severely damaged and began planning how to relocate its two million people.
• Aethelred warned Ryan that Frozen Earth Territory could not house the population, so Ryan ordered Mr. Ross to prepare plans for the Northern Great Wall.
• Ryan invited Viscount Walter to Zero Crossing City and questioned his son Payton’s marriage alliance with the Mayers Family.
• Viscount Walter explained that food shortages and falling iron profits had pushed him toward the alliance, and Ryan criticized his betrayal while offering to sell him food in autumn.
• A servant told Viscount Walter that Payton had been bitten to death by Lang while passing through Winged Gorge, and Walter feared Ryan was responsible.

Ryan’s rumors about the deaths of noble heirs spread as he revived Quick Landa and gave him Frostmourne, which Quick used to save three knights from an orc attack. As Quick’s exploits fueled a distorted legend about Ryan’s swords and the Eight Knights, Viscount Walter became ill with fear.

• Ryan heard that Viscount Walter’s child had died and ignored rumors linking him to the killing, which he had spread himself.
• Ryan revived Quick Landa at the Braveheart Guild, gave him Frostmourne, and supported his future knight training.
• Quick rode into the Northlands and single-handedly defeated orcs who had surrounded Gak and two other knights.
• Gak and the other knights learned that Quick carried a sword gifted by Ryan and wondered whether wielding one could help them establish noble bloodlines.
• Viscount Landa praised Quick’s strength and courage, while rumors framed the dead heirs as unworthy and Viscount Walter fell ill from fear.

A famine and disease spread across Northwind Province, prompting nobles to slaughter the sick while Ryan sent the Stag Legion to burn corpses and contaminated belongings. As Ryan questioned his growing pragmatism and fading ambition, he went to Nidhogg for a Dragon Heart, believing it could restore his former vigor.

• Starvation and disease struck Northwind Province, and nobles responded by killing the sick and anyone suspected of infection.
• Ryan sent Mikaela and three hundred Stag Legion cavalry to burn corpses, clothing, and houses across noble territories; Mikaela invoked the God of Light to reduce resistance.
• Ryan reflected to Brandt that the disaster might benefit him, while Grand Mage Macken told him that age and experience had diminished his ambitions.
• Ryan opened a Planar Gate to Nidhogg and decided that eating another Dragon Heart could solve his loss of vigor.
• Ryan received a damaged but still-beating Dragon Heart, about one-third the size of a complete heart.

Ryan received shipbuilding craftsmen from the Melendez Family and set out to make them build ships for crossing Nidhogg Ocean. After intimidating Gabriel and taking control of the craftsmen, Ryan left Gabriel confined at Rhino Horn Mountain and planned to send him hunting with Egil.

• Ryan learned that Avril's brother Gabriel would bring Melendez shipbuilding craftsmen to Frozen Earth Territory, while Avril warned him that Gabriel was an awful person.
• Ryan intercepted Gabriel's convoy, escorted it past his hunting grounds, and frightened Gabriel with a display of orc heads.
• Gabriel threatened to stop the shipbuilding, but Ryan pointed out that Gabriel was not a craftsman and had him taken to the castle while ordering the craftsmen to work.
• When a craftsman claimed they could not build ships without Gabriel and could not test them on the frozen river, Ryan let a giant boar stampede carry him off and ordered Brandt to supervise the rest.
• Ryan left Gabriel at Rhino Horn Mountain, and he told Avril that Egil would take her brother hunting in a few days.

Ryan struggled to obtain seaworthy ships while the Empire launched a crusade against the Church of Dawn and Black Swan assassins targeted nobles across Northwind Province. In Zero Crossing City, Ryan met Brendan Ignazio, who represented ancient southern noble bloodlines seeking to buy weapons, and he remained wary that their weapons might reach the Empire’s enemies.

• Ryan discovered that Melendez’s craftsmen could build only a crude covered boat with their available tools, so he ordered Mr. Ross to help them with alchemy.
• Emperor Florian declared war on the Church of Dawn, presenting a thousand true charges against it as battles and unrest spread across the Empire.
• Appia and Sven reported that Black Swan assassins had attacked Ryan’s castle, and Ryan assigned Appia to guard the castle while Pield checked on the lady.
• Ryan learned that nobles throughout Northwind Province had also survived Black Swan assassination attempts, then traveled to Zero Crossing City three days later.
• Brendan Ignazio introduced himself as a representative of ancient southern noble bloodlines and asked to purchase weapons, while Ryan warned that he could not let them reach the Empire’s enemies.

Ryan investigated why alchemically made ship materials would not float, then witnessed Surtr and Isabella’s battle escalate as the Twilight Kin attacked the lands of Aesir. He returned to the Frozen Earth Territory and prepared to seek Church support in the Northlands before traveling to Galle Province to meet Count Clayton.

• Ryan visited Ross’s shipyard, where alchemists and craftsmen argued over a sunken vessel, and suggested its alchemically altered materials might be too heavy.
• Ross ordered the wreckage weighed, and the craftsmen and alchemists began testing thinner planks with comparable strength.
• Surtr fought Isabella, burned away her flesh, and tried to strike her, but the Tidal Dragon bound him with tidal essence and disappeared into the sea.
• Ryan received Surtr’s message that the world’s origin was shattered and that Surtr’s flames would eventually engulf Nidhogg; the Twilight Kin then attacked the lands of Aesir.
• Ryan received Count Clayton’s request to visit Galle Province and told Avril and Aethelred to manage the Frozen Earth Territory while he was away.
• Ryan decided to travel to the Northlands first to seek Archbishop Adriana’s support before continuing to Galle Province.

Ryan traveled from the Northlands to Count Clayton’s castle, where he and his father contracted to wage war in an Otherworldly Plane. There, Ryan summoned a rift to Nidhogg, and the Blaze Dragon recognized the scent of an awakened Demon Dragon.

• Ryan crossed the Mountain-Bearing Warthog’s territory with Anla, then visited Adriana in a snowbound Northlands village and asked her to help him influence the Church of Dawn.
• Adriana refused to join Ryan’s political plans but marked Sven as a Dawn Believer with Holy Radiance.
• Ryan reached Galle Province, met Count Clayton, and agreed by contract to wage war in the Otherworldly Plane controlled by their family.
• Count Clayton brought Ryan to the plane and showed him the tens of thousands of soldiers in the Blaze Dragon Knight Legion, led by Ivar Clayton.
• Ryan used the Dragon Emperor’s Crown to tear open a rift to Nidhogg, and the Blaze Dragon said that the Demon Dragon had awakened.

Ryan and Count Clayton joined forces with the Frost Giants to fight the dragons, while Count Clayton turned the frozen sea into a route for their army. As the Demon Dragon awakened and searched for another Great Being, Ryan asked his father for imperial fortress blueprints to build a Great Wall in the Northlands.

• Count Clayton offered Raglov the Heart of the Frost Giant King, and Raglov broke open his chest to place it inside himself and call the sleeping Frost Giants.
• Raglov's call awakened berserk Frost Giants beneath the Aesir seas, and their black ice froze the ocean and the Tidal Dragons before stopping at human lands.
• Ivar revealed that Count Clayton had another Heart of the Frost Giant King, which Count Clayton melted to bless the Blaze Dragon Knight Legion and Ryan's Stag Legion.
• Count Clayton led the armies across the newly frozen sea as Blaze Dragon Christman revealed that the awakened Demon Dragon's will covered the world and sought another Great Being.
• When Count Clayton asked what Ryan wanted as compensation for the war, Ryan requested blueprints for several imperial fortresses so he could build a Great Wall in the Northlands.

Ryan and Count Clayton’s forces advanced across the frozen sea, where the Blaze Dragon Knight Legion slaughtered Nidhogg’s dragons with overwhelming strength. Watching the legion, Ryan began to understand that the Empire’s strongest nobles had created human retainers through a secret process of sublimation and evolution.

• Ryan asked Count Clayton for fortress plans, and Clayton promised to send him incomplete designs from the Otherworld.
• As extreme weather ravaged the frozen sea, Ryan sensed Surtr’s power gaining the upper hand over Dusk and watched a corrupted Twilight Dragon attack a Storm Dragon.
• Count Clayton ordered the Blaze Dragon Knight Legion onward, and the legion’s knights killed dragons that descended to attack them.
• The legion continued its charge, killing seventeen Saint Realm dragons and absorbing their blood and power through its knights and warhorses.
• Count Clayton explained that the legion could not advance further without Divine Essence, and Ryan inferred that its final transformation involved sublimation into retainers belonging to humanity.
• Ryan connected the power of the Blaze Dragon Knight Legion and the grand dukes’ forces to the true meaning of blasphemy: creating human retainers like those of the gods.

Ryan took command of the Blaze Dragon Knight Legion while Ivar used the Flower of Morning Radiance to awaken the Demon Dragon sealed beneath the glacier. The glacier collapsed, exposing the sleeping god’s flesh and leaving Ryan’s forces amid the shattered ice.

• Count Clayton claimed a wounded Legendary Dragon’s heart to trade for an item held by Ivy and strengthen his ties with another Legendary Mage.
• Count Clayton charged alone into the dragon-filled sky as Ivar named Ryan commander of the Blaze Dragon Knight Legion and asked him to protect the artifact’s activation.
• Ryan led the Stag Legion and the Blaze Dragon Knights in killing dragons drawn to the battlefield, while the Dragon Emperor’s Crown suppressed their ability to fly.
• Ivar used Mirror Flower Water Moon to cast the Flower of Morning Radiance onto the glacier, drawing the Lord of Dawn’s gaze toward the sleeping Demon Dragon.
• The glacier collapsed under the clashing divine powers, revealing terrifying flesh within and cracking the frozen sea.

The awakened Demon Dragon battled Surtr until Leon Clayton opened a path for the Lord of Dawn’s power, forcing the Demon Dragon from the world. Surtr then sent the Demon Dragon’s marked Divinity to Ryan, while Arryris urged him to find and kill Isabella before the Dragon God awakened.

• The Demon Dragon returned to its shell, destroyed the Twilight Kin, and fought Surtr as Ryan absorbed some of its Old Days Divinity.
• Leon Clayton unleashed stolen Divinity to tear open the sky, allowing the Lord of Dawn’s Holy Radiance to drive the Demon Dragon from the world.
• The Demon Dragon left Count Clayton with a bloodline curse, while Surtr survived and sent its marked Divinity raining down toward Ryan and his allies under their sacrificial contract.
• Ivar warned that the Dragon God could awaken as the last Great Being in the world, and a Tidal Dragon burst through the ice as the frozen dragons stirred.
• Arryris froze the Tidal Dragon, then told Ryan to find Isabella and kill her.

Ryan returned the two Extraordinary Legions to solid ground, paid Surtr with Old Days divinity, and learned that both he and Count Clayton remained burdened by curses. As Brendan secretly bought up weapons in Zero Crossing City and the Path of Dawn turned bloody, the Dragon God awakened and sent a tidal surge toward the human-held shore.

• Ryan led the Extraordinary Legions across the frozen sea with Arryris stabilizing the ice, and the Blaze Dragon returned before they reached solid ground.
• Ryan found that the Demon Dragon's Curse and his contract with Surtr were disrupting his body, then performed a sacrifice that left only three hundred points of Old Days divinity on his Spirituality Panel.
• Count Clayton awakened with a fiery crystal from Surtr countering the Demon Dragon's Curse, but revealed that Surtr had cursed him and would devour his soul if he died.
• Ryan opened a rift for Count Clayton to leave the world, while he stayed behind to send the Blaze Dragon Knight Legion out and continue the war against the dragons.
• In Frozen Earth Territory, Brendan arranged for weapons to be bought up across Zero Crossing City so he could send arms to the Ignazio Family as war approached.
• The Dragon God awakened, and a tidal surge began crashing toward the humans' land.

Ryan and Count Clayton arranged for powerful Space Mages to bring the Northlands into Nidhogg and drive away the awakening Dragon God. The mages agreed to the costly deal, and Ryan revealed the Dragon Emperor’s Crown as they prepared to enter the Otherworld.

• Ryan proposed letting the Northlands erode Nidhogg so the weakened Dragon God would leave, and Count Clayton agreed despite the world’s lost wealth.
• Count Clayton contacted nobles and Space Mages, including Countess Winter, while Ryan returned to the Clayton Earldom to negotiate the arrangement.
• Thirty-six Saint Realm Space Mages gathered, and Count Clayton secured Lord Ophelia’s help in exchange for forbidden spell scrolls, spatial entrances, and a teleportation array.
• Ryan negotiated with the other mages, arranging for their help against dragons and securing Count Winter’s support in Northwind Province.
• The mages finalized their terms, and Ryan put on the Dragon Emperor’s Crown, revealing its ancient dragon aura to the assembled mages.

Ryan’s forces prepared to exploit the ocean and the dragons’ battle, while Damien Hoffman invented a gear-driven ship propeller. In the north, Lord Ophelia unleashed his Legendary Boon and trapped the dragons in shrinking spatial prisons.

• Lord Ophelia dismissed Count Clayton and Ryan’s views on the gods, then joined the mages traveling north to help open the world’s spatial barrier.
• Damien Hoffman struggled with the shipbuilders over how to propel Ryan’s ship, then realized that gears could transfer power to a propeller.
• A storm struck as Frost Dragons and Tidal Dragons fought at sea, and Ross protected the ship with a Magic Scroll.
• Damien built a gear-driven propeller in a day and used his water talent to turn it, while Ross agreed to provide resources for the invention.
• Thirty-six Spatial Mages formed a spatial magic circle in the north as dragons tried to stop them.
• Lord Ophelia released his Mage Tower and used Broken Eternal Prison to trap the fleeing dragons inside shrinking spatial barriers.

Ryan negotiated control of the dragon spoils and prepared for Nidhogg’s worsening cold as northern winds and migrating dragons entered the world. The chapter ended with Raglov awakened and heading north to hunt dragons while Ryan hoped to keep their bones for trade.

• Ryan refused Countess Winter’s demand for dragon remains and threatened war if she traded dragon blood with other nobles.
• Count Clayton exchanged goods with the mages for dragon bones and traded information about Isabella to Ophelia in return for his spatial arrangements.
• The spatial formation brought snow and freezing northern winds into Nidhogg, and the Stag Legion brought down a migrating dragon.
• Raglov awakened after absorbing the cold, grew larger, and led the Frost Giants north to hunt dragons.
• Ryan called out to Raglov not to gnaw on the bones because he wanted to sell Dragon Bone Powder.

Ross sent Ulf and Brunamigis on a sea voyage to recover fragments that had fallen from Surtr, and Ulf found and retrieved one from the deep seabed. As the ship sailed toward another fragment, an unseen shadow followed it through the dragon-ruled ocean.

• Ryan ordered Ulf and Brunamigis to lead a force east to recover Surtr's fragments from the sea.
• Ross sent the ship out with sorcerers, craftsmen, sailors, and knights, and the crew crossed the southern ocean.
• Ulf sensed unusual heat and dove into the deep sea, where he found Surtr's eternally burning fragment among the dead marine creatures.
• Ulf froze a giant squid that attacked him, then returned to the surface and told the crew what he had found.
• Alchemists used ropes and metal pincers to secure the fragment beneath the ship, and the vessel sailed toward another site.
• An enormous shadow that even Ross could not detect followed the ship through the dark ocean.

Isabella, a wounded former Dragon Chosen, reached the Northlands and revealed the Dragon God’s presence to the mortals there. Ryan and Count Clayton discussed their victories against the dragons and the Empire’s political opportunities before the entire sky revealed the Great Being’s body.

• Isabella hid aboard Ross’s returning ship, then swam ashore and headed toward the northern humans, hoping to find the key to leaving the world.
• Ryan led the battered Stag Legion to the Clayton Family’s battlefield and discussed Dragon Blood Rice and Surtr’s remains with Count Clayton.
• Count Clayton told Ryan that the Gronde Kingdom was using pressure from the Empire to seek greater influence within The Church.
• Isabella bit her finger and flung a drop of blood into the sky, causing the Dragon God to notice the Dragon Emperor’s authority within her.
• The world trembled, and Ryan and Count Clayton saw the vast, storm-filled sky that formed the Dragon God’s body.

Ryan and the Space Mages used the Northlands’ freezing winds to drive the Dragon God from Nidhogg, then Ryan returned to Norris and learned that war was brewing between the Church and ancient southern nobles. Back in Northwind, he discovered local nobles had been selling weapons south and summoned them to Rhino Horn Mountain to assert his authority.

• Ryan offered Ophelia and the Saint Realm Mages a share of Nidhogg’s wealth in exchange for redirecting the Northlands’ freezing winds into the sky.
• Ophelia and the Space Mages opened a vast spatial rift, and the Dragon God eventually left Nidhogg, leaving a white scar across the sky.
• Ryan returned to Dragon Slayer City, where Ivar Clayton explained that the Ignazio Family and other ancient nobles were preparing to resist the Church along the Path of Dawn.
• Ryan persuaded Viscount Melendez to help secure a West Coast settlement for Northlands warriors in exchange for access to Dragon Bone Powder and other benefits.
• Ryan traveled home via Volga Province, then learned that Northwind nobles had secretly sold weapons to southern nobles and called them to Rhino Horn Mountain.

Ryan hosted the nobles of Northwind Province at a banquet on Rhino Horn Mountain, where he served dragon meat and dragon blood wine. The feast united the nobles around him, and Ryan declared it would become an annual tradition.

• Count Soron told Fidel that the Soron Family had lost influence to Ryan and urged him to restore their bloodline's former greatness.
• Baron Hatton and Lynn discussed Ryan's gathering and the shifting alliances among Northwind's nobles as they settled into the stone houses.
• At the banquet, Count Soron recounted how noble resistance and the Empire's war had weakened The Church and reshaped the balance of power.
• Brendan Ignazio and the other nobles discovered that Ryan had served dragon meat, then eagerly gathered to taste it.
• Ryan drank Fluorescent Mushroom mixed with dragon blood, released a blast of flame, and served dragon blood wine to the nobles.
• Ryan proclaimed the Dragon Feast a celebration of Northwind's nobles and promised an annual feast, prompting the crowd to cheer with him.