Chapter Summaries

Wai agreed to join the battle so Black Earl could help Shaina save Elder Tree and the others, and Black Earl turned the fight against the Desolate-Island Strongman. The suited man treated Shaina’s rain as forbidden outside aid and summoned Ammit to enter the battle.

• Wai struggled between protecting his own life and helping the Noah Family, then agreed to Shaina’s request after Black Earl remained silent.
• Shaina gave Wai an enchanted cloak and cast a defensive spell on him, and Wai entered the battlefield after declaring that he wanted to join the game.
• Black Earl formed a giant of earth and stone that suppressed the Desolate-Island Strongman and helped Gai Nuo gain the upper hand.
• Shaina summoned torrential rain so Wai could conceal himself, but the suited man declared it outside aid and counted down before acting.
• The suited man summoned Ammit, the crocodile-headed Demonic Beast, to enter the battlefield and restore balance to the game.

The Black Earl fought Ammit and Libya while investigating why Ammit’s Black Death Ray harmed him more than anyone else. He recognized Ammit’s power as the judgment of a legendary crocodile monster, leaving the suited man’s game and its rules at the center of the conflict.

• Ammit’s Black Death Ray damaged the Black Earl and his creations far more than it affected Gai Nuo or Elder Tree, leading the Bilos Family to suspect the suited man had targeted him.
• The Black Earl reasoned that the suited man could not have orchestrated the entire chain of events just to lure him into the fight, while he continued battling Ammit and Libya.
• Gai Nuo questioned and threatened the suited man, who claimed that anyone entering his game had to abide by its rules and denied breeding Ammit specifically to counter the Black Earl.
• The Black Earl multiplied his earthen giants and moved his avatar among them, making it difficult for Ammit to locate him with the Black Death Ray.
• The Black Earl told the legend of the Yalu Deity and the Field of Reeds, where a crocodile monster devoured souls judged impure by the Soul Scale.
• The Black Earl concluded that Ammit possessed the legendary monster’s power of fairness and order.

Black Earl deduced that Ammit was likely the rare gatekeeping demon of the Field of Reeds and that the man in the suit was connected to the Savage World's Yalu Deity. The man in the suit confirmed Black Earl had guessed correctly and remained unconcerned as Black Earl summoned stone giants to trap Ammit and Libya while a gemstone giant gathered power.

• Black Earl reasoned that the wizard-level Strongmen came from the Savage World and that Ammit's rule-enforcing behavior and Black Death Ray fit the gatekeeping demon's role.
• Tree Elder suspected the man in the suit was a spy backed by the Yalu Deity and considered summoning the Extreme Sect to pursue him.
• The man in the suit praised Black Earl for identifying Ammit and showed no concern about the Extreme Sect.
• Black Earl sensed that the man in the suit welcomed the prospect of being pursued, then created a gemstone giant and a hardened blackstone giant.
• Ammit and Libya attacked the gemstone giant, but Black Earl's stone giants blocked them while the blackstone giant kept Ammit occupied and the gemstone giant accumulated energy.

Stop revealed that he had engineered Gai Nuo’s verbal contract and answered the questions awarded for winning the game. He identified himself as a sound-element wizard from the Savage World, denied being allied with the Yalu Deity, and admitted that he had incited the Shallow-Sea Strongman to attack Bilen Tree Court.

• Black Earl unleashed the Gemlight, but Stop recalled Ammit and Libya before the attack struck and declared that he was conceding the game.
• Gai Nuo accused Stop of breaking his own rules, while Tree Elder stopped him from making another impulsive agreement and realized Stop had manipulated him into the original contract.
• Stop honored the game’s reward and agreed to answer Gai Nuo’s first two questions as Shaina and Lucia arrived.
• Stop introduced himself as a Southern Region human named Stop, said he had been born in the Savage World, and denied being on the Yalu Deity’s side.
• Stop admitted that he had incited the Shallow-Sea Strongman to attack Bilen Tree Court.

Stop taunted Elder Tree and revealed that his attack on the Bilen Tree Court had been partly motivated by his own happiness and a gift for Black Earl. As Stop tried to escape, Black Earl destroyed his Echo Reflection barrier, but an unknown ally rescued him; Shaina recognized the man as Exus.

• Stop rejected Elder Tree's assumption that he attacked the Bilen Tree Court out of hatred and said he had come to deliver a gift to Black Earl.
• Stop used Echo Reflection to repel attacks from Elder Tree, Gai Nuo, and Shaina, then began disappearing into the darkness.
• Elder Tree agreed to Black Earl's plan, and Black Earl used a dust-and-sand tornado to wear away Echo Reflection.
• Elder Tree pierced Stop with poisonous thorny vines, but a light shield appeared, severed the vines, and healed Stop's wounds.
• Exus appeared behind Stop, and Shaina recognized him and questioned why he was protecting Stop.

Stop and Exus escaped the Bilen Tree Court through Exus's multicolored spatial rift, while Elder Tree and the others could not stop them. Gai Nuo began searching for Sharon but detected an anomalous energy response in Paradise, where Elder Moon was staying.

• Exus revealed that he had saved people beneath the council hall, and Stop explained that Exus had come to help despite their conflict with the Bilen Tree Court.
• Exus and Stop suspected that Sharon might be in trouble and decided to find her before leaving the world.
• Exus opened a multicolored spatial rift while his light barrier withstood Elder Tree's attacks, and Stop escaped through it after Black Earl refused to help without new terms.
• Starleaf concluded that the Bilos Family could not match Stop and Exus, while Shaina remained stunned by Exus's actions.
• Gai Nuo searched the Bilen Tree Court for Sharon and found an anomalous energy response in Paradise, where Elder Moon was staying.

Angel opened a door through Paradise’s spatial seal without breaking it, using a combination of spatial knowledge and magi-patterns. Swift Spirit’s clone did not answer its summons, so Angel, Dox, and Kael prepared to investigate the restraint inside.

• Angel practiced cracking the seal while consulting Kael, and Dox learned spatial knowledge from their discussion.
• Angel found the seal’s core point and realized luck, aided by his strong foundation, had helped him crack it quickly.
• Angel used an array disk and magi-patterns to open a door through the seal without disturbing it, impressing Kael.
• Swift Spirit summoned its clone, but the clone did not respond despite being unharmed.
• Angel explained that some energy was restraining the clone, and Dox suggested that another spatial seal might be inside Paradise.

Angel and his companions entered Paradise, where nested spatial barriers divided the grounds into regions. They found a human-faced tree that began selecting a game, and Dox asked Kael to stop the selection.

• Angel had Swift Spirit use Wind Listening, but it detected no recent sounds, so the group followed the direction of its clone deeper into Paradise.
• The group carefully explored the area and found a spatial barrier enclosing the region.
• Kael discovered an arched doorway in a banyan tree standing on the barrier.
• The tree's human-face pattern opened its eyes and announced that Region One's players had assembled and that game selection would begin.
• After the tree explained that anyone could call a stop to select a game, Dox asked Kael to do it.

Dox and Angel stopped Kael from accepting the Human-Faced Pattern’s game after Dox’s intuition warned that it was influencing him. Dox suspected the game was a trap that would form a contract, and Kael’s story about relic drudges gave them a precedent for contracts imposed through a seemingly harmless encounter.

• Kael tried to call the Human-Faced Pattern to stop, but Angel used Swift Spirit to send purifying wind into his mouth and prevent him from speaking.
• Dox explained that his danger sense had flared when Kael spoke and that he and Angel had concluded the Human-Faced Pattern was influencing Kael with psychological suggestion.
• Kael recognized that his impulsive behavior had been unlike him, and Dox said the Human-Faced Pattern likely wanted to form a contract by drawing them into its game.
• Kael recalled an apprentice who had become a relic drudge after entering Bewitching Heart Castle and answering a Bewitching Heart Demoness’s question.
• Kael explained that the demoness’s force field had bound visitors to servant contracts, and Dox said the incident had informed his suspicion about the Human-Faced Pattern.

Angel, Dox, and Kael bypassed the Human-Faced Pattern by opening a route through Paradise’s spatial membrane and entered a mountain cave, where Dox sensed an apprentice nearby. In an arena elsewhere, Elder Moon fought the Masked Man until he noticed newcomers had entered the game and decided the match had to end.

• Dox warned Angel and Kael that the Human-Faced Pattern might bind them through a contract, so they chose not to communicate with it.
• Angel used the matching spatial parameters of the membrane and Paradise’s spatial seal to open a passage, leading the group through the membrane into a mountain cave.
• Dox sensed an Earthfire Salamander bloodline aura nearby, and Angel led the group toward its source.
• Elder Moon fought the Masked Man in the arena while defeated wizards and apprentices remained trapped in spatial seals.
• Elder Moon struck the Masked Man after he briefly slowed, then attacked his Light Void Shield when he cast it from a witchcraft slot.
• The Masked Man noticed newcomers had entered the game improperly and said he would end the game first.

Dox and the others found Bansen, a Bilos Family apprentice whose scleroderma and Earthfire Salamander bloodline had made his skin nearly stone-hard. Bansen explained how the Masked Man had sealed Paradise and forced its inhabitants into dangerous games, leaving Dox to investigate the Mud Doll Maze and its origins.

• Dox recognized Bansen's hardened skin as scleroderma, and Bansen explained that Elder Moon had helped him join the Bilos Family and fuse with the Earthfire Salamander bloodline.
• Bansen revealed that Elder Moon had pursued a cloaked Masked Man who appeared in Paradise, after which a spatial seal trapped everyone inside and divided the area into territories.
• A human-faced stone announced that the trapped inhabitants had to clear two games to escape, and a formal wizard ordered the people on the mountain to participate.
• Bansen entered the Mud Doll Maze alone, where he learned to avoid mud doll monsters, poisonous mushroom monsters, spatial traps, and other hazards while searching for the exit.
• After a chain trap collapsed a passage and triggered spatial attacks, Bansen escaped and stopped to recover, where Dox found him by sensing his Earthfire Salamander bloodline.

Dox’s mental probing drew a swarm of Mud Doll Demonic Beasts toward the group, and he chose to face them while Angel prepared illusions. Dox held back the charging swarm and searched among its varied mud-made forms, leaving Angel and Kael unsure what he was looking for.

• Dox discovered that more than a hundred Mud Doll Demonic Beasts had noticed his mental power and were charging toward the group.
• Angel questioned Bansen and learned that the beasts had never pursued him before, then agreed to follow Dox’s vague inspiration and face them.
• Angel concealed Bansen and Kael with illusions, and Bansen left while Angel and Dox stayed to meet the approaching swarm.
• Dox stopped the torrent of Mud Doll Demonic Beasts with his body, then darted among them without attacking.
• Dox closed his eyes and listened as the beasts swarmed around him, while Angel observed their many distinct mud-sculpted forms.

Dox defeated the mud-puppet fiends and exposed the Little Mole, which had tried to make him attack it and enter a contract. The Little Mole’s consciousness escaped after naming the Underground Arena Tournament, while Angel learned that Dox had uncovered its scheme by hearing it recite the contract and relying on his inspiration.

• Dox knocked out most of the mud-puppet fiends while avoiding harm to the Little Mole hidden among them.
• Dox exposed the Little Mole as a disguised attacker that had pretended to bite him, and it accused him of being a prophecy wizard.
• The Little Mole tried to make Dox put it down or attack it so it could bind him to a contract, but it jumped down on its own.
• The Little Mole mistook Angel and Dox for members of the Bilos Family and challenged them to meet it at the Underground Arena Tournament before its consciousness escaped.
• Dox explained that he had heard the Little Mole reciting the contract by amplifying his hearing with the Five-Sense Balancing Technique, while his inspiration had guided his suspicions.

Angel proposed that Paradise’s games might be designed to entertain a troublemaker by putting players through fear, hope, and despair, and he and Dox suspected Witch Sharon was behind them. They headed toward the Underground Arena Tournament after discovering Swift Spirit’s avatar was in the same direction, leaving open whether they would be forced into the arena holder’s rules.

• Angel suggested that Paradise’s purpose might be to judge players’ hearts and provide amusement rather than offer a fair path to escape.
• Angel used a Mind Illusion to walk Kael through a player’s experience, from fear and hope to despair at facing a formal spatial wizard in the final arena.
• Dox realized that the arena holder might be seeking amusement and connected the theory to Witch Sharon, whom Kael had described as a troublemaker.
• Angel cautioned that Witch Sharon’s involvement was only a guess, while Dox said he could track the mole’s spiritual aura.
• Angel and Dox discovered that Dox’s target and Swift Spirit’s avatar lay in the same direction, likely toward the Underground Arena Tournament.
• Angel agreed to follow Dox toward the destination, concerned they might have to fight under the arena holder’s contract rules.

Angel, Dox, and Kael entered the Underground Arena Tournament through a hole Angel opened beneath the Mud Doll Maze, where they found a cavern filled with lava and flames. Outside Paradise, its spatial seal suddenly shattered while Exus and Stop were inside, and Angel wondered where Swift Spirit’s clone was.

• Angel opened a passage through dense spatial traps, and he, Dox, and Kael descended safely into the Underground Arena Tournament.
• Exus and Stop entered Paradise after seeing that its spatial seal remained intact, while Black Earl and the others arrived too late to follow them.
• Tree Elder and the Bilos Family could not find a way to break the spatial seal, but it suddenly began flashing and shattered.
• Angel, Dox, and Kael found a cavern of lava and flames, and Dox sensed Little Mole’s possessor on a distant platform.
• Angel agreed to go toward the platform and wondered where Swift Spirit’s clone was.

Angel, Dox, and Kael reached the high platform, where apprentices endured mental pressure and a statue warned visitors to qualify for the arena. After it attacked Dox, he destroyed it and the group continued toward the arena.

• Angel and Dox followed the road through the lava rivers to the high platform, recognizing its gemstone paving as a former cultivation area.
• They found unconscious apprentices and two who were still conscious; the female apprentice warned them to watch out for the statue, while the male apprentice muttered about Number Three before collapsing.
• Angel explained that the apprentices were enduring mental pressure, and the group continued toward the winding staircase.
• The Human-Faced Pattern statue announced a mental-impact qualification for the arena, but Dox, Angel, and Kael ignored it and started climbing.
• The statue attacked Dox with an arrow of mental power, so Dox smashed it and continued up the stairs.

Dox explained that the Human-Faced Pattern statue had attacked to confirm what they knew about the contract and to curse whoever shattered it; the resulting blood curse weakened his right hand. Angel and Dox reached the high platform, where they found wizards fighting in an arena and several prisoners pinned down by the battle’s pressure, and Dox began identifying the fighters.

• Dox explained that he and Angel had let the Human-Faced Pattern statue attack so they could retaliate without triggering the contract, but shattering it had also triggered a hidden curse.
• Dox revealed that the statue’s anti-prophecy effect had concealed a low-level blood curse that slowed the blood energy in his right hand.
• Angel offered to remove the curse with Sunlight Sanctuary, but Dox refused because of the cost of using it again.
• Angel, Dox, and Kael reached the high platform and saw two wizards fighting inside a domed arena while their pressure pinned down dozens of apprentices and three injured official wizards trapped in spatial seals.
• Dox identified the imprisoned wizards as Yaji Bilos, Sea Eagle, and Wulusi, who were confused to see him in Paradise.
• Dox moved on to introduce the people fighting in the arena.

Angel learned that Swift Spirit’s missing avatar was likely on the Masked Man, forcing him to consider entering the arena’s contract to retrieve it. After defeating Elder Moon, the Masked Man closed the arena and challenged Angel and Dox.

• The Masked Man badly injured Elder Moon while Dox mocked the fighting and argued with Yaji and the Sea Eagle wizard over an apology.
• Angel asked Wulusi about a wind elemental spirit, and the Sea Eagle wizard said he had seen wind traces around the Masked Man.
• Angel concluded that Swift Spirit’s avatar was still nearby, likely on the Masked Man, and that retrieving it might require him to enter the arena’s contract.
• The Masked Man defeated Elder Moon, sealed her beneath the arena with the other wizards, and closed the Dome.
• The Masked Man turned its gaze toward Angel and Dox, issuing them a challenge.

Angel and Dox confronted Sharon the Witch, who revealed herself and tried to persuade them to enter the Paradise Game arena. Dox hinted that Sharon’s companions had caused a crisis outside, and Sharon ended by accusing the pair of stalling.

• Angel and Dox saw through the Masked Man’s provocation, and Sharon the Witch removed her mask after they implied they knew who she was.
• Sharon asked for their names, and Dox introduced himself while Angel gave the name Jon.
• Sharon invited Angel and Dox to compete in the arena, but Dox suggested she had created the Paradise Game for amusement and that her companions had other aims.
• Dox told Yaji that something serious had happened outside Bilen Tree Court and demanded the Blade-Shadow Monster’s leg in exchange for details.
• Sharon pressed Angel and Dox to enter the arena and accused them of stalling for time.

Dox stalled Witch Sharon while Angel and Kael broke the spatial seal covering Paradise, freeing the captives and dissolving the games’ contracts. With the contract restraints gone, Dox attacked Witch Sharon as Angel prepared an illusion and searched for her Swift Spirit clone.

• Witch Sharon realized Dox was stalling and revealed that her companions had arrived through a spatial gate.
• Angel signaled Dox to prepare to act, while Kael confirmed he was ready to help break the seal.
• Angel used ripples of energy to shatter the spatial seals binding Sea Eagle, Yaji, and Wulusi and the seal covering Paradise.
• The shattered seal ended Witch Sharon’s games and dissolved their contracts, freeing people trapped throughout Paradise.
• Dox charged Witch Sharon as Angel arranged Nightmare Illusion nodes around the spatial gate and began searching for her Swift Spirit clone.