Chapter Summaries

Angel investigated Lucas's Sailing Log and found that its accounts did not match the eras in which the recorded events supposedly occurred. He sought a historian in Yuesè City, where Nite arrived to help with his inquiries.

• Angel used the Holographic Tablet to analyze White Shell Shipping records and discovered that the Nautilus Sea had recorded clear weather for eighteen hundred years, despite Lucas having lived three thousand years earlier.
• Angel searched Yuesè City's library for Lucas but found only the legend of The Beautiful Naya.
• Angel learned that Alwin had gone to Spring Vine to deliver compensation to the families of sailors who died, and he asked Helen to find someone knowledgeable about the Shining Gold and Shining Silver Eras.
• Duru asked to visit his old fishing village, and Angel gave him two defensive magic-pattern hide scrolls before letting him go.
• Angel continued his research and advanced the Poem of Blankness to eleven magic patterns.
• Helen returned with Nite, a hereditary Anjou Dynasty noble and former sailor, whom Angel recognized as the source of an alternate version of The Beautiful Naya; Angel asked what Nite had learned.

Angel visited Professor Gorman to learn about The Beautiful Naya and heard competing folk, historical, and unofficial accounts that might fit together. When Angel asked about Lucas, Gorman froze and wondered why Lucas had come up again.

• Nite brought Angel to meet Charles Manson, who used his status as the City Lord’s son to take them to Professor Gorman’s home.
• Gorman recognized something unusual about Angel and privately spoke with him after Nite and Charles left the room.
• Gorman recounted the folk legend and historical account of The Beautiful Naya, then suggested that twin sisters might explain how both versions could be true.
• Gorman shared an unofficial account that Naya had once been kind before her temperament changed after marriage, possibly because her twin sister had taken her place.
• Angel asked whether Gorman had heard of Lucas, and Gorman froze before asking why Lucas had come up again.

Angel questioned Professor Gorman about why multiple people had been seeking information on Lucas, then read Gorman’s historical research and learned Lucas was a minor noble of the Anjou Dynasty. Angel left after using Nightmare Illusion to make Gorman promise to keep his visit secret.

• Angel learned that a black-robed man and a purple-haired woman had separately asked Gorman about Lucas before him.
• Gorman showed Angel his research, which described Lucas as a dissolute noble and swindler who had deceived the king before being sent out to sea.
• Angel learned that Lucas had been a minor noble of the Anjou Dynasty and that further records would have to be sought there.
• Angel asked Gorman to conceal his visit and used Nightmare Illusion to influence him into agreeing.

Angel continued investigating Lucas while agreeing to test Charles and other young people for wizarding talent. After nearly a thousand people failed the assessment, Angel punished two noblewomen who insulted the test and flew off when Toby reported that the group he had been waiting for had arrived.

• Angel agreed to test Charles and anyone else under thirty who wanted to pursue wizardry at the City Lord's Manor on Sunday.
• Charles emerged from his assessment without talent, and close to a thousand other candidates also failed throughout the day.
• Two noblewomen accused Angel of being a swindler, so Angel cast Nightmare Illusion aura on them and warned that their punishment would last a month.
• Toby returned to tell Angel that the group he had been waiting for had arrived, and Angel flew away to meet them.

Angel followed a black-robed apprentice from Gorman’s courtyard to Moon Zither Port and discovered that the man was connected to a powerful organization and a One-Horned Abyss Whale. After the apprentice trapped Angel in a water bubble, Angel summoned a colossal flaming beast and broke free, leaving the whale’s horn as a possible prize.

• Angel questioned Gorman and learned that the black-robed man had asked about the purple-haired woman, whom he called the Basket Witch.
• Angel followed the black-robed man to Moon Zither Port, where he summoned a white dolphin and rode it out to sea.
• The black-robed man met a One-Horned Abyss Whale, and Angel recognized the creature as evidence of the man’s powerful backing.
• When Angel pursued him, the black-robed man attacked with columns of water and trapped him in a bubble, revealing himself to be an alchemical puppet.
• Angel summoned a colossal beast wreathed in flames, shattered the bubble, and charged away from the black-robed man.

Angel confronted Jiebo, who revealed that he had released the Rat-and-Ant Underground Society members under Siliwu’s orders and warned Angel away from an investigation involving Lucas. After leaving, Angel considered the mystery and realized Toby’s detectable aura had exposed them, so he decided to find a way to conceal it.

• Jiebo appeared after consuming his black-robed puppet and recognized Angel, then explained that Siliwu had ordered the Rat-and-Ant Underground Society members released to target Phantom Demon and Angel.
• Angel claimed he had followed Jiebo because he thought he was connected to the Rat-and-Ant Underground Society, while Jiebo warned him that investigating the matter would bring death and that Florence was coming to the Devil Sea.
• Angel refused Jiebo’s invitation and left without learning why Jiebo had come, but inferred that Siliwu and Florence were investigating Lucas.
• Jiebo received a report that Angel had spent the day testing ordinary people’s talents at the City Lord’s Manor and concluded that Angel likely knew nothing about the mysterious space.
• Angel returned home, comforted a dejected Toby, and realized Toby’s aura had helped others detect them, making concealment his next priority.

Helen discovered a genuine guide to the Wizarding World at Yuesè Library and learned that Si Man had arranged for her to find it. Si Man offered to help Helen enter the wizard ranks, then asked about the Cloud Conch’s guardian, whom she had seen recruiting gifted individuals at the City Lord’s Manor.

• Fulai waited at the library for Helen, but the guards failed to notify him when she arrived.
• Helen found The Call of Wizards, a book containing accurate information about the Wizarding World, and began reading it.
• Fulai followed Helen and continued pestering her until Si Man intervened and made him flee the library.
• Si Man told Helen she had placed the book where Helen would find it and offered to help her obtain a potion to increase her mental power after they returned to Summer Dew Ridge.
• Helen agreed to follow Si Man after saying goodbye to the Cloud Conch’s captain and crew, and Si Man asked her about the ship’s guardian.

Helen told Si Man about Pat, explaining that their conversation had inspired her to enter the Wizarding World and pursue her own worth. Si Man realized Pat was likely Angel, and Helen ended the conversation more determined than ever to improve herself and follow in his footsteps.

• Helen admitted that she admired Pat but said their conversation had helped her decide to become an extraordinary individual and pursue her dreams.
• Si Man explained that Pat had fought Jiebo at sea and emerged unharmed, then asked Helen about Pat’s origins and abilities.
• Helen recounted Pat’s ties to Savage Cave, his role in Roman’s affairs, and his skill with illusions, alchemy, and magic patterns.
• Si Man recognized the Lionheart-and-thorns symbol on Pat’s parchment and identified him as Angel, showing Helen a magazine that supported her conclusion.
• Helen took the news calmly and resolved to work harder to catch up with Angel, leaving Si Man grateful for the change he had inspired.

Angel asked Bismarck and Sabo about the Basket Witch and learned she was Shaluo, the Truth-Knowing Wizard who owned Summer Dew Ridge. The chapter left Angel warned to avoid her, while Si Man and Helen learned that Pat had supposedly left Yuesè City.

• Si Man and Helen found Pat’s note saying he planned to visit other cities, though he had not actually left Yuesè City.
• Angel visited Bismarck at the White Shell Shipping branch and asked whether he knew the Basket Witch.
• Bismarck contacted Sabo, interrupting Sabo’s battle in the Infinite Battle Tower and forcing him to concede.
• Sabo told Angel that Meriessa understood the situation and that Angel was no longer involved in his plans to visit the Feran Continent.
• Sabo identified the Basket Witch as Shaluo, the Kalabite Truth-Knowing Wizard and true owner of Summer Dew Ridge, and warned Angel to avoid her.

Angel continued investigating Lucas and traveled with Nite to Lost Song City, the capital of the Anjou Dynasty, hoping to trace Lucas’s past and learn about the places in his nautical log. He accepted Nite’s invitation to stay with his family and planned to ask the old noble house about the city’s history.

• Angel decided to investigate Lucas’s trail in the Anjou Dynasty, especially the place where Lucas had supposedly died.
• Angel met Nite at a riverbank bridge, and Nite agreed to guide him toward his hometown in the Anjou Dynasty.
• Angel and Nite crossed the wild central region aboard the Gondola, passing Beastbone Mountain and the Tatamu Tribe before reaching the Anjou Dynasty.
• Angel arrived with Nite in Lost Song City and explored its fluorite-lit streets and landmarks.
• Angel agreed to stay at Nite’s home, where he hoped to ask the old noble family about the Anjou Dynasty’s past.

Angel found Muya's handwritten account of Lucas in House New Ross's basement, discovering that the family likely still carried Lucas's bloodline. After learning that a three-thousand-year-old map had been stolen from Noble Academy, Angel secretly retrieved another copy from House of Anjou's royal library, where Lucas's records were missing.

• Angel examined the last members of House New Ross and found no gifted descendants, then followed Nite to the basement to read the family's historical records.
• Angel found Muya's handwritten manuscript, which described her relationship with Lucas and showed that one of their children survived as an ancestor of House New Ross.
• Angel located Widow Street on a modern map and asked Nite to borrow a map of Lost Song City from the Shining Gold Era.
• Nite reported that the old map had recently been stolen from Noble Academy by someone who could fly, leading Angel to suspect Lucas's other searchers were involved.
• Angel used Boundless Silence to enter House of Anjou's royal library and retrieve a three-thousand-year-old map, but found no records of Lucas there.

Angel avoided Widow Street after discovering apprentices were watching it, then found a fluorite wish-tree sculpture in Radiant Glow Square that matched a detail from Muya’s notes about Lucas. Learning the tree had been made centuries after Lucas’s time, Angel wrote a wish on a golden wind chime, leaving its connection to Lucas as another unexplained anomaly.

• Angel sensed he was being watched near Widow Street, spotted two apprentices monitoring the area, and decided not to enter.
• Angel recalled Muya’s account of Lucas’s glowing wish tree and recognized a fluorite sculpture in Radiant Glow Square as a possible match for the tree beside ancient Andema Lake.
• Angel listened as the shopkeeper explained the wish-tree custom and claimed that the current queen’s wish had come true.
• Angel paid two hundred gold coins for a golden wind chime and asked when the tree had been completed.
• The shopkeeper said the tree had been completed more than six hundred years earlier, and Angel concluded that Lucas’s stories repeatedly predated the things later built around them.
• Angel wrote wishes for Mentor Jon’s recovery, his brother’s health, and Lionheart’s Flame never to be extinguished.

Angel searched for places connected to Lucas and arranged for Nite to investigate old wells, hoping to locate the well where Lucas had died. Later, Angel visited shipwright Ohm in disguise and paid him to share what he knew about Lucas’s ship, the Feather Fan.

• Angel searched Pompeii Alley and other locations from Lucas’s records but found no clues.
• Angel marked likely areas on a map and asked Nite to secretly investigate their wells and construction dates, offering him Pale Blue Water as payment.
• Angel disguised himself as Pat and visited shipwright Ohm at his riverside factory during a snowstorm.
• Angel asked Ohm about the Feather Fan, and Ohm identified it as Lucas’s exploration vessel from the Shining Gold Era.
• Ohm focused on gossip about Lucas as Angel pushed a bag of gold toward him, then Angel gave him the money after hearing about Lucas’s famous scam.

Angel learned the story behind Lucas’s supposed scam and concluded Lucas likely survived his sentence, while Deep Sea Song investigated Lucas’s ship and fate. Angel then received Nite’s map of Lost Song City’s wells, preparing to narrow down his search.

• Angel learned from Ohm that Lucas had been accused of faking a voyage to the Devil Sea and sentenced to death, but the ship’s log suggested Lucas had returned alive and remained unexecuted.
• Angel concluded that the people of Deep Sea Song and Summer Dew Ridge probably did not know Lucas later died by suicide, so his investigation of the wells was unlikely to attract attention.
• Jiebo ordered Deep Sea Song’s apprentices to investigate Lucas’s ship and death after Siliwu urged him to find Lucas’s connection to the mysterious space.
• Bai told Jiebo she had watched Angel near Widow Street, and Jiebo decided not to pursue him because he believed Angel was only seeking talented individuals.
• Nite gave Angel a map marking Lost Song City’s wells and their construction dates, allowing Angel to narrow his search.

Angel searched the old wells around Lost Song City for evidence of Lucas’s supposed death, but found nothing in any of them. He returned to the New Ross residence questioning whether Lucas had lied about jumping into a well.

• Angel rode with Nite through Rat Tail Street, where he skillfully threw snowballs back at the children who had pelted the sleigh.
• Angel inspected a sealed public well and found nothing unusual at its bottom.
• Angel told Nite to seek gifted individuals for testing at the New Ross home, with a five-gold-coin fee and a spiritual-impact threshold to limit applicants.
• Angel investigated the wells on Widow Street, including one at Nite’s friend’s home, but found no clues and no talent in the knight’s son.
• Angel searched six more wells at Lucas’s other properties and found no remains or residue, leaving him unsure whether Lucas had ever jumped into a well.

Angel abandoned his investigation into Lucas and began testing children for wizarding talent at Count New Ross’s estate, using Mental Shock as a threshold. After the royal family’s children failed, the crowds also produced no gifted individuals, while White and Jiebo watched and concluded Angel was simply carrying out a guide mission.

• Angel decided to stop investigating Lucas and inscribed a Mental Shock magic pattern at the estate gates.
• Nite revealed that the king and his children had arrived, and Angel sent royal children back when they tried to enter through the side entrance.
• Toby attacked the Thirteenth Prince, but a steel-armored seabird knocked him down and warned the crowd with its pressure.
• The Thirteenth Prince passed the gate but had no talent, while every other royal child failed the Mental Shock threshold.
• Angel tested the crowds from morning until midnight without finding a gifted individual, and White and Jiebo watched from the clouds, judging that he was conducting a guide mission.

Jiebo and White discovered that Angel had triggered an alchemical omen at White Oak Mountain and went to investigate, where Toby’s Flame Griffin kept them from approaching. Angel woke inside the omen after crafting a cloak inscribed with the Poem of Blankness and began recalling his strange journey through the phenomenon space.

• White told Jiebo that no talented candidates had appeared at the testing and that Angel had left New Ross Count’s Estate without explanation.
• An alchemical omen appeared over White Oak Mountain, and Jiebo recognized it as the result of Angel’s alchemy; White realized Angel was the renowned alchemist associated with Phantom Demon.
• Jiebo and White flew to the mountain with Si Man, but Toby’s Flame Griffin blocked them from reaching the summit, so they waited below.
• Toby worried as Angel remained immersed in the omen, while Angel opened his eyes within the phenomenon space and saw the River of Fate disappear.
• Angel recalled crafting the Poem of Blankness into a cloak, entering the omen’s phenomenon space, walking beside the River of Fate, falling asleep, and experiencing the life of an eccentric who lived in a clock tower.

Angel endured five years inside a clock-tower madman, then faced Cassini, who called himself Time, in the Wheel of Time and declared the trial complete. Angel emerged as his cloak finished forming, while Bai, Si Man, and Jiebo witnessed the creation from White Oak Mountain and departed without meeting him.

• Angel watched the clock-tower man live in isolation for five years, refusing to merge with his mind, until the man leapt from the tower and spoke to him before dying.
• Angel awoke in a dim void beneath the Wheel of Time and spoke with a shadow that identified itself as Cassini, or Time.
• Cassini said Angel had chosen to wait rather than merge and claimed he would take the other choice before vanishing with the Wheel of Time.
• Angel passed through a door and emerged as the cloak absorbed energy and was completed.
• Bai and Si Man judged Angel's creation to be at least a peak mid-tier alchemical creation, possibly half-step high-tier.
• Jiebo told Bai to leave without meeting Angel, and Bai and Si Man departed with him.

Angel returned with the mysterious cloak and wondered whether Cassini was real and what it meant to steal a past choice. In Rose Garden, David chose metallurgy despite Liana’s strength in fragrance crafting, and Liana accepted him as her disciple.

• Angel recalled Toby and flew back toward New Ross Count's Estate, pondering Cassini and the omen space.
• David reached the final question in Liana’s tests, which asked him to choose his future direction.
• Jack Su urged David to choose fragrance crafting, but David remembered his love of metallurgy and wrote “Metallurgy, harmonization.”
• Liana explained that choices could become impossible to reclaim as time and circumstances changed.
• David firmly confirmed his choice, and Liana accepted him as her disciple and gave him a flying slip.

Sanders dreamed of the Time Thief and discussed the omen with Kant before setting out to cross the Abyssal defense line. Meanwhile, Angel discovered that his cloak had gained an unexplained one-time effect capable of blocking even a Legend’s gaze.

• Sanders woke from a dream and urged Kant to leave the Abyss, but Kant chose to stay and help him.
• Kant asked about Sanders’s dream, and Sanders told him he had dreamed of the Time Thief and recalled their encounter in his youth.
• Sanders lent Kant the Stele of the Strange Ring and praised Angel’s abilities, while Kant shared his curiosity about the apprentice’s music boxes.
• Sanders and Kant discussed the Time Thief’s marks and the choices he stole before Sanders announced they would cross the defense line into the Abyss’s heartland.
• Angel used the Eye of Nalda to examine his cloak and found that it had gained a mysterious one-time effect that could defeat even a Legend’s gaze.