From the latter half of the night until dawn, Iver had been running himself ragged.
This time, quite a number of people had made the impromptu decision to ascend because of the surging atmosphere of transcendence.
Many of them had not prepared properly and had hurriedly chosen to ascend. As a result, many were injured, and Iver's healing abilities came into play at that moment.
But for that very reason, these people had forcibly "padded" the ranks with quite a number of survivors!
Starting at two in the morning, the Inspectorate began investigating how many newly ascended Fourth Level and Fifth Level individuals had completed their ascensions within Avalon—Avalon had supported the Fourth Level with high salaries precisely to ensure that future Fifth Levels would only emerge from among them.
—Now, this far-sighted plan had finally reached the moment when it could show its value.
First came Lily and Yulia—they had both completed their ascensions without incident. The power they had gained from the Shepherding Method was overwhelmingly powerful for their Levels to begin with... not to mention that many inadequately prepared weaklings had mixed into this Promotion Ritual. Even with only half their power, the Night Demon and Paradox Flame Butterfly were still overwhelmingly superior to these Fourth Level and Third Level supernatural beings.
As Iver had predicted, Yulia had long since gained the Hourglass's attention because of her invention. When she participated in the Promotion Ritual, the Hourglass had already been watching her. After completing her ascension, she had smoothly changed classes into a Trailblazer.
—Only then did she learn from the Hourglass that she had already fulfilled the requirements to become a Trailblazer when she had completed the Difference Engine.
She also learned some rather sad news...
Mr. Babbage had not become the Hourglass's apostle.
In other