Chapter Summaries

Iver and Hypatia discussed how the Ouroboros Ring would bring Phantoms into the Material Realm and create new work for Great Sin Scholars and their escorts. Hypatia agreed to help seal the Round Table Knights' spirit, which she suspected was Heracles, leaving Iver eager to claim a powerful potential ally.

• Iver explained how the Ouroboros Ring would spawn Phantoms and how Great Sin Scholars could capture them, creating new professions and a path forward for former Demon Scholars.
• Hypatia accepted Iver's terms and said the spirit did not need to be transferred into Clarent before sealing.
• Hypatia reasoned that the spirit might be Heracles, whose soul could have survived in the sword after his memories faded.
• Iver agreed that Heracles was a likely explanation and prepared to begin the sealing, realizing the spirit might possess Pillar God-level potential.

Iver used his own antler, feathers, and candle tears to begin forging Tarot Cards for the holy knight, invoking the Silver Crowned Dragon and the Fallen Angel. The ritual revealed Heracles’s memory of taking a sacred sword despite Hermes’s warning, and ended with Iver recognizing that Heracles had ultimately been overcome by fate.

• Iver chose The Chariot and Justice for the holy knight and prepared the cards using his antler, feathers, and candle tears.
• Iver invoked the Silver Crowned Dragon, and a supernatural blizzard froze Hypatia’s café and bookstore around the ritual.
• Iver called on the Fallen Angel and requested the Imprint of Greed, combining the two powers to transform the Tarot Cards around Hypatia’s soul-light orb.
• The ritual’s radiance showed Iver a memory of Hermes warning Heracles that the sacred sword could drive him mad and make him kill his family.
• Heracles dismissed the warning, claimed sufficient power could shatter any fate, and took the sword.
• Iver recalled that Heracles later went mad and killed his wife, children, and friend, realizing that Heracles had been defeated by fate.

Iver witnessed a vision of Balin drawing a cursed sword, killing the Lady of the Lake, and receiving Merlin’s prophecy of disaster. The vision then showed the delusional Don Quixote fighting imaginary giants beside Galahad and promising to protect Iver, before the illusion shattered.

• A Lady of the Lake challenged Arthur and the Round Table Knights to draw the sword bound to her, but Arthur, Gawain, and the others failed.
• Balin drew the sword, killed the Lady of the Lake, and succumbed to violent desires as Merlin prophesied the Empire’s ruin and Balin’s destined bloodshed.
• The vision shifted to Galahad traveling with Don Quixote, who mistook windmills for giants and imagined he had defeated them.
• Don Quixote recognized Iver as the future emperor and vowed that he would eventually come to protect him.
• The vision collapsed and shattered.

Iver appointed Don Quixote guardian of the promised La Mancha Territory and summoned him as a Great Sin Beast. After the transformation produced the Holy Sword Wielder card, Don Quixote appeared in awakened armor with Clarent and pledged to fight for Iver.

• Iver recognized Don Quixote’s sorrow beneath his knightly madness and promised to rebuild La Mancha as his home.
• Iver named Don Quixote guardian of La Mancha, granted him the mark of Greed, and summoned him as a Phantom Demon of the Path of Authority.
• A ritual transformed the Justice and Chariot cards into Adjustment and The Chariot, creating the Great Sin card Holy Sword Wielder.
• Iver learned that the card could summon Don Quixote as a protective light shield or as a fighter who could transform into Clarent.
• Iver displayed the card, and Don Quixote emerged in silver-white armor with Clarent and vowed to fight for him.

Hypatia recalled the Theocracy’s ancient war machines and explained why its leaders dismantled them: the elves wanted to reject rule through force and pass their ideals to future generations instead. Don Quixote’s resemblance to the old Sublime Arbiters left Hypatia reflecting on how the Theocracy had changed.

• Hypatia recognized Don Quixote’s aura as resembling that of a Sublime Arbiter, and Iver asked about the name.
• Hypatia described the Oathbreaker Destroyer fortresses and the Sublime Arbiters who had fought from them in the Dark Ages.
• Iver asked why the Theocracy had abolished the Sublime Arbiters, and Hypatia recalled Hermes’s explanation that the Theocracy did not want to appear warlike or dangerous.
• Hypatia explained that the Theocracy should use force only to preserve neutrality and pass its ideals onward rather than glorify ancient weapons.
• Hypatia saw that Don Quixote resembled the emotionless Pope Guards of the past and considered how removing one’s claws and fangs to join civilization mattered to the Dedication Path.

Iver rejected the chance to follow the Path of Dedication, choosing instead to pursue hope and the possibility of an Eleventh Miracle. With Don Quixote reduced to a sword and ready to protect him, Iver prepared to ask the Constant Self’s vessel, Hecate, about the Blood Angel.

• Iver felt the Civilization Source River calling to him, but Isabel warned him not to sacrifice himself for others.
• Iver told Isabel and the others that he would not follow the Path of Dedication and explained that an Eleventh Miracle might break the Tenth Sacred Number’s cage.
• Hypatia recalled the Constant Self’s belief that the doomed First Source River still had another way to live, and realized the Constant Self had truly loved the Beast Lord.
• Iver declared that he would step forward like the Fool, and Don Quixote dissolved into a floating greatsword to accompany him.
• Iver decided to seek Hecate’s view of the Blood Angel, having already arranged a meeting through Pure White.

Iver and his companions went to the Seventeenth Circle to meet Cardinal Hecate, as Hypatia shared her ancient history with Hecate and Constant Self. They discovered Constant Self was inhabiting Hecate, and Iver sensed that self-severance had left the Pillar God unable to feel affection for her old friend.

• Hypatia told Iver that she, Hermes, and Heracles had known Hecate for thousands of years, and recalled Hecate helping Heracles enter the underworld during his labor.
• Hypatia explained that Hecate had taught Constant Self witchcraft before becoming a priest and speculated that Hecate had used a power to prolong her youth.
• Iver and his companions entered the Seventeenth Circle, the witchcraft layer governed by Hecate, and found her waiting at a forest crossroads.
• Iver recognized Constant Self in Hecate because her eyes were red, though Hypatia initially mistook her for the old Hecate.
• Constant Self greeted Hypatia by her nickname, but Iver sensed that she felt no genuine joy or affection toward her old friend.

Iver spoke with Constant Self, who explained that Cain had been created as part of her failed effort to produce a new Pillar God of the Error Source River. She gave Iver permission to kill Blood Angel, but her loyalty to Ring Angel left open the possibility that she would oppose Iver if they became enemies.

• Constant Self called Iver Snake and agreed that he could kill Cain and let Blood Angel feed on him if needed.
• Constant Self explained that Cain was an experiment meant to provide a bearer for the power of the Sacred Number Nine before Amber was exhausted.
• She revealed that humanity was her attempt to create a Perfect One who could become a new Tail Pillar, but she had abandoned the plan because she could not love the being she needed.
• Constant Self withdrew from Cardinal Hecate's body after telling Iver he could call on her and that she would watch over his prayers.
• Iver realized he could move against Blood Angel without fearing Constant Self's intervention, but worried that she might side with Ring Angel against him in the future.

After the Blood Angel slaughtered nearly all the Children of the Moon in Iris Flower Kingdom, Iver and his companions discussed the kingdom’s collapse and the Angel’s disappearance. News then arrived that Aymar Nur had reached the true Sixth Level, while Iver realized killing the Blood Angel could let him advance as well and expose how the Ouroboros Ring ritual worked.

• Iver took Isabel and Sherlock to the Vendome estate after the Blood Angel killed nearly all the Children of the Moon in Iris Flower Kingdom.
• Arsene described Hawkeye’s infighting, and Iver reviewed reports of the Children of the Moon’s infiltration and the devastation across the kingdom’s political and social institutions.
• Isabel worried that the missing Blood Angel might threaten ordinary people, and Iver guessed he had gone underground.
• Argon de Vendome delivered news that Aymar Nur had reached the Sixth Level and invited Iver to observe the Nest Sacred Chant.
• Argon inferred that the Ouroboros Ring could remove the Wall of Equilibrium’s suppression and left, while Iver guessed he intended to prevent witches from producing another Sixth Level enemy.
• Iver considered that killing the Blood Angel could bring him to the Sixth Level and reveal a method for others to kill Angels.

Priest Cassius watched Clara pray in a church, unaware that she was a Hawkeye Organization assassin communicating with her senior apprentice, Little Deer. Clara confirmed that their target was beneath the church and chose to report the discovery rather than investigate further.

• Cassius recognized Clara, a dance teacher, and found himself distracted by her as she prayed.
• Little Deer sat beside Clara, and the two exchanged coded messages while appearing to pray.
• Clara explained that Cassius was a potential bell for the organization and could help them build ties with the Theocracy.
• Little Deer asked about their investigation, and Clara confirmed that the discovery was beneath the church.
• Clara decided they should report the discovery instead of investigating further, fearing something might happen.

Dancing Skirt saw that the Hawkeye Organization had become corrupted after the Child of the Moon’s apparent death, with power-hungry assassins abandoning their work to fight over control of Iris. Only Honey Badger’s pro-Theocracy faction continued carrying out missions, and Dancing Skirt wondered whether the country itself had gone mad.

• Iver’s departure from the papacy weakened Honey Badger’s faction as Iris people came to believe he had lost the Theocracy’s protection.
• After Blood Angel appeared and the Child of the Moon was believed dead, Hawkeye’s power grabbers called for seizing control of Iris and driving out foreigners and rival groups.
• Assassins captured surviving Blood Slaves and used them as outlets for their fear and resentment.
• Hawkeye’s safehouses filled with arguments over power, while assassins threatened surviving councilors and stopped accepting many commissions.
• Most assassins declared their mission complete and refused to search for Blood Angel, leaving Honey Badger’s faction as the only group still working normally.
• Dancing Skirt wondered whether Iris, rather than the Child of the Moon, had gone mad.

Dancing Skirt wrestled with guilt over the countless people she had killed for the Hawkeye Organization and decided she could no longer accept the life she had earned through those crimes. After sending her fortune to her parents, she infiltrated the church’s underground alone, hoping to die before her mission ended.

• Dancing Skirt refused Little Deer’s proposal to lure former comrades into a deadly trap, believing it would make her complicit in further corruption.
• Dancing Skirt recalled her decades of assassinations and betrayals, her sister’s death at the hands of a Child of the Moon, and the guilt she felt over killing people whose crimes she did not know.
• Dancing Skirt imagined retiring in Iris with a husband and children, but the prospect made her feel sick despite the future being within reach.
• Dancing Skirt declined Priest Cassius’s invitation to dinner and watched him leave, believing he deserved someone better.
• Dancing Skirt anonymously sent her property to her parents and entered the church’s underground alone, despite having already reported Blood Angel’s location to her Teacher.

Iver and his companions arrived at Rumm Champagne Chapel, where they discussed how the company used Church sponsorship and welfare programs to protect itself despite its corrupt practices. Iver reflected on Iris’s deeper social failures and Yulia’s difficult mission, while the Blood Angel beneath the chapel remained silent.

• Iver explained that Iris relied on Church sponsorship because its priests needed funding to protect the population from undead.
• Arsene described how Rumm Champagne had allegedly stolen Saint-Réol Champagne’s recipe, lowered its quality, and used charitable sponsorship to repair its reputation.
• Isabel struggled with the injustice of Rumm Champagne benefiting from its wrongdoing while Saint-Réol Champagne went bankrupt, and Iver argued that the Irisian government had failed to care for the poor.
• Arsene wondered whether the Church’s silence reflected a form of dedication, and Iver said the land’s corruption had left no simple right choice without confronting its source.
• Iver sensed the Blood Angel beneath the chapel and chose to trust it, then considered how Yulia’s effort to give people a way to live would require opposing an entire era.

Iver, Sherlock, Isabel, and Arsene explored the enormous cellar beneath Rumm Champagne Chapel, where Sherlock explained how Rumm Company used it to protect its champagne business. Arsene uncovered human blood vessels beneath the limestone walls, and they began twitching.

• Isabel was astonished by the cellar’s size, and Sherlock explained that it had once been a champagne factory’s wine cellar.
• Sherlock reasoned that Rumm Company had given the cellar to the church to avoid scandal while retaining a secure place to age high-end champagne.
• Iver explained that church purification could not meaningfully alter wine over the long term, and Sherlock said wealthy customers could still be swayed by the appearance of holiness.
• Arsene noticed something strange inside the limestone and asked Iver to illuminate the wall.
• Arsene uncovered a dense web of human blood vessels beneath the limestone, and the vessels began twitching.

Sherlock and the others descended into a hidden chamber beneath the wine cellar, where they found the Blood Angel and a woman praying as black smoke entered her body. The woman revealed herself as a threat connected to Nothingness and opened a succession of doors in Iver’s vision, overwhelming him with a terrifying voice.

• Sherlock petrified the collapsing ground and slowed the group’s fall with a Group Feather Fall Spell.
• The group discovered a vast chamber decorated with blood-vessel murals, a sleeping Blood Angel, and a woman praying beneath its image.
• Iver stopped Isabel from approaching the woman after sensing that she was alive and recognizing that her presence was suspicious.
• The woman recited an account of the Snake and the world’s cycle of Eternal Calamity, while black blotches spread across her face and her dull yellow eyes brightened.
• The woman called the Snake to rise and welcome her, then opened countless doors in Iver’s vision and urged him to accept her grace.

Iver witnessed visions of past reincarnation cycles and the Reincarnation Angel’s Golden Apple, while a woman’s words left him frozen. Isabel tried to shield him and Sherlock attacked the woman, but she nullified his spell and claimed he had used her power against her.

• Iver saw Amber rewind the world with the Golden Apple before a sorrowful serpent-like boy resembling him let go of it, and Amber fell back into slumber as time resumed.
• Isabel noticed Iver was unresponsive, transformed to resemble him with her puppet mask, and stepped between him and the woman.
• Sherlock secretly cast Fourth Level Chain Lightning at the woman, believing she was a hostile First Level mage.
• The woman nullified the spell before it could reach her and asked Sherlock how he dared use her power against her.

Sherlock realized that spells came from the contaminating knowledge of the Void and that the Great Sage had borne their cost in silence. As Dancing Skirt overwhelmed Sherlock and Iver, Isabel summoned Don Quixote, but the Blood Angel’s attack struck Dancing Skirt instead.

• Arsene recognized the intruder as Dancing Skirt of the Hawkeye Organization, and Sherlock deduced that she had gone to the Blood Angel’s hiding place hoping to die.
• Sherlock connected the Path of Void to spells and concluded that the Great Sage had stayed silent to contain their corruption.
• Dancing Skirt spoke to Sherlock, flooding his mind with knowledge and leaving him and Iver unable to fight.
• Isabel threw her card and called for Don Quixote as a gigantic blade of flesh and blood formed behind Dancing Skirt.
• The Angel’s blade swept toward Dancing Skirt, who stood with her back to the shattered heart.

The Blood Angel descended in Lucia Tepes’s body and attacked Dancing Skirt, while Don Quixote shielded Isabel and the others. Cain confronted Dancing Skirt, who revealed she had escaped from within Cain and intended to consume her; their battle began as the cavern broke apart.

• The Blood Angel’s Blood Blade split Dancing Skirt and nearly destroyed the group, but Don Quixote blocked the shockwave and Dancing Skirt became immune to the blade’s second strike.
• Dancing Skirt asked Cain whether she would betray her, and Cain appeared as a blood-covered girl in Lucia Tepes’s body.
• Isabel recognized the girl as Cheese, while the Blood Angel recognized Isabel as Lu Lu and said she would deal with her later.
• Dancing Skirt revealed that Cain had abandoned her divine body, allowing her to escape and reach the Serpent’s pathway, and called Cain her snack.
• Dancing Skirt and Cain clashed, shattering the space between them and sending destructive shockwaves through the cavern.

Dancing Skirt’s Whisper of the Void began dissolving the church and surrounding district, but Blood Angel resisted by wielding hatred preserved through sacrifice. Iver realized Blood Angel’s power was created to oppose nothingness, and Blood Angel called on the moon to witness her purpose.

• Dancing Skirt’s black crystal brought forward the world’s eventual nothingness, dissolving her surroundings and breaking Blood Angel apart when she looked at her.
• Blood Angel struck Dancing Skirt with a blood blade, interrupting the dissolution and waking Iver and Sherlock from their visions.
• Blood Angel explained that the hatred endured by her three thousand blood vessels let her resist the fragments of nothingness.
• Iver reasoned that Blood Angel’s sacrificial power gathered meaning from the lives taken and had been created to oppose nothingness.
• Blood Angel raised her hands toward the moon and called, “Mother,” asking it to bear witness.

The Blood Angel’s moonlight drove Dancing Skirt’s vessel toward collapse, but she redirected her attack at Iver. Don Quixote sacrificed his head to summon enormous wings of light, and they collided with the nothingness.

• The Blood Angel’s moonlight accelerated the dissolution of Dancing Skirt’s vessel, leaving only her upper chest and right arm.
• Dancing Skirt used Black Light to cut through the moonlight and aimed a killing attack at Iver.
• Iver called out to Don Quixote, who stepped in front of him rather than trying to evade.
• Don Quixote cut off his own head and released a vast formation of light that became wing-shaped shields.
• The nothingness and Don Quixote’s shields of light slammed into each other.