Chapter Summaries

Yuriol questioned Brando’s reckless claim to territory, but Brando explained that Count Jandernel’s response was already bringing war. Brando began preparing for an imminent attack while weighing his limited forces and the possibility of Madara’s involvement.

• Yuriol reflected on his growing responsibility toward the refugees and asked Brando how he intended to inherit territory in defiance of the nobles’ rules.
• Brando learned from Yuriol that Uncle Leto had sent news and concluded that Sir Pallas’s renewed activity meant Count Jandernel was preparing for war.
• Brando reassured Yuriol that they could defeat Count Jandernel and estimated that they had one or two months to prepare, though Sir Pallas might attack sooner.
• Brando considered the strength of his human and Cave Dweller forces, suspected Count Jandernel would seek outside help, and ordered Charles to watch Madara’s Bone Frames.
• Charles reported that Brando’s investigators had found no useful information about the remnants of Eluin’s Southern Legion, forcing Brando to suspend his plan to use them against Madara.

Antitina overcame the workers’ fear and reluctance by enforcing the wall repairs and providing them with daily meals, earning their trust and boosting Brando’s reputation. With help from Beru and Audum, the repairs were completed by the end of the month, and Brando recognized Antitina’s dedication and ability.

• Brando continued searching for Eluin’s Southern Legion while trusted mercenaries passed through the mountains via Shafrund.
• Antitina forced reluctant residents to work on the city walls, then won many over by providing white bread and meat stew each evening.
• Antitina used the territory’s meat reserves and sent mercenaries hunting to maintain the workers’ dinners, telling them Brando had arranged the support.
• More people began asking whether the lord needed workers, signaling that Antitina’s efforts were weakening the old nobility’s influence.
• Audum corrected mistakes in the wall repairs, and the work accelerated until the walls were completed by the end of the month.
• Antitina apologized to Brando for the delay, but he praised her dedication and recognized her as an invaluable aide.

Brando praised Antitina’s work on Tonigell’s city walls, then addressed the gathered mercenaries about nobles’ responsibility and the future they could build under his leadership. He left them considering his implied offer to become his vassals and help transform Eluin.

• Roman, Clencia, and Vern praised the newly completed city walls and Antitina’s work, while Brando watched her with admiration.
• Antitina accepted a handkerchief from Medisa after Brando’s approving look moved her nearly to tears.
• Brando recalled the night they killed a legitimate lord and said their actions had begun to make them more than ordinary rioters.
• Brando invoked Former King Eck’s teaching that nobility, strength, and power meant responsibility, and urged everyone to face the coming challenges together.
• Brando asked whether they would remember his words if they became nobles of a reborn Eluin, implying that they were his people and vassals.
• Clencia and the mercenaries felt a surge of passion at Brando’s vision, while Antitina realized he intended to change Eluin’s noble system.

Jelt spotted a hillmen camp near Pallas and warned his team that the hillmen might be looking for them, prompting preparations to withdraw. Brando received the scouts’ intelligence about the hillmen, but their purpose remained unclear.

• Jelt recalled how he had joined Brando’s forces and volunteered for the scouting mission before watching a camp below the mountaintop.
• Mayov reached Jelt using the scouts’ password, and Jelt identified the camp as belonging to hillmen rather than Pallas knights.
• Jelt warned Mayov that the hillmen might be looking for the scouts and ordered him to report the discovery as the team prepared to withdraw.
• Brando met one of Charles’s Elemental Envoys, who delivered intelligence from the northern scouts about the hillmen.

Brando learned that a mountain tribe had appeared in Pallas and was likely joining Count Jandernel’s forces against him. He also recruited the Elemental Envoy nicknamed Red Pig as an apprentice, naming him Mcdonald.

• Brando read a letter reporting that an eastern Grahall Mountains clan had appeared in Pallas and concluded that the tribesmen were coming to fight him.
• Brando warned Qian and Medisa that Count Jandernel might have mobilized more forces alongside Pallas’s army and Madara’s undead.
• Brando wondered who had recognized the significance of the mountain tribesmen and learned that Lady Charles had sent another letter.
• Qian forced the Elemental Envoy to reveal his familiar, a duck that Lady Charles had given him for luck.
• Brando learned the Elemental Envoy was called Red Pig and told him to become his apprentice.
• Brando named Red Pig Mcdonald.

Brando received word that the Druids had returned and began preparing to put his plans into action as Pallas's army gathered. He visited Beru's forge, where the old master described the difficulties of producing armor with inexperienced workers and obsolete Magitech equipment.

• Brando burned a blank letter bearing a secret mark and learned from it that the Druids had returned.
• Brando sent Macdonald to find Tajip and instructed him to bring the Cave Dwellers' leader discreetly to a meeting place.
• Brando set out with Qian and Medisa, then stopped at Beru's forge to discuss an idea.
• Brando saw that Beru's workers were still practicing on ordinary armor because the craftsmen and old Magitech machines were not ready for the White Lion Armor.
• Beru complained that Fir Territory's forge and technology lagged far behind the standards he had known in Eluin.

Brando discussed the shortage of materials and labor limiting Master Beru’s workshop, then proposed recreating an Elemental Furnace to improve forging and smelting. Medisa offered a way to collect free elements, and Otales ended by asking whether she belonged to the Elf King’s royal family.

• Beru told Brando that his workshop had made more than two hundred sets but lacked enough skilled workers to expand further.
• Brando explained the idea of an Elemental Furnace, and Beru eagerly asked to try building one.
• Medisa questioned Brando’s claim that the technique came from the Buga Wizards, and Brando covered his mistake by saying he had inherited the High Tower Wizard tradition.
• Brando outlined the furnace’s challenges, and Medisa said a Magic Array could collect free elements.
• Brando realized the furnace could become a profitable product to sell in Ambersell and asked Medisa to explain her method.
• Medisa hinted that her Silver Elf heritage could solve the problem, while Otales asked Brando whether she was a member of the Elf King’s royal family.

Brando discussed the obstacles to building an Elemental Furnace and persuaded Beru to use his connections to help gather materials and workers. He proposed bringing refugees to Tonigell, but Beru warned that strong laborers were unlikely to be among them.

• Otales explained that Medisa could use elemental conduction technology, and Medisa confirmed she could do so.
• Brando and Beru discussed stabilizing the furnace’s flame, acquiring magic cores, and obtaining a Mana Conduction Device.
• Brando persuaded Beru to ask his students and Royalist contacts to lend assistance, while promising they would be paid.
• Brando clarified that he wanted people to help with the work, not to buy or sell them, and explained his idea of recruiting refugees displaced by years of war.
• Beru recognized Brando’s plan to bring refugees to Tonigell but cautioned that most refugees were not strong laborers.

Brando reassured Beru that he would bring refugees to Tonigell despite concerns about food, then inspected the unusual armor Beru had made from his drawings. The inspection was interrupted by Mcdonald, who arrived with a cloaked dwarf.

• Brando told Beru he had considered the difficulties of taking in refugees and entrusted the matter to him.
• Beru worried that Tonigell could not feed a larger population, but Brando cited Shafrund's silver mine, the merchants of Ambersell, the northern fleet, and the druids' treaty.
• Brando redirected the conversation to the Elemental Furnace plan, and Beru said he had completed fewer than three hundred sets of the requested equipment.
• Beru led Brando and Medisa into a storeroom and brought out a heavy, oddly shaped suit of armor made to Brando's drawings.
• Mcdonald arrived to see Brando with a short, cloaked figure whom Beru recognized as a dwarf.

Brando revealed to Beru that Tajip represented a clan of three thousand Cave Dwellers and explained that he wanted to arm them against the reinforcements Pallas was likely to receive. He offered Tajip five hundred suits of specially designed heavy armor in exchange for an undisclosed condition, and Tajip agreed.

• Brando revealed Tajip as a Cave Dweller chieftain and told Beru that three thousand Cave Dwellers had joined his forces.
• Brando explained that Count Jandernel would likely bring reinforcements and that the Cave Dwellers needed better equipment.
• Brando offered Tajip five hundred suits of heavy armor designed for Cave Dwellers, and Tajip hesitated because his people did not normally wear armor.
• Beru angrily confronted Brando for mass-producing untested armor, then inspected the design and accepted that it appeared suitable.
• Brando whispered a condition to Tajip, who considered it and agreed to the deal.

Princess Griffine and Oufwell discussed how Count Jandernel’s coming conflict with Brando could benefit the Royalist Faction either way, while Pallas faced repeated Cave Dweller attacks in Mintai Territory. Pallas chose to delay the campaign and strengthen defenses, leaving the war poised to continue after winter.

• Griffine asked Oufwell who would win as Pallas marched toward Fir Territory, and Oufwell said either outcome would keep Count Jandernel from acting rashly.
• Griffine questioned why Brando was helping, and Oufwell suggested the adventurer was driven by ambition.
• Pallas learned that Cave Dweller attacks had killed nearly a hundred people that week and caused more than three hundred total losses in less than two weeks.
• Pallas heard that mountain folk who tried to retaliate had been ambushed, and he suspected the Cave Dwellers were infiltrating from Shafrund.
• Pallas ordered his forces to tighten defenses, reroute supplies, and postpone the campaign until the Month of Spring Dawn rather than pursue the Cave Dwellers.

Brando explained how he had maneuvered Pallas into delaying his attack while buying time for his plans concerning Valhalla. He then told his subordinates he would leave the territory for a month or longer, keeping his destination secret.

• Brando discussed Pallas’s retreat with Fern, Antitina, Clencia, and Medisa, explaining that his report had been a trap designed to shape Pallas’s choices.
• Brando revealed that Pallas’s decision to wait would slow his preparations while Tajip’s raids continued, giving Brando the time he needed to secure Valhalla.
• Brando explained that Pallas’s apparent options were arranged to benefit Brando, and that the enemy would lose by following his rhythm.
• Brando told his subordinates to manage their responsibilities because he planned to leave the territory for a month or longer.
• Antitina asked whether Brando was going to Shafrund, but he refused to reveal his destination.

Brando prepared to journey into the Black Forest after learning that the Druids had found Valhalla but could not reach it because the forest’s rules had changed. Before leaving, he encountered the prisoner Caglis and revealed that he was the lord Caglis had wanted to see.

• Brando defeated Kuran in a swordsmanship match and reflected on how close his Military Swordsmanship had come to its limit.
• Grand Druid Gray Raven told Brando that the Druids had found Valhalla but had been blocked by dangerous changes in the Black Forest.
• Caglis escaped from the dungeon and attacked Brando, whom he mistook for a guard.
• Brando disarmed Caglis and forced him to surrender, then questioned him about why he had not killed the soldiers.
• Brando revealed himself as the lord Caglis had been demanding to see, leaving Caglis stunned.

Brando released Kagris and tried to recruit him as his adjutant by claiming he was working for Princess Griffine and revealing his ambitions. Kagris accepted the appeal, while Brando left Kuran wondering what scheme he had in mind when he invited him on a trip.

• Brando ordered the soldiers to release Kagris and told him he wanted him to serve as his adjutant.
• Brando claimed he was Princess Griffine Kolkova Odephys's secret envoy and showed Kagris the Silver Shield Crest, though Kuran remained unsure whether his story was true.
• Brando urged Kagris not to waste his life in Tonigell, and Kagris asked what Brando wanted before agreeing that his ambitions sounded like a great idea.
• Kuran warned Brando that Sir Mintai would be furious if Kagris left with him, and Brando said the old knight would remain in the dungeon for now.
• Brando admitted the story about the princess was false, then asked Kuran whether he wanted to take a trip.

Antitina oversaw the young recruits as they were loaded onto wagons at the secret camp, then set out by a separate route. At the Black Forest border, Brando, Kuran, and Caglis arrived, where Caglis eagerly embraced the adventure despite Kuran's warnings.

• Antitina arrived at Brando's secret camp with Qian and observed the young recruits gathering on the training ground.
• Antitina asked about several youths from nearby manors and learned they had sneaked away to join the recruits.
• Mercenaries registered the young people, issued them identification tags, and loaded them onto four covered wagons.
• Antitina told Qian they would take another route so their carriage would not reveal Brando's movements, and Qian asked whether she wanted to go to the Black Forest.
• Brando, Kuran, Caglis, and Mcdonald reached the Black Forest border, where Kuran recalled the horrors of the November War and warned Caglis about the dangers.
• Caglis said he no longer regretted coming and eagerly looked forward to adventuring in the Black Forest.

Brando gathered Kuran and his companions at the Black Forest borderlands to begin an expedition and train the younger members of his group. He invited Antitina to join them so she could learn about Valhalla, while Tia arrived to gather materials for Tamar.

• Kuran agreed to help Brando as long as he did not have to oppose Count Jandernel or become his subordinate.
• Brando's caravan arrived at the forest, bringing Antitina, Qian, Furo, and Tia with the mercenaries.
• Antitina explained that Furo had come to attend to Brando, and Brando reluctantly accepted the arrangement.
• Brando asked Antitina to accompany the expedition so she could familiarize herself with Valhalla, and she agreed despite the danger.
• Antitina said Tia had come at Tamar's request, and Brando realized Tia was there to gather materials.

Brando learned that Tama had sent Tia to gather a long list of rare materials in the Black Forest and devised a competitive training plan for his men around the search. At the forest’s border, Caglis reunited with Meria, a noble who had been captured by mercenaries, and began persuading her to use the expedition as a chance to escape her father’s control.

• Antitina prompted Brando to ask Tia what Tama had sent her to collect, and Tia listed materials ranging from common crystals to legendary treasures.
• Brando planned to split his men into three teams led by himself, Qian, and Kuran, then score their travel and discoveries to encourage competition and cooperation.
• Caglis recognized his old friend Meria among the newcomers and learned that Meria had been captured while traveling with her retainers.
• Meria realized she was at the border of the Black Forest and pleaded with Caglis for help, but he urged her to treat the expedition as a chance to escape her father.
• Brando asked Antitina why several estate-family nobles had joined his recruits, and she said they had secretly come because of his growing reputation.

Brando led sixty young people through a week of harsh training and gathering alchemical materials in the Black Forest, while recording their discoveries and signs of increasingly dangerous territory. As Black Wolves appeared nearby, the guardians kept quiet and watched the young people battle stone leopards to assess their training.

• Brando recorded the properties and uses of Black Mage, Moonview, Four-Leaf Clover, and Witch's Bane gathered by the young people.
• Brando noted that the six groups had collected increasingly rare materials as they moved deeper into the Black Forest.
• Brando outfitted the young people with swords made by Master Beru and presented them as symbols of the White Lion Guard and its ideals.
• Brando recorded signs of Black Wolves, while the guardians withheld information about the monsters to observe how the young people would respond to an ambush.
• The young people fought twelve stone leopards as Yuriol judged their performance, with the lowest-scoring group facing a dangerous three-mile run.

Brando watched the young fighters train in the Black Forest, reflected on the Druids’ support for Fir Territory, and practiced alchemy with rare forest materials. The chapter ended with Brando recalling how Otales’s swordsmanship insights had unlocked another level of Eluin Military Swordsmanship.

• Brando judged the young fighters’ progress and noted that the Druids had brought more than a hundred members to aid Fir Territory’s defense and agriculture.
• Brando used the Blood Refinement Technique to extract Mana Essence from evening primrose and eventually produced an Incomplete Aura of Luck from Four-Leaf Clovers.
• Flora admonished Brando for wasting so many clovers while he tried to advance his alchemy through practice.
• Brando recalled that freeing Otales from the Wind Queen Ring had led her to teach him swordsmanship insights and unlock one additional level of Eluin Military Swordsmanship.

Brando explained his alchemy skills and discussed Dragon Power Potions with Frou while the young people trained in the Black Forest. After Ropal brought him a Serpent Lizard Beast scale found at a nearby pond, Brando realized valuable alchemical materials and a potential threat were close by and called everyone to action.

• Brando said his level-seven alchemy could make Dragon Power Potions, though his success rate would be low and he lacked the ingredients.
• Brando and Frou discussed the hardships of mercenary life and the cost of powerful potions.
• Ropal showed Brando a scale that Antitina and Tia had found in a pond.
• Brando identified the scale as belonging to a Serpent Lizard Beast and recognized its blood and scales as valuable alchemical materials.
• Brando summoned Kuran, Qian, Yuriol, and the young people, declaring that they had work to do.