Chapter Summaries

Locke’s Great Radiant Dragon Sparrow won the Golden Holy Grail Flying Magic Plant Competition after outpacing the Flying-Man Gourd and overcoming the Julian Hive. Leon Newman finished second, accepted the loss, and resolved to keep improving until he could challenge Locke again.

• The Great Radiant Dragon Sparrow surged into the lead, while the Thunder Spruce was destroyed after colliding with a Wyvern and was eliminated.
• The Julian Hive broke free and attacked the racers, but Barrett’s Great Radiant Dragon Sparrow tore through it with special flames and continued ahead of Leon Newman’s Flying-Man Gourd.
• The Flying-Man Gourd swallowed swarm members to convert them into energy and nearly caught the Great Radiant Dragon Sparrow, while Patrick’s Green Dumpling Cloud-Puff Gourd fell behind in third place.
• Near the finish, Leon urged Simon to swallow the Mechanical Wyvern’s Sun Refinement Array, but the wyvern’s thermal rays damaged the gourd and ended the attempt.
• Barrett crossed the finish line first, securing the championship for Locke, while Simon and Leon’s Flying-Man Gourd finished second.
• Leon congratulated Locke, vowed to challenge him again, and the host announced Locke’s partnership with Wizard Bruce to develop the Great Radiant Dragon Sparrow as a flying vehicle.

Locke won the Golden Holy Grail championship, received the Crimson-Gold Guard rank, and negotiated with Wizard Bruce to establish the Aladdin Shop Alliance. The alliance would sell Locke’s Great Radiant Dragon Sparrow alongside Leon Newman’s Flying-Man Gourd, with Locke agreeing to have a lawyer clarify the partners’ responsibilities.

• Rose the witch and Wizard Joshua discussed recruiting Breeders for Olaye, while Wizard Trisk dismissed Locke as no threat to him.
• Locke received the Golden Cup championship badge and the Crimson-Gold Guard rank, then activated Crimson-Gold Attire and examined its abilities.
• Wizard Bruce offered Locke a partnership to sell the Great Radiant Dragon Sparrow through a joint Shop Alliance, and Locke named it Aladdin.
• Bruce proposed adding Leon Newman’s Flying-Man Gourd to the alliance, with profits split among the partners and the Windcatcher Sacred Land covering any losses.
• Locke agreed to include the Flying-Man Gourd and said his friend at the Mithril Law Office could draft a contract defining their responsibilities.

Locke finalized a Shop Alliance contract with Windcatcher Sacred Land to sell flying devices, then Russell Throne arrived and summoned him. As Russell led Locke through the Corridor of Yesteryear, he warned him that the Golden Three-Headed Hound among the phantoms was real and dangerous.

• Locke reviewed and accepted a contract giving him thirty percent of the Flying-Man Gourd Shop Alliance’s profits while exempting him from operating costs if it lost money.
• Wizard Bruce and Witch Edith arranged seed production and sales, and Edith taught Locke and Wizard Newman the Ladybug Marauders’ courier spell while explaining Windcatcher Sacred Land’s partnership with them.
• Russell Throne interrupted the meeting, recognized Locke as the wizard who had written him a letter, and asked him to come along after Locke finished signing the contract.
• Locke followed Russell through the Corridor of Yesteryear, where magical phantoms appeared and vanished around them.
• Russell warned Locke that the Golden Three-Headed Hound was a real Sun-Ring-level guardian that had eaten wizards by posing among the phantoms.

Russell Throne showed Locke how his Atavistic Evolution had affected the Corridor of Yesteryear and asked him to take on the abandoned Golden Incantation project. Locke recognized that combining the project with his own research might yield more precise Atavistic Evolution, and Russell Throne waited for his answer.

• Russell Throne showed Locke the cracked Golden Tassel Wheat statue and explained that the corridor was an ancient Spirit Macro creation that reacted to Locke’s revived plant.
• Russell Throne asked about Locke’s Special-Grade Funding Grant proposal, and Locke said he planned to continue researching Atavistic Evolution rather than pursue Magic-Plant Crystallization Technology.
• Russell Throne demonstrated the Golden Incantation, and Locke learned its Second-Ring Spell Model after watching him cast it once.
• Russell Throne explained that the Golden Incantation could expose hidden Golden Magic in plants and might strengthen Locke’s Atavistic Evolution, though its abandoned project required extensive sunrise and sunset data.
• Locke realized Russell Throne had approached him because combining their research could advance the project, and Russell Throne asked whether he would take it on.

Locke examined the Golden Incantation project and realized Golden Magic might strengthen Magic Plants and support his research into Atavistic Evolution and Summer Prosperity. After testing and defeating a Golden Beholder Construct, he accepted Russell Throne’s project, though he still needed fifty-five years of solar-orbit data from the Realm of Dusk and Dawn.

• Locke considered whether to pursue the Golden Incantation and reasoned that it required recent solar-orbit data from the Realm of Dusk and Dawn.
• Locke connected his work on Atavistic Evolution and the Tree of Prosperity’s Summer Prosperity, recognizing that either could lead to the second forging of his Great Magic and make him a Star-Ring Wizard.
• Russell Throne materialized a Golden Beholder Construct so Locke could learn more about Golden Magic by testing himself against it.
• Locke analyzed the construct’s adaptive attacks, learned its Golden Gaze Spell, and used a Golden Eye Grass to reflect the spell and destroy the construct.
• Locke realized Golden Magic could strengthen Magic Plants and accepted Russell Throne’s project, receiving his students’ experimental data but still needing fifty-five years of solar-movement records.

Locke left the Realm of Dusk and Dawn with new knowledge about the dangerous Cold Mountain Ruins and growing sensitivity to Golden Magic, then delivered his second Doppelgänger Potion to Sea Queen Throne. Helen Throne approved it and began a second lesson on advanced Doppelgänger Potion variations, leaving the Rapid Advancement Class overwhelmed by the news.

• A young Alchemist captured Exupéry's battle record and learned that Locke and Russell Throne had defeated the Beholder Golden Construct.
• Locke and Russell Throne met Witch Rose arguing with Leon Newman, and Rose warned Locke that his position with Red Dragon Throne could soon be threatened.
• Russell Throne told Locke about the Black-and-White Grimoire and the deadly Cold Mountain Ruins, advising him to finish the Golden Incantation project before considering a visit.
• Russell Throne explained to the Golden Three-Headed Hound that he had brought Locke into the Corridor of Yesteryear to observe his potential in Golden Magic.
• Locke returned to the Wizard inn, struggled with visions of an ancient city, and decided to leave the Realm of Dusk and Dawn the next day.
• Locke gave Helen Throne his second Doppelgänger Potion, and she approved it before announcing an advanced Doppelgänger Potion lesson that distressed the Rapid Advancement Class.

Locke received Sea Queen Throne’s warning about his next lesson and continued developing his Tree of Prosperity while weighing the costs of his research. At the Truth Institute, Wizard Droma urged him to join the booming Magic Plant Crystallization Technology field, but Locke chose to pursue his own ideas.

• Wizard Alex Walker and Witch Rose questioned whether someone had completed the Doppelgänger Potion assessment honestly, while Locke declined to explain his success.
• Sea Queen Throne asked Locke to place bets for her, then warned that the next lesson would be difficult and said she would invite a talented Crystallization Wizard Seedling from the Rain-Marsh.
• Sea Queen Throne returned Locke’s Doppelgänger Potion and cautioned him that entering the Spirit Macro Pool casually could affect his Potions talent.
• Locke’s Ancient Tree Fruit Doppelgänger received a Tourmaline King Peach and a Dragon-View Peach from Golden Crown Mountain, and Locke considered using his enhanced Golden Magic to develop Summer Prosperity.
• Locke weighed the cost of exploring an undeveloped plane and decided to focus on earning money for his research and the upcoming Special-Grade Funding.
• Wizard Droma urged Locke to enter the Magic Plant Crystallization Technology research path, but Locke said he had his own research ideas, leaving Droma unable to understand his choice.

Locke discovered that a travelogue hidden in Golden Crown Mountain’s library described a massacre tied to the Historical Records War and might lead him to a Black-and-White Grimoire. After Wizard Ackerman exposed the book’s Historical Interlayer spell, he left its investigation to Locke and asked him to keep the discovery quiet for now.

• Lady Helen’s maid gave Locke a Name Potion that stabilized his Golden Magic, and Locke continued drafting his Special-Grade Funding proposal.
• Locke searched for a way to obtain the celestial data needed for his Golden Incantation and found an old travelogue describing Archaeology wizards killing one another in Ancient Ruins City.
• Locke suspected the massacre was part of the Historical Records War and that a Black-and-White Grimoire destroyed in reality could be recovered from a parallel history.
• Wizard Ackerman used spells to identify the travelogue’s Historical Interlayer enchantment and found that an Archaeology wizard had secretly placed it in the library.
• Ackerman failed to identify the book’s author and asked Locke to investigate before he reported the discovery to the Academic Committee; Locke declined Ackerman’s offer of Magic-Plant Crystallization Technology information.

Locke investigated the missing Black-and-White Grimoire and found no useful clues in the library, but Warwick offered to use the Eye of Wisdom to identify the travel journal’s author. Williams reported her success with Magic Plant Crystallization and received Locke’s help obtaining an Ice Magic Mirror, while Douglas revealed he knew the location of an ancient treasure beneath the Black Hole Witch Peach.

• Locke searched the library for clues about the Black-and-White Grimoire but found no information to advance his investigation.
• Williams told Locke she had published a Group 1 paper on crystallizing the Snake Plant, and Locke arranged for Gregor to lend her an Ice Magic Mirror lens.
• Locke contacted Warwick about the Black-and-White Grimoire, and Warwick agreed to use the Abyss Werewolf’s Eye of Wisdom to investigate the travel journal’s origins.
• Douglas, urged on by Lagma Mammon Witch King, told Locke that he had the coordinates of an ancient treasure and wanted to share it.
• Douglas showed Locke a treasure map indicating that the treasure lay among the roots of the Black Hole Witch Peach.

Locke brought Douglas into the Black Hole Witch-Peach Chamber and used Douglas's Beast Claw Necklace to open a passage to an ancient Wizard King's hidden world. They found the world under the Dark Great Evil King's control, and his Sun-Ring projection confronted them as the chapter ended.

• Locke persuaded the blind Moon-Ring Wizard to let him and Douglas enter the Black Hole Witch-Peach Chamber.
• Locke broke through the Bamboo-Knot Root Vines and used Douglas's Beast Claw Necklace to activate the hidden spell beneath the tree.
• Locke and Douglas entered a rain-soaked world where Douglas revealed that the treasure was sealed inside a stone tablet that was also a magic book.
• Locke sensed that the world had been captured by the Dark Great World and that few mortals remained there.
• The Dark Great Evil King confronted Locke and Douglas, while the Lagma Mammon Witch King urged them to flee before the Evil King's true body arrived.

Locke and Douglas were trapped in the Dark Great Evil King's domain, where the king tried to strip their names and turn them against each other. With help from a hidden Fourth-Ring Wizard's power and the Lagma Mammon Witch King, Locke escaped the shadow-play space and reached a passage back to the Wizarding World after recovering Douglas's magical light.

• The Dark Great Evil King severed Locke and Douglas's planar passage, began draining Douglas's magical light, and compelled Locke to speak his name.
• Locke used the Great Radiant Dragon Sparrow's cries to disrupt the Dark World's power transmission, then wounded the king's true body with a pinecone-infused Goldflow Fern Spear and broke out of the shadow-play space with Douglas.
• The Lagma Mammon Witch King took control of Douglas's body, told Locke he could open a planar passage with one strike, and asked him to recover Douglas's magical light.
• The Dark Great Evil King's true body arrived, but the Witch King used Locke's power to unleash a Kingdom Domain and a chain lightning attack against the king and the Dark World's monsters.
• Locke spotted a World Tree Leaf beside a withered peach tree, reclaimed Douglas's magical radiance with golden tassel wheat, and charged through the Plane Gate.

Locke escaped the Dark Great World with Douglas and triggered Dark King Roroya’s declaration of war against Golden Crown Mountain. As the Academic Committee authorized an expedition into the Dark Great World, the Lagma Mammon Witch King revealed how Locke could restore Douglas’s shattered soul.

• Locke returned from the Secret Treasure World with Douglas, prompting Dark King Roroya to declare war on Golden Crown Mountain.
• The Elder Council discussed the threat, the Inspection Deacons Group continued its meeting, and Witch Catherine’s Academic Committee learned what Locke had done.
• Trajan presented evidence connecting the Dark Great World to the wizard ruins and Dark Age, and the Academic Committee approved committing resources to planar exploration.
• A moon-ring wizard refused to repair Douglas’s shattered soul but gave Locke an hour before disposing of the soul fragments.
• The Lagma Mammon Witch King revealed that he was only a wisp of mind sustaining Douglas and instructed Locke to reunite Douglas’s magical radiance with his body, expose them to a thunderstorm, and bury them so his soul could recover.

Locke refined eight bottles of Name Potion for Antoine, who revealed a possible Super-Planet Plane discovery that could win Special-Grade Funding. After Locke helped Warwick identify a travelogue’s author as Maxwell, Warwick’s claim that Locke’s real name was magically protected led Locke to suspect his body’s original name and decide he needed to return to Corfu Island.

• Locke gave Antoine eight bottles of Name Potion and a Doppelgänger Potion in exchange for five million Magic Stones, and Antoine described the possible Super-Planet Plane in the Four Bright Waters ruins.
• Antoine asked Locke to refine a Double Doppelgänger Potion, while Locke declined to pursue Magic-Plant Crystallization Technology because he lacked the energy to divide his attention.
• At Witch’s Kitchen, a Moon-Ring Witch from the Rose Council offered a Special-Grade Funding project to Wizard Droma and discussed Locke’s lack of interest in Magic-Plant Crystallization research.
• Locke met Wizard Warwick, who used his Eye of Wisdom to identify the travelogue’s author as Maxwell, an Abyssal Baron who had entered the Endless Abyss.
• Warwick told Locke that magic protected his real name, prompting Locke to suspect it was his body’s original name and decide to return to Corfu Island.

Locke decided to pursue Maxwell’s trail through the Supernatural Purgatory and asked Antoine to arrange his entry. As the Special-Grade Funding contest tightened and Golden Crown Mountain debated new basic-academy textbooks, Brandy waited to learn whether the Rose Council would choose him for its Magic-Plant Crystallization Technology project.

• Warwick suggested using the Supernatural Purgatory to draw out beings who had fought Maxwell, and explained that Archaeology wizards knew scattered, unreliable stories about him.
• Locke chose to continue the search and asked Antoine for help entering the restricted Supernatural Purgatory.
• Antoine agreed to arrange Locke’s entry through Wizard Fischer, who approved it in exchange for three thousand Second-Ring contribution points despite warning of the realm’s danger.
• Antoine told Wizard Fischer he could not guarantee winning Special-Grade Funding, while they discussed the Elder Council’s opposition to Witch Catherine and the coming revision of Golden Crown Mountain’s basic textbooks.
• The Moon-Ring Witch praised Brandy’s Magic-Plant Crystallization Technology proposal but said she would wait longer before deciding, and Brandy urged her to select him over Zeno.

Locke raced to publish research on three special Imaginary Roots and Golden Spiritual Breath to earn enough contribution points to enter Supernatural Purgatory. His papers were accepted, leaving him with the points he needed and bringing him closer to searching for Wizard Maxwell.

• Locke rejected the Moon-Ring Witch’s offer to take over the Rose Council’s Magic-Plant Crystallization project, choosing to pursue his own research plans.
• Warwick promised to create a Historical Atlas to help trace connections to Wizard Maxwell.
• Locke sent Douglas to recover in a thunderstorm, and Douglas woke to find his teacher asleep and Locke asking him to help in the laboratory.
• Rose Witch learned that the Rose Council had delayed her Special-Grade Funding application because her research did not concern Magic-Plant Crystallization Technology.
• With Douglas’s help, Locke completed three papers on the Great Radiant Dragon Sparrow’s Dragon-Horn Imaginary Root, the Golden Dragon Claw · Air Pineapple’s Nail-Shaped Imaginary Root, and Golden Spiritual Breath.
• Locke learned that all three papers had been accepted by Cloud Marsh and the Myriad Crossroads, earning enough contribution points to enter Supernatural Purgatory and leaving him 1,500 points to spare.

Locke entered Supernatural Purgatory to fulfill his agreement with the Elder Council and search for a connection to Wizard Maxwell. After discovering that the realm was ruled by waves and endless combat, he fought off its inhabitants and planned to use his travelogue and Historical Atlas to draw out anyone with information.

• Wizard Trajan agreed to advance Locke three thousand contribution points and lent him a Rational Wave Ring, teaching him how its waves strengthened his body and helped him evade attacks.
• Antoine warned Locke that Supernatural Purgatory imprisoned the souls of the Undying Luo and that killing a Demon King was the only way to escape, then opened the entrance.
• Locke entered the realm, saw the Undying Luo among the warring inhabitants, and learned that the Wave World suppressed his other powers.
• Locke dodged an eagle-man’s attack, dragged him down, and used Demon Dragon Rose to kill him before destroying a six-handed attacker as well.
• Locke suppressed the realm’s killing intent and decided to seek information about Wizard Maxwell using his travelogue and Historical Atlas, while his clone attended Sea Queen Throne’s lesson on Spirit Macro Modification.

Sea Queen Throne challenged her Second-Ring Potion Master students to learn Spirit Macro Modification, then demonstrated their shortcomings by having the young Crystallization Wizard Alba Dalton refine a Doppelgänger Potion. As the lesson began, Locke sensed the arrival of a Star-Ring lifeform in Supernatural Purgatory.

• Witch Eve Roland protested Sea Queen Throne’s demanding curriculum, and Witch Roland left the classroom with Edgarde Abbas and Thierry Bess after Sea Queen Throne refused to change the course.
• Sea Queen Throne invited Alba Dalton to refine a Second-Ring Doppelgänger Potion, and the students watched as Alba demonstrated extraordinary potion skills despite her Crystallization rank.
• Alba Dalton identified seven mistakes in her potion, leaving the remaining students silent as Sea Queen Throne defended her lessons and resumed teaching Spirit Macro Modification.
• Sea Queen Throne explained how multiple Spirit Macros could be combined for a Form-Shift Potion, then seated Alba beside Locke Augustine.
• In Supernatural Purgatory, Locke sensed overwhelming Magic Pressure and saw the void warning sign of a Star-Ring lifeform.

Locke fought the Demon King Werewolf and his purgatory subordinates, using the Shift-and-Shadow Potion and Summer-Grass Gate to break the Werewolf’s Star Ring. Locke then activated Historical Reenactment and vanished from the Werewolf’s reach, leaving the battle unresolved.

• Locke defeated the Golden Behemoth and the dual-blade orc, then tried to bypass the Demon King Werewolf’s challenge by attacking him directly.
• Haoren Dabu and the other purgatory fighters trapped Locke, but Locke used Golden Sacred Peach roots and Shift-and-Shadow illusions to make their attacks strike one another.
• The Demon King Werewolf escaped the roots, overwhelmed Locke’s defenses, and tracked his apparent clones by scent.
• Locke used Spirit Macro Phantom Clones to conceal his real position and trapped the Demon King Werewolf in Summer-Grass Gate, breaking his Star Ring.
• Locke touched the Demon King Werewolf and activated Historical Reenactment, escaping the Werewolf’s counterattack as the Werewolf searched for him in confusion.

Locke used Historical Reenactment to witness how the young Demon King Werewolf became Maxwell’s apprentice, then used the Historical Atlas to force Maxwell’s presence into the reconstructed past. Maxwell recognized Locke’s methods and asked how he had found him through the materials he had left behind.

• The Moon-Ring Witch gave the Brandy Wizard a project and special-grade funding opportunity, then learned that he had helped force a Truth Institute researcher to leave.
• The Brandy Wizard celebrated receiving the project documents and boasted that they would help him defeat Zeno and Augustine for funding.
• Locke reconstructed the Demon King Werewolf’s past and watched the young werewolf repeatedly ask Maxwell to teach him magic.
• After the werewolf persisted for more than a year, Maxwell agreed to teach him and questioned his desire to judge right and wrong.
• Locke could not see or hear Maxwell in the reconstruction, so he used the Historical Atlas to restore Maxwell’s outline and voice.
• Maxwell recognized the Historical Atlas and Locke as a fellow countryman from the Cloud Marsh Wetland, then asked how Locke had found him.

Locke learned from Wizard Maxwell that seventeen Black-and-White Grimoires had been destroyed in the Historical Records War and received information about a battle that could let him enter its parallel history. Maxwell warned that the authorities had erased his discipline, Experimental Historical Sociology, then attacked the reenactment of the Demon King Werewolf, causing the Supernatural Purgatory to collapse until Fischer Wizard intervened.

• Locke told Wizard Maxwell that he had found him through the Werewolf's soul in the Supernatural Purgatory, and Maxwell agreed to answer three questions in exchange for the secret.
• Wizard Maxwell revealed that seventeen Black-and-White Grimoires were destroyed in the Historical Records War and named the Black Bone Grand Sacrificial Blade and Pale Hunting Dagger as weapons capable of destroying them.
• Locke asked for details about the war, and Maxwell gave him records of a localized battle involving Wizard Universities, powerful wizards, and conflicts between Truth Wizards.
• Wizard Maxwell warned Locke that the authorities had erased his discipline, Experimental Historical Sociology, after he simulated a world where Black Wizards appeared before White Wizards.
• When Locke pressed Maxwell for the experiment's result, Maxwell attacked the Demon King Werewolf in the reenactment with the Historical Boundary Stele Curse, damaging Locke's Spell Model and destabilizing the Supernatural Purgatory.
• The Legacy Wizard Formation shook as Antoine tried to stabilize it, Locke was expelled from the Supernatural Purgatory, and Fischer Wizard arrived and stabilized it with a massive air ball.