Chapter Summaries

Shade prepared for the coming conflict in Randall River Valley, accepted a flute that could summon Helen and Grace, and traveled through a Teleportation Gate to join the others. He arrived at Miss Benanis's manor, where the group waited for the remaining allies and the Randall Flower to bloom.

• Shade told Luvia and Iluna about the Four Seasons Flower and agreed to carry the materials for summoning the Desire for the Autumn Flowers, using them only if necessary.
• Shade returned to Tobesk after the group meeting and warned Doctor that he might need to leave at any time the following week.
• Helen and Grace gave Shade the Butterfly Summoning Flute, which could summon them for ten minutes, and he accepted it.
• Miss Sylvia opened a Teleportation Gate at the Cassandra Auction House, and Shade crossed through with Miss Swift and the other witches.
• Shade arrived at Miss Benanis's manor, learned that Iluna had gone to negotiate with the Church, and offered to help Miss Swift recover from spatial motion sickness.

Shade prepared for the Randall River Valley operation after a minor earthquake in Tobesk and met Marylin Handel to discuss the Guardians’ unnatural collective soul. After Sister Devlin agreed that the Guardians would likely become the final enemy, Shade and Luvia faced the prospect of confronting the Mad Guardian next week.

• A minor earthquake woke Shade, Dorothy, and Mia, and Shade decided he should hurry his plans in Randall River Valley.
• Shade met Marylin Handel at Bountiful Earth Inn, where she agreed to help send a soul onward after its death and condemned the Guardians’ collective existence as blasphemous.
• Marylin Handel and Joey Barton explained that the Guardians’ merged souls could be vulnerable to soul curses, and Marylin taught Shade the Thaumaturgy Soul Whiplash.
• Shade arranged lodging for Marylin Handel and told her the operation would take place next week.
• Sister Devlin met Shade and Luvia at Wilde Opera House and agreed that the distorted Guardians would likely become their final enemy.

Shade examined conflicting accounts of the Academy’s founding and traveled to Randall River Valley, where he helped test a potion against a captured Fallen Earth Elemental Giant Spirit. The potion worked, and Miss Galina asked Miss Sylvia how far Shade and Benanice’s relationship had progressed.

• Shade reviewed three documents that gave different accounts of what the Academy’s founders had offered the God of Night for their land.
• Shade arrived in Randall River Valley and learned that an earthquake and spreading fire had killed at least a hundred people.
• At Miss Benanis’s estate, Shade found Miss Sylvia, Miss Galina, and Miss Swift testing a Mud Potion in the basement workshop.
• Miss Sylvia trapped a captured Fallen Earth Elemental Giant Spirit with her enhanced Web Spell, and Miss Swift’s potion destroyed it.
• Miss Galina discussed selling the effective potion and asked Miss Sylvia about Shade and Benanice’s relationship.

Shade visited Miss Danist and learned that Saint Byron’s preserved First Epoch treasure was a tablet bearing an ancient story of the Moon God. He accompanied her to Stonemason Street, where a curse had turned hundreds of people, including Prince William and Princess Margaret, to stone, and the Church prepared to confront a cultist statue inside the association.

• Miss Sylvia hinted to Miss Galina that Shade had filled perfume bottles before falling ill, and Miss Galina decided Benanice was competing with her.
• Shade asked Miss Danist how Saint Byron’s founders had acquired the school grounds, and she explained that the Academy preserved a First Epoch tablet about the Silver Moon Sage and the Supreme Sun Binder.
• Miss Danist received word of an emergency at the Randall River Valley Stone Masons Association, and Shade joined her and the other professors on the journey there.
• The group found hundreds of living people transformed into stone, including Prince William and Princess Margaret, and learned the incident had begun around two-thirty.
• The gathered Church and Academy leaders identified a cultist stone statue on the association’s third floor and prepared a coordinated strike to contain its power.

A joint operation at the Stone Masons Association ended the petrification crisis, but the shattered statue’s disappearance remained unexplained. Shade restored Margaret, Prince William, and other victims with his Toy Making thaumaturgy, and Margaret embraced and kissed him afterward.

• Mr. Granjay led Professor Danist and Ms. Michelle into the Stone Masons Association while Mr. Evans sealed the building in an illusion, and Professor Stewart entered through the roof later.
• A shattered stone head flew from a third-floor window and melted into the soil before Mr. Evans could secure it.
• Shade found Margaret and Prince William petrified, and Miss Danist explained that the Church planned to restore them with a counterspell that might fail.
• With the Church’s approval, Shade used Toy Making to restore Margaret, then Prince William and eighteen other victims.
• Margaret entered Shade’s resting room, embraced him, and kissed him intensely.

After the attack at the Stone Masons Association, Margaret used the incident to advance peace talks between the royal family and the association, while Shade and the Witches continued investigating the cultists’ preparations for the Divine Advent Ritual. Luvia brought news of spreading Mad Earth sites and a new relic, but the Guardians and the spring gemstone remained missing.

• Margaret told Shade that the attack had strengthened her position and that she would use The Church’s newspaper reports to present the royal family’s peace talks with the Stone Masons Association as settled.
• Shade told Margaret he planned to resolve matters in Randall River Valley that week, and she kissed him before their next expected parting.
• Shade informed the Witches and Luvia that the petrification incident could be connected to the cultists’ Divine Advent Ritual and the old man’s final stone statue.
• Stone Osenfott wrote that he had obtained the Sapphire Earring and arranged to exchange it with Shade at a tavern outside the city the next evening.
• Luvia told Shade that seven Mad Earth sites had appeared near Randall River Valley and that The Church had found a Fallen Earth Elemental Giant Spirit in Delarion’s northern mountains.
• Luvia gave Shade two Thunder God’s Wrath coins, explaining that they could become powerful bolts of Thunder, while confirming that the Guardians and spring gemstone were still missing.

Shade used a Thunder God's Wrath coin to divine the location of the spring gemstone and learned it was in a local auction house warehouse. He met Stone Osenfott at the Sturgeon Tavern, returned the items Osenfott had commissioned, and discovered that Osenfott had Founding and wanted another favor in exchange for it.

• Shade and Luvia used a Thunder God's Wrath coin to locate the spring gemstone, which was in the Cassandra Auction House warehouse.
• Shade traveled to Sturgeon Village and went to the Sturgeon Tavern to meet Stone Osenfott.
• Shade gave Osenfott the Kasonlik Third Class Combat Hero Medal and the Sapphire Earrings, and Osenfott confirmed they were the items he sought.
• Shade demanded the promised clue about Founding, and Osenfott revealed that the card was now in his pocket.
• Osenfott offered to give Shade Founding if Shade agreed to do one thing for him, and Shade angrily questioned his renewed demand.

Shade examined Osenfott’s Founding card and agreed to meet him at his manor on Friday night to receive it. After Osenfott left, the Demon appeared, discussed Shade’s promised task and a backup weapon, then stopped time to warn him against tricks.

• Osenfott showed Shade a powerful Founding card and invited him to his manor on Friday night, promising to give it to him.
• Shade let Osenfott leave after receiving a pouch of coins to cover the tavern bill, and decided to call the Doctor on Friday.
• The Demon returned in Osenfott’s guise and asked whether Shade was ready to fulfill his commission after obtaining the card.
• Shade showed the Demon his telescopic sword, and the Demon offered him a relic dagger as a backup weapon.
• The Demon questioned Shade about the God Summoner and snapped its fingers, freezing time throughout the tavern.

After the Demon threatened Shade into dueling Osenfott at Osenfott Manor on Friday, Shade met Mr. Asmon in a tavern and agreed to hear about rumors of Demons while playing Rhodes Cards with him and magician Mark Winston. As the game began, Shade resumed an old story about a Demon and a boy who wished to seal it.

• The Demon threatened to kill increasing numbers of people unless Shade showed up Friday, dueled Osenfott, and stabbed him, then offered six possible rewards for compliance.
• After the Demon vanished, Shade met Mr. Asmon, who confirmed that rumors of Demons had drawn him to Randall River Valley City.
• Shade invited Mr. Asmon to share his story over Rhodes Cards, and Mark Winston joined them, offering a special card as a wager.
• Mark showed them the Circus Tragedy · Headless Clown card and explained that it commemorated the deaths at Jasmine Circus thirty years earlier.
• Shade proposed a three-player card game and began retelling Mr. Asmon's story about a Demon, a man who wished to seal it, and a boy who later made a wish of his own.

Shade played Rhodes Cards with Mr. Asmon and Mr. Winston while Mr. Asmon continued his tale of a youth who killed the girl he loved to free her soul from the Demon. The story paused before its conclusion, and Shade asked Mr. Asmon about local rumors concerning Demons.

• Shade won the first round against Mr. Winston after their final cards gave Shade twenty-nine points and Winston twenty-eight.
• Mr. Asmon told how the youth fell in love with a village girl, then rejected her and killed her so the Demon could not claim her soul.
• Mr. Asmon won the second round after Mr. Winston’s Headless Clown card pushed his total over twenty-one.
• Mr. Asmon explained that the youth feared the Demon would return to the girl after his death, and said the youth continued toward the distant horizon after freeing her soul.
• Mr. Winston gave Shade the Stars 3 Circus Tragedy · Headless Clown card and left the tavern.
• Shade asked Mr. Asmon whether he would discuss local rumors about Demons.

Shade exchanged information about Randall River Valley’s Demon legends with Xiao En Asmon and warned him to avoid traveling outside the city for now. On Wednesday morning, Shade received a letter and a heavy package from Mia San Goode, leaving its contents unknown.

• Shade and Xiao En Asmon traded information about the Stoneville Kingdom, Saint Perry’s Cemetery, and the Demon’s sealed location.
• Shade warned Asmon about the plague, cultists, and the dangers of investigating local Demon legends, and Asmon said he would wait until spring before deciding whether to continue.
• Shade accepted Asmon’s request for the withered black rose, then left the tavern and reflected that the Demon affair would end on Friday.
• On Wednesday morning, Shade signed for a letter and heavy package sent by Mia San Goode, then carried the box inside with ease.

Shade discovered a golden armor set sent by Miss Goode and planned a spring visit to her. He then discussed his Friday meeting with Osenfott and the Soul-Sucking Demon Blade with Doctor Schneider, who warned that the Demon was manipulating him.

• Shade opened Miss Goode’s crate and found a golden cat-shaped display holding a complete set of armor, which he tried on and planned to maintain.
• Shade wrote back to Miss Goode, thanked her for the gift, and said he planned to visit with Mia in late March or early April.
• Shade told Doctor Schneider that he would meet Osenfott on Friday and arranged to use the disappearance of the Origin card as a signal.
• Shade planned to have allies wait outside Osenfott Manor with the Demon Hunting Seal and Night Watchman, while Doctor Schneider watched the Origin card from Magician’s Escape Box.
• Doctor Schneider identified the dagger as the Soul-Sucking Demon Blade and warned Shade that Gothe was misleading him by making him focus on the weapon.

Shade made final preparations to kill Stone Osenfott on Friday night and coordinated with Marylin Handel and Sister Devlin. Sister Devlin revealed that the Witch Council wanted Miss Lathers to become a Chosen One, while Shade and Luvia suspected something was wrong with the Guardians; he asked what The Church thought.

• Shade confirmed to Doctor Schneider that he would banish Stone Osenfott's soul after killing him and outlined his safeguards for Friday night.
• Shade met Marylin Handel and Joey Barton as they sent away an evil spirit, whose memories revealed that Osenfott's allies had arranged the arson that killed a merchant's family.
• Shade arranged for Marylin Handel and Joey Barton to enter Osenfott Manor when Joey Barton's Origin card disappeared on Friday night.
• Shade met Sister Devlin at Snake Heart Hospital, where she told him Sivie Aurora had delivered the Witch Council's request to let Miss Lathers become a Chosen One if possible.
• Shade said he trusted the Guardians' intentions but remained cautious about their condition, and Sister Devlin said Luvia shared her concerns before Shade asked what The Church thought.

Shade coordinated plans with Sister Devlin for the Demon and Chosen One matters, then met with the witches at Miss Benanis’s estate. Miss Swift found the final green Hexagonal Gemstone Shade needed and revealed that her good mood came from meeting Princess Margaret.

• Shade asked Sister Devlin to wait outside the Demon’s estate on Friday and enter when she received his signal, while she warned him that Randall River Valley felt like a sign of the world’s decay.
• Sister Devlin examined Shade with flames, found nothing wrong with his body, and urged him to be careful when confronting the Demon.
• Shade joined Miss Aurora, Luvia, and the witches at Miss Benanis’s estate, where he confirmed he planned to handle the Demon while the others focused on the Chosen One Ritual.
• Miss Swift gave Shade the final green Hexagonal Gemstone after tracing it to a diviner who had brought it to Randall River Valley more than a century earlier.
• Shade thanked Miss Swift with a kiss, and she told him she was cheerful because she had met Princess Margaret.

Shade visited a Lookout Tower by Nidlan Lake to investigate a rumor about where the Demon had once been sealed, but found that the Church had already searched it and uncovered nothing. Before leaving, he accepted Margaret’s invitation to a banquet where she planned to negotiate with the Stone Masons Association.

• The flaxen-haired girl told Shade that Margaret’s appearance had restored her confidence, wished him success, and offered him access to the local auction house.
• Margaret invited Shade to Thursday’s banquet, where she intended to pursue a preliminary peace agreement with the Stone Masons Association and might use the gold mine as a bargaining chip.
• After Margaret kissed him, Shade set out alone to investigate Mr. Xiao En Asmon’s clue about the Demon’s former seal near Nidlan Lake.
• Shade found signs that a Dawn Church Ring Arcanist Squad had searched the Lookout Tower that morning and left without finding anything.
• Shade waited for the squad to depart, searched the tower’s four floors, and found only the Church’s investigation traces and a still-warm fire basin.

Shade met the Osenfott Manor maid, who asked him to help free her and the Butler and revealed that Stone Osenfott’s contract involved a heart. After searching the lake, Shade recovered a Demon Hunting Seal and brought the fragments to Benanice Manor, where he showed them to the others.

• The Osenfott maid told Shade that she and the Butler wanted him to make Stone Osenfott declare them free, and she explained that his contract with the ancient evil involved a heart.
• The maid said the ancient evil had once been sealed in the lake and suggested Shade search its bottom for clues.
• Shade searched underwater for four hours and recovered stone fragments containing a Demon Hunting Seal, a Keeper of Secrets Level relic.
• At breakfast, Shade explained the relic’s powers and how he had obtained another Demon Hunting Seal in Tobesk.
• Miss Sylvia examined the stone fragment and remarked on the skill of the Ring Arcanists who had established the seal.

Shade discussed the Demon’s concealment ability and gave Iluna the ring before attending Margaret’s banquet alone. At the manor, he spotted Stone Osenfott outside and found him threatening a fallen man in the stables.

• Shade explained that a damaged stone slab warned that the Demon could hide by taking the form of anything it reflected.
• Shade gave Iluna the ring, and she decided to keep it with her while declining to attend the banquet.
• Miss Aurora and Miss Galina planned to survey the Black Night Spirit Temple, while Iluna stayed at the church to rest.
• Shade arrived alone at Margaret’s banquet and spotted Stone Osenfott moving through the garden shadows.
• Shade followed Osenfott to the stables, where he found him holding a pitchfork over a fat man crawling toward the door.

Shade interrupted Shi Dong Osenfott as he prepared to kill a man at the banquet manor, then discussed Osenfott’s immortality and possible heart condition with him. Mr. Lathers warned Shade that a catastrophic fourth-stage earth distortion was approaching and said reaching the Heart of the Earth for the Chosen One Ritual might be impossible.

• Shade entered the stable and learned that Osenfott intended to kill a man who had used legal usury to force one of Osenfott’s friend’s younger sisters into selling herself.
• Shade argued that Osenfott should not kill the man on someone else’s estate, and Osenfott petrified him and buried the statue beneath the stable floor.
• Shade questioned Osenfott about his immortality and the pain he could still feel, but Osenfott left after inviting Shade to his manor the next night to take Founding.
• Mr. Lathers emerged from the stable shadows and warned Shade that a major earthquake would strike north of Randall River Valley City early Saturday, advancing the earth’s distortion to its fourth stage.
• Mr. Lathers explained that he could no longer leave the Heart of the Earth and cautioned Shade that the distortion there might prevent him from reaching it to perform the Chosen One Ritual.

Shade refused to sacrifice Siris La Ses to restore the Guardians, promising instead to purify the Earth and find another way to help them hold the ritual. He took a fragment of the Heart of the Earth for guidance, then stayed hidden in the stable to learn why Mr. Enriques had returned.

• The Guardians explained that their corruption could be reversed if the Heart of the Earth returned to normal, or temporarily eased if a new soul joined them, and named Stone Osenfott and Siris La Ses as candidates.
• The Guardians gave Shade a small fragment of the Heart of the Earth and said it could guide him toward the main body; Shade refused to put Siris in danger and promised to keep his word to purify the Earth.
• The Guardians departed by turning into soil, and Shade resolved to seek the Heart of the Earth’s divinity and prepare for the evil god’s descent.
• Shade encountered Mr. Enriques waiting near the stable, then watched as Aunt Louise gave him a letter containing the results of her investigation in Wilundell.
• Shade slipped back into the stable and pretended to be inspecting horses when Mr. Enriques arrived to read the letter.

Shade helped Mr. Enriques confront his doubts about his wife Maggie’s past and deliver a letter asking her to meet him. After reading her husband’s message, Maggie reconciled with him, and they began rebuilding their marriage.

• Mr. Enriques told Shade that he had investigated Maggie’s past in Weilun Dai’er City and would decide whether to remain married after reading the results.
• Mr. Enriques read the report, burned it, and wrote Maggie a letter asking her to meet him by the fountain.
• Shade delivered the letter to Maggie in the banquet hall and walked outside with Miss Lathers to watch the couple meet.
• Mr. Enriques told Maggie that he still loved her and would move back into their bedroom, while warning her not to give him another reason to doubt her.
• Maggie apologized, promised to love him for the rest of her life, and embraced and kissed Mr. Enriques beneath the moonlight.