Chapter Summaries

Legenes Presia began the Knowledge and Wisdom enlightenment ritual at Stonehenge, spreading divine insight across Lake Heart Island and strengthening several of those present. Shade’s Destiny Ring absorbed the ritual’s light, and he realized the trials he had completed had prepared him to gain the Fourth Ring Enlightenment.

• Sister Devlin told Shade that the Church might not be able to keep the Evil of Pantanal sealed, while Shade warned her not to reveal the Space Labyrinth beneath the lighthouse.
• Legenes Presia began the enlightenment ritual, and its light calmed the storm and spread wisdom across the island.
• Galina gained her Twelfth Ring, Sylvia learned how to make nylon, and Miss Pawo discovered how to build the Difference Engine’s core component before leaving with the Truth Society’s Ring Arcanists.
• Shade recognized how his trials had prepared him for the wisdom ritual, and his Destiny Ring absorbed the light as the parchment copied by Miss Writer entered it.
• Shade gained the Fourth Ring Enlightenment, while Iluna’s five Wise Man’s Gleaming Stones formed an arc above her and recorded part of Legenes Presia’s power.

Shade inscribed the Water of Wisdom Spirit Rune and jumped from the lighthouse to absorb divinity while Sister Devlin held the weakening seal. At Stonehenge, Legenes Presia completed his ritual, revealed his plans for Evil of Pantanal, and demonstrated overwhelming power as the assembled forces prepared to oppose him.

• Shade inscribed Water of Wisdom as his fifth Spirit Rune of the Fourth Ring, completing his path below the Fourth Ring.
• Shade decided he had no time to arrange a ritual for advancing to the Fifth Ring, asked Sister Devlin to hold on, and jumped from the lighthouse with the golden Glimmerstone.
• Legenes Presia awakened as the Chosen One of Knowledge and Wisdom and explained that he would release Evil of Pantanal if The Church proved able to reach him.
• Iluna and the arriving Church forces, Witches, Old John, and Ring Arcanists confronted Legenes Presia as the seal continued to weaken.
• Legenes Presia unleashed an arrow of light that destroyed nearly a third of the Withered Forest and left the gathered forces unharmed behind their defenses.
• Legenes Presia offered the others ten minutes to leave before he opened the ancient seal, but no one moved, and he challenged them to stop him.

As the Pantanal Evil began to return, Shade arrived above Lake Heart Island and used the Wise Man’s Gleaming Stone to draw on divinity and complete his ascension. Legenes Presia launched a powerful attack as Shade advanced toward him, leaving their confrontation unresolved.

• The Pantanal Evil stirred beneath the island, and Iluna prepared to confront Legenes Presia while waiting for Sister Devlin.
• Shade emerged from the lighthouse in golden radiance, drawing on the Wise Man’s Gleaming Stone as the island’s observers watched.
• Shade’s divinity summoned a vast Destiny Ring, and the Four-Colored Spirit Runes and their visions overlapped with him as he ascended.
• Shade imbued the final Spirit Rune of his Words of Sublimation with divinity and gained insight into knowledge, wisdom, water, ocean, and crown.
• Legenes Presia recovered enough to draw his bow, invoke Mystic Lock—Knowledge Domain, and fire a charged arrow of light at Shade.

Shade used his Water of Wisdom Mystic Lock to combine four Mystic Locks and turn Legenes Presia’s arrow back on him, suppressing the Fourth Chosen One’s angelic power. Shade then challenged Legenes to catch an arrow representing his wisdom, while Legenes formed a vast crystalline shield to defend himself.

• Shade summoned the Water of Wisdom Mystic Lock, bringing Lake Heart Island within his heart together with three other Mystic Locks and transforming the island around them.
• Shade reflected Legenes Presia’s arrow through the angel statue, shattering his halo and suppressing his ancient bloodline power.
• Shade drew on powers displayed within the Mystic Lock and formed a greatbow from his five Glimmerstones.
• Shade challenged Legenes to catch an arrow embodying his knowledge and wisdom, and asked Iluna to judge their duel.
• Legenes declared why he believed himself the first-ranked Chosen One and turned his books, memories, and knowledge into a massive multicolored crystal shield.

Shade shattered Legenes Presia’s Crystal Shield with an arrow infused with his knowledge, but Legenes refused to concede and challenged him to a duel of knowledge and wisdom. As the duel began, three ancient tablets emerged from Shade’s coat and circled him.

• Shade fired a powerful arrow that broke the Crystal Shield and left Legenes Presia severely injured.
• Legenes refused to admit defeat, and Shade offered him another chance to fight.
• Legenes proposed a wager and challenged Shade to a duel of knowledge and wisdom before the Balanced Chosen One.
• Legenes used his clay tablet and five Wise Man's Gleaming Stones to create five enormous tablets for the duel.
• Shade realized that three glowing tablets representing the Yellow Moon, Red Moon, and Silver Moon had resonated and emerged from his coat.

Shade challenged Legenes Presia in a contest of Knowledge and Wisdom, using his stone slabs to counter the Chosen One’s clay tablets on writing, mathematics, and machinery. After winning those three clashes, Shade faced Legenes’s combined final attack on literature and music, but hesitated because he did not understand those arts.

• Shade’s five Wise Man’s Gleaming Stones merged into his three glowing stone slabs as Iluna witnessed his contest with Legenes Presia.
• Legenes summoned writing chains from his first clay tablet, but Shade’s Silver Moon melted them and cracked the tablet.
• Legenes sent a mechanical bird from his mathematics tablet, but Shade’s Yellow Moon confused it and cracked the tablet.
• Legenes fired a gear-filled weapon from his machinery tablet, but Shade’s Red Moon blocked and reflected its attack, cracking the third tablet.
• Legenes combined his final two clay tablets to summon a growing phantom, while Shade formed two new stone slabs but could not produce an image because he lacked understanding of literature and music.

Shade defeated Legenes Presia in a contest of knowledge and wisdom, claimed his Chosen One power, and transformed Aiken Ola Knowledge Arrow. When the group returned to Lake Heart Island, they found the Old Continent engulfed in supernatural chaos as the sky shattered.

• Shade defeated Legenes Presia and made him concede by asking an unanswered question about expressing every even number greater than two as the sum of two primes.
• Iluna declared Shade the victor, and Shade recorded Legenes Presia's Chosen One power in the three Moon Stone Slabs and Aiken Ola Knowledge Arrow.
• Aiken Ola Knowledge Arrow transformed, gaining the ability to grant Thaumaturgies or make suitable targets Chosen Ones of Knowledge and Wisdom.
• Shade and the others returned to Lake Heart Island, where violent supernatural forces spread across the Great Swamp and toward the Old Continent.
• The sky shattered amid black lightning and a distant prayer, and Shade connected the disaster to Luvia's dream and the Bloodkin prophecy of the end.

Shade used the ancient Stonehenge Ritual Matrix and forcibly recited his Words of Sublimation as the Evil of Pantanal broke free and threatened the Great Swamp. With Another Me supporting him, he awakened a power that reached across the Material World, though its true target remained to be revealed.

• The Evil of Pantanal escaped its seal, and the Divine Ritual contained it within the Pantanar Area as fissures and tentacles engulfed Lake Heart Island.
• A tentacle dragged Legenes Presia underground, while Sister Devlin and the High-Ring Arcanists prepared to face the returning evil.
• Shade told Iluna he had prepared for the catastrophe and urged her to retreat from the Stonehenge before he used its Ritual Matrix.
• Shade called on Another Me and forcibly recited the Words of Sublimation, causing bells to ring across the Great Swamp and beyond.
• Another Me supported Shade as he realized he was trying to awaken the people he had cherished through time.

Shade and Feliana awakened the Echo of Spacetime at Stonehenge as the Evil of Pantanal broke free and attacked Lake Heart Island. Five Demigod Witches from another time appeared beside Shade to repel it, leaving the battle ongoing.

• Shade used his vibration to touch spacetime’s anchors, and the Echo of Spacetime froze everything on the island.
• The Evil of Pantanal broke its seal and returned to the Material World, advancing toward Lake Heart Island despite the churches’ attacks.
• Miss Danist and Miss Aurora used the Staff of the Library of Oranord to partially bind the evil creature, while Stonehenge’s bells erased tentacles that struck its mist.
• Chloe Marks, Schultz Theresa, Violet Marshall, and Oranord emerged from the Echo of Spacetime and drove the Evil of Pantanal back.
• Feliana walked out of Stonehenge with Shade and joined the four other Witches beneath the starry sky.

Shade and five Demigod Witches joined forces to stop the Ancient Evil Being of Pantanal from destroying Lake Heart Island and the surrounding land. Shade and Miss Feliana’s arrow petrified the creature and cut it off from the world’s power, leaving it motionless as the battle ended.

• The five Demigod Witches appeared around Shade and bowed to him as the frozen time resumed.
• Miss Olanord threw the enlarged Pearl of the Yellow Moon at the Evil of Pantanal, wounding it and driving it into a deep pit.
• Miss Chloe froze Pantanal Lake, and Miss Teresa struck the evil being with five torrents of blue light.
• The Witch Emperor used the Night Watchman to pin the creature to the earth, but it gathered power for a devastating attack.
• Shade and Miss Feliana drew the Knowledge Arrow together and fired it through the gray-green sphere into the creature.
• Fifth Epoch runes spread across the creature as its shell petrified, severing its access to the world’s power and leaving it still.

Sister Devlin used the First Fire and two ancient weapons to burn the Evil of Pantanal into a long slumber, while the Church and Academy investigated the aftermath. At Stonehenge, the five Witches reunited with the weakened Shade before their time-bound visit ended, and Iluna gained a new rune after helping complete a closed loop in time.

• Sister Devlin threw the dark gold scythe and Ashen Longsword at Pantanal's petrified body, and fire consumed the lake as the evil being's influence faded.
• Maria questioned Sister Devlin, who said she did not know what had happened before leaving to deal with the lighthouse seal.
• Miss Galina revealed that the short Witch had worn Shade's ring, and Miss Aurora proposed discussing how to report Shade to the Council.
• Old John met Old Higgins, and they discussed the Silver Moon Library, the end of the world, and a promising young man in Tobesk.
• At Stonehenge, Iluna relayed Miss Olanord's earlier message to Shade, completing a time loop and gaining the Closed Circle rune that let her advance to the Sixth Ring.
• As their visit ended, Miss Feliana asked Iluna to care for Shade, and Shade said goodbye to the five Witches before they departed.

The five Witches healed the Pantanal Great Swamp and departed after singing farewell to Shade, who had fainted from overexertion. Sister Devlin took him back to Tobesk, where Luvia, Tifa, and Mia welcomed him home as the long night ended.

• Miss Feliana, Miss Olanord, Miss Violet, Miss Teresa, and Miss Chloe kissed Shade goodbye before dissolving into golden light.
• The Witches' golden motes extinguished the fires, healed the land, and swept away the swamp's evil power.
• Iluna asked Sister Devlin to take Shade away from the Church, then kissed him and stayed behind to explain the events to the Church.
• Sister Devlin carried Shade from Stonehenge toward the lighthouse as the stone pillars became living tree trunks.
• Little Mia sensed Shade's return, and Luvia and Tifa found him with Sister Devlin at the house.
• Sister Devlin said Shade had fainted after forcibly using the Words of Sublimation, and Luvia and Tifa helped him upstairs.

After the battle at Lake Heart Island, Shade slept for more than fifty hours while Tifa cared for him at Miss Galina’s estate. He woke to find the others safe and reunited with Luvia, who was still shaken by the events and her strange new Spirit Rune.

• Tifa and Luvia brought the exhausted Shade upstairs, and the Nun explained that Shade’s Words of Sublimation had defeated the Chosen One and placed the Chosen One’s power within Aiken Ola Knowledge Arrow.
• Luvia touched the arrow and awakened a new Spirit Rune as the Destiny Ring emerged; the Nun returned to the Church, and Tifa took Shade to Miss Galina’s estate for treatment.
• While Shade slept, Father of Infinite Tree warned him not to use the Words of Sublimation too often and explained that they could summon Witches from the past who had obtained Witch Echo.
• Shade woke on Saturday morning at Miss Galina’s estate after sleeping for more than fifty hours, reunited with Little Mia, and learned that Miss Annette and the others had watched over him and were safe.
• Luvia returned and hugged Shade, and he promised to stay by her side and help them face whatever came, leaving her in tears.

After recovering from the Pantanal War, Shade learned about its aftermath and gave Luvia a new Thaumaturgy. Luvia left for the city, while Shade remained at Miss Galina's manor and learned that Sir Legenes Presia had survived but gone mad.

• Shade told Luvia how Cherub-Kerub helped him understand his power, and Luvia asked him to rest at the manor until morning.
• Luvia explained that the Great Swamp had mostly recovered, though Pantanal Lake and Lake Heart Island remained contaminated, and that The Church and the Three Great Academies were investigating the Chosen Ones and the five Witches from the Fifth Epoch.
• Shade offered Luvia the qualification of the Fourth Chosen One, and she accepted the arrow's gift of a Thaumaturgy that could sense fatal danger.
• Luvia told Shade that Sir Legenes Presia had survived the war but had gone completely mad, and that the Nature Church had taken him into custody.
• After lunch, Luvia rode back into the city, and Shade watched her carriage leave Miss Galina's manor.

Tifa lured Shade into Duchess Galina’s bedroom under the pretense of giving him a magic potion, and the two shared an intimate encounter while Galina was away. Later, Shade reflected on his gains from the Pantanal War, including his new ring, the Aiken Ola-Chosen One’s Arrow, and the Elixir of Immortality scroll.

• Tifa led Shade to Galina’s bedroom and revealed that the promised magic potion was herself.
• Tifa and Shade became intimate on Galina’s bed while Little Mia ran away and Galina was in Huntington.
• Shade bathed at the manor and learned that Tifa would receive the Kingdom High Justice on Galina’s behalf.
• Shade considered how his Witch Echoes and the Words of Sublimation could let him summon Demigod Witches across Spacetime.
• Shade decided to wait until all twelve Chosen Ones appeared before choosing who would receive the Aiken Ola-Chosen One’s Arrow’s qualification.
• Shade examined the Elixir of Immortality scroll written by Miss Violet and Miss Teresa, which only he could read.

Shade rested at Miss Galina’s manor, gained a new Space Labyrinth signpost at Lake Heart Island Lighthouse, and met Sister Devlin there to seek a Level 0 Relic. The chapter left them preparing to face the relic on the cursed island.

• Shade used Aiken Ola-Chosen One's Arrow on Tifa, who gained the Enlightenment Spirit Rune: Pain and completed the runes needed to advance to the seventh ring.
• Luvia visited Shade in a borrowed maid’s dress and stayed with him overnight.
• Shade entered the city with Luvia and Tifa, then returned home and lured Mia with four rings before heading to Lake Heart Island Lighthouse.
• Shade opened a new Space Labyrinth signpost at the lighthouse and found its hidden space contained an empty gray stone bookshelf.
• Shade met Sister Devlin outside the lighthouse and told her he intended to meet a Level 0 Relic; she agreed to accompany him.

Shade received further power from the Primordial Fire and met Desire at the shore of Pantanal Lake to deliver the pink perfume. Desire rewarded him with the bottle and teased him before vanishing into the lake.

• Sister Devlin told Shade that Iluna was returning and the three Great Witches had gone back to Huntington, then strengthened Shade's Primordial Fire and taught him Flame Attachment.
• Shade and Sister Devlin went to Pantanal Lake, where he gave Desire the pink Perfume Bottle she had requested.
• Desire praised the perfume, returned the bottle to Shade, and explained how he could summon her again using a Desire Crystal and water.
• Desire vanished into the mist after warning Shade about the final day, then called him burnt wood from the lake.

Shade and Sister Devlin freed the Swamp Witch’s remaining soul, which returned to the Underworld aboard an old wooden boat, and Shade gained a new Thaumaturgy. After sharing Year-End Festival wishes with Sister Devlin, Shade returned to Huntington to meet the three Witches before they departed.

• Shade and Sister Devlin dug up the Swamp Witch’s remains, and Sister Devlin used her scythe to separate the soul from the Humanoid Relic.
• The Swamp Witch’s soul shared its memories with Shade, absorbed his curse, and boarded the Small Wooden Boat to sail toward the end of death.
• Shade gained the Thaumaturgy Summon Old Wooden Boat and exchanged Year-End Festival wishes with Sister Devlin.
• Shade returned to Huntington with the cat and went to Bauhinia Manor, where Miss Galina, Miss Sylvia, and Miss Aurora were waiting for him.

Shade told Miss Galina, Miss Aurora, and Miss Sylvia about summoning five witches from the Fifth Epoch and the knowledge and Demigod Road recording he had brought back. The witches agreed to conceal what happened on Thursday, while Shade revealed that he had stripped the Chosen One qualification from Legenes Presia.

• Shade showed the witches his Words of Sublimation and explained that he had summoned Witch Emperor Violet, Miss Schultz Teresa, Miss Mana Falianna, Miss Olanord, and Miss Chloe Marquez during Time Exploration.
• Shade described how Miss Teresa and Miss Violet had hidden knowledge in a book for him, and Miss Galina asked him to make copies for the witches and Grandma Cassandra.
• Shade revealed that Miss Chloe had given him an ice crystal recording her Demigod Road, and Miss Galina eagerly thanked and kissed him.
• Miss Aurora said the witches would help conceal Thursday's events by blaming the God Summoner if the Speaker asked, while Shade explained that the Church might have mistaken him for the God Summoner.
• Shade denied being a Chosen One and said he had used Iluna Beias's knowledge to strip Legenes Presia of the Chosen One qualification.
• Shade told Miss Galina that Tifa could advance to the Seventh Ring, and the witches discussed their own progress and possible future advances.

Shade and the witches celebrated the success of the Pantanal Operation before he traveled with Miss Sylvia to visit Princess Margaret. Margaret, lonely and missing Shade, was astonished when he climbed up to her second-floor window and she pulled him inside.

• Miss Aurora, Miss Galina, and Miss Sylvia gave Shade a half-hour lesson in kissing before celebrating the Pantanal Operation over lunch.
• The group discussed the Pantanal Great Swamp’s potential as a trade route and the risk of future conflict between Kassenric and Delarion.
• Shade and Miss Sylvia traveled to the royal manor, where he explained that his prime-number problem was only a conjecture and Miss Sylvia told him to respect the teacher-student relationship when meeting Margaret.
• Margaret, missing Shade as she prepared to return to Weilun Dai'er City, spotted him sneaking across the manor courtyard.
• Shade climbed to Margaret’s second-floor window with Little Mia under his hat, and Margaret pulled him inside.