Flesh

Biodata

Feature	Information
Name	Flesh
Alias(es)	Flesh Crown; Crown of Flesh and Blood; Starry Sky Flesh
Species/Race	Taboo existence
Affiliation	Connected to the Flesh beneath Bronze City and the Bronze Pillars
Occupation/Role	Corruptive entity spreading through Bronze City
Status	Active; its widespread manifestation has retreated beneath Bronze City, where residual Flesh remains as a less-dangerous Eerie resource. 504
First Appearance	Chapter 409 (as a corruptive, exposed-Flesh special manifestation)

Power Progression

Stage / Realm / Level	Chapter	Notes
Corruptive special-individual manifestation	409	Appears as a single-eyed, exposed-Flesh creature capable of killing Night Watchers, corrupting targets through contact, and evading attacks through boneless distortion.
Corrosive Flesh manifestation	411	Remains alive after being shredded by purple light; its tissue erodes and disintegrates the Attendant's power.
Escaping variant	412	Survives combined purple-light and alchemy-flame attacks despite blistering, burning, and withering.
Abyssal core	433	Revealed as a massive flesh silhouette beneath the Abyss, synchronized with a heartbeat that makes the Flesh and Bronze Pillar inscriptions pulse.
Golden-light vulnerability	435	Flesh in the hollow crumbles into dead ash when exposed to a descending golden light.
Golden-black pursuit	447	Surges through the Pipe Network Layer as a tide of golden-black Flesh; it stops at the surface exit but assimilates Night Watchers left underground.
City-wide proliferation	446 448	Adapts to fire, converts Bronze City's west wall into living meat, erupts as Flesh Pillars, and produces humanoid Horizontal Line Faces.
Sea of Flesh	454 460	Breaches all four city walls and fills the Inner City with dark-red and dark-gold Flesh interwoven with plant roots.
Flesh Crown manifestation	461	Forms an enormous dark-gold crown above the Tower of Erudition, develops aerial tendrils, and actively searches for the Sky-Seeking Fortress.
Crown of Ten Thousand Kings mobilization	467	The Crown gathers Flesh from both the Inner City and underground toward itself in preparation to attack Lu Yuan.
Inscribed Starry Sky main body	468	The city-spanning Flesh is identified as outward branches or a shell, while the rising main body is covered from root to tip in dense, abstruse characters.
Vitality devoured by Pale Eye	470	The transformed Guardian freezes and withers large areas of Starry Sky Flesh, then feeds on its vitality, gouging a hollow in its inscribed outer sheath.
Fusion contested by the Sea of Knowledge	477 478	As the Crown joins with the Starry Sky Flesh, Lu Yuan's Authority strengthens the Worms of Knowledge and strips power from the Crown; two of its six polluted eyes close.
Nascent Taboo fusion	479	The Crown of Ten Thousand Kings fuses with the Starry Sky Flesh into an unnamed nascent Taboo; Lu Yuan tears away part of the Crown, leaving the resulting existence incomplete.
Sea of Worms resistance	481	Leike's multiplying Swarm Insects suppress the fused being's Flesh and open a passage toward the Tower of Erudition, drawing the Taboo's attention and intensified attacks.
Authority gambit	491	The fused being feeds Flesh into its roots and attempts to elevate another power within itself to call upon an external world and complete its incomplete Authority.
Continued growth under attack	493	Despite having layers stripped away by the Sea of Knowledge's falling words, the Taboo draws fresh Flesh from below and continues growing toward completion.
Final transformation amid annexation	497	The Newborn Taboo completes its final transformation at the center of the battlefield, while the surrounding Sea of Blood loses large quantities of Flesh to the collision of black, multicolored, and green powers.
Withering and retreat	498 504	The Flesh Walls wither after the Starry Sky Flesh's influence ends; the remaining Flesh retreats underground rather than dying and becomes far less dangerous.

Background / History

Flesh first surfaces during the Bronze City conflict through a powerful exposed-Flesh special individual with a horizontal slit-like eye. It corrupts the Attendant through direct contact, absorbs the Great Ascendant's mechanical strike, and escapes back among the Ghouls after being attacked. 409

It subsequently appears as a highly corrosive material associated with special individuals and polluted Ghouls. Even when the Attendant shreds a Flesh manifestation with purple-light filaments, the tissue survives and corrodes those filaments from within. A later mass withstands purple light and alchemy flames, then escapes while critically damaged. 411 412

Far below the city, Flesh is revealed to be connected to the Abyss and Bronze Pillars. Its rhythmic heartbeat causes the Flesh throughout the Abyss to rise and fall, while the Pillars' inscriptions flicker in response. The Flesh mass becomes agitated after Lu Yuan obtains the fourth fragment, sealing exits and filling an underground cavern. 433 434

Bronze City itself was built to suppress the severed Flesh sealed by the City Founder. By the time Lu Yuan reaches the Abyss, the tissue has become inseparable from the bases and shafts of the Bronze Pillars, spreading through strands that bind the bottom of the Abyss. Its pollution concentration rises sharply near the main mass, and observing it draws the Abyss's attention and triggers a Sanity check. 433

A golden eye temporarily destroys the Flesh in the cavern, reducing it to ash and opening an escape route. This does not end the threat: golden-black Flesh later pursues Lu Yuan, Blue Knight, and Klaus through the Pipe Network Layer, while other tendrils assimilate Conrad's entire Night Watcher team. 435 447

The entity subsequently overruns Bronze City. It adapts to fire, transforms city walls into Flesh Walls, erupts through streets as pillars, consumes civilians and defenders, and fills the Inner City with a sea of Flesh reinforced by entwined plant roots. 446 448 454 460

The Guardian and the Person on the Wall temporarily halt portions of the spread by severing the special individuals and Flesh Walls from their regenerative foundation. However, the Flesh rapidly counterattacks, overwhelms their defenses, and inundates the Inner City. 451 453 455

Above the Tower of Erudition, the spreading mass manifests as the Flesh Crown, which contests the falling character fragments of the Sea of Knowledge and detects the approaching Sky-Seeking Fortress. 459 461

During the rescue from the Tower of Erudition, the Crown of Ten Thousand Kings draws Flesh from the Inner City and the underground Abyss toward itself. The inscribed Flesh that rises afterward is distinguished from the city's ordinary spreading tissue: it is the true Starry Sky main body, while the earlier Flesh was merely an extended shell and its lesser branches. 467 468

The Guardian, transformed into the Pale Eye, attacks the Starry Sky Flesh. His gaze freezes and withers large swaths of it, while the eyeballs he produces devour its vitality and tear open its inscribed outer sheath. 469 470

As the Crown and Starry Sky Flesh join, Lu Yuan uses the Sea of Knowledge's Authority to strengthen the Worms of Knowledge and strip power from the Crown. Two of the Crown's six polluted eyes close during the stripping. The Crown subsequently fuses with the Starry Sky Flesh, creating an unnamed nascent Taboo. Lu Yuan forcibly removes part of the Crown during this fusion, leaving the new existence incomplete. 477 478 479

Leike's Swarm Insects later fight the fused being's Flesh in a battle of mutual feeding. Their numbers grow into a Sea of Worms that suppresses the Flesh and opens a passage toward the Tower of Erudition, until the Taboo notices Leike and intensifies its attack on the passage. 481

In response to its later disadvantage, the fused being attempts to sacrifice its own Flesh to the embedded roots in exchange for the power to call upon another world. Even while the Sea of Knowledge's words strip away its tissue, fresh Flesh rises from beneath it, allowing it to continue growing toward completion. 491 493

The City of Chains also contests the fused being. Its chains carry green flames that scorch even Starry Sky Flesh, despite the roots, veins, and surrounding tissue attempting to wrench or sever them. A.M. and the Great Ascendant serve as the anchors bringing the City of Chains into reality, and Lu Yuan allows their intervention to continue because it helps restrain the Newborn Taboo. 490 495

During the ensuing clash, large sheets of Flesh evaporate or are devoured, the Sea of Blood visibly shrinks, and the Inner City's terrain is repeatedly razed into depressions. At the center of this battlefield, the Newborn Taboo completes its final transformation. 497

Following the end of the Starry Sky Flesh's influence, the Flesh Walls wither and the remaining rotting Flesh withdraws underground. It does not perish completely, but the residual mass at the bottom of the Abyss possesses greatly reduced threat and can be treated as a recyclable Eerie resource of Bronze City. 498 504

Appearance

Flesh has no fixed humanoid body. Its primary form is a dark-red to golden-black, pulsating organic mass that can reshape itself into walls, roots, tendrils, creatures, and a crown. 433 447 461

• Dark-red tissue with a wet, feverish texture and a nauseating fishy stench. 434 447
• Interwoven with meridians and plant roots, sometimes making the two indistinguishable. 459 460
• Can form humanoid Horizontal Line Faces and special individuals covered in raw, exposed flesh. 409 424 446 449
• Some special individuals possess a single slit-like eye across an otherwise featureless or exposed-Flesh face. 409 413 424
• Its crown form is dark gold, spiked, suspended by hanging strands of Flesh, and embedded with seven jewel-like eyes. 461
• The Crown has six polluted blackened eyes and one central eye that remains clear. 461
• Its true Starry Sky main body bears densely packed characters and inscription-like patterns along every strand of Flesh, from its roots to its tips. 468
• After fusing with the Crown, it assumes the form of an immense Flesh mass crowned by a gigantic Crown of Flesh. 479
• In its fused form, Flesh and root systems intertwine beneath the Crown, while black-and-white radiance emerges from fissures in its inscribed body. 479
• Black-and-white fissures also fill the surrounding void wherever its Flesh has flowed during the fusion. 479
• Following its retreat, the rotting tissue softens completely and no longer gives off an Eerie stench, despite retaining Eerie vitality underground. 504

Abilities & Skills

Regeneration and Adaptation

Flesh rapidly restores damaged tissue and changes its response to threats.

• Regenerates burned, cut, or blasted sections almost immediately. 412 430 434
• Reconnects severed body parts through newly grown sinews, muscle, and membrane in under ten seconds. 430
• Its special individuals can instantly close wounds and restore damaged Flesh during combat. 424
• Adapts after exposure to fire, eventually spreading and regenerating despite the Great Ascendant's flames. 446
• Can replenish sections destroyed by the Worms of Knowledge from an underground source. 457
• Golden light can reduce exposed Flesh to inert ash. 435
• Flesh struck by the Sea of Knowledge's word-spears can be blasted into gray residue, but fresh tissue rapidly floods in to replace the destroyed sections. 467
• The green flames carried by the chains used against the Crown can scorch even the Starry Sky Flesh. 490
• Severing a special individual's connection to the greater Flesh prevents its self-healing and allows it to be destroyed. 451
• The Pale Eye can freeze and wither Starry Sky Flesh, devour its vitality, and gouge through its inscribed outer sheath. 470
• Even after the Sea of Knowledge strips away successive layers of the fused Taboo's Flesh, fresh tissue rises from beneath it as it grows toward completion. 493
• Its hyperactive vitality initially prevents the Hooded Night Watcher from directly manipulating or alienating a special individual's Flesh. An implanted sphere made from his own alienated Flesh nevertheless damages the creature from within. 424
• The purple-black flame wielded through Adrian's borrowed power uses Flesh as fuel, burrowing from the ground into deeper layers and spreading through the tissue. 432
• The plant roots embedded within its Flesh make ordinary methods ineffective, forcing the Guardian to confront it through direct power. 454

Corruption and Assimilation

Contact with Flesh corrupts living targets and absorbs them into its mass.

• Corrodes extraordinary constructs, including the Attendant's purple-light filaments. 411
• Its corruption can damage and force the Great Ascendant to discard Silver Alloy components. 409 419
• Rotting corruption spreads through flesh-based defenses, forcing the Hooded Night Watcher to discard his own meat-armor. 424
• Corrupts Leike's Swarm Insects on contact, causing them to curl up and shatter from within. 424
• Envelops victims, burrows through their blood vessels and between bones and muscles, then assimilates their blood and organs. 447
• Produces corrupted humanoid entities, including Horizontal Line Faces. 446 449
• Swallows Ghouls and converts them into nourishment after the Taboo's primary influence recedes. 504
• Assimilated victims may briefly retain consciousness and moving eyes after losing control of their bodies. 447
• Severed Flesh can release highly corrosive dark-red steam during combat. 453

Environmental Control

The entity reshapes underground passages and the city itself into extensions of its body.

• Seals tunnels and cavern exits by growing tissue from surrounding walls. 434
• Forms a subterranean regenerative foundation that allows connected special individuals and Flesh masses to recover from otherwise fatal damage. 429 430 451
• Surges through the Pipe Network Layer as a pursuing tide. 447
• Transforms Bronze City's walls into expanding Flesh Walls. 446 453
• Raises dark-red Flesh Pillars that collapse buildings and destabilize the city. 448
• Uses tendrils with wet, slit-like tips to probe the air around the Sky-Seeking Fortress. 461
• Draws Flesh from the Inner City and beneath the Abyss to consolidate it around the Crown of Ten Thousand Kings. 467
• Uses its intertwined roots as a conduit to feed itself into another internal power and attempt to summon an external world. 491
• Can withdraw its residual mass beneath the city rather than remain exposed after its greater influence fades. 504
• Interposes large quantities of Flesh before incoming knowledge-spears, preventing Lu Yuan's attacks from reaching the Crown's true phantom body. 468
• The Person on the Wall's Wasteland phantom can make incoming waves of Flesh vanish as though transferred elsewhere. 455

Intelligence and Perception

Flesh displays awareness, strategic behavior, and the ability to prioritize threats.

• Special individuals recognize the Hooded Night Watcher as a greater threat than an exhausted Leike. 424
• The Flesh Crown senses disturbances caused by the airship despite its Stealth Inscription. 461
• The Crown redirects Flesh from its struggle with the Sea of Knowledge to search for and intercept the airship. 461
• Its rapid recovery of intelligence alarms Green, who judges it to be far too intelligent. 461
• The Flesh reacts with apparent fear when the Worms of Knowledge first begin consuming it, though it continues resisting their advance. 457
• The fused Taboo notices Leike's advancing Sea of Worms and concentrates its attacks on the passage his insects have opened. 481
• The fused nascent Taboo deliberately attempts to abandon the dominance of the Crown and Starry Sky Flesh in order to seek a new source of Authority. 491

Taboo Nature and Fusion

The Abyssal Flesh is a reviving severed limb from an existence above the Starry Sky. Polluted over time, it has developed an independent consciousness and was predicted to one day be crowned within the Abyss. 433

• The Flesh beneath Bronze City has a direct connection to the Bronze Pillars, whose inscriptions pulse in time with its heartbeat. 433
• It searches for and attempts to suppress the Golden Order fragments responsible for its ancient confinement. 454
• The inscribed Starry Sky Flesh is the main body of the Taboo, distinct from the mass of lesser spreading Flesh that covers the city. 468
• As the Crown joins with the Starry Sky Flesh, the Sea of Knowledge strips power from the Crown; two of its polluted eyes close. 477 478
• Its fusion with the Crown of Ten Thousand Kings creates an unnamed nascent Taboo that cannot be fully identified or named by Lu Yuan's analysis. 479
• The missing portion of the Crown leaves the fused Taboo incomplete and creates a flaw in its otherwise overwhelming existence. 479
• The Newborn Taboo eventually completes its final transformation during the battle in which the surrounding Sea of Blood is being stripped away. 497

Knowledge Content and Resource Value

Flesh can serve as a source of knowledge, energy, and usable Eerie material rather than solely as a corruptive threat.

• Lu Yuan reasons that the Flesh contains lingering knowledge and Abyssal aura, together with remnants of the extraordinary beings it has devoured, making it suitable food for the Worms of Knowledge. Their subsequent feeding confirms that knowledge can be extracted from it. 457 460
• Feeding on the Flesh grants Lu Yuan experience in numerous fields, including medicine, alchemy, inscriptions, languages, music, and Forbidden Studies. The gains bring Pharmacology and Pharmacognosy to their limits and unlock Pharmaceutics. 457 460
• As a Worm of Knowledge appears to reach a core within the Flesh, its feeding supplies Sanity that helps sustain Lu Yuan while he controls the Sea of Knowledge. 467
• Leike's Fifth Order enhancement gives his Swarm Insects limited resistance to the Taboo Flesh. Their mutual feeding supplies him with energy from the Flesh, which he channels back into additional insects. 481
• After losing the Taboo's support, the residual Abyssal Flesh retains Eerie vitality but poses far less danger, making it a recyclable resource belonging to Bronze City. 504

Related Entities

• Flesh Amalgam — A separate deep-level aberration created when 23 drained corpses and severed limbs fuse into a single mass under a Grey-robed Person's ritual. 71
• Flesh Tree — A separate city-wide corruptive growth associated with the Deep Sea Church and the Plump; it turns living humans into trees of flesh and blood and uses corpses to create fanatical servants. 110 112
• Special Individuals — Flesh-covered, highly corruptive Ghouls with extraordinary regeneration; some are produced during the spread through Bronze City. 409 424 446
• Horizontal Line Faces — Humanoid creatures generated from the living Flesh Wall. 446
• Flesh Crown — Crown-shaped manifestation suspended above the Tower of Erudition and connected to the sea of Flesh below. It is later called the Crown of Ten Thousand Kings and converges the surrounding Flesh toward itself. 461 467
• Starry Sky Flesh — The densely inscribed true main body of the underground Taboo, distinguished from the city-spanning Flesh shell and its lesser branches. 468
• Nascent Taboo — The incomplete, unnamed existence produced when the Crown of Ten Thousand Kings fuses with the Starry Sky Flesh. 479
• Bronze Pillars — Structures connected to the Abyssal Flesh mass; their inscriptions pulse with its heartbeat. 433
• Worms of Knowledge — Creatures of the Sea of Knowledge capable of consuming Flesh and slowing its advance, although the mass can replenish itself from below. 457 467
• Pale Eye — The Guardian's transformed Eerie form, which devours vitality from the Starry Sky Flesh and damages its inscribed sheath. 469 470
• Leike's Swarm Insects — Flesh-eating insects that form a Sea of Worms and briefly suppress the fused Taboo's Flesh, at the cost of heavy losses. 481
• City of Chains — An external power summoned through A.M. and the Great Ascendant; its green-flamed chains restrain the Crown and burn the Starry Sky Flesh. 490 495
• Flesh Transcendents — A distinct Transcendence Path that tempers the body through contaminants. Its branches include Full-Body Enhancement and Eerification, while the Dragonblood Potion can further alter its development. These uses of flesh concern human bodily transformation rather than the identified Abyssal severed limb. 578 579

Flesh of the Holy Sovereign's Estate

The Land of the Dead Silence contains another extensive flesh-based environment associated with the Holy Sovereign and the Withered Glory Society Heretics. Its dark-red, flesh-like ground forms part of the Holy Sovereign's estate and serves its followers. No direct identification with Bronze City's Starry Sky Flesh is established in these encounters. 656 665

• Corpse reclamation — The ground absorbs decaying flesh and blood from the dead, leaving bones behind. Lu Yuan observes that Heretic bodies are reclaimed particularly rapidly, unlike ordinary corpses. 653 664 665
• Communication — Heretics use the flesh-like ground to transmit messages. The surrounding fog is not under their control and obstructs their communications, helping explain how Wanderers evade them. 665 666
• Restraint and assault — Heretics draw flesh and bone from the ground to trap opponents, raise barriers, and form tendrils. One leader encloses Lu Yuan in a cocoon of rotting Flesh and dry bones while repeatedly assaulting his sanity. 656 657
• Soul-tracking ritual — A group captures two souls in a pulsing lump of Flesh, which points toward Lu Yuan and enables the pursuit of Frey and her newborn Seed. 660
• Sacrificial structures — Frey remembers captives suspended in cages of Flesh and bone chains on an enormous Flesh tower. During the Heretics' ritual, the captives rot and melt into the structure wherever their bodies touch their cages. 661
• Battlefield shaping — Chanting Heretics create a Flesh-like swamp that traps and slows the Blue Knight and Brunkel, while a Fourth Order leader regenerates within his territory. Lu Yuan attacks the chanters to disrupt the formation. 669 670
• Whirlpools and bodily reconstruction — A Heretic leader turns the ground beneath the Blue Knight into biting whirlpools of flesh and blood. His exploded flesh then reconverges into a suspended humanoid skin-sack without skeletal support. 672

Story Role / Major Arcs

Bronze City Abyss

The Flesh serves as the central underground threat beneath Bronze City. Its core lies beneath the Abyss, connected to Bronze Pillars and able to trap intruders by sealing tunnels and flooding chambers with regenerative tissue. 433 434

Pipe Network Layer Collapse

After its underground awakening, golden-black Flesh chases Lu Yuan's group toward the surface and assimilates the Night Watchers who remain in the Pipe Network Layer. 447

Fall of Bronze City

Flesh spreads from the underground system into the city, converting defensive walls into living meat, creating Flesh Pillars and special individuals, and overwhelming both the Inner and Outer City. 446 448 453 454

The Guardian and the Person on the Wall briefly suppress parts of the Flesh by cutting them off from their regenerative source, but cannot prevent the Flesh Wall's renewed advance or the complete flooding of the Inner City. 451 453 455

Lu Yuan turns the Flesh into a source of advancement by having the Worms of Knowledge consume it. Their feeding supplies knowledge experience and later Sanity, enabling him to continue resisting despite the enormous difference in power. 457 460 467

Siege of the Tower of Erudition

The Inner City becomes a sea of Flesh, with the Tower of Erudition as the last major area not yet swallowed. The Flesh Crown battles the Sea of Knowledge's falling character fragments while trying to locate and attack the Sky-Seeking Fortress. 459 461

The Sea of Knowledge helps create an evacuation route from the Tower of Erudition, but the Crown of Ten Thousand Kings responds by gathering the Flesh of the Inner City and underground Abyss toward itself for a direct attack. 467

Starry Sky Fusion and Retreat

The Flesh's inscribed Starry Sky main body rises and establishes true contact with the Crown. The transformed Guardian's Pale Eye tears into its outer sheath and consumes its vitality. As fusion proceeds, Lu Yuan strips power from the Crown through the Sea of Knowledge. 468 470 477 478

Their fusion produces an incomplete nascent Taboo. Leike's Sea of Worms briefly holds back its Flesh and opens a passage through it; the fused being later attempts to invoke another world through its roots and incomplete Authority. It continues replenishing Flesh even as the Sea of Knowledge strips it away. 479 481 491 493

The City of Chains adds another force to the struggle, restraining the Crown with green-flamed chains that burn its Starry Sky Flesh. The ensuing collision consumes or evaporates large portions of the Sea of Blood, even as the Newborn Taboo completes its final transformation. 490 495 497

After the Starry Sky Flesh's influence ends, the Flesh Walls wither and the remaining mass retreats beneath Bronze City. The residual Abyssal Flesh remains active but is no longer the city-destroying Taboo threat it was during the fall of Bronze City. 498 504