Recaps

The Rock Grand Knight Commander began a quiet safety investigation after the Heretic died without any sign of outside interference. Lu Yuan spent the afternoon searching books for clues about the Withered Glory Society, then left for the Lantern Knight’s potion team despite his growing fatigue.

• The Rock Grand Knight Commander decided to investigate everyone involved in deciphering eerie inscriptions to confirm they were safe, rather than treat anyone as a suspect.
• Lu Yuan and Oden searched through the inscription room’s books for the Withered Glory Society but found no match.
• Lu Yuan calculated that his daily work could earn him three Knight Tokens and help him gather ingredients for the Dragonblood Potion.
• After hours of reading, Lu Yuan lost one point of sanity and ended his shift.
• The Lantern Knight invited Lu Yuan to help with potions that evening, and Lu Yuan agreed to go to the potion team.

The Rock Grand Knight Commander and the Lantern Knight discussed Lu Yuan’s abilities and whether the Rock Grand Knight Commander should take him as a student. Lu Yuan then learned that a Northern Territory mission was approaching and told his friends he had joined the Rock Grand Knight Commander’s group, though he might still choose to deploy with them.

• The Lantern Knight assured the Rock Grand Knight Commander that Lu Yuan showed no Contamination or signs of Pathway Rampage and praised his talent and combat ability.
• The Rock Grand Knight Commander and the Lantern Knight noted that Lu Yuan had studied Potions under Laurina but had no known records in Eerie Inscription Studies.
• Blanca, Dean, and Leon waited in Lu Yuan’s cabin, where his Night Watcher clothes served them tea on their own.
• Blanca told Lu Yuan that their mission was about twenty days away and that the Northern Territory was facing a major mobilization around Withered City.
• Blanca warned Lu Yuan about a ruthless Heretic exterminator sent to the region and confirmed that teams could be formed freely.
• Lu Yuan told his friends that he had joined the Rock Grand Knight Commander’s group and might not be deployed, but could choose to go if the situation required it.

Lu Yuan discussed whether he would join Blanca’s squad for the Northern Territory mission after passing two intermediate certifications, while the team planned for his possible absence. After Blanca and the others left, Oden urged Lu Yuan to help Blanca, noting her rapid progress and her connection to the horn.

• Lu Yuan explained that he might join the Northern Territory mission in twenty days, depending on his preparations and other obligations.
• Dean asked Lu Yuan to make a stonefire gauntlet from materials his family would send, and Lu Yuan agreed.
• Blanca decided to recruit another squad member while keeping a reserve place open for Lu Yuan, who confirmed that he had signed a contract.
• Dean warned the group that his family would participate in the imperial mission and would prepare for Cold Crow City, while the others planned to meet again before his departure.
• After Blanca and the others left, Oden told Lu Yuan that Blanca was likely a leading family heir, was connected to the horn, and was nearing the fourth order.

Oden explained to Lu Yuan that the Sea of Knowledge was a prison containing knowledge and beings connected to Taboos, Transcendence, and possibly Immortality. He warned Lu Yuan about exploring it and could not explain the dangerous black words, leaving Lu Yuan cautious about touching them.

• Lu Yuan asked Oden about the Sea of Knowledge, and Oden said it imprisoned the foundations and information of powerful beings, suppressing Taboos by erasing their traces from the real world.
• Oden warned Lu Yuan that his connection let him enter the Sea of Knowledge but that exploring it could provoke Taboos and get him killed.
• Lu Yuan asked about other Forbidden Lands, and Oden identified the green forest swallowed by the Sea of Knowledge while cautioning him not to speak its name.
• Lu Yuan asked whether the Sea of Knowledge's knowledge had consciousness and why some words were black, but Oden said he did not know and urged him not to touch the black words.
• Lu Yuan remembered that the black words had nearly sealed a Rift and that his Authority warned him of danger.

Oden explained the Sea of Knowledge’s three regions and how travelers might reach its dangerous depths, warning Lu Yuan that prolonged stays could trap him and consume his soul. Lu Yuan left the conversation aware that the black characters might lie in the Unknown Zone and that he needed to limit his time inside.

• Oden told Lu Yuan that the Sea of Knowledge had three regions: the Radiant Zone, the Deep Zone, and the Unknown Zone.
• Oden explained that the Deep Zone was difficult to reach because the Sea of Knowledge consisted of irregular, shifting planes, and that his group followed a creature attracted by a refined knowledge-worm drug.
• Oden said the black characters most likely came from the Unknown Zone, and Lu Yuan resolved to be cautious when opening a Sea of Knowledge Rift in the Northern Territory.
• Oden warned Lu Yuan that staying in the Sea of Knowledge for more than half an hour could make it feel like home and weaken his desire to leave.
• Oden cautioned that staying for a full hour could leave Lu Yuan trapped forever, with his soul eroded and his consciousness erased.

Oden explained how the Sea of Knowledge eroded visitors and described the rising tides that let explorers salvage knowledge and ruins. Lu Yuan headed to the Lantern Knight’s Potion Studies assignment, where he found a displeased white-haired girl waiting alone.

• Oden warned Lu Yuan that prolonged exposure to the Sea of Knowledge erased minds and turned people into corpse shells.
• Oden told Lu Yuan that rising tides washed knowledge and ruins out of the Sea of Knowledge and offered to teach him how to salvage them.
• Lu Yuan asked whether the refining formula crushed Worms of Knowledge, and Oden confirmed that it did.
• Lu Yuan left Oden’s home and walked through the snowy Knight Academy toward the Hanging Tower to report for the Lantern Knight’s assignment.
• Lu Yuan entered the Potion Studies room and found a petite white-haired girl who looked unhappy.

Lu Yuan joined Frey Blanc’s Potion Studies group and learned about a heretic potion that could alter a person’s Pathway into the Believer Path. As the group struggled to explain how the potion worked, Oden proposed that it might contain material from a rare fungal Taboo.

• Frey Blanc checked Lu Yuan’s badge, introduced herself as his group leader, and showed him the research rooms and sanity-checking lamp.
• Frey explained that the group was investigating heretic potions that altered Pathways and restored energy, but could transform users into Believers.
• Lu Yuan learned that the potion worked well below the Fourth Order, while intelligence suggested a more powerful version might affect those of the Fourth Order.
• Oden reasoned that a Taboo could alter someone’s Pathway and suggested that a rare fungal Taboo’s hyphae might be blended into a potion.

Frey explained the effects and dangers of the three Heretic potions and assigned Lu Yuan to study the Plague Water and Aura Concealment Potion. Left alone in the laboratory, Lu Yuan opened the Inscription-covered box to test whether his Gray-White Text could identify the samples, and an unsettling aura seeped out.

• Frey explained that the Pathway Mutation Potion lowered drinkers’ resistance and could make them dependent on repeated doses, though its effects varied unpredictably.
• Frey told Lu Yuan that the team had made limited progress on the Aura Concealment Potion but little progress on the Pathway Mutation Potion or Plague Water.
• Frey led Lu Yuan to the laboratory and restricted him to studying the Plague Water and Aura Concealment Potion, first by reading the team’s notebooks.
• Frey explained that Lu Yuan could use one sample of each potion per day unless she approved additional samples after he made a discovery.
• After Frey left, Lu Yuan opened the Inscription-covered metal box to test his Gray-White Text, and an unsettling aura emerged.

Lu Yuan examined a diluted potion called Delusion of the Land of the Dead Silence and learned that its ingredients included rare plague materials tied to an unknown realm. Oden concluded that someone was gathering the ingredients from a plague elsewhere to spread it through the Auris Empire, though Lu Yuan doubted the neighboring Visarion Empire would risk such a plan while its own territory suffered.

• Lu Yuan identified the living potion as a diluted special alchemical construct from the Land of the Dead Silence, but the Gray-White Text obscured one contaminated ingredient.
• Oden told Lu Yuan that he had never heard of the Land of the Dead Silence and explained that the Spirit World was a realm beyond the ordinary world that could appear amid widespread death and disaster.
• Lu Yuan copied the potion's identified ingredients for Oden, who recognized Rotspot Grass, Plague-Wailing Mushroom, and Gray Gangrene Vine as exceptionally dangerous plague-related materials.
• Oden reasoned that a plague had broken out somewhere beyond the Auris Empire and that someone was collecting ingredients to spread it there.
• Lu Yuan questioned Oden's theory, doubting that the Visarion Empire would launch an invasion while allowing a plague to ravage its own territory.

Lu Yuan examined a plague-causing potion and asked Oden for a possible countermeasure, then used the Gray-White Text to identify an aura-concealing potion tied to the Land of the Dead Silence. He concluded that the group behind the potions intended to spread plague and conceal their movements, while Oden was baffled by the concealment potion’s ingredients and method.

• Lu Yuan asked Oden to propose a formula to counteract the plague potion, and Oden named five ingredients that might help mitigate its effects.
• Oden warned that the potion’s plague was unlike anything from his era and that its effects and stability were difficult to predict.
• Lu Yuan inspected the aura-concealing potion and learned from the Gray-White Text that it was called Gate of the Land of the Dead Silence and might be key to entering that land.
• Lu Yuan identified the potion’s readable ingredients as Mistveil Flower, Breath-Holding Fern, and Rotspot Grass, alongside an unreadable ingredient, and inferred that it concealed aura by sinking it into the Land of the Dead Silence.
• Oden was astonished that Rotspot Grass and basic aura-concealing materials could form such a potion, while Lu Yuan decided to use Frey’s progress as a reference.

Lu Yuan and Oden reviewed the Knight Academy’s findings on the Aura Concealment Potion and learned how its effects might be screened for. Their discussion gave Lu Yuan an idea for detecting people infected by Plague Water, and Oden began considering how to revise his formula.

• Lu Yuan read the Master Ledger’s findings that the Aura Concealment Potion used a physical mechanism to block detection and that the researchers had identified most of its ingredients.
• Oden explained that the potion’s unknown ingredient made direct detection difficult, while the researchers’ proposed Putrefaction Fluid screening risked false positives.
• Lu Yuan studied the researchers’ disguised Holy Water test, which changed color when it reacted with traces of Putrefaction Fluid.
• Lu Yuan realized he could develop a potion to detect people infected by Plague Water instead of reconstructing its formula, and he shared the idea with Oden.
• Oden approved the approach and began considering changes to his formula, while Lu Yuan chose not to pursue credit for the Aura Concealment Potion research.

Lu Yuan began planning research into the Plague Water with Oden, then discovered Frey undergoing a dangerous Pathway mutation in her room. He pulled her away from the apparition and learned that her condition could still be treated with a Leaf of Hope or a Sanity-Stabilizing Potion.

• Lu Yuan and Oden reviewed the Master Ledger’s failed Plague Water experiments and decided to begin developing the potion the next evening.
• Lu Yuan found Frey’s room silent, then received warnings about a high-level Source of Pollution and rushed inside.
• Lu Yuan saw Frey entranced beneath a shadowy apparition and used the Time Bestower to pull her out of the room.
• Lu Yuan slapped Frey until she showed signs of awareness, while the White Lamp warned that her sanity was deteriorating.
• Lu Yuan used Deep Study to assess Frey’s early-stage Pathway mutation and identified a Leaf of Hope or a Sanity-Stabilizing Potion as possible treatments.

Lu Yuan stabilized Frey with a Sanity-Stabilizing Potion after her Pathway was affected by a phantom, and the Lantern Knight found no trace of the disturbance. Lu Yuan then proposed creating a potion to detect Plague Water infections and received approval to request ingredients.

• Lu Yuan gave Frey a Sanity-Stabilizing Potion, which calmed her and made the phantom opening disappear.
• The Lantern Knight arrived, checked Frey and the research room, and confirmed that she was out of danger.
• Lu Yuan told the Lantern Knight that Frey had been affected by a phantom, while concealing that he had not investigated the room.
• Lu Yuan proposed making a potion to detect Plague Water infections so infected people could be isolated before an outbreak.
• The Lantern Knight approved Lu Yuan's request for dozens of ingredients, which would take at least two days to prepare.

Lu Yuan and Oden concluded that Frey's bewitchment likely came from an unknown domain rather than the Pathway Mutation Potion itself, then searched the Withered Glory Society records for clues. Oden found a matching Inscription that could identify the Heretic church, while Lu Yuan considered how to report it to the Rock Grand Knight Commander.

• Oden told Lu Yuan that Frey's Contamination and bewitchment likely came from a strange domain, and they agreed to investigate further once they obtained the potion.
• Lu Yuan attended the Morning Bell Knight's final training session of the week, where his Knight Body Technique improved slightly but his Breath of Health remained blocked.
• Lu Yuan and Oden searched the Withered Glory Society records together, with Oden rapidly reading while Lu Yuan guarded his Sanity and body.
• Oden found an old book describing Inscriptions, and Lu Yuan confirmed that five markings matched the Withered Glory Society Inscription in the room.
• Lu Yuan decided the record could help the Rock Grand Knight Commander identify the Heretic church, then heard increased patrols approach outside.

Lu Yuan revealed the name of the Withered Glory Society to the Rock Grand Knight Commander, who suspected Lu Yuan’s ability had caused a Heretic’s death. The next morning, Lu Yuan continued training in the Four Breaths without the Morning Bell Knight’s help.

• Lu Yuan showed the Rock Grand Knight Commander a book that matched the inscription and identified the Withered Glory Society.
• The Rock Grand Knight Commander rewarded Lu Yuan with twenty Knight Tokens and considered whether Lu Yuan had caused the Heretic’s death through an information-revealing ability.
• The Rock Grand Knight Commander interrogated the captured Heretics and learned that their Holy Sovereign was unharmed.
• Lu Yuan woke early and went to the training grounds to practice the Four Breaths despite the canceled class.
• Lu Yuan struggled to focus without the Morning Bell Knight’s bell but sensed his body growing stronger as he trained.

Lu Yuan told the researchers that his clue identified the Withered Glory Society, then learned that Frey had awakened with no memory of the night she was rescued. Oden warned him that her missing memories could signal corruption as Lu Yuan went to see her.

• Lu Yuan continued practicing the Knight Body Technique but could not circulate the breath of health, while his Sanity IV remained unchanged.
• At the Hanging Tower, Lu Yuan told the researchers that a damaged bard’s book identified the Withered Glory Society and urged them to search for more records.
• Lu Yuan collected two Knight Tokens and settled down to browse books in the inscription room.
• The Lantern Knight told Lu Yuan that Frey had awakened but remembered nothing from the night in question, and asked him to help recover her memories.
• Lu Yuan agreed to see Frey, while Oden warned him that her memory loss could mean her sanity had been invaded and urged him to stay alert.

Lu Yuan and the Lantern Knight investigated Frey’s lost memories and found that she could not recall the potion method or the events surrounding it. Lu Yuan agreed to help recreate the experiment by tracing the missing ingredients, despite the danger of having his own memories erased.

• The Lantern Knight told Lu Yuan that Frey had lost her memories of the night but showed no signs of Contamination.
• Frey confirmed that she could not remember how she had analyzed the Pathway Mutation Potion and that thinking about the missing events briefly stopped her consciousness.
• Lu Yuan guided Frey through the room where she had worked, but seeing where the phantom appeared only confirmed that her related memories had been deleted.
• The Lantern Knight proposed using records and missing ingredients to reconstruct Frey’s actions and asked Lu Yuan to restore the potion.
• Lu Yuan agreed to participate, and the Lantern Knight warned him that the mission was dangerous and that he could not withdraw once it began.

Lu Yuan examined the Pathway Mutation Potion and learned that it was an alchemical creation connected to the Land of the Dead Silence, not an ordinary potion. The Lantern Knight began testing Lu Yuan’s ability to infer how Frey had made it, while explaining why the Academy had reluctantly approved the research.

• The Lantern Knight gave Lu Yuan a booklet listing the seven ingredients Frey had used, and Oden inferred that she had tried to separate the potion’s active components.
• Lu Yuan inspected the potion and saw that Gray-White Text identified it as an alchemical creation that invited people into the Land of the Dead Silence, though he could not see its composition.
• Lu Yuan and Oden concluded that Frey had triggered the creation’s effect and prematurely activated a Pathway mutation, causing her memory loss.
• The Lantern Knight warned Lu Yuan not to touch the potion and to use the limited supply sparingly, then asked him to infer Frey’s method from the ingredients.
• The Lantern Knight explained that the Academy had assigned the research to his group despite String Knight’s doubts and the scarcity of the potion.

Lu Yuan impressed the Lantern Knight with his deductions about how Frey had tried to analyze the Pathway Mutation Potion and was officially assigned to help reverse-engineer it. With four potion samples available, Lu Yuan followed Oden’s plan to begin testing the residue for a contaminating material.

• Lu Yuan reasoned that Frey had separated the potion’s water and suggested isolating its core contaminating material, while warning that purification could be dangerous.
• The Lantern Knight explained that the potion lost its effects within a day of being opened and officially brought Lu Yuan onto the investigation.
• Lu Yuan followed the Lantern Knight into the oval room, where they prepared to use four remaining sets of ingredients and potion samples.
• Frey watched from the side as the Lantern Knight kept her from handling the potion because another attempt could kill her.
• Oden told Lu Yuan to remove the potion’s water, heat the residue, divide it into five portions, and test the first portion with holy water.

Lu Yuan extracted and tested the ingredients in the Pathway Mutation Potion, discovering that adding High-Grade Holy Water created a diluted Invitation to the Land of the Dead Silence. He then concentrated another portion repeatedly until the residue turned black and became so faint that his senses seemed to ignore it.

• Lu Yuan used Water-Separating Stone and heat to extract a viscous substance from the Pathway Mutation Potion.
• Lu Yuan added High-Grade Holy Water to one portion, which reverted into a lighter-blue liquid and earned him Pharmacology experience.
• Lu Yuan read the Gray-White Text's description of the result as a diluted Invitation to the Land of the Dead Silence and reasoned that one ingredient supplied the potion's core effect.
• Lu Yuan followed Oden's advice and concentrated another portion through repeated extractions.
• Lu Yuan watched the residue turn completely black and grow so faint that his senses unconsciously filtered it out.

Lu Yuan realized the refined residue drew a person’s aura into the Land of the Dead Silence, where their Pathway could be contaminated. When a high-level Source of Pollution appeared, Lu Yuan and Frey were pulled into a distorted desolate world.

• Lu Yuan refined the residue until it became a nearly invisible black fragment, and Oden concluded its effect was concealment rather than contamination.
• Lu Yuan theorized that the Pathway Mutation Potion drew people into the Land of the Dead Silence, where something contaminated their Pathways.
• Oden realized that repeated use of the Aura Concealment Potion might likewise expose its user to contamination.
• The Lantern Knight reported that his potion test had failed, then asked Lu Yuan about the tiny fragment.
• Gray-White Text warned Lu Yuan of a high-level Source of Pollution, and the Time Bestower revealed a desolate world above the residue with Frey inside it.
• Lu Yuan’s consciousness was pulled away as the Lantern Knight watched Lu Yuan and Frey sway.

As Lu Yuan's consciousness was pulled toward the Land of the Dead Silence by the Pathway Mutation Potion, Oden tried to follow and protect him but was swept into the Sea of Knowledge inside Lu Yuan. Lu Yuan found himself face-to-face with Frey, while the Sea of Knowledge battered the connection to the Land of the Dead Silence.

• Oden realized the Pathway Mutation Potion was dragging Lu Yuan's consciousness toward a Taboo entity and decided to follow him into the Land of the Dead Silence.
• Oden left his refuge in the Drowner's shell and surged toward Lu Yuan's sanity layer.
• A torrent from the Sea of Knowledge appeared between Oden and Lu Yuan's consciousness, blocking his way.
• The Sea of Knowledge swept Oden inside, then sealed shut as Lu Yuan's droplet-shaped Authority drove the five dark shadows to its bottom.
• Lu Yuan recognized Frey before him, and the two stared at each other in bewilderment.

After being pulled into the Land of the Dead Silence with Frey, Lu Yuan found that his Authority was gone, though the Gray-White Text still worked. Frey recovered part of her memory but could not explain what she had seen, leaving them trapped in a dangerous place where time moved differently.

• Lu Yuan realized he and Frey had been dragged into the Land of the Dead Silence and found that his Authority had not followed his consciousness.
• Lu Yuan used the Gray-White Text on Frey, which identified her as a human soul cast into the Land of the Dead Silence.
• Frey remembered that repeated purification of the Pathway Mutation Potion had triggered its effect and that she had spent four days in the land.
• Lu Yuan realized that four days there had passed in only seconds outside and worried that staying longer would wear away his consciousness.
• Frey tried to recall what she had seen, but pain stopped her, and Lu Yuan concluded that a Taboo being had appeared in the land.

Lu Yuan and Frey found themselves in the vast, fog-covered Land of the Dead Silence, where Frey’s memories offered no reliable route out. Lu Yuan sensed the Authority of the Sea of Knowledge drawing closer and concluded that Frey’s diminished rationality had left her weaker within this world.

• Lu Yuan surveyed the fog-shrouded wasteland and found no clear signs of life or a way forward.
• Lu Yuan asked Frey whether she remembered her route, and she said this location differed from where she had arrived before.
• Lu Yuan decided not to follow Frey’s remembered route and waited for his connection to the Authority of the Sea of Knowledge to strengthen.
• Lu Yuan asked Frey about strange things she had encountered, and she recalled only an uncertain feeling that something ominous had been nearby.
• Lu Yuan concluded that his nearly intact rationality made him stronger in this world than Frey, whose rationality had not fully recovered.

Lu Yuan and Frey left their starting place and headed toward a distant mountain through the fog, while Oden was swept through a dangerous sea of knowledge inside Lu Yuan. At the Knight Academy, Eli and the Astrologer Grand Knight Commander discovered that the star representing disaster had lit up.

• Lu Yuan doubted Frey's belief that no one else was in the world and warned that Heretics or other people might have been dragged there.
• Lu Yuan and Frey agreed to leave their starting place and walked toward the outline of a distant mountain through the fog.
• Oden drifted helplessly through a vast sea of words and knowledge, protected by a faint membrane around his consciousness.
• Eli asked his teacher why the dark star representing disaster had lit up despite the teacher's claim that it never would.
• The Astrologer Grand Knight Commander inspected the scarlet-and-black star and murmured that the foretold event had come to pass.