Chapter Summaries

Thor searched for Senior Byron by starting a Dream Tour from the Second Warehouse, but entered a strange dream filled with fragmented voices. He recognized the dreamers as the Mouth-type Grudge Spirits he had once chased as a giant octopus, and began questioning one of them.

• Thor wondered whether Billy was trying to win his trust or belonged to a different side, while remaining wary of him.
• Thor began a Dream Tour in the Second Warehouse after searching near Senior Byron’s dormitory for several days without finding his Spirit Body.
• Thor entered a pitch-black, fragmented dream and heard its inhabitants argue about eating him.
• Thor recognized the frightened Soul Fragments as the Mouth-type Grudge Spirits that had once attacked him in Mentor Kazi’s Laboratory.
• Thor grabbed one of the Grudge Spirit fragments and threatened to eat it if it could not answer his question.

Thor learned that a living person had entered the Interlayer outside the Second Warehouse and went to ask Haywood to lend him Heidi so he could search for the person. Haywood initially refused, but Thor offered a Wizard Body Modification potion in exchange, leaving Haywood tempted by the deal.

• Thor questioned the Grudge Spirit Fragment Mouths and learned that a living person had crawled into the Interlayer where the eyes stayed.
• Thor returned to reality and decided he needed Heidi's help to search the dangerous Interlayer.
• Thor asked Haywood to lend him Heidi, but Haywood refused because searching without a time limit could get her killed.
• Thor proposed an equal exchange and explained that Haywood's Locator had left his physical body too strong for his Spirit Body.
• Thor showed that his skin could contain a Spirit Body and offered Haywood a Wizard Body Modification potion, which addressed Haywood's weakness and tempted him.

Thor traded Haywood a potion for a ribbonfish that could shelter Spirit Bodies, then entered the Interlayer to search for Byron. He found a featureless, child-sized figure that turned out to be Byron, though Byron remained in the dangerous Interlayer.

• Haywood refused to trade Heidi but offered Thor a talking ribbonfish that could protect a Spirit Body from the Interlayer’s eyes.
• Thor inspected the ribbonfish, completed the trade with Haywood, and prepared to leave his body under Xiao Zao’s guard.
• Thor entered the Interlayer inside the ribbonfish and searched through the space filled with eyes.
• Thor sensed a child-sized, foam-covered figure and worried that it was not Byron.
• The figure opened a slit at its neck, and Byron recognized Thor and asked why he had come to such a dangerous place.

Thor found Byron trapped in the Interlayer, where Byron explained that his Locator had saved him from Ula by using Feigned Death Escape. Thor led the injured Byron toward the exit, and they escaped the eyes’ trap just as the eyes attacked.

• Thor reunited with Byron, who revealed that Ula had attacked him and that his Locator’s Feigned Death Escape had hidden him in the Interlayer.
• Byron explained that he could not leave because he had lost his skin and would be vulnerable to the Corruption outside.
• Thor decided to use a Witchcraft Item to help Byron and guided him toward the exit marked by Thor’s Mental Mark.
• As they moved, the eyes watched them and stirred their agitation, so Thor pushed Byron onward while helping him control his Mental Power.
• Thor used Spirit Armor Technique to shield them, then grabbed Byron and charged through the marked exit as black beams shattered the armor.

Thor emerged from the Interlayer into an illusion of a ruined Wizard Tower and encountered an aged Haywood, who claimed they had last met a hundred years earlier. Haywood began recounting their past before revealing that a rebellion had killed Mentor Gorsa.

• Thor found the Wizard Tower in ruins and realized the black light might have trapped him in a mental illusion.
• Thor discovered rows of skulls on stakes in the grass facing the ruined tower and followed a voice toward the West Tower.
• A dark gray ray struck Thor, but his Spirit Armor Technique blocked it, and he recognized the attacker as the aged Haywood.
• Haywood claimed Thor had disappeared for a hundred years and recalled that Thor had once asked to borrow Heidi to search the Interlayer.
• Haywood explained that he had not finished studying Thor's medicine before a rebellion broke out and killed Mentor Gorsa.

Thor heard Haywood’s account of the Wizard Tower’s fall and investigated whether the old apprentice was real or an illusion. Haywood led Thor to shelter in the West Tower, warning that deadly horrors surrounded the ruins after dark.

• Haywood claimed that snowflakes erupted from the corrupted Gorsa, spreading Corruption through the Wizard Tower, while Heidi absorbed it and sacrificed herself to save him.
• Thor questioned Haywood’s story, then grabbed and examined him, finding physical injuries and stats that made him doubt the encounter was merely an illusion.
• Haywood warned Thor that terrifying beings encircled the ruins and killed anyone who ventured out after dark.
• Haywood led Thor into his makeshift home in the West Tower and lit a Candle Lamp, warning him not to leave its light.

Thor investigated the strange night in the West Tower and confirmed that the apparent future was an illusion dated to the present. He considered two ways to break it: confront the Corruption in the darkness or kill Haywood, who might be shaping the illusion.

• Thor noticed that the stars outside resembled eyes watching him, and Haywood warned him not to stay anywhere without light.
• The view beyond the door vanished into darkness, and Thor's Diary issued a danger warning as the darkness began consuming the door.
• Thor retreated beside Haywood, and the darkness withdrew after the candles held it back.
• Thor read the Diary's date and concluded that the scene was an illusion caused by a beam of black light, designed to make its victims doubt reality.
• Thor reasoned that the illusion covered a small area and weighed whether to fight the Corruption or kill Haywood.

Thor used Haywood’s arm to power a Witchcraft Array and entered the Consciousness Platform to confront the darkness invading his mind. There, the Stars devoured the darkness, leaving Thor to wonder what dangerous force they had absorbed.

• Thor decided to keep Haywood alive and began drawing a Witchcraft Array, hoping to learn what had created him.
• Haywood offered his right arm as a source of Magic Power and warned Thor not to attract the darkness before the array was ready.
• When the darkness swallowed the doorway, Haywood stood between it and Thor while Thor activated the array and invited him inside.
• Thor used the array to enter the Consciousness Platform, where darkness began Corrupting the night sky and advancing on the Stars.
• The Stars blazed and devoured the invading darkness, and Thor realized something terrifying might now be part of his platform.

Thor discovered that the Consciousness Platform had absorbed the invading eyes and gained a Rune that gave him hundreds of simultaneous visions. After rescuing Senior Byron from the Interlayer, Thor placed him inside the Elf King's Head to give him a new body, but the Fried Fish unexpectedly woke up.

• Thor traced the new Eye Rune and gained a vision of hundreds of moving scenes, including thin lines running through them.
• Thor returned from the illusion to find the eyes in the Interlayer docile, then pushed Senior Byron through the marked exit.
• Thor left the ribbonfish and returned to his body, where he found Byron deteriorating after leaving the Interlayer.
• Thor put Byron into the Elf King's Head and brought it to the Experiment Table to modify it as Byron's new skin.
• The Fried Fish raised its head and spoke, startling Penny.

Thor discovered that he had unknowingly become an Official Wizard after the Visual Rune harmonized his Mental Power and Magic Power. He questioned a ribbonfish who claimed to be Haywood, learning that Haywood remembered being a Level 3 Apprentice thirteen years earlier and was about to undergo Wizard Body Modification.

• Thor had Xiao Zao bring the revived ribbonfish to his Experiment Table, where it identified itself as Haywood, a Level 3 Apprentice at the Wizard Tower.
• Thor realized he had become an Official Wizard and tested how much more efficiently he could use his Witchcraft and Spirit-Devouring Ester.
• Thor explained that absorbing the power of the eyes and mastering the Visual Rune had harmonized his Mental Power and Magic Power, allowing him to advance unnoticed.
• Thor continued helping Senior Byron while questioning Haywood, who recalled the year 304 of the Shuoyue Calendar and an upcoming modification with Kongsha and Ivan.
• Haywood remembered that he had been close to becoming an Official Wizard and expected the Wizard Body Modification to give him a strong chance of advancing.

Thor learned how Ivan’s and Kongsha’s modifications failed before Gorsa interrupted the ribbonfish as it began describing Haywood’s experiment. Gorsa revealed Kongsha’s missing half-face inside his chest, then offered to tell Thor about Haywood’s modification.

• Thor learned that Kongsha’s experiment made her body contain multiple incomplete spirits, while Ivan’s attempt to inhabit a Faceless One’s corpse left him without a body.
• Agu told Thor that the previous owner of the Wizard Tower was Camus of the Radiance Family, who left shortly before Gorsa took over.
• The ribbonfish began recounting a planned modification involving Haywood and his younger sister Heidi, but Gorsa stopped it by consuming it and storing its Mist-Formed Earthworm form in an amber box.
• Thor saw the upper half of Kongsha’s face inside Gorsa’s chest and wondered whether Gorsa had deliberately shown it to him.
• Gorsa congratulated Thor on his promotion and offered to explain Haywood’s modification.

Gorsa explained that Ribbonfish was the severed, corrupted part of Haywood’s Spirit Body, isolated in the Interlayer after a failed alteration experiment. He assigned Thor to research whether the Delayed Rejection Potion could work with Blue Water Soul, leaving Thor preparing to investigate the potion and the Resurrection Experiment’s hidden purpose.

• Gorsa told Thor that Ribbonfish was Haywood as he had been at an earlier point, and explained that Haywood, Ivan, and Kongsha had undergone alterations for the Resurrection Experiment.
• Gorsa explained that Haywood’s experiment had failed, leaving part of his Spirit Body irreversibly alienated and separated in the Interlayer, while the rest of him lost the memories from that period.
• Gorsa told Thor that he had avoided directing the details of Thor’s studies to keep him from suffering the same fate as Ivan or Kongsha, and noted that Thor was the only apprentice to advance in over ten years.
• Gorsa assigned Thor to join Rum and Kazi’s Blue Water Soul research and test whether it was compatible with the Delayed Rejection Potion to extend Ula’s time with her Vessel.
• Thor suspected that Blue Water Soul contained dangerous impurities and that the Resurrection Experiment might conceal a threat, so he agreed to work with Rum and Kazi while preparing to investigate further.

Thor asked Gorsa to conceal his promotion, and Gorsa disguised his newly joined Magic Power and Mental Power so Thor could pass as an apprentice. The chapter ended with Ula preparing for the Resurrection Experiment while doubting that success would let her and the others make their own choices.

• Thor asked Gorsa to keep his promotion secret, and Gorsa planted a thorn-like disguise that made Thor's Magic Power and Mental Power seem unsettled.
• Thor asked how Haywood knew about events before Thor entered the Interlayer, and Gorsa said the Interlayer held many people's secret thoughts, including his own.
• Ula told Kazi and Rum that her abnormal reaction had followed the destruction of the mark she left on Thor, and she rejected a less toxic potion because pain helped her stay alert.
• Rum said the Resurrection Experiment was in its final confirmation stage and could begin within six months if all went well.
• Kazi said he hoped to travel to Kaorge City after the experiment, while Ula warned that Gorsa might still make decisions for them without their consent.

Thor joined Kazi and Rum's laboratory and presented his Delayed Rejection Potion, which impressed Ula and the mentors. They decided to test whether it could complement the Blue Water Soul Potion.

• Thor met Ula, Kazi, and Rum after Gorsa sent him to the laboratory, and Ula questioned him about the erased Mental Mark on the Puppet.
• Kazi asked Thor about Byron's Gray Matter Potion and his sudden departure, but Thor said he did not know why Byron had left.
• Thor revealed his Delayed Rejection Potion after Ula challenged his research plan, and Ula and the mentors were impressed by his results.
• Kazi asked how Thor had discovered that corpses could reject Spirit Bodies, but Thor offered only a vague explanation.
• Rum proposed finding new Vessels so they could compare the Blue Water Soul Potion with Thor's Delayed Rejection Potion.

Thor investigated Gray Matter and Blue Water Soul while preparing to test Gray Matter Potion himself, then helped Keli study ways to reduce the pain Adhesive caused Spirit Bodies. Keli was ordered to abandon that work and assist with a Soul Toxin experiment as the Resurrection Experiment approached.

• Thor compared the Blue Water Soul formula with Senior Byron's Gray Matter Potion and suspected Lady Ula had not consumed either potion to replenish her soul energy.
• Thor decided to prepare more Gray Matter Potion and try taking it himself after finding no warning in the Diary.
• Thor found Keli discouraged because Mentor Gudo had criticized her research into reducing Adhesive's pain, and he offered to help her.
• A Level 3 Apprentice summoned Keli to Mentor Gudo, so she left Thor to watch over her notes.
• Keli returned and told Thor that Lady Ula did not want the pain reduced and Mentor Gudo had ordered her to stop the experiment and work on increasing a Soul Toxin's efficacy.

Thor secretly followed Ula into the Interlayer and discovered she could shed the Shadow Monster skin she had been wearing. Seeing her in her original form helped him understand the Death Wizard Diary’s warning about a fourth passage.

• Keli told Thor that she still lacked an antidote for Alpha Toxin, so Mentor Gudo had halted her experiments.
• Thor continued studying Blue Water Soul and Delayed Rejection Potion, but made little progress and decided to involve Agu in another experiment.
• A Spirit Body briefly spied on Thor in the Second Warehouse before heading deeper into the Interlayer.
• Thor followed Penny into the Interlayer and spotted Ula removing the Shadow Monster skin made from Ivan’s body.
• Thor connected Ula shedding her skin to the Death Wizard Diary’s warning about the fourth passage.

Thor watched Ula secretly eat in the Interlayer, then followed her through the Candle Pipe after the Diary warned that pursuing her directly would bring death. The mouths guided him to Mentor Anze’s Laboratory, but Thor struck a barrier while trying to enter.

• Thor saw Ula eating cautiously in the Interlayer, and the eyes gathered around her until she put on her black silhouette skin and left.
• Thor received a death warning against recklessly following Ula, but decided he still needed to learn where she was going.
• Thor entered a Candle Pipe to follow Ula without being seen, and Mouth-type Grudge Spirits guided him through it.
• Thor reached Mentor Anze’s Laboratory after the mouths said Ula had gone inside, but they could not tell him what she was doing.
• Thor tried to reach the laboratory through its pipes and hit a barrier.

Thor investigated Ula’s movements and noticed that Luokai’s relaxed appearance concealed unusual mental activity, then returned to the Second Warehouse and alerted Gorsa that he had discovered something about the Resurrection Experiment. After Gorsa failed to respond, Thor tested the Gray Matter Potion and discovered that the malice it produced was absorbed by the stars in his Consciousness Space.

• Thor found a Witchcraft Array blocking the pipe, learned Ula had left, and sent mouths to follow her while he waited outside Anze’s laboratory.
• Thor saw Luokai leaving the laboratory and sensed mental power escaping from his body, so he stopped watching him.
• Thor learned Ula had entered the nineteenth floor and wondered whether she was secretly consuming malice, then asked the Diary whether telling Gorsa would put him in danger.
• Thor crossed the Interlayer to the Second Warehouse and sent Gorsa a message saying he had made an important discovery about the Resurrection Experiment, but received no reply by morning.
• Thor drank the Gray Matter Potion and felt his spirit body strengthen slightly before a wisp of gray malice appeared and attacked him.
• Thor tried to contain the malice, but the stars in his Consciousness Space absorbed it.

Thor warned Gorsa that Blue Water Soul contained persistent malice and revealed that Ula had consumed it, but Gorsa chose to accelerate the Resurrection Experiment rather than suspend it. After eight days of preparations, Gorsa told Thor that the formal experiment would begin the next day in the Garden outside the tower.

• Thor told Gorsa that Blue Water Soul contained powerful, persistent malice and described finding someone in the Interlayer.
• Gorsa revealed that Ula had consumed Blue Water Soul, shattered the crystal, and absorbed its contents.
• Gorsa explained that he was struggling to keep Ula from being pulled back into the Abyss and demanded Thor's notes on the Delayed Rejection Potion.
• Gorsa ordered Thor to prepare for the Resurrection Experiment, which he planned to begin within ten days.
• After eight days, Gorsa appeared in the Second Warehouse and told Thor the experiment would begin the next day in the Garden outside the tower.

Thor gathered materials for the Resurrection Experiment and joined the crowded preparations in the Half-Life Garden, where Keli had unexpectedly become essential to making the Adhesive. Kazi asked Thor why the Tower Master had moved up the experiment, but Thor said he had only just learned it would be held in the Garden.

• Thor learned that Haywood had been excluded from the experiment, and Haywood recalled the disastrous first attempt that had left Gorsa badly injured.
• Thor collected materials from the warehouses and passed the Scarecrow on his way to the Half-Life Garden.
• Thor found Keli preparing to handle the Beta Toxin and saw Gudo, Monica, Jero, Anze, Rum, and their apprentices assembled for the experiment.
• Jero joked that Senior Byron had died, then admitted they had split up after their mission outside.
• Kazi walked beside Thor and asked why the Tower Master had moved up the Resurrection Experiment, and Thor said he had only learned that it would take place in the Garden.