Chapter Summaries

Evan arrived in Innsmouth with a Byron Group research party and recognized several Deep Ones among the locals. Lili and Haixi identified him as the mysterious Shadow and decided to conceal their discovery while preparing for possible betrayal by the Byron Group.

• Tom and the other students traded eerie stories about Innsmouth as Evan wondered what the Byron Group researchers were hiding.
• Evan and the research party arrived in the decaying coastal town, where he cheerfully greeted the locals and hoped to provoke a reaction from Byron and the others.
• Professor Byron announced the group would conduct experiments at a seaside villa, and Doctor Furim warned them to avoid local food and drink.
• Evan recognized Joshur, Lili, and Haixi among the Innsmouth representatives and noticed Lili react with panic when she saw him.
• After the convoy departed, Lili told Haixi that Evan was likely the Shadow and that she could smell her own Deep One scent on him.
• Haixi confirmed she smelled her scent on Evan too, ordered Lili to keep the discovery secret, and prepared to resist if the Byron Group tried to use them as sacrifices.

Evan discovered that the Byron Group had secretly fed the students Deep One bodily fluid, while Byron and Greenfire prepared a plan to lure him into the Dreamlands and dismember him. The chapter ended with Byron asking Greenfire to save Evan’s backside and rectum.

• The students arrived at the Byron Group’s seaside research hotel, where Professor Byron welcomed them and warned them not to go outside after seven at night.
• Evan detected Deep One bodily fluid in the food and realized the Byron Group had been feeding it to the students to reduce their self-awareness.
• The students gathered marine specimens for their first experiment, then Tom went outside at night with a young woman and returned terrified after encountering a monster.
• Byron promised to provide the students with local talismans that would keep wild animals away, then secretly discussed his plan with Greenfire.
• Byron planned to take Evan into the Dreamlands and have Greenfire dismember him, hide his head, and turn the remaining pieces into explosive talismans for the students.
• Greenfire asked which parts Byron wanted saved, and Byron said he wanted Evan’s backside and rectum.

Evan warned his resentful classmates that their food might contain Deep One bodily fluid, then traveled to the Dreamlands to meet Hill and check her Anchor. Hill introduced him to the thriving Tavern’s patrons before taking him to her room to clear the blockage.

• John accused the Byron Group of experimenting on students and turned his resentment toward Evan, while Lane told him to stop.
• Evan recalled that Byron had invited him to the Laboratory to help him become a Master, and he prepared a Deity-Summoning Magic Array as a contingency.
• Evan warned the students to eat less and later told Lane that he had smelled Deep One bodily fluid in the food; the students dismissed his warning.
• Evan used a Magic Array to enter the Dreamlands and found Hill’s Tavern bustling with patrons of many species.
• Hill introduced Evan to the patrons as her man and Doctor Armitage’s devoted Disciple, then took him to her room to clear her blocked Anchor.

Evan joined Byron in the Dreamlands to temper his Beyonder Characteristics, despite Hill warning him that the ritual could leave his body vulnerable. Byron led him to ancient ruins and supplied him with potions, while Evan secretly reversed their side effects and fed Fusion Potions to the Mist Brain Plague.

• Hill warned Evan that his soul could become trapped in the Dreamlands if his body were destroyed, and offered to become his Anchor in the Real World.
• Evan accepted Byron's invitation and followed him to a hidden Laboratory, where Byron performed a ritual to send them into the Dreamlands.
• Greenfire revealed that Byron and his allies intended to exploit Evan, believing Evan trusted Byron too readily.
• Evan recognized the Dreamlands ruins from his prophetic dream and thanked Byron for entrusting him with the task of opening the ancient barrier after he became a Master.
• Evan drank Fusion Potion and Shadow Potion, reversed their side effects, and began merging his Beyonder Characteristics.
• Byron gave Evan three more Fusion Potions, and Evan secretly shared them with the Mist Brain Plague.

Evan fused the Mist Brain Plague with the Garden of Life and advanced to Master, while Byron waited for his moment to seize control of him. As Evan acclimated to his new form, his body in the Material World came under attack, and Byron revealed his betrayal.

• Byron watched Evan drink five Fusion Potions and secretly planned to exploit his dulled instincts by showing him the Black Sun's symbol.
• Evan fused his Beyonder Characteristics, and Byron sensed powers connected to the God of the Pale Moon and the Blood Moon God within them.
• The Mist Brain Plague nourished and fused with the Garden of Life, raising Evan's Status to Master and boosting his attributes.
• Evan struggled to control his unfamiliar new body, then received Panel notifications that his Material World body was being attacked and his hands had been severed.
• Evan asked Byron what was happening, and Byron laughed and admitted he was dropping the act.

Byron tried to devour Evan, but Evan revealed his fully awakened Black Sun's Wings and caught him off guard. Evan trapped Byron with the wing's monstrous growths and began infecting his body and soul, leaving Byron helpless and horrified.

• Byron used his Black Sun symbol to daze Evan and prepared to devour him, relying on his Devouring and Splitting Characteristic and his Prophet avatar's Battle Prediction.
• Byron used Battle Prediction on Evan and foresaw his own bloodshed, but Evan's clawed wing seized him before he could escape.
• Byron recognized Evan's ten-meter Black Sun's Wing and realized Evan had awakened the complete Characteristic despite Byron's efforts to limit his potion intake.
• Evan explained that he had pretended to be controlled and struck as soon as Byron began using Battle Prediction, then mocked Byron's shocked reaction.
• Evan told Byron to look at his body as black and red threads, twisted plants, Viruses, insects, Skull Flowers, and pus-covered gravestones began growing across him.

Evan defeated Byron in the Dreamlands, took his memories with the Silver Key, and learned that Zhongli had faked his death. In the Real World, Byron’s First Personality returned after the plan failed, learned that Number Two was trapped by Evan, and sought satisfaction by sniffing a piece of rectum.

• Evan tormented Byron with the grotesque effects of his Beyonder Characteristic and revealed that Pulis had provided the complete Black Sun Characteristic.
• Byron broke down over Pulis’s success, and Evan used the Silver Key to take his memories concerning the Black Sun after revealing that Zhongli had faked his death.
• Byron sensed that Evan had taken his memories, then raged about Pulis and Sapp.
• Greenfire’s dissection of Evan’s body had killed four of his six students before Byron’s First Personality sat up in the research chamber.
• Byron told Greenfire that Evan had obtained the complete Black Sun’s Wings and trapped Number Two in the Dreamlands, then took the piece of rectum Greenfire gave him and vowed to make Arkham part of his body.

Byron discovered that Evan had been absorbing magic potions through his rectum, helping explain his victories, and learned that Evan had activated the complete Black Sun's Wings. Greenfire revealed a golden Badge that he believed could bring Arkham to heel.

• Byron sniffed Evan's rectum and realized his dizziness came from poison and that it held an unusually high concentration of magic potions.
• Byron and Greenfire concluded that Evan had secretly stored and absorbed potions through his rectum, and Greenfire recalled records of Evan using unexplained potions during a fight with Klaus's ghouls.
• Byron told Greenfire that Evan had activated the complete Black Sun's Wings and that two strange forces in Evan's Beyonder Characteristic had restrained Number Two.
• Byron examined Evan's grotesquely mutated body parts and resolved to keep Evan's soul from returning to his body.
• Greenfire argued that they could no longer treat Evan as expendable, then produced a golden Badge that Byron believed could bring Arkham to heel.

While Greenfire described how Evan’s corpse killed four students during the autopsy, Byron and Greenfire planned to exploit its remains. In the Dreamlands, Evan carried Byron toward a black Giant Egg, endured his Spirituality Shock Period, and reversed the Potion Chain’s effects, leaving Byron horrified as Evan’s Demon Hunter abilities doubled.

• Greenfire told Byron that Evan’s body and severed organs had killed four students through supernatural attacks, including a bone-eroding plague, a transforming gas, an acidic stomach, and a deadly utterance.
• Byron promised Greenfire a larger share of the spoils, and they planned to use Planar Banishment on the remains while waiting for Evan to lose his bearings between worlds.
• Evan used Black Sun’s Wings to carry Byron through the Dreamlands ruins toward the black Giant Egg, concealing how weakened he was during his Spirituality Shock Period.
• After thirty-five hours, Evan reversed the side effects of his Fusion Potion, shadow magic potion, and Potion Chain, gaining permanent increases and the Darkfire King’s protection that doubled his Demon Hunter Profession’s effects.
• Byron realized his Potion Chain had failed to suppress Evan’s profession and instead strengthened him, and he demanded to know why.

Evan recovered from his ascension while Byron deteriorated, and Evan used the Blasphemous Plague to force him to explain the black egg. Byron revealed that it contained Black Sun’s Shadow, and Evan prepared to make him a Blood Slave.

• Byron deduced that Evan could turn potion side effects into benefits, but Evan redirected his suspicions toward Witch methods and Mason’s Bloodline and Contract.
• After forty-eight hours, Evan regained his strength while Byron’s body and soul decayed under the Viruses.
• Evan infected Byron’s memories with the Blasphemous Plague and demanded to know what was inside the black egg.
• Byron revealed that Black Sun worshippers had summoned Black Sun’s Shadow and used it to disable the Sun Family’s transit hub, stranding over two hundred expeditionary forces in the Dream Maze.
• Evan considered the five Black Sun entities and formed Black Blood, intending to make Byron his Blood Slave.

Evan converted Byron into his first Blood Slave, and Byron eagerly agreed to research Evan’s blood and support the Rhine Faction. Evan sent Byron into his body to deal with an approaching threat, while Byron’s First Personality and Greenfire prepared to enter the Dreamlands and seize the Shadow of the Black Sun.

• Evan planted a Blood Seed in Byron and used his blood to restore Byron’s body and gain complete control over him.
• Byron accepted Evan as his master because he was fascinated by Evan’s blood, and he offered to develop technologies and Magic Potions for Evan’s faction in exchange for a steady blood supply and permission to study it.
• Evan agreed that Byron could continue as his professor, then sent him into a chamber inside his body to help with the threat approaching through distorted space.
• Inside the chamber, Byron met a talking Goat, which recognized that Byron’s unsettling interest in research made it a likely test subject.
• In the Real World, Byron’s First Personality and Greenfire confirmed their preparations, opened a rift to the Dreamlands, and set out to claim the Shadow of the Black Sun.

Greenfire and Byron No. 1 found Evan in the Ruins, and Byron No. 1 accidentally exposed Evan's ambush when he resonated with his other personality and made Evan fart. As Evan fought Greenfire's monster horde, the two men used a single-use Magic Artifact to curse a piece of Evan and tried to seal his Profession Characteristics; the effect had not yet been shown.

• Greenfire and Byron No. 1 sensed filthy Spirituality in the Ruins and realized Byron No. 2 might be in danger.
• Byron No. 1 resonated with Byron No. 2, opening a passage that made Evan fart and exposed his hiding place.
• Greenfire summoned more than a thousand Potion Aberrations and failed chimeras, and Evan fought them with his shifting Sacred Bone Staff.
• Greenfire and Byron No. 1 used a curse ritual and Darkfire Dancer's Tune on a piece of Evan, intending to suppress his Profession Characteristics for twenty-four hours.
• Evan continued destroying the horde with his weapon and plague-ridden abilities while Greenfire and Byron No. 1 watched for the Magic Artifact's effect.

Evan’s Toxic Blood and plague-spawned growths devastated Greenfire’s experimental army, but Greenfire and Byron No. 1 countered by using a cursed Greenflame Dancer to seduce Evan’s Demon Hunter Characteristic. The curse suppressed Evan’s profession abilities, though he remained confident because his other Beyonder Characteristics were unaffected.

• Evan used Toxic Blood to corrode the monsters surrounding him, then spread viruses and spores that grew into mushrooms and warty plague fruits.
• Greenfire and Byron No. 1 watched the experimental army collapse and speculated that Evan’s Bloodthirsty Species Characteristic let his blood contain and blend with toxins and plagues.
• Evan hurled the plague fruits at the two men, but Greenfire drained their vitality and welcomed the chance to keep Evan for himself.
• Greenfire summoned a Greenflame Dancer, and the Panel warned Evan that the Darkfire King’s Curse was seducing his Demon Hunter Characteristic.
• The Greenflame Dancer resisted Evan’s Garden of Life and suppressed his Demon Hunter Sight and Toxic Blood, but Evan realized his other Beyonder Characteristics still worked.

Evan fought Greenfire and Byron No. 1 after his Profession Characteristic was locked, but his remaining powers kept him dangerous. Unable to defeat Greenfire or risk drawing other enemies, Evan tried to persuade the two men to work with him instead.

• After his Profession was locked, Evan’s Spirituality manifested as a lovestruck silver-haired soul, while Greenfire trapped him with flaming ropes and revealed his mutated Demon abilities.
• Evan contaminated Greenfire through their exchange of words, then struck him with a Bone Fist Gauntlet and shattered his head with an Uppercut.
• Byron No. 1 intervened with a Flesh Wall, giving Greenfire time to regenerate his head and burn away the Viruses Evan had implanted.
• Evan concluded that Greenfire’s green flame countered the Garden of Life and that their fight could leave them vulnerable to other factions.
• Evan challenged Byron No. 1 and Greenfire’s assumptions about their control of the Ruins, warning that rivals from outside or within their organizations could take advantage of them.

Evan learned about Greenfire’s abilities before outsiders arrived in the Ruins, including Rudolf, Duma, Charles Madu, and Yit. Yit revealed that he had activated the second stage of Black Sun’s Wings and the first stage of Black Sun’s Shadow, and Rudolf began fighting him.

• Byron No. 2 explained Greenfire’s powers and praised Evan, while Evan urged Byron No. 1 to study emotional intelligence.
• A golden flash brought two groups of outsiders into the Ruins, including Rudolf, Duma, Charles Madu, and Yit.
• Evan recognized Madu and Yit as targets on Great-Grandmother’s kill list and saw their arrival as a chance to fulfill his Contract.
• Duma revealed that he had used Rudolf’s Spirituality resonance to enter the Ruins, and Yit attacked Rudolf to claim the Sun Bloodline in his body.
• Yit survived Rudolf’s punch and manifested Black Sun’s Wings and strange mouths that Byron No. 2 identified as signs of the God-Devouring Child.
• Byron No. 2 explained that Yit had activated the second stage of Black Sun’s Wings and the first stage of Black Sun’s Shadow, then Rudolf powered up and welcomed the fight.

Evan and Greenfire joined forces against Duma’s group as rival factions converged on the ruins. The Holy Sword Execution Squad killed an Eye of Horus leader and announced they wanted the Radiance Prism, while their captain became fascinated by Evan’s Copperization.

• Rudolf’s attack on Yit failed, and Greenfire’s flames burned Yit before Duma shielded it with a demon spirit.
• Greenfire proposed that he and Evan join forces against the other groups, and Evan agreed while Byron No. 1 took offense at their exchange.
• The Holy Sword Execution Squad and Gust’s Eye of Horus faction arrived at the ruins, bringing the number of gathered factions to six.
• Three Holy Sword warriors attacked the Eye of Horus leader, and their captain killed her with a blow from a skull-filled blood wheel.
• The captain said his squad wanted the Radiance Prism and warned the others not to interfere, then recognized Evan’s Copperization and praised his life energy.

Evan confronted the Holy Sword Execution Squad after its captain targeted him for his mature Copperization, and the battle exposed the origin of Evan’s Magic Artifact. Evan left the captain’s Brass body melting and burning from his Viruses and Plague, astonishing everyone who witnessed it.

• Greenfire rescued Evan from the captain’s chains and declared that the squad could not take him, starting a battle between the gathered factions.
• The captain pursued Evan, recognizing his Copperization and identifying the Bone Saint Child’s aura in Evan’s transforming Magic Artifact.
• After the captain revealed Evan’s connection to Sapp’s failed ascension, the other fighters realized Evan had acquired the Bone Saint Child’s companion Magic Artifact.
• Evan struck the captain with his Fist Gauntlet and infected him with Viruses and Plague, which began melting the supposedly contamination-proof Sacred Brass.
• The captain’s body burst apart as flaming growths spread through its molten Brass, leaving the fighters stunned by Evan’s burning Viruses and Plague.

Evan fought off Greenfire and Duma while using the Sacred Bone Staff’s transformations to seize a Magic Artifact and attack Byron No. 1 at range. As Byron No. 1’s allies closed in and the battle descended into chaos, he activated the Golden Badge, threatening to take everyone down with him.

• Evan escaped Duma’s Demon Spirit by burning it with red Viruses and Plagues, then flew toward Byron No. 1 in search of an ally.
• Greenfire tried to stop Evan with a Giant Beast’s Spine Magic Artifact, but Evan bound it with Blood Chains and absorbed it.
• Evan’s strange dog head howled, collapsing Greenfire’s flame cage and frightening the Flame Spirits into retreat.
• Evan transformed the Sacred Bone Staff into a rifle and infected Byron No. 1’s fleeing chunks of flesh with Plague until Byron’s true body fell.
• Duma blocked Greenfire from reaching Byron No. 1, while Yit charged toward Byron and the recovering captain ordered his squad to attack everyone.
• Byron No. 1 pressed the Golden Badge and threatened to make everyone die with him.

Greenfire’s plan plunged the Ruins into darkness while Deep Ones used the students’ dreams to power a Magic Array in the Real World. Evan killed Byron Number One, but the ancient communicator he had activated summoned a Sun Son, who recognized Evan’s black wings as a heresy.

• Greenfire crushed a blue droplet, flooding the Ruins with darkness as the Masters sensed strange creatures and growth nearby.
• In the Real World, most of the students, Professor Mons, and Lane collapsed; Professor Freem and Morales remained standing as two Deep Ones confronted them.
• The Deep Ones explained that they were borrowing the students’ dreams to sustain a Magic Array and revealed that Arkham was safe in the Dreamlands; Freem agreed to observe rather than fight.
• Evan kicked Yit away, devoured Byron Number One’s soul, and learned from Byron Number Two that Number One had used an ancient communicator to summon a Solar Dynasty expeditionary force.
• A Golden-armored Sun Son arrived from the darkness and fixed his gaze on Evan’s black wings, which the Solar Dynasty regarded as the ultimate heresy.

Dan Tie, a long-lost Sun Son, awoke among the ruins of the Sun Empire and attacked Evan and the others, mistaking them for blasphemers. As the survivors fled toward the Giant Egg for shelter, Dan Tie repeatedly blasted Evan apart, but Evan kept regenerating.

• Dan Tie awoke in ruined Sun Empire territory, fought back his bloodthirsty instincts, and recognized the Black Sun's presence in the Giant Egg and the people nearby.
• Dan Tie attacked Evan with a lightning-wreathed blade, splitting him apart, then killed Yit despite the Demon Spirit's defense.
• Greenfire and the captain of the Holy Sword Execution Squad approached Evan to seize the Sacred Bone Staff and his spirit, but Evan regenerated and urged them to flee together toward the Giant Egg.
• Evan used Blood Chains to pull Gust from hiding and carried him as the group ran, while Dan Tie pursued and shattered Evan with his shoulder-mounted cannon.
• Evan repeatedly regenerated after Dan Tie's attacks and joked that even when the rest of his body was destroyed, his mouth remained intact.