Chapter Summaries

Mobius revived Cui Ji, offered to perfect her and her sisters in exchange for experiments and caring for someone, and promised protection from the Ravenlock Family. The chapter left Cui Ji living safely with her sisters and returning to their home on New Year’s Eve.

• Cui Ji relived memories of her torture as Mobius and Girl A monitored her recovery.
• Mobius confronted Cui Ji and Girl A about the institute’s crimes, and Cui Ji defended her sisters’ desire for a home.
• Mobius offered to help Cui Ji and the other clones perfect themselves in exchange for experiments and obedience to someone she would assign them to care for.
• Mobius promised protection and offered to collect interest from the Ravenlock Family.
• Cui Ji later returned to the sisters’ home with gifts, where they welcomed her as she joined their New Year’s Eve preparations.

On Fairy’s first business day of the new year, Hugo visited Wise and Belle to ask about the [Son of the Devil], but Griseo knocked him unconscious after sensing their alarm. Hugo later described the film and invited Wise to a public raffle connected to an upcoming videotape auction before leaving the store.

• Wise told Belle that a huge order had arrived, and she hurried to prepare for the client.
• Hugo arrived, introduced himself as a collector, and asked Wise and Belle about the [Son of the Devil].
• Griseo sensed the managers’ tension and knocked Hugo unconscious with her [Discipline] Signets.
• Wise carried Hugo to the inner HDD room, where Hugo woke and pretended that he had simply fallen asleep.
• Hugo explained that [Son of the Devil] was an Old Capital film and invited Wise to try a public raffle for an upcoming videotape auction.
• Hugo said goodbye to Wise and left the store.

Mayor Meflor visited the video store, revealed that he had known Carole, and offered to upgrade Wise and Belle’s HDD system so they could regain their Ether aptitude. He also commissioned them to retrieve the stolen Sacrificial Ghost Core at a TOPS auction, then invited Griseo to the Municipal Government with the prospect of a Void Hunter Badge.

• Wise rushed back to the video store after Belle warned him it was in danger and learned that Victoria Housekeeping’s master, Mayor Meflor, was coming to meet them.
• Meflor arrived and revealed that he knew Belle and Wise’s teacher Carole, while saying that the fall of the Old Capital required a public culprit despite his belief that more had happened.
• Meflor explained that the HDD system suppressed Wise and Belle’s natural Ether aptitude and offered to have Lycaon upgrade it so they could eventually enter Hollows themselves.
• Meflor commissioned Wise and Belle to attend a TOPS auction and help the Municipal Government recover the stolen Sacrificial Ghost Core.
• Meflor invited Griseo to the Municipal Government, suggesting that she could take ownership of a long-unused Void Hunter Badge.

Mayor Meflor questioned Griseo about her identity after sharing an ancient myth, and she identified herself as [The Stars]. Speaking through Mobius, Griseo accused the Old Capital government of enabling the Helios Institution’s experiments and covering up its role in the city’s fall; Meflor acknowledged the political infighting behind the disaster and hinted that old factions still sought power.

• Meflor read Griseo a story from the Twelve Gods Chronicle and asked which deity she represented.
• Griseo said she was [The Stars] and described her journey toward unknown possibilities.
• Mobius spoke through Griseo and accused the Old Capital government of knowingly allowing dangerous Ether experiments and concealing the Hollow threat.
• Griseo recounted how officials abandoned Defense Force units, erased evidence, and suppressed witnesses after the Old Capital fell.
• Meflor admitted that factional rivalries and political maneuvering had contributed to the Old Capital’s destruction and said New Eridu remained vulnerable to old power struggles.

In the archives, 'Griseo' challenged Mayor Meflor over his request that she become a Void Hunter and exposed his plan to use an auction to implicate TOPS in the Praise Society’s schemes. She agreed not to stop him and invited him to come with her, leaving him alone with the First-generation Void Hunter Medals.

• Meflor showed 'Griseo' the seven medals of the First-generation Void Hunters and explained that New Eridu was nearing a crisis as Hollow Zero expanded.
• Meflor said the Municipal Government had watched Griseo for two years and hoped she would become a variable against the threat to New Eridu.
• 'Griseo' accused Meflor of inviting her to City Hall to separate her from Phaethon and admitted she had uncovered his plan to divert public attention and weaken TOPS.
• Meflor confessed that the Sacrificial Ghost Core, auction, Mr. Hugo, and Phaethon were bait in a scheme to link the Ravenlock Family and TOPS to the Praise Society.
• 'Griseo' said she would let Meflor's plan proceed because she wanted to see its outcome, then asked him to come with her.
• After 'Griseo' left the archives, Meflor looked at Lady Wanzhou's medal and wondered whether her solitary pursuit of the Primus's power had felt like his own path.

Griseo, Billy, and Meflor watched an exhausted street performer portray the Starlight Knight for children in Lumina Square. After Griseo suggested he might be raising money for a hospitalized family member, she asked Billy to take her back to the Municipal Government, leaving Meflor quietly affected by what he had witnessed.

• Billy greeted Griseo and Meflor in Lumina Square and posed proudly as the Starlight Knight.
• The group watched a worn-out performer act out Starlight Knight moves for children, who cheered and gave him pocket money.
• After the crowd left, the performer removed his helmet and gathered his props and the Denny he had received.
• Griseo asked Billy whether he smelled disinfectant, and Billy guessed the performer was raising money for a family member's medical expenses.
• Griseo told Billy to take her to the Municipal Government and said she was about to become a Void Hunter.

Meflor read Griseo a report about Morel, a struggling street performer who played the Starlight Knight to bring joy to his hospitalized daughter, Claire. After promising Claire that the hero would visit her, Morel left for another job while hospital staff worried about his health and finances.

• Sivillian delivered Meflor the report on the performer, and Griseo asked Meflor to read it aloud.
• The report described Morel's nightly performances and his visits to Claire, who had been hospitalized for Ether Adaptation Failure Syndrome for three years.
• Morel shared milk with Claire and told her about the Starlight Knight, promising the hero would visit when she felt better.
• After Claire fell asleep, Morel rested briefly in the corridor before leaving at two in the morning for another job.
• Phil gave Morel a loaf of bread, while another nurse suggested asking the head nurse for more financial help.

Morel accepted a job performing as the Starlight Knight on Sixth Street after Griseo, Billy, and Meflor learned of his sacrifices to care for his daughter. He left with a meal for her and an advance payment promised, while Billy mistook Meflor’s official documents for forgeries.

• Billy, Griseo, and Meflor invited the exhausted Morel to eat and offered him a paid performance job on Sixth Street.
• Meflor showed Morel documents for the event and offered to arrange care for his daughter if she came along.
• Morel explained that his daughter had Ether Adaptation Failure Syndrome and confessed he felt unworthy of playing the Starlight Knight for her.
• Griseo and Billy encouraged Morel to accept the role and bring his daughter to the show.
• Meflor offered Morel 500,000 Denny with a 300,000 advance, and Morel signed the contract before leaving with food for his daughter.
• Billy praised Meflor’s convincing disguise, then accused him of forging a Municipal Government seal.

Three days after Griseo’s meeting with Meflor, Sixth Street held a large Starlight Knight performance while Wise and the others continued investigating the Sacrificial Ghost Core. Morel prepared to fulfill his promise to his daughter, and Claire arrived at the show with Qingyi and Zhu Yuan.

• Belle, Billy, and Griseo watched the crowded performance venue from the video store, and Griseo reassured Belle that her power would protect Wise.
• Morel put on the new Starlight Knight suit and went backstage, determined to tell his daughter and the crowd, “In the name of starlight, I will protect you.”
• Qingyi and Zhu Yuan brought Claire to the front of the stage in a wheelchair, and Claire said she trusted Qingyi to protect her.

Morel performed as Starlight Knight to bring joy to his daughter Claire, who was seriously ill. After the show, Claire asked the knight to make life easier for her exhausted father, and Morel promised to grant her wish.

• Belle spotted Zhu Yuan and Qingyi attending the event with Claire, while Meflor had sent them as a way to give them time off.
• Morel appeared as Starlight Knight and defeated three villains in a staged fight, delighting the children and Claire.
• Griseo gathered colored light, explaining that a father's color had brought everyone's happiness together.
• Morel left the stage and approached Claire, who joyfully recognized Starlight Knight and touched his costume.
• Claire refused to wish for her illness to be cured and instead asked Starlight Knight to make things easier for her tired father.
• Morel promised to grant Claire's wish, and they sealed the promise with a pinky swear.

Meflor learned that Morel and Claire had been killed after the Ravenlock Family turned to targeting poor citizens for organs. A mysterious message summoned him to Lumina Square, and he ordered New Eridu onto emergency footing while addressing Griseo as “Your Highness.”

• Meflor reviewed Lycaon's report and continued planning to use Hugo to weaken TOPS and advance City Hall's position.
• Servilian reported that Morel and Claire had been found dead near the Hollow in eastern Janus District.
• Meflor read the report linking the Ravenlock Family's organ trafficking to the deaths of poor citizens and condemned TOPS.
• A blue orb delivered a message summoning Meflor to Lumina Square.
• Meflor ordered a level-one combat alert, the return of elite personnel and Hoshimi Miyabi, the recall of high-ranking investigators, and the activation of Contingency Plan One.
• Alone in his office, Meflor murmured, “Your Highness Griseo...”

Griseo showed Meflor how her authority could preserve scenes from the past, revealing Morel and Claire sharing a happy moment before their deaths. She offered him a second, unsettling vision, but Meflor asked to skip it, and Griseo dispersed it.

• Griseo told Meflor that Morel and Claire's deaths mattered as little to her as New Eridu's fate did, then offered to show him her authority.
• Meflor touched Griseo's yellow ether orb and experienced Morel bringing breakfast to Claire in the hospital as she enjoyed a meat bun and began to recover.
• Meflor realized the vision had captured a past moment from Morel and Claire's lives and feared the power Griseo had demonstrated.
• Griseo explained that [The Stars]' authority collected paint and gestured toward a gray orb.
• Meflor asked to skip the gray orb, and Griseo dispersed it.

Morel found a better job and spent happy days with Claire, but her condition suddenly worsened and doctors persuaded him to approve experimental surgery. The chapter ended with the doctor telling Morel that Claire had died.

• Morel quit his freight-yard jobs after finding flexible, better-paid work as the Starlight Knight at an amusement park so he could spend more time with Claire.
• Hartmann ordered a hospital administrator to act once Claire's genetic sample was ready, agreeing to payment and a location as usual.
• Morel received a call that Claire's condition had worsened and returned to the hospital, where a doctor claimed her improvement had been a final rally before the end.
• The doctor persuaded Morel to sign consent for experimental Organ-Targeted Repair Surgery using an Ether reagent, and nurses took Claire into the operating room.
• After three hours, the doctor came out and told Morel, "I'm sorry. We did everything we could."

After discovering that the girl in the operating room was not Claire, Morel tracked Doctor Lin and the people who had taken his daughter. He pursued their vehicle into a Hollow despite Zhu Yuan’s warning, determined to rescue Claire himself.

• Morel noticed the body’s clean wrists and missing birthmark and realized the girl in the operating room was not Claire.
• Morel learned Doctor Lin had left, then found him loading large boxes into a vehicle near the hospital’s back entrance.
• Morel called Zhu Yuan with the vehicle’s license plate and followed it as it headed east.
• Zhu Yuan tracked the vehicle into a Hollow and warned Morel to stop and wait for professionals.
• Morel thanked Zhu Yuan, then entered the Hollow without protective equipment or a Proxy’s guidance to search for Claire.

Morel found Claire imprisoned in a Hollow Raiders’ camp and fought his way to her, but Doctor Lin and the bandits surrounded them. A later document revealed that Morel and Claire were brutally killed and Claire’s organs were harvested.

• Morel endured Ether corrosion in the Hollows and spotted Claire among children held in cages at a bandit camp.
• Morel killed a bandit who had left the camp, took his clothes, and disguised himself to get closer to Claire.
• Doctor Lin recognized Morel, but Morel knocked him down and broke open Claire’s cage.
• Morel reunited with Claire as the bandits gathered around them, and his Strong Luck was exhausted.
• Servilian’s document reported that Doctor Lin kept Morel alive while Claire’s organs were removed, then Morel suffered thirty-seven comminuted fractures.

Mobius revealed to Meflor that Griseo’s perception of human emotions could make her either protect or destroy New Eridu, and challenged him to decide whether to fight. Meflor’s hidden fighters attacked, and Griseo began forming a Taixu array to counter them.

• Mobius explained that Griseo sensed humanity’s emotions as colors and that the events surrounding Morel and Claire had nearly driven her to destroy New Eridu.
• Meflor realized Griseo’s calm concealed how close she had come to losing control, while Mobius formed an Ether barrier around Lumina Square.
• Mobius sensed seven fighters concealed nearby and acknowledged Meflor’s ability to gather them.
• Hoshimi Miyabi and a white-haired fighter launched attacks at Griseo, followed by the other hidden fighters.
• Mobius switched the Infinity Signet to Mortal Life, and Griseo began forming the Taixu Formation—Bagua Rebirth.

Hua used Griseo’s body to demonstrate the Bagua Rebirth formation against Meflor’s assembled fighters, then Griseo revealed she was present in person. Meflor surrendered, mistaking Hua’s power for another authority Griseo had acquired.

• Hoshimi Miyabi, Yixuan, Ithaqua, and four Municipal Government fighters attacked Griseo inside the sealed barrier.
• Hua took control of Griseo and used Bagua Rebirth to trap Hoshimi Miyabi and Yixuan while nullifying the other fighters’ attacks.
• Ithaqua attempted a sneak attack, but Griseo’s force repelled him, briefly allowing Hoshimi Miyabi and Yixuan to break free.
• Hua expanded the formation and struck its center with Inch force, cleaving the heavens, forcing Ithaqua to one knee, and sending the four weaker fighters flying.
• Griseo returned to herself, told Meflor she was not an avatar, and Meflor raised his hands in surrender.

After Griseo ended the confrontation with Meflor, she challenged him to consider whether a story’s ending mattered, prompting Hoshimi Miyabi and Yixuan to revisit painful memories of their families. The group dispersed, while Meflor asked Miyabi to plan an operation against Niniwe and invited Yixuan to discuss Yunkui Mountain.

• Meflor surrendered, ending the clash between the Municipal Government and Griseo, and Griseo asked whether a story’s ending mattered.
• Griseo said Morel and Claire’s story was over but New Eridu’s stories continued, then left Meflor to think about her question.
• Hoshimi Miyabi remembered killing her mother at her mother’s request and realized she wished that story had ended differently.
• Yixuan remembered her sister’s sacrifice in Hollow Zero and the grief she had hidden for eleven years.
• Meflor told Ithaqua to report the confrontation as a false alarm and asked everyone to keep the events confidential.
• Meflor asked Hoshimi Miyabi to prepare a plan to eliminate Niniwe and invited Yixuan to discuss Yunkui Mountain at City Hall.

After Griseo exhausted herself confronting the Municipal Government experts, Cui Ji carried her toward the video store and reassured her about Claire. The story then turned back two days, when Griseo and Cui Ji prepared Mobius’s reagents to try to help Claire.

• Griseo’s knees buckled after she left the confrontation, and Cui Ji caught her and carried her on her back.
• Cui Ji told Griseo not to blame herself for what happened to Claire and reminded her that she did not have to save everyone.
• Two days earlier, Cui Ji searched The Stars Publishing House for the reagents Mobius had made to extend the Silver Replicas’ lifespans.
• Cui Ji found the vials, and Griseo confirmed with Mobius that they could be used for Claire.
• Griseo and Cui Ji drove through a storm toward the hospital, joking about rainy-night scenes and Griseo’s comic updates.

Griseo and Cui Ji learned that Claire had supposedly died, while her father Morel had vanished after entering a Hollow to rescue her. Zhu Yuan’s investigation revealed that the body was a clone created with Silver Army technology, and Cui Ji set out to investigate Morel’s disappearance in Hollow LB-10.

• Griseo and Cui Ji visited the hospital to see Claire, but the nurse told them Claire had died after a failed surgery and Morel had disappeared.
• Zhu Yuan arrived and explained that Morel had reported Claire abducted, then entered a Hollow alone to rescue her and could no longer be contacted.
• Zhu Yuan examined Claire’s body, and Cui Ji identified it as a clone made with Silver Army technology.
• Zhu Yuan called for the Criminal Investigation Squad to investigate the suspected identity fraud and seal the hospital exits.
• Zhu Yuan warned Cui Ji that the case involved the Ravenlock Family and said Morel was last seen in Hollow LB-10; Cui Ji left to find Griseo.