Chapter Summaries

Three years after annexing Greyrock Province, Louis reviewed Red Tide’s growth and intelligence about escalating wars and spreading supernatural threats, then resolved to expand south and overseas. After cultivating, he yielded to Sif and Emily’s advances despite having important plans for the afternoon.

• Louis reflected on Red Tide’s expanded ports, roads, railways, and stable administration, as well as his own advancement to Early Peak Knight.
• Louis learned that the Jade Federation and Kalien’s Empire were nearing war and considered how Red Tide could profit before marching south.
• Louis read that the Calvin Family’s power was growing in the Holy Eastern Empire while the Golden Feather Flower Church assimilated the island’s population, and he planned to annex the empire and build ships for an overseas campaign.
• Louis learned that Balk had been deeply assimilated by the Coral of Illusory Desire and decided to eliminate the pirates and the force behind the coral.
• Louis cultivated his Battle Aura and magic, then told Sif and Emily he had important work before giving in to their advances.

Louis arrived at Dawnlight Harbor and saw how its strict laws, infrastructure, and mechanized industries had transformed the city. At the dockyard, Oland showed him the armored flagship Fernando, leaving Louis to admire the ship as the finest work of their age.

• Louis departed Red Tide by train after Sif teased him and Emily reminded him to stay warm and delegate his work.
• Elliott welcomed Louis to Dawnlight Harbor, and Louis praised the governor’s composure after two years apart.
• Elliott showed Louis the harbor’s clean streets and workers, explaining how the Red Tide Code provided housing and wages while enforcing strict rules.
• Louis saw steam-powered conveyors and foundries replacing much manual labor, then asked Elliott to take him to the dockyard.
• Oland explained his shipbuilding standards and presented the armored flagship Fernando, which Louis called the most beautiful work of their age.

Louis inspected the Red Tide Fief’s heavily armed steam warship and ordered it to sail before its sea trials were complete. At dawn, the ship left Dawnlight Harbor to hunt the creatures gathering along the southern shipping lanes.

• Oland showed Louis the ship’s watertight compartments and steam engines, where the stokers hurried to feed the boiler after learning who he was.
• Oland guided Louis through the warship’s main guns, rapid-fire cannons, Reaper weapons, Dragon Breath System, and Deepwater Concussion Bombs.
• Louis ordered the crew to finish resupplying and prepare to sail at six the next morning, despite the ship having completed only half its sea trials.
• The warship blasted its steam whistle and departed Dawnlight Harbor as thousands of residents watched and cheered.
• The steel behemoth sailed into the mist-shrouded sea toward the creatures gathered along the southern shipping lanes.

Rosa received Balk’s offer to join a pirate alliance using Corrosive Touch against Louis’s Red Tide ships, and decided to attend the meeting so she could steal the formula for herself. She reached Skull Fortress wary of the gathered crews and the strange, diseased attendants, while her ship waited offshore under orders to fire on the fortress if anything went wrong.

• Rosa received Balk’s letter and a Deep-Sea Black Pearl, then resolved to go to the Shattered Isles and take the Corrosive Touch formula for herself.
• Rosa approached Skull Fortress and recognized the ships of Karn the Bonecrusher, Viper, and other pirates gathered in its anchorage.
• Rosa anchored five nautical miles from the fortress and ordered Miller to keep the guns trained on it, fire indiscriminately if she was in danger, and sail away afterward.
• Rosa went ashore with two guards and found the docks unnaturally quiet, with black-robed attendants whose gray, slimy skin made her suspect disease or alchemical poison.

Rosa and the other villains gathered at Skull Fortress to demand a weapon against the iron ship, but Balk arrived transformed by a parasitic organism and revealed that his promised rebirth was a terrifying trap. Balk killed Kahn with ease, leaving the surviving villains facing the creature controlling him.

• Rosa grew impatient while waiting for Balk and threatened him if he could not provide venom capable of melting an iron ship.
• Moro panicked, claimed they were underwater inside a fish, and tried to flee before Balk arrived with a veiled woman.
• Balk appeared unnaturally youthful and claimed the deep sea could rebirth the villains, while Sanders challenged him about his changed appearance.
• Kahn overturned the table and attacked Balk, but Balk stopped his punch with one swollen hand.
• Kahn's fallen hat exposed a pulsing parasite in Balk's open skull, and Balk crushed Kahn's fist and head before the gathered villains.

Balk killed Rosa, Kahn, Moro, and Sanders, then revived them as headless beings and sent the fleet to sea. As Deep Ones overran the harbor, Miller escaped aboard the Scorpion and saw Louis's steel warships arrive.

• Balk consumed Moro's summoned spirits, killed him and Sanders, and defeated Rosa after Kahn had already fallen.
• Balk killed Rosa, and pink growths replaced the heads of all four corpses as they rose again under his control.
• Deep Ones swarmed Miller's ship, infested sailors, and forced him to fire cannons toward the castle to create an opening.
• Miller ordered the Scorpion to flee, cut loose pirates clinging to the hull, and threw wounded and excess crew overboard to lighten the ship.
• Miller saw the reanimated pirates take control of the harbor fleet and flee toward open water aboard the Scorpion.
• Louis's steam-powered warship and its escorts emerged from the fog under the flag of the Red Tide Fief.

Cortes and Red Tide’s steel vanguard fleet crushed the pirate armada before the Tyrant, Shadow Serpent, and Deathwhisper emerged to challenge them. As deep-diving Fishmen jammed the warships’ propellers and the Tyrant closed on the Red Flame, Cortes requested a heavy hammer strike.

• Fishmen drove the pirate ships into Red Tide’s vanguard while thralls rowed and fought under their control.
• Cortes ordered the twelve vanguard ships to fire, then burned pirates who tried to board the Red Flame and pushed the fleet through the wreckage.
• Miller watched the steel warships demolish the pirate fleet, then heard a horn announce the arrival of larger enemy vessels.
• The Tyrant absorbed the fleet’s gunfire, the Shadow Serpent evaded shots, and the Deathwhisper’s psychic assault tested the Red Tide sailors.
• Deep-diving Fishmen clogged the warships’ propellers, slowing them as the Tyrant bore down on the Red Flame.
• Cortes requested a heavy hammer strike to turn the battle against the approaching monsters.

The Fernando effortlessly destroyed the Tyrant, the Shadow Serpent, the Deathwhisper, and the Black Reef Prince with overwhelming firepower. From the Scorpion, Miller watched the battle and realized the legendary sea powers were helpless against the iron warship.

• Alwin ordered the Fernando to engage the three approaching ships, and its bow crushed a pirate brig in its path.
• The Fernando used armor-piercing shells to vaporize the Tyrant and a barrage of secondary guns to tear apart the Shadow Serpent.
• Louis watched as rotary autocannons and alchemical fire destroyed the Deathwhisper and its plague-filled attacks.
• A fused sea monster identified as the Black Reef Prince surfaced, and Alwin ordered the Fernando's supercritical main gun to erase it.
• Miller watched from the Scorpion and collapsed in despair as he recognized that the old sea powers had no chance against the Fernando.

Louis and the Red Tide Knights entered the hall and confronted Balk and Meryl, two grotesque servants of the deep-sea sovereign. Louis killed them effortlessly, leaving his knights stunned and newly devoted to his strength.

• Louis led the Red Tide Knights through the island’s mind-corrupting pink mist and into the hall where Balk and Meryl waited.
• Vale raised a bloodline shield to protect the knights from the monsters’ overwhelming presence, but Louis stepped out of it to face them alone.
• Louis caught Balk’s lunge, drained his power, and crushed his throat and parasitic brain.
• Meryl transformed into a mass of flesh and tentacles and attacked Louis with mind-corrupting mist, but his starlight repelled it.
• Louis drained Meryl’s energy and destroyed her with a crimson-powered punch, leaving no trace of her body.
• Vale and the other knights knelt before Louis after witnessing his overwhelming strength.

Louis entered the Silent Eye alone, defeated its guardians, and absorbed the pink power held within its coral. The visions it revealed hinted at the power’s ancient origins, and Louis left believing that gathering the remaining fragments would uncover the truth.

• Louis ordered Vale and the Transcendent Knights to guard the cave entrance and kill anything that emerged, then entered alone.
• Louis killed twelve Deep Sea Tyrant Warriors and four Deep Sea High Priests with a single rapid attack.
• Louis reached a bone altar and resisted the pink coral’s attempt to overwhelm his consciousness.
• Louis’s powers revealed memories of Balk being taken over by a Brain Jellyfish, an ancient captain’s suicide, and a sorrowful young man holding an infant.
• Louis absorbed the pink power as a fourth halo around the Primordial Heart and gained abilities to influence trust and distort an opponent’s senses.
• Louis concluded that his powers were fragments of a dead being and said he had three and a half fragments left to find.

Selton Calvin accepted Holy Scrip and ordered his family’s shops to prioritize it, while Lampard learned that the Holy See would not support the Southeast Province against the Jade Federation. After Selton refused to help build an independent supply route, Lampard resolved to make a risky move to avoid being discarded.

• Selton Calvin saw that the Holy See was diverting grain, feeding commoners golden soup that gave them unnatural strength, and replacing Imperial currency with Holy Scrip.
• Selton accepted the Holy See’s payment and ordered Calvin Family grain and oil shops to refuse Imperial gold and prioritize Holy Scrip.
• Lampard confronted Cardinal Salomon about the northern threat and the Jade Federation’s advance, but Salomon demanded a larger tithe instead of providing military supplies.
• Selton judged the Holy Eastern Empire doomed and refused Lampard’s request to use Calvin Family trade routes for an independent supply line.
• After Selton left, Lampard admitted he risked being discarded by the Holy See and decided to make a risky move.

The Holy See burned three old nobles at a public execution, while their allies and Duke Calvin failed to intervene. Bishop Salomon summoned Selton Calvin to discuss matters face-to-face.

• A gold-robed cleric of the Inquisition burned three old nobles with golden strange flame, which melted their Ancient Dragon scale amulets as the crowd watched.
• Baron Cass pleaded with Duke Calvin to spare the condemned from being burned, but the duke's gates remained shut and Cass left.
• Selton withheld a blood-written plea from his father, then burned the letter after Duke Calvin remained silent.
• Bishop Salomon ordered a knight to summon Selton Calvin to the cathedral bell tower for a private discussion.

Selton bargained with Bishop Salomon for the Holy See’s support, offering the Calvin Family’s resources in exchange for political power and help purging his rivals. Lampard revealed to Duke Calvin that the Holy See was secretly draining his life, and the duke identified Selton as an enemy and decided to let him take power early.

• Selton met Bishop Salomon atop the bell tower and offered the Calvin Family’s cooperation and half its exclusive grain rights in exchange for being crowned Protector Duke and borrowing the Templar Order.
• Salomon offered to help Selton found a nation and use the Heretic Tribunal against his opponents, and Selton accepted the alliance.
• Lampard entered Duke Calvin’s bedchamber through a secret passage and told him that his decline was caused by a remote life-draining curse used to murder the Regent King.
• Lampard explained that someone who spent long periods with Duke Calvin served as a living anchor for the curse, and the duke realized Selton’s visits and tea deliveries made him part of it.
• Duke Calvin declared Selton an enemy and told Lampard he would grant his son’s wish to take over early.

Louis received Duke Calvin’s final letter and the family signet ring, accepting his position as head of the Calvin Family and preparing to seize the poisoned Southeast Province. He ordered the exhausted Sir Nico kept alive to witness the Red Tide Legion’s military review, while beginning to add a new segment to the event.

• Bradley brought Sir Nico to Louis with Duke Calvin’s letter, which explained the deliberate collapse planned for the Southeast Province and named Louis head of the Calvin Family.
• Louis read Duke Calvin’s instructions, accepted the family ring, and resolved to take control of the crisis in the Southeast.
• Louis ordered Sir Nico given the finest room and a Life Potion, then asked him to assess the Red Tide Legion at its military review.
• Sir Nico addressed Louis as “House Head,” completing the transfer of authority, while Bradley recognized that Duke Calvin was near death.
• Louis reassured Bradley that Duke Calvin was not dead yet and asked about preparations for the military review.
• Louis proposed adding another segment to the next day’s military review and told Bradley to note it down.

Before the Red Tide military parade, the people and nobles gathered to witness the fief’s industrialized army and Louis’s command. Louis opened the parade by drawing his sword and ordering the Blades of Red Tide to unsheathe.

• Red Tide residents and visitors filled the parade ground, showing their prosperity and anticipation of conflict with the South.
• Gray prepared to command the parade, reflecting on how Louis had trained him and entrusted him with the army.
• Nico and Bradley watched the assembled forces, and Nico judged that Louis had surpassed the old duke and hoped the army was strong enough for revenge.
• At ten o’clock, the horn sounded, the crowd fell silent, and Louis stepped onto the reviewing platform.
• Louis quieted the crowd with a gesture, drew his longsword, and ordered the Blades of Red Tide to unsheathe.

Louis displayed the Red Tide Fief’s modern army at a military parade, convincing the nobles and spectators that it could overwhelm the forces of the South. He called for a march south against the Holy See, and the army advanced as supporters pledged their aid.

• Gray ordered the troops to form ranks, and Sako led more than three hundred young Transcendent Knights past the reviewing stand.
• The Tundra Wolf cavalry and Polar Bear Corps paraded, while Nico and other nobles were astonished by the Red Tide Fief’s forces.
• Gray demonstrated the infantry’s rifles, machine guns, and rockets, then showed how the Steam Tanks destroyed an obsidian boulder with their main cannon.
• Louis accused the Holy See of exploiting the people of the Southeast and declared the march south a campaign of liberation and revenge.
• Count Harvey praised Joern for supporting Louis and offered the first shipment of military provisions, while Louis ordered the forces to advance south.

After Duke Calvin’s funeral, Selton took power with the Holy See’s support, but the disappearance of Emperor Lampard and the destruction of the treasury left him exposed. Salomon’s regime brought famine, purges, and Selton’s execution, while Salomon prepared the way for the Golden Feather Flower’s new kingdom.

• At Duke Calvin’s funeral, Selton claimed the regency and pledged a sacred covenant with the Holy See, concealing that his signet ring was fake.
• At the banquet, Selton learned that Emperor Lampard had disappeared, then reassured himself that the Holy See still needed him to access the treasury and collect taxes.
• The Holy See’s officials found the Southeast’s tax records burned, imposed brutal levies, and used the resulting famine and collapse of Holy Scrip to incite witch hunts with promises of flour and Golden Soup.
• Selton discovered that the ducal treasury was empty, but the Holy See cut off his supplies, and his own Knight Order dragged him out and burned him as a heretic.
• Salomon crushed a Dragon Scale Amulet, declared that equality required obedience, and prayed before a Golden Feather Flower seedling in a secret chamber.

Hans endured the Holy See’s starvation and Golden Soup in White Stone Town while secretly preserving a little food and resisting its control. As the Red Tide Army approached, the clergy turned the town into a battlefield and forced its people, including children, into the defenses, leaving Hans praying that Louis would destroy the Holy See’s forces.

• The Holy See seized White Stone Town, murdered the Dragon Ancestor’s priest, imposed sacred quotas, and crushed resistance through executions and imprisonment.
• Hans secretly avoided drinking Golden Soup after seeing it kill a rat, and hid his remaining wheat and meat beneath the millstone.
• A red-robed inquisitor warned the town that the northern Red Tide Army was coming, and the clergy began preparing fortifications with Thorn Knights.
• Thorn Knights demolished homes and killed townspeople, feeding their bodies to thorn roots that formed defensive barriers.
• The clergy forced parents to place children, including Amy, in explosive-filled pits, while Hans was assigned to carry explosives.
• As the Red Tide Army appeared on the horizon, Hans prayed for Louis to slaughter the Holy See’s forces, even if he died too.

Red Tide used Frostleaf Shells to put the Holy See’s child-borne explosives and their handlers to sleep without killing the children. The Thorn Knights then charged through the sleeping children, trampling them as they advanced on Red Tide.

• Old Hans watched from a chimney as the Holy See positioned children carrying explosives across its defenses to stop Red Tide.
• Vance spotted the trap and urged the army to avoid the children, while Gray ordered Type Three Frostleaf Shells fired above them.
• Red Tide’s blue mist put the children and a red-robed cleric to sleep, leaving the explosives scattered and the children alive.
• The Thorn Knights burst through the mist and charged toward Red Tide without regard for the children beneath their feet.
• Old Hans watched the Thorn Knights trample the sleeping children and wished for fire to burn them away.

Gray's Red Tide forces destroyed the Thorn Knights and breached the town's defenses in barely fifteen minutes, then began treating survivors and searching for buried children. As Hans received food and looked up at the Red Tide flag, the Holy See's emblem lay trampled beneath it.

• Gray's troops cut down the charging Thorn Knights with concentrated rifle and machine-gun fire, while tanks crushed the few who reached the front line.
• Gray ordered the Fire Salamander to burn through the living thorn wall, and the Steam Shovel cleared a road into town.
• The Medical and Sanitation Battalion treated the unconscious townspeople as Vance and other soldiers dug children from frozen pits, where fewer than half were still alive.
• Ronan's knights found Hans, confirmed he was a living person who had resisted the Golden Soup, and gave him white bread.
• Hans ate the bread in tears as survivors drank soup in the square and the Red Tide flag rose above the shattered Holy See emblem.