Chapter Summaries

Evan and the Silent Knights traveled toward Hillkin as explosions and a damaged bridge revealed unrest in the region. After the Workers' Party leaders decided to turn an armed riot into an uprising, Evan sent a raven to inform Dawn.

• Reno found that explosives had destroyed a railway bridge, forcing Evan and the other passengers to wait for a train to return.
• Evan learned that Hillkin's Workers' Party members had been arrested and chose to continue toward the region, where Dawn was monitoring the party.
• Workers seized Hillkin's arms factory, stormed the prison, and freed two Workers' Party representatives and other members.
• Polly urged the party leaders to overthrow Hillkin's ruling nobles and seek autonomy, and Joseph and others agreed to make the riot an uprising.
• Evan and the Silent Knights reached Hillkin, and Evan sent a raven carrying news of the uprising back to Dawn.

Mulan learned that Hillkin’s uprising had grown from severe exploitation and decided Dierjia should intervene, while his Shadow Demon self and Shire traveled to Doya to find Moor. They found Moor fleeing with a group of armed people as vampires or blood thralls closed in, and the chapter ended with Moor giving his silver-bullet revolver to the group’s leader.

• Mulan studied intelligence records on Hillkin, judged that the Workers’ Party would likely fail, and ordered Raven Church members in Ilkhan to gather there and protect the people.
• Mulan’s Shadow Demon body left Silias with Shire, who wanted to find a role beyond resting in Great Oak Town.
• In Doya, Shire sensed blood thralls, and the two saw a newspaper warning children and young women not to go out at night.
• Mulan and Shire tracked Moor to an abandoned office, found one of Handel’s books, and continued searching for him.
• Near a factory, Moor and more than twenty armed companions fled attackers; Moor gave the group’s leader his revolver loaded with Handel’s Alchemical Silver Bullets.

Moor escaped the monsters hunting him in Bach and reunited with Mulan and Shire, who urged him to travel to Hillkin to support the uprising. When a vampire arrived to seize him, Shire attacked and cut the vampire’s throat.

• Moor’s group used Alchemical Silver Bullets to destroy a pursuing monster and reached a factory where more than a hundred workers sheltered him.
• Mulan and Shire found Moor, returned the book he had left behind, and asked him to go to Hillkin and help the Workers’ Party’s uprising.
• Moor learned that his student and the Workers’ Party had led an uprising in Hillkin, while Shire explained that the monsters hunting him were Blood Slaves.
• Seven vampires entered the workshop, and their leader threatened to taste Moor’s blood.
• Shire stepped forward to fight the vampires, then appeared in front of their leader and cut his throat.

Shire killed a vampire at the factory, and Mulan and Shire escorted Moor toward the Ilkhan Kingdom while their allies coordinated through raven messengers. As workers rebelled in Hillkin and overwhelmed the local garrison, the city’s nobles tried to evacuate, leaving the fighting unresolved.

• Shire used his Blood Shadow Handblade to kill a vampire, whose death caused six Blood Slaves to collapse and rot away.
• Moor left the factory with Mulan and Shire, urging the workers to keep resisting the Doya authorities and promising to return.
• At dawn, Owen and another man examined the vampire’s remains and concluded that powerful allies might be backing the workers.
• Moor received a message from Mulan through a raven, while Evan gathered forces in Hillkin and prepared for emergencies.
• Workers attacked a garrison post between Hillkin’s wealthy district and Industrial District, using a cannon to destroy a fortification.
• An officer told Hillkin’s nobles that the garrison lacked modern weapons and ammunition, then arranged their evacuation after they promised the soldiers combat bonuses.

The Rebel Army seized Hillkin City’s stores and City Hall, but the Ilkhan Kingdom rejected negotiations as the dead rose to attack the rebels. Reno fought the Living Dead while Evan observed events and Phoenix killed the Court Wizard watching over the uprising.

• The rebels captured a grain warehouse and City Hall, and Polly sent a telegram to the capital with the Workers’ Party leaders.
• Polly read the kingdom’s reply, which declared that rebels would be executed and offered no terms.
• Dead garrison soldiers rose around City Hall and attacked the rebels, who retreated inside as the Living Dead swarmed the grounds.
• Reno fought the Living Dead outside City Hall and told the rebels to target their heads with gunfire.
• Evan met the mink-coated Ilkhan Court Wizard on a rooftop and said he would leave Hillkin to observe events.
• Phoenix killed the Court Wizard with a swift sword strike while Evan explained how he had distracted him.

Evan, Phoenix, and Reno saved the Workers' Party rebels in Hillkin and warned them that the Ilkhan Kingdom would attack. After the kingdom sent an ultimatum and launched its assault, the rebels and Dawn members fought back and repelled the first attack.

• Phoenix killed the mink-coated death mage while Reno defeated the Living Dead outside City Hall, then surviving rebels rushed out and nearly fired on Reno.
• Evan told Polly Baso and the Workers' Party leaders that their uprising could not succeed alone and urged them to prepare for war.
• Evan reported that Ilkhan Kingdom troops were advancing, and the kingdom dropped leaflets threatening Workers' Party members while offering pardons to workers who captured them.
• The Raven Messenger and a flock of crows attacked three Airships, causing them to crash and prompting the Kingdom Army general to order an immediate assault.
• Dawn members helped defend the rebel positions as the Kingdom Army attacked with artillery and Steam Tanks, and the rebels destroyed a tank and held off the first assault.

As the Kingdom Army intensified its assault on Hillkin, Evan authorized a decapitation strike while the Workers' Party launched a counterattack. Reno infiltrated the enemy camp but failed to kill its spellcaster, and the rebel counterattack ended in devastating losses.

• A Raven Church follower survived the Kingdom Army's advance by hiding under a corpse, while fighting continued across Hillkin for a week.
• Evan agreed to Reno's plan for a decapitation strike and ordered the Dawn members to support a coordinated counterattack that night.
• The Workers' Party led hundreds of rebels in an assault that briefly overwhelmed the Kingdom Army's outer fortifications as Reno's squad waited outside the camp.
• Reno disguised himself among the living dead, then used a flock of ravens as cover to enter the camp and attack its command tent.
• A spellcaster's Alchemy Talisman saved him from Reno's twin blades, and gunfire forced Reno to withdraw with several bullet wounds.
• The Kingdom Army crushed the rebel counterattack, leaving only six Dawn members and a dozen wounded or maimed rebels to return.

As the Ilkhan Kingdom’s army crushed the Hillkin Uprising, Evan and the Dawn Members led survivors out of Hillkin City. Two days later, Moor reached the survivors and rallied them to continue resisting, awakening a fire of magic power.

• As surrender spread among the rebels, some captured Charles and other Workers’ Party members, and the Ilkhan Commander ordered a general assault on Hillkin City.
• Evan, Phoenix, Reno, and the Dawn Members led a breakout with hundreds of rebels and Workers’ Party members while Kingdom Army troops attacked the city.
• Evan used powerful magic to kill charging soldiers and tank crews, revealing his location and drawing an artillery barrage as the group fled under cover of suicidal crow attacks.
• Two days later, Mulan and Shire arrived with Moor at the survivors’ camp, where Evan and the Dawn Members welcomed them.
• Moor comforted the survivors and urged them to keep resisting, then flames of magic power ignited in his hands.

Mulan and his companions intervened when the Kingdom Army prepared to execute captured Workers' Party members, rescuing them with a shadow-and-crow attack. Mulan used Chris's Love to summon the Raven Queen's power against a flutist wielding a holy relic, then escaped with the prisoners.

• The Kingdom Army paraded over a hundred captured Workers' Party members to an execution ground and sentenced them to death by firing squad.
• A wounded Workers' Party member denounced the nobles and capital before soldiers struck him and prepared to fire.
• Moor restrained his anger while Mulan secretly spread shadow magic through the crowd and summoned crows to disrupt the execution.
• A Supernatural Being from Ilkhan used a flute and a holy relic to dispel the crows and attack Mulan, who drank Chris's Love and summoned the Raven Queen's power.
• Mulan sent a crow after the flutist, who used his companion as a shield, and the attack wounded them both.
• The Workers' Party members vanished from the platform, and Mulan escaped with them after identifying the flutist's threat.

After the Hillkin Uprising, Mulan and Moor helped the Workers' Party refine its ideology, form a guerrilla army, and spread resistance across Ilkhan. By early July, Basman had agreed to arm the growing movement, while Mulan anticipated that their mutual exploitation would eventually backfire on Basman.

• News of the Hillkin Uprising spread widely, while authorities in several countries banned Moor's books and repression intensified in Ilkhan.
• In a remote northern Ilkhan village, Moor and Workers' Party members refined their program as Mulan recorded how their shared convictions could awaken magic power.
• Mulan showed Moor the Book of Dawn and explained the threat Dawn faced, then the two agreed to support each other's cause.
• With Dawn's support, the Workers' Party formed its first guerrilla army, and scattered uprisings spread across Ilkhan as the authorities tried to suppress public opinion.
• Basman's secret agents agreed to help arm the Workers' Party, whose forces in northern Ilkhan grew to nearly two thousand by early July.

Evan and Mulan found Taylor, a former Holy Temple believer who had endured lingering pain while waiting for the First Apostle. Mulan cleansed Taylor with the Book of Dawn and recruited him to help uncover the Holy Temple’s secrets.

• Taylor delivered fish to the Holy Temple, returned to his basement, and drank liquor to dull the pain in his scarred leg.
• Evan visited Taylor, who feared he was a monster, and asked whether Taylor had met the First Apostle.
• Mulan arrived and revealed that he was the Sage and the First Apostle of the Dawn Association.
• Mulan used the Book of Dawn to burn away the evil god’s influence in Taylor, leaving him free of pain and newly determined to fight.
• Mulan asked Taylor to investigate the Holy Temple’s deeper structure, the location of the Stone of Revelation, and the whereabouts of the world’s holy relics.

Taylor left Sawei for the West Ridge Duchy to seek information and possibly reach Sacred Mountain, while Mulan and Evan discussed Dawn’s plans. At Black Castle, Alopha and Matt succeeded in growing crystals that could provide a physical substrate for Psychic Weapons, raising the possibility of forging weapons capable of piercing holy relics.

• Taylor received an encrypted telegram and decided to travel to the West Ridge Duchy, leaving a replacement to impersonate Taisi in Sawei.
• Taylor disguised himself and departed, while Mulan and Evan discussed the Ilkhan uprising, holy relics, and the growing supernatural dangers.
• Alopha showed Mulan and Matt ice-like crystals grown in a culture dish after months of experiments.
• Alopha and Matt celebrated the breakthrough and planned to answer their critics in the next issue of Truth and Magic.
• Mulan realized that enough crystals could make it possible to forge a Psychic Weapon imbued with Dawn’s will that might pierce a holy relic.

Mulan, Alopha, and Matt successfully stabilized a Psychic Crystal, and the sixth issue of Truth and Magic spread the news across the supernatural world. Mulan then gave Sebastina a Crystal Dagger and ordered her to prepare to break through an exceptionally tough target.

• Mulan and Alopha used an Alchemy Magic Array to fuse the crystals into a stable, rice-grain-sized Psychic Crystal, and Matt joined their celebration.
• The researchers postponed the sixth issue of Truth and Magic until their next results were ready, then published their findings and a sarcastic supplement targeting their critics.
• Readers across the world reacted to the issue, while an old man who had written an abusive submission destroyed his work and decided to write in support of the researchers instead.
• Sebastina worried that Mulan doubted her loyalty, but Mulan visited her after class and asked her to use a special weapon against an extremely tough object.
• Mulan gave Sebastina a Psychic Materialization Crystal Dagger and told her to rest and conserve her strength until she learned what she would attack.

Sebastina traveled with the Raven Messenger to Silias, a secret realm surrounding a colossal world tree, where the Raven Queen tasked her with destroying the Wish-Granting Pot. Sebastina pierced the Holy Relic with her dagger, and the Pot exploded, unleashing a shock wave and torrents of strange energy across the Secret Realm.

• Sebastina accepted Mulan's command to prepare for a future mission and later received Route Directions from the Raven Messenger.
• The Raven Messenger guided Sebastina into Silias, where she saw the world tree and met Farolynch.
• The Raven Queen appeared, revealed that the Wish-Granting Pot was the target, and told Sebastina to destroy it.
• Sebastina used her thief skills and transparent dagger to pierce the Wish-Granting Pot, despite its resistance.
• The dagger shattered, and the Wish-Granting Pot exploded, knocking everyone except the Raven Queen to the ground as strange energies surged through the Secret Realm.

Dawn destroyed the Wish-Granting Pot, unleashing elemental energy across the world and freeing people such as Kilga from its influence. As Mulan explained Dawn’s plan to manage the resulting rise in chaos, Shire’s growing resolve led him to help a poor child while pursuing his mission among Ilkhan’s nobles.

• The Raven Queen and the World Tree absorbed much of the Wish-Granting Pot’s released energy before it crumbled to dust, and Dawn’s members celebrated its destruction.
• Elemental activity and violent weather spread across the world, while Kilga realized the Wish-Granting Pot’s hold on him had ended and ordered his forces to conquer the remaining satellite islands.
• Sebastina returned to report to Mulan, who explained that destroying the Holy Relics would initially raise the world’s energy but eventually allow the World Tree to purify the remaining chaos.
• Mulan praised Lun Chakus’s comments on the spiritual domain during a public lecture.
• In Ilkhan, Shire reflected on oppression, bought all the goods a poor girl was selling, gave her his scarf and coins, and continued his mission to approach the grand dukes.

Queen Nisheriel heard Ilkhan’s envoy request Dierjia’s help against Basman and the Workers’ Party uprising. After Ilkhan accepted Dierjia’s demands, the envoy revealed that mysterious dark-powered sorcerers were aiding the rebellion, and Mulan recognized the threat.

• Nisheriel told Dierjia’s officials that Basman was massing troops near Ilkhan’s border and might be supporting the Workers’ Party.
• Ilkhan’s special envoy denied asking Dierjia to wage war, but requested pressure on Basman and offered industrial support.
• Nisheriel demanded Ilkhan accept Dierjia’s terms, including the right to station troops at Tilia Deepwater Port, and the envoy agreed.
• Mulan questioned why Ilkhan could not suppress the uprising, and the envoy explained that mysterious supernatural beings were helping the rebels evade Ilkhan’s forces.
• The envoy said a leader among the sorcerers wielded dark powers, and Mulan nodded gravely as Nisheriel recognized the threat.

Mulan agreed to lead Dierjia’s supernatural team to Ilkhan, ostensibly to help suppress the civil unrest and deter Basman while secretly advancing Dawn’s plans. After Dierjia approved the mission, Mulan assembled a suspiciously well-suited team and traveled toward the northeastern coast.

• Nisheriel asked Mulan whether he personally wanted to go to Ilkhan, and he said he would lead the mission to protect Dierjia and the Queen.
• Mulan planned to use the mission to protect Dawn’s goals and make Basman understand the Dilga Empire’s position.
• Evan told Moor that Mulan Jonester, the Radiant Judge, was also Mr. X, reassuring him that Dawn had an insider leading the expedition.
• Dierjia accepted the Ilkhan envoy’s request, and Mulan selected Sebastina, Menggeli, Haisen, Barton, graduates, and Black Castle students for the team.
• On the train to the northeastern coast, Mulan questioned the Ilkhan People about their enemies and began preparing his plans.

Mulan and his Dierjia party arrived in Ilkhan to help suppress the rebellion, then pressed the king for intelligence instead of attending a banquet. At the military headquarters, they planned for possible rebel attacks, and Mulan prepared to move ahead while considering how to deal with a perceptive Ilkhan general.

• Mulan sailed north with his companions and the Ilkhan envoy, then traveled overnight by train to the Royal Capital.
• Mulan met King Bamye II, greeted Sylven, and insisted on receiving intelligence and preparing to depart rather than attending a welcoming banquet.
• Ilkhan generals discussed likely rebel targets, including Hillkin, Banayang, and the Lomiyang Region, while Mulan warned that the rebels could strike in several places.
• Mulan agreed to move ahead of the Ilkhan armies and noted that the general who identified Lomiyang posed a serious threat.

Mulan and his companions uncovered an attempt to poison them aboard the train and escaped before it exploded, then entered Lomiyang in disguise. The chapter leaves Mulan and his allies approaching the Grand Duke while Black-Robed Mulan warned that the real Mulan Jonester had to be eliminated or driven away.

• Mulan detected enhanced Mind-Erosion Toxin in his coffee, and Handel failed to catch the attendant who had delivered it.
• Mulan ordered everyone to leave the train; Sylven and the two Necromancers followed, and the train later exploded.
• Mulan had the Necromancers send corpses to the crash site as false bodies and collected belongings to support the deception.
• Mulan and Sylven entered Lomiyang disguised as traveling salesmen, and Mulan said they would approach the Grand Duke before targeting the Workers' Party.
• At the ducal residence, Black-Robed Mulan told Shire and the Grand Duke that the train passengers were probably not all dead and that they needed to eliminate or drive off Mulan Jonester.

After the battle, Sylven and the others freed the old duke from magical control and learned that a mole had exposed their movements. Mulan sent Sylven to reinforce the Royal Capital while he began tracking the enemy, leaving Sylven under suspicion and the mole still unidentified.

• Sylven recovered his Magic Flute, whose surface had been corroded by foreign magic, then joined Sebastina and Haisen as they treated the old duke.
• Sebastina told the duke's family that he had been controlled as a human puppet, and the old duke thanked his children and the Dierjia People for saving him.
• Sylven warned that a mole among the kingdom's senior officials knew of the Dierjia People's arrival and might redirect the enemy's attack toward the Royal Capital.
• Mulan returned with a scrap of clothing and questioned whether Sylven was the mole, but Sylven insisted their opponent had hidden his strength.
• Mulan ordered Sylven to return to the Royal Capital and investigate the mole, then told Handel to track the fleeing enemy while he hunted hostile supernatural beings.