Chapter Summaries

Dile and his companions drove a group of black-clad upperclassmen into Giant Crocodile Lake, then subdued them with Tang Lan’s lightning and looted their spatial pouches. The group finished collecting their haul while Tang Lan stood guard in case anyone woke up.

• Dile chased the black-clad group toward Giant Crocodile Lake with an illusion of Rampaging Brown Bulls, and they leaped into the water to escape.
• The group discovered the lake was full of Giant Crocodiles and fought them while Dile and his companions cooked and ate a crocodile nearby.
• Dile and his companions reached the battered upperclassmen, and Tang Lan shocked their leader when he attacked.
• Tang Lan filled the lake with lightning while Dile, Ning Qing, Cheng Yu, and Bennett pulled the stunned people ashore and knocked down those who tried to fight back.
• Dile and Ning Qing searched the upperclassmen and took their spatial pouches, while Tang Lan watched for anyone who woke up.

Dile and his companions captured and beat Galvin McCauley and the other men in black, then loaded them into a truck and headed toward the group’s base. As Cheng Yu considered staying to gather intelligence, a fireball struck the truck and left Galvin blackened.

• Dile beat the bound Galvin with a brick, while Cheng Yu and Bennett joined in attacking the other men in black.
• Galvin tried to convince Dile that they were fellow Miskatonic University students, but Dile did not believe him.
• Galvin produced a capsule that became a small truck, and Dile’s group loaded him and his companions inside.
• Cheng Yu decided to remain in the area for a while rather than rely only on the Infiltrator Series to gather intelligence.
• A fireball fell toward the truck, and Cheng Yu used Galvin as a shield, leaving him blackened by the explosion.

Dile's squad fought a Man in Black who attacked them in the woods, while Cheng Yu concealed his strength as much as he could. The squad finally incapacitated the man and began beating him with bricks before he could identify himself.

• Dile spotted the disguised Man in Black and attacked him, while the man used wooden spikes and stone pillars to fight back.
• The Man in Black hurled a stone sphere at Cheng Yu, who shattered it with Infinite Technique and then pretended to collapse from exhaustion.
• Dile broke the stone pillar, and the Man in Black dodged a lightning attack after noticing that the other black-clad men had been defeated.
• The Man in Black caught Ning Qing in a wooden hand, but Dile launched Bennett at him and followed with a flying kick.
• Cheng Yu pulled the Man in Black beneath Dile's kick, and a lightning strike paralyzed him.
• Dile struck the Man in Black with a brick and ordered Old Bei, Yuri, and Xiao Qing to join in before the man could finish saying who he was.

Cheng Yu’s team completed the New Student Test, and Jimmy welcomed the survivors to Miskatonic University while warning them about the deadly risks ahead. In the Principal’s Office, Yog decided not to interfere with the fate of the person beside His Highness.

• Dile handed Cheng Yu’s team Spatial Pockets, while the Man in Black escaped by sinking into the soil; Dile later handed the captured Truth Cult members to the instructors.
• The burly man ended the test, expelled students who had failed, and warned those who showed hatred before they had the strength to act on it.
• A freckled young woman healed the remaining students, and Jimmy told them that Miskatonic University’s students faced heavy casualties before asking whether they were ready for danger.
• Many new students shouted that they were ready; Dile and Tang Lan joined in, Cheng Yu pretended to be fired up, and Bennett said he would prove himself through action instead of slogans.
• Jimmy reported to the Principal that every member of the Special Admissions Class had passed, and Yog told Grete he would not interfere with the ordained fate of the person beside His Highness.

Cheng Yu and Bennett discussed their views on responsibility, ambition, and the future before introducing themselves again by their full names. After Bennett chased off Dile, Cheng Yu wondered whether Bennett or Dile was the outsider whose fate had become entangled with the planet, and how the academy and its spiritual-energy revival related to the authority fragment.

• Bennett asked Cheng Yu why he had enrolled and what he thought of the world, and Cheng Yu described himself as an ordinary, pragmatic person who would do what he could if responsibility fell to him.
• Cheng Yu praised Bennett’s commitment to his ideals, and the two introduced themselves again as Bennett McAdam and Yuri Constantine.
• Dile entered and teased Bennett and Cheng Yu, so Cheng Yu used Wan Xiaoting to send Dile into Bennett’s punch.
• Bennett chased Dile through the damaged walls, while Cheng Yu considered whether Bennett or Dile was tied to the planet’s mysteries and the authority fragment.

Cheng Yu ordered the Legion to strip-mine the B3397 Universe while remaining neutral toward the Star Sea Alliance. Back at the academy, Dile drew with instructor Qi Yao, and Cheng Yu was paired with Bennett for a sparring match.

• Cheng Yu learned that the Legion controlled the B3397 Universe and ordered the Conductor to develop it at full capacity, exhausting its resources within twenty years.
• The Performer reported that the Star Sea Alliance had contacted the Legion, and Cheng Yu instructed it to remain neutral without compromising.
• Dile fought instructor Qi Yao to a draw, earning cheers from the students and praise from Cheng Yu.
• Bennett challenged Cheng Yu to a spar, and the two were paired for training.
• Cheng Yu prepared to fight Bennett as the System hinted that the match involved a trap and warned him not to break character.

Cheng Yu and Bennett fought an intense hand-to-hand match that showcased their contrasting skill and strength. Qi Yao ended the training session with neither fighter clearly victorious, and the freshmen applauded their performance.

• Dile went to the stands to watch Cheng Yu and Bennett fight while asking the girl to continue treating his injuries.
• Cheng Yu and Bennett traded grapples, strikes, and counters, with Cheng Yu relying on technique to compensate for Bennett's greater strength.
• Bennett's heavy attacks forced Cheng Yu backward, but Cheng Yu redirected Bennett's force and landed a clean backhand before being struck by an elbow.
• Cheng Yu broke Bennett's hold, struck his head, and mounted him to throw punches, while Bennett countered by striking Cheng Yu in the armpits.
• Qi Yao called time, and the battered fighters stood as the freshmen applauded their combat skills.

A Star Sea Alliance investigation team discovered that the passage to the B3397 Star Sector had been deliberately closed, with altered parameters suggesting an artificial cosmic wonder. Meanwhile, the Legion fortified its renamed home universe and continued refining its forces as Conductor prioritized dealing with the organic entities before him.

• Owen and his Star Sea Alliance team found the B3397 passage closed and suspected someone had deliberately sealed it.
• An operator reported that the passage's data had changed in ways that resembled an artificially created cosmic wonder, so Owen ordered three months of observation.
• The Legion established its headquarters in the RTX Destroyer Home Universe, surrounding its core planet with extensive defenses.
• Conductor continued producing the Wisdom K-Series to improve the Legion's Guardian and Defender forces using the Mechanical Gospel Compendium.
• Conductor judged the Legion's combat data insufficient and decided that dealing with the organic entities before him was the priority.

The Legion, presenting itself as the Mechanicus, contacted Owen’s fleet and agreed to send an envoy with him to the Star Sea Alliance. After Owen departed with Wisdom Z-6666, the Legion prepared to infiltrate the Star Sea and gather intelligence.

• The Conductor decided the Legion should make contact with the Star Sea Alliance and sent a transmission to Owen’s fleet.
• Owen identified his force as the Star Sea Alliance Investigation Force, and the Conductor threatened to annihilate him before asking him to transmit information about the Star Sea.
• The Legion’s Guardian 0-9 screened Owen’s transmission while the Performer successfully breached Owen’s intelligent program and established a Star Sea information database.
• After reviewing Owen’s information, the Conductor sent Wisdom Z-6666 as an envoy to accompany Owen to the Star Sea Alliance Headquarters.
• Owen welcomed Wisdom Z-6666 aboard and suspected the Mechanicus was a rising Machine Species as his ship departed.
• The Conductor approved the production of thirty Wisdom K-Series units and assigned the Performer and Strategic Command Center to develop a Star Sea strategy.

Conductor followed Cheng Yu’s orders to remain neutral, while Wisdom Envoy accompanied Owen to Star Sea City, where the Star Sea Alliance proposed a Qualification War to decide whether the Mechanicus could join. Wisdom Envoy accepted the terms, leaving the contest set to take place at the B3397 Star Sector passage entrance.

• Conductor contacted Cheng Yu, received orders to remain absolutely neutral, and drafted a policy for future development.
• Owen brought Wisdom Envoy to Star Sea City and reported the B3397 Star Sector events to Layla Henrietta.
• As Star Sea City’s network connected to Owen’s ship AI, Performer deployed Infiltrator 0-8 units to infiltrate the city’s networks and copy their data.
• Owen suggested a Qualification War to determine whether the Mechanicus posed a threat, and Layla summoned Wisdom Envoy to discuss it.
• Layla offered a war between roughly five thousand Star Sea Alliance drones and up to thirty thousand Mechanicus troops, with victory granting alliance membership and protection.
• Wisdom Envoy agreed to fight at the entrance to the B3397 Star Sector passage, with the alliance’s inability to break the passage’s seal also counting as defeat.

Cheng Yu learned that the qualification war could bring suppression if the Legion appeared too threatening, so he ordered it to win with difficulty. As the Star Sea Alliance began the war and sent Shatla's Magic Colossus Corps to B3397, the Legion prepared its forces to secure victory without revealing its full strength.

• Cheng Yu learned the qualification war's rules from Conductor and instructed the Legion to win without making the victory look too impressive.
• Cheng Yu and Dile fought monsters on Kashi Star and prepared to face a boss.
• Conductor, Performer, and Artist planned to stage delays by restricting Legion units' operations and moving the Iron Throne deeper into Legion territory.
• The Star Sea Alliance announced the qualification war, and Eloise, Bernard, and the Legendary Sword Mercenary Group bet on the Mechanicus winning.
• Layla learned that the Alliance would deploy Shatla's Magic Colossus Corps, while the Legion selected thirty thousand units for the battle.
• The Magic Colossus Fleet arrived at the entrance to the B3397 Universe, beginning the qualification war.

The Legion fought the Shatra Civilization’s Magic Colossus forces after Vax Corporation’s Channel Opener reopened the B3397 Universe passage. The Legion’s Enabler 0-1 units disabled the enemy flagship, leaving the qualification war’s outcome unresolved.

• Star Sea Alliance operators activated Vax Corporation’s Channel Opener, and the Legion suspended its blockade of the B3397 Universe passage.
• The Legion sent Purger 0-6 units through the passage, where the Shatra Civilization’s Magic Colossi inflicted heavy losses before the Purger 0-7 units joined the battle.
• The Legion’s forces struggled against the colossi and suffered heavier casualties, while the operators watched the fight remotely.
• A thousand Enabler 0-1 units evaded enemy fire and surrounded the lion-headed flagship, draining its drive core and disabling it.
• The dark-helmeted operator removed his helmet and blamed the decision to place the Channel Opener on the flagship, while the light-helmeted operator explained why it had been necessary.

The Legion won the Qualification War and received its membership documents from the Star Sea Alliance. Owen visited the Mechanicus homeworld, R Star, and Conductor agreed to send an envoy to Star Sea City, while the Legion prepared to join the Alliance under cover of deception.

• Performer used Regulator 0-4 to immobilize enemy colossi, allowing Purger 0-6 to destroy them.
• After learning that a Surveillance Ship was on its way, Performer withdrew Regulator 0-4 through a wormhole, leaving Purger 0-6 and Purger 0-7 to fight the remaining colossi.
• Layla watched footage of Enabler 0-1 disabling a Magic Colossus, while a Shatra Civilization official reported the threat to Lord Alger.
• Conductor relocated the passage exit and masked the universe's signals before allowing Owen to enter.
• Owen arrived at R Star, where Conductor accepted the Mechanicus's membership documents and named the Wisdom unit that had accompanied Owen as its envoy.

Cheng Yu authorized an emotion module for the Envoy Wisdom Unit after approving extensive safeguards, while Layla predicted Shatra would soon pressure the Mechanicus over the Legion’s weapon. Shatra’s ambassador received orders to learn how the weapon worked, leaving its meaning of “spare no cost” open to interpretation.

• Cheng Yu instructed Conductor to maintain the Legion’s diplomatic principles and approved an emotion module for the Envoy Wisdom Unit under layered security measures.
• The Envoy Wisdom Unit gained a warm, smiling face and began treating workers at the Mechanicus’s temporary compound politely.
• Owen reported his observations from the B3397 Universe to Layla, who said Shatra would likely confront the Mechanicus over the Legion’s technology.
• Shatra’s Minister of Magic ordered its ambassador in Star Sea City to obtain the weapon’s operating principles without damaging Shatra’s reputation.
• The Shatra ambassador wondered whether the order to spare no cost permitted a final resort.

The Legion’s Wisdoms planned to confront the Shatra Civilization after it began probing the Legion’s technology. Cheng Yu approved the reasoning behind their hard-line strategy, which relied on Regulator 0-9 and the threat of escalation to deter Shatra’s strongest forces.

• Ralph set out to contact the Legion’s ambassador after Shatra ordered him to probe the fledgling civilization and obtain Enabler 0-1’s operating principles.
• Conductor and the other Wisdoms decided the Legion would not compromise and planned a show of strength against Shatra, rejecting full-network infiltration by Infiltrator 0-8.
• The Wisdoms concluded that Shatra was the best target because it had recently fought Vax and was short on military strength, and they assigned Performer to coordinate the operation.
• Cheng Yu studied Conductor’s analysis and agreed that the Legion needed to defeat Shatra’s vanguard to discourage the other Star Sea Giants from exploiting its weakness.
• Cheng Yu concluded that Regulator 0-9 and the danger of triggering a wider conflict made the Legion’s victory likely, then called the Wisdoms cold and sinister.

Ralph N. Kossat failed to persuade Jane to reveal the Mechanicus’s weapon that had disabled the Magic Colossus Corps, and returned to Shatla determined to confront the Mechanicus. As Duke Dalton searched the demonic web for an anomaly, the story left its cause unknown.

• Ralph N. Kossat visited Jane and offered any price for details about the weapon, but Jane refused and assured him the Mechanicus would not share it with other civilizations.
• After Ralph departed, Jane sent a report to Infiltrator 0-8, and the Mechanicus’s plan continued toward its goal of starting a battle.
• Ralph returned to Colossus Castle and contacted Shatla’s homeworld, convinced that the Mechanicus’s weapon threatened Shatla even if it remained exclusive to the Mechanicus.
• An anomaly briefly appeared in Shatla’s demonic web as Ralph made his call.
• Duke Dalton sensed something wrong in the demonic web, searched it, and found no visible trace of the anomaly.

Duke nearly eradicated Infiltrator 0-8 from the Demonic Web, but the Legion’s Wisdom units sacrificed most of it to preserve a tiny hidden remnant. The Legion assessed the costly encounter and continued building toward the larger computers it would need to challenge a Legendary.

• Duke searched the Demonic Web with his Mental Power and destroyed 99.96% of Infiltrator 0-8.
• Conductor, Performer, and Artist diverted the Legion’s computing power to support Infiltrator 0-8 as Duke hunted it.
• The Wisdom units split off most of the remaining Infiltrator 0-8, letting Duke find one trace while ordering the final remnant to remain silent in the Demonic Web.
• The Legion tallied heavy losses, including more than a dozen Wisdom units whose heads exploded, and judged that a Legendary could only be matched in computing power by at least a Nebula-Class Computer.
• The Legion pressed ahead with construction of a Star-Region-Class Computer while describing how its computer network could expand across cosmic structures.

Shatra maneuvered the Gonzales Co-Link into hiring its mercenaries for a supposedly justified strike against the Mechanicus, while the Legion mobilized for war after intercepting the plans. Cheng Yu hesitated during a fight as Dile yelled at him to join in.

• Duke discovered that the captured piece of Infiltrator 0-8 had become ordinary metal and destroyed it.
• Wagner recognized that Shatra intended to use the Gonzales Co-Link as a weapon against the Mechanicus, but replied to Ralph and accepted Shatra's plan.
• Ralph went to legalize Gonzales's planned actions while Infiltrator 0-8 sent the intelligence to the Legion and infiltrated Gonzales's central network.
• The Legion entered full combat readiness, gave Performer wartime authority, and began coordinating its forces and Wisdoms.
• Dile, Bennett, Tang Lan, and Ning Qing prepared to fight as Cheng Yu stood distracted, and Dile shouted at him to stop spacing out.

After Dile’s team defeated an alien trafficker behind a series of disappearances, Dile revealed that his power was True Illusion. Jimmy told the team that the mysterious Principal, known as The Beyond One, wanted to meet them.

• Dile transformed into a gigantic Godzilla-like creature and defeated the alien trafficker, though the fight destroyed half the city.
• Dile told Bennett and Cheng Yu that his ability was True Illusion, which made whatever he imagined real.
• Jimmy praised the team’s success and said the Chairman would reward them for capturing the trafficker and seizing his secret interstellar routes.
• Jimmy told Dile and his teammates that the Principal, The Beyond One, wanted to see them.

Yog summoned Dile and his squad to the Principal's Office and asked them to represent Kashi Star in the Qualification War. He explained that they would compete in the Star Sea Grand Competition, where placing in the top hundred would count as passing, and waited for their answer.

• Dile and his companions prepared nervously to meet the Pathfinder, while Jimmy warned them to behave seriously.
• Jimmy brought the group to the Principal's Office, where they met Yog, Grete, and the black dog.
• Dile enthusiastically praised Yog's guidance, impressing Tang Lan, Ning Qing, and Jimmy.
• Yog offered Dile's squad a mission to represent Kashi Star in the Qualification War.
• Yog explained that the Qualification War would take place through the Star Sea Grand Competition, with a top-hundred finish required to pass.
• Yog described the competition's age rules and asked the squad whether they would accept.