Chapter Summaries

At a writers’ competition supervised by Falk, Dylan and several others told stories and received passes or failures while Lorry watched the black cat Nois’s reactions. After Kayla’s story passed, the attention turned to Lorry as the next storyteller.

• Lorry learned that Dylan had drawn the first turn and wondered whether Dylan’s description of a high-ranking police officer could lead him to the Chief’s Widow.
• Dylan told a horror story about shipwreck survivors who encountered vampires at a castle, and Falk announced that Nois had passed it.
• Gavin told a story about a man hunted by devils, failed, and lost his chance to continue; Lorry noticed that Nois’s tail did not flick.
• Hayden and Blake failed, while Harvey, Chloe, Lucas, and Kieran passed, and Falk explained that some rule violations brought delayed punishment.
• Kayla told a story about a detective who died alongside a serial killer, passed, and left Lorry next to tell his story.

Lorry avoided using a famous mystery plot and instead told a frightening story about a thief who discovered a writer dressing up in a mirror-filled study. The story left the drawing room shaken, while the black cat watched Lorry and accidentally tapped Mr. Falk's arm with its tail.

• Lorry considered several classic suspense novels but decided to avoid plots that might break Falk's storytelling rules.
• Lorry used Spirit Vision and noticed the black cat's unusually deep purple aura, then secretly activated Vera's black badge.
• Lorry told a story about a thief who found a writer in a dress and heavy makeup asking whether he was beautiful.
• Chloe screamed, the lights went out, and Falk relit the candles as the frightened guests recovered.
• Lorry ended his story with the protagonist possessed by a ghost, and the black cat watched him before its tail tapped Mr. Falk's arm.

After Raven and Fors passed Mr. Falk’s storytelling test, the guests retired for the night. Raven slipped out of the manor to search for the Chief’s Widow and reached a woman’s bedroom in the Hunting Forest.

• Mr. Falk announced that Dylan, Harvey, Chloe, Kayla, Lucas, Kieran, Raven, and Fors had passed and would return for the next round the following evening.
• Dylan asked Raven to submit a story to his suspense and horror magazine, and Raven agreed in return for Dylan’s help finding a lead on the Chief’s Widow.
• After the guests and servants had settled, Raven used the Shadow Ring to leave his room and cross the rain-damaged mountain road.
• Raven climbed the Hunting Forest’s perimeter wall and silently reached a likely residence after evading a maid on patrol.
• Raven looked through a partly open window and saw a young woman sleeping inside.

Lorry broke into Mia Pierce’s bedroom to question her about the suspicious death of her husband, former Nies Police Precinct chief Damik. As Lorry left, Mia called for him to wait, suggesting she had more to say.

• Mia Pierce woke from a dream about her late husband and discovered Lorry collecting her tears beside her bed.
• Mia offered Lorry money and jewelry, then agreed to answer his questions when he promised to leave her unharmed.
• Mia told Lorry that Damik had kept his work and politics from her, and that her father had stopped her from making a scene at the precinct for her family’s safety.
• Mia admitted that she and her father suspected Damik’s death had not been an accident because he was too careful to expose himself to gangsters’ guns without cause.
• Lorry claimed he was a secret Police Headquarters investigator and proposed communicating through newspaper advertisements before heading for the door.
• Mia called out to Lorry to wait as he was about to leave.

After learning that Altair and Begat had visited Director Damik, Lorry returned to the Mountain Estate with more questions about the connected cases. His rest was cut short when Gavin was found burned to death inside a wardrobe and Blake was found hanged, prompting Falk to order the remaining guests’ doors checked.

• Mia Pierce told Lorry that Altair and Begat had visited Damik’s Hunting Forest a month and a half earlier, and Lorry advised her to stay elsewhere.
• Lorry returned to the Mountain Estate and suspected Altair and Begat were connected to the Koyar Village Case, the Baron Percival Case, and Damik’s death.
• Fors told Lorry that Gavin had shut himself inside a wardrobe and burned to death.
• Lorry and Fors found Gavin’s body sitting peacefully in the wardrobe, and Fors suspected supernatural forces may have been involved.
• Chloe screamed after Blake was found hanged in the adjoining room, and Falk ordered the butler to check every other guest’s room.

After Hayden and Dylan died in ways that mirrored their stories, the surviving guests learned that heavy rain had blocked the road from the manor. They all decided to risk leaving rather than remain there, while Falk suddenly laughed.

• Falk led the others to Hayden's room, where they found him drowned in the washroom sink.
• Fors learned that Dylan had died after splitting open his own head with an axe.
• Falk ordered the rooms guarded and told Walker to check the road and report the deaths to the police if it was passable.
• Walker reported that mud and worsening rain had made the road impassable, leaving the guests stranded for several days.
• Kayla, Chloe, Fors, and the other surviving guests said they wanted to leave the manor, and Falk suddenly laughed.

At Falk’s estate, Kayla killed the black cat serving as Supervisor and tried to leave, but a supernatural force returned her to the sitting room and drove her to shoot herself. Kieran then threatened Falk with Kayla’s revolver and demanded an explanation.

• Falk told the guests they could not leave without the Supervisor’s permission, and Kayla shot the black cat dead.
• Kayla announced she would leave the estate and report what happened, while Fors and Lorry waited for her to return.
• After Kayla failed to come back within fifteen minutes, she suddenly appeared at the sitting-room door, saying she had already left the estate.
• Falk laughed and said the Supervisor would punish anyone who broke the rules, and Kayla shot herself with her revolver.
• Kieran grabbed Kayla’s revolver, aimed it at Falk, and demanded an explanation, warning that he had once been a pirate.

Falk explained that the rules counted Kayla’s story as a violation and used the possibility of survival to turn the remaining contestants against one another. After the others dispersed, Lorry assessed his dangers and hoped Vera would arrive before he had to use his final trump card.

• Falk said Kayla had broken the rules twice, and Harvey recognized that the ninth rule gave the Supervisor final authority to interpret them.
• Kieran fired at Falk, but Harvey knocked the gun aside; the two fought until another shot wounded Kieran in the arm.
• Falk told Lucas that a rule-breaker could still survive by winning, provided they did not break the rules again, and implied the others might prevent that.
• Manor servants carried Kayla’s body to the ice cellar while Fors escorted Chloe away, and Lucas, Kieran, and Harvey left the sitting room.
• Alone, Lorry weighed the dangers posed by the Manor and the other contestants, hoped Vera would find him, and considered using his final trump card if Vera did not appear by tomorrow.

A writer revealed the plot behind Damik’s death and set his sights on Lorry, while Lorry and the others competed in Falk’s storytelling contest. After Nois returned from the dead and exposed Lucas’s rule-breaking, the finalists were announced, but Lorry sensed the contest would end that night.

• The writer described how Begat and his allies had arranged Damik’s death, then learned that Lieutenant Colonel Vera was investigating and decided to kill Lorry, whose pen name was Raven.
• At the estate, Lorry told a modified version of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd and received a pass from Falk.
• Harvey failed his round, threatened the group, and was disarmed by Lorry before Falk had him removed.
• Lucas told a story about a corpse strangling a protagonist named Lucas, but Nois returned with mangled, bloody wounds and exposed his second breach of the rules.
• Falk named Chloe, Kieran, Raven, and Fors as the finalists, while Lorry sensed that everything would end before the next evening.

Nois turned against Falk after Falk ordered him to kill everyone in the manor, leaving Falk under Nois's control. In the ice cellar, Lorry watched Fors hide before Kieran and Chloe arrived, and Kieran began searching for Fors.

• Nois explained that he had killed Dylan after Dylan discovered his true form, and Falk agreed to let him kill everyone in the manor.
• Nois used his gaze to seize control of Falk, then forced him to carry the cat toward the butler's room.
• Lorry hid in the ice cellar, where five corpses had been laid out, and waited for others to arrive.
• Fors entered the cellar and hid behind barrels, unaware that Lorry was watching her.
• Kieran and Chloe entered the cellar, and Kieran told Chloe to search the left side while he approached Fors's hiding place.

Fors hid with Lorry as Chloe and Kieran searched for them, then overheard the pair plan to mutilate Kayla’s body for a black magic ritual. The Shadow Ring’s influence overwhelmed Lorry, and he passed it to Fors before urging her to escape, but Fors began plotting to take the ring and capture him.

• Lorry hid Fors in the shadows, allowing Chloe and Kieran to search the area without finding them.
• Chloe explained to Kieran why she had betrayed Fors and chose Kayla’s body for the black magic ritual.
• Kieran dragged Kayla’s body out and dismembered it as Chloe instructed, while Fors watched in distress.
• The Shadow Ring’s negative influence filled Lorry with violent and possessive thoughts about Fors.
• Lorry gave Fors the ring and told her to silently recite “shadow” in Hermes or Ancient Hermes.
• Fors followed his instructions, then began considering how to take the ring and capture Lorry.

Chloe killed Kieran, then died after slipping in his spilled blood and striking her head. Lorry explained that Chloe had broken a second rule by mistaking detective fiction for horror, and Fors introduced herself anew as a Sequence 9 Beyonder of the Apprentice Pathway.

• Fors handed the Shadow Ring back to Lorry, who prepared to confront Kieran and Chloe as they worked on the ritual.
• Chloe corrected Kieran's magic circle, then stabbed him from behind and revealed she had planned to kill him before he could kill her.
• Chloe slipped in Kieran's spilled blood, struck her head on a crate, and died, reenacting the death in her first story.
• Fors asked why Chloe had been punished, and Lorry explained that her story lacked the defining deadly threat of horror fiction, so she had already broken another rule.
• Fors mourned Chloe and Kayla, gathered Kayla's remains, and introduced herself to Lorry as Fors, a Sequence 9 Beyonder of the Apprentice Pathway.

Fors explained that the black cat Nois was likely Randolph’s Brain and proposed that she and Lorry cooperate to survive and defeat it. Their plan was threatened when they realized Nois might be growing stronger, while a writer revealed that he had engineered the gathering so Nois could advance and massacre everyone.

• Fors told Lorry that Randolph’s Brain fed on human inspiration, used rules to control its victims, and could be defeated if they won the competition.
• Lorry questioned whether the creature’s strength could keep growing, and Fors realized she did not know; they heard footsteps upstairs and feared trouble.
• Fors offered to keep Lorry safe with her Teleportation Bracelet and promised to spare him if she won, and Lorry agreed to partner with her.
• A writer described how he had arranged for Falk to summon Nois and draw Raven to the Mountain Estate, where Nois could feed and grow stronger.
• The writer predicted that Nois would soon isolate the estate, kill the survivors, and send puppets to attack the hunting forest before returning to the Spirit World.

Lorry and Fors fought their way through the basement as puppets and armed manservants closed in, then escaped into the icehouse using Fors’s Door Opening ability. They remained trapped inside, with the door under attack and the villa apparently detached from the real world.

• Lorry and Fors found nearly ten armed manservants at the basement stairs and prepared to fight their way past them.
• Lorry shot several attackers while Fors used her Shadow Ring, but the puppets kept advancing and Kieran proved difficult to stop.
• Lorry theorized that the villa had become detached from the real world and asked Fors to use Door Opening to reach the icehouse through the ceiling.
• Fors emerged in the kitchen, and Lorry followed her into the icehouse before she shut its door against the pursuing puppets.
• The manservants battered the icehouse door while Lorry and Fors waited inside, surrounded by danger.

Lorry and Fors fought through Falk’s manor after realizing Randolph’s Brain could detect and mentally influence them, but Falk’s apparent death failed to stop the puppets. As they were being cornered and Fors exhausted, Vera contacted Lorry and offered indirect help with a Mystical Item and charms.

• Lorry and Fors used the Shadow Ring to evade the puppets and waited for an opening to attack Falk.
• Lorry realized Randolph’s Brain had known their location, so he and Fors rushed Falk while the puppets converged on them.
• Lorry shot Falk, but Falk rose again as a puppet, and the surrounding puppets resumed their attack.
• Randolph’s Brain mentally urged Fors to give up, but Lorry recognized the attack and brought her back to her senses.
• After a prolonged chase left Fors exhausted, Vera contacted Lorry and said she could not enter their area but could provide a Mystical Item and charms to help them escape.

Lorry received the Curse of Knowledge and several charms from Vera, then prepared with Fors to face the approaching puppet army. After assigning Fors a role in their plan, Lorry watched her vanish into the shadows as the puppets drew near.

• Vera sent Lorry a white bone ring and six charms, explaining the Curse of Knowledge's abilities, spells, and dangers through one of the charms.
• The Curse of Knowledge spoke aloud, insulting Fors and warning Lorry that it would refuse to help if she stayed close.
• Lorry told Fors that the puppets would catch up within minutes and assigned her the Shadow Ring and charms while he handled the fight in the open.
• Fors accepted the equipment and prepared to force Randolph's Brain's true body to appear.
• Lorry used a recorded spell to make Fors vanish into the shadows, then faced the approaching puppet army.

Lorry fought Nois and its puppet army, using the Curse of Knowledge’s abilities to break through the encirclement and destroy the black cat’s body. He forced Randolph's Brain to emerge, and faced the creature’s exposed true form.

• Nois taunted Lorry about having escaped death before, leading him to suspect the attack was connected to the chief's death in the line of duty and to consider Altair or Councilor Begat as its master.
• Lorry used Blazing White Spear to burn puppets, but Nois countered with gunfire and sent the remaining puppets charging once the spear ran out.
• Lorry used Gale to knock back the puppets and Glide to rise above them, then restored his spirituality as he closed in on Nois.
• Lorry used Psychological Suggestion, Charm, and Provocation to subdue Falk, the butler, and Nois, then dismembered the black cat with wind blades.
• A translucent creature emerged from Nois's corpse, revealing the true body of Randolph's Brain, and Lorry faced it without flinching.

Lorry and Fors destroyed Randolph's Brain, then learned through spirit channeling that it had acted on orders from Altair, the author of The Earl's Revenge. Fors pressed Randolph's Brain for the reason Altair targeted Baron Percival and Lorry.

• Lorry used Distortion and Fear while Fors revealed herself and bound Randolph's Brain with Imprisonment.
• Fors used Spirit Piercing, amplified by Lorry's Curse of Knowledge, to destroy Randolph's Brain and free its puppets.
• Lorry and Fors hurried to Falk's laboratory, where Fors performed a spirit-channeling ritual to question Randolph's residual spirituality.
• Randolph's Brain said it had never served Falk and had attacked Lorry, who used the alias Raven, on its master's orders.
• Randolph's Brain identified its master as Brett, who had changed his name to Altair and wrote The Earl's Revenge to lure Baron Percival.
• Fors asked why Altair wanted to lure Baron Percival and why he wanted Lorry dead.

Lorry and Fors learned that Altair and Member of Parliament Begat had orchestrated the Mountain Estate disaster, but Lorry stopped the spirit-channeling ritual before Randolph's Brain revealed too much. After returning to reality, Lorry reported the conspirators to Lieutenant Colonel Vera and urged MI9 to act before Altair fled Backlund.

• Randolph's Brain revealed that Altair and Member of Parliament Begat had conspired to steal Duke Negan's documents, and that Altair later arranged the deaths to silence witnesses.
• Randolph's Brain began explaining how Altair gained power through prayer, but Lorry interrupted the ritual after sensing the spirit was trying to harm Fors.
• Lorry warned Fors that knowledge could be dangerous, and Fors asked him to find a Trickmaster potion formula while he promised to keep an eye out.
• Lorry and Fors realized they had returned to reality, and Fors used the Shadow Ring to leave as Lorry surveyed the nearly hundred dead at the Mountain Estate.
• Vera arrived, and Lorry handed him Randolph's Brain's remains; Vera praised Lorry's merit and said it was enough to advance to Sequence 8.
• Lorry told Vera that Altair and Member of Parliament Begat had masterminded the catastrophe and urged him to act before Altair escaped Backlund.

Lorry and Vera used Teleportation to pursue Altair, but found he had already fled his villa. After MI9 seized Altair’s considerable assets, Vera told Lorry that his book Young Roselle had sold out almost immediately.

• Vera explained that the dead Spirit World creature’s contractor would have sensed its death and that there was not enough evidence to act against Councilor Begat.
• Vera gave Lorry a spirituality-replenishing charm and asked him to use Teleportation to take them to Altair’s villa.
• Lorry transported Vera through the Spirit World to the villa, where they found no traces of Beyonder powers and only ordinary servants.
• Lorry vowed that Altair would not escape next time, and Vera said he had alerted his colleagues to send the police.
• Vera and Lorry discovered that MI9’s mission spoils included Altair’s vast wealth, then Vera told Lorry that Young Roselle had sold out its first print run.