Chapter Summaries

After the Goodwell Chemical Factory explosion, Lumian and Franca learned that Jenna’s mother, Elodie, had been injured but was saved, and Franca went to visit her. Lumian prepared and drank the Pyromaniac potion after defining provocation as defiance, leaving his advancement underway.

• Franca warned Lumian that the factory explosion might have been part of a ritual and urged him to alert the authorities about Hugues Artois’s role.
• Lumian told Franca that Jenna’s mother, Elodie, had been badly injured in the explosion but was saved with his Healing Potion; Franca hurried to Holy Palace Hospital.
• Franca lent Lumian 4,000 Felkine for his advancement and agreed to contact the authorities before visiting Jenna.
• At the hospital, Jenna reassured Julian that her friends would help pay for Elodie’s treatment, and Franca arrived at the ward.
• Lumian received the Pyromaniac Beyonder characteristic and mixed it with the supplementary ingredients to make the potion.
• Lumian resolved that provocation symbolized defiance and drank the Pyromaniac potion.

Lumian endured the painful transformation and advanced to Sequence 7, becoming a Pyromaniac, then tested his new abilities. He left to watch Hugues Artois’s office, determined to start a fire against the man despite the danger.

• Lumian resisted the agony of advancing and recovered as the burning marks on his body healed.
• Lumian discovered that his new Pyromaniac abilities included improved Spirit Vision and Danger Sense, flame control, fire spells, and strong resistance to flames.
• Lumian tested his crimson and white-hot flames, formed a flaming sword, and infused Hedsey’s dagger with fire.
• Lumian changed clothes and went to Market Avenue to observe Hugues Artois’s office from across the alley.
• Lumian considered how to set a fire against Hugues Artois, knowing he was outmatched by the Evil God's Favored around him.

Lumian watched the parliamentary office to learn the routines and locations of Hugues Artois and his associates, then disguised himself as Bonno Goodwell to enter the building. The chapter ended as he reached the office of the coughing assistant secretary, Tibert Jacques, and knocked on the door.

• Lumian observed the parliamentary office and identified the rooms occupied by Hugues Artois, the red-haired lady, and several campaign staff members, including the man who spat phlegm.
• Lumian prayed for protection from divination, burned off his distinctive hair, and bought clothes, a wig, and a false beard.
• Lumian disguised himself as Bonno Goodwell and hid his vagrant clothes in a quarry cavern.
• Lumian returned to the parliamentary office, where the gatekeepers recognized him as Mr. Goodwell and let him pass.
• Lumian reached the second-floor office labeled for assistant secretary Tibert Jacques and knocked on the door.

Lumian attacked Tibert Jacques in his office, killed him with a delayed fire infusion, and staged the scene to implicate the Aurora Order. Hugues Artois and his team found Tibert’s remains, while the red-haired lady noted that Tibert’s recent crimes could also point suspicion toward Hugues.

• Lumian entered Tibert Jacques’s office and discovered that Tibert was weaker than he had expected.
• Lumian engulfed himself in a Flame Cloak, beat Tibert while taunting him, and prevented him from calling for help as his disease-based attacks failed.
• Lumian left Mr. K’s fingerprint beside Tibert, bowed, and escaped through the balcony before Tibert exploded from the fire infusion Lumian had placed inside him.
• Hugues Artois, the red-haired lady, and others found Tibert’s remains, and the red-haired lady suggested that the attacker’s methods resembled those of the Aurora Order.
• The secretary with gold-rimmed glasses revealed that Tibert had caused the deaths of two elderly scavengers, leading the red-haired lady to observe that Tibert’s death could point toward Hugues.

Hugues Artois reassured his campaign team after Tibert’s murder and delivered a speech defending worship of the Great Ones as humanity’s path to a better future. Elsewhere, Lumian destroyed evidence of his attack, Valentine challenged restrictions on investigating Artois, and Jenna’s mother Elodie woke from her coma before falling asleep again.

• Hugues Artois dismissed the threat after Tibert’s death, then urged Cassandra, Rhone, Marguerite, and Bodouva to see their cause as just and the Great Ones as humanity’s route to cosmic civilization.
• Cassandra praised Artois’s speech and said That One’s gifts included a power called “Speaker”; Artois told the team to continue as planned.
• Lumian returned to his vagrant disguise in Underground Trier and used crimson fire ravens to burn the clothes and objects tied to his attack.
• Valentine urged Angoulême to investigate Hugues Artois, but Angoulême explained that a Church-notarized contract limited them to questioning him without compelling evidence.
• Elodie awoke in Holy Palace Hospital, reassured Jenna that she had thought she would see her husband, then briefly spoke with her daughter before falling asleep again.

Lumian admitted to Franca that he had killed Hugues Artois's assistant secretary after advancing to Pyromaniac, while Jenna reassured her mother that her treatment costs were covered. Elodie secretly learned the likely cost of treatment, then jumped from the hospital window and died, leaving Jenna devastated.

• Lumian told Franca he had killed Tibert after taking the Pyromaniac potion, and Franca helped him dye his hair back to avoid suspicion.
• Jenna told Elodie that her hospital treatment would take months and that Franca had lent them the money to pay for it.
• Elodie learned from a doctor that her treatment might last five to seven months and cost several hundred felkine a week.
• Jenna left to buy food while Elodie spoke with Julian, then sent him to fetch a doctor after claiming she felt unwell.
• Elodie removed her IV and jumped from the hospital window, and Jenna found her dead outside.

After Elodie died by suicide following the news of her treatment costs, Lumian and Franca helped Jenna face her grief and pointed to the people and institutions responsible for her family’s suffering. As they returned from the hospital, Jenna resolved to visit Bonno Goodwell that night.

• Franca told Lumian that Jenna’s mother, Elodie, had jumped from the hospital’s sixth floor after learning the cost and duration of her treatment.
• At the hospital, Lumian told Jenna that neither she nor her family was to blame, and accused Bonno Goodwell, the factory owner, and the government of causing their suffering.
• Lumian suggested that the Goodwell Chemical Factory explosion might have been a murder or sacrifice involving evil god worshippers, prompting Jenna to break down in tears.
• Jenna and Julian prayed during Elodie’s last rites and decided to cremate her and take her ashes to the Catacombs once the crematorium was available.
• On the way home, Franca encouraged Jenna to support Julian, while Lumian reminded her to watch her own mental state.
• Jenna told Lumian and Franca that she wanted to pay Bonno Goodwell a visit that night.

Lumian, Franca, and Jenna confronted Bonno Goodwell and forced him to admit that he arranged the chemical factory explosion after being encouraged by Member of Parliament Hugues Artois's secretaries. They fled when someone arrived, and the Purifiers began questioning Goodwell about his faith and his visit to the Parliamentarian's Office.

• At a banquet, Bonno Goodwell asked Inspector Travis Everett for police protection, while Everett warned him that injured workers and their families were still waiting for compensation.
• Lumian, Franca, and Jenna entered Goodwell's bedroom, subdued him and his wife, and forced Goodwell to drink Truth Serum.
• Lumian bluffed that he knew Goodwell had caused the factory explosion, and Goodwell admitted that he had arranged it.
• Goodwell named Rhone and Tibert, secretaries to Member of Parliament Hugues Artois, as the men who persuaded him to blow up the factory for insurance and rebuilding funds.
• When someone rang the gate bell, Jenna wounded Goodwell, and the three intruders escaped through the garden.
• Angoulême, Valentine, and Imre questioned Goodwell about his faith and his visit to Hugues Artois's office, leaving Goodwell pale with fear.

Angoulême arrested Bonno Goodwell for the chemical factory explosion but lacked evidence to pursue Hugues Artois’s secretary, Rhone, and planned to let wild Beyonders investigate instead. Jenna returned home to find her brother Julian traumatized by their mother’s death and seemingly losing his sanity.

• Angoulême questioned Bonno Goodwell under a notarized divine oath, then arrested him for arson, causing an explosion, and murder while freezing his assets for compensation.
• Angoulême explained that the Church lacked evidence to arrest Rhone and proposed exploiting wild Beyonders to investigate the parliamentarian’s office.
• Lumian and Franca discussed vengeance with Jenna, who vowed not to spare Rhone but agreed to wait for a safe opportunity.
• Jenna returned to 17 Pasteur Street and found Julian terrified, blaming himself for their mother’s death, and apparently going mad.

Jenna cared for Julian after his breakdown and worried that he remained at risk despite seeming calmer. She was drawn to Hugues Artois's sympathy banquet, while Franca and Lumian waited for her; the chapter ended with Jenna arriving in tears to say Julian had gone mad again.

• Jenna soothed Julian through the night, then covered him with a blanket as he fell asleep.
• In the morning, Jenna saw Julian acting calm but stiff and decided to seek a Psychiatrist, while encouraging him to take his time finding work.
• Jenna read Hugues Artois's comments about the Goodwell Chemical Factory explosion and laughed as she reached the ruined factory.
• A woman from the hospital told Jenna that Hugues Artois was hosting a sympathy banquet, then led her to his office, where Jenna entered after a search.
• At the Golden Rooster Inn, Franca told Lumian she planned to check on Jenna, but Jenna arrived in tears and said Julian had gone mad.

Jenna’s brother Julian was fired and suffered a breakdown, prompting Lumian and Franca to investigate, but Charlotte Calvino ambushed Lumian while disguised as Jenna. Meanwhile, Hugues Artois discussed exploiting the grieving residents as the Mother Tree of Desire’s followers unleashed a gigantic tree across the Market District.

• Jenna told Lumian and Franca that Julian had been fired after missing work for his mother’s funeral and had broken down in distress.
• Franca went to arrange psychiatric help for Julian, while Lumian decided to confront the factory owner and Julian’s master.
• The false Jenna stabbed Lumian with a wooden dagger, revealed herself as Charlotte Calvino, and said they needed some of his blood.
• At a condolence banquet, Hugues Artois and Rhone discussed using the grieving residents to gain followers, while Cassandra mocked their manipulation.
• A gigantic brown-green tree burst from the ground near the Golden Rooster Inn and spread its branches across several blocks.

Lumian was transported to the Shadow Tree, where Charlotte revealed that the tree had nurtured Trier’s depravity for over a thousand years and needed a sacrifice to reach a crucial stage of growth. Hugues Artois separately explained how the crisis could advance his political plans, while Charlotte identified the Angel-level power sealed inside Lumian as the intended offering.

• After Lumian’s fireball missed Charlotte, branches and vines enveloped the Golden Rooster Inn and transported him to the Shadow Tree, where he could not find Franca.
• Lumian saw people in the affected streets surrendering to violent and excessive desires while everyone outside the area remained unaware that those who entered did not return.
• Hugues Artois told Cassandra and his other subordinates that the Bliss Society planned to extend the underground tree into the Astral World, and he outlined how the crisis could help him bring the Eighth Bureau into the Market District.
• Lumian encountered Charlotte moving through scenes from different eras, and she called him the first heathen to enter the divine tree and become one with it.
• Charlotte explained that the Shadow Tree had been cultivating Trier’s indulgence for over a thousand years and needed Lumian as a weighty sacrifice because of the Angel-level corruption sealed inside him.
• Charlotte said High Priest Suzanne had discovered the sealed power when Lumian first summoned her, and that her later desire to kill him was not only because of Charlie.

Lumian realized that Suzanne Mathis had recognized the danger sealed within him and fought Charlotte Calvino inside the Shadow Tree’s strange domain. The chapter left Suzanne confronting Lumian, while Franca prepared to use Tarot cards after finding him missing.

• Lumian understood that Suzanne Mathis had reason to investigate the angel-level power sealed within him, and that Charlie’s arrival at his door might not have been mere luck.
• Lumian attacked the Shadow Tree with fire ravens and used a delayed fireball to break free of Charlotte Calvino’s seductive influence before she could draw him into a wet flower.
• Lumian burned Charlotte’s arms, but a falling branch forced him to dodge, and he saw Suzanne Mathis emerge among the illusory branches as pale flowers bloomed across the tree.
• Jenna watched Hugues Artois mingle at a banquet and restrained herself from confronting him because she lacked evidence and he had powerful protection.
• Franca used Mysticism Smelling Salts to overcome a sudden surge of desire, found Lumian missing, and took out the Two of Cups and Judgement cards.

Franca summoned Madam Judgement, who attacked Lady Moon but failed to stop her. Trapped by the Shadow Tree and realizing its power came from centuries of accumulated desires, Lumian faced its roots and flowers and invoked Termiboros, accusing his enemies of planning to sacrifice him.

• Franca used the Judgement card to summon Madam Judgement, who arrived in the wilderness surrounding the Shadow Tree.
• Madam Judgement deprived Lady Moon of her ability to reproduce and tried to banish her, but Lady Moon swallowed the hurricane attack.
• Lumian attacked the Shadow Tree with fire, briefly breaking through one layer of bark before realizing its many layers embodied centuries of human desires.
• Lumian recognized that Suzanne Mathis and Charlotte Calvino had manipulated his emotions, then suspected the Shadow Tree's flowers were releasing a knockout drug.
• The Shadow Tree's roots formed a towering barrier around Lumian as its branches and flowers advanced, and he taunted his enemies for wanting to sacrifice Termiboros.

Lumian tried to convince Suzanne Mathis that an actual angel, Termiboros, was sealed inside him, but she revealed the Bliss Society planned to sacrifice him with the seal intact. Termiboros finally gave Lumian a way to act, and Lumian drove Fallen Mercury into the Shadow Tree, piercing its first layer of bark.

• Lumian heard Termiboros explain that he would wait for the ritual to create a chance to break free rather than help Lumian.
• Lumian told Suzanne Mathis that a real angel was sealed inside him and warned her to stop the ritual, but Suzanne said the Bliss Society would sacrifice him, the seal, and Termiboros together.
• Lumian challenged Termiboros to act rather than be delivered to the Mother Tree of Desire, and Termiboros told him to stab the Shadow Tree's trunk with Fallen Mercury.
• Lumian resisted Suzanne's attempts to stir his desires by enduring the Mysticism Smelling Salts and charged the Shadow Tree.
• Lumian struck Fallen Mercury's hilt with an explosive gauntlet, driving the blade through the first layer of bark and shallowly into the Shadow Tree.

Lumian exchanged a fate with Fallen Mercury as the Montsouris Ghosts arrived and began corroding the Shadow Tree, creating an opening in its alternate space. Suzanne Mathis called for aid, and a mysterious woman in an orange dress appeared outside and tried to tear open a rift.

• Lumian used the Shadow Tree’s accumulated fates to exchange the fate of a root burned by invisible flames for the fate of encountering the Montsouris Ghosts, cracking Fallen Mercury in the process.
• Termiboros told Lumian the Montsouris Ghosts were about to arrive and could create an opportunity for him to escape, though they could not destroy the Shadow Tree.
• The Montsouris Ghosts appeared, resisted Suzanne Mathis’s and Charlotte Calvino’s attacks, and spread across the Shadow Tree’s base as corrosive black liquid.
• The alternate space began shaking and developing rifts, and Suzanne Mathis chanted an incantation to summon aid from the Mother Tree of Desire.
• A mysterious woman in a long orange dress stepped through an illusory door and tried to tear open a rift beside the Shadow Tree.

Lumian escaped the Shadow Tree’s inner space with Franca, but Termiboros blamed his misfortunes on his fate and urged him to surrender to the angel. Lumian rejected the warning, pushed Franca out of the wilderness, and ran back to rescue the people Suzanne Mathis was attacking.

• A starlight gate opened, allowing Lumian to escape the Shadow Tree’s inner space and reunite with Franca.
• The ritual’s collapse restored the wilderness’s inhabitants to their senses, but Suzanne Mathis sent the Shadow Tree’s branches and vines after them to drain their vitality.
• Termiboros told Lumian that he was an unlucky one whose fate had harmed people close to him, and warned that Gabriel, Charlie, Jenna, and Franca would die if he resisted.
• As Gabriel, Pavar Nissen, the eloping couple, and others were seized by vines, Lumian resisted Termiboros’s pressure and continued toward the wilderness’s edge with Franca.
• Lumian pushed Franca out of the wilderness, then turned back toward Suzanne Mathis with his Flame Cloak burning his skin and flesh.

Lumian and Franca fought the Shadow Tree while Saint Viève appeared in its damaged alternate space. At the banquet, Jenna stabbed Hugues Artois through the eye, then closed her eyes as crimson sparks surrounded her.

• Lumian charged toward Suzanne Mathis, but the Shadow Tree sank underground and shook the wilderness, briefly disrupting his advance.
• Jenna realized Hugues Artois seemed pleased by the anomaly and suspected he was behind the Market District’s disasters and her brother Julian’s breakdown.
• Charlotte Calvino tried to ambush Lumian as a shadow, but Franca fired at her and called out to him.
• Saint Viève appeared at the Starlight Gate as the Shadow Tree’s alternate space lay damaged.
• Jenna approached Hugues Artois during his banquet and stabbed him through the eye with a silver fork, then stopped resisting as crimson sparks appeared around her.

Jenna assassinated Hugues Artois during a public appearance, while Imre arrested her and kept the other conspirators from retaliating. In the wilderness, Lumian, Franca, and Anthony killed Charlotte and advanced toward Suzanne Mathis's Shadow Tree as she withdrew her attacks.

• Jenna drove a silver fork into Hugues Artois's eye and brain, killing him as Seventh Bureau agents shot her.
• Imre subdued Jenna, ordered the agents to check on Hugues Artois and maintain order, and prevented the others from attacking her.
• As the Shadow Tree sank and the streets returned to their original arrangement in the wilderness, Lumian turned to confront Charlotte while burning himself to stay lucid.
• Anthony Reid used Intimidation to panic Charlotte, and Lumian's fire ravens and Franca's gunshot killed her.
• Suzanne Mathis attacked Lumian, Franca, and Anthony with branches and vines, then withdrew them to the Shadow Tree as the three advanced.

Lumian outmaneuvered Suzanne Mathis and used Fallen Mercury to transfer the fate of the Shadow Tree’s roots being burned by the Invisible Fire of the Underground onto her. Suzanne turned to ashes, leaving the Shadow Tree damaged and the outcome of the ritual unresolved.

• Suzanne Mathis used her influence to overwhelm Franca and Anthony Reid with fear, leaving Lumian without their help.
• Suzanne Mathis stirred Lumian’s desire to survive, but the pain from his crimson flames kept him lucid enough to recognize that he had to kill her to escape.
• Lumian feigned an attack on Suzanne Mathis, then used an exploding Giant Fireball to propel himself into the Shadow Tree and stab it with Fallen Mercury.
• Fallen Mercury shattered and transferred its stored fate to Suzanne Mathis, causing purplish flames to consume her until she turned to ashes.
• A trunk of the Shadow Tree caught fire, broke, and fell.