Recaps

Lin Ze and Saira crossed Blackstone Flats and reached the entrance to Crow Valley, where Lin Ze explored a hidden stone house. He found a booklet written in the same script as the boundary marker, but could not read it, and the chapter ended with him noticing Saira watching him in the dim light.

• Lin Ze told Saira that Crow Valley lay beyond Blackstone Flats and showed her Galleons and knives they could trade for food.
• Lin Ze and Saira crossed Blackstone Flats and found a broken stake pile containing an iron emblem that Saira identified as belonging to an eastern lord.
• At the edge of Crow Valley, Lin Ze entered alone while Saira stayed behind with the pony, which refused to approach the gorge.
• Lin Ze used Apparition to reach a stone house inside the valley and found signs that someone had recently been there.
• Lin Ze discovered a hide booklet written in the same script as the boundary marker, but could not read it and put it in his pocket.
• Saira arrived at the house, explaining that the pony had run off, and Lin Ze continued searching while she watched him from the doorway.

Lin Ze uncovered a bloodstained stone platform and realized that the Saira accompanying him was Morgana in disguise. Morgana confronted him about his knowledge of magic and Merlin, then guessed that he came from the future.

• Lin Ze examined a hidden chamber and found bloodlike stains around a hollow stone platform.
• Lin Ze noticed that Saira had not blinked and questioned how quickly she had reached the valley.
• Morgana revealed that she had put the real Saira to sleep and was impersonating her.
• Morgana dissolved the stone building, formed a chair from the rubble, and questioned Lin Ze about his wand, Hogwarts, and Merlin.
• Morgana guessed that Lin Ze had come from the future, startling him inwardly.

Lin Ze confronted Morgana about the Broken Arc Array and learned that one of her former students had created it before being expelled for his interest in transforming the living and dead. Morgana revealed a finger bone said to represent death, which matched the one Lin Ze had received from Colin, but she left him waiting to learn how to use it.

• Morgana reconstructed Lin Ze’s Boundary Break spell and told him she had never seen magic like it.
• Lin Ze told Morgana he had found a Broken Arc Array bearing her name, and she identified it as a spell she had taught a gifted student over a century ago.
• Morgana revealed that she had expelled the student because he wanted to transform living people into the dead and the dead into something else.
• Morgana opened a compartment beneath the stone platform and showed Lin Ze a finger bone that closely matched the one he had received from Colin in Whitewater Valley.
• Morgana used her finger bone to summon a ghost and explained that it represented death, one of five bones said to uphold the world’s rules.
• When Lin Ze asked how to use his bone, Morgana teased him and asked what he would give her in return for the answer.

Lin Ze bargained with Morgana to help find her former student Mordred in exchange for learning to use the god’s finger bone. He discovered that the bone granted powerful spatial abilities at little magical cost, but Morgana warned that repeated use would erode his humanity, and Lin Ze asked how to find Mordred.

• Lin Ze agreed to help Morgana find Mordred after she explained that he had stolen her heart and left her cursed to remain in Crow Valley.
• Morgana used her death finger bone to reveal the Gate of Death and explained how matching magic could activate a god’s finger bone.
• Lin Ze channeled spatial magic through his finger bone, opening a small rift and sensing the details of Crow Valley, including Saira asleep beside the pony.
• Morgana identified Lin Ze’s finger bone as the space finger bone and warned that using it would leave divine marks and diminish his humanity.
• Lin Ze thanked Morgana for the warning and asked how he could find Mordred.

Lin Ze learned that Morgana could use the Space Finger Bone to sense the Life Finger Bone stolen by Mordred, then left Crow Valley with Saira. They headed for the royal capital to look for clues about what they were seeking.

• Morgana explained that Mordred had taken her Life Finger Bone, and that it could resonate with Lin Ze’s Space Finger Bone.
• Morgana revealed that she was a Night Elf and told Lin Ze to leave Crow Valley after giving him precautions about the finger bone.
• Lin Ze used Apparition to return to Saira, who woke up after being knocked unconscious.
• Lin Ze told Saira they were going to the royal capital and frightened her with a story about Morgana before they set off.

Lin Ze and Saira reached the Blackwater River ferry and met a young traveler who shared rumors about the Witch King. The young man described the Witch King's arrival at the palace and his service to the kingdom, leaving Lin Ze curious about the Witch King's possible connection to Mordred.

• Lin Ze and Saira crossed the plains and arrived at the Blackwater River ferry, where they stopped at a tavern for food.
• A young man joined their table and said he was headed to the royal capital as well.
• The young man asked whether Lin Ze and Saira had heard that the king had imprisoned the Witch King, whom he considered a good man.
• After Lin Ze paid him with a gold coin, the young man recounted rumors that the Witch King had appeared at the palace three years earlier and used witchcraft to help the kingdom.
• The young man described how the Witch King had turned a foreign prince who demanded the princess's hand into a pig-headed man.

Lin Ze and Saira met Arthur at a tavern and invited him to travel with them toward the capital, where they planned to find someone. At their campsite, Arthur learned Lin Ze was a wizard and recognized Saira as the North’s rumored sword-wielding patrol officer.

• Arthur shared rumors that the Witch King was imprisoned and recalled seeing him travel in a black carriage escorted by soldiers.
• Lin Ze and Saira invited Arthur to join them on the road to the capital, and he introduced himself as Arthur.
• On the journey, Lin Ze noticed Arthur moved with the practiced quiet of someone trained to fight.
• At their campsite, Arthur watched Lin Ze use magic and asked whether he planned to rescue the Witch King.
• Arthur repeated a rumor about a North patrol officer who could cut off seven heads in a row, and Saira ordered him to eat when he guessed she was the officer.

Lin Ze and his companions traveled toward the royal capital, where Arthur’s account of the Witch King convinced Lin Ze that Sirius might be there. At the city gate, Saira planned to enter separately, while Lin Ze disguised his clothes with magic.

• Lin Ze, Saira, and Arthur continued along the busy highway toward the royal capital.
• Arthur described seeing the Witch King perform magic with a gem-set wand, and Lin Ze concluded that the Witch King was probably Sirius.
• Arthur excitedly asked whether Lin Ze was going to the capital to rescue the Witch King, making Lin Ze suspicious of him.
• As they reached the capital, Saira said she would enter separately because her armor was conspicuous.
• Lin Ze used Transfiguration to change his robes into an ordinary coarse-cloth gown, leaving Arthur astonished.

Lin Ze and Arthur entered the royal capital and settled into an inn, where Lin Ze learned that rumors about the Witch King included claims that the king had imprisoned him. The chapter left Lin Ze planning to approach the palace and still uncertain why the Witch King had been confined.

• Saira used her patrol badge to enter the city, while Lin Ze and Arthur passed through with a flock of sheep.
• Lin Ze explored the capital with Arthur, who revealed that he had grown up there and had almost no family left.
• Lin Ze noticed armed men speaking quietly with a bearded leader in the inn, then placed defensive spells around his room.
• Arthur brought roast meat and flatbread to Lin Ze, and they discussed Lin Ze's search for the Witch King.
• Lin Ze told Arthur that the Witch King might be a friend, and Arthur shared rumors that the king had imprisoned him for plotting against the throne, refusing to fight, or being too powerful.

Lin Ze watched the crowd gather before the palace for the public whipping of a deserter who had defended the Witch King, while Saira offered to help him enter the palace as her attendant. The chapter ended as the young man proclaimed the Witch King’s innocence and the fat official ordered the beating to begin.

• Lin Ze left the inn and learned from a soup-stall owner that a former Witch King guard had been caught trying to plead the Martial King’s innocence.
• Lin Ze went to the palace square, where guards prepared a platform for the deserter’s public whipping.
• Saira found Lin Ze, gave him chestnut cakes, and warned him about the palace guards and their anti-wizard weapons.
• Saira offered to take Lin Ze into the palace as her attendant when she reported on the North the day after tomorrow.
• A fat official brought the emaciated deserter to the platform, and the young man declared that the Witch King was innocent.
• The fat official ordered the soldiers to beat the young man.

Lin Ze and Arthur witnessed Kay, a former guard of the Witch King, being whipped in public, and Arthur revealed his connection to him. Saira brought Lin Ze a rough map of the palace perimeter from a former palace worker, leaving their plans to reach the imprisoned Witch King taking shape.

• A fat man ordered soldiers to whip Kay for shouting about the Witch King, and they dragged the unconscious guard away after five lashes.
• Lin Ze found Arthur furious in the crowd and stopped him from speaking before Kay was carried off.
• Arthur told Lin Ze that Kay had been his childhood friend and explained that Kay was arrested after refusing to leave the Witch King's service.
• Arthur admitted he did not know how the Witch King had been imprisoned and believed the king did not trust him.
• Saira met Lin Ze behind the Golden Stag Inn and showed him a rough map of the palace perimeter, drawn with help from a former palace worker.

Lin Ze infiltrated the palace and reached the tower where Sirius was imprisoned. After freeing him, Lin Ze and Sirius were ambushed by a hidden guard as they tried to leave.

• Lin Ze used Apparition to enter the palace and controlled a guard with the Imperius Curse to learn how to reach the Witch King's prison tower.
• Lin Ze followed the guard through the palace, subdued the tower guards, and opened the tower door.
• Lin Ze found Sirius imprisoned behind an iron grille and snapped the magical shackles with his strength.
• Sirius joined Lin Ze in leaving the tower, but a hidden guard thrust a longsword at them.

Lin Ze rescued Sirius from imprisonment in King Arthur’s era and learned how Constantine had kept him captive for two years. They escaped to the Golden Stag Inn, where Sirius explained that Constantine wanted him to win a war and make him immortal.

• Lin Ze used Dragon Transformation to deflect a guard’s sword, knocked him out, and Apparated away with Sirius.
• The guard woke, remembered the name Merlin, and ran to report that the Witch King had been taken.
• Lin Ze and Sirius arrived in an alley behind the Golden Stag Inn, where Sirius recovered from Apparition and said he had spent three years searching for Lin Ze.
• Sirius told Lin Ze that Constantine had imprisoned him after he refused to wipe out an enemy army, using shackles made of Magic-Suppressing Stone.
• Sirius explained that Constantine had also demanded help becoming immortal and had kept him locked up for two years after he failed to provide it.

Lin Ze brought Sirius out of the palace and moved him, Arthur, and Saira to a safer house. There, Lin Ze warned Arthur that the dying king might threaten him and offered help if Arthur wanted to pursue the throne, leaving Arthur’s choice undecided.

• Lin Ze brought Sirius to the inn, where Arthur recognized him as the Witch King and was startled to learn he had been rescued.
• Sirius inspected Arthur, learned he was King Arthur, and ate the food Lin Ze ordered while Saira arrived and gave Lin Ze the address of a safer house.
• Lin Ze, Sirius, Arthur, and Saira moved to the courtyard house in the east of the city, where Lin Ze used Lumos and Sirius longingly eyed his wand.
• Arthur explained that Constantine was his adoptive father and said he did not want the throne, while Lin Ze warned that the dying king might act against him to protect his own children.
• Lin Ze suggested Arthur had prepared for the royal family’s politics and offered to help him, but Arthur did not decide whether to accept.

After the palace blamed the Witch King’s rescue on someone called Merlin, Sirius persuaded Lin Ze to claim the name and support Arthur’s rise to the throne. The group divided their efforts between finding the Sword in the Stone and rallying Arthur’s trusted ministers, while planning to turn public opinion in his favor.

• Saira told Lin Ze and Sirius that the palace had announced the Witch King was rescued by someone named Merlin, based on a guard’s report.
• Sirius urged Lin Ze to claim the identity of Merlin, and Lin Ze agreed.
• Sirius explained the legend of the Sword in the Stone and proposed it as a way for Arthur to become king.
• Saira warned that Arthur lacked access to the palace, an army, and trusted allies, while Arthur said several old ministers might still support him.
• Lin Ze questioned whether the ministers were reliable, then the group split up: Lin Ze and the Witch King would seek the Sword in the Stone, while Saira and Arthur would contact the ministers and influence public opinion.

Lin Ze and Sirius searched for a place to stage the Sword in the Stone, then visited the temple to investigate its unfamiliar statues. They discovered the smallest statue was warm and contained something like a crystallized space, but the temple’s caretaker could not identify it.

• Lin Ze and Sirius went to an abandoned quarry, where Sirius proposed placing a sword in a stone and inviting people to try to draw it.
• Lin Ze suggested they visit the temple because Arthur had said its gods were unrecognized.
• Lin Ze and Sirius examined three statues and found that the smallest one was warm despite the cold, damp hall.
• Lin Ze detected something like a crystallized space inside the small statue, which shuddered when Sirius touched it.
• An old caretaker ordered them to leave and identified the first two statues as the Holy Mother and the Thunder God, but said he did not know who the third represented.

Lin Ze and Sirius investigated a mysterious statue at the temple, while Arthur met two former royal retainers and grew discouraged about his claim to the throne. Lin Ze told Arthur he needed the king’s authority to track down a formidable person, and Arthur agreed to help before warning that the current king was more complicated than he seemed.

• The temple caretaker explained that the small, unidentified statue was the main reason Constantine visited the temple each year, then urged Lin Ze and Sirius to leave.
• Lin Ze said his Legilimency had been blocked by an item on the caretaker, and he and Sirius left the temple.
• Sirius ordered a three-foot knight’s sword from a blacksmith, planning to use it for the Sword in the Stone.
• Saira told Lin Ze that two former royal retainers had reacted differently to Arthur’s plan to claim the throne, and Lin Ze found Arthur brooding in his room.
• Lin Ze told Arthur he needed royal authority to track down a formidable person, and Arthur promised to help once he took the throne.
• Arthur said Lifute Boqin had warned him that the current king was not as simple as he appeared.

Lin Ze learned that Constantine’s miraculous victories and later behavior might be connected to an evil god and a small idol. He approached the temple’s old caretaker for information and revealed his dragon form to pressure him into talking.

• Arthur recounted Boqin’s story of Constantine surviving a siege after his soldiers vanished, and the group suspected the small idol was connected to an evil god.
• Arthur explained that a palace meeting would take place in three days and described a little gate near the kitchens that could help him enter unnoticed.
• Arthur recalled that Constantine had once treated him kindly but stopped summoning him after his sons were born.
• Lin Ze decided to question the temple’s old caretaker about the idol and went to the temple alone the next morning.
• Lin Ze offered the old man gold coins, then manifested his dragon scales and golden eyes to demonstrate his power.

Lin Ze learned that the temple statue, called the Remnant Shedding, had been brought from a mountain shrine in the North and that Constantine fed it blood during his worship. He and Sirius traveled to the North to investigate the shrine, and Lin Ze located it using the Space finger bone.

• Lin Ze pressured the old caretaker into revealing scrolls that identified the statue as the Remnant Shedding, a shell once found inside a mountain in the North.
• The caretaker told Lin Ze that he had seen Constantine kneel before the statue and offer it a bowl of blood that vanished.
• Lin Ze concluded that Constantine had a transactional relationship with the statue and told Saira and Sirius what he had learned.
• Lin Ze and Sirius decided to investigate the old shrine in the North, leaving the Sword in the Stone for later.
• Lin Ze opened a Boundary Break rift and traveled with Sirius to the northern wasteland.
• Lin Ze used the Space finger bone to sense the surrounding land and found the shrine.

Lin Ze and Sirius investigated a frozen cavern and discovered a vast underground bone pile feeding a pulsing heart through dark red threads. At the heart of the pile, Lin Ze found a skeleton holding a dark, rune-covered stone and a finger bone matching his own “Space” finger bone.

• Lin Ze and Sirius entered a cavern beneath a frost-covered stone wall and found a bloodstained platform and murals depicting a king sacrificing soldiers.
• Lin Ze used the “Space” finger bone to sense a huge cavity beneath the cavern, filled with bones and a pulsing heart connected to them by dark red threads.
• Lin Ze used Boundary Break to take Sirius into the cavity, where they saw the heart and the threads running through the bone piles.
• The heart beat violently, making the threads glow and the bones shift to reveal a path to a cross-legged skeleton.
• Lin Ze found a rune-covered stone embedded in the skeleton’s ribs and a dark finger bone in its hands that matched his own.

Lin Ze recovered an inky-black finger bone from a skeleton in the North, triggering a violent reaction from a heart in the cave and barely escaping with Sirius. Back at the courtyard, he found that neither he nor Sirius could channel magic into the bone, and decided to ask Morgana how she had wielded the Life and Death finger bones.

• Lin Ze found an inky-black finger bone resonating with his Space finger bone and removed it from a skeleton, causing the cave’s heart and dark red threads to surge.
• Lin Ze pulled Sirius free from the bone heap, and they escaped through a Boundary Break as the cave shook.
• Lin Ze and Sirius returned to the courtyard, where Lin Ze tested the finger bone and discovered that it repelled both their magic.
• Lin Ze told Saira about the cave’s murals and suspended heart, and she connected the event to Constantine sacrificing soldiers for power.
• The next morning, Lin Ze recalled that Morgana had wielded both the Life and Death finger bones and decided to ask her how she had done it.

Lin Ze visited Morgana in Crow Valley to identify the new finger bone and learn what lay beneath the northern temple. He left with the bone identified as Wisdom and Morgana's theory that a living Shedding God remained beneath the temple, while her inability to leave Crow Valley remained unresolved.

• Sirius questioned whether Morgana truly could not leave Crow Valley, and Lin Ze decided to visit her while Sirius stayed behind to watch Arthur.
• Morgana identified Lin Ze's black finger bone as the Wisdom finger bone, which no one had ever managed to wield.
• After hearing about the bones and beating heart beneath the northern temple, Morgana suggested that a living Shedding God resided there and that the shrine in the imperial capital held a false shedding.
• Morgana explained that her elven heritage let her use life magic and that she learned death magic before obtaining the Death finger bone.
• Lin Ze asked whether Morgana really could not leave Crow Valley, and she replied that she would not have needed his help if she could.

Lin Ze and his allies prepared to use the Sword in the Stone to support Arthur’s claim to the throne, while Constantine’s searches raised the risk that their plan had been exposed. The chapter ended with Lin Ze and Sirius identifying the little idol as the main danger to their scheme.

• Saira reported that two veteran ministers were sympathetic to opposing Constantine, and Arthur planned to enter the spring festival preparations with Boqin.
• Lin Ze told the group what Morgana had revealed about the Shedding Gods, and they decided not to approach the little idol rashly.
• Lin Ze collected an unfinished sword from the blacksmith, and he and Sirius planned to engrave it with the words, “Whosoever draws this sword shall be king of Britain.”
• Saira reported that royal guards had searched a tea shop where she and Arthur met Boqin, and she said Constantine was looking for the Witch King and Merlin.
• Lin Ze proposed presenting the sword to Constantine when Arthur entered the palace, so Arthur could draw it after the king and his sons failed.
• Lin Ze and Sirius agreed that the little idol was the key variable they needed to guard against.

Lin Ze infiltrated the palace disguised as a priest and presented Constantine with the Sword in the Stone, claiming that whoever drew it would rule Britain. Constantine ordered his attendants and guards to try drawing it, but the sword remained lodged in the stone.

• Lin Ze and Saira discussed how people were spreading stories about the Witch King and asking about Merlin, while most showed little affection for Constantine.
• On the day of the spring rites, Arthur entered the palace disguised as a servant while Lin Ze slipped inside through a temple passage.
• Lin Ze disguised himself as an old priest and told a palace official he had brought Constantine a treasure from the high priest.
• Constantine received Lin Ze, who revealed the Sword in the Stone and read its inscription declaring its drawer the ruler of Britain.
• An attendant failed to draw the sword, and Constantine ordered several guards to try, offering a reward to whoever succeeded.

Lin Ze presented the Sword in the Stone to Constantine, but none of the king’s sons could draw it, deepening the conflict over succession. Constantine accused Lin Ze of impersonating the high priest and ordered the guards to seize him, while Lin Ze challenged the king over his connection to something hidden in the temple.

• Constantine questioned Lin Ze about why he had never seen him in the temple, and Lin Ze claimed the high priest had summoned him from overseas to present the sword.
• Constantine ordered his ministers and sons to gather and test the Sword in the Stone, and none of the princes could draw it.
• Constantine asked whether his sons were unfit to rule, and Lin Ze replied that drawing the sword depended on the gods’ will.
• Arthur entered the hall disguised as a servant and watched from an inconspicuous corner without Constantine noticing him.
• Constantine challenged Lin Ze to name the gods and accused him of bringing a worthless sword, then ordered soldiers to seize him.
• Lin Ze let the guards surround him and asked Constantine whether he truly disbelieved in the gods or whether the king’s past deeds involved something in the temple.