Chapter Summaries

After creating Mirror Ace, Ace began recruiting talented youths in the fortress to train as future researchers and planned to establish a Wizard Academy. When rescued village orphans arrived, he spotted new prospects among them, while Arno and another boy clashed over whether ordinary people could become heroes.

• Ace created Mirror Ace, who left to research Magic Trick and hunt Demonic Beasts with Daina, while Ace recovered from the strain of making the copy.
• Ace transformed into Glimmer and Iron Masked Fire Fist, then searched the fortress for healthy youths with strong spiritual power and marked suitable candidates.
• Over nearly a month, Ace contracted with dozens of boys and girls, made them wizard apprentices, and required them to study Logic and Elementary Mathematics.
• Soldiers returned from a nearby village with youths rescued from the Dark Clergy, who had killed the adults and abducted the children for an evil sacrifice.
• At the relief shelter, Auli clung to Arno as he promised to protect her, but another boy insulted Arno's dead father and his belief in heroes, prompting Arno to attack him.

Ace chose Auli as a gifted apprentice and gave her a magic book, while Mirror Ace and Daina spread simplified magic books among demon hunters. Ace developed powerful Pneumatic Railgun Flameblast spells, then set out into the Lar Mountains to find Demonic Beasts for a higher-level blessing ritual.

• Ace used an Illusion Barrier to examine the orphanage children, chose Auli for her overclocked mind, and gave her a magic book after taking her blood.
• Auli woke to find a status panel before her eyes after dreaming of Ace and hearing the principles she was expected to follow.
• Mirror Ace and Daina hunted Demonic Beasts, gathered materials, and distributed simplified magic books to demon hunters, creating an outer circle of Enchanting Apprentices.
• Ace refined Magical Nitroglycerin and designed three Air-Pressure Railgun spell models that launched devastating Flameblast attacks.
• Ace performed a lesser blessing ritual, found its gains too small to solve his stagnating meditation, and headed into the Lar Mountains to seek powerful Low-level Demonic Beasts.

Ace built a concealed Signal Tower inside Mount Baal to extend coverage across the Demon Hunting Wilderness, while Mirror Ace and Daina tested soul-altered Magic Crystal gauntlets. The chapter left Sulu injured and on the run after betraying his companions, as he considered which path of magic to pursue.

• Ace hollowed out Mount Baal, reinforced its interior, and concealed a Signal Tower and more than a dozen transmitters inside it.
• Daina used her mutated Magic Crystal gauntlets to kill a Crimson Crystal Rabbit, while Mirror Ace observed that the weapons were absorbing Remnant Souls and developing a new rune structure.
• Ace and Daina spotted demon hunters fighting a Deep Lurker Crocodile and left without helping, while Ace watched the struggle through his magic book.
• Sulu shoved a female companion toward the Deep Lurker Crocodile to escape, then took an arrow in the back as another demon hunter called him out.
• Mirror Ace decided to keep Sulu under surveillance and potentially use him, while Sulu treated his wound and rejected the Academic Wizard's Path because he urgently wanted to grow stronger.

Sulu chose the Enchanting Wizard's Path but could not yet learn its martial skills. Mirror Ace witnessed the destitute knight Ancesta defeat a group of Demon Hunter bandits and, noticing his unusual spirit, summoned him to make a contract with the Firebearer.

• Sulu selected the Enchanting Wizard's Path and discovered that he was not yet an Intermediate Wizard Apprentice, though his grimoire offered him other spells and methods.
• The Ugly Contractor and several Demon Hunters attacked Borg's caravan, but Ancesta charged in and killed the bandits after Donna was threatened.
• Ancesta introduced himself to Donna as a knight from Norton of the Northern City-State, then rode away without receiving thanks or payment.
• After the caravan disappeared from sight, Ancesta lamented his poverty and considered trading the iron hammer he had taken for a new lancehead.
• Mirror Ace noticed that Ancesta's spirit had overclocked and used the hammer to mark and summon him, where the Firebearer announced a contract.

Mirror Ace formed a pact with Ancesta, while Auli and Arno struggled to survive at the fortress orphanage. When Ancesta encountered Auli and Arno, their magic books revealed that they were fellow contractors.

• Mirror Ace used the Hammer of Oblivion to bind Ancesta into a pact and learned that he was the last inheritor of the Mind Flow Knight Training Method.
• Ancesta entered the fortress after guards confiscated his broken lance.
• Auli practiced magic and hoped to earn enough points to buy Arno a magic book.
• Arno brought meat-filled bread to share with Auli, then went out to let other boys beat him in exchange for breakfast.
• Auli secretly followed Arno and watched him endure the beatings, while Ancesta came upon them.
• Auli and Ancesta's magic books opened and announced that the contractors were fellow travelers who should cooperate.

Ancesta recognized Arno’s courage and began training him in the ways of the Mindflow Knight, leaving Arno determined to make courage his Core Creed and become a hero.

• Ancesta met Auli, explained that he admired Arno, and agreed to teach him techniques after Auli learned who he was.
• Arno shared the food he had brought with the orphanage children, and Auli saved a piece of smoked meat for him.
• Ancesta trained Arno each afternoon for a month in evading attacks and enduring blows, while providing him with meat.
• Arno told Ancesta he wanted to fight to protect the weak, and Ancesta taught him the Secret Teachings of the Mindflow Knight and had him swear the knight’s oath.
• Arno chose courage as his Core Creed and vowed to unite it with nature’s rhythm to gain power comparable to a hero.

Ancesta left after teaching Arno the Heart Intent Flow, while Mirror Ace recognized the method as a new form of mental overclocking. In a flashback, Ace defeated and captured a pack of Gale Wolves, gathered their spirit fragments, and discovered a limit on the Soul Runes his Secret Treasury Space could hold.

• Ancesta said goodbye to Arno and urged him to hold fast to his creed as he left to pursue a path combining the Heart Intent Flow and the Wizard's Path.
• Mirror Ace reviewed Ancesta's records, marked him as a Mental Overclocker, and recognized the Heart Intent Flow as a powerful training method.
• In the Lar Mountains, Ace evaded seven Gale Wolves, marked them with secret art imprints, and used Tracking Flameburst Bombs to kill six and capture the wounded survivor.
• Ace preserved the lead wolf's head, collected spirit fragments from the dead wolves, and found that intense radiance destroyed their spirit bodies.
• Ace tried to add analyzed Soul Runes from the wolves' azure crystals to his Secret Treasury Space and discovered that it could no longer store new runes.

Ace experimented on captured barbarians to develop blessing rituals, first discovering that powerful Demonic Beast materials caused lethal transformations. After imprinting the materials with his innate magic power, he managed to strengthen the subjects, but a Mental Enhancement experiment ended with a transformed soul smiling at him before it exploded.

• Ace captured barbarians who attacked him and used Lesser Mental Blessing rituals to raise their mental strength for experiments.
• His first blessing trials killed the subjects, and further tests showed that strengthening their minds with powerful Demonic Beast materials made them burst into liquid.
• Ace contaminated most of the magical materials with his innate magic power, successfully strengthening barbarians but creating an unknown connection to himself.
• Ace contaminated the Mental Blessing materials with difficulty and began testing Mental and Perception Enhancement rituals on the subjects.
• During a Mental Enhancement ritual, a subject's soul took on Ace's appearance, smiled at him, and exploded.

Ace experimented with blessing rituals and soul magic, then recruited nearby Shamans as subjects to improve his spiritual-power conversion method. After resisting an influence that urged him to sacrifice the Shamans, he erased their memories and purified the sacrificed Demonic Beasts’ souls, expanding his Secret Treasury Space and enabling him to replicate new Soul Runes.

• Ace’s attempt to overwrite and extract magical imprints triggered a danger warning, so he purified the materials and recorded the Purification Technique and Soul Shatter Technique.
• Ace’s physical and spiritual blessing experiments improved his subjects, but most of the vaporized spiritual power was lost, prompting him to seek stronger subjects.
• Ace disguised himself as a Shaman, recruited nearby Shamans through spells and displays of power, and began using them to refine his spiritual blessing ritual.
• A traditional sacrificial ritual raised the conversion rate from thirty percent to seventy percent, and Ace adapted its runes while avoiding its mysterious source of power.
• As an unseen influence urged him to kill the Shamans, Ace canceled the ritual and used the Hammer of Oblivion to erase their memories.
• Ace activated the revised ritual, sacrificed Demonic Beasts, and purified their souls; the resulting spiritual power expanded his Secret Treasury Space and lifted its limit on replicating Soul Runes.

Ace reorganized his Soul Secret Treasury Space after reaching the Advanced Wizard Apprentice level, then examined the three holy relics he had taken from the shamans. He discovered that one relic marked heroic beings and an ancestral land, while another was an intricate design blueprint.

• Ace reached about 8 marks of mental power after converting over ninety percent of his mistified mental power, then killed the Demonic Beasts and spared the shamans.
• Ace left the shamans at a Barbarian Tribe and traveled to a mountain near the wind vent to study his Soul Secret Treasury Space.
• Ace chose which spells and soul runes to retain, then spent nearly a month painfully dissolving spell models and runes to make room for future simulation rune sets.
• Ace examined the shamans' three holy relics: a weight-reducing storage pouch, a map marking heroic beings and the Ancestral Land, and an intricate design blueprint.

Ace discovered an ancient blueprint that revealed the previous civilization may have reached a steampunk era, but it burned to ashes after drawing him into a vision of a colossal battlefield. He built a Signal Tower in the Lar Mountains, contacted Mirror Ace, and asked him to help investigate a place that might hold clues to the previous civilization.

• Ace examined a blueprint for a high-pressure air rifle and air tank bearing the imperial crest of the previous civilization, then experienced a vision of gigantic war machines battling an enormous pair of hands before the blueprint burned to ash.
• Ace decided to investigate the Ancestral Land and analyze the unidentified Demonic Beast's stomach pouch, while the Book Spirit began studying two barbarian holy relics.
• Ace left the mountain, found a suitable peak in the Lar Mountains, and constructed a Signal Tower to contact Mirror Ace.
• Ace established contact with Mirror Ace and asked him to come assist at a place that might reveal clues to the previous civilization.

Mirror Ace prepared to leave Northern Territory Fortress and said farewell to Daina after spending a day with her. He left her a warning that Blasphemers were under investigation and told her to stay away from the Demon Hunting Wilderness.

• Mirror Ace exchanged information with Main Body Ace, who planned to establish a Wizard Academy when the time was right.
• Mirror Ace drank with Soron, who revealed that he had found Jeanne near an unnamed hill in the Lar Mountains and warned that the legion was preparing to attack Blasphemers.
• Mirror Ace gifted Kent Rona a painting of Northern Territory Fortress and invited Daina to meet him in the hospital's rear courtyard.
• Mirror Ace embraced Daina and asked her to spend the next day with him, and they wandered through the fortress until curfew.
• Daina found Mirror Ace gone the next morning and read his note warning her not to enter the Demon Hunting Wilderness while the city-state investigated the Blasphemers.

Main Body Ace and Mirror Ace synchronized their experiences, then prepared to investigate the canyon blocking the path to the Ancestral Land. Their probing revealed that an unknown intermediate Demonic Beast was luring creatures into a depression beneath the mist.

• Main Body Ace and Mirror Ace synchronized their minds and agreed that both versions of Ace had meaning, while Main Body Ace resolved to keep their spirits aligned.
• Main Body Ace inscribed Permanent Spiritual Blessing and discovered his spiritual power had reached 9.9 marks, but his meditation method could no longer sustain its growth.
• Ace captured Fire Lizards and sent them into the mist-filled canyon, where their connections to his charm spells weakened and they vanished into a depression.
• Mirror Ace used Eagle Eye Sharpness and Snake Eye Thermal Sense to see through the canyon’s magical mist as the Fire Lizards disappeared.
• Main Body Ace sent more Demonic Beasts into the canyon and carried Mirror Ace overhead, where Mirror Ace spotted an unknown, unusually cold Demonic Beast controlling their movements.

Ace prepared an aerial assault to destroy the canyon’s illusion-controlling Demonic Beast, then used soul spells to eliminate its Remnant Soul. The Transparent Winged Snake vanished, leaving behind a dreamlike crystal.

• Ace discovered that Mechanical Mind delayed the canyon mist’s control, and a Big Mouth Lar Bat escaped with its soul badly damaged.
• Ace and Mirror Ace devised a plan to use transformed Magic Glycerin tubes, then prepared and produced nearly three hundred of them.
• Ace transformed into an eagle and flew Mirror Ace over the canyon, where they dropped the tubes and fired a Tracking flameburst shell at the marked Demonic Beast.
• The explosions destroyed the unknown Demonic Beast’s body and dispersed the canyon mist, leaving a Remnant Soul.
• Ace used Soul Burst to weaken the Transparent Winged Snake’s Remnant Soul, then cast Purification Technique and destroyed it, leaving a dreamlike crystal.

Ace discovered a rare Dream Rune Group inside a dreamlike crystal, then searched for the Ancestral Land and uncovered a concealed, abandoned settlement. The settlement held the remains of scholars and others who had been killed with extraordinary power, including an elderly scholar who died while calculating pi.

• Ace used his mirror image to retrieve the dreamlike crystal, studied several of its runes, and added it to his research plans.
• Ace decided to charm Demonic Beasts and capture barbarians before exploring the Ancestral Land, then detected a concealed area in the canyon.
• Ace used charmed Thunder Monkeys to test the concealed area and break its hiding effect, revealing an abandoned settlement.
• Mirror Ace entered the settlement and found skeletons wearing clothing from Medimous City-State and the Northern states, with signs of extraordinary violence.
• Mirror Ace found geometric calculations and the number 3.141592 beside a skeleton, then saw a vision of an elderly scholar being killed while calculating pi.

Mirror Ace and Main Body Ace explored a ruined settlement and discovered that its people had studied the laws behind extraordinary power. A diary revealed how one researcher learned Barbarian witchcraft, developed new spells, and began to pry open the sealed World Gate.

• Mirror Ace explored the settlement, found rune-inscribed hides and a sword, and bowed to the forgotten pioneers who had studied extraordinary power.
• Mirror Ace signaled Main Body Ace that the settlement was safe, and the two searched it for clues.
• Main Body Ace found a dusty diary and used Clean and Renew to restore it.
• The diary described how its author disguised himself as a Barbarian shaman, studied witchcraft, and identified the Origin Force Pattern in Demonic Beast hides.
• The author recorded discovering patterns that strengthened his body and spiritual power, creating Child of Wind, and finding a pattern that enhanced the Origin Force Pattern.
• The author concluded that his discoveries had opened a tiny crack in the World Gate sealed by gods and heroes.

Ace read Nicholas’s diary and witnessed how Nicholas discovered irrational numbers, used them to perfect a strengthened Origin Force Pattern, and transcended. The next day, Nicholas woke to a mob condemning Hibbs for questioning the Pythagorean School’s doctrine and demanding that he be drowned.

• Ace read Nicholas’s diary and felt the diary owner’s emotions as he turned its pages.
• Nicholas traveled to Milne City and joined the Pythagorean School to study mathematics and solve the flaws in his Origin Force Pattern.
• Nicholas overheard Hibbs asking whether the hypotenuse of an isosceles right triangle was an integer or a fraction, and realized that some numbers were neither.
• Nicholas calculated that irrational numbers could explain the pattern’s structure, then used his discovery to draw a strengthened Origin Force Pattern and transcend.
• Nicholas woke to hear a crowd accuse Hibbs of blasphemy for questioning the Pythagorean doctrine and call for his execution by drowning.

Nicholas rescued Hibbs from the Pythagorean School and recruited him into a movement of scholars who studied mysterious patterns. After the Punishers raided their secret gathering place, Nicholas and the surviving Great Scholars escaped, and his diary revealed his plan to explore ancient underground ruins.

• The Pythagorean School drowned Hibbs for arguing that numbers included more than integers and fractions, but Nicholas cut him free and pulled him from the lake.
• Nicholas introduced himself to Hibbs as a new Shaman and invited him to use his wisdom to explore the mysterious world together.
• Nicholas and Hibbs gathered scholars into the Fire Thief Alliance, known publicly as the Nicholas School, with Nicholas as its Chief Great Scholar.
• The Punishers stormed the scholars’ secret gathering place and slaughtered many members, while Nicholas led the surviving Great Scholars through a hidden passage.
• In his diary, Nicholas recorded that he had found a passage from the Lar Mountains gorge to underground ruins and planned to explore them for treasure.

Ace prepared for the hidden passage by creating a new Magic Stone production ritual and equipping thousands of Magic Glycerin tubes with flexible combat functions. After completing the simulated rune group in his Soul Secret Treasury Space, he entered the ruins with Mirror Ace and a herd of Demonic Beasts.

• Ace and Mirror Ace found the starlit mechanism that opened a hidden passage in the canyon wall, but Ace sensed that the ruins dulled mental perception and decided to prepare first.
• Ace designed the Magic Stone Creation Ritual to convert Demonic Beast materials into mana storage media, then developed thousands of Magic Glycerin tubes with Ejection, marking, and Tracking rune arrays.
• Ace used the Book Spirit and the collective computing power of contractors' magic books to reverse-engineer the Soul Rune-level simulated rune group and successfully replicated it into his Soul Secret Treasury Space.
• Ace told Mirror Ace to capture powerful Low-level Demonic Beasts so they could explore the ruins.
• Ace and Mirror Ace opened the hidden passage again and drove charmed powerful and ordinary Demonic Beasts into its gray depths as they followed behind.

Mirror Ace passed a magical test and discovered a vast, abandoned steel city beneath the passage, where magic was heavily suppressed. After the main body joined him, Ace explored the city, found signs of another explorer, and uncovered a library filled with books from a fantasy steampunk civilization.

• Mirror Ace solved the math questions guarding an old steel door and read a warning from Nicholas about heroes and Punishers.
• Mirror Ace entered the underground city, tested the magical suppression, and sent information to the main body through Magic Signal relay stations.
• Main Body Ace joined Mirror Ace, and they agreed to explore separately before setting out in different directions.
• Ace found fresh soil inside a performance hall, suggesting another explorer had entered the city.
• Ace discovered an abandoned library and used the Book Spirit to understand its books, which revealed the legacy of the Agustin Empire and its steam-powered technology.