Recaps

Klein impersonated Admiral Amyrius through a banquet and the journey home, avoiding suspicion from Auston and secretary Luan while assessing the admiral’s habits. At the residence, he was left alone in the locked bathroom as Cynthia prepared to join him.

• Klein disguised himself as Amyrius and told Auston he would give him an answer when he left Oravi.
• Klein attended the governor-general’s banquet, spoke with guests, and ate while keeping up Amyrius’s appearance.
• Luan presented Klein with suspicious naval-base accounts, and Klein told him to put them on his desk.
• Klein returned to Amyrius’s residence, where Cynthia welcomed him and led him upstairs to bathe.
• Cynthia changed into a nightgown and tried to enter the bathroom, but found that Klein had locked the door from inside.

Klein continued impersonating Admiral Amyrius Rieveldt, avoided Cynthia’s advances, and worked through the night. While sleeping at his desk, he was trapped in a dream by a mysterious figure who warned him to stay out of Aston and the others’ affairs, leaving Klein suspecting the Hermits of Fate were involved.

• Klein avoided intimacy with Cynthia by telling her he had work, then changed into pajamas and went to the study.
• Cynthia prayed to the Mother Tree of Desire with a strange black necklace, asking to become more alluring and bear Amyrius a child.
• Klein signed simple documents as Amyrius and left vague comments on complicated ones before falling asleep at his desk using false eyes.
• A mysterious figure invaded Klein’s dream and warned him not to get involved in Aston and the others’ affairs.
• Klein challenged the figure’s identity, and its talk of an era’s fate led him to suspect the Hermits of Fate.

Klein reasoned about the Hermits of Fate’s warning to Amyrius, then impersonated the admiral through a full day of inspections, reports, and a dinner banquet. As he returned home dreading his encounter with Cynthia, she secretly prepared and drank a potion after invoking the Tree of Desire.

• Klein suspected the Hermits of Fate had warned Amyrius because a member had commissioned the intervention, but he decided to stay out of the matter.
• Klein realized the dream visitor had used a method other than Nightmare powers to reach him, and felt his work for Amyrius had earned him the Ninth Law charm.
• In the City of Silver, Colin asked Derrick whether he had later Sun potion formulas, and arranged for him to join an exploration in about two months.
• Klein, disguised as Amyrius, inspected Oravi Naval Base, listened to officers’ reports, and attended a supplier’s dinner banquet without breaking character.
• Cynthia scraped powder from a black-rhinoceros-horn pendant, mixed it into hot water, invoked the Tree of Desire, and drank the mixture while awaiting Amyrius’s return.

Klein, disguised as Admiral Amyrius, avoided Cynthia by claiming his body needed time to recover, then learned that Auston Rieveldt had been removed as governor. He chose not to meet his brother and sent him back to Backlund, leaving Klein to carry Amyrius’s restrained grief over the family crisis.

• Klein claimed to Cynthia that his body had developed abnormalities and asked to spend the night alone, then she fell asleep after dreaming of a star-filled sky.
• Klein returned to Oravi Naval Base and learned from Luan that Auston Rieveldt had been removed as governor and that a replacement would arrive that day.
• Klein considered how Amyrius would respond when Luan reported that Auston wanted to see him.
• Klein refused to meet Auston and told Luan to buy him a ticket back to Backlund.
• Luan told Klein that Auston had called him cold-hearted before leaving.
• Klein returned to the villa, embraced Cynthia, and told her that Auston had been removed as governor.

Klein, acting as Admiral Amyrius, reflected on his identity before waking to an outside influence that drove the villa’s occupants into grotesque compulsions. He found Cynthia transformed into a towering monster, and she asked him to have a child with her.

• Klein used his experiences as Amyrius to clarify his own identity, then fell asleep peacefully.
• Klein awoke from a sexually charged dream, recognized that an outside force had affected him, and armed himself with the Ninth Law charm and Creeping Hunger.
• Klein found a waiter frantically eating raw fish and two maids acting out compulsions as he made his way toward the master bedroom.
• Klein entered the bedroom and saw Luan and the other occupants caught up in uncontrolled lust around a towering, flower-covered body.
• The monster revealed itself as Cynthia and shyly told Klein that she wanted to have a child with him.

Klein used the Ninth Law charm to block the outside power that had transformed Cynthia, but its backlash burst his eyes. After escaping her grasp by changing into Gehrman Sparrow, he healed himself and attacked the weakened monster with Creeping Hunger.

• Klein used Creeping Hunger’s Distortion on Cynthia’s request, but her mutated form resisted it and sent branches and flowers after him and the others.
• Klein activated the Ninth Law charm and prohibited interaction with the outside world, isolating the power that had transformed Cynthia.
• The backlash burst Klein’s eyes, while Cynthia collapsed into a mass of flesh and tumors and the surrounding guards and attendants fell unconscious.
• Cynthia’s branches seized Klein, but he changed his appearance to Gehrman Sparrow, causing her to loosen her grip and let him go.
• Klein transferred his eye injuries to his left shoulder, activated Creeping Hunger, and summoned a pillar of sacred light onto Cynthia.

Klein purified Cynthia after she revealed that the Mother Tree of Desire and the Celestial Sect had caused her transformation, then ordered an investigation into the sect. After his subordinates arrested its Sequence 8 leader, Klein began to suspect the sect was connected to the Rose School of Thought.

• Cynthia identified the Mother Tree of Desire and the Celestial Sect as the cause of her condition, and Klein purified her to stop the corruption.
• Klein found a cracked, black pendant resembling a miniature rhinoceros horn among Cynthia's clothes and ordered Luan to investigate the Celestial Sect and tend to the unconscious household staff.
• While waiting in the study, Klein considered whether the starry sky he had seen represented the Astral World and wondered what the bright star signified.
• Luan reported that Cynthia's parents had led investigators to the active Celestial Sect, whose members preached nudity, nature, and indulgence, and whose leader was a Sequence 8 Lunatic.
• Klein suspected the sect might be connected to the Rose School of Thought and ordered Luan to bring its leader to him.

Klein interrogated Follett Ken and learned that the Celestial Sect had planned to corrupt Admiral Amyrius through Cynthia and the Necklace of Procreation. Follett revealed that the Mother Tree of Desire had directed the scheme, and Klein connected its first revelation to the day he arrived on Oravi Island.

• Klein used the pressure of Spirit Piercing to make Follett explain that Cynthia had wanted a child with Beyonder powers and that the Necklace of Procreation could help her conceive with Admiral Amyrius.
• Follett revealed that the necklace’s powder and Cynthia’s prayers could corrupt the man who conceived a child with her, making him a believer and blessed one of the Mother Tree of Desire.
• Klein deduced that the Celestial Sect had sought to covertly corrupt Amyrius, while Luan admitted the guard had failed to monitor Cynthia’s relatives and friends.
• Follett said the Mother Tree of Desire had instructed the sect in a dream on February 4, and identified the sect as a branch of the Rose School of Thought under the saint Zatwin.
• After Luan left the study, Follett admitted that the sect had used the necklace and a tramp’s hair in a ritual on February 6 to amplify the tramp’s appetite.
• Klein realized the ritual had targeted Amyrius’s tramp double and that February 4 was the day Klein had arrived on Oravi Island.

Klein uncovered the Celestial Sect’s crimes, killed Follett Ken, and ordered a purge on Oravi Island while impersonating Admiral Amyrius. Three days later, the real Amyrius returned and learned how much had changed in his absence.

• Klein questioned Follett Ken, confirmed the sect had made no special arrangements to interfere with divination, and heard him confess to numerous crimes.
• Klein killed Follett Ken, took his Lunatic Beyonder Characteristic, and ordered Luan to help the police purge the Celestial Sect and pursue the Rose School of Thought.
• Klein declined Governor Ben Connard’s banquet invitation and spent the next two days recovering from his injuries.
• The real Admiral Amyrius returned to Klein’s room and verified his identity by naming the Ninth Law charm.
• Klein told Amyrius that his secretary had been injured, his younger brother had lost the governorship, Cynthia had mutated and been purified, and several staff members had been infected.

Klein finished impersonating Admiral Amyrius, received his remaining payment and a merfolk cufflink, and learned that the Celestial Sect’s attack had caused Cynthia’s death and Secretary Luan’s injury. In Stoen, Audrey learned that the potion formula she sought was for a Hypnotist.

• Klein told Amyrius about the dream warning, Cynthia’s mutation, and the investigation, and Amyrius said Klein had made the right choice while refusing to explain why he had changed his plans.
• Klein gave Amyrius the cracked Necklace of Procreation, changed back into his own clothes, and left the garden villa; Amyrius watched the night sky as the pendant crumbled in his hand.
• Klein collected five hundred pounds and the Merfolk Cufflink from Bilt, then provided the ritual details for making a messenger-calling harmonica.
• Bilt learned that Auston Rieveldt had been removed as governor and that Cynthia had died in a Celestial Sect assassination attempt on Amyrius, while Secretary Luan had been injured.
• In Stoen, Audrey heard from Smin that the potion formula she could earn through contributions was called Hypnotist.

Klein learned how Marauders could parasitize hosts and postponed investigating Leonard until he could find a safe helper. He left the area under a new identity, while Audrey was assigned a final task to earn the Hypnotist formula.

• Azik replied to Klein, explaining the two forms of Parasite control and how a host might be freed through an unwitting prayer and ritual.
• Klein decided not to investigate Leonard yet because he lacked a trustworthy helper and feared alerting the Parasite.
• Bilt learned that Admiral Amyrius had sailed for Bayam and ordered his subordinates to stop searching for Gehrman Sparrow after hearing he had disappeared.
• Klein changed his identity and lodging, then registered as a volunteer at the Oravi Medical Aid Foundation under the name Sinbad Volent.
• Audrey hunted with Susie in East Chester County, and Smin told her to buy a Twenty Years' War notebook from Associate Professor Michelle as her final task for the Hypnotist formula.

Audrey planned how to approach Associate Professor Michelle about a wartime notebook, while Alger and Fors continued advancing their own plans. Klein arrived in Nass, the City of White, and was introduced to the archipelago’s pirate-filled port before canned wolf-fish drove him to dry-heave.

• Audrey learned that the notebook belonged to Associate Professor Michelle’s collection and devised a discreet way to request a viewing through Jane and her brother.
• Alger reflected on his progress digesting the Wind-blessed potion and his difficulty obtaining the Ocean Songster formula.
• Fors finished her circus work after digesting the Trickmaster potion, and the circus owner asked her to advertise the circus in her next book.
• Klein traveled from Oravi Island to Nass to meet Cattleya and seek wild mermaids in the eastern Sonia Sea.
• Klein walked through a fight between pirates and a local gang, then fled the stench of cans of wolf-fish and dry-heaved in a secluded corner.

Klein arrived in Nass, sampled its whale-based cuisine, and contacted Admiral of Stars Cattleya through a coded meeting. The chapter ended with Klein asking when they would set off for the dangerous waters of the Sonia Sea.

• Klein recovered from opening a can of wolf-fish and walked through Nass, where he saw a protest against excessive whaling turn into a clash with police.
• Klein settled into an inn under the name Gehrman Sparrow and reasoned that few Faceless would remain in the Gargas Archipelago.
• Klein sampled several white-whale dishes before returning to the inn for the night.
• Klein went to the Fanatical Whale Dance general store, gave the shopkeeper the coded message, and was led to a hidden room.
• Klein met Admiral of Stars Cattleya through a crystal ball, confirmed his identity as Gehrman Sparrow, and asked when they would set off.

Klein visited the Rorsted Bar to gather information and heard of a mysterious deep-sea ruin before encountering the notorious pirate Gillschies. He returned to his hotel without pursuing the pirate, while Derrick met Colin Iliad in the City of Silver about the upcoming exploration mission.

• Klein arranged a meeting with Cattleya for eight that night, then went to the Rorsted Bar to collect news and check whether Roy King had been rescued.
• Klein overheard an adventurer describe Garis finding an enormous, mysterious well on the seabed east of Gargas.
• A nervous young man entered the bar seeking members of the Adventurers' Mutual Aid Society, and several adventurers stood to respond.
• Klein recognized the man who appeared at the entrance as Gillschies, Agarito's second mate, but Gillschies withdrew and left after glancing at Klein and a towering adventurer.
• Klein left the bar and returned to his hotel, while Derrick Berg met Colin Iliad in the City of Silver.

Derrick prepared to join Colin’s expedition to cleanse Afternoon Town while Klein waited to leave Nass aboard the Future. After receiving a warning from Slaughterer Gillschies, Klein boarded Admiral of Stars Cattleya’s ship and departed for the eastern Sonia Sea.

• Colin told Derrick that he would lead an exploration team to cleanse Afternoon Town again, and Derrick agreed to join.
• A shadow warned Klein not to interfere in the events at noon, claiming to speak for the King of Immortality.
• Klein decided not to report the warning to the Church of the God of Combat and prepared his equipment for the sea voyage.
• Klein traveled to Pier 6, where Admiral of Stars Cattleya arrived aboard the Future amid the harbor’s alarm and coastal cannons.
• Cattleya created a bridge of starlight to the pier, and Klein crossed it to board the Future.

Klein boarded the Future and met Admiral of Stars Cattleya's officers as the ship sailed east along the whaling route. Cattleya arranged his lodging and agreed to take his Pugilist Beyonder Characteristic as part of his remaining passage fee.

• Cattleya sensed the many mystical items Klein carried and greeted him before leading him aboard the Future.
• Cattleya explained that few sailors were traveling east because the route was dangerous, and Klein observed the ship's ritualistic symbols.
• Klein met Frank Lee, who explained his unusual experiments with crossbreeding crops and animals, and second mate Heath Doyle, a Rose Bishop who had survived an accidental potion exposure without going mad.
• Cattleya showed Klein where he would stay, while Frank Lee offered him a baked potato that Klein declined.
• Cattleya asked about Klein's remaining Beyonder Characteristics, and he offered an Interrogator, a Pugilist, and a Lunatic; she chose the Pugilist.

Klein traveled aboard the Future with Admiral of Stars Cattleya, while Emlyn joined a Sanguine trial to hunt believers of the Moon Primordial. The Future reached the site of rumored Fourth Epoch ruins on the seabed, which Cattleya planned to investigate.

• Klein agreed to sell Cattleya a Sequence 8 Pugilist Beyonder characteristic for 700 pounds and arranged to deliver it the next day.
• At Harvest Church, Father Utravsky praised Emlyn for helping win new believers, and Emlyn wondered why Leonard Mitchell had stopped watching him.
• Kasimi Odora told Emlyn, Ruth Báthory, and other young Sanguine that they would compete to track down and kill believers of the Moon Primordial; Emlyn accepted the trial.
• The Future passed wary whaling ships and scattered several pirate ships as it sailed along the whaling route.
• Cattleya told Klein that the crew had spotted the location of supposed Fourth Epoch ruins on the seabed and intended to investigate.

Klein joined Admiral of Stars Cattleya’s crew as they investigated a mysterious deep-sea well, while Frank Lee showed off his unusual biological experiments. Nina’s dive found a tiny, deep, pitch-black well, leaving the crew to hear more about what she had discovered.

• Klein developed a sore throat from carrying the Biotoxin Bottle, then met Frank Lee on deck as Frank demonstrated fish whose blood had become wine.
• Frank introduced Nina, the crew’s boatswain and deputy navigator, and she asked Klein whether Vice Admiral Ailment was as charming as rumored.
• Nina and several sailors dove into the sea to explore the well while Klein discussed Cattleya’s secret route and the strange waters ahead.
• Frank gave Klein a medicinal green apple that cured his sore throat and cough.
• Nina resurfaced with a corroded metal bar and a piece of porous black earth, reporting that the well’s opening was tiny but its dark interior was very deep.

Nina described an ancient underwater well too small for humans to enter, and Cattleya decided to study the objects Nina recovered before considering an expedition. Klein suspected he could use the Sea God’s power to send marine creatures inside, while Audrey visited Michelle Deut’s collection and recognized Dragonese grammar in a knight’s notebook.

• Nina told Cattleya that she had found a tiny, deep underwater well near corroded steel ruins and gave her a metal fragment and marked soil.
• Cattleya judged that entering the well was too dangerous until she had examined the recovered objects, and rewarded Nina with Sonia Blood Wine.
• Klein considered using the Sea God Scepter to command small marine creatures into the well, then noticed Cattleya glance at him and wondered whether she had similar plans.
• Klein sensed someone watching Gehrman Sparrow from behind the curtains of an upper-level room, but entered the cabin without reacting.
• Audrey visited Michelle Deut’s collection and became interested in a knight’s notebook from Sonia Island.
• Audrey recognized the knight’s unusual short sentences as grammatical habits of Dragonese she had studied.

Audrey persuaded Michelle Deut to give her the Sauron royal helmet and the Twenty Years' War notebook by funding an antiquities research fund, gaining the items while supporting her reputation and future access to historical artifacts. After finding no obvious clues in the notebook, she arranged to use Magic Mirror Divination with Mr. Fool's permission.

• Audrey offered Michelle Deut a donation of money, land, and a manor to help establish an antiquities fund, and he agreed to give her the helmet and notebook.
• Audrey received the items at the Hall Family villa and found the notebook contained fragmentary entries with no obvious mystical clues.
• Audrey reasoned that the Psychology Alchemists might want the notebook as a divination medium connected to the knight's experiences and possibly a mind dragon.
• Audrey decided to try Magic Mirror Divination by petitioning Mr. Fool, and Susie stood guard outside her room.
• Klein heard Audrey's prayer aboard the Future and gave permission for the divination.

Audrey used Magic Mirror Divination to discover that the notebook’s owner, Lindrila, was buried in a Dragon-worshipping village in East Chester County. Klein then investigated a mysterious watcher aboard the Future and found Frank Lee mourning the failure of his fish-breeding experiment.

• Audrey performed Magic Mirror Divination and asked about the notebook’s original owner.
• Klein connected with Audrey’s mirror from above the gray fog and divined the notebook’s owner’s whereabouts.
• Audrey saw a village church and cemetery, where a gravestone bore the name Lindrila, and decided to give the notebook to the Psychology Alchemists.
• Klein concluded that the notebook and village were connected to a Dragon, then considered the risks of Magic Mirror Divination.
• Klein searched the room where he suspected a watcher had been but found it empty.
• On the deck of the Future, Klein encountered Frank Lee, who said his silver-scaled fish could not reproduce and sucked on one of them.

Klein and the Future encountered the Black Death, flagship of the King of Immortality, Agarito, on a storm-filled sea route. After the ships passed, Agarito attacked them with supernatural laughter, and Cattleya used the Future’s defenses and starlight to help the ship escape.

• Klein spotted a huge sailing ship near a storm and recognized it as the Black Death, flagship of Agarito, the King of Immortality.
• The Black Death and the Future passed each other without fighting, while pirates on both ships watched and provoked one another.
• After the Black Death turned away, Agarito’s malicious laughter overwhelmed the Future’s crew and began transforming some of them.
• Cattleya activated the Future’s magical markings and used starlight and a gale to speed the ship away from the Black Death.
• Klein recovered as the laughter faded, considered how he might defend the Future if Agarito pursued them, and saw Cattleya’s dark marks disappear.

After the Future escaped the Black Death, Klein helped Frank Lee and Nina calm the sailors while Cattleya treated herself in the captain’s cabin. The ship was caught in a storm and briefly forced off course, but the crew returned it to the safe sea route; Klein then chose not to pursue the Black Death.

• Cattleya withdrew to her cabin, leaving Frank Lee to calm the sailors who were still writhing in pain.
• Frank Lee explained that he had added sedatives to the beer, while Klein helped restrain Nina so Frank could inject her with a stronger sedative.
• Klein proposed knocking the sailors unconscious instead, and Frank agreed, so Klein used the back of a saber to knock them out one by one.
• Klein met Ottolov, the Future’s navigator, and noticed that his eyes seemed similar to Cattleya’s before Ottolov warned the crew of an approaching wave.
• The crew steered the Future through a violent storm and back onto the safe sea route, while Klein used the Sea God charm to steady himself.
• After seeing no sign that the Black Death had caught up, Klein returned to his room and rejected the idea of using The Fool’s power to search for and attack Agarito.

Fors met with Dorian Gray, who gave her the Astrologer potion formula and Lemano’s Spellbook while warning her about its limits and dangers. Meanwhile, Klein learned that the Future was nearing its destination.

• Fors noticed Dorian signal danger outside the station, avoided approaching him, and later met him at the Hat Trick Inn.
• Dorian told Fors that his former student Lewis Wien was a traitor who had helped devastate their organization and might now be a Traveler.
• Dorian gave Fors the Astrologer potion formula and Lemano’s Spellbook, explaining how it recorded Beyonder powers and warning that each use could make her dangerously lost unless she spread her blood on its cover.
• Fors asked about Lewis Wien and said she wanted to avenge Dorian, Lawrence, and Anlisa, but Dorian warned her to avoid him.
• Aboard the Future, Klein encountered Cattleya, who said they would soon reach those waters.

The Future entered the Sea of Ruins, where Klein learned that its drifting ruins, monsters, and mysterious voices made it dangerous to explore. As the ship approached a nearby ruin, an enormous gasp sounded beside everyone.

• Cattleya explained that Heath Doyle needed flesh and blood to use his Rose Bishop abilities, and he devoured a large fish.
• The Future plunged over a vast rift, but a surge of seawater caught the ship and tossed it safely across.
• Klein saw the golden, sunlit sea and the remains of vast ruins beneath the water.
• Cattleya warned Klein that the Sea of Ruins held unpredictable dangers, including unreal monsters and voices that could drive Demigods mad.
• The Future approached the ruins, and an enormous gasp sounded beside everyone.