Chapter Summaries

[Autumn Light and Osmanthus Shadows] led a squadron of Soldier Bees carrying fire-oil bombers into a low-altitude raid on Holy Crusader barracks in Fir City. After enemy grapeshot shot down his bombers, he redirected the attack toward the cathedral and its twin towers.

• [Autumn Light and Osmanthus Shadows] ordered the Soldier Bee pilots to split into pairs and scatter toward their assigned barracks as Holy Crusaders fired at them.
• [Soaring Clouds 5564] fell toward a barracks with [Court a Little Death], who grabbed his hands and spun them through the air before they crashed and ignited the fire oil.
• [Autumn Light and Osmanthus Shadows] and [Litang's Supremely Fierce Tiger] reached their target, where the elite Holy Crusader from the previous attack blasted their Soldier Bees and bombers out of the sky.
• [Autumn Light and Osmanthus Shadows] abandoned the barracks target and pointed his surviving partner toward Fir City's cathedral, saying its twin towers had to be hinting at something.

[Litang's Supremely Fierce Tiger] and [Autumn Light and Osmanthus Shadows] crashed Soldier Bees into the cathedral’s bell towers, setting them ablaze. As the flames brought down a bronze bell and stunned the crowd, [Zhong Lele] captured the spectacle for her next video.

• [Litang's Supremely Fierce Tiger] and [Autumn Light and Osmanthus Shadows] aimed their Soldier Bees at the cathedral’s twin bell towers and crashed through stained-glass windows.
• Antiya Lisi sensed the fire through his roots and angrily realized the rebels had attacked the cathedral.
• The fires spread through the wooden structures inside the towers, casting shifting colored light across the crowd.
• The wooden supports of the right-hand tower’s bronze bell burned through, and the bell crashed down to the stone floor.
• [Zhong Lele] photographed the burning towers, stunned spectators, and fallen bell for her next video thumbnail.

Willow completed her investigation of the psionic energy and left Valhalla on an official trip to trace its source. In Fir City, Marba planned to lead most of his troops against the rebels’ stronghold near White Wax Town, leaving Antiya Lisi to defend the city.

• Willow told Ed that the psionic energy was part of a spell, likely cast by someone of middle tier or above, but its purpose and caster remained unknown.
• Willow submitted a leave request to investigate further, and Ed had her complete business-trip paperwork before she left Valhalla to track the energy’s residue.
• Marba told Antiya Lisi that the rebels’ core position was north of White Wax Town and proposed a direct strike to destroy their leadership.
• Antiya Lisi warned that Marba’s plan risked Fir City, but Marba argued that attacking was their only chance to survive and avoid Lord Sailesi turning them into puppets.
• Marba planned to depart that night with eighty percent of his Holy Crusaders and reach White Wax Town in about three days, while Antiya Lisi held Fir City.

Marba organized an elite force to leave Fir City and carry out a decapitation mission against the suspected false god near White Wax Town, while Willow tracked psionic traces across Aduolin Province. Ed sent Willow to Black Locust Town to support the coming attack on Fir City by buffing the Soul Returners.

• Marba asked Antiya Lisi to hold Fir City for three days while he located the enemy's core, and Antiya Lisi agreed to impose martial law if the rebels intensified their attacks.
• Marba ordered his subordinates to muster troops, weed out the bottom twenty percent, and prepare for the mission; mutated-plant seeds were distributed to the chosen soldiers.
• Nearly five thousand elite Holy Crusaders gathered south of Fir City at midnight and secretly marched toward White Wax Town, leaving a trail that root tendrils recorded along with a familiar psionic fluctuation.
• Willow tracked lingering psionic energy through Aduolin Province until she reached Black Locust Town, where Ed told her to find Grand Knight Commander Nuolun and buff the Soul Returners attacking Fir City.

Willow became the psionic advisor for the Fir City Operation and gave the gathered Soul Returners buffs as the quest shifted toward a full assault. After the players set out for Fir City, Willow left to support Soul Returners in another town.

• The game announced the final update to the Fir City Operation, removing entry restrictions and adding full occupation of Fir City as an objective.
• Players learned they could enter Fir City through the western tunnel and began preparing to head there.
• Willow arrived at Black Locust Town and announced that she had come on the lord's orders to serve as the operation's psionic advisor.
• Willow used her psionic energy to buff more than a hundred Soul Returners at once.
• Willow wished the players victory for the Second Holy See and teleported away to assist Soul Returners in another town.

After Willow gave the players a powerful twelve-hour buff, they marched toward Fir City and drew fire from its Holy Crusader defenders. [Xiexie Huigu] reached [Zhong Lele]’s concealed tunnel entrance, covered in arrows, and she greeted him as “Mr. Hedgehog.”

• The players discovered that Willow’s Psionic Energy Stimulation boosted their attributes for twelve hours and set out for the tunnel west of Fir City.
• The players formed a scattered column, with Constitution-focused players leading the long march while others lagged or used dragon-powered carriages.
• The Holy Crusaders spotted the approaching players and fired arrows at them from Fir City’s walls.
• [Xiexie Huigu] took numerous arrows but used smoke to reach the concealed tunnel entrance, where [Zhong Lele] welcomed him.

Players used a tunnel to infiltrate Fir City while the Holy Crusaders tried to stop them from the walls. Antiya Lisi ordered a provisional knight order to find and destroy the tunnel exit, while more than a hundred Treant Hunters slept underground.

• Xiexie Huigu treated his wound and pressed on, while Zhong Lele watched the players confirm the tunnel’s location and enter it in a scattered line.
• A Holy Crusader officer realized the rebels had dug a tunnel and sent a messenger to inform Archbishop Antiya Lisi.
• Samuer and Icarus watched the battle from a hill and each predicted that a different side would win.
• Pond Fish and Old Abyss took over at the tunnel entrance, using dead players’ bodies to form a barricade against arrows from the walls.
• Antiya Lisi ordered his lieutenant to organize the remaining Holy Crusaders, find the tunnel exit in the western district, destroy it, and then bring the provisional force to the cathedral.
• Antiya Lisi turned his attention underground, where more than a hundred Treant Hunters had fallen asleep after fighting and patrolling through the night.

The Soul Returners emerged from their tunnel into a house in Fir City, but [Mules and Horses Drive the Sun] urged them to wait until enough players had gathered before attacking. As more players crowded into the house and climbed upstairs, they were told there was no room left.

• The apprentice bishop assembled the remaining soldiers into the provisional Holy Crusaders First Knights and marched them toward Fir City's western district.
• Players emerged from the Soul Returners' tunnel into a house whose original owner had been evacuated from the city.
• [Mules and Horses Drive the Sun] stopped the players from leaving, warning that the Holy Crusaders could discover the tunnel and trap them at its exit.
• The players agreed to wait until they had enough people to leave together and avoid being picked off by the Stained Ones.
• As more players poured into the house, they crowded upstairs until one player returned to report that there was no room left.

The Holy Crusaders searched a residential area they suspected contained the tunnel’s exit, while players crowded the stairs leading out of the tunnel. Their search brought them to [Mules and Horses Drive the Sun]’s house, where they found a room full of men and a player stuck in a hole in the floor.

• Players emerging from the tunnel packed the staircase so tightly that those on it could barely move.
• The Holy Crusaders returned to Fir City and searched homes in a neighborhood facing the tunnel entrance.
• A resident hid the rebels’ coins and leaflet while the Holy Crusaders searched his home and found nothing.
• An apprentice bishop led his own squad to [Mules and Horses Drive the Sun]’s house and forced the door open.
• The Holy Crusaders found at least twenty men inside and a player stuck in a hole in the floor, leaving the squad leader struggling to respond.

Players poured from a house and attacked the Holy Crusaders in Fir City, while [Mules and Horses Drive the Sun] ordered them to secure the tunnel exit and call for reinforcements. Elsewhere, Marba sent scouts into a strange flower field called the [Verdant Corridor] to investigate before his force advanced.

• The cleric ordered the Holy Crusaders to attack, and [Mules and Horses Drive the Sun] led the players in overwhelming their squad leader.
• The bishop-in-training blew his whistle as the players burst through a second-floor window and charged the Holy Crusaders in a chaotic swarm.
• The bishop-in-training was reminded of a Blood Corpse Tide by the players' numbers and madness as they destabilized the house.
• [Mules and Horses Drive the Sun] made guarding the tunnel exit the players' priority and called for reinforcements from outside Fir City.
• A scout reported a patch of flowers ahead to Marba, who ordered elite Holy Crusaders to investigate the [Verdant Corridor].

Marba led Fir City's Holy Crusaders through the Verdant Corridor, where scouts discovered Worker Bees and accidentally triggered an alarm that summoned a swarm of Soldier Bees. Marba ordered a forced march into the insects' interception, leaving the ordinary Holy Crusaders facing a threat they could not overcome with courage alone.

• Marba led Fir City's elites into the warm, flower-filled Verdant Corridor, which served as a feeding ground for the Hive Will's bees.
• A scout spotted a pollen-covered Worker Bee and chose to report it rather than attack.
• Another scout shot down a Worker Bee, prompting the first scout to kill the one he had spared as it began an alarm dance.
• Worker Bees spread the alarm, and Soldier Bees stopped feeding and took flight toward the Holy Crusaders.
• Marba ordered the Holy Crusaders to pair shields with shooters and charge through the insects' interception.
• Marba led the charge as Soldier Bees gathered overhead, while most ordinary Holy Crusaders faced a foe they could not defeat through courage alone.

Marba led the Holy Crusaders out of the Verdant Corridor after the Soldier Bees inflicted heavy casualties, while Ed arranged to capture the wounded and prepared for the enemy force entering Jerry’s territory. In Fir City, the Soul Returners kept gaining ground until the Holy Crusaders began a sudden, organized retreat as Treant Hunters threatened to arrive.

• Marba ordered the Holy Crusaders to abandon those too badly wounded to move and advance at full speed through the Verdant Corridor.
• After losing hundreds of men, the Holy Crusaders reached the snowfields, where the Soldier Bees stopped at the terrain boundary; Marba ordered a rest and marked their route on a map.
• The Soldier Bees gathered the wounded and held them alive, while Ed thanked the Hive Will and arranged for people to collect them as workers at his charcoal processing plant.
• Ed ordered Number Four, Number Seven, Number Ten, and Tiya to lead Gungnir into action, told Jerry to handle an approaching enemy force, and asked Motley if he was ready to face his former colleagues.
• In Fir City, the Soul Returners continued their street-fighting assault and slowly expanded their territory despite the Holy Crusaders’ advantage in casualties.
• As darkness approached, the Holy Crusaders sounded their retreat signal and withdrew in formation, leaving the players wary of the approaching Treant Hunters.

[Clear Soup Master] unlocked a hidden quest to save the Treant Hunters and investigate the Stained Ones, then arranged for players to capture the Treant Hunters alive. As the Treant Hunters approached the battlefield, the players prepared to prune their branches rather than kill them.

• [Clear Soup Master] unlocked the hidden side quest and learned that he should save the Treant Hunters and investigate the Stained Ones.
• [Clear Soup Master] used a Blood Corpse's fingernail to poison himself, hoping to escape Antiya Lisi's control through his vampire grand duke.
• [Clear Soup Master] sent instructions to the battlefield, where [Zhong Lele] explained that the Treant Hunters were the cathedral's test subjects.
• The players agreed to capture the Treant Hunters alive by cutting their branches while keeping their main trunks intact, and to spare the sane informant.
• As night fell, the players heard the Treant Hunters approaching through the alleys.

[Clear Soup Master] logged into the World of Disorder and found that tree transformation and Blood Corpse corruption had left him in a conflicting hybrid state. As the two forces continued to struggle inside him, Adelaide, the grand duke behind the blood poison, asked who opposed her power, and he named Antiya Lisi.

• [Clear Soup Master] returned to the game early and examined a status panel showing the effects of tree transformation and Blood Corpse transformation.
• Ed and Little Green reviewed how [Clear Soup Master] had used a Blood Corpse nail and discovered that the blood poison was fighting Antiya Lisi's control inside his body.
• Ed secretly kept the two corrupting forces balanced and edited [Clear Soup Master]'s panel to reflect his changing hybrid state.
• Adelaide spoke to [Clear Soup Master] and asked who dared oppose the grand duke's power.
• [Clear Soup Master] identified Antiya Lisi, the archbishop of Fir City, as Adelaide's opponent.

Grand Duke Adelaide took control of [Clear Soup Master]'s body, transformed it into a Blood Corpse Half-Treant, and broke out of the cell. He confronted Archbishop Antiya Lisi, who failed to recognize him, and Adelaide challenged him to fight.

• Adelaide recalled that Antiya Lisi had tortured his son Oliver to death and asked [Clear Soup Master] to give him control of his body.
• [Clear Soup Master] agreed, and Ed sent him a prompt asking whether he wanted to log out and reconstruct his body; he declined and began recording.
• Adelaide swallowed the black crystal embedded in [Clear Soup Master]'s palm, and the blood poison rapidly spread through the body.
• Adelaide's Blood Corpse Half-Treant form gained enough strength for him to tear apart the wooden cell bars and stride out.
• Antiya Lisi appeared and asked who was controlling his Treant Hunter; Adelaide identified him, but Antiya Lisi said he did not know him.
• Adelaide told Antiya Lisi to meet his death.

Adelaide controlled [Clear Soup Master]'s body and used its bloodline power to fight Antiya Lisi inside the collapsing cathedral. He saw through the dust and struck what he thought was Antiya Lisi, but the archbishop had switched places with a wooden puppet and was now poised above him as a bell tower came crashing down.

• Adelaide used Absolute Punishment's Blood Feud ability on Antiya Lisi, while Antiya Lisi withdrew his support from the unstable church ceiling.
• Adelaide caught the falling stones with transformed vines and flesh, then redirected them toward Antiya Lisi, who dodged them easily.
• Ed realized Adelaide could see Antiya Lisi's red silhouette through the dust, and [Clear Soup Master] suspected the ability was effectively a cheat.
• Antiya Lisi stomped the floor to stir up dust, but Adelaide found him and stabbed him with a Corpse Poison-coated shortsword.
• Adelaide discovered he had stabbed a wooden puppet instead of Antiya Lisi, who appeared on the second floor as an enormous bell tower came crashing toward Adelaide.

Adelaide fought Antiya Lisi in Fir City, but Antiya Lisi’s speed and attacks disrupted Adelaide’s control over his Blood Corpse body. Realizing he needed to die before his Blood Corpse transformation was stripped away, Adelaide launched a reckless counterattack.

• Adelaide redirected the bell tower into the cathedral’s second tower, bringing down Fir City’s twin-towered cathedral.
• Antiya Lisi moved rapidly between airborne bricks and closed in on Adelaide, who split his eyes’ movements to track him.
• Antiya Lisi struck Adelaide repeatedly, causing Adelaide’s Tree Transformation to surge and his Blood Corpse Transformation to diminish.
• Adelaide realized Antiya Lisi’s punches were disrupting his connection to the body and could prevent him from branding his opponent if he became a Half-Treant.
• Adelaide abandoned thoughts of victory and attacked Antiya Lisi without regard for his life.

Antiya Lisi killed Adelaide, who had transformed into a Blood Corpse, and discovered he had received Adelaide’s Blood Feud mark. Meanwhile, Marba led his legion beyond the Verdant Corridor and prepared to face an unfamiliar cavalry unit clad in bio-armor.

• Antiya Lisi recognized Adelaide’s plan, caught his attack, broke his hand, and killed him with a palm strike.
• [Clear Soup Master] experienced Adelaide’s death from the first-person perspective, then watched his soul rise to choose a respawn point.
• Antiya Lisi found that Adelaide’s Blood Feud had branded him, but he could not figure out how his Treant Hunter had become a Blood Corpse.
• Antiya Lisi ordered the Holy Crusaders to clean up the cathedral ruins and meet him underground through a hidden passage.
• Marba’s scouts reported an approaching cavalry unit equipped with bio-armor unlike anything he expected outside the Graycast Corridor.
• Marba ordered the Holy Crusaders to form ranks and brace for impact while he studied the cavalry’s defensive armor and the Hoofed Beasts’ strength-enhancing implants.

Marba’s Holy Crusaders repelled a bio-armored cavalry raid without losing anyone, but the attackers’ unusual projectiles left many soldiers incapacitated or wounded. The cavalry escaped, and Marba’s legion regrouped to assess its losses.

• Marba ordered the Holy Crusaders to brace their shields, watch for projectiles, and fire at the circling cavalry.
• The riders avoided the shield wall and threw bursting spheres that released disorienting smoke, irritating liquid, and life-draining wooden spikes.
• Holy Crusader archers found that arrows barely harmed the riders but could injure their poorly protected Hoofed Beasts; the riders treated or abandoned wounded mounts and fled with their bio-armor cores.
• Marba ordered his troops to rest and take a head count, learning that no soldiers had died in the raid.
• A grand knight commander reported that many Holy Crusaders had suffered injuries or lost combat effectiveness from the cavalry’s projectiles.

Marba realized Ed’s forces had anticipated his cavalry charge and were using safe, persistent harassment to weaken the Holy Crusaders and slow their advance. After seeing the thorn attacks spread among his soldiers, Marba weighed whether to press on or turn back, recognizing that the damage to his legion’s mobility threatened his surprise attack.

• Marba concluded that the enemy had exposed his surprise attack plan and was trying to force him to abandon his march toward Fir City.
• Ed ordered Gungnir to harass the Holy Crusaders with thrown projectiles, thorny plants, and hit-and-run tactics while avoiding close combat.
• A Holy Crusader was injured when he fell onto a comrade whose thorns had taken root, and the new growth threatened to spread the injuries further.
• Marba questioned his grand knight commander about whether the soldiers would rather endure the attacks or keep marching, and whether they needed to rest.
• Marba recognized that the enemy was targeting ordinary soldiers rather than the legion’s commanders, but their weakened condition threatened the force’s ability to carry out its surprise attack.