Chapter Summaries

After Ed restored Enzo to human form, he sent him with Duma to the Adventurers' Guild in Valhalla. Meanwhile, [Vanilla Ice Cream Scoop] discovered that Deadwood Vines in her Greenhouse had captured several Holy Crusaders, then learned Ed had defeated their attack on Valhalla and obtained footage of the battle.

• Ed told Duma to take Enzo to the Adventurers' Guild in Valhalla and suggested Enzo find Number Seven if his family agreed to let him sign up.
• [Vanilla Ice Cream Scoop] opened her Greenhouse and learned from the players gathered outside that intruders were trapped in her backyard.
• [Vanilla Ice Cream Scoop] used her Plant Compatibility to stop the Deadwood Vines while [Chocolate Ice Cream Scoop] pulled out a still-living Holy Crusaders squad leader.
• The players rescued seven or eight Holy Crusaders squad leaders from the vines and restrained the prisoners to collect their bounties.
• A player told [Vanilla Ice Cream Scoop] that Ed had defeated the attackers with an alchemical golem and a fire dragon.
• [Vanilla Ice Cream Scoop] added a player as a friend and received his battle recording, while [Chocolate Ice Cream Scoop] also sent her his footage.

Vanilla Ice Cream Scoop posted a bounty for Marba, fearing the Stained Ones commander could return to threaten Valhalla. Just as Duma arrived at the Adventurers' Guild with Enzo, he was mistaken for Marba and used Demonic Whisper to calm the crowd before announcing his new post.

• Vanilla Ice Cream Scoop decided the writers could not be trusted to prevent another attack, so she posted a bounty for the missing Stained Ones legion commander Marba.
• Vanilla Ice Cream Scoop used a screenshot to draw Marba's face on the bounty notice and warned that he might return to Valhalla.
• Duma emerged from the Depths of the World with Enzo and entered the Adventurers' Guild, where he began to sign the register.
• Hearing Vanilla Ice Cream Scoop mention Marba, Duma startled the priest, and the crowd gathered around the red, four-handed demon.
• Duma used Demonic Whisper to keep the crowd calm and introduced himself as the Soul Returner Legion Commander assigned to the southern defensive line, calling himself Nige Ganhuo.

Duma learned that the name Nige Ganhuo carried a humorous meaning, accepted it as his new identity, and began telling the Soul Returners his history. He left them listening to a lengthy account that mixed true events with carefully blurred details, using his storytelling as Demonic Whisper.

• Duma asked the Soul Returners what was funny about the name Nige Ganhuo, and [Western Sharpshooter] explained its mocking double meanings.
• Duma accepted the name and told the Soul Returners he would soon command their combat operations in the southern territory of the Second Holy See.
• Duma reflected on the welcoming lack of hierarchy among the Soul Returners and wondered why one of them had called him a black man despite his red skin.
• Duma began recounting his life to the curious Soul Returners, while [Western Sharpshooter] briefly interrupted to ask how he had arrived.
• Duma described his military past, his battles against Duke Frostblade's forces, his journey north, and his confrontation with Marba, blending accurate facts with omissions.

Duma convinced the players that Marba had died and began a new life as Nige Ganhuo in the Second Holy See. In Valhalla’s packed tavern, [Noncompliant Nickname 1214] interrupted the festivities to ask whether the players feared another attack.

• Duma told the players his life story and established that Marba had burned until nothing remained, while [Vanilla Ice Cream Scoop] and a cleric destroyed the wanted posters.
• Duma began his new life as Nige Ganhuo in the Second Holy See, and the players’ recordings were set to preserve his story on the official website.
• [Gill's Cuisine] served the newly brewed Scarlet Millet alcohol at the Mortgage Tavern as [Aluode] and two drinking buddies joked about what they would do with endless lifespans.
• [Noncompliant Nickname 1214] climbed onto a table, addressed the players who had defended Valhalla, and asked whether they worried it would be attacked again.

[Noncompliant Nickname 1214] rallied Valhalla's players to form a volunteer force to defend their home. The players agreed to create an Imperial Guard and settled on the name Adrian Imperial Guard after realizing their boss was Ed Adrian.

• [Noncompliant Nickname 1214] urged players to organize a mobile force to protect Valhalla and its surroundings.
• [Gill's Cuisine], [Gu Gugu], and [Do Some Farm Work] voiced their support, and other players joined in.
• The players agreed to call their force an Imperial Guard but debated what prefix to add.
• A player suggested the Adrian Imperial Guard, and another explained that their boss was Ed Adrian.

The players founded the Adrian Imperial Guard after agreeing on its purpose and rallying around cries of loyalty. Meanwhile, Ed transformed the Treant Hunters back into humans but could not restore the half-treants, so Duma suggested they might become the beginnings of a new race.

• [Noncompliant Nickname 1214] rejected players’ proposed passwords and hand signals before [Litang's Supremely Fierce Tiger] asked why they were forming the Adrian Imperial Guard.
• The players shouted their loyalty to the Second Holy See, Valhalla, and Ed, officially founding the Adrian Imperial Guard.
• Ed restored more than a hundred Treant Hunters to human form and offered them the choice to return home, remain with him, or train with Gungnir.
• Duma asked Ed how he would deal with the half-treants, whom Ed could not safely transform back into humans.
• Duma recounted how persecuted humans in the Demon Realm created the lich race and suggested that the half-treants could become a new race.

Duma told the captured half-treants that Ed could extend their lives by stabilizing their bodies, but they would remain half-treants. He urged them to choose survival and assured them the Soul Returners would accept them.

• Ed agreed to help the half-treants only if they consented, and warned Duma not to use his powers of beguilement when speaking to them.
• Duma visited the half-treants, whose bodies were transforming into trees, and explained that returning to human form would likely leave them dead before autumn.
• Duma said remaining half-treants would also leave them unlikely to survive another year because Antiya Lisi had made them into disposable cannon fodder.
• Duma offered Ed's way to extend their lives to around forty or fifty years, explaining that it would replace damaged body parts with plant tissue and leave them permanently half-treant.
• Duma urged the half-treants to keep living and promised that the Soul Returners would not look down on them.

Ed restored the half-treants’ strength and assigned Duma to arrange their futures before planning the next campaign. Meanwhile, [Clear Soup Master] found that his hidden quest remained unfinished and recruited friends to help investigate the Stained Ones’ true purpose.

• Ed guided the half-treants’ symbiotic plants to heal their damaged bodies and restore their strength.
• Ed told Duma to send former Holy Crusaders to the High-Quality Charcoal Processing Plant and let the civilian half-treants choose between Fir City and Valhalla.
• Ed instructed Duma to notify the newly formed Holy Crusaders’ leadership so they could plan their next strategy.
• [Clear Soup Master] realized his hidden quest continued beyond Fir City and that he still needed to uncover the Stained Ones’ true purpose.
• [Clear Soup Master] found altered records in the underground archives and asked [Great Wei Boxing Champion] and [Zhong Lele] to help solve the mystery.

[Zhong Lele] and [Great Wei Boxing Champion] helped [Clear Soup Master] investigate the Stained Ones' hidden objective in Fir City's cathedral archives. They concluded that missing children may have been smuggled out of the city and sent [Clear Soup Master] to check the gate records.

• [Zhong Lele] received [Clear Soup Master]'s message about a hidden quest and met [Great Wei Boxing Champion] on her way to the cathedral.
• [Clear Soup Master] explained that altered files had obscured the Stained Ones' real objective, and the three began investigating the records.
• [Great Wei Boxing Champion] identified a long list of supposed dead test subjects and reasoned that the names did not match the number of Treant Hunters.
• [Zhong Lele] and [Great Wei Boxing Champion] realized the missing children might have been sent out of Fir City rather than killed or turned into Treant Hunters.
• [Clear Soup Master] went to search the entry and exit records, while [Great Wei Boxing Champion] told him to start with the south gate before the Blood Corpse lockdown.

Ed considered how to give players more combat power after realizing their bodies could not grow faster than their souls, and he rejected making blessing cards more common. He searched Antiya Lisi’s experimental records for ways to help players fight stronger enemies without disrupting their growth.

• [Clear Soup Master] hurried through Fir City after receiving [Great Wei Boxing Champion]’s instructions about the south gate records and former guards’ interrogations.
• Ed saw off the half-treants, then examined the wrecked cathedral prayer hall and reflected on Antiya Lisi’s final acts.
• Ed left [Clear Soup Master]’s hidden quest unsettled so the players could continue investigating the Stained Ones.
• Ed recognized that players lacked the combat strength to defeat powerful enemies and reasoned that their bodies had to stay matched to their souls.
• Ed rejected increasing the supply of blessing cards and switched to the players’ first-person replays to search Antiya Lisi’s experiments for other methods.

Ed found a promising new idea for combining multiple consciousnesses and bodies through Grafting. Meanwhile, [Clear Soup Master] traced suspicious winter fruit shipments from Fir City and began questioning former south-gate guards.

• Ed read Antiya Lisi’s record of a failed experiment that had placed two consciousnesses in one Treant Hunter, then considered whether multiple souls or symbiotic plants could make Grafting succeed.
• [Clear Soup Master] entered Fir City’s south-gate records room and searched the wagon logs for patterns in the movement of cargo.
• [Clear Soup Master] found that a six-Hoofed Beast freight wagon had left about every half month carrying fruit from special mutated plants, even during winter.
• [Clear Soup Master] asked the Holy Crusaders to take him to the detained rank-and-file soldiers and separately questioned two former south-gate guards.

[Clear Soup Master] interrogated a gate guard about the men who had escorted a Hoofed Beast freight wagon, but learned that all three had died in the battle for Fir City. [Zhong Lele] proposed questioning their superior, Howard, and the players realized he might be directly above them before [Clear Soup Master] went to find Ed.

• [Clear Soup Master] used an electric rod to interrogate a gate guard, who identified three Holy Crusaders as the wagon’s escorts.
• [Zhong Lele] and [Great Wei Boxing Champion] checked Fir City’s roster and discovered that all three named Holy Crusaders had died in the fighting.
• [Zhong Lele] suggested finding the escorts’ superior, and the players identified Howard as a possible source of information.
• The players recalled that Grand Knight Commander Nuolun had taken Howard prisoner and realized he might be held above them.
• [Clear Soup Master] found Ed repairing the cathedral and asked to speak with him.

[Clear Soup Master] asked Ed for access to Howard while investigating the Stained Ones, but Ed insisted he prove himself and gave him a rare orange that could combine players into a powerful Treant Aggregate. The chapter left [Clear Soup Master] realizing Ed expected him to use the item during the dungeon run.

• [Clear Soup Master] asked Ed to make an exception so he could question Howard before the dungeon opened to the public.
• [Clear Soup Master] described his investigation, and Ed said he would have to earn the strength to face Howard himself.
• Ed created a Citrus Aggregate orange and gave it to [Clear Soup Master] as assistance for his investigation.
• [Clear Soup Master] read the item's description and realized that up to six players could use it to form a Treant Aggregate.
• Ed hinted that [Clear Soup Master] should find allies and use the orange in the upcoming dungeon run.

Clear Soup Master assembled a six-player team to enter Fir City Cathedral’s new dungeon and question Howard. Ed opened the way but warned them that the trial would be difficult and left them to choose a route, as the team stood before the east and west towers.

• Clear Soup Master asked Ed when a team could enter the dungeon, and Ed agreed to open it for them that day.
• Clear Soup Master recruited Great Wei Boxing Champion, Howling Pothos, Good Times Don't Last, Do Some Farm Work, and Zhongde; Zhong Lele stayed behind to film Ed rebuilding the cathedral.
• The six players arrived at Fir City Cathedral, where Ed led them to the doors beneath the bell towers and explained that they could use shortcuts to reach Howard.
• Clear Soup Master asked which tower held Howard, but Ed said he did not know.
• Do Some Farm Work asked whether the team could split up, and Ed said they could.

[Clear Soup Master] led the six players into Fir City Cathedral, where Ed had secretly prepared a dungeon filled with horror and puzzles. After they defeated a room full of Thorn Rats, [Do Some Farm Work] found what looked like a key item, leaving the party to investigate its purpose.

• [Clear Soup Master] chose the west building and led the group into the dungeon in their agreed formation.
• Outside, Ed used vines and rubble to build three passageways between the cathedral's bell towers as he prepared to test his dungeon design.
• At the first junction, [Clear Soup Master] ordered the party to clear a room where they heard enemies, and [Great Wei Boxing Champion] kicked open its door.
• [Howling Pothos] recognized the Thorn Rats spilling from a cleric's robe, threw in Paralysis Bombs, and held the door shut until the rats fell unconscious.
• [Great Wei Boxing Champion] speculated that the dungeon could contain enemies beyond humans, and [Do Some Farm Work] found half of a miniature World Tree statue that seemed like a key item.

The party cleared the cathedral’s first floor and searched the western bell tower’s second floor, opening rooms that held supplies, rats, and enemies. After [Good Times Don't Last] opened a door that seemed safe, he came face-to-face with a towering half-treant.

• [Do Some Farm Work] found a broken half statue whose smooth edge suggested it had been cut, but the party found nothing else valuable in the room.
• The six players cleared the first floor and reached a pair of doors on the second floor that could only be pushed open from the other side.
• The party searched the second floor, finding keys, supplies, rats, carvings, and enemies behind doors, but not the other half of the wooden World Tree holy icon.
• [Do Some Farm Work] kicked open three doors in succession and fought priests, an apprentice bishop, and a Stained Ones squad leader with the party.
• [Good Times Don't Last] opened another door, expecting a safe room, and found a nearly three-meter-tall half-treant inside.

[Clear Soup Master]'s team opened the passage from the west tower to the east tower and discovered that the clerics there pursued intruders in groups. [Howling Pothos] devised a plan to trap them in the west tower's rooms, leaving three clerics locked inside a storeroom as flaming objects flew through its vent.

• [Do Some Farm Work] reasoned that they needed to reach the upper floors to find a way into the east tower, and the team continued clearing rooms until they reached the third floor.
• The players found that the third-floor door required a Thorn Rat, a tattered clerical sash, and a half-treant branch, then retrieved the three items from earlier floors.
• After clearing the third floor, the team opened the connecting door and drew the attention of patrolling clerics in the east tower.
• [Howling Pothos] told the others to hide and planned to lure the clerics into rooms, lock them inside, and defeat them there.
• [Howling Pothos] ambushed the last cleric as three clerics entered a storeroom, escaped with the key, and locked them inside.
• The trapped clerics began Directed Alienation to break down the door, just as two flaming spherical objects were tossed through the vent.

The players cleared the east tower and discovered that the two halves of a World Tree icon formed a key to a passage between the towers. In the east tower’s boss room, Howard attacked them until they used the promise of taking him to Gorn to catch his attention.

• The players finished clearing the east tower’s clerics and found the other half of the miniature World Tree icon on the last apprentice bishop.
• The players entered the west tower’s fourth-floor room, found Gorn training thirty-six Holy Crusaders, and closed the door without fighting him.
• Do Some Farm Work realized the fourth floors might connect, and the players found a matching door and an emblem-shaped recess in the east tower’s boss room.
• Howard rejected the players’ questions and attacked, but Good Times Don’t Last made him hesitate by offering to take him to Gorn.
• Clear Soup Master pointed out the connecting door and claimed Gorn was on the other side as Howard prepared to strike.

Howard confronted Gorn in the west building's boss room, and the two former allies fought over Howard's betrayal and dismissal. The players waited for their feud to weaken one side, planning to kill Gorn and capture Howard to question him about the test subjects' bodies.

• Howard ordered the players to open the corridor door, and Do Some Farm Work used the holy icon to unlock it.
• Howard recognized Gorn and charged him with his fallen clerics, while Gorn ordered the Holy Crusaders to defend.
• Clear Soup Master explained the players' hidden quest goal: kill Gorn, capture Howard half-dead, and question him about the test subjects' remains.
• Howard and Gorn exchanged accusations over Howard's dismissal and Gorn's role in it, then resumed fighting with transformed weapons and armor.
• Do Some Farm Work explained that the players would wait for the feud to weaken one of the two men before joining the fight.

Howard defeated Gorn in the west building's boss room and ordered the Holy Crusaders to follow him, but they froze when an enormous armored treant appeared behind him. In the east building, the players prepared to transform and use [Citrus Aggregate] as Howard gained the upper hand.

• Howard cut open Gorn's abdomen with his great axe, leaving him unable to fight.
• Howard told the Holy Crusaders to follow him and attack the enemies across the connecting corridor, and they agreed.
• The Holy Crusaders saw an enormous treant with thick bark armor rise behind Howard, then watched it charge toward him.
• Half a minute earlier, [Howling Pothos] warned that Howard was gaining the upper hand, and [Do Some Farm Work] said Gorn was about to lose.
• [Clear Soup Master] took out the purple rare item [Citrus Aggregate], peeled it, and gave three segments to [Howling Pothos].