Chapter Summaries

Li Ang, the Elden Lord who had followed an aura of Earth, awakened in Leon Kaspar’s body in Tingen City and slaughtered the cultists who had summoned him. After his exhausted body collapsed, he tried to leave for the stars but was blocked and forced back, while a gray-eyed man found him alive.

• The Erdtree Church’s believers sacrificed Leon Kaspar, but Li Ang awakened in his body and killed their leader, the Oracle.
• Li Ang examined Leon’s memories and learned that the young man had joined the church for revenge and volunteered to summon the Tarnished.
• Li Ang summoned the Dark Moon Greatsword and killed the black-robed believers in the basement.
• As trained figures approached, Li Ang’s body gave out from the power he had used, and he tried to escape as a spirit.
• A massive barrier stopped Li Ang and sent him back into his failing body, where he heard the gray-eyed man tell Klein that someone was still alive.

Leon Kaspar, an otherworldly intruder inhabiting a detective’s body, answered Klein Moretti and Dunn Smith’s questions about a cultist’s death while concealing what he could. That night, Dunn entered Leon’s nightmare to question him, but Leon vanished from his bed and appeared behind him.

• Leon agreed to Klein Moretti’s routine questioning and claimed he remembered nothing about the previous night.
• Leon said he had followed Sirius Arepis on Howes Street for a client, but could not recall how he reached the basement where Sirius died.
• Leon named the woman who hired him, and Klein revealed she had died mysteriously the day after hiring him.
• Dunn Smith shook Leon’s hand and used a strange ability to examine him before the officers left.
• That night, a mutilated corpse appeared at Leon’s window, and Dunn entered Leon’s nightmare to question him.
• Dunn found Leon missing from the bed, and Leon asked him if he was looking for him.

Leon confronted Dunn in a dream and used his power to force the Nighthawk captain to reveal why the team had investigated him. As the dream ended, Ranni reached out to Leon and said the Lands Between had begun searching for him.

• Leon revealed his divine presence in the dream, overwhelming Dunn and taking control of the dream.
• Leon forced Dunn to explain that the Nighthawks had found him alive at a cult gathering and had investigated him before considering recruiting him.
• Leon asked Dunn about a historical figure from his home and learned the name Roselle Gustav.
• Leon altered Dunn’s memories of the interrogation, making him believe Leon was an ordinary private detective and nothing unusual had happened.
• Ranni contacted Leon through the blue moon, but red began covering it as powerful beings tried to locate him.
• A god’s darkness shielded Leon from their attention, and Ranni’s voice returned briefly to say the Lands Between had set out to find him.

Leon returned home after the Nighthawks released him, then prepared to flee and attempted to contact Ranni through a ritual. Ranni warned him that other gods were searching for him, and Roundtable Hold transported him to the Lands Between, where two new Tarnished appeared.

• Klein and Dunn released Leon after confirming his story, and Dunn asked Klein to guard Chanis Gate that night.
• Leon returned to his agency, told Martha to pack valuables in case they had to relocate, and gathered cash and a bank-account key from a hidden compartment.
• Leon decided to seek Roselle Gustav, investigate the barrier blocking him, and avoid joining the Blackthorn Security Company.
• Leon performed a ritual with the Dark Moon Ring and Dark Moon Greatsword to contact Ranni, who warned him that other gods sought him before the Lands Between arrived.
• Leon found himself in Roundtable Hold in his Lands Between body, where two figures emerged from the golden grace as new Tarnished.

After the Tarot Club meeting, Klein and Audrey were unexpectedly summoned to the Roundtable Hold, where Leon explained that they had become Tarnished and could choose whether to use the place. He offered to erase their memories if they left, but the chapter ended with their choice still undecided.

• Klein allowed Audrey to join another organization as long as she kept the Tarot Club secret.
• After the gathering, Klein and Audrey were separately transported from their homes to the Roundtable Hold, where they met Leon.
• Leon identified the place as the Roundtable Hold and told Klein he had made a grammatical error while speaking Jotun.
• Leon explained that the two had become Tarnished through the Greater Grace and could enter and leave the Hold freely.
• Leon described the Hold's former purpose and offered to erase their memories if they chose to leave; otherwise, they could treat it as a gathering.

Leon explained that the flame Klein had encountered was the Frenzied Flame, an Outer Deity’s power, and revealed that he was from another world searching for a way home. Klein and Audrey agreed to join his meetings, which he scheduled for Mondays, and he gave them code names and a ritual for contacting him.

• Klein asked Leon about the contagious flame that had killed his older brother, and Leon identified it as the Frenzied Flame and warned him to avoid its sparks.
• Leon revealed that he was not from their world and was searching for a way home, prompting Klein and Audrey to stay with him.
• Leon set their meetings for one o’clock every Monday, and Audrey chose the code name Spectator while Klein chose Sailor.
• Leon asked them to seek information about the Erdtree Church, the Frenzied Flame, and other unusual beings, promising rewards.
• Klein requested a way to contact Leon, and Leon taught them a ritual using the Elden Ring symbol, four candles, and an offering.

Leon decided to seek protection from the Nighthawks rather than flee, and went to the Blackthorn Security Company to report in. Rozanne led him underground toward the Chanis Gate, where Captain Dunn was on duty.

• Leon dressed, gave Martha money and a silver-white bell, and left her to watch the detective agency.
• Leon reconsidered fleeing after connecting Ranni’s warning, the Frenzied Flame, his predecessor’s strange choices, and his parents’ murder to a possible larger scheme.
• Leon chose to seek shelter with the authorities and traveled by carriage to the Blackthorn Security Company.
• Rozanne introduced herself as a Nighthawks civilian employee and explained that Captain Dunn could not leave the Chanis Gate.
• Rozanne led Leon down to the underground passage and described where its three routes led.

Leon signed a contract to join the Nighthawks and stayed at their base under protection while the team investigated threats involving a cult, a relic, and an escaped Beyonder. As Leon and Klein talked near the Chanis Gate, urgent knocking sounded from inside it.

• Leon met Leonard, who predicted that Leon would join the Nighthawks, then accepted Dunn Smith’s offer and signed a five-year contract.
• Dunn told Leon that a disguised Beyonder had escaped during an operation and that the cathedral was sending two supernatural items to Backlund while reinforcements traveled to Tingen.
• Dunn warned Leon and Klein never to open the Chanis Gate unless it opened from the inside, then left them on duty.
• Klein explained that Welch McGovern had transformed into a ball of fire and burned to ashes while absorbing the Antigonus Family Notebook’s power.
• Leon and Klein discussed Nighthawk life, aristocratic gossip, and the novel Storm Manor until knocking sounded urgently from inside the Chanis Gate.

Leon and Klein guarded Chanis Gate when a rag doll emerged and Leon knocked it back inside with his cane. After Klein divined that a paper covered in occult symbols posed no immediate danger, he rang the alarm, but a scream from Rozanne answered.

• Leon and Klein heard heavy knocking from behind Chanis Gate and stayed on guard despite not knowing what was happening.
• A rag doll in a black court gown pushed Chanis Gate open and reached outside, but Leon struck it with his cane and forced it back behind the door.
• Leon and Klein examined the paper the doll had dropped, and Klein's pendulum divination indicated it was not dangerous.
• Klein rang the alarm to notify the other Nighthawks, but he and Leon heard Rozanne scream in terror.

Klein and Royale fought a clown-like attacker who was assaulting the Nighthawks’ base, while an intruder searched Leon’s home for the Spirit Calling Bell. The Mimic Tear appeared to protect Martha, and Leon spotted a pattern in the attacker’s movements as the fight continued.

• Klein rushed upstairs after Rozanne’s voice abruptly stopped, while Leon followed after briefly considering whether to enter the Chanis Gate.
• Klein and Royale found Rozanne down and exchanged fire with a clown-faced man outside, who vanished and reappeared while mimicking gunshots with his fingers.
• An intruder searched Leon’s bedroom, then approached Martha’s silver-white handbell; Martha woke and rang it, summoning the Mimic Tear behind him.
• Leon sensed the bell’s warning, judged that the Mimic Tear could handle the intruder, and joined Klein and Royale in the hall.
• Leon watched the clown’s movements and told Klein that a tiny flash of fire appeared before each reappearance.

Leon helped Klein wound the Clown, who escaped after Leonard’s poem failed to stop him. While they guarded Rozanne, Leon suspected the attack was meant to distract the Nighthawks; then the Clown reappeared behind Klein, and Leon rushed to save him.

• Leon pointed out that a spark appeared where the Clown would reappear, and Klein used the cue to land a shot.
• Royale and Klein fired at the Clown until Leonard’s poem interrupted the fight, but the Clown resisted its effects and escaped as the Nighthawks pursued him.
• Royale left Klein and Leon to guard Rozanne, and they carried her into the lounge after confirming she had only fainted.
• Klein told Leon that the Clown belonged to the Secret Order and followed the Seer Pathway, while Leon suspected the attack was meant to draw the captain and the others away.
• A paper figure drifted through the window, and the Clown reappeared behind Klein and hurled a fireball at him.
• Leon yanked Klein out of the fireball’s path, then swung his cane at the Clown.

After Klein and Leon killed a Sequence 7 Clown who attacked the Blackthorn Security Company, Dunn accepted their account and confirmed Leon’s appointment as a special consultant. The Nighthawks learned that an Aurora Order cultist had broken into Leon’s home and uncovered ties between the cults and the notebook, while Klein questioned why the attacks had converged on them.

• Klein told Dunn that he and Leon had killed the Clown, and Leon backed his account by explaining how he had struck the attacker with his cane.
• Dunn showed Leon an Archbishop-issued appointment letter naming him a full member and special consultant with a weekly salary of twenty pounds; Klein accepted Dunn’s offer to apply for his own full membership.
• Dunn explained that the Clown had been drawn out because the Antigonus Family’s notebook had not yet been sent away, and he ordered Frye to examine the corpse.
• Dunn told Leon that an Aurora Order cultist had broken into his home, where Miss Adeline was safe but the house was badly damaged; the intruder had spontaneously combusted and turned to ash.
• Klein identified the dead intruder as Hanass Vincent, and Dunn said a partly burned letter from “Mr. Z” linked the operation to the notebook’s sale and the fabric merchant Sirius Arepis.
• Klein wondered aloud why several organizations had converged on the same goal and tried to kill them even after achieving it, suggesting something was wrong.

A notebook laid out Ince Zangwill’s intended account of the events in Tingen, then recorded how unexpected powers repeatedly disrupted his script. Its latest version said that Leon Kaspar’s ritual succeeded, leaving him as the sole survivor at the site, though the Nighthawks would still kill him after he lost control.

• The notebook described how the Antigonus Family Notebook reached Welch McGovern and how Klein Moretti survived the incident and joined Dunn Smith’s Nighthawks.
• It recorded Ray Bieber’s transformation and the arrival of destructive flames that were not part of anyone’s plan, after which the Secret Order attacker fled.
• Sirius recruited Leon Kaspar into the Erdtree Church and promised him the Tarnished pathway to help him get revenge.
• Sirius’s ritual unexpectedly received a response, leaving Leon as the only living person at the scene before the Nighthawks arrived.
• The notebook claimed that Leon would later lose control in Dunn’s dream and be killed by the Nighthawks.

Ince Zangwill’s attempt to script Leon Kaspar’s death was disrupted, and Leon survived the attack alongside Klein. After helping Leon arrange temporary housing, Klein faced Leon’s direct questions about the strange events and what he had already sensed.

• Ince Zangwill’s written account described how the Secret Order and Aurora Order planned to seize the Antigonus Family’s notebook and attack the Nighthawk base, but the operation failed.
• Hanass Vincent followed an aura to Leon Kaspar’s residence and died, while the Nighthawks blamed the incident on a Potion running out of control.
• A powerful force shattered Ince Zangwill’s writing as he tried to make fate destroy Leon, and the quill later declared that the story of Tingen City was not over.
• Leon and Klein visited the Tingen Housing Association, where Klein’s brother Benson bargained for Leon to rent furniture cheaply while his damaged home was repaired.
• Leon asked Klein why he had offered false testimony and pressed him to discuss the events they had experienced, so Klein joined him in a carriage to talk privately.
• Leon told Klein that, as a Seer, he must have sensed something was wrong and understood that the events were not as simple as they appeared.

Klein and Leon discussed the threat posed by the Clown over an expensive meal at the Bonaparte Restaurant. Klein left Leon with a drawing of a distinctive chimney, and Leon agreed to investigate its locations in Tingen with help from others if needed.

• Leon took Klein to the Bonaparte Restaurant and ordered a lavish meal.
• Klein explained that his intuition suggested the Clown had been watching both him and Leon for an opportunity.
• After eating, Klein admitted he wanted a trusted detective to investigate houses with a particular red chimney.
• Klein showed Leon a drawing of the chimney and its surroundings.
• Leon agreed to investigate for about a week and said they would share the cost of hiring extra help.

Leon and Klein left their conversation with a cautious trust in each other, and Leon planned to build alliances and information channels while his power recovered. After returning home, Leon found a mysterious letter from a faithful believer announcing that the Haligtree seed had been planted and urging him to await the law’s descent.

• Leon told Klein that his willingness to take risks suggested he had something protecting him, but Klein kept the Gray Fog and Tarot Club secret.
• Leon ended the probing conversation, explained that he valued reliable colleagues, and said Leonard also seemed to have something to fall back on.
• Leon reflected that he needed allies and information channels, and considered the Roundtable Hold and the Erdtree Church as potential resources.
• Klein told Leon to report to Old Neil the next day to learn procedural mysticism, and Leon agreed to go.
• Leon found a letter bearing an Erdtree design that called him the Great Child of Prophecy and said the seed of the Haligtree had been planted.

Leon used the Elden Ring to sculpt a Magician's Rune from a Beyonder Characteristic and considered what this meant for taking the gods' authorities. At the Blackthorn Security Company, he began his Nighthawks training and joined Klein's occultism lesson, where he spotted a pair of eerie floating eyes behind Old Neil.

• Leon sculpted a Magician's Rune from the Sequence 7 Beyonder Characteristic and discovered it could briefly grant Magician abilities or serve as a Potion ingredient.
• Leon reasoned that the experiment might let him use his laws to claim the authorities of the world's gods, but decided to wait before giving the Rune to Klein or testing it on anyone.
• Dunn assigned Leon to study the Nighthawks' knowledge with Old Neil, practice shooting, and write a report about the previous night's events.
• Leon found Klein attending Old Neil's lesson on Ritualistic Magic and recognized a familiar scent coming from Old Neil's direction.
• Leon noticed a transparent eye and a bloodied empty socket floating behind Old Neil.

Leon recognized the mysterious eyes as connected to Scarlet Rot and questioned Old Neil about the ritual magic that produced them. After learning that the Moses Ascetic Order worshiped a pair of eyes and hearing Klein’s account of the organization, Leon learned that its Hidden Sage had supposedly come to life as an evil god.

• Leon saw a pair of eyes appear behind Old Neil and sensed Scarlet Rot, but suppressed the Elden Ring’s power.
• Leon asked Old Neil to teach him the ritual magic, and Old Neil gave Leon and Klein a lesson in mysticism and warned them against praying to unknown entities.
• Leon asked Klein about the eyes he had seen through Spirit Vision, and Klein described them as transparent and without eyelashes.
• Leon told Klein that the Mystery Pryer Pathway was controlled by the Moses Ascetic Order, whose god took the form of a pair of eyes.
• Klein recalled that the Nighthawks had obtained the Mystery Pryer Potion formula from the order and told Leon that the Hidden Sage had once been an idea before becoming a personified evil god.

Klein and Leon decided to investigate Old Neil themselves rather than risk the Holy Cathedral condemning him, after Klein’s divination confirmed something was wrong. At the Blackthorn Security Company, they learned Old Neil was sick, and Rozanne’s account of his past made Klein suspect his memories of visiting him had been altered.

• Leon argued that Old Neil might knowingly have sought out the mysterious eyes and warned that reporting him could lead the Holy Cathedral to eliminate him.
• Klein divined that something was wrong with Old Neil but kept the result to himself, and Leon proposed that they investigate together.
• Klein and Leon arrived at the Blackthorn Security Company planning to watch Old Neil and visit him after work, but Rozanne told them he had taken sick leave.
• Klein suggested visiting Old Neil at noon and mentioned his late wife, but Rozanne said Old Neil had never married and had no piano at home earlier that year.
• Klein and Leon exchanged uneasy looks as Rozanne recalled that Old Neil could not play any instruments.

Leon and Klein visited Old Neil after learning that his condition had worsened, and they discovered that he was using a strange seed to bring Celeste back. Leon challenged Old Neil’s plan, and the door shook as Old Neil angrily denied the accusation.

• Leon and Klein arrived at Old Neil’s house and found that spirits were avoiding the area.
• After no one answered the door, piano music began inside, and Klein noticed scarlet gas and a dark red growth spreading across the ground.
• Old Neil told them to leave, but Leon confronted him about his ritual and asked what he was trying to do.
• Old Neil revealed that a god had given him a seed that he believed would resurrect Celeste without blood or sacrifices.
• Leon accused Old Neil of forcing Celeste to endure decay for his own comfort, and Old Neil shouted that Leon was lying.