Chapter Summaries

Keweite summoned Xipei to the research institute to show support for His Excellency Mephistopheles, and Mel supplied Xipei with a robe for the occasion. As Xipei dressed, they discussed visiting Silverheart Fortress together once the busy period ended.

• Keweite begged Xipei to attend the institute gathering, where everyone was expected to support His Excellency Mephistopheles.
• Mel recalled that Doug had mentioned cooperation with the research institute but admitted he had not listened to the details.
• Mel warned Xipei not to wear the institute uniform and gave him a robe matching his own, explaining that he had ruined Xipei’s robe while washing it.
• Xipei and Mel discussed the robe shops in Silverheart Fortress and agreed to visit the city together after the busy period.
• Xipei put on the robe, and Mel praised how it looked on him.

Mephistopheles argued with Anna as she packed for his trip to an international magic summit, then used shadow magic to pin her to the ceiling after she mocked him. The chapter ended with Anna protesting and Mephistopheles reflecting on the dark elves’ gender customs.

• Anna packed Mephistopheles’ clothes and accessories while he insisted he was only going to a berserker summit.
• Anna corrected Mephistopheles and teased him about his physique and height.
• Mephistopheles reminded Anna that she had lied about going to the library to play games at an internet café.
• Mephistopheles used shadow magic to plaster Anna to the ceiling when she continued talking back.
• Anna threatened to report Mephistopheles, and he argued that dark elf society would not take her complaint seriously.

The narrator left her mage tower for the capital’s summit after ordering Anna to study Space Magic and stay out of trouble. On arriving, she considered visiting the great library and worried about what to say at the summit, reflecting on how others misunderstood her research and reputation as a dark mage.

• The narrator suspended Anna from the ceiling and ordered her to memorize Space Magic theory and avoid her dark elf sisters.
• The narrator recalled Anna’s unruly habits, her close ties to the dark elves and sacred tree elves, and how she had caused trouble in internet cafes.
• The narrator packed Anna’s prepared clothes, left her in the butler’s care, and traveled to the capital by public airship.
• After arriving, the narrator spotted the great library and decided to visit it to look for material on Space Magic.
• The narrator worried that her summit speech would be misunderstood whether she discussed Space Magic or Mental Magic, and reflected that she had never learned Black Magic.

Xipei spotted cyborg thieves climbing a building with a suspicious device during the magic summit and sought help without alerting the crowd. After contacting Lusien and Priest Luolan, she considered how to stop the criminals without causing a public panic.

• Xipei noticed cyborgs scaling a building while peacekeepers watched the crowded square below.
• The crowd’s attention shifted to Mel’s holographic projection, giving the cyborgs time to reach the device.
• Unable to find her phone or locate Lusien at first, Xipei contacted him through her mental power and accidentally incapacitated him.
• Priest Luolan identified himself, explained Lusien’s condition, and relayed Lusien’s warning that the device might be a detonator.
• Luolan argued against calling in the Magitech Corps because a lockdown and evacuation could delay them, and Xipei considered how to act before the cyborgs detonated the device.

Xipei distracted the crowd by summoning Luolan, then fought a group of cyborgs above the Capitol while disguised as Mephistopheles. After the crowd mistook him for the archmage and cheered, Xipei spotted another group of cyborgs and tried to keep fighting without damaging Mel’s reputation.

• Xipei asked Luolan to draw the crowd’s attention, and Luolan descended into the square amid light, petals, and cheers.
• Xipei teleported to a rooftop and attacked the cyborgs with Shadow Dance, lightning, and other spells while protecting an explosive object with Absolute Protection.
• Two cyborgs jumped toward the crowd, so Xipei disabled one’s antigravity device, pulled the other’s blood from his body, and slowed the falling cyborgs with Feather Fall.
• Xipei feared the crowd had seen him use Black Magic, but the spectators mistook him for Archmage Mephistopheles and cheered.
• Xipei noticed another group of cyborgs sneaking around a nearby block and restrained himself from using overly spectacular spells to protect Mel’s reputation.

Ciprins fought cyborgs who attacked a bomb on the building, sent the bomb safely into the sky, and confronted the attackers with Hellfire. Reynold mistook the scene for a personal drama and tried to reconcile with Ciprins, who silenced him while continuing the fight.

• Ciprins used Gravity magic to knock a flying cyborg away and accidentally caved in another cyborg's chest.
• When the cyborgs attacked the bomb with magitech cannon fire, Ciprins detached the section of wall holding it and launched it into the sky, where it exploded harmlessly.
• Reynold found Ciprins wearing Mel's clothes and urged Ciprins to stop making a scene and get back together with him.
• Ciprins bounced Reynold into the hall with an Air Shield as cyborgs aimed hand cannons at Ciprins.
• Ciprins summoned black Hellfire that surrounded the cyborgs and burned them, then cast a Silence Spell on Reynold when he called out again.

Xipei and Lusien captured the cyborgs who attacked the parliament building, after which Xipei and Mel escaped the reporters to shop for pets. At a magic pet shop, they questioned why a harmless slime was classified as dangerous.

• Xipei and Lusien fought the fleeing cyborgs, with Lusien asking Xipei to leave some alive for capture.
• Xipei apologized to Lusien for knocking him unconscious, and Lusien said he had only been briefly dizzy.
• Mel used Invisibility Spell to take Xipei away from reporters who mistook him for Mel, and they decided to shop for pets and see a movie.
• Xipei asked Mel what pet he wanted, and Mel said he liked black cats but worried Anna would mistreat one.
• Xipei and Mel visited a magic pet shop and questioned the owner about the dangers of magical creatures after seeing a clean, harmless-looking slime.

Xipei and Mel shopped for magical ingredients, then met Luolan, who relayed Angela’s plans to investigate their enemies. Moli arrived to collect their purchases and was horrified to learn that Xipei intended to crush her beloved spiders for experiments.

• Xipei and Mel were thrown out of a pet shop after the clerk mistook their talk of slime mucus for plans to abuse a pet.
• Xipei and Mel bought black widow spiders, toads, caterpillar eggs, and slugs at a shop they treated as a source of magical ingredients.
• Luolan told Xipei that Angela had gone to investigate and expected to return next month so they could confront the people she found.
• Xipei called Moli to collect the live ingredients, and Moli arrived by car.
• Moli excitedly admired the spiders as fashionable pets, but Xipei told her to crush them for experimental materials.

Xipei and Mel tried a holographic movie and became so dizzy and sick that they could barely walk. As Mel went to buy Xipei a drink, Reynold found Xipei and insisted on taking him home, suspecting Mephistopheles Madsen had hurt him.

• Xipei told Moli to process the materials while she and Mel went to the theater for a holographic movie.
• Xipei and Mel spent the screening vomiting and emerged pale, trembling, and unable to walk steadily.
• Mel helped Xipei sit down and went to buy him a cold drink.
• Reynold found Xipei, grabbed him, and asked why he looked ill.
• Reynold said he had waited for Xipei for over two hours and urged him to come home, asking if Mephistopheles Madsen had hurt him.

After Reynold grabbed Ciprins, Mel rescued him and accidentally transformed Reynold into a sheep, drawing a crowd at the cinema. Mel and Ciprins discussed getting a sheep as a pet and disguised themselves to avoid being photographed.

• Reynold shook Ciprins until Mel returned and pulled him away.
• Mel's Transformation Spell turned Reynold into a sheep while leaving his leopard-print underpants unchanged.
• Mel threatened to turn Reynold into an alpaca if he bothered Ciprins again, and the spell wore off, leaving Reynold exposed in public.
• Ciprins covered Reynold with black mist and suggested that he and Mel keep a sheep.
• Mel agreed that a sheep would make a good pet, and Ciprins cast a Disillusionment Charm on them to deter secret photographs.

Xipei and Mel recovered from the botched Transformation Spell and decided to buy a black sheep, while Reynold struggled to understand that they knew each other and that Xipei was moving into Mel's tower. Their search ended in disappointment when they found no sheep at any pet store in Holy Light City.

• Xipei checked that Reynold had suffered no lasting harm from briefly turning into a sheep.
• Mel warned Xipei about Reynold, then let Xipei ruffle his hair and agreed to look for a black sheep with him.
• Reynold realized that Xipei and Mel knew each other, and Xipei explained that they had met in prison while studying spells.
• Xipei thanked Reynold for the meals he had ordered and told him to stop because Xipei was moving into Mel's tower.
• Xipei and Mel visited every pet store in Holy Light City but found no sheep.

The narrator visited her apprentice Moli to inspect her processing of magical materials and was startled by Moli’s gore makeup and secret pet spider. When Moli said she was going to a nightclub to find a date, the narrator warned her about bizarre diseases, leaving Moli exasperated by her outdated ideas.

• The narrator visited Moli’s luxurious home after forgetting to give Mel the spell notes.
• The narrator mistook Moli’s gore makeup for blood, then praised her efficient processing of the magical materials.
• Moli admitted she had hidden a spider because she wanted to keep it, and the narrator allowed her to keep a pair.
• Moli said she planned to go to a nightclub and find a date, so the narrator warned her about catching diseases.
• Moli rolled her eyes at the narrator’s claim that a disease could make dead people’s heads grow from someone’s chest.

Moli reassured her teacher that she would avoid the nightclub, but her teacher encouraged her to go and then tried to equip her with protective spells. The conversation left her teacher reflecting on her grim past and on how out of touch her warnings sounded in modern life.

• Moli cried after her teacher used a graphic illusion on her, then asked what painful memories had made the illusion so realistic.
• Moli promised to stay home and study magic, but her teacher told her to go out and enjoy herself.
• Moli teased her teacher about exaggerating her age, prompting her to recall being abducted and apprenticed to a dark mage she later killed.
• As Moli headed out, her teacher insisted she learn spells to detect sexually transmitted diseases and disguised devils.
• Moli protested that she was only going to drink and sing with old classmates, and her teacher finally let her go.

The narrator spent the morning at Moli’s home, reflecting on her new comforts and preparing to return to the research institute. She told Moli they would soon move into Mephistopheles’s mage tower, and they set out for work together.

• The narrator decided she would ask Mel to accompany her on an outing another day and stayed overnight at Moli’s home.
• The narrator worried about returning to the institute and possibly becoming an assistant, then dressed in Mel’s mage robes to visit the five-star old man.
• Moli returned with breakfast after staying out late, and the narrator warned her not to rely on wakefulness potions.
• The narrator told Moli about her own academy and explained that the Federation had required her to earn academic qualifications before taking the institute’s entrance exam.
• The narrator told Moli to pack because they would soon move into Mephistopheles’s mage tower, and Moli eagerly welcomed the idea of living with her teacher.
• The narrator and Moli planned to go to the research institute together, but Moli said she wanted to drive instead of using a Magitech teleporter.

Ciprins worried that the news footage of his fight at the summit would expose him as a black mage, especially after learning the Dawn Alliance might be targeting Mephistopheles. At the research institute, the five-star old man confronted Ciprins with gossip that Reynold had confessed his love to Mephistopheles.

• Ciprins and Moli watched a news report praising the unidentified black mage who had fought the cyborgs and thrown a bomb away from civilians.
• The report linked the mage to Shadow Moon Temple and said the Dawn Alliance might be targeting Mephistopheles, prompting Ciprins to resolve to stop the organization.
• Moli celebrated Ciprins’s televised heroics and said she wanted to tell everyone he was her apprentice.
• At the institute, the five-star old man accused Ciprins of still believing he and Reynold were together.
• The five-star old man claimed Reynold had confessed his love to Mephistopheles at a cinema the previous night and that someone had posted pictures online.

After her laboratory mishap, the narrator was demoted to assistant and assigned to work for the new mage Yamosi, while she continued testing her assistants’ magic. The chapter ended with news that Archmage Mephistopheles Madsen had secretly built a massive mage tower overnight in Holy Light City.

• A five-star old man showed the narrator a picture of Reynold as a sheep, and Moli said the image had spread across social media as Reynold’s popularity rose.
• The narrator received an order demoting her and her assistants to assistants serving the newly arrived mage Yamosi, whom the executive deputy director favored.
• The narrator and her assistants reported to Yamosi’s laboratory, but he was absent, so she tested their spells and silenced Keweite after he made a crude remark.
• The narrator stuck her assistants’ hands to their trouser seams and made them use magic to eat at the institute cafeteria.
• The midday news reported that Mephistopheles Madsen had demolished an entire residential development and raised a huge mage tower there overnight.

The narrator learned that Mephistopheles had completed a protected mage tower intended as a home for them and Moli, while helping the assistants practice controlling magic. Ms. Angela then arranged to transfer the narrator to the Shield of the New Star and asked them to join a future field assignment against the cyborgs.

• A news report described Mephistopheles's new tower, its defenses, and rumors that he had built it for someone he loved, prompting Moli to say she would pack to move in.
• The narrator let the assistants practice using their phones without touching them, and Moli and Keweite were the only ones who succeeded.
• Moli became absorbed in reading while walking and eating, so the narrator guided her around an obstacle and saw her onto a magical transporter.
• Ms. Angela called the narrator, learned that the institute had demoted them, and offered to transfer them to the military or the Shield of the New Star.
• The narrator chose the Shield of the New Star, and Ms. Angela said that after she returned in two weeks, the narrator and Mephistopheles would join her on a field assignment to investigate a cyborg secret base.

Xipei prepared to move into Mel's mage tower, but a crowd and traffic restrictions delayed her arrival as curious people gathered to see the tower. Mel urgently summoned her because politicians, including a five-star old man, had arrived, and Xipei teleported to the tower to help.

• Mel told Xipei she could move into the tower the next day and left his raven familiar to guide her.
• Xipei set out for the tower, but traffic restrictions and crowds filled the eastern district because people wanted to see the mage tower.
• Mel told Xipei that the prime minister had brought politicians into the tower and asked whether he could throw a five-star old man out the window.
• Xipei warned Mel that the old man could not use Feather Fall, then carefully teleported to the tower steps.

Xipei arrived at Mel’s mage tower, where Mel turned the five-star old man into a bouncing slime after he insulted her. After the politicians left, Mel showed Xipei around the tower and told her about his childhood there.

• Xipei entered the tower, which accepted her mana and revealed its layout to her.
• Mel embraced Xipei, then turned the five-star old man into a slime when he insulted her.
• Mel cast a bouncing spell on the slime and reassured the prime minister that it was protected from harm.
• Xipei calmed Mel, and the slime finally stopped bouncing and landed outside the tower.
• The prime minister and the female speaker left, and Xipei asked Reynold to take the meddlesome vice director with him.
• Mel showed Xipei around the tower and told her his teacher had built it and that he had spent his childhood there.

Mel showed Xipei around the mage tower and revealed that his teacher had been the legendary archmage Yamier. Their tour was interrupted when Moli exuberantly embraced Mel’s apprentice Anna and the two ended up embedded in the tower’s ceiling.

• Mel explained that the tower had belonged to him since his teacher died, and Xipei saw a childhood memory of Mel crying about priestesses pinching his cheeks.
• Xipei and Mel met Butler, the ghost who cleaned and maintained the tower, then explored its corridors and collections.
• Mel revealed that his teacher was Yamier Madsen Yilisi, the legendary Lord of Flames who had lived for nearly six hundred years.
• A scream from the entrance hall brought Mel and Xipei downstairs, where they found Moli hugging and kissing Anna, Mel’s dark elf apprentice.
• Mel and Xipei scolded Moli and Anna, then knocked them into the ceiling, where they became matching stone reliefs.