Petrillo and Dominick clear the hospital floor by floor, fighting possessed patients and staff used as human shields. Two civilians die on their watch: nurse Marie from cardiac arrest during the initial wave, and an elderly patient when a demon accidentally unplugs her ventilator.

Major corruption episode. The corruption offers Abigail a vision of total power - a golden city without pain, fear, or love. She nearly succumbs before realizing love has been surgically removed. She fights back using specific memories of the people she loves.

Ren gives a selective debriefing to Intelligence Officer Kael, omitting the fused demon speech to avoid heresy charges. Hierophant Lethane confronts him about a 7-minute gap and promotes him to lead scout with expanded alchemy authorization.

With two more Void Walkers rampaging, Gregory splits 20,000 wardens: 10,000 to Bridane under Tam and 8,000 to the southern granaries under Abigail. Bridane is saved but barely, with 75,000 civilian dead and 600 wardens lost; Tam orders clear fire zones to kill the Walker, a decision that costs...

Cael leads fifty people down the deep road over three days, revealing his thirty-year harmonic attunement that allows him to physically sense the seven seal lines as distinct frequencies.

Dael signals the surface priests. Lethane channels divine fire through the mountain. Charges detonate, collapsing the Crucible. The boneglass entity accepts its death with gratitude. Lethane's fire hits the wound directly. World goes white.

Three days after Greywind Pass, Ren faces a tribunal in Lethane's war pavilion. Callum uses an ancient doctrinal loophole to attend as spiritual advocate, arguing the doctrine of necessary judgment, while Vasserine cites operational results.

Ren grieves Tik outside the wall while the surviving guild members scatter in separate directions. Pell departs south, Dara and Joss head east toward family. Ren and Ludo, the last two guild members, join the refugee column heading north.

The advance scouts discover the demon-occupied village of Ashford. A hunter-class demon attacks Ren; he survives using flash powder to exploit its light-sensitive crystalline eyes and a belt knife to draw first blood—an amber fluid.