Awesome / Cradle Series

Book 1 - Unsouled

• The book starts with Lindon fighting the Remnant of an ancestral tree, tricking it into a trap, and grabbing its treasure while it's distracted. It is repeatedly made clear that a single mistake would have gotten him killed.
• Okay, he's fighting children, but Lindon sweeping the Foundation matches is still worth noting.
  In the weeks leading up to the Seven-Year Festival, he'd trained every day to deal with possible threats. What if an opponent could resist the Empty Palm? What if they had a technique they could land on him first? What if his madra was exhausted before the later rounds?
  But as the sun crept past noon and Lindon defeated his fifth opponent, he realized there was one scenario he'd never prepared for: easy victory.
  [...]
  The reality slowly set in, like water seeping into soil. He'd won a tournament, even a small one, using actual sacred arts. He was a sacred artist, and all of Sacred Valley knew it.
• When the Li Grand Patriarch shows up, Lindon soon realizes that he has absolutely no chance of surviving a fight with him. He decides to fight him anyway, on the off chance that his death will do something. He is instantly killed with no effect, but Suriel is so impressed that she lets him keep his memories so that he might escape his fate.
  Suriel's internal monologue: This was the sort of person the Abidan were created to save: the weak who stood against the strong. The sort of person the Phoenix was meant to save. The sort of person who might, with a little outside help, even reach beyond their fate.
• Lindon fights his Patriarch's grandson, in what is supposed to be an exhibition match. He actually wins (using the hornet Remnants he prepared earlier) and leverages this into being accepted into the Heaven's Glory school.
• When Lindon first meets Yerin, she has been fighting nonstop for two weeks, and collapses the second she realizes that he's not going to try to kill her. Five minutes later, she still fights some of the most dangerous Heaven's Glory disciples and wins.
• Lindon kills an Iron. It wasn't an outright fight, sure, but he still wins and kills his opponent.
• Lindon stabs a Jade, and after getting thrown high into the sky, manages to twist mid-air to throw seals down at a Sage remnant. He is then able to call a Thousand Mile Cloud to him and land on it, then fly away. He does all this with no training of any kind ever.
• All of Lindon's accomplishments culminate in one moment near the end. He's out of tricks, he's trapped with a vastly more powerful sacred artist, and he is about to die after having failed in every way. But Elder Whitehall hesitates before pursuing him.
  The elder took a step inside, glancing from side to side as though checking to see what other trick Lindon had prepared. That sight was like dawn rising before Lindon's eyes.
  Elder Whitehall, a Jade leader of the esteemed Heaven's Glory School, was wary of him.
  • Even better, the elder refuses to believe that he's actually unsouled, and even makes him a We Can Rule Together offer, under the impression that Lindon is actually a powerful expert.

Book 2 - Soulsmith

• Yerin not allowing any of the Sandvipers to insult Lindon.
• The first time Eithan encounters the Sandvipers, he casually steals a pipe and starts walking with them. When they attacked, he simply walked between them, causing them to stab each other and trip over their allies. He humiliates the Book's main antagonists without even trying.
• We see a ceremony where a young member of the Sandviper clan is given a single drop of Sandviper poison to transform him into the Bloodforged Iron body. The clan heir is worried it's too much for him to handle, but he is assured that more poison, while more painful, results in a more powerful body. Cut back to Lindon, who is being directly bitten by four Sandvipers during his own transformation.
• Lindon, after being stabbed through the shoulder and left for dead, gets up and kills the Sandviper heir by stabbing him.
• Eithan shuts up all the Sandvipers just by unveiling his Underlord core.

Book 3 - Blackflame

• Eithan finally lets loose, breaking out of a trap designed specifically to hold him and tearing apart his assassins using a pair of scissors and a broom. Later it's revealed that he was still holding back.
  Eithan: Gentlemen, this is a mistake.
• Cassias has spent the book as Eithan's gopher/Straight Man. He spends the early part of the Jai clan attack panicking trying to find his wife and child. He confirms they're safe shortly after being cornered by eight Highgolds led by one of the top 300 strongest in the entire kingdom. Said Highgold completely panics upon realizing that it's Cassias they're fighting, since he's ranked number 2 in the entire empire. The fight end very, very quickly.
  • A minor point in the above, but the person Cassias is ranked 2nd to? His own wife. Talk about a Battle Couple.
• Yerin advancing to Highgold mid-fight with Jai Long, and suddenly she is outmatching him. Jai Long was a Truegold,so still a stage above her.
• Lindon, who had been cheating by using pure madra to shape the dragon's breath previously, with his back up against the wall is forced to use the dragon's breath by condensing blackflame madra as it is supposed to be. He manages to do it and burns Sandviper Gokren's hand off. As a Lowgold, he manages to cripple a Truegold.
• Lindon does what the people of his homeland The Sacred Valley considered the province of gods and Heavenly Messengers: Advances to Gold. Granted, they didn't know that Gold is just the first step of adulthood outside of their valley, but thanks to the unique nature of the Sacred Valley no one has reached Gold there in over 100 generations.
• Credit where it's due: Jai Daishou managed to pull a Faking the Dead against a man known for being The Omniscient using a bound Remnant he had prepared previously.

Book 4 - Skysworn

• Awesomeness by second hand account: Not a single one of the assassins, mercenaries, death cults, or death remnants are willing to take on Eithan on behalf of Jai Daishou.
  Mo She: Me and my boys would take a contract out on the heavens themselves, if the price was right. Worst that could happen is we die, right? But going up against someone who knows you're coming and can do something about it...well, there's a difference between gambling and throwing your money down a well.
• Eithan kicking the asses of the Blood Phoenix cultists, by himself.
• We finally get to see why Akura Malice and Monarchs in general are so feared when Malice fights the Bleeding Phoenix to a standstill while covered in purple crystal armor so large that one of her legs is mistaken for a mountain at first.

Book 5 - Ghostwater

• Lindon's fight as a Lowgold with Mu Enkai, who in his introduction had cowed an entire town into subservience including Highgold officials. Finally we see a point of view from one of Lindon's foes and it's glorious.
  He had time for one last, jealous thought. This stranger had so much power, but he acted like a servant. If Enkai had sacred arts like that and combined them with the egg, he could have ruled the world.
• Lindon's final fight against Ekeri. At this point he's still a Lowgold and he doesn't have Dross bonded to him yet, but he fights and kills a Truegold that a Monarch faction considered promising enough to send to Ghostwater.
• Longhook is one of the most promising young emissaries of Redmoon Hall. Their Dream artists even read his fate and saw that one day he will become the next Blood Sage. Eithan kills him anyway the second he gets him somewhere without witnesses.
  Longhook: My fate... does not... end here...
  Eithan: [smiles sadly] Everything ends.
• The first time Dross fully activates, providing Lindon with a perfect combat simulation. Even better, it doesn't take long for the implications to hit—we've seen Suriel do something similar. Lindon has a Presence.
  Information requested: combat solution against Akura Harmony.
  Beginning report...

Book 6 - Underlord

• Lindon finally decides to stop letting people shoving him around, and refuses to let the Skysworn arrest them. He then proceeds to curb-stomp about a dozen Skysworn (while Yerin is doing the same with the other half) without killing any of them. It's impressive enough that even Naru Gwei takes notice—with the added benefit that it conclusively proves that they're not insane murderers.
  Lindon's fear ignited. When he'd been imprisoned by the Skysworn before, it was for no cause other than his Path. They had never trusted him to work for them, and had treated him like an enemy from the very beginning.
  They had used their superior advancement to push him and control him and keep him locked in a tiny room. If he continued to allow that, it would never stop.
  There had to be an end to it.
• Lindon gets an indirect one when Charity tells the Seishen Kingdom about him.
  Daji stood up so fast that he almost knocked his chair over. He looked furiously eager. "A Truegold! He is mine. I will carve the difference between us into his body."
  Charity did not move her eyes from the King’s face. "That would not be appropriate. As I said, I wish not to lose talented members of the young generation."
  "I swear to you on the name of our family that I will leave him alive to regret crossing you."
  Finally, Charity turned to him. "I will make myself clear. If you face Wei Shi Lindon before you reach Underlord, you will surely die."
  They were in a wide open space, but her voice seemed to echo, hanging in the air long after the words should have faded.
  Daji's mouth fell open a little, his face showing pure, almost comical shock. He had never faced a worthy opponent of his own advancement level.
• Yerin with her Blood Shadow fight two Underlords to a standstill and nearly fatally wounds one of them as a Truegold. Sure she almost died, but she still took on two people a level above her by herself.
• Despite the fact Yerin is pretty much one attack away from death and very nervous about her Blood Shadow's intentions, she still stood against Meira and did some real damage.
  Yerin raised her sword.
  "Did I say you could leave?" the Truegold asked the Lady.
• Lindon fights a one on one with an Underlord as a Truegold using super powerful cannons.
• All three of the advancements to Underlord.

Book 7 - Uncrowned

• Lindon gets another indirect one, from Orthos.
  "Jade... If Lindon returned today and saw what I've seen, he would leave every Jade in the Heaven's Glory School as a pile of ashes."
  Kelsa's hopes receded. She had somewhat believed him at first, but this was too ridiculous. To begin with, his claim contradicted itself. "You said that entering the Valley made your spirit weaker. If that's true, he couldn't be any stronger than a Jade."
  Red-and-black eyes met hers. "I said what I said."
• After months of losing to every Akura Underlord, Lindon challenges them all at once, and defeats the first two in one move each. Then he tells Fury that he challenged all of them, and he defeats all of them at once (except Grace and Pride, who stay back).
• Without meaning to Lindon goes from the middle of the pack in the first round to being #10 of the entire Uncrowned King tournament. It's entirely possible that if he hadn't held anything back he'd have been even higher.
• Eithan, being Eithan, intentionally puts himself at the back of the rankings. It takes a second for Charity to realize exactly what he was doing.
• Yerin and Lindon's duel.

Book 8 - Wintersteel

• Lindon manages to keep open the connection to Dross when Northstrider took him, which impresses even Northstrider.
• Eithan faces Sha Miara, the secret Monarch, who all the other Monarchs know will be the ultimate victor—she had to give up all rewards just to be given a chance to compete. Eithan beats her in nine seconds.
  Dross: [We could have done it faster.]
• The Blood Sage has been petitioning Northstrider to allow him to train and study Yerin since she made it to the top sixteen in the Uncrowned tournament using his techniques much to the anger of Min Shuei, The Winter Sage. He finally gets an audience with Northstrider to make his case to train Yerin and Northstrider responds by punching him clear out of the city.
  Min Shuei: That was even more satisfying than I'd imagined.
  Northstrider: He thinks only in terms of life and death. He knew I would not kill him, so he thought he was safe. Fool.
• Seishen Daji tries to ambush Lindon, who overcomes him easily and steals his weapons and armor before sending him on his way.
• Seishen Daji assembles a team of Underlords to take down an Abyssal Palace tower, only to find that Lindon has already taken it out by himself. Thinking he has the numbers advantage, he tries to attack Lindon. It goes even worse than the last time. Meanwhile, Lindon is assembling his Ruler technique to destroy the tower and scare away the nearby dragons.
  If you would allow us to deal with our pursuers, we will leave you alone," Meira continued. "We have dragons coming in."
  "Not anymore," Lindon said [...] "Those dragons were in the tournament."
• Lindon engages three Truegolds and a peak Underlord all on his own and wins. The Underlord is so convinced that Lindon had to burn a suicidal amount of power to be able to stand against them that he believes their loss was worth it. Gilligan Cut to Lindon being perfectly fine and being more worried about Little Blue giving him a lecture and all of the points he'd just lost out on.
• After 8 books and a few years in universe Lindon has finally figured out how to interact with Eithan and not be constantly on the back foot.
  The Arelius Overlord swept his long blond hair away from his face and affected an offended expression. "I'm afraid your invitation never reached me. Your many messengers must have betrayed you, or been waylaid by enemies."
  Lindon pressed his fists together and bowed. "What need is there for an invitation between brothers? I know that wherever I go, you go as well."
  Over the years, Lindon had learned how to handle Eithan.
  Eithan laughed loudly and threw his arm around Lindon.
• To put the above in context, when Lindon first met Eithan in Soulsmith he was a Shrinking Violet at best, now he's Grew a Spine and can finally play with Eithan on his own level.
• After Yerin gets defeated twice in the final round (where three losses means she's done), she finally fully bonds with her Blood Shadow, something that the Red Sage has been trying to get her to do because no one has ever done it before. She becomes a Herald—something which should be impossible before Archlord—and then completely destroys her opponent. Northstrider forces her to cancel her preparations at the beginning of the fight.
  Northstrider: If you start at the same time as she does, the fight will be too short.
• Akura Fury waits till his mother Akura Malice is safe from the Golden Dragons using Penance to kill her before revealing that he could have advanced to become a Monarch at any time after being introduced in the books.
  Xorrus: Why? If you could advance, why did you wait?
  Fury: To see this look on your face!
• We get to see why Akura Malice is one of the most feared Monarchs in all of Cradle again:
  Malice's smirk widened into a smile. "Sometimes I wonder if you know me at all, Sesh. Your people destroyed the Rising Earth sect and tried to destroy two more of my teams." Northstrider sensed something in the great distance. The dragon and the lion looked up at the same time. "Did you think that I would let that go?" Malice continued. "Did you think I couldn't reach you?" Her smile widened further into a fierce, maniacal grin. "Did you forget my name?"
• When Mercy, Eithan and Lindon arrive at Sky's Edge, Pride says that it was foolish to come and that they should have brought backup, since it is surrounded. Mercy is confused since they are the backup.
  Pride: You should have brought reinforcements.
  Mercy, confused: We did.
• Following the above, Lindon proposes a duel against the people who had surrounded his team, and during it proceeds to close the gap between him and his opponent less than a second after the battle had begun, ignores all of his enemy's attacks as if they weren't there and consumes the person's madra, terrifying the onlookers. No one wanted to duel anymore after that.
• In the final battle, Lindon kills and consumes three of the Uncrowned in quick succession, demonstrating beyond a shadow of a doubt that he would have been Uncrowned if he hadn't faced Yerin in his first match. To underline the point, he collects the Uncrowned construct from one of the corpses, implying he's going to find a way to attach it to his soul.
  He received one brief impression of of Calan's last moments.
  He'd sensed the Hollow Domain. To him, it had felt like the absolute emptiness. Like the death of the spirit.
  In his case he was correct.
• Yan Shoumei's bloodshadow Crusher which has almost Herald level strength takes one look at Lindon and runs away.
• Eithan announces his presence in the final battle by annihilating one of the enemy Overlords, so that he doesn't even leave a Remnant. Then he reveals that he advanced to Archlord when no one was looking, and manages to hold off the Red Sage.
• Lindon obtaining the necessary insight to bond with the Void Icon and becoming the youngest Sage in centuries.
  Lindon: I am the End.
• Earlier in the novel Mercy, in an effort to boost Lindon's self esteem, tells him that if she asked him to punch a hole in the sky he would respond: "Apologies, it might take me a few years". Then at the end, when Mercy is barely able to stand up to Sophara, Lindon arrives and issues this Call-Back:
  Mercy: Finish her!
  Lindon: I'm here to punch a hole in the sky.
• Soon after the above, Lindon manifests the Void Icon, which opens a hole in the sky.
• Northstrider finally managed to create a Presence of his own, which saved his ass a few times in the battle against Reigan Shen.

Book 9 - Bloodline

• Yerin suggests that they use their cloudship to ram something (she doesn't really care what) to get the Ninecloud Court to let them leave. The Ninecloud Soul panics because it realizes that they might actually do that.
• Seishen Daji managed to find a way to lie while under a Magically-Binding Contract, and uses it to accuse Lindon of making baseless accusations despite the multiple witnesses to his crimes. Mercy agrees that it's just a personal feud. Lindon takes his cue, challenges Daji to a fight, and Daji realizes that he is now in a grudge match with one of the most powerful men in the world. He promptly suffers an absolutely humiliating Curb-Stomp Battle.
  • When Dross asked Lindon why he didn't just kill Daji?
    Lindon: My name isn't Mercy.
• Fury's Ascension ceremony. We finally see where Heralds and Sages go when they Ascend.
  • Yerin, to Fury's delight, describes killing Sesh as like swatting a fly.
• Lindon versus the Heaven's Glory School. They have almost their entire military force mobilized, and all his allies are either out of range or exhausted and injured. Orthos' biggest concern is that Lindon will feel bad later if he slaughters everyone.
• Lindon arriving to save the Wei clan from the Heaven's Glory School's Jades, single-handed. Orthos know the fight is over as soon as he senses his approach.
  Orthos: He's here.
  Kelsa: Who?
  Orthos: Hold on for a little longer, girl. This battle is almost won.
  Orthos: [to the Heaven's Glory School] We have reinforcements coming. We will accept your surrender.
• The Akura Golds introduce their delegation, which outmatches the entirety of Sacred Valley, as being led by "the Sage of Twin Stars." Lindon is being described at the same level as people who have been worshiped as gods.
• The Kazan clan actually listening to Ziel's warning and getting the hell out of there. Even apathetic Ziel was impressed.
• The Wei clan turns on Lindon because they can't understand why he would come back for anything besides revenge. They actually make a good showing of it at first, between the suppression field, a script circle, and Lindon having to cover Yerin. But once the circle is broken, he uses his remnant arm to consume White Fox madra and then turn it around on them, perfecting their own path and making them all look like children.
  First Elder: You may have great power, but we have honed our techniques over many years. You have never seen the true Path of the White Fox.
  [Lindon sees through all his illusions and grabs him by the arm]
  Lindon: No. This is the Path of the White Fox. Pay attention.
• When Mercy realizes that the Li clan is stalling because they think the whole thing is a trick, she flies up to the Jades, takes them all down in seconds, and all without killing them.
  Li Matriarch: You have defeated me, but it will take more than you alone to conquer the Li clan.
  Mercy: No it won't. But why would I waste so much time? [summons her Golds]
• Two hundred years ago, the Mad King crafted an artifact of such immense power that it made him invisible to Fate. By sheer luck, he encountered Ozriel... which did not go well for him.
• We finally see what happened on Limit all those years ago. The Mad King, with is above mentioned artifact went there, only to encounter Ozriel, who immediately annihilated him, and then to add insult to injury, stole his artifact and convinced Suriel that he was dead.
• Suriel's second meeting with Lindon. She shows him several possible futures, including two where he kills Dreadgods. In the one where he killed the Titan, he even fights Northstrider afterwards for the binding.
• Lindon's Advancement to Overlord. While not as epic as the jump to Underlord, his revelation is awesome.
  Lindon: I... advance.
• Jai Long and Jai Chen are about to die, when Lindon shows up and kills an entire army of bloodspawn and dreadbeasts in a few seconds.
  Lindon hovered in the air, his back to Jai Long. He was surrounded by a halo of shining constructs, firing in every direction. A rainbow of colors streaked out from him, and just for that moment, he looked like he had sprouted a pair of wings made of light.
  For a frozen moment he hung there, blazing like a many-colored phoenix.
  [...]
  Sage of Twin Stars, Jai Long thought. He believed it now.
• Lindon using Blackflame and his authority to cut open a void space.
• It might have been a Pyrrhic Victory, but the team driving off a Dreadgod is all kinds of awesomeness. Especially considering that it might have gone to the Blackflame Empire if they didn't. In particular, there's his conversation with Elder Whisper, and why he didn't help.
  Elder Whisper: To face one of the four beasts with illusions is to face down a lion with a spider's web.
  Lindon: That's how we beat it.

Book 10 - Reaper

• After multiple books away from the Blackflame Empire the main characters return, now more powerful than the Naru Huan the Blackflame Emperor, and their welcoming ceremony is a lightshow that rivals any described in any of the books previously.
• Seeing Lindon and Yerin receive the respect afforded their advancement level is awesome. Even the Emperor of their old home bows to them now.
• It took the Blackflame Emperor bowing to Lindon to hammer it home, but Wei Shi Jaran finally realizing just how far his son has come, and that he wasn't just gifted power as Jaran thought.
• When Cassias Arelius, Heir Apparent to the Blackflame Arelius clan, lets Lindon and Yerin know that he's dealing with rivals and sabotage in other cities around the Blackflame empire Yerin decides to take a walk unveiled around those cities. The sabotage stops.
• The entire dive down the labyrinth, with increasingly more powerful enemies, culminating in several Herald-level enemies and finally... a Monarch.
• Mercy advancing to Overlady by realizing that she is the antithesis to her mother, or in her own words:
  Mercy: She is Malice, I am Mercy!
• Suriel realizes that the Court of Seven will take the easy road and let the Vroshir finish their raids, which will include destroying Cradle. Iteration 110 isn't that important to the Abidan; it's an important recruiting world and a symbol of significance as their origin, but ultimately it's not worth the risk. How does Suriel convince the others to help her save it? Go to fight the Mad King and all his armies in Fathom by herself. The loss of Suriel is something worth mobilizing the entire Court for. One by one, they arrive to save her.
  • Raziel:
    A flaming sword burst through the Mad King's hand.
    A woman carved through the Vroshir's attack with her sword, her Mantle boiling behind her like wings of white fire. Even her hair was crimson flame, and she severed the other attacks binding Suriel with one more sweep of her blade.
  • Gadrael:
    Another figure marched into the fading blue light, holding his molten shield ready. The Titan blocked the oncoming void-beasts, slapping them back out of reality.
    "You will stand trial for this," Gadrael warned Suriel. "But for now..." He set his shield and faced the Mad King. "...nothing will touch you."
  • Zakariel and Talariel:
    Just when the Way had faded to one thin azure thread, a girl's head popped out.
    She looked like she was about twenty, and she glanced around with uncertain eyes. "Quick, let's go!"
    Someone else shoved her from behind. A distinguished gentleman whose glasses gleamed. As the girl tumbled out of her tunnel and emerged next to Suriel, he stepped out elegantly, and he even had his weapon in the form of a cane.
    "I suppose you’re going to insist on making me work, aren't you?" said the Spider, gesturing with his cane.
  • Makiel:
    "This is not my doing," Makiel said.
    The Hound manifested in full battle armor, holding his broad two-handed sword in one hand. He looked completely unharmed, with his dark and weathered skin and his iron-gray hair, but Suriel could see that his existence was still weak.
    He gave Suriel a hard look. "But if we are to walk this path, we will walk it together. All of us."
  • Durandiel:
    The Ghost blew hair away from her face, and Suriel realized for the first time the woman was standing at her side. Durandiel was the only one of the Seven not wearing armor, instead wearing a dull gray dress that hazed into smoke and carrying a tall staff.
• Lindon's first project with the Soul Forge and his newfound understanding of significance (which acts very much like Intent)? Combine Blackflame and pure madra into the ultimate soulsmith hammer, which he names Genesis.
• Lindon smithing a Herald-level spear. He names it Midnight, Cursed Spear of the Destroyer.
• Lindon finds his Archlord revelation while in the middle of a pitched battle with Reigan Shen. Then he changes it, because he decides the singular isn't good enough.
  Lindon: I want more. I want...everything. I... no, we, will never stop!
• Dross provides Lindon an escape plan to get away from Reigan Shen. Lindon instead decides to use his authority as a Sage to throw Shen out of the Labyrinth. Their wills directly clash, and Shen almost wins... except that Lindon recently swore an oath to get rid of Shen, while Shen recently broke his oath to leave. Lindon wins, and Shen disappears.
• There are four layers of authority over the Labyrinth: Subject One owned the Labyrinth most recently, and Lindon receives his blessing by dint of his Hunger arm and his status as the Void Sage. Before him were the soulsmiths who created the Dreadgods, and Lindon receives their blessing due to being a soulsmith himself, due to his creations, and due to having been born in Sacred Valley, meaning he is descended from some of them. Before them was Ozmanthus Arelius, and Lindon receives his blessing due to being an adopted member of the Arelius family. Last, the Labyrinth was first constructed by the original Abidan before they left Cradle, and Lindon receives their blessing due to Suriel's marble and her approval that it represents. The end result? Lindon steals the Labyrinth from Reigan Shen, making the biggest dungeon complex in the world his own personal territory, and then ejects all of Shen's allies in Sacred Valley. Even Northstrider was jealous of Lindon for this feat.
• Lindon's arm crumbles to dust because it's not strong enough to withstand his Archlord Madra. That's okay though, he'll use the Dreadgod Subject One's arm instead.
  "Mine," Lindon said, and the word was a command.
  The arm flowed into his own.
• Every damn moment after the Mad King appears in the sky.
  • The entire world quakes at his mere presence. Reality itself starts to break and every seer starts screaming. Even the Bleeding Phoenix (which recently got a power and intelligence upgrade) runs and hides. We are given shots of all the Monarchs panicking as they realize how all their plots and plans to rule this one little world have come to nothing.
    The Way itself was trembling, and [Northstrider] tried to step beyond the world, but found he couldn't. It was as though there was nothing beyond Cradle at all.
    His oracle codex screamed, the surface of the glossy black orb flickering with texts, and he seized it in one hand.
    "What is happening?" he demanded.
    The codex was incoherent. It repeated only one phrase, over and over:
    [A destroyer has come.]
  • Lindon's team slowly comes to terms with how completely and utterly outclassed they are, but decide to sit together to watch the end. Eithan apologizes to them, weeping, and says he wishes they had more time. Then he takes out Ozriel's black marble.
    The marble cracked.
    Eithan looked into the sky as he held out the black marble. "Remove restraints and release authority. Authorization zero-zero-eight... Ozriel."
  • Eithan has been Ozriel this entire time. His mere presence suppresses the Mad King's horrible weight.
    The world stopped shaking.
    Northstrider stared into the reflective black surface of his codex. The turmoil calmed, and the message it had displayed—[A destroyer has come]—now flickered out.
    It was replaced with a new message, and if the previous one had brought with it the chaos of panic, this one came along with the silence of the grave.
    White letters on a black surface declared: [The Destroyer has come.]
  • The Sage of Calling Storms sounds like he's having a religious experience when he senses Ozriel.
    "He's here," the Sage whispered.
    Reigan wasn't much interested—he figured they were all dead either way. He sighed. "Who?"
    "The Reaper."
  • As Ozriel is recalling his armor through the Way, the Mad King tries to attack before he's ready. With the scythe modeled after the Reaper's, which means he has full authority over it.
    The Iteration split in half as he cut at the fabric of existence, but Eithan held out a hand. The slice in reality stopped exactly at the edge of his palm.
    Eithan laughed. "A poor choice of weapon."
    Who could have more authority over Ozriel's Scythe than Ozriel?
  • And of course, the battle between the Reaper and the Mad King. Ozriel demonstrates the powers of all seven other Judges (except Suriel), outmatching the Mad King in every respect despite being severely weakened from his long veil and using a knock-off scythe. He overpowers him so completely that Oth'kimeth, the Class-1 Fiend that is one of the most dangerous entities in existence, runs away rather than finish the fight.
  • After everything has settled down and everyone gets to keep their memories, Reigan Shen has one absolutely horrified thought: He's spent the last several years antagonizing the Reaper, including murdering his descendants and screwing with his favored disciples. He decides to get Lindon and co off the planet as soon as possible; the idea of killing them instead doesn't even seem to occur to him.

Book 11 - Dreadgod

• Ozriel was slated to be the successor for five of the Judges. The current sitting Judges? They were the second choices.
• Ozmanthus' hunger echo helping Lindon fix Dross' structure.
  • And Lindon rapidly catching on. No wonder Eithan chose him as his disciple.
• A smaller scene, but the bottom of the Labyrinth doesn't disappoint. Lindon finds the chambers of the original seven Abidan (plus a new one Eithan carved for himself at some point), filled with scripts so powerful that they cause an Archlord's eyes to bleed.
• Ziel becoming closer and closer to advancing to Sage. Not bad for someone who was a spiritual cripple a year and a half ago.
• The Wandering Titan doesn't wander anymore. Now it sprints towards its target, like a mountain running.
• The newly empowered Dreadgods. They can use spatial travel now, and swap places with one another. The Wandering Titan and the Silent King use this to set a trap, since the defenses against one are so different from another.
• Lindon accidentally breaks his oath, and while Malice eventually helps him, both she and Charity consider it likely that Lindon's future advancement is crippled. Charity even warns Mercy that it's likely he'll destroy his apartment in pure instinctive fear when he wakes up. When he wakes up, he... shakes his head, double-checks to see if his oath is still in place (that is, the single most traumatic thing he could do right now) and immediately starts training again.
• Yerin advancing and becoming a full Herald by figuring out her Archlord revelation.
  The aura from the natural treasures around her died, the winds falling. Now nothing concealed the bodies of the Silent King thralls who had tried to attack her while she advanced. They had posed a threat to her while she was in the middle of advancement.
  But not when she had finished. Then, they faced her new purpose.
  "To kill monsters."
• Little Blue of all people shoving a spear into Redmoon's chest. She might be terrified of fighting, but she helps her friends.
• Lindon consuming the Silent King's dream.
• All the protections Lindon gave his family.
• The Silent King's army can flawlessly mesh their techniques together and rival Monarchs.
• Emriss Silentborn sneaks onto the battlefield by hiding in the flying fortress of the Silent Servants
• The Silent King sends out s call for the other Dreadgods... and watches in horror as Lindon catches the cry for help and eats it.
  The Silent King called for more Dreadgods. It ran into the first one an inch from his throat. And there the call stopped.
• Lindon kills the Silent King. One Dreadgod down, three to go.
  But the Silent King hadn't given up yet. He snarled and swept his paw at the tiny human that dared to seize him by the throat.
  An oversized, blue-white palm strike of pure madra landed on his huge chest. Lindon's Empty Palm.
  Unpowered by madra, the Silent King's paw hit Lindon's side with the force of a housecat. The King looked into the empty eyes of the Void Sage and thought that having some more physical power might not be so bad.
• Lindon usurps the Silent King's position as a Dreadgod, and becomes a proto-Dreadgod himself.
  Malice sneered at him. "Do you know how much stronger the other three will become now that another has fallen? You cannot fathom—"
  "Four," Lindon corrected. He raised his right hand in a fist. "The other four."
  Power exploded from the Silent King's corpse. Hunger aura. It flashed to every corner of the world, empowering the other Dreadgods.
  All four of them.
• What Lindon replies with when Reigan Shen accuses him of taking things from him, remember that not too long ago Shen could have folded up Lindon and put him in his pocket without even looking at him. The statement makes even Yerin shiver.
  "I have not yet begun to take from you," Lindon said quietly.
• The team going on a tour around the world... and robbing everyone blind.
  • While on the trip, Yerin, without any hinting whatsoever from Lindon, Dross or Emriss, manages to figure out to use the Dreamway to reveal the Monarchs' big secret, which helped convince Mercy to go with them and abandon Malice.
• Lindon and Yerin fight Malice. Despite Malice holding the fight over Moongrave—thus holding her own city hostage—they manage to force her to flee. They force a Monarch to flee from her home turf.
  • During the fight, Malice sticks Mercy in a pocket dimension to keep her from just leaving with Lindon and Yerin. Mercy proceeds to use her Book of Eternal Night (which Malice unlocked for her) to temporarily reach Herald level, busting out of the pocket dimension in kaiju-sized amethyst armor and trade blows with her mother.
  • After the fight, Mercy is in a coma from overuse of power. She is guarded by Charity, Pride, and every other high-ranking Akura Archlord left. Lindon and Yerin show up and take her. They take the heir of a Monarch straight out of her home city.
    Charity hesitated. She glanced around as though looking for help. Then, helplessly, she moved.
    Lindon bent down to pick Mercy up, but one person stood up to him. Pride covered her. "We'll take care of her," the Underlord insisted.
    Lindon picked Mercy up anyway. "When I see you again," Lindon said, "I hope we're on the same side."
    Then they left, because no one could stop them.

Book 12: Waybound

• The very first thing that happens is Lindon builds a world. Yes, it's a tiny one, but this is the sort of thing that Monarchs have trouble with.
• Lindon uses items stolen from all the Monarchs to steal their authority, borrowing their Icons for a moment and replicating the wish Yerin made in Bloodline. End result? He heals Mercy from permanent spiritual damage.
• Part of the training hall is a replica of the bottom of the Labyrinth, the seven rooms where the original Judges (and later Ozriel) gained their power.
  "What are these?" Orthos asked.
  [The Paths of Heaven,] Dross responded, and for once he sounded completely serious.
• Reigan Shen attacks Sacred Valley to distract Lindon and waste his time. Lindon fights him off. By himself. Using a bow forged from the Silent King that creates thousands of illusory duplicates of every arrow—except that these "illusions" are so powerful that they can shatter Monarch techniques and the bow has such a high level of existence that it touches the Way itself. And then he pulls out the arrows forged from the Penance prototypes, which follow Reigan Shen halfway across the world and force him to use an Abidan Titan artifact to survive. Dross even notes that if they pursue, they have a decent (though not great) chance of killing him outright.
• After suffering defeat against Lindon in the fight above Shen then attacks Lindon again in concert with Northstrider, Akura Malice, two Sages, and an entire contingent of Archlords. Lindon once again rebuffs them with a combination of his Silent King bow, the Labyrinth's defenses, and when he's finally pushed he activates his most powerful weapon: The Hunger Echo of Ozmanthus Arelius. Who then proceeds to rebuff all three attacking Monarchs with one attack. Not to say anything of how Lindon is able to drive away the two Sages and their Archlords with either his illusionary copies or in direct combat which last seconds.
• While searching for a way to imbue Yerin's Herald attacks with authority, the echo of Sword Sage suggests that Heralds can copy the attacks of Sages and Monarchs in order to "feel out" how their authority flows through attacks. Lindon asks if it has to be a sword, instead suggesting that she copy the attacks of Ozriel himself. Eventually, she does so successfully, naming the technique the Reaper's Sword. To emphasise the point, at Herald, Yerin managed to imitate enough of the skill of a Judge to stop Malice's attacks later.
• When Ziel finally meets the Sage of Calling Storms again, he shield-bashes him so hard his arm breaks and they carve a trench into the ground, before proceeding to smash him to paste with his hammer. It doesn't stick due to his hyper-regeneration but it's still impressive.
• The Weeping Dragon is about to blast the rest of Lindon's team with dragon's breath... so Lindon draws from both his cores at the same time, performs two different soulfire powered full-body Enforcer techniques that threaten to tear his body apart and calls upon the Void and Dragon Icons at the same time to burn his body for fuel for the technique (including his physical body, spirit, blood essence and lifeline) in order to allow him to move fast enough to push the Weeping Dragon's head up. He then wins in a direct contest of strength with the Dreadgod, forcing it to fire its technique at the moon where it carves a trench into the surface that can be seen with the naked eye. He passes out immediately afterwards.
• Ziel stabs the Weeping Dragon with a Penance Arrow which results in its death.
• Malice appears as the Weeping Dragon is on the verge of death, having sensed that everyone is unconscious. She puts Mercy in a void space to take home, then looses an arrow at Yerin, figuring that she might as well eliminate one of her enemies (she knows she can't hold Yerin for long). Except Lindon wakes up, and all of Malice's senses scream at her that if the first thing Lindon sees is Yerin dying, Malice has no possible future. She desperately manages to cancel her own technique, and turns around to see Lindon just... standing there. He pulls Mercy out of the void space, makes sure all his friends are all right, and goes off to consume the Weeping Dragon... all while completely unconscious. Malice just stands by with the air of someone holding their breath while a predator looks for them.
• When the Weeping Dragon died, Lindon rose up on threads of energy, being empowered by the Dragon, after its death. It utterly terrified Malice.
• Lindon starts effecting the aura and makes the sky go black after the Weeping Dragon dies.
• When Lindon looks up at Malice, she runs away.
• Lindon manages to fight the Bleeding Phoenix and the Wandering Titan, at the same time. Quite the upgrade from getting crushed by the Titan's breathing back in Bloodline. He's so powerful that at this point, Reigan Shen interfering is little more than a distraction.
• Yerin's manifestation of her Icon. After watching all the harm Malice has inflicted upon Mercy, the rest of her family and the world, Yerin cannot see her as anything but a monster... and what was her Archlord revelation again?
  And she remembered her Archlord revelation. It wasn't to fight monsters. Yerin was meant to kill them.
  In that silent world, Yerin looked to Malice and saw a monster.
  She'd been using her anger at Malice, her disgust, for motivation. But that wasn't what Eithan felt when he swung his scythe. It wasn't what she had felt when she'd used Penance.
  This wasn't revenge.
  It was an execution.
  In a world that still seemed frozen, Yerin pulled her sword back almost causally. An image in the sky mimicked her movements. Not a sword.
  A vast, black scythe.
  "Die," Yerin ordered. She brought her sword down in a simple overhand chop.
  And at Yerin's command, the Death Icon descended on Akura Malice.
• Lindon fights a brief 1v1 against the Wandering Titan.
• Lindon and Yerin kill the Pheonix together by commanding it to die.
• The sky turns completely black after Lindon's victory, thanks to his presence affecting the aura.
• Yerin, after joining the Reapers, is shown doing a solo mission to save an iteration. A kingdom on its last legs is trying for the last time to summon a hero from another world to defeat the Dark Lord whose conquest of the World is nearly complete. Yerin shows up, determines this kingdom doesn't seem to be evil, opens a portal to the Dark Lord's throne room, checks he's evil, then kills him with a single stroke, leaving only an ear behind. Yerin does this so quickly, that in the legends of this world, she's the Mighty Warrior Heron.
  • Also note that it's implied this isn't some minor homegrown apocalypse. The mention of how easily he's been winning, how it seems as if destiny itself is on his side, implies that the Dark Lord is one of the Mad King's seeds, an ascendant being sent back to his own world to cause chaos, with powers far beyond what this world is capable of comprehending. Yerin still killed him in one hit.
• When Lindon merely lets his veil slip a tiny inch, the crowd he was talking to sense his power like a blade of an executioner hanging right above them.
• Lindon's final battle is a rematch against the Li Grand Patriarch, who tries again to invade Cradle in the next Seven Years Festival after being freed from Haven. This time Lindon doesn't require the help of a Judge, and shocks Li Markath that a child he didn't even remember killing the first time was able to defeat him with ease in the span of seven years. Culminating in Lindon revealing the weapons and armor he forged from the Dreadgod parts (most of which don't even have bindings).
  All of Iteration 110 shook when these treasures were revealed, and Li Markuth finally realized how outclassed he really was.
  "Was Suriel the one that granted you these powers?" Li Markuth asked. He still worked for a way out.
  "Suriel and Ozriel," Lindon said.
  Inwardly, Markuth cursed the Mad King. If he'd known two Judges had arranged for the protection of Cradle, he would have just fled.
• Every single weapon Lindon makes from the Dreadgods counts as Awesome:
  • The Bow of the Silent King, incredibly spiritually dense, able to forge dream madra into arrows due to the binding at its heart, when fired the arrows will create illusory duplicates that Lindon himself has a hard time telling apart from the original and that have such a high level of existence that they can harm Monarchs. He has twelve real arrows made from the bones of the Silent King that have an even greater spiritual weight and three arrows that were forged from Penance prototypes.
  • Wavedancer is reforged with the binding of the Weeping Dragon, allowing it to forge eight copies of itself out of storm madra when in use, forming a nine sword formation. It is able to forge living lighting serpents out of nearby storm madra and control nearby storm aura to buffet and push back foes without needing to consume madra from the user. Its binding is able to recreate the Weeping Dragon's dragon's breath, a technique strong enough to reach the moon and carve a visible trench in it.
  • He reforges Netherclaw and the old sword of the Sword Sage with the binding of the Bleeding Phoenix, what the binding does is not revealed but it can be surmised that it is extremely strong given how Yerin was impressed with it despite having already worked for the Abidan for two years.
  • We don't see the shield he made for Ziel but it is a shield made with a Dreadgod binding so certainly awesome.
  • The Crown of the Silent King enhances Dross' abilities and allows him to use them more effectively, to the point that Dross is able to overwhelm the Wandering Titan with a dream technique and force it to stumble in a vital moment.
  • The Shells of the Titan, three mini-duplicates of the Wandering Titan's shell that orbit around Lindon, giving off the spiritual feel of a mountain range and strong enough to stop Vroshir energy weapons.
  • The cloak of the Bleeding Phoenix, resembling a cloak of boiling blood, strong enough to absorb and steal Li Markuth's sword that could level entire fortresses outside of Cradle.
  • Chainmail made of the scales of the Weeping Dragon, further protection in case something gets past the Shells of the Titan, able to conduct storm madra.
• After Lindon ascends, he finds himself in a Vroshir homeworld. After escaping the "welcome party" (they were fully prepared for Monarchs, he just blew past them anyway), he faces a Silver Lord. Just as it looks like she might be able to handle him, he gets help from an unexpected source.
  The Abidan appeared with no warning, his fist sending out ripples of darkness from its impact against the dagger. There was the stylized symbol of a wolf's head on the breast of his armor, and he wore no helmet—most of the Abidan had their heads bare.
  His hair drifted up, twisting like living shadow, and excitement gleamed in his red eyes.
  [...]
  "You finally made it!" Akura Fury said happily.
• Lindon's first mission as a Reaper: He is sent to Verge, the world where Suriel was forced to accelerate its fated end, where he faces the Devourer of Dimensions, a Class-2 Fiend. A prince of the world (one of the ones slightly responsible for everything going wrong) meets him, and tries to help. Lindon tells him to just stand aside.
  "How can you face that?" the prince asked. "That's not an enemy, that's... the end."
  Lindon lifted into the air and turned to face the Fiend. Dark fire kindled in his hand.
  "No," Lindon said. "I am the end."