I'm at chapter ~270 and I lost interest. Idk, it started off really interesting and then I just lost steam, as it happens with most of these novels. So, how does it end?
Theodore reaches the 9th circle, the realm of transcendents and I think gods(was pretty vague, since at one point it described the 10th circle as being the domain of gods, but the actual gods like Zeus and co. are 9th circle level power) after meeting Myrdal who helped him seal Sloth. Myrdal was an avatar remnant of Prometheus, the god who gave humans the ability to handle mana. Gods and Demons were afraid of humanity due to humanity developing afterwards at a ridiculous rate, changing from insects to being on par with the Gods within a few thousand years. The Gods got help from humanity to end the Demons, which solidified relations between the forces, but eventually I guess the gods died for some reason in the meantime? So it turns out Myrdal had set up Theodore from the beginning, which is why the original version of Myrdal's elemental introduction book was in that school library, and Myrdal/Prometheus' plan was to end the age of magic so that humanity would survive until we ventured into the stars using science, now that the gods and demons had been slain he decided to end mana so that things that could threaten humanity wouldn't spawn anymore. To do so he used Sloth, which has the ability to stop time and absorb mana which it had been doing since it was sealed. It was sealed for iirc a few thousand years after contracting with Myrdal and with Gluttony's help they banished Sloth from the dimension, with the mana being taken with it, and that hole in the dimension from banishing it apparently leaking the rest so over the next few centuries magic would become impossible. Queue five year timeskip. Theodore reached the limits of 8 circles, at the precipice of 9 circles and they hype it up cultivation-style with Gluttony saying he could remain at that level forever, rise to transcendence or fall down and never be able to reach the 9th circle again. Theodore becomes a transcendent during a fight after realizing that the 9th circle is the body, because a magician's body is a world or something like that, and he destroys his body but not really since there was no reaction or explanation of what actually happened to reach the 9th circle? Anyways, after Myrdal's plan is inevitable at this point so Lust in the East continent goes haywire, deciding to turn everyone with her bloodline in the East into monsters, which is a pretty big portion of the population. She did that because the declining mana means that world would become useless to her since it'd stop producing exceptional people she could collect the seed of to enhance her babies. She was basically just going hail-mary hoping that activating her bloodline would produce something really good, as small as the chance is. Most people living in the East continent die from the monsters and Lust takes over Sylvia's body using some of the monsters (her and Becky (Veronica) were there since they'd requested for aid from Theodore's people and Theodore wasn't yet back from sealing Sloth when they got the message). Lust gives back Sylvia in return for Theodore having sex with Sylvia so that Lust could get his seed to produce a more powerful baby. Lust succeeds in birthing it and Theodore for some reason waits until it's been birthed to attack the fortress where Lust was doing this, despite knowing the Heavenly Demon she was producing using his seed would be powerful enough to kill them all. He barely manages to win and kills Lust. Killing Lust apparently triggers Wrath, which takes the form of a meteor, to start heading to Earth to destroy it now that all but 2 of the Sin Grimoires are dead. For some reason this makes sense because they work together or something? It really doesn't match up with what's been said lore-wise up to here, but whatever. And for some reason the knowledge that Wrath destroys worlds where most of the Sin Grimoires avatars have been destroyed (again, why would they do this?) is only unlocked for Gluttony once Wrath starts heading there. Anyways, Wrath apparently multiplies its power based on the threat level, which is apparently based off of how many people know it's about to kill them and how much power people prepare. Also, since Theodore is connected to Gluttony which apparently sends a signal to Wrath automatically, anything he prepares will be seen by Wrath who will just add more power to this incarnation, making preparation useless. So Theodore doesn't tell anyone about it to keep its power in check. Gluttony suggests hiding away some people he chooses to survive since there's basically no way that Wrath can be stopped. Theodore chooses instead to bet on himself awakening a new power during his fight with Wrath that would help him survive.Yeah, you read that right. He marries Becky (Veronica), Sylvia and the eld lady. Anyways, he fights Wrath and basically it's useless and every time he brings out something Wrath repairs itself and/or sends out stuff to respond. Once Wrath enters the atmosphere, it's combustion against the atmosphere causes everyone to see it and it gets super strong (again, why the hell is Wrath's power based off of this is something I do not see a possible reason for). Theodore decides to harmonize himself (his sorcery, remember) to magic itself. This causes him to hook up to the Akashic Record, a being which contains all knowledge in the universe and is essentially omnipotent. This being feels Theodore's attempt and decides to check out Earth getting rammed by the meteor, because apparently people who try to access the Akashic Record are interesting to it? The enormity of the Akashic Record wipes out Theodore's soul. Suddenly the meteor blows up and the Akashic record realizes its ability had been used to do so. It turns around and Theodore's there, apparently he was somehow revived by the strong people from the Age of Mythology. turns out the reason a lot of those strong figures died is they tried to access the Akashic Record to become truly omnipotent, since that's the ultimate endgoal. Some of the people who were particularly strong still somehow retained their will. Some of these happened to be Theodore's acquaintances he'd talked to with Gluttony's power and they convinced everyone to help mend theodore's soul. Theodore returns to Earth after chatting with the Akashic Record and apparently he has a sliver of the akashic Record in him now so he's a lot stronger. He manipulates the world with a wave of his hand, healing the damage to the atmosphere the meteor did. He talks with Gluttony and Gluttony tells him to release the 7th seal and merge with his main body to become an existence surpassing the Akashic Record but turns it down because he doesn't want to reach that level. Reaching that level will apparently make him unable to love his wives and child (Sylvia's pregnant by this point) because he'll view them as lesser beings. This in spite of the fact that with him reaching the 9th circle he has almost infinite life so it'll likely happen at some point down the line anyways. Gluttony tries to eat him to forcefully complete its reason for existing but coincidentally Theodore dying in the Akashic Record broke their contract so Gluttony can't. Gluttony copies Theodore's body and his pre-akashic record abilities and they fight. Gluttony has super knowledge so he's more precise than Theodore but post-akashic record Theodore is super powerful and wins and then reveals he could've won from the very beginning using the move he learned from the bit of the Akashic record he has, but was unwilling to leave Gluttony. He banished Gluttony, who says being his contractor was fun, which is very odd considering Grimoires are supposed to be beings that don't really have a concept of 'fun', just seeking to fulfill the reason they were made. So at the very end Theodore gets a new position in the Meltor Kingdom that basically gives him unlimited power basically equal to the king, but in reality if he disagreed with the king with his strength there's nothing the king could do. His baby's born and he's nervous while Sylvia's giving birth and Paragranum (the alchemy Grimoire) talks to him. She tells him (nonthreateningly) she wonders how long he'd be able to live the way he does as he watches everyone he loves die from old age, as he is the last Transcendent of humanity now. It had basically become impossible for new transcendents to appear on Earth due to the lower mana concentration. Beings like him at the 9th circle are already removed from humanity. Someone at the 8th circle level might be able to live 500 or so years, but someone at the 9th circle was essentially immortal. He can't raise his family to the 9th circle, so he'd be left alone in a few generations. To be exact, he could raise them to that level by using the Akashic Record and probably by fusing with Gluttony too, but chooses not to. I really disliked the ending arc personally. It felt like there were a lot of plotholes and it could've been so much better. The angles they chose to approach why he did things were imo terrible. The ending itself also had a whole bunch of issues for me. Overall though I'd rate it decently, probably a 3.5 or 4/5, which is decently high for me. I enjoyed it, though it's definitely not something I'd place anywhere near my favorites. It just could've been so much better.
Honestly what annoyed me was that the whole story is 400 chapters but they waited till chapter 300+ for his dense self to accept any of the women who liked him. In addition it mentioned he could raise people to transcendents if he wanted and what annoyed me was he could raise atleast his wives to be transcendent but he chose not too. I dont know why he didnt at minimum choose to do that for them or would he rather see them die? I mean that part seemed stupid and who knows since high elfs already live thousands of years, veronica a part dragon should live a long time, and sylvia 7th circle should live couple of hundred years until she gets 8th circle. I mean the fact that he didnt atleast make them all transcendent really annoyed me since he says he really cares for them so why not?
Yeah, that whole ending arc was crap. If it had been a solid ending I might've even been able to rate it 4.5/5 which is super high for me. I honestly can't think of a redeeming trait for that ending, it's like it was purposefully made to be be as unsatisfying as possible while still seeming legitimate enough for people not to think it was a joke. Seriously, the whole reason he turned gluttony down is that he'd view his wives as lesser beings, while he could've raised them to at least be reasonably strong (though still nothing to him). Heck, if he'd fused with Gluttony he might've even been able to raise them to a point they'd be decently strong, enough so that he could acknowledge them as proper people. Just so ridiculously crap of an ending for an otherwise pretty great series.
Read the remaining 25 chapters. It wraps up some of what you talked about before. Im not sure why the translator said 400 chapters was the end.
Pretty sure that there’s no way for me to read those chapters, as far as I see they don’t exist and aren’t even referenced on any English site. edit: you might be looking at the unofficial sites, the story ends at chapter 400 with the destruction of Wrath and besting Gluttony but some sites for some reason have it as when he met the Akashic Record.
I read it on Riddibooks (about 9 cents a chapter) I gave a readers digest version on another thread It hasn't been officially translated tho which is unfortunate imo because I think ending it at ch400 was too abrupt. 425 is the true ending from what I can tell