Darrow begins as a rising Peerless Scarred at the Academy, commanding the man-of-war Quietus in a climactic war game meant to win him a fleet for ArchGovernor Nero au Augustus. He springs a clever pursuit against Karnus au Bellona, but a hidden destroyer rams his flagship. Eight hundred and thirty-three die in the ambush. Darrow saves his valet, Theodora, and, in grief and fury, tries to board Karnus’s ship in a solo strike. The Academy’s Proctors halt him, turning triumph into catastrophe.

Back at the Academy, House Bellona publicly humiliates Darrow, beating and branding him with impunity. The loss and spectacle sour Nero’s favor. On the voyage to Luna, Nero’s Politico, Pliny, details bombings rippling through the Core. Nero responds with a plan to manipulate public fear—then discards Darrow as a liability, ordering his contract auctioned. On Luna, Victra au Julii reveals Pliny’s long game against Darrow and smuggles him into Lost City to parley with Adrius “the Jackal” au Augustus.

In the Lost Wee Den, the Jackal proposes weaponizing fear of the Sons of Ares, using media, syndicates, and Darrow’s heroism to consolidate power. The meeting detonates into a systemwide bombing. Evey, a Pink-turned-Sons operative, leads a cell for Harmony, who has seized control after Dancer’s murder. Darrow rescues the burned Jackal from the blast and is dragged to a Sons stronghold where Harmony demands he suicide-bomb the Sovereign’s gala. She shows raw footage of Eo’s execution: Eo was secretly pregnant. Shattered, Darrow agrees—then, at the gala, refuses to be a butcher.

Darrow plants the trigger but reclaims Eo’s dream, challenging Cassius au Bellona to a duel instead. With training from Lorn au Arcos revealed, he dominates Cassius and severs his arm. The Sovereign alters terms mid-duel to shield Bellona; a melee erupts between Augustus and Bellona. In the chaos, Augustus’s prodigy Leto freezes inexplicably and is beheaded by Karnus—the Jackal’s covert sabotage exposed only to Darrow’s eye. Darrow retreats, only to face Praetorians led by Fitchner—his former Proctor—now the Rage Knight. Arrested and delivered to the Sovereign, Darrow survives a chilling truth game with living Oracles by springing a single decisive question: Octavia planned to allow Bellona to assassinate Augustus. The Oracle brands her a liar.

Octavia pivots, declaring Order Zero and arguing that Augustus must die to preserve imperial fear. Mustang, torn between duty and disgust, yields to the calculus. Before judgment falls, Mustang’s contingency springs: Sevro and the Howlers crash through the storm to extract Darrow. In the Augustus villa, Praetorians and Bellona are purging survivors. Darrow halts the slaughter by revealing a hostage—Lysander au Lune, the Sovereign’s grandson, abducted by Mustang. Aja au Grimmus stays her hand, allowing an evacuation. As the stork lifts, Aja cripples Quinn, Sevro’s lover; then Tactus betrays them, leaping into the night with Lysander and costing them their leverage.

Hemmed in by the Sovereign’s dreadnought Vanguard, Darrow refuses capture. He and Sevro helldive in starShells, smash through the bridge glass, and seize command. On the shipwide feed, Darrow renames the dreadnought the Pax, opens the armories, and orders Blues, Oranges, and Grays to depose Gold officers. An Obsidian Stained, Ragnar Volarus, annihilates a boarding party, pledges himself to Darrow, and rescues their allies. Orion Xe Aquarii, a hard-nosed Blue, takes the helm and punches the Pax through the armada while Darrow broadcasts the Sovereign’s perfidy. In the aftermath, Quinn dies. The grief widens a rift with Roque, even as Darrow hands the Jackal proof of Octavia’s complicity to wage a propaganda war.

Trust deepens where it matters. Sevro reveals Ares sent him and plays a whisperGem from Ares and Dancer affirming Darrow’s mission and Harmony’s betrayal. Victra bares her heart; Darrow declines romance but keeps her close. With the Telemanuses pledged, Darrow sails for Europa to recruit Lorn. Lorn refuses. As Aja’s kill team infiltrates and Kellan au Bellona’s fleet descends, Darrow springs his own trap—mines that erase the Praetorians while Roque ambushes Bellona in orbit. Aja slips away. In a bunker, Tactus breaks and surrenders, only for Lorn to execute him, binding House Arcos to the conflict and scarring Darrow’s circle further.

Consolidating spoils and new white ships, Darrow hears Mustang’s dire news: Pliny has staged a coup, butchered Augustus’s leadership, and captured the fleet with Bellona backing. Darrow retakes the flagship Invictus by infiltration, frees loyalists and the Jackal, humiliates Pliny before his peers, and watches them kill their patron. He declares an Iron Rain on Mars while the Jackal prepares a fifteen-minute comms blackout to blind defenses.

The invasion is brutal and audacious. Victra’s mother betrays the Bellona in orbit, unleashing boarding craft into their core. On the ground, Darrow reveals the true prize—the Sovereign is in Agea—and opts for a covert river breach to avoid a sack. A Bellona ambush detonates an EMP that sinks his team. Darrow butchers his way out of dead armor, drags Ragnar free, and leads a mud-soaked counterambush. Losses are staggering; Sevro swears himself “always” even through grief. With gear ruined and time short, Darrow arms Obsidians with razors and sprints for the Citadel as Mustang collapses the city’s shields.

At the pads, Darrow spies Octavia boarding amid Aja, Karnus, and Fitchner. He hurls himself into the closing shuttle, kills Karnus in the bay, and is beaten senseless by Aja. Ordered executed, he is saved by Fitchner, who turns on the Sovereign’s guard: Fitchner is Ares. He blasts the Praetorians and hauls Darrow to safety.

Convalescing by the sea, Darrow learns the war has shifted. The Sovereign escaped wounded; Nero has been rescued; Roque has captured most of the Bellona fleet and holds real power; alliances with Arcos and Julii are forming. Mustang becomes Darrow’s Politico and urges distance from the Jackal. Ares alerts them: the Jackal has seized Darrow’s Red, Pink, and Violet allies. In Attica, Darrow publicly deepens his alliance with the Jackal while secretly staging a Sons raid with Sevro and Fitchner to free Harmony and Mickey, framing the Jackal’s security chief to protect his cover. In a warehouse reunion, Fitchner reveals his Red wife and Sevro’s heritage; the Sons propose a ruthless succession path. Darrow demands transparency and asks to return to Lykos.

Back in the mines, Darrow confronts the hollowed relics of his past and lets Eo go. He shows Mustang the truth—he is Red, carved to Gold—and kneels to her judgment in the deep. Ragnar joins him, choosing faith over fear. The question of trust is answered when the war’s tempo extinguishes their pause.

At the Mars Triumph, Nero crowns Darrow and offers adoption and marriage to Mustang; Darrow accepts for strategy. The celebration becomes a slaughter. Disguised Golds infiltrate; Roque pricks Darrow with a paralyzing poison as Antonia murders her mother and shoots Victra. Lilath ambushes Lorn; the Jackal finishes him. Praetorians descend under Aja and Cassius. The Jackal executes Nero, crowing that he orchestrated Claudius’s death long ago. Sevro searches for Fitchner; instead, Roque opens the gift box to display Fitchner’s severed, grape-stuffed head—Ares is dead. Paralyzed and marked for dissection by the Sovereign’s order, Darrow watches his revolution implode as Mustang’s fate remains unknown.