Progression & Ascension
Progression in Yomi no Sho is not a single curve — it is a staircase. Every 30 levels, your Shades hit a soft cap that can only be broken by an Ascension, a permanent ritual that consumes rare materials and unlocks the next tier of content. The first soft cap is at level 30; subsequent caps are at 60, 90, 120, and 150. Each cap brings a major shift in game pace, available content, and the optimal playstyle.
This page covers the philosophy of Ascension, the material costs at each tier, and the strategic decisions you will face at each cap.
Soft caps and the idle slowdown
Section titled “Soft caps and the idle slowdown”Before the first Ascension, levelling a Shade from level N to N+1 costs roughly 100 * N^1.5 Munin. At level 25 this is about 12,500 Munin; at level 29 it is about 16,800. The curve is gentle, and most players reach level 30 within three days of casual play.
At level 30, the cost curve inflects sharply. Level 31 costs 50,000 Munin — roughly three times what level 30 cost. Level 32 costs 75,000. This is the soft cap: the game does not prevent you from continuing, but the cost becomes punishing relative to the stat gain (each level gives roughly +2% to attack and HP). The intended path is to Ascend, which resets the level cap to 60 and restores the gentle cost curve.
Between Ascensions, the soft cap serves a pacing function. It is the game’s way of saying “you have finished this chapter; go do the next thing.” Pushing through a soft cap without Ascending is almost never worth the Munin — the only exception is a specific late-game min-max strategy that involves leaving a Shade at level 34 to abuse a rounding quirk in the defence formula.
The Ascension ritual
Section titled “The Ascension ritual”Ascension is performed at the Hall of Eight Pillars, which unlocks at level 30. Each Ascension requires three things:
- A Shade at the current soft cap. The Shade must be exactly at the cap (level 30, 60, 90, etc.) — over-levelling past the cap is wasted Munin.
- A set of Ascension materials. These vary by Shade and tier; see the table below.
- A Sanzu Coin. A single coin per Ascension, regardless of tier. Sanzu Coins are the rarest gating material in the game.
On Ascension, the Shade’s level resets to 1, but their base stats increase by 12% permanently. Their skill tree expands with a new tier of upgrades. Their level cap increases to the next tier (60 after first Ascension, 90 after second, and so on). The stat increase compounds across Ascensions: a Shade at Ascension 5 has roughly 1.12^5 = 1.76x the base stats of an unascended Shade at the same level.
Material costs by tier
Section titled “Material costs by tier”The materials required for each Ascension tier are fixed and known in advance, which lets you plan your farming routes. The table below lists the cost for the first four tiers — beyond tier 4, the costs scale linearly and the community maintains a calculator.
| Tier | Materials | Source zone | Approx. farm time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 30 Bone Ash, 1 Sanzu Coin | Field of Tethered Bones | 2–3 days |
| 2 | 50 Drowned Silk, 1 Sanzu Coin | The Drowning Marsh | 5–7 days |
| 3 | 80 Kagura Bell, 1 Sanzu Coin | Mount Kagura | 10–14 days |
| 4 | 120 Frozen Tears, 1 Sanzu Coin | Frozen Peak | 18–25 days |
The Sanzu Coin is the binding constraint at every tier. There is no farmable source of Sanzu Coins — they are awarded only from one-time quest completions, world boss first-clears, and the monthly login bonus. A free-to-play account will receive roughly 8 Sanzu Coins in the first month, 4 in the second month, and 2–3 per month thereafter. This is the primary pacing mechanism for late-game progression.
Strategic decisions
Section titled “Strategic decisions”Which Shade to Ascend first
Section titled “Which Shade to Ascend first”Your first Ascension is the most important strategic decision in the game. The 12% stat boost and the expanded skill tree are significant, and you should give them to the Shade who will carry you through the second tier of content.
The community consensus, as of patch 2.4, is that Kagaribi is the correct first Ascension for most accounts. Her expanded skill tree at Ascension 1 unlocks Phoenix Tether, a party-wide burn application that dramatically increases the clear speed of every fire-aspected zone in tier 2. Accounts that instead Ascended a summon-only Shade (typically an SSR pull) report 15–20% slower tier-2 clears on average.
The exception is accounts that pulled Tengu in their first 50 summons. Tengu’s Ascension 1 unlock is so dominant in the Drowning Marsh that it justifies Ascending him first and using Kagaribi unascended for an extra week.
Single-target vs. party Ascension
Section titled “Single-target vs. party Ascension”A frequent question is whether to Ascend one Shade to tier 3 or three Shades to tier 1. The answer is almost always the latter. Three tier-1 Ascensions cost roughly the same total Munin as one tier-3 Ascension (because tier-3 materials are dramatically rarer), and a party of three Ascended Shades will outperform a party with one heavily Ascended carry in nearly every zone in the game.
The exception is world boss content, where single-target damage is the only thing that matters and a hyper-invested carry is the correct strategy. Most accounts maintain a “world boss carry” — a single Shade pushed to the highest Ascension the account can afford — alongside a more balanced party for zone clearing.
When to stop Ascending
Section titled “When to stop Ascending”There is no hard level cap in Yomi no Sho, but there is a practical ceiling. Beyond Ascension 5, the stat gains are small relative to the material cost, and the only content that demands them is the Sunless Throne, a permanent endgame boss that resets weekly. Most accounts stop at Ascension 5 across their main party and invest further only in their world boss carry.
The decision of when to stop is personal. Some players enjoy the incremental grind; others find it tedious. The wiki documents the math so you can make an informed decision, but it does not prescribe an endpoint.
Preparing for your first Ascension
Section titled “Preparing for your first Ascension”If you are approaching level 30 on Kagaribi and have not yet unlocked the Hall of Eight Pillars, here is a checklist:
- Complete the Embers of Memory quest chain, which unlocks the Hall.
- Farm 30 Bone Ash from the Field of Tethered Bones. This takes 2–3 days of active play.
- Acquire 1 Sanzu Coin. If you have not yet spent your first-month login bonus coins, you should have one available.
- Review Kagaribi’s Ascension 1 skill tree in the Skill Trees page so you know which upgrades to prioritise.
- Stockpile roughly 100,000 Munin to spend on levels immediately after Ascension, since the level-1-to-10 grind is fast but expensive in aggregate.
Once all five items are checked off, perform the Ascension at the Hall of Eight Pillars. The cutscene is unskippable on first viewing — it is roughly 90 seconds long and contains lore relevant to the broader plot.