Chapter 2. Treasure Hunt
Bink finds Millie's bones--squished into a book--and she is brought back to life only to reveal that her magic talent is sex appeal. Bink's Talent had "thought" that 9-month pregnant Chameleon was too grumpy for Bink and fixed it so Millie would win, get the wish, and become alive for his benefit. Then it realized that adultery would be a bad thing, so it sends Zombies to keep Bink from getting the Treasure Hunt prize: a date with Millie. King Trent realizes this and decides to send Bink away on an adventure to find the Source of Magic.
Chapter 3. Nickelpede Chase
Bink, Chester Centaur, and Crombie (transformed into a Griffin) travel until they are attacked by a dragon. To get away they travel down a crevice, only to find it full of Nickelpedes. To escape they must team up with the dragon. They escape the crevice into the Herman the Hermit memorial, where Chester pays his respects to his dead uncle.
Chapter 4. Magician's Castle
They travel to Humfrey's castle and Bink goes through the tests to get in. Humfrey reveals to them that, in order to succeed, they need a magician with them. They only one available is himself, so he mothballs the castle and joins the group. With him he brings a tiny Golem named Grundy to translate Crombie's griffin-speech.
Chapter 5. Golem Heights
Crombie uses his talent to point out a safe place to spend the night. They find the house of a vegetarian ogre. Bink asks Grundy what his question was that put him in Humfrey's service, and the golem is surprised that anyone would be interested in him. He had wanted to know how to become real: the magician's answer was "care." Wanting to repay Crunch the Ogre's hospitality, Bink accidentally frees Beauregard, Humfrey's 'captive' demon. Crunch tells a story of how he once met an Ogress, so they give him advice on going after her. Beauregard gives them all some advice, even Grundy, and disappears.
Chapter 6. Magic Dust
They follow a floating, twisting path to a village of females. The village is in charge of taking the magic dust that comes from the ground and blowing it to the rest of Xanth. A Siren has lured away all the men ever come, but the girls can't her because she made a deal with a Tangle Tree to let men pass and kill women. Our heroes are lured by the Siren's song, but woman-hating Crombie fights against it and provokes the Tangle Tree into attacking. The song is drowned out, but now they're about to be eaten! Crombie escapes and leads all the women to destroy the tree. But then they hear the song again!
Chapter 7. Deadly Distaffs
By amazing 'coincidence' a battering ram hits a pineapple tree, dislodging its explosive fruit onto Chester and temporarily deafening him. He shoots the Siren with an arrow. Still alive, she tells them that she just wanted to love the men, but they always went to the other island where her sister the Gorgon lives. Humfrey uses healing water to save Siren and they destroy her dulcimer, the source of her magic. Next they blindfold themselves except for the magician, who uses a mirror to see, and go to the other island. The Gorgon isn't even aware that she was turning the men to stone; she thought they all left, leaving gifts of statues. Humfrey seems attracted to the Gorgon, and makes her face invisible, thus nullifying her magic. They return to the village and take a Griffin guide (female of course) to lead them through the Region of Madness. A Midas bug almost lands of Crombie, but the lady griffin sacrifices herself to save him, a shock for the woman-hater.
Chapter 8. Mad Constellations
Bink finds a piece of wood, which they discover reverses active magic. Come nighttime they are watching the stars when the constellations come alive. Crazed, they walk a spiral staircase made of stars up to the sky. Unaffected by the magic because he is not real, Grundy rides a flying fish up to them and uses the Reverse Wood to show them that they are climbing a tree and will soon fall to their deaths. They climb back down but the now-angry constellations attack them and they loose the Reverse Wood. Grundy guides them safely through the forest to the Reverse Tree stump, where their sanity returns. Bink pesters Grundy about why he helped them until the tiny golem yells "Because I CARE!" Suddenly Grundy is half real, and also no longer immune to the Madness.
Chapter 9. Vortex Fiends
The group travels to a lake where the Fiends that the ogre spoke of live. Bink spots another mound of dirt; they've been popping up everywhere he goes. Humfrey realizes it's the hole of a Squiggle who must be spying on them. Humfrey, Crombie and Grundy go into a magic bottle while Bink and Chester swallow magic pill that let them breathe under water, and they go to the bottom of the lake to the Gateway Castle. It houses the Vortex--a whirlpool no one has ever come out of. In exchange for their stay, they watch a play by the Fiends, who are entertainment monopolists. Chester discovers his Talent: a magic flute. The lord, angry that they "tried to perform instead of watch" with the flute, throws a curse at them. To get away, they leap into the Vortex.
Chapter 10. Precious Nymph
The water-breathing pills saved them, since they woke up later on an underground beach. The water is poisonous and they are thirsty, and they lost the bottle with their friends. Bink and Chester travel until they hear water dripping. Bink drinks some, sees a Nymph, and realizes that the water was Love Potion! The Nymph's name is Jewel, and she is in charge of distributing all the jewels for people to mine up. She is actually quite intelligent, unlike most nymphs, and begins to like Bink when she sees how hard he struggles to remain loyal to Chameleon. She takes them through the ground on her diggle to a demon city where they meet Beauregard again. He momentarily summons Crombie to point out the bottle's direction, gives them some advice, and sends them on their way to rescue Humfrey, Crombie and Grundy before they fall into their enemy's hands; the one spying on them with squiggles. If he opens the bottle, he can control them!
Chapter 11. Brain Coral
They finally arrive at a lake, the source of the poison. The bottle is floating on it, Grundy sitting on top. Below the lake is their enemy: the Brain Coral, an entity unable to move yet able to control animals and other simple things. It gets control of Grundy and the golem opens the bottle in the name of the Brain Coral. A battle ensues: Bink against Humfrey, Chester against Crombie. Chester falls in the poison and is gone. Bink, furious, fights so fiercely that he defeats Crombie and forces Humfrey to surrender. The Brain Coral agrees to show Bink the Source of Magic if he will listen to him afterwards.
Chapter 12. Demon Xanth
Humfrey leads them to the Source of Magic: an omnipotent Demon, X(A/N)th. These types of demons are all-powerful, and to relieve the boredom of such they play status games. X(A/N)th lost one and so had to remain "in inertia in isolation" until released by "vermin." Bink and company traverse the cavern with the demon's face in the wall, picking up vast demon thoughts. Bink is faced with a moral dilemma--free the demon, risking the destruction and/or loss of magic for all of Xanth? Or let a living, feeling creature suffer because of his inaction? After a moral definition argument, Bink says the words; "I free you, Xanth."
Chapter 13. Magic Loss
X(A/N)th blasts out of the ground, destroying anything in his path. He truly didn't care. After the cave in, Bink looks for his friends. Humfrey is missing, Crombie is in the bottle with no magic to release him, Grundy has become a doll, the Brain Coral is dead, and Chester had been pickled by the poison water and couldn't be found. Jewel is fine, and Bink is free of the love spell. Bink and Jewel travel to the surface but the nymph stops there; she loved him for real now and knew it wouldn't work. All the magic creatures are reverting to more Mundane forms and the land looks devastated. The Magic Dust Village is rejoicing because the men are freed from the Gorgon's spell. Cherie Centaur is happy that the "obscenity" of magic is gone until she realizes that she had a Talent: beauty. Bink and Cherie stumble across Crunch Ogre, who has taken the Ogress as his wife. The ogress is really a Fiend actress, and informs them that she likes "being an Ogress" better than she ever like being a Fiend.
Chapter 14. Paradox Wish
Bink, Cherie, and her foal Chet travel back under the earth to see if they can find Chester. Suddenly, they realize that the magic is returning! Demon X(A/N)th has come back! He reveals that the other great demons have created a new game which will take him an eon or so to learn how to play, and he figures he'll stay in Xanth while he learns. However, he plans to kill everyone who knows about him so he wont be disturbed. Bink quickly argues that it would be better to let them live and put up the old Shield around him. X(A/N)th agrees for the challenge of it, and also brings back all their missing friends. He takes up Cherie's challenge to reward Bink and gives him a ball containing a wish. They return to Castle Roogna and inform the King of their adventure. They release Crombie and change him back to human. Bink gives his wish to Crombie, who plans to use it to have Jewel fall in love with him. He doesn't trust women, but perhaps he might trust a Nymph. Grundy gets employed by the king, and Bink returns home to discover that Millie the ex-ghost loves Jonathan the Zombie, and that his own newborn son's talent is the ability to communicate with the inanimate! Magician-class magic!