Paxton’s face darkened to iron. He knew the sect would crumble if the panic spread another inch. “All elders! Form up on me! Crush the revolt! Gavin, Yvette, take our elite, safeguard the cubs and the archives! If the line breaks, you escort them out—no hesitation!”
The moment Paxton barked the command, several pivotal nodes of the Sect Guarding Grand Array detonated in unison.
Ghostly blue fire fountained skyward, shredding sigils that had shielded the mountain for centuries. The once-radiant barrier collapsed into a drab, quivering haze, and the innermost gates of the Myriad Beast Sect yawned open like a wound.
“No!” Paxton’s shout cracked through the smoke, half warning, half disbelief. His heart sank into despair.
From every direction rolled fresh battle cries—hoarse, eager, merciless—an avalanche of sound sweeping down the peaks.
The rebellion of the Melded Beastkin had been plotted for seasons.
Outer posts, inner vaults, even kitchen corridors erupted at once. Neutral tribes and a few pure-blood clans seduced by promises of power surged into the fray. Within heartbeats, Paxton’s proud stronghold dissolved into civil war.
“Sir! The formation is down! The traitors command overwhelming numbers, bolstered by outsiders. We are encircled!” a steward cried, drenched head to toe, his own blood gluing fur to armor.
Paxton stared across a courtyard now burning like a funeral pyre. He saw Bartram entangled in savage combat, saw trusted disciples butcher one another, saw Infinite Soul Demon Sect plants grinning behind masks of ash.
He knew things were not going well for them. If they continued to fight, the Myriad Beast legacy would die tonight.
“Pass the word! Every disciple still loyal is to withdraw into the deepest reaches of the Myriad Beast Mountains! Scatter. Survive!” Paxton forced the order past clenched fangs.
“But, sir!” the elders wailed, voices breaking like old timber.
“Carry it out!” Roaring, Paxton erupted into a towering silver wolf.
Moon-bright fur bristled crimson where fire-sparks met blood. One long, grief-soaked howl rippled over the compound.
“All clansmen! Follow me and break through!”
He took the rear alone, scything with silver claws that became whirling blades of light. Demon adepts and traitor bears reeled back, buying seconds—precious seconds—for the fleeing column.
Gavin’s eyes welled with tears, yet he obeyed. He slung a bulging storage satchel—scriptures and spirit ore—across his shoulders. Beside him, Yvette shepherded a cluster of panicked cubs, steering the core disciples down a hidden ravine long prepared for darkest night.
The battle along the escape route proved brutal. Claws against talisman, fang against cursed steel. Rebel scouts and Demon Sect killers shadowed every bend, hungry for the sect’s heart.
To shield Paxton’s retreat, Bartram ignited his own life-essence. A bear-shaped starburst rocked the gorge, halting the pursuers. His final roar echoed off shattered walls before his vast body crashed, silent at last, beneath collapsing pillars.
“Elder Bartram!” Gavin and Yvette screamed, the name ripping free before they could stop it.
They felt his familiar aura blink out, one more flame smothered, yet neither dared look back. Grief pushed them faster ahead.
Paxton fought and retreated, crimson matting the silver. Every breath painted the ground red. Only intimate knowledge of twisting gullies, and raw, late-stage Heavenly Immortal might, let him sever the chase at last and vanish into the endless, peril-laced wildwood of the Myriad Beast Mountains.
***
Days later, through rain, smoke, and whispered signals, Paxton, Gavin, Yvette, and the scattered survivors converged, one by one, at hidden refuges marked long ago in ink and blood. The roll call was grim.
Where once the Myriad Beast Sect had bustled with strength, barely a third of its core force remained, most of them bandaged, limping, or simply staring at the ground in mute despair.
They had burrowed deep inside a razor-thin mountain gorge, masked beneath layers of illusion runes that turned solid cliffs into shimmering mirage. Wind whispered over the wards, carrying no hint of life within.
Paxton surrendered his beast form at the gorge’s heart. The pallor washed across his human face; every breath felt like dragging fire through cracked ribs.
He glanced over the empty stretch where halls, training courts, and dormitories had stood. Their ashes now swirled somewhere on the wind, together with the screams of disciples and elders who had never escaped. The weight of that silence pressed harder on him than any wound.
“Take care, sir…” Gavin pressed a thumb-length sprig of azure healing fern into his master’s palm, the way a soldier might slip a blade to a fallen commander.
Beside them, Yvette worked stitches through torn flesh, her eyes rimmed crimson. She did not speak; the slight tremor in her fingers said enough.
Paxton’s voice rasped like gravel. “Have we confirmed it? Why did the Melded Beastkin turn on us, and who propped them up?”
