The moment Jared crossed that threshold, a force one hundred times richer, and far wilder, than anything outside slammed into him. It smelled of primeval wilderness and felt like a colossus of fire rousing from sleep to swallow him whole.
A single, resonant hum rippled through space, then the dizziness of transition broke, and the world opened like a curtain yanked from a stage. Even Jared, tempered by battlefields and heavens alike, caught his breath.
He was not inside some petty cave-dweller’s hideout. He stood within a self-contained realm, cut loose from Level Ten itself, forged entirely from living fire.
Overhead stretched a sky of perpetual combustion: no sun, no moon, no stars, only rivers of molten flame thick as syrup. To the east flowed newborn dawn-gold fire, warm yet imperious.
In the west, sunset-orange currents drifted like embers, solemn and vast. The southern vault blazed with blistering white, the illusory echo of the true solar flame that purifies all things. Northward drifted violet-black clouds so deep they seemed able to swallow heat, light, even souls.
Nothing here stayed still. Fire streamed, collided, and reshaped itself—a phoenix beating fiery wings, a dragon carving circles in incandescent air. Color bled across the dome in radiant sheets, beauty enough to steal breath, danger enough to still a heart.
Beneath Jared’s boots lay dark-red bedrock crystallized by eons of burning, its surface veined with endless, web-thin fissures.
From those cracks erupted pillars of flame, some icy blue yet searing, others midnight black yet bright as noon. Each column arced skyward until it met falling tassels of fire, weaving blazing waterfalls that stitched earth and heavens together.
The roar of their union never ceased, a living anthem of this untamed realm.
Magma did not hide meekly beneath the crust. It rolled in full view of the heavens, coursing across the scarlet continent like rivers, lakes, and an ocean of open fire. A living artery, pulsing heat in every direction.
Crimson, honey-gold, and bruised-violet channels intersected and diverged, each lava river slow yet relentless, the current thick as spilled honey and twice as unforgiving.
Upon those molten waters drifted flowers of pure flame and porous stones that burned forever, their embers refusing to sink or dim.
The air reeked of sulfur, yet was laced with a strangely sweet fragrance, an intoxicating perfume born of minerals no mortal furnace could name.
Far off, whole mountain ranges rose, peaks sculpted not from rock but from flame-forged crystal, each summit towering like a cathedral of embered glass.
Those peaks were formed of treasures that would spark wars in the outside world: Scarlet-Core Crystal, Solar-Fire Gem, Heart-Flame Jade—all fused naturally, here, in obscene abundance.
Every mountain stood translucent. Liquid fire flickered inside their bodies, throwing hallucinations of dancing light that rippled across the land in surreal halos. And at each summit burned an Eternal Flame, a crown that would never gutter, sculpted by cosmic whim into ever-changing shapes.
One such flame unfurled as a red flower large enough to blanket half a mountain. Its petals turned slowly, each vein etched with drifting runes of creation.
Another arranged itself into the crouched silhouette of a fire-forged unicorn, silent, unmoving, yet its mere posture poured dread and reverence across the valley.
A third burned as the outline of a vast palace—arches, eaves, and shuttered gates chiseled from living fire, as though some primordial god still dwelled within.
Fire-aligned spiritual energy hung so thick it had condensed into a shimmering mist—rose, gold, and violet threads sliding through the air like gauze.
A single breath scalded throat and lungs, branding the chest with a sweet, agonizing warmth. Yet for any who practiced the fire-type cultivation methods, this realm was paradise unspoiled, the ultimate crucible. Even more astonishing, the land had birthed fire-born creatures, sentient motes shaped by the very essence they swam in.
Flame-sprites no larger than a fist skipped across the lava like children on a playground, their bright eyes blinking within candle-like bodies. Ruby-scaled dragon-carp, several feet long, glided beneath the surface.
When they leapt, fountains of sparks followed them into the blistering air. Far overhead, Radiant Fire Birds, wings wider than a doorway, tails trailing seven-colored fire, glided in silence, their calls as clear as phoenix song.
At the foot of distant slopes lumbered magma giants, hulking golems stitched from flaming boulders. Each sluggish step made the ground tremble like a drum.
Violence and beauty, creation and ruin—every heartbeat of this place declared the primal law of flame, weaving a savage yet vibrant tapestry of life.
Here, the fire laws were whole. The energy hierarchy soared far above anything known within Level Ten’s most revered danger zones or sanctuaries. The sharp rasp of scorched lungs tore through the brilliance, a brutal reminder that paradise welcomed only the worthy.
Paxton, Gavin Stone, Yvette Shadowstep, and a few dozen remaining Myriad Beast Sect disciples followed Jared onto the dark-red crystalline ground, and calamity struck the instant their boots touched down.
The omnipresent heat, once merely oppressive, found new purpose. It lunged like a predator that had tasted blood. Scalding spirit-fire became millions of barbed, red-hot needles, driving through every pore, burrowing toward bone with merciless hunger.
Skin sizzled as though an iron brand had been clamped across every inch of flesh. Each breath no longer drew air but vaporous magma, searing windpipes, blistering lungs from the inside out. Even tightly shut eyelids failed to shield them; blinding brilliance burned straight through, stabbing the mind with vertigo and white-hot pain.
“Ah!” A young fox-clan disciple, barely Level Two of the Heavenly Immortal Realm, collapsed to his knees, unable to endure the trial of living flame.
Skin that only a heartbeat ago looked whole now erupted with a rash of liquid blisters. They swelled, burst, and dribbled sickly yellow pus. He curled up on the scalding floor, breath thinning so fast it no longer sounded human.
“Hold on… Keep your heart meridian sealed with your art, now!” Paxton roared, the order raw in his throat.
Yet Paxton himself fared little better. Born of the Silver Moon Wolf line, he commanded wind and lunar force, elements that recoiled from pure flame.
A furnace seemed to replace his chest. Every organ sizzled like meat laid on iron.
The demon power usually flowing like mountain streams inside his vessels clogged to molten sludge. Old wounds flared. Heat lanced up his throat. He tasted iron and forced the mouthful of blood back down while a purple hue suffused his face.
Gavin’s true form, the Earth-Shatter Ape, carried resistance toward fire. Even so, fire reddened every inch of his hide. Sweat surfaced only to vanish in white salt crusts before a drop could fall.
Jaw locked, Gavin planted himself between the oncoming blaze and Yvette, who wavered behind him on the verge of blackout.
