“Looks like the trip through the Godgrave Mountains wasn’t a waste after all…” Jared handed the fragment back. “It belongs to the Ghost Clan. Keep it. It may lead you to your kin.”
Luther met his gaze, gratitude flickering behind the black smoke in his eyes, and stored the fragment with solemn care. They combed the hall again, turning loose stones and cracked altars until they found several battered Ghost Clan artifacts and a handful of ancient alloys. Small pieces, yet rich enough to fill a cultivator’s year of trade.
With nothing left to claim, they stepped outside and pushed west, leaving the fallen temple to its silence. The journey stayed mostly calm. Threats appeared—loose spirits, crumbling traps, hungry beasts—but none rose high enough to break their stride.
Twenty days of flight carried them past the last ridge of the Godgrave range and onto the soil of the western region. The first sight made them frown. Heat haze blurred a horizon that held no end.
Where the northern region glittered with ice fields and the central realm rolled with green hills, the west unspooled as barren desert and shattered redbed rock. Yellow sand billowed, and scorched earth stretched mile after mile.
A burning wind sliced across exposed skin, kicking sheets of grit into the air. Every breath tasted of dryness and quiet violence; the local spiritual energy lay thin, edged, and wild. Here and there stood dead poplars or spiny cacti, their shadows cast over bleached animal bones half-buried in the dunes.
“The western region… its reputation is deserved…” Luther sighed. “No wonder they call it a place of exile. Living or cultivating here costs ten times the effort.”
Jared studied the blowing sand. Harsher lands forged harder lives; any beast that lasted here would demand respect. They altered course and flew toward the Myriad Monster Mountain Range marked on Immortal Cyril’s map.
With every league, the desert worsened, the sun sharper, the dunes steeper. Sandstorms roared, pits of shifting sand opened without warning, and venomous scorpions or sand vipers struck from hiding. At noon, the sand could roast an egg; at midnight, it could crack stone with frost.
Their cultivation sheltered them. Natural perils passed like buzzing flies against their protective aura. What set their nerves on edge were the growing footprints of civilization—more precisely, of the celestials.
On the third evening, they glided above a dried riverbed and spotted the first celestial outpost. The fortress was crude but strong, with walls of stacked boulders, patrolled by armored sentries. Above it, a few small airships hovered, their array lights sweeping the dunes. Around those walls lay scattered beast-race corpses, some sun-bleached to parchment, others fresh enough to glisten.
“A celestial demon-suppression post.” Icicles shone in Jared’s eyes. “Immortal Cyril was right; celestials are crushing the beast resistance with blood.”
They veered wide of the stronghold and pressed farther into the desert. Nearer the Myriad Monster Mountains, the outposts multiplied, and so did the mutilated bodies of beasts. Even the wind-driven sand could not wash away the faint, metallic scent of spilled blood.
A collapsed ridge cut across their line of travel. Patches of ground had turned to cinders, and splinters of ruined talismans glittered among scattered rocks. Everywhere, the land still wore the wounds of small, unseen skirmishes.
“Mr. Jared,” Luther said, his voice tight, “the situation is even worse than we imagined.” Luther’s face hardened. “The celestials have dug in here. I fear the Beastfolk Resistance is barely holding on.”
Jared dipped his head. “First, we find the Resistance and learn the details. Rushing in blind will only give us away.”
The map Master Cyril had left showed the Myriad Monster Mountain Range sprawled across the center of the western region. The chain stretched hundreds of thousands of kilometers and had once been the beast race’s holy ground; now, it lay beneath the celestials’ heel.
After five more days aloft, the outline of the mountain range finally rose out of the haze. A boundless sweep of crimson peaks sprawled ahead, coiled across the desert floor like a dragon at rest.
Jagged spires punched into the sky, their flanks crowded with grotesque boulders. Between them stood the broken shells of ancient halls, the walls still bearing faded beast-folk totems. Entire summits had been sheared away, and valleys lay choked with rubble, every vista scarred by war. High overhead, celestial scout Skimmers wheeled in slow circles, sheets of probing light sliding across the broken ground.
“No more flying,” Jared murmured. “They’ll spot us at once.”
He and Luther dropped to the sand, muffled their auras, and used the broken terrain to slip deeper into the mountains. Crossing the boundary tightened the air around them, as though the very rocks were holding their breath.
The range had once thrummed with life; now, it felt as cold and hollow as a tomb. Every so often, they glimpsed a luckless beast-folk survivor, battered, with terrified eyes watching from cave mouths and fissures, unwilling to risk the open.
Jared and Luther snatched a handful of stragglers and rifled through their memories with a soul-searching art, stitching together a picture of the mountains’ plight. The celestials had stationed the Beast-Quelling Hall here.
A Beast-Quelling Venerable at Top Level High Immortal Realm Level Seven held command. Under him stood the Five Beast Kings, three thousand celestial guards, and tens of thousands of beast-folk servitor troops.
Opposing them, the Beastfolk Resistance was once led by King Altair, Lady Lysandra, and Lord Stoneback. At its height, their army had numbered 100,000, yet now fewer than 30,000 remained, scattered and besieged across a handful of redoubts.
King Altair had escaped with grave wounds, his whereabouts unknown. Lady Lysandra was trapped within the Miragebound Maze—no one knew whether she still breathed. Lord Stoneback lay pinned beneath the Beastlock Array, his soul roasted without pause.
The Resistance Remnants, now under a few Beast Generals, clung to the depths around Skyfiend Gorge, a last stand that could collapse at any moment.
“Skyfiend Gorge…” Jared whispered, tasting the name. That gorge might prove their only point of entry. They skirted celestial patrols and began threading toward Skyfiend Gorge. Each new mile forced fresh horrors into view. Blackened beast-folk villages smoldered in the sand, hills of bones rose like cairns, and severed heads swung from poles—each atrocity a billboard for celestial rule.
“Those animals…” Luther growled, teeth grinding. Though he was not of the beast race, Luther felt their anguish as keenly as his own.
Jared stayed silent, but the chill in his eyes sharpened until it felt like a drawn blade. Three days of creeping brought them to the outskirts of Skyfiend Gorge. The terrain rose in tight, jagged rings, natural walls that favored defenders and punished attackers.
Yet, the celestials had thrown ring after ring of troops around the gorge, sealing every gap. Dozens of celestial airships prowled above, their formation weaving a Lockdown Grand Array across the sky.
On the ground, new stone forts bristled with sentries, celestial soldiers and beast-folk auxiliaries pacing beneath stiff banners. Detection arrays blanketed the outer waste, ready to shriek at the faintest disturbance.
