A swordsman himself, Jared carried the Dragonslayer Sword, a legend forged of myth and steel, so the prospect of an entire city honed in its worship stirred a pleasant curiosity.
“Let’s take a look inside,” Jared said, already striding toward the yawning gates. Kishor halted on the dusty road outside Swordmaster City.
Bathed in the late-afternoon glow, the ramparts before loomed like an iron tide frozen in mid-crash, their arrow slits glinting with cold promise. He folded his thick arms, a single crease barely troubling his brow, then shook his head.
“I’ll stay out here and wait,” said, his voice a low rumble that seemed to vibrate against the stone.
“Inside, the rules chafe me.” His gaze slipped past Jared, refusing to meet the younger man’s eyes, an unspoken tension tightening the air like a drawn bowstring.
Jared studied Kishor’s averted stare yet chose not to press. He had traveled long enough with the big man to know caution was never wasted.
if Kishor, so blunt, so fearless, preferred the wilderness to those walls, there had to be ghosts waiting in that city.
“Very well,” Jared said at last. “Flaxseed and I will gather what we need quickly. Stay sharp out here.”
Kishor bared a flash of perfect teeth. “Relax. Even if an eighth-tier Earthly immortal Realm shows up, I may not win, but l’m not foolish enough to stand and die.”
With no more words, Jared turned on his heel, Flaxseed trotting beside him, both heading toward the yawning city gate.
They had scarcely drawn beneath the arch when Flaxseed’s jaw dropped. High atop twin arrow towers stood two motionless figures, one on each side of the gate.
On the left waited an azure-robed swordsman, eyes closed, long blade slung across his back like a slumbering thunderbolt.
On the right balanced a white-robed woman, slim sword angled toward the flagstones, pale hair drifting as though stirred by some private breeze. Neither twitched, as if time itself had carved them from marble.
“What are they doing, being punished for skipping drills?” Flaxseed whispered, scratching his scalp. “Stand that straight for hours? I‘d cramp in places I didn‘t know I had.”
Jared narrowed his eyes. invisible blades seemed to whistle between the two statues. He felt each silent collision, each burst of killing wind.
“Their swords are already clashing,” murmured. “Not steel to steel, will to will. He wields a dominance that could cleave mountains. She answers with a gentleness supple as water, soft enough to swallow lightning.”
“A duel? They haven’t even blinked,” Flaxseed protested.
“It’s a contest of sword intent,” Jared replied. “More lethal than any whirl of blades. Break your enemy’s intent, and their cultivation shatters, sometimes their mind along with it.”
Flaxseed gave a low whistle. “Swordmaster City folk sure play different games.”
Jared turned to continue, but a sudden, razor-edged beast-roar split the crowded causeway, slicing through conversation and thought alike.
“Make way! Out of my path!” a man bellowed, his voice slicing the morning air like iron.
Clad in embroidered silks that flashed gold and crimson, thundered toward the city gate astride a hulking beast, part lion, part nightmare, its third eye blazing. Each hoof strike pounded dust Skyward, sending merchants and beggars scattering in shrill panic.
Flaxseed‘s instincts screamed for retreat, reached to yank Jared aside. Jared caught the older man’s wrist and, without a word, anchored himself to the cobblestones, facing the oncoming brute as if watching a distant tide roll in.
“Courting death!” the brocaded youth snarled, giving the monster’s armored head a brisk smack. “Trample that fool!”
The three-eyed juggernaut seemed to understand. Its jaws yawned wide, fangs glittering like drawn sabers, and it hurtled forward, tearing up the roadway in a storm of stone and dust.
