With Gavin and Yvette leading the way, Jared threaded through a maze of razor ridges and half-hidden goat tracks that laced the outer rims of the Myriad Beast Mountains.
The two guides bled with every step, yet their instincts spared the party from spore-choked ravines and dens where slumbering monsters breathed sulfurous steam.
Long hours passed. When the sun drooped low and painted the western clouds a molten orange, Gavin lifted a vine curtain to reveal an illusion-shrouded fissure between twin peaks.
They crossed the illusion array. The hollow beyond opened wide, a secret valley cupped by cliff walls the color of tarnished bronze. Dozens of huts, stone foundations topped with cedar trunks, hugged the slopes in careful tiers.
At the center squatted a taller hall of slate blocks, and before it, on a wind-scoured plaza, loomed a weather-pocked statue of some primeval beast whose features had long since blurred into myth.
Wolf-tailed sentries polished bone-handled spears. Fox-eared artisans flayed scaly hides for armor. Bear-clan youths heaved baskets of ore toward smelters that hissed with green fire.
This was Rockhold Gorge, an outpost the Myriad Beast Sect treated like a dagger pointed at the mountain’s edge.
Curiosity rippled across those faces when Gavin returned with an unknown human and a unicorn whelp that radiated sacred heat. Yet the moment their senses brushed Jared’s aura—merely Human Immortal Realm, Level Seven—many gazes cooled into thin disdain.
Strength ruled Level Ten. To weak cultivation went no respect, and few even tried to hide the fact.
Ignoring every whispered slight, Gavin and Yvette led Jared straight toward the grand stone hall that anchored the valley’s heart.
Inside, under smoky lanterns, an elder in weathered leather armor sat upon a jagged throne. His hair had gone the color of ash, a claw scar cleaved his brow, and the pressure rolling from him spoke of the Heavenly Immortal Realm, Level Five.
This was Garrick Flint, Elder of Rockhold Gorge.
“Elder Flint!” Gavin and Yvette dropped to one knee, palms pressed against the flagstones.
Garrick’s eyelids lifted the width of a blade.
“What happened?” His words scraped like gravel tossed across iron. “Did those Infinite Soul Demon vermin harry you again?”
“Yes, sir,” Gavin answered, voice tight. He recounted the ambush, the moment death had loomed, and the lightning-quick strike with which Jared had felled five cultivators within seconds.
Garrick’s sharp stare speared Jared. He probed, felt only the gentle ripple of a Level Seven Human Immortal, and the brief gravity in his face shattered into open scorn.
“Human Immortal, Level Seven… yet you claim he butchered five of the Demon Sect, including a Heavenly Immortal Level Five, in an instant?” Garrick let out a short, hard laugh. “Stone, Shadowstep, perhaps blood loss has you seeing visions, or perhaps this human cloaks himself in tricks meant to fool the gullible.”
He would not, could not, believe a word of it. After all, challenging people in another realm was nearly impossible. To slaughter multiple foes of higher rank in the blink of an eye—utter fantasy in his eyes.
Garrick found the tale preposterous.
In his eyes, the strange youth must have relied on petty sleight of hand, a flicker of light, some borrowed talisman, and through dumb luck happened to render aid. Now, bold as a leech, the brat dared inflate the story, hoping to shake a bounty loose from the Myriad Beast Sect.
“Sir, every word is true. I swear it on my life!” Gavin cried, breath hitching on the last syllable. Beside him, Yvette bobbed her head fiercely.
Garrick answered with a single, scorn-filled grunt. His chin lifted as his gaze raked over Jared like an auctioneer appraising livestock.
“Whatever gimmick you used,” he drawled, “you did save my disciples. The Myriad Beast Sect pays its debts.”
He flicked his wrist. A scatter of dull, low-grade celestial gems clinked against the floor at Jared’s boots—alms tossed to a beggar.
“Pick them up and leave Rockhold Gorge. The Myriad Beast Mountains swallow the careless; die somewhere else, not on my doorstep…”
