The sound of hurried footsteps scraped across the courtyard stones. An elder in tattered robes dropped to his knees before Jared, pulling a dozen frightened cultivators down with him.
“Thank you, benefactor, for saving our lives!” His voice trembled, thick with tears that refused to fail. Jared’s stomach tightened, moments ago these people had been lined up for the headsman.
He bent, fingers sliding beneath the elder’s elbows, and lifted him gently. “Please, stand. You were condemned on false charges. I will go to the Azure Firmament Immortal Continent myself, learn the truth, and see justice served.”
The elder shook his head so violently his wisps of hair whipped the air. “Kind one, don’t set foot in Azure Firmament. The place devours good men. Not long ago two cultivators breached the barrier and reached level twelve. They were dragged back and beheaded in front of everyone.”
The words struck Jared like cold iron, his heartbeat stuttered. His mouth moved before thought could stop it.
“Elder, were those two a man and a woman?”
A tremor threaded through his voice, louder to his ears than any shout.
The elder’s eyebrows leaped. “How could you possibly know that?”
His bafflement rang genuine.
Heat drained from Jared’s limbs, leaving them to wobble. Sidney and her husband had once risked level twelve for him, promising to return quickly.
Had the executioner’s blade found them instead?
And were they now trapped on that same continent, heads already lost?
Luther leaned closer, voice pitched low. “Mr. Chance, you know those two, don’t you?”
Jared forced a slow breath, shook his head. “I’m not sure. Elder, where exactly were the executions carried out?”
“In Jade Immortal City, eastern region of Azure Firmament,” the elder said without hesitation. “That city belongs to Jade Immortal Manor, we fled from their square the moment the axe fell.”
Jared’s hand shot out, stopping the elderly peddler before he could shuffle past. “Sir, did you see who beheaded those two cultivators?”
The words scraped his throat, urgency throbbed in his temples.
The old man’s brows knit; he shook his head. “I only heard about it, never saw it myself.”
His gaze slid away, as though the question carried splinters.
Jared folded his fist in thanks, barely pausing. “Luther, we leave for Jade Immortal City now.”
The resolve tasted like iron on his tongue.
Before the last syllable cooled, his figure blurred. A silver arc knifed into the sky, vanishing beyond the roof-line.
Startled, Luther gathered wind under his robes and darted after the gleam.
Wind screamed past Jared’s ears, yet his heart raced faster.
Please let it be some other couple…
Jared begged the empty sky. If it was them, he would raze every celestial stronghold on this continent.
***
Seven dawns later, their shadows dropped onto Jade Immortal City at the continent’s western rim.
The journey across the North Abyss Icefield’s buffer lands had stripped his cloak white with frost. Here, spring breathed from every stone; warmth seeped through his boots. Walls rose like carved jade, pale and luminous, brushed by drifting aqua light.
Inside, towers layered like crystal petals, cranes glided between balconies the way sparrows chase grain back home. Yet beneath the perfume of spirit mist, something pressed on his lungs.
Pedestrians hurried with eyes fixed ahead, conversation clipped to whispers.
Patrol squads in matching teal robes prowled the streets, the words Jade Immortal stitched over their hearts like a warning.
The unease curdled into action; he caught a middle-aged cultivator by the sleeve.
“Friend, forgive the intrusion,” he said, bowing. “Some days ago, was a man and woman executed here, in public?”
The man’s face drained of color; he snatched his sleeve free. “Never heard of it! You have the wrong person!”
He bolted, as if Jared’s question carried plague.
Jared questioned another, and another; each time the recoil was the same. At the first mention of decapitation, mouths sealed, shoes scraped away from him.
The topic itself felt cursed, hovering like black smoke they refused to breathe. So, talk of the deaths was smothered here; common folk feared even the echo of it.
“Mr. Chance, this isn’t Coldabyss. Under celestial eyes, everyone walks on knives,” Luther murmured.
Frustration beat against Jared’s ribs. “Then where do we ask?”
“Every big city keeps shadows for sale,” Luther said. “We find the darkest corner.”
He noticed a thin, secret heat flare behind Luther’s lashes.
“Information brokering, black-market trades, underground ring fights, any place that runs on coin or brute power will spill a few answers. West side of Jade Immortal City, back alley, there’s a stall called the Knowledge Pavilion.”
Jared’s answer came before the echo of the name had settled. “Lead the way…”
He followed Luther through side corridors the color of old parchment, always one stride behind, always watching the corners Luther chose not to take.
The crowds thinned; noise softened to scattered footfalls and the tap of loose shutters.
Moisture clung to the narrow lane ahead, as though the stones sweated secrets.
A spoiled-pill scent tangled with wet mold and something raw, blood, maybe, that caught at the back of his throat.
People here dressed like yesterday’s promises, faded at the seams, some torn outright.
Most eyes slid across him with merchant caution or street-wolf threat, none held the floating grace he had grown used to in the city’s brighter quarter.
The deepest alley spat them out before a squat shop no taller than Jared’s shoulder. Above the door a chipped wooden sign hung askew, the dark red paint blurring three characters, “Knowledge Pavilion”.
He saw no doorman, yet the air around the frame prickled, layers of quiet sigils woven tight enough to hum against his skin.
He pushed inside.
An oil lamp, half-starved, shook its yellow flame over the counter and filled the room with pulse-weak light.
A hunched old man sat behind the plank counter, scar tissue mapping every inch of his face. He polished a night-black dagger with a cloth so filthy it had grown its own shadows.
His breath crawled through the shop, indistinct, but Jared tasted the weight of it, High Immortal Realm, third grade at least, maybe more.
Without lifting his head the man rasped, the sound like a cracked gong, “Buying, or selling?”
