“High Immortal Realm!” The declaration burst out before anyone could hush it. The wolf general gaped. “Mr. Chance has broken into the High Immortal Realm?!”
“Top Level High Immortal Realm Level One,” Jared replied evenly. “Yet my blade can reach Level Eight, and I can still trade blows with Level Nine.” He swept his eyes across the gathering. “Nor do I stand alone.
Luther sits at Level Six, Morvane at Level Five… One hundred Nether City Guards are Level Four or higher. With your best warriors, we form an elite strike team.”
Hope flared in Madam Nightfox’s pupils. “If that is true… perhaps there really is a path…” After a short pause, she inclined her head. “I will march with Mr. Chance. Four Beast Generals of Level Five remain; they will go as well.”
“Good,” Jared decided. “Three days from now, we strike the Beast-Quelling Hall.”
The next three days passed in relentless preparation, every corner of the refuge ringing with weapons being checked and spiritual power being honed. Jared handed out pills and rare materials seized from King Redstinger, King Nightbat, and King Goldtoad, urging every warrior toward a sharper edge.
For his own part, he sat cross-legged, Nether Codex open, letting each breath weld fresh strength onto his new realm.
Dusk of the third day arrived. Every blade was ready, every resolve tempered. Under the settling night, eight shadows—Jared, Luther, Morvane, Madam Nightfox, and four Beast Generals—slipped from the refuge and headed for the mountain at the heart of Epea. One hundred Nether City Guards and three hundred Beastfolk Warriors took positions farther out, waiting to pounce the instant the head fell and confusion spread.
The Beast-Quelling Hall crowned a towering peak in the Myriad Monster Mountain Range, its slopes etched with layer upon layer of celestial wards. Night deepened, and the eight figures drifted closer, silent as drifting fog.
“Three kilometers ahead lies the first warning array,” Madam Nightfox whispered. “Heaven’s Eye Array; nothing concealed can pass it.”
A gray gleam flickered in Jared’s eyes. Chaotic force poured out, shaping a thin, mist-colored veil around the squad. “Stay close…” He stepped into the array’s range without hesitation.
Scouting lights swept the gray veil, yet not a single rune stirred in alarm. The chaotic layer smothered every trace of breath or spirit; even a Heaven’s Eye found no pulse to read. Madam Nightfox stared, shaken by the silent proof before her.
Jared’s tone stayed mild. “Chaos holds everything. A detection array is nothing against it.”
They cleared the first cordon and gathered at the mountain’s foot. The base bristled with vigilance—patrols every hundred steps and flying vessels sweeping the starlit air above.
“How do we reach the top?” one Beast General asked in a low growl. Jared lifted his chin toward the distant hall; a shard of frost flashed in his eyes. “We carve our way.”
Before the last syllable faded, his figure blurred into a streak of gray and shot upward. “Enemy attack!” Celestial guards turned at once, alarm horns splitting the night. Yet Jared’s speed shredded distance itself.
The Dragonslayer Sword sang free, and every swing laid celestials down like wheat beneath a scythe. Chaotic force swallowed flesh and spirit alike, leaving nothing to rise again. Luther, Morvane, and the rest followed the wake he left, each art opening a fresh, fierce corridor.
“Hold them!” A celestial commander bellowed and charged, leading more than a hundred guards into a sudden wall of steel. Jared never bothered to glance. His left hand closed, chaotic force forming a vast gray palm that slammed downward.
Boom! The strike pulped dozens of guards where they stood, and the commander’s soul vanished in the same breath. A celestial guard stumbled backward, armor clanging, his throat tightening around a broken shout. “W-What… What kind of power is that?!” he screamed, the gray glow still rippling across the plaza as the smell of scorched stone filled his lungs.
The survivors felt their knees buckle. Faces drained chalk-white, they clawed at one another for balance, minds already fleeing even while their bodies stayed frozen, certain that the next breath might never come. Anything below High Immortal Realm Level Six fell the instant his blade parted the air—one stroke, no second chances.
Even foes at High Immortal Realm Level Seven lasted no more than three exchanges before their life force bled away under gray swordlight. For those at High Immortal Realm Level Eight, he still required rhythm, yet ten moves were enough to tip the scale and leave them broken at his feet.
In less than an hour, the eight-man strike team had carved its way to mid-mountain. Behind them, corpses of celestial guards sprawled in heaps, armor already cooling in the night mist. Above, inside Beast-Quelling Hall atop the peak, torchlight flickered across gilded tiles while tension thickened like storm clouds.
Fury cracked out of the Venerable. “This is the Beast-Quelling Hall! Layered wards, thirty thousand soldiers! No matter how strong Jared is, can one man truly face an army of thirty thousand?!” He burst forward, body and blade merging into a single, unstoppable stroke.
A ribbon of gray brilliance sheared through the night, moving so fast it seemed to leap past time itself. A jagged fissure carved itself across the shield’s gilded face. The shockwave hurled the Venerable backward several dozen yards as hot, metallic bitterness rushed up his throat.
As expected, on the second day, a scout arrived with urgent news. Golden chains arced overhead, weaving themselves into a vast Worldlock Net Entrapment Array that dwarfed the one at Beast-Quelling Hall. Rumor said that if this mesh ever closed, even a High Immortal Realm Level Nine expert would stay trapped forever.
“Jared… He actually dared to return?!” The Venerable ground each word between his teeth. “And he advanced into the High Immortal Realm… That whelp must not be allowed to live another hour!”
King Silverserpent’s voice wavered like a frayed harp string. “Venerable, his momentum is overwhelming. Perhaps we should yield the field for now…”
“Yield what?!” Fury cracked out of the Venerable. He rose in a swirl of dark robes and barked, “Pass my order! Activate the Heavenbound Beastlock Array! I will take his head myself and present it to the Grand Venerable!”
“At once!” King Silverserpent and King Ironhawk chorused, scrambling toward the hallway light. Outside the hall, Jared’s party reached the front plaza, the flagstones still slick with fresh blood that glimmered under moonlight.
Across the open ground, three thousand celestial guards had locked shields into a tight formation, steel discipline visible in every measured breath. Overhead, dozens of skysail barges drifted into a luminous grid, their hull runes casting spears of gold that barred the night like latticework.
A booming voice rolled from the inner chambers. “Jared! You dare walk into your own cage? Today is the day you die!”
The Beast-Quelling Venerable’s declaration echoed from within the grand doorway, heavy with murderous certainty. Jared planted his sword tip against the stones, calm eyes reflecting the torch flame. “Beast-Quelling Venerable, come out and meet your death!”
