"Another pair of doomed idiots," someone muttered from the bunks.


    "How long does this nightmare stretch?" a second voice sighed.


    "Cyril really means to scour every outsider this time, doesn''t he?"


    The murmurs wove together, pity and numbness taking turns inside the same hollow eyes that appraised Jared and Luther.


    Jared slid to the farthest corner, knees drawn up.


    Behind half-closed lids he let his senses roam, mapping exits, counting runes,


    weighing the temper of both guards and prisoners.


    Luther, never skilled at waiting, drifted toward a cluster of gentler faces.


    He bowed just enough to be nonthreatening and pitched his voice low.


    "Friends, could you tell us why we were seized the instant we crossed the gate? They imed the City Lord lost some treasure."


    "Treasure, my foot," an emaciated elder rasped. "That''s the story they feed tourists. The n is to purge anyone from the eastern region—or anyone who might breathe its air."


    "The eastern region? Azure Firmament Immortal Continent?" Jared asked, eyes no longer pretending to sleep.


    The elder gave a thin nod. "Exactly."


    Word reached Cyril: the big human sects back on Azure are moving pieces-quiet convoys, cloaked troops-aimed straight at the North Abyss Icefield.


    He assumes spies are already here, setting the stage from inside Coldabyss City.


    So the City Lord would rather slit a thousand throats than let one scout slip away— everyone who enteredtely went in chains, especially us refugees from the east.


    Jared''s senses snagged on the single phrase as though it had thorns. "Fleeing? The Azure Firmament Immortal Continent is the human race''s sacred ground for cultivation. Why would anyone need to run for their lives?"


    The elder darted a nce toward the corridor, shoulders shrinking before he breathed the words toward the floor. "Fellow Daoist, you don''t understand. The Azure Firmament is no longer ruled by humans."


    "Some hundreds of years ago, a group calling themselves celestials seized the continent. Their blood runs rich, their power deeper still, and they look down on us the way hawks look down on field mice."


    "Celestials?" The word tasted metallic on Jared''s tongue. His gaze tightened, memories stabbing forward-again that damned lineage. Maxwell had been imprisoned by a celestial n chief. Of course it was them.


    The elder nodded so hard his hood slipped back, revealing a bruise-yellowed jaw. "Yes. Celestials."


    "No one knows how, but they bent the leaders of the continent''s greatest sects to their will. The banners outside still read human, yet every order whispers from celestial throats."


    "They strip resources, crush anyone who resists. Disciples and wanderers alike flee."


    "We barely survived the journey to the rtive calm of the North Abyss Icefield, hoping to build new homes-only to find ourselves trading wolves for tigers." His eyes shone wet.


    A wiry young cultivator burst out, voice quivering.


    "Those celestial bastards don''t even see us as people. To them we''re a lesser breed fit only for chains."


    "My master refused to kneel, so they turned him into a living puppet. I will have vengeance!"


    "Quiet!" The elder pped a trembling hand over the youth''s mouth. "Walls have ears. If the guards hear that, we''re dead."


    Jared listened in silence, turmoil roiling under his ribs.


    Celestials—arrogant, oppressive-of course they would overreach.


    Luther''s voice cut through the dread. "Has no one intervened? What about the great powers of the Central Heaven-Origin Sacred Continent?"


    The elder let out a breath that tasted of defeat. "Intervene? Who would dare?"


    The celestials'' origins are shadowed, their strength frightening, and rumor says they have patrons even in the Central Realm.


    Besides, they rule from behind human faces. As long as the banners look proper, the great ns keep their hands clean.


    Unless the celestials threaten core interests, why would anyone champion a few minor cultivators like us?


    The cell drowned in thick, poisonous quiet. Jared could taste iron on his tongue.


    The iron door mmed open, its echo knifing through the hush, and a squad of hard-eyed guards stormed inside.


    The m of a baton against a cell door cracked through the gloom. "Everyone up! Form a line!" the Guard Captain barked.


    Jared peeled himself from the stone wall, cold seeping through his robe, every muscle coiled but his face nk.


    A thin voice two cells down trembled, "What''s happening? Are they letting us go?"


    The sound carried brittle hope that scraped against Jared''s nerves.


    Boots rasped closer. "Let you go?" The captain''sugh had the edge of broken ss.


    He stopped where Jared could see the blood crusted on his whip. "By order of the City Lord, every suspected spy marches to the Northern Execution tform.


    Sentence to be carried out


    immediately, so others learn


    ????


    obedience."


    Shock ripped through the block. "What?!" Several prisoners mmed against their bars.


    "We''re innocent—no spies here!"


    Someone shouted toward the upper tier, "Master Cyril, you can''t murder the meless!"


    The corridor degenerated into ovepping screams, curses, wet sobs; a storm of human noise that bounced off the frozen stone and tried to bury Jared''s thoughts.


    "Silence!" The whip cracked.


    Leather tore into the loudest man''s back; red sprayed across gray rags. The Captain yanked the whip free. "Make another sound and die on the spot! Chain them all."


    Steel-fisted soldiers surged in,


    wolfish eyes shining. They mped heavier cors around every neck


    the new weight dragging Jared''s spine forward as they forced the line out of the cell block.


    set


    Cold air flooded his lungs as they entered the outer passage. Jared''s gaze stayed t, but inside he measured distances, numbers, the looseness of each guard''s grip.


    He had hoped the City Lord would verify identities; today''s disy proved Lord


    Coldabyss wanted a purge, not justice. Waiting would mean dying.


    To his left, Luther''s whisper slid straight into Jared''s mind. "Mr. Chance, what now?"


    The ghostly undertone carried a flicker of lethal intent.


    Even bound, Luther''s posture said predator, not prey.


    Jared answered without moving his lips. "Watch for openings," he sent back, calm as falling snow.


    The chain snaked forward into the open. Wind knifed across the avenue, lifting grit that stung Jared''s eyes while the column trudged toward the northern quarter.


    Crowds gathered along both sides, cultivators wrapped in thick furs, whispering behind gloved hands.


    None stepped closer; the cold in their eyes said the City Lord''s power reached every doorway in Coldabyss City.


    The procession climbed wooden steps onto a vast terrace of ck ice, its surface shining like a butcher''s b.