He shed out with one sword strike and collided head-on with all six bone des at the same time.
ng! ng! ng! ng! ng! ng!
Six metallic crashes rang out almost at once, shaking the air around them until it quivered.
The impact left Jared''s sword hand numb, and the Dragonyer Sword nearly flew out of his grasp.
But the three-headed skeleton was driven back several steps too.
"Move!" Gwendolyn caught Jared and pulled him through the opening the skeleton had just been forced to leave.
The two of them threw everything they had into it and ran wildly toward the depths of the Ancient Battlefield.
Behind them, dozens of giant skeletons kepting without letting up.
Every step they took made the ground shudder.
After running for who knew how long, the pursuers behind them finally began to fall farther and farther back.
The skeletons seemed to have territories of their own. Once Jared and Gwendolyn crossed a certain line, the things stopped chasing them.
They stood along that invisible boundary, the ghostly green fire in their eye sockets flickering a few times.
Then they slowly turned and went back to the ces where they had originallyin asleep.
Jared and Gwendolyn finally stopped.
Both of them bent forward, dragging in huge breaths.
Both of them had taken hits.
A bone de had sliced open Jared''s left arm, and blood ran down his wrist in steady drops.
There was still blood at the corner of Gwendolyn''s mouth.
Her face looked even paler than usual.
"You''re hurt."
"It''s nothing. I''m fine."
Gwendolyn wiped the blood from the corner of her mouth and looked into the distance.
"We''re almost there."
Jared followed her gaze.
Thend ahead had changed.
It was no longer one t stretch of in. A massive basin opened up in front of them instead.
Steep cliffs ringed the edge of the basin.
Those cliffs were packed with dense cracks, like marks gouged out by a giant''s fingers.
And at the bottom of the basin...
Jared sucked in a cold breath.
At the bottom of the basin was a sea.
A sea made of ghostfire.
Ghostly green mes churned, burned, and roared across the bottom of the basin.
They covered the entire ce, stretching so far that Jared couldn''t see the end of them.
The mes burned so hot that even from thousands of yards away, Jared could still feel that searing heat washing straight into his face.
And at the exact center of the Sea of the Dead, there was a lone isle.
It wasn''trge. At most, it stretched a few hundred yards across.
There were no skeletons on the isle. No broken weapons either. There was only a stone dais.
Resting on that stone dais was a pearl the size of a fist.
Its color kept changing. One moment it was gold, the next ck, then ice-blue, then clear and colorless.
Every time it changed, a visible ring of ripples spread out from the pearl and swept across the entire Sea of the Dead.
Where those ripples passed, the ghostfire snuffed out for a brief instant, then red back to life again.
"What is that?" Jared asked.
Gwendolyn stared at the pearl, and the look in her eyes burned like twin mes.
"The root of the Frost Deity Branch. The Heart of the Northern Abyss."
Her voice shook, as if something buried for ten thousand years was finally forcing its way out.
"The Frost Deity Branch bloodline came from Aldric. And the core of Aldric''s power is this pearl he left behind after death.
"If we can get it, the Ice God Bloodline will be truly strengthened. It won''t need any outside force to sustain it anymore."
She turned to Jared, and for just a moment, a trace of appeal shed through her eyes.
"Help me get it."
Jared stared at the Sea of the Dead, his brows pulled tight.
"How are we supposed to get through that Sea of me?"
Gwendolyn reached into her clothes and took out an ice-blue talisman.
Its surface was packed with dense runes, and a bone-deep chill poured off it.
"This is the Ice-Seal Talisman our Frost Deity Branch ancestors left behind.
It can open the passage through the ghostfire. But it onlysts for thirty breaths. Within those thirty breaths, we have to cross the Sea of me and reach the isle." "Thirty breaths?"
Jared measured the distance with a quick look.
From the edge of the cliff to the isle, it was at least several thousand yards.
Several thousand yards through ghostfire in thirty breaths.
And on top of that, whatever might be hiding in that Sea of me...
"It''s enough." He drew in a deep breath. "Let''s go."
Gwendolyn threw the Ice-Seal Talisman toward the Sea of the Dead.
The talisman burst open above the Sea of me and turned into a blinding ice-blue pir of me.
The pir of me shot straight down into the Sea of the Dead.
Everywhere it passed, the green ghostfire split to both sides and exposed a narrow passage.
The ground inside the passage was ckened rock.
On both sides, the walls of me towered dozens of yards high.
The heat rolling off the walls of me was brutal.
Even with the Ice-Seal Talisman shielding them, Jared could still feel the st of it pressing against him so hard it stole the air from
his
chest.
"Go!"
The two of them jumped into the passage and sprinted at full speed.
The ckened rock under their feet burned like red-hot iron. Every step came with a sharp sizzling sound.
On both sides, the walls of me kept writhing, as if they might m shut at any moment.
Ten breaths passed.
They had covered a third of the distance.
Twenty breaths passed.
The isle was already in sight.
The stone dais and the pearl on it stood out with brutal rity.
Then, right at that moment, the Sea of the Dead suddenly heaved.
A massive skeletal hand thrust out of the Sea of me and grabbed at the two of
them.
That skeletal hand wasrger any skeleton they had run into
before Each finger stretch
dozens
of yards long, and ghostfire burned
at every fingertip.
"Don''t stop!" Gwendolyn shouted and struck out with a backhand palm.
Ice-blue divine radiance mmed into the skeletal hand.
Frost spread over its surface at once, and its speed dropped.
But thatyer of icested for less than a breath before the ghostfire on the skeletal
hand melted it away.
The skeletal hand kept reaching for them.
Jared clenched his teeth and ripped the Dragonyer Sword from its sheath.
Then he swung with everything he had.
A golden de-re burst out and turned into the phantom of the Five-wed
Golden Dragon.
Roaring, it mmed straight into the skeletal hand.
Boom!
The skeletal hand was sted back several yards.
But the recoil hit Jared just as hard. His blood surged, and a thin line of blood spilled
from the corner of his mouth.
"Ten breaths left!" Gwendolyn shouted.
The two of them kept sprinting.
The skeletal hand came after them again.
This time it was faster and more vicious.
At the same time, a second skeletal hand and then a third thrust out of the Sea of
me.
They came in from every direction and sealed the passage tight.
"We''re toote!" Gwendolyn called out, and thest bit of steadiness in her voice
gave way.
Jared looked at the skeletal hands closing in, then at the pearl on the isle not far ahead.
Something hard shed through his eyes.
"You go first."
He grabbed Gwendolyn by the shoulder and hurled her toward the isle with all his
strength.
"Jared!"
Gwendolyn''s voice scattered into the
wind She tried to turn back but her body had already been thrown the isle.
os kont
At the same time, Jared turned around and faced the three gigantic skeletal hands.
Inside Jared, the chaotic force started to boil.
Violet radiance poured out of him and gathered over his body, forming a thinyer of
the cuirass.
That cuirass wasn''t gold.
It wasn''t ice-blue either.
It was a deep, bottomless violet, like the first streak of light before chaos had ever
split apart.
All three skeletal hands grabbed for him at the same time.
Jared raised both hands, his palms facing out.
Violet radiance burst from his palms and mmed into the three skeletal hands.
Boom!
The entire Sea of the Dead shuddered.