"What kind of ce is the Pyre Chasm?" Jared asked.
ric Wraithmoor didn''t answer right away.
ric fell silent for a moment. Then he came down from the city walls and led Jared
to a stone hall standing in the middle of the ancient city.
Threerge characters were carved across the doors of the stone hall:
"Archive Tower."
"This is where the Ghost n has kept its records and scriptures for tens of
thousands of years."
ric pushed the doors open and brought Jared inside.
The inside of the stone hall was far bigger than it looked from the outside.
Rows of stone shelves filled the ce, packed with jade slips and old tomes. Some of the jade slips had already gone dim. Some of the old tomes had yellowed with age, their pages brittle enough to break at a touch.
A ce like this should have been the most tightly guarded secret of any race.
No outsider should ever have been allowed to step inside.
And yet ric had brought Jared here himself.
That alone showed how much he trusted him.
ric walked to the innermost stone shelf and took down a dark red jade slip.
"The record on the Pyre Chasm is in here."
He pressed the jade slip to his forehead, and a faint glow rose from it.
A momentter, he handed the jade slip to Jared.
"See for yourself."
Jared took the jade slip and sent his spirit sense into it.
The information inside came crashing over him like a flood.
Tens of thousands of years ago, a streak of heavenfire fell from the sky and struck
the eastern reaches of the Nether Mountain Range.
That heavenfire was no ordinary fire.
The instant it hit, it smashed a crater 1 thousand miles wide straight into a mountain range 10 thousand yards high.
Mountain stone melted. The earth split apart.
In that single instant, every living thing within 10 thousand miles was burned down to ash.
The heavenfire did not go out.
It had burned in the crater for tens of thousands of years, and through all that time, it had never once been extinguished.
No one had ever seen anything like the aura of the me inside that crater.
That was why it came to be called heavenfire.
This heavenfire had a will of its own.
Its own wrath. Its own hunger.
Anything living that went near it got swallowed whole. Then it would turn their soul and sense into fresh fuel and feed it back into the me, until the fire burned even harder.
There was something else down in the chasm too.
Heavenfire beasts.
They were vicious beasts that had formed naturally inside the heavenly crater after the heavenfire fell.
Their bodies were condensed out of me, and every single one of them possessed strength above the True Immortal Realm.
They guarded the Pyre Chasm and attacked any living thing that came close.
For tens of thousands of years, cultivators of the Fifteenth Firmament had gone out of their way to avoid the Pyre Chasm.
No one dared go near it.
No one dared fly over it.
There had once been a powerhouse at True Immortal Realm Level Five who tried to uncover the Pyre Chasm''s secrets.
That person never came back.
The Pyre Chasm was the most dangerous ce in the Fifteenth Firmament.
Nothing else even came close.
When Jared finished reading the records inside the jade slip, he stayed where he was for a long time without a word.
Then he lifted his head and looked at ric.
"Lydia and Gwendolyn are in the Pyre Chasm?"
ric nodded.
His face had gone iron hard.
"The scout reported that they''re trapped at the outer rim of the Pyre Chasm. They''re injured, and the heavenfire beasts are still attacking them. They can''t get out, and nobody outside can get in."
"But....." He paused, and when he spoke again his voice had dropped even lower. "They''re still alive. The scout can still sense Lydia''s aura. It''s weak, but she''s alive."
Jared rose to his feet and put the jade slip back on the stone shelf.
"I''ll go."
ric looked at him. Somethingplicated passed through his eyes.
"Mr. Chance, the Pyre Chasm..."
"I know," Jared cut in. "But I have to go."
He didn''t say why.
But ric understood.
It wasn''t for some grand cause.
It wasn''t because of any promise, either.
It was only because the people he meant to protect were in there.
That was all.
ric stayed silent for a long time.
Then he did something Jared hadn''t expected.
He dropped to one knee.
"Mr. Chance, on behalf of the Moonshade Realm, on behalf of the Ghost n, I''m asking you for one thing."
Jared moved at once to pull him up. "What are you doing? Get up and talk."
ric didn''t rise.
"Lydia is my daughter. She''s the Princess of the Moonshade Realm. Since she was little, she never listened. She was always running off, always leaving me hanging."
"While she was gone, I thought I''d never see her again. Now she''s finallye back, and she''s trapped in the Pyre Chasm."
His voice shook.
His eyes were red, but he kept the tears from falling.
"As her father, I''ve been useless. I couldn''t beat the celestials. I couldn''t protect my nsmen. And now
can''teven save my own daughter All can do all I can do is beg you.
He lifted his head and looked at Jared.
"Mr. Chance, please bring Lydia back."
Jared looked at him.
This man had been ground down by hatred for thousands of years.
This man had lost his wife, lost his nsmen, lost almost everything.
At this moment, he wasn''t the Sovereign of the Moonshade Realm.
He wasn''t the leader of the Ghost n.
He was only a father worrying over his daughter.
"I''ll bring her back," Jared said.
Atst, ric''s tears fell.
Once the news spread, the entire Moonshade Realm erupted.
It wasn''t fear.
It wasn''t retreat.
It was resolve that had been pressed down for far too long, finally breaking loose.
"The Princess is trapped in the Pyre Chasm!"
"We have to go save her!"
"Sovereign, let me go!"
"I''m going too! The Princess saved my life!"
Below the city walls, several hundred Ghost n warriors had gathered.
Their armor was old and battered. Their weapons didn''t even match. But in every
pair of eyes, the same fire burned.
ric stood upon the city walls and looked down at them.
His eyes had gone red.
"Brothers."
His voice came out rough, but it
rolled through the crowd like a bell striking in every ear, know who sh? is to you. She''s your Princess, she''s my daughter, and she''s the hope of our Moonshade Realm."
"She''s trapped in the Pyre Chasm. She''s wounded, and heavenfire beasts are
attacking her. You all know what kind of ce the Pyre Chasm is. If we go, we may
note back."
He paused.
His gaze passed over every face below.
"I''m not forcing anyone. If you''re willing to go, step to the right."
Not a single person moved.
Then...
Everyone stepped forward at the same time.
In one clean motion, the whole crowd shifted to the right.
ric''s lips shook.
"You all..."
An old warrior stepped out from the crowd.
A scar ran across his face, from his browbone all the way to his chin. He''d gotten it
many years ago, when the celestials had hunted them down.
"Sovereign, have you forgotten?"
His voice stayed level. "Back then, if
the Princess hadn''t stopped the celestial pursuers for us, everyst one of us would already be dead The Princess saved our lives Now she''s in trouble. If we hide in the
back at a time like this, then what right do we have to call ourselves Ghost n?"
"That''s right!" another young warrior shouted. "Who cares about the Pyre Chasm?
Even if it''s the deepest hell, we''re going!"
"Save the Princess!"
"Save the Princess!"
The shouting crashed forward like a rising tide, each wave louder than thest.
Jared stood upon the city walls and watched it happen.
Something hot and steady moved through his chest.
This was the Ghost n.
Hunted for thousands of years.
ughtered by the millions.
A people that had hidden in the dark, clinging to whatever breath they had left.
They were poor, weak, worn down, and driven to the edge.
But when their Princess was in trouble, they stepped forward.
No hesitation.
No retreat.
ric drew in a deep breath and gave a hard nod.
"Good. Then we go. Everyone, take your best arms. Take all the healing elixirs. We
leave in half an hour!"
The Ghost n warriors answered with a thunderous roar, then turned and rushed
off to prepare.
Jared walked over to ric''s side and lowered his voice. "Sovereign, I have a
request."
ric looked at him. "Speak, Mr. Chance."
"Once we reach the Pyre Chasm, let me go in first. You wait outside."
ric''s face changed at once. "How could that work..."
"The heavenfire beasts in the Pyre Chasm aren''t something ordinary Ghost n
warriors can handle."
"If you go in, you''ll only add to the losses. I''ll go in alone, find Lydia Wraithmoor and Gwendolyn, and bring them out."