"Yes."
Edmund lowered his voice.
"Shadow Hall has been expanding the underground pcetely, and they need a huge number of hands. They don''t dare touch people from the major powers, so they pick off wandering cultivators like us instead.
"Once they''re taken to the Shade Abyss, very few ever make it back."
Jared fell silent for a moment.
"Does Mchy Vane know about this?"
Edmund gave a bitter smile.
"The Lord of Shadow Hall... maybe he doesn''t know. Maybe he does and just doesn''t care. In Shadow Hall, his word is absolute. No one dares go against his orders. But he rarely concerns himself with things like this. Most of the time, it''s the people under him acting on their own."
"What kind of person is Mchy Vane?" Jared asked.
Edmund took a second, then said, "The Lord of Shadow Hall... he isn''t one of the demon nsmen by birth."
Jared paused.
"He''s not a demon?"
"That''s right." Edmund nodded. "He entered the Shade Abyss 5 thousand years ago. Back then, the Hall Master of Shadow Hall was Magnus Storme.
"Mchy Vane defeated Magnus Storme by himself and took the Lord''s seat." "His methods were ruthless, but under his rule, Shadow Hall''s power rose fast. It went from a small force to one of the top three major powers in the Fifteenth Firmament."
"Magnus Storme?" Jared repeated the name.
"Yes. After Magnus Storme was beaten by Mchy Vane, he fled. Later, he joined the Celestial Tribunal and became its Deputy Hall Master."
"Aren''t the celestials supposed to be arrogant? Why would they take in a demon?" Jared asked.
Edmundughed, and there was nothing warm in it.
"The celestials act high and mighty on the surface, like everything else is beneath them. Behind the scenes, they''re rotten to the core."
"They didn''t take Magnus Storme in out of pity. They took him in because he had an ancient thunder canon in his hands. Rumor says that if it''s cultivated to the limit, it can rival the peak of the True Immortal Realm.
"The Tribunal wanted that canon. That''s why they gave Magnus Storme shelter."
"Because of that, Mchy Vane and the Celestial Tribunal have been bitter enemies. Over thest 5 thousand years, they''ve shed again and again, big fights and small ones, with countless dead and wounded."
"Mchy Vane has always been looking for a chance to get back at Magnus Storme, but he''s never made a move. Some say he''s wary of the Tribunal Venerable standing behind Magnus Storme.
"The Tribunal Venerable is the number one figure in the Fifteenth Firmament, a True Immortal Realm Level Eight expert. Mchy Vane isn''t his match."
Jared nodded.
That was enough. The picture had alreadye together.
"Thank you for telling me, Master Rowe." Jared cupped his fist.
Edmund quickly returned the gesture.
"You''re too polite, fellow adept Jared. You saved our lives. What does a little information matterpared to that?
"Right, what brings you to ckstone City? Are you heading to the Shade Abyss?"
Jared nodde
Edmund Rowe''s expression turned grave. "Fellow adept Jared, I''d advise you to be careful. Shade Abyss has been locked down hardtely, and they''ve been especially wary of outside cultivators. You just beat up men from Shadow Hall. Word has probably already reached Shade Abyss. If you go there now..."
"I know," Jared cut in. "I know how far to take it."
Edmund let out a breath, then reached into his robe, pulled out the token, and held it out to Jared.
"This is a token from our Wandering Cultivators Alliance. If you run into trouble in Shade Abyss, take it to the Wandering Cultivators Alliance local chapter in ckstone City. We''ll do everything we can to help."
Jared epted the token and thanked him.
Then he left ckstone City with Gwendolyn.
The entrance to Shade Abyss was a gigantic stone door. On both sides stood two lines of demon cultivators, each of them somewhere between True Immortal Realm Level One and Level Two.
They wore ck cuirasses and carried long spears. Their faces were hard and cold.
The moment Jared and Gwendolyn reached the stone door, they were surrounded on all sides.
"Stop right there!"
"Who are you?"
"Anyone who trespasses into Shade Abyss dies!"
More than twenty demon cultivators closed in around the two of them, their
spearpoints aimed straight at their throats.
Jared didn''t move. He didn''t say a word either.
He only stood there and looked at them, calm and steady, as if he were looking at a swarm of ants.
The captain at the front recognized him at once. He was the same demon captain Jared had sent running in ckstone City not long ago.
His face went dark, and the look in his eyes turned vicious.
He was a captain, after all, yet Jared hadn''t given him the slightest bit of face.
He had swallowed it in ckstone City. Here, on his own ground, he had no intention of swallowing anything.
"Jared, you injured men from Shadow Hall, and you still dared toe to Shade Abyss? You''ve got a death wish!"
He shed a hand forward. "Take them!"
More than twenty demon cultivators
moved at the same time. ck
demonic aura burst our and turned into countless chains, whipping toward Jared and Gwendolyn to bind them fast.
Jared raised his right hand.
A mass of chaos-me gathered in his palm.
The instant the me appeared, those chains of demonic aura met it like ice under a
zing sun. They vanished on the spot, burned clean out of existence.
The aftershock of the me mmed into the twenty-odd demonic cultivators and sent them flying.
They crashed hard against the stone door, and blood burst from their mouths.
The captain got thrown back too.
He struggled up from the ground, and when he looked at Jared again, the fear in his eyes was impossible to miss.
"You... you..."
"Stop!"
A sharp shout rang out from behind the stone door.
A demon cultivator in a ck robe stepped out through the stone door.
He was at the True Immortal Realm Level Three. His face was bleak and hard, with
a knife scar at the corner of one eye.
It was Shade, the same man Jared had met back in the Pyre Chasm.
The moment Shade saw Jared, his face changed.
He hurried forward and bowed.
"Fellow Adept Jared, my men were blind to who they were dealing with and gave offense Hall Master has been waiting for you for quite a white. Please,e with me."
Jared gave him one look, then drew the me back.
"Lead the way."
Shade brought Jared and Gwendolyn through the stone door and into Shade Abyss.
Behind them, those demonic cultivators fought their way back to their feet.
They looked at each other, every face stunned, each of them carrying the same look
of having barely kept hold of their life.
Beyond the stone doory a deep, shadowy tunnel.
Glowing ore was embedded in the walls on both sides, pouring light through the
entire passage until it shone from end to end.
The tunnel stretched on for a long way, twisting and turning as if it would never
reach an end.
Every so often, another squad of demonic cultivators was out on patrol duty.
Each time they saw Jared, they stopped where they were and bowed their heads in
salute.
Jared''s face stayed calm, and he never turned his eyes aside.
Gwendolyn followed behind him, dressed in white that stood out sharply against the
darkness.
After about half an hour of walking, the tunnel finally came to an end.
The space ahead opened up all at once.
Whaty before them was a massive underground pce.
The pce ceiling rose hundreds of yards overhead. Countless glowing ores were
set into it, spreading across the vault like an upside-down night sky.
The floor was made of ck jade, polished smooth as a mirror. It caught every
figure that crossed it and threw back a clear reflection.
Dozens of massive stone pirs stood along both sides of the pce.
The history of demon warfare had been carved into them, from ancient times all the way to the present. One relief after another looked salifelike It almost seemed ready to move.
At the far end of the pce, a high tform stood waiting.
A ck throne rested on top of it.
A man sat on that throne.
Mchy.
He looked to be a little over thirty. His features were so handsome they tipped into something almost unearthly, with skin white as snow and lips red as blood.
His eyes were a deep violet. In his pupils, it seemed as if whirlpools were turning,
ready to drag in anyone who looked too long.
A faint ck demonic aura drifted around him.
It wasn''t violent. Ity quiet and still, like a sleeping Shadow Dragon.
His cultivation was at True Immortal Realm Level Seven.
Something shifted in Jared''s gaze.
True Immortal Realm Level Seven was one minor realm below the Tribunal
Venerable of the Celestial Tribunal.
Even so, that still ced Mchy among the very top powers in the Fifteenth
Firmament.