The heavy dragon bone jade token bumped against Ye Chen’s hip with every stride, clinking against the rusted crossguard of his broadsword as he crossed the suspension bridge away from the central coliseum.
Behind him, the roar of three thousand spectators still echoed across the cloud sea, but the road leading back to the Ruined Peak was shrouded in quiet sulfur mist.
Ye Chen walked with steady, measured steps along the narrow ridge trail, his boots kicking loose shale into the bottomless gorge below. His patched gray tunic was scorched at the hems, and his muscles ached from the violent kinetic strain of channeling the spatial singularity, but beneath his ribs, his liquid core turned with dense, unshakeable power.
The banishment decree was broken. The legal barriers that had trapped hi
