Chapter 5497

Clutching his mangled wrist, Scarface screamed-a single, ragged note of pain and fury. “Who’s out there?”

Flaxseed jerked his head up. At the alley’s entrance stood a figure he knew by heart—white shirt fluttering like a defiant banner in the breeze.

Black-White Flame coiled around Jared in quiet spirals, ancient charms of heat and shadow breathing power into the night. He had rushed over from the Cardinal Realm.

“Jared? What are you doing here?”

Joy and disbelief collided in Flaxseed’s eyes, turning into tears.

A heartbeat ago, he had pictured only death, the alley shrinking into the mouth of

a grave. Now, as Jared stepped from the darkness, hope cut through despair like dawn through fog.