Chapter 5525

A cavern yawned open at the base, runes like crawling green fire circling the lip-countless hungry eyes glaring from the stone.

Two guards in black robes stood motionless. Their faces were masks of wax, their eyes empty hollows, as if their else’s souls had been harvested away.

“Halt! Identify yourselves!” one barked, the echo slicing through the canyon.

Flaxseed started forward, but Jared lifted a hand-an unspoken order heavier than iron.

Jared stepped ahead. Each footfall seemed to land directly on the guards’ hearts.

“We’re the ones who’ve come to claim your worthless lives.”

The instant Jared finished speaking, his aura exploded from him—a tidal wave of invisible pressure that roared across the mountaintop corridor. The two guards never even blinked. They were ants in a tsunami, pulverized mid-breath, bones and armor liquefying into a wet smear against the stone before a scream could form.