A Man Like None Other (Jared Chance) novel Chapter 6550

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Ten miles outside Rookfire, inside an abandoned forsaken shrine.

Claire sat beneath a battered, broken idol, idly turning a silver-white transit talisman between her fingers.

A faint trace of the force of Space Law moved across its surface.

The moment she fed it spiritual power, it would carry her thousands of miles away to a safe zone in an instant.

She hadn’t used it.

Not because she wasn’t worried about danger.

Because she knew Jared wouldn’t make a move against her.

At least, not yet.

"The package was delivered," she said to herself, her voice so soft it echoed through the empty shrine.

She took out a bronze mirror from her satchel of holding.

Cedric’s face surfaced across the mirror’s dim gleam.

"Chairman Cedric, the welcoming gift has been delivered."

"He accepted it?" Cedric’s voice came through the mirror.

"He did. He took both the map and the token." Claire paused.

"But he accepted them too calmly. He didn’t ask a single question. He didn’t show any emotion at all. He’s... harder to handle than we expected."

Cedric fell silent for a moment on the other end of the mirror.

Then he laughed.

"If he were easy to handle, I’d be disappointed. Keep watching him. Don’t expose who you are. When he needs help, that’s when you appear."

"Understood."

Claire put the mirror away, rose from beneath the ruined idol, and brushed the dust from her skirt.

She walked to the doorway of the shrine and looked out at the distant lights of Rookfire.

Something complicated flickered through her eyes.

She was the vice-master of the Abyssal Exchange, a Golden Immortal Level Three cultivator skilled in disguise and social maneuvering.

She had carried out countless missions, and she had never failed once.

But this time, unease kept needling at her in a way she couldn't name.

The look in that young man's eyes had been too calm.

Too calm for someone being hunted by three great powers at once.

He hadn't looked like prey at all. He'd looked like a hunter, waiting with endless patience for his prey to walk into the trap on its own.

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At the same time, in an unremarkable house on the other side of Rookfire—

Adrian sat cross-legged on a crude wooden bed, the wooden sword laid across his knees, his eyes half-closed.

His spirit sense spread over the whole of Rookfire like an invisible net.

Every cultivator in the city was within his awareness.

Jared's presence was in the small inn in the northern part of the city, steady and deep, immersed in cultivation.

Gwendolyn's presence was in the room next door, cultivating as well.

The woman who had delivered the satchel of holding had already left Rookfire.

She had paused for a moment at the forsaken shrine 10 miles outside the city, then headed southward in the direction of Everspire, the Abyssal Exchange's stronghold.

Agents of the Abyssal Exchange.

Adrian opened his eyes, his refined face giving nothing away.

From beginning to end, he had watched the battle between Jared and the Ember God Palace in the Godfall Wastes.

From the moment Garrick arrived with his forces, to the instant Jared cut him down with a single sword strike, drove back Vaughn and Silas, and wiped out all thirty members of the Ember Drake Guard, Adrian had seen every detail with perfect clarity.

He hadn't shown himself.

Not because he hadn't wanted to.

Because he couldn't.

The Ember God Palace had planted eyes inside the Godfall Wastes, and the Abyssal Exchange had been spying from the shadows too.

If he had appeared then, with all three powers present at once, the situation would have turned dangerously complicated.

It might even have sparked a conflict no one could control.

That wasn't what Master Alaric wanted to see.

"One sword strike to kill a peak Golden Immortal Level Three."

Adrian murmured the words under his breath, his fingers gliding lightly over the wooden sword's blade.

"True Immortal Realm Level Eight, killing across an entire major realm, and doing it while the opponent was burning blood essence. That kind of combat strength..."

He didn't finish.

But a rare gravity flickered through his eyes.

He was the most outstanding disciple of his generation in the Aureate Way, a Golden Immortal Level Two—already counted among the very best of the younger generation in the Eighteenth Firmament.

But if he had been the one facing Garrick, he would have been confident of winning.

A one-strike kill? That, he could not have done.

And he definitely could not have exterminated thirty elite Golden Immortal Level One cultivators in ten breaths.

Yet this young man named Jared was a full four minor realms below him in cultivation.

Then he drove the Focus Technique at full force, sending chaotic force surging through his meridians.

By the next morning, the moment the first golden sun lifted its head over the eastern horizon, Rookfire began to wake in the dawn.

The bright moon had not fully set yet, and the crimson sun had only just revealed half its arc.

All three blazing suns hung in the sky at once, bathing the city in a stunning wash of gold, silver, and red.

Jared opened his eyes, coming out of meditation.

He had cultivated through the entire night.

For a full 12 hours, chaotic force had rushed through his meridians without stopping. The barrier at the middle-phase of True Immortal Realm Level Eight had started to loosen, but he was still some distance from a breakthrough.

Chaotic force devoured too many resources.

If he relied on meditation alone, breaking through even a single minor realm would likely take years, maybe even decades.

He needed more resources.

More fights. More opportunities.

And the Northern Abyss Frost Chasm might be where the next one waited.

Jared got to his feet and stretched, a quiet series of pops running through his bones.

He went to the window and pushed it open.

The cool morning wind hit him head-on, carrying the noise of the city with it.

There were already plenty of cultivators moving through the streets.

Vendors were setting up their stalls, and their shouts rose one after another.

Smoke curled from the chimney of the three-story stone hall in the center of the city, and the air was thick with the smell of roasted spirit beast meat and spirit-wine.

A faint rustle came from the room next door.

Gwendolyn was up.

A moment later, someone knocked.

"Come in."

Gwendolyn pushed the door open and stepped inside.

She had already changed into a clean set of white clothes. Her long hair was tied back again, and the silver-white longsword hung at her waist.

Her complexion looked much better than it had the day before.

A night's rest had pulled her back from the exhaustion of the Godfall Wastes, and that familiar cold brightness had returned to her eyes.

"Let's go."

Jared checked the supplies in his satchel of holding.

He still had plenty of healing elixirs left, and his emberstone crystals were enough for now.