The King Of Warriors novel (Jared Chance) novel Chapter 6549

The moment they stepped through the city gate, the noise of the city hit them head-on.

Rookfire wasn’t large, but it was alive.

Stalls packed both sides of the street—arcane implements, healing elixirs, spirit materials, demon-beast remains. Hawkers shouted over one another without pause.

People brushed shoulder to shoulder, most of them wandering cultivators.

Now and then, disciples in matching arcane robes passed by, and the peddlers and loose cultivators around them instinctively opened a path.

The most eye-catching building in the city was a three-story stone hall at its center. A banner flew from the roof, embroidered with a three-legged golden crow wrapped in flame—the mark of the Flame Deity Branch.

Its main gate stood open. Voices spilled out from inside, along with the rich smell of meat and wine. It was a tavern.

Jared didn’t head for the stone hall in the middle of the city. Instead, he found a little inn tucked away in a quiet corner and took rooms there.

The inn was small, only two stories. The first floor was a bare-bones dining room, and the second held a handful of guest rooms.

The proprietor was an elderly cultivator at True Immortal Realm Level Nine, white-haired and slightly stooped. When he saw two strangers come in, caution flickered through his eyes before a businessman’s smile replaced it.

"You two staying the night, or just here to eat?"

"Rooms. Two of them." Jared set several spirit stones on the counter.

The elderly cultivator took the spirit stones and handed over two wooden keys with a genial smile. "Last two rooms on the second floor. Quiet. No one will bother you there."

Jared took the keys. Before going upstairs, he asked casually, "Anything going on in the city lately?"

The elderly cultivator’s smile stiffened.

He glanced to either side, then lowered his voice. "You’re from out of town, aren’t you? Rookfire hasn’t been peaceful lately. A few days ago, the Ember God Palace sent people into the city to collect taxes. They hauled off more than half the spirit materials from several shops.

"Then another group showed up yesterday. Not from the Ember God Palace. They were wearing white arcane robes—word is they were from the Hall of Radiance. Said they wanted to set up a preaching post here. Those two groups nearly started fighting at the city gate."

He paused, his voice dropping even lower. "You’d better be careful, sir. A lot of unfamiliar faces have come into the city lately. No one knows who they’re with."

Jared nodded and went upstairs.

The guest room was small and plainly furnished: a wooden bed, a wooden table, a single wooden chair, and a dust-covered prayer mat in the corner.

For someone who’d spent the whole day crossing the Godfall Wastes, it was more than enough.

Jared closed the door, sat cross-legged on the prayer mat, and took the map slip out of his satchel of holding again.

He sent his spirit sense into it and went over everything one more time, carefully, from beginning to end.

This time, he looked even harder. His attention lingered over every corner of the map, committing every mark and note to memory.

His gaze paused on the locations of the Ember God Palace and the Hall of Radiance. Then it swept past Everspire of the Abyssal Exchange and the rough location of Ashford Hollow before finally stopping on one place that made his brows draw together.

In the map’s northeast corner, farther north than the Ashford Range, lay an area marked the Northern Abyss Frost Chasm.

There were no detailed notes on that region at all. Just a few lines of red text:

"Frozen forbidden lands. Buried in ice year-round. Cold enough that even Golden Immortal cultivators can’t remain there for long."

"Space is extremely unstable. Teleportation arrays cannot lock onto it. Flying arcane craft cannot approach."

"Site of the ancient Frost Deity Branch ruins. Possible Frost-Deity inheritance left behind."

"Danger level: unknown."

Jared stared at those few lines for a long time.

The Frost Deity Branch.

The remnant soul of the Frost Deity Branch’s ancestor was still sleeping inside his consciousness field.

And this Northern Abyss Frost Chasm in the Eighteenth Firmament was marked as the site of the ancient Frost Deity Branch ruins.

That meant the Frost Deity Branch had once maintained a foothold here as well.

What he didn’t know was whether any of the Frost Deity Branch’s surviving kin were still there now.

Jared put away the map slip, rose, stepped out of the guest room, and knocked on Gwendolyn’s door next door.

The door opened almost at once.

Gwendolyn had already changed into a fresh set of white clothes, her long hair tied back again, a cup of hot tea in her hand.

"What is it?" she asked, catching the strange look on Jared's face.

Jared held out the map slip to her. "Take a look at this."

Gwendolyn took the jade slip and sent her spirit sense into it.

A moment later, she looked up, surprise flashing through her eyes. "The Northern Abyss Frost Chasm? A Frost Deity Branch ruin?"

"You know this place?"

Gwendolyn shook her head. "No. I may be one of the Frost Deity Branch's descendants, but I don't know anything about a ruin in a place like the Eighteenth Firmament."

She paused. "You want to go?"

Jared was just about to answer when an old, frail voice suddenly rang out in his consciousness field.

"The Northern Abyss Frost Chasm..."

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