A Man Like None Other (Jared Chance) novel Chapter 5717

Still, the Soul Devourer had once been a giant on level nine. After ten millennia as a disembodied mind, his command of soul arts was peerless, and this remnant had been crafted as his last, most vicious safeguard.

Even with Jared's reflexes—sharp as drawn steel—several stray soul threads still slipped through his mental net. They were the light ones, wisps that held nothing but noise and harmless memories, scattering like ash across the air.

The principal shard of the Soul Devourer's consciousness detonated on itself, vanishing in a grit of psychic dust and taking most vital memories with it.

Jared flooded the ruin with his own spiritual sense, stooping, in a sense, to sift the debris. Each broken image he caught was held, studied, then filed away before it could fade.

What he saw was a clutter of information—minor cruelties inside Skyfiend Sect, schemes the dead lord had dangled before Elder Bonewick like poisoned bait. Anything truly important—especially the memory of where Soul Devourer's true body hid—had been locked behind a curse that shattered the moment the remnant died.

Yet a single glimmer survived the self-destruction. One half-spoken landmark repeated itself: "Nether... Blood Sea... edge... Soul-Graves..."

Nether Blood Sea—Jared knew the name. It lay along the lowest rim of level nine, a forbidden stretch of crimson water said to be an ancient battlefield of gods and fiends. Endless blood. Endless wailing spirits. Chaos etched into the very law of heaven. Even Heavenly Immortals kept their distance. Hiding a true body there suited the Soul Devourer's venomous craftiness.

"Nether Blood Sea... Soul-Graves..."

Jared mouthed the words, eyes narrowing to a hunter's edge. "Looks like I have to pay that place a visit."

Down on the fractured plain, the battle's thunder dwindled to its final growls.

Elder Bonewick watched the last fleck of the Soul Devourer's soul remnant flee, and hope left him like blood from a cut vein. His apparition lost cohesion; Coall's claw sheared an arm from it, fire-dragon breath and lightning-dragon wrath following hard until the phantom screamed and burst apart.

With the apparition gone, Bonewick and the surviving elders buckled. Blood gushed from their mouths; their auras guttered to dying coals.

"We surrender—please, we surrender!" one elder shrieked, flinging aside his treasure and dropping to his knees.

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