"He is actively hunting us."Jin poured a cup of hot tea and smiled at the men gathered around the table. The young cultivator sat in the primary study of the Fang family estate, projecting an aura of supreme confidence. He lifted the porcelain cup to his lips and savored the bitter liquid while the mortal warlords processed the intelligence he had just delivered.Patriarch Fang sat at the head of the table. He did not look afraid. The supreme leader of the Southern Alliance leaned back in his leather chair and let out a deep guttural laugh. The sound echoed off the stone walls of the ancestral manor."The King of the North is walking blindly into the South," Patriarch Fang said. He slapped his thick hand against the polished wood. "He thinks he can bring a handful of mercenaries into my territory and dictate terms. He is delivering his own head to our doorstep. This is your chance to finish the job Jin."Lu Ming stood near the armored glass window overlooking the sprawling estate gro

The remaining Fang family mercenaries dropped their weapons onto the blood soaked gravel of the Kingswood Railyard. The sharp clatter of steel hitting the stones echoed through the decaying industrial lot. They raised their hands in absolute surrender and fell to their knees. The sudden silence of the battlefield felt heavier and far more oppressive than the automatic gunfire that had preceded it. Chase Lu stood in the exact center of the carnage. His tailored black suit remained pristine and completely untouched by the surrounding violence.Iron Tyrant marched forward with his tactical rifle raised to his shoulder. The giant security chief sneered at the defeated men. He stepped over a rusted iron coupling and began kicking the discarded firearms away from the kneeling soldiers to ensure the perimeter was safe."Bind their wrists," Chase ordered calmly. He looked down at the cowering men who had tried to kill him just moments ago. "Load every single one of them onto the transport pla

Victoria Qin tasted blood. She lay on her side against the cold concrete of the main courtyard. Every breath sent a jagged spike of agony through her chest. General Gao had broken her ribs with a single brutal palm strike. The pain forced her to take shallow gasping breaths just to remain conscious. She focused on the rhythmic thumping of her own heartbeat to ground herself in reality.The military compound was eerily quiet. The towering stone walls of the estate cast long dark shadows across the pavement. Victoria tried to push herself up. Her left arm collapsed under her own weight. She fell back down to the hard ground. The sharp edges of the concrete dug into her shoulder. She was an elite corporate executive and a highly trained operative. She had survived corporate espionage and triad assassins in North City. But she possessed zero spiritual energy. She could not fight a man who manipulated the fundamental forces of reality.She looked up at the towering figure of her father's r

Chase stood in the center of the ruined courtyard while the golden mist around his hands flickered erratically. He understood the math of the martial world perfectly. His Dragon Qi was a primordial apex predator and Gao wielded the lesser energy of a tiger. In the wild a newborn dragon possessed infinitely more potential than a mature tiger but the tiger still held the immediate advantage of size and stamina. Chase knew he would exhaust his shallow core and bleed out before he ever shattered the Stage 2 alchemical armor with his bare hands.He needed the great equalizer. He required a tool that bypassed the dense physical defense of the military commander.Chase opened his mind to the dimensional space tethered to his neural network. The air rippled violently near his right hip. An oppressive void manifested in the physical world for a fraction of a second. He reached his empty hand into the spatial distortion and pulled his newly acquired artifact into reality.The blade of Pride ma

The briefcase hit the polished mahogany desk with a dull thud. Lu Sheng popped the brass latches and flipped the lid open. He revealed neat rows of unregistered bearer bonds. The volume of the wealth inside the case represented the gross domestic product of a small island nation.Facilitator Ye sat back in his high leather chair. The Northern Overseer Facilitator did not reach for the money. He steepled his fingers and looked across the wide desk at the Capital heir.His spacious corner office sat on the top floor of the Northern Federal Building on State Street. The floor to ceiling windows offered a commanding view of the bustling financial district below. Ye had spent three decades clawing his way up the brutal political ladder of the province. He recognized a bribe immediately. He also recognized the desperate rigid posture of a man fighting a losing war."You brought a substantial amount of paper into a federal office Lu Sheng," Facilitator Ye noted calmly. He kept his voice stea