Chapter 117: Heroes Rise Young!

Manester stared at Kyo as though either his ears had failed him or the old bastard had finally lost his mind.

"Wait."

He raised one hand.

"Say that again."

"He broke through right there?"

"To Rank Five?"

Kyo took in Manester’s expression, the look of a man who had just swallowed a live fly, and finally felt some of the frustration in his own chest loosen.

Good.

Why should he be the only one forced to suffer through having his entire understanding of cultivation shattered?

Kyo nodded with maddening calm.

"Yep."

"Right there."

He even lifted a hand and acted it out as though describing what he had eaten for dinner.

"One moment he was middle stage Rank Four."

"Then, whoosh, late stage Rank Four."

"Before I could even blink, boom, Rank Five."

"Smooth the whole way."

"No bottleneck. No pause. Not even a stumble."

"Like drinking ten gallons of beer."

Manester said nothing.

Kyo looked completely sincere.

That somehow made it worse.

Manester swallowed.

"You are fucking with me."

"I was stuck at peak Rank Four for three whole years!"

"I nearly killed myself training, swallowed more medicine than I can remember, and almost died before I finally touched the threshold of Rank Five."

"And you are telling me he just stood there and broke through?"

Kyo spread his hands.

"Do not ask me."

"At this point, I am not convinced he is human either."

"You should have seen it."

He clicked his tongue, still remembering the scene.

"It was like heaven itself was chasing after him with a spoon."

"Would not even let him refuse."

"Just kept stuffing power straight into his mouth."

Manester slowly sank back against the seat.

His eyes drifted toward the roof of the vehicle.

Everything he wanted to say eventually condensed into two words.

"Holy shit."

He had been in charge of Norcrest long enough to believe he had seen every kind of storm.

Apparently not.

This one was a little too large.

Manester pulled out a cigarette.

It took him three attempts to light it.

Only after breathing out a long stream of smoke did his thoughts begin to settle.

Kyo might joke around constantly, but there were some things he would never lie about.

Not something like this.

If Kyo said Joren had reached Rank Five, then Joren had reached Rank Five.

"So..."

Manester narrowed his eyes and looked through the window toward the distant mushroom cloud that still hung over the horizon.

"If that kid really is Rank Five now..."

"With the ridiculous way he fights above his realm, plus all those strange abilities of his..."

He turned toward Kyo.

"Against three peak Rank Five beast kings..."

The rest of the question hung there.

Kyo considered it for a moment.

Then gave an extremely conservative answer.

"At minimum?"

"He would not lose."

"And there is something else."

Kyo tapped one finger against his temple.

"Joren may act reckless, but his head is clearer than almost anyone I know."

"Do you really think he would have sent me away if he was not absolutely sure?"

Manester paused.

That...

Actually made perfect sense.

Joren was the kind of person who never made a move without knowing exactly what he stood to gain.

From the outside, half the things he did looked suicidal.

Then you looked closer and realized the bastard had already calculated everything.

If he had dared send Kyo away and remain alone in the core region...

Then in Joren’s mind, those three beast kings had probably stopped being enemies.

They were already corpses.

Once that thought settled in, the weight in Manester’s chest vanished.

A smile almost followed.

His gaze shifted toward the direction Sable had disappeared.

"Damn."

He shook his head.

"Poor Sable."

"Came all this way planning to perform some heroic rescue of an idiot."

"When he gets there, he is going to find out the idiot was him."

Kyo laughed.

"Let us go."

Manester crushed out his cigarette and leaned toward the driver.

"Drive faster."

"I want to see how our honorable inspector is doing."

...

Deep inside the Fallen Zone, a black figure tore across the ruins like a human cannonball.

Protective force raged around him.

Sable.

At this point, he had completely abandoned any concern for dignity.

There was only one thought left in his head.

Save them.

He despised Joren.

Thought the kid was arrogant, reckless, beyond saving.

But Sable was still an official of Highcrest City.

And there were three thousand soldiers out there who had done nothing wrong.

He could not let them die because of one boy’s stupidity.

"Joren, you little bastard!"

Sable raced forward, cursing inwardly.

"If even one soldier dies because of you, I swear I will drag you before a military tribunal even if it costs me this uniform!"

"Just hold on."

"Stay alive."

"If even one breath remains, I can still get you out."

The abandoned television tower finally came into view.

Sable’s chest tightened.

He had already prepared himself for what he expected to see.

Corpses everywhere.

Voidbeasts running wild.

A battlefield turned into hell.

Maybe even that arrogant young Frontier Marshal on his knees, finally understanding how badly he had miscalculated.

Then Sable cleared the last stretch of ruins.

The scene opened before him.

And he stopped.

Completely.

His body went from full speed to stillness so violently that the ground cracked beneath his feet.

He did not notice.

His mouth had fallen open.

The fury in his eyes vanished.

There were corpses everywhere.

That part was true.

But not one belonged to a human.

Voidbeasts.

Nothing but Voidbeasts.

Large ones.

Small ones.

Bodies scattered in every direction until the blood soaked into nearly every visible patch of ground.

The stench was overwhelming.

Midday sunlight poured down like molten gold across the four hundred meter television tower.

At the very top, closest to the sky, stood one figure.

Tall.

Still.

A black coat snapping in the wind like a battle flag planted at the edge of the world.

Joren said nothing.

Did nothing.

One hand rested on the hilt of the absurdly large black blade beside him as he looked down over the land that had just been taken back.

Behind him, carved into a massive rusted steel plate, were words that seemed to blaze beneath the sunlight.

Every stroke carried enough Blade Intent to make the eye ache.

[Take Back the Wastes, Reclaim Our Land!]

The sight struck Sable like a hammer to the skull.

His thoughts went blank.

Then his gaze dropped.

Three thousand Antares Command soldiers stood in formation beneath the tower.

Perfectly still.

No one spoke.

No one moved.

They had not even noticed the unexpected arrival of an inspector from Highcrest City.

Three thousand pairs of eyes were fixed on the same person above them.

Bloodshot.

Burning.

Sable knew that look.

He had seen it before.

Just never directed at a military commander.

Those were not soldiers looking at a superior officer.

Those were believers looking at something sacred.

Travelers who had crossed endless darkness and finally seen the sun break through.

Sable tried to speak.

"This..."

One hand rose, trembling slightly, pointing toward the figure above.

Every reprimand he had prepared on the way here died in his throat.

He wanted to call Joren arrogant.

The mountains of Voidbeast corpses around him answered first.

That was not arrogance.

That was strength.

He wanted to call him a spoiled brat intoxicated by authority.

Then his eyes returned to the words carved into the tower.

[Take Back the Wastes, Reclaim Our Land!]

Even Sable, who had spent half his life navigating power and politics, felt suddenly small beside the force carried in those words.

Then the figure at the summit moved.

Joren seemed to notice him.

He turned.

From hundreds of meters above, his eyes settled on Sable.

Their gazes met.

Sable’s body stiffened.

He was an inspector from Highcrest City.

A Rank Five expert accustomed to standing above others.

Yet the instant those eyes fell on him, his presence was suppressed by a seventeen year old boy.

Joren’s gaze was quiet.

Deep.

And beneath that stillness lay an indifference that seemed to place every living thing at the same distance.

For one impossible moment, Sable felt an instinct he had never expected from himself.

The urge to bow.