A Man Like None Other (Jared Chance) novel Chapter 6432

"At the same moment, the two of them opened their eyes.

Their gazes met across the distance."

"No words passed between them.

They did not need any signal at all to read what lay buried deep in each other's eyes: the same heavy pressure, settled in the same place."

"They saw the shadow hanging over the road ahead, refusing to lift.

They saw the life-and-death crisis pressing down on both of them."

In the Celestial Alliance, two supreme elders who had been in seclusion for years had already reached the final closing stage of their assault on the Golden Immortal threshold.

At any moment, they could break through the barrier and emerge, stepping into the rank of Golden Immortal.

Once a Golden Immortal appeared, every True Immortal became an ant.

"That gulf was a heavenly chasm.

It could not be crossed."

Jared slowly rose to his feet and walked out of Pentacarna Tower with steady steps.

His gaze swept across all of Freevale's square.

"Across the square, every cultivator trained and cultivated with everything they had.

Not one of them dared slack off, not even a little."

Elder Cillian personally led three hundred elite Sylvan warriors, moving day and night between Pentacarna Tower and the vale.

"They used the time difference inside the tower to train hard and gather strength.

Their spiritual power grew richer by the day."

"Their battle formations locked together with sharper and sharper coordination.

Life-filled spiritual power brimming around them, their battle strength climbed step by step."

Nathaniel directed the human Resistance, drilling killing battle formations day and night without pause.

They hammered their combat skills, strengthened their attack-and-defense coordination, and tempered their will and nerve.

"Their discipline held strict.

Their formations stayed orderly.

Their morale still held."

They had sworn to defend Freevale to the death.

"Everyone was fighting to grow stronger.

Everyone was fighting to prepare for war."

"They wanted to hold on to their homeland.

They wanted to hold on to the hard-won days of peace they had barely managed to claim."

"But Jared understood with brutal clarity that all of this was nowhere near enough.

A cup of water against a burning cart.

Effort that could not change the ending."

"It would not matter how many cultivators they had.

It would not matter how practiced the battle formations became, or how dense their spiritual power grew."

"Before a genuine Golden Immortal adept, they would be no more than ants and dust.

They would not withstand a single blow."

Numbers, tactics, arms, the secret art—everything they could bring together still could not erase the heavenly gap between a True Immortal and a Golden Immortal.

Alone, he walked up to the upper ramparts of Freevale and stood there in the wind.

Jared looked far toward the Northern Marches, toward the place where the Celestial Alliance held its ground.

The distant horizon lay dark and heavy, and from somewhere beyond sight, a killing edge seemed to press across the empty miles.

For a long while, he stood there without a word. Inside him, every possible answer turned into a dead end; every part of him still pushed against it; every measure he had left came up short.

"Then we can only gamble," he murmured under his breath.

His voice came out low and rough, worn down to the bone, with no clear direction left in it.

"We gamble that the two Grand Elders fail in their attempt to reach Golden Immortal, that they fall short at the last step."

"We gamble that something goes wrong in seclusion, and the backlash leaves them badly wounded."

"We gamble that before they break through, we can fight our way into the heartland of the Celestial Alliance and break it open with our lives on the line."

"We end this war before they get the chance. Apart from that, there is no way out."

Nathaniel walked slowly up onto the city walls and came to Jared's side.

He had heard every word of that low murmur. His chest dropped under the weight of it, and a bitter smile tugged at his face.

No warmth remained in that smile.

"A gamble? You're talking about all our lives, and the safety of everyone in Freevale."

"The path to survival for tens of thousands of clansmen—are we really staking all of it on one throw?"

"Do we still have any road left behind us?"

Jared did not turn back. He gave no answer.

There was nothing he could say, and no bright road ahead came into view.

He could not find a perfect plan, either.

A powerful enemy was on its way, and the dead end had already closed around them. Beyond that gamble, no choice remained.

The sense that no strength would be enough rose like a cold tide, slowly covering the bottom of his heart, pressing until even breath seemed hard to draw.

Several days went by in a rush, gone almost before anyone could mark them.

That morning, the sky hung in one flat sheet of gray.

Thick clouds piled layer upon layer, sagging low over the horizon. No daylight showed. No wind stirred.

Everything felt dull and compressed, heavy enough to tighten the chest and keep the mind from settling.

For no clear reason, no one could stay still. It was as if some disaster had already begun lowering itself over the world.

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