Six King-Rank Warriors

Northern Front, Sector G-7, abandoned war zone.

The sky over this area was a sickly yellow-brown. Heavy clouds hung low overhead, like a filthy rag that could never be wrung dry.

Branches of the Spatial Rift had torn countless gashes across the earth. Some were large enough to swallow a medium-sized transport ship; others were only as thick as an arm.

Turbulent energy poured from the rifts, twisting the air into waves of heat and tearing distant scenery to pieces.

The ground was strewn with the wreckage of a war fought more than a decade ago. Broken alloy frames lay half-buried in rubble, and rust-streaked gun barrels jutted at angles from the ruins like bones no one had come to bury.

Yang Shuyan walked alone through the ruins.

She did not walk quickly, but every step was steady.

Her dark gray combat suit fluttered in the turbulent energy, while the bun pinned with a wooden hairpin remained perfectly neat. Her hands hung naturally at her sides. She carried no weapon.

She knew Bloodwing was watching.

Her movements had been exposed the moment she entered the first Feathered Human scout patrol zone.

The scouts hidden in the shadows did not attack. They watched, passed on reports, and waited for their temple master to decide.

Yang Shuyan neither looked back nor quickened her pace.

She followed her planned route deeper in, crossing a battlefield shattered by the Spatial Rift, then a dried-up channel where energy had once flowed. Beneath the yellow-brown light, she left a long, solitary shadow.

The false objective the Military Department had prepared for her was to investigate the pattern of Spatial Rift activity in Sector G-7.

It was credible enough: the Federation truly needed that intelligence. It was also important enough to warrant a Divine Intent Grandmaster coming