Elder Sterling sat on an overturned wooden crate outside the three-foot ice wall.
His brass-rimmed reading spectacles perched precariously on the bridge of his crooked nose.
A single tallow candle sputtered inside a cracked glass lantern beside his worn leather boots.
In his calloused, sword-scarred hands, the Golden Core Peak elder held Book 7 of The Bandit King’s Secret Bride.
His bushy gray eyebrows were knitted into a fierce, agonized knot.
He turned the final leaf of coarse woodblock parchment with exquisite care.
On the final page, the Bandit King stood alone at the edge of the Thousand-Sword Cliff.
He was riddled with forty poisoned black arrows.
