The ten thousand spectators seated along the cliffs of Granite Platform One were waiting for the sound of wet meat hitting stone.
In the long, bloody history of the Continental Conclave, every fighter who had ever fallen into the Thousand-Array Deep gap without an old family void-skiff had been reduced to a fine crimson spray within four seconds.
The spatial shears of the deep pit didn’t negotiate. They were razor-thin space-folding fault lines that sliced through flesh, bone, and soul with the cold indifference of a heavy-duty meat slicer.
Yet, as Lu Zhen took his third step out into the void, no blood fell.
No bones snapped.
No spiritual ward shattered with a violent crackle.
Instead, Frank’s body slipped into the tiny gap between spatial map points with the silent finality of an oiled piston sliding into a polished metal tube.
The air around him didn’t whistle. The howling five-hundred-mile void gale that battered the Astral Void-Skiff didn’t even rustle the denim fabric of his overalls.
