Chapter 116

I walked through the bazaar, my destination the red light district. The morning sun shined brightly at this hour. I looked at the sun and thought of Jane. Her vampire blood running through me, empowering me and making me immune to the sun's harsh reality upon all vampire kind.

' Man I miss that crazy woman. To think she made me promise to make her my first wife… did she already know I'm scum who would take any woman I fancy? That is true in a sense. But not any woman!'

I was deep in my thoughts when a woman bumped into me. I thought it was a poor attempt at pickpocketing. But when I looked down to see a mortal woman with fair brown skin and long auburn hair down , with tattered clothing on, with her fruit basket down beside her, the fruit strewn along the pavement. I couldn't help but feel sorry as she rubbed her head.

" Oww~… did I bump into stone or something?" The woman said as she looked up, only to freeze as she looked up at me.

'W-Woah! How can someone be so, so handsome!?' The girl thought as she gazed at the young man in front of her. He had a slight smile on his face as he noticed her infatuated gaze on him.

'Yep. Still got it~.' Jason thought as he got down and started collecting the fruits. 'Man, those are some big tits.' Jason couldn't help but sneak a peek at her mountain peaks.

'Not as big as Edna. But big nonetheless.'

" You should be more wary of who you bump into, young lady. Not everyone would be as easy-going as I." Jason said. Smiling warmly as he finished collecting the fruit for the girl.

The girl came out of her reverie, noticing her fruit basket filled, she looked at Jason with an incredulous gaze.

"T-Thank you, you didn't have to do that though." The girl got up and bowed slightly.

"Eh, why not. Just my good deed for the day. See ya. " Jason said and waved her goodbye as he went on his way.

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Ramla looked on as the handsome young man made his way toward the red light district. As she realized that, her face scrunched in disgust.

"Who was that?" Nea said beside her.

Ramla flinched, looking at her sister with a pout.

"You scared me! And that's no one. Just some man on his way to a brothel or something." Ramla said as she looked and saw Adea carrying the rest of their groceries from a nearby store.

"Typical men, Hmph! Let's go back home, I'm exhausted…" Nea said as she dragged her feet while carrying heavier weight than both of her sisters thanks to her Dwarven ancestry.

" I really thought he would be different, you know? He was too handsome for him to go to a brothel." Ramla commented as they went on their way to their lodging.

She checked her fruit basket, hoping he at least took a fruit for the road, only to see a pouch buried between.

Ramla opened the pouch, only to be surprised by the golden brightness within.

'There's more than fifty gold coins here… who is that man?'

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Jason stepped into the brothel.

Perfume, smoke, and low laughter drifted through the air like a spell meant to make you forget the outside world. But Jason remembered too much. His boots tracked in the dust of a long desert road, his cloak still crusted with fine sand. He stood out—foreign, sun-burnt, and far from home.

He wasn't looking for comfort. He was looking for a ship.

Rumor had it that somewhere in Pearlwater, there was a vessel willing to cross the ocean. Not west to the spice isles or east along the merchant lanes—but north, toward the Empire of Dawn. Most said it was a myth. A fool's dream. But Jason kept asking.

Eventually, someone pointed him toward a man named Sable.

He found him in a quiet corner, seated on velvet cushions, half-lost in the shadows. Sable watched him approach with a faint smile, like he'd been expecting him.

"You're not from here," Sable said, taking in the cloak, the way Jason's hand hovered near the hilt of his blade. "And you're not here for women."

"I'm looking for a ship," Jason said. "One that sails beyond the northern reach."

Sable chuckled, low and dry. "You and a hundred dead men."

Jason didn't blink.

After a pause, Sable nodded slowly. "There is such a ship. But she doesn't take passengers. Only survivors."

Jason frowned. "Survivors of what?"

"A tournament," Sable said. "Fighting to the death. Win, and you earn a place aboard."

Jason's jaw tightened. "What's the ship's name?"

Sable's eyes glinted in the lamplight. "The Dalyla. She sails with the first tide after the full moon."

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The moon hung low and full over Pearlwater when Jason followed Sable through the sleeping city. The brothel's warmth was long behind them, replaced by narrow alleys and the hush of stone streets slick with sea mist. Sable moved like a man who belonged in the shadows. Jason followed without a word, his dusty cloak trailing behind him like a faded banner.

"You don't ask many questions," Sable said over his shoulder.

"I don't need to."

Sable glanced back, amused. "Most men would want to know what they're walking into."

Jason didn't answer. He didn't need to.

They reached an old iron grate sunk into the street, half-covered in moss and rust. Sable pried it open with a grunt and dropped into the darkness below. Jason followed without hesitation.

The cistern beneath the city was ancient—stone tunnels arched high above, slick with condensation. They passed torch-lit corridors, distant echoes of water dripping in the black. But as they moved deeper, the sound changed—voices, distant and hungry, the thud of boots, the sharp ring of steel.

The fighting pit.

It wasn't grand. Just a wide circle of stone ringed by broken columns and rotting benches. Men and women gathered in clusters, hooded and murmuring, their faces pale in the firelight. Blood stained the floor. Old and new.

Sable turned to him. "There's no sign-up. No ceremony. They watch. They choose. If you step in, there's no stepping out."

Jason pulled back his hood. His pale hair caught the firelight. "That's fine."

Sable looked him over, frowning slightly. "No armor. No blade."

"I don't need one."

That made Sable grin. "Body cultivator, then. I should've guessed. Desert-born and quiet as the grave."

Jason didn't want to correct him.

'Quiet as the grave... that sounded cool.' Jason chuckled inwardly.

A horn sounded—a low, hollow bellow that echoed through the cistern like a call from the underworld.

"They've seen you," Sable said, nodding toward the pit. "You're up."

Jason stepped forward, his boots echoing against the stone. He unfastened his cloak, letting it fall to the blood-soaked floor.

The crowd quieted.

Across the pit, a massive man stepped forward, wielding an axe nearly as tall as Jason himself. He was scarred, snarling, and very used to killing.

Jason just raised a hand, palm open, and beckoned.

The man across the pit let out a bellow and slammed the axe against his chest, the sound echoing off the stone walls. The crowd roared with approval—bets shouted, fists raised. Bloodlust thickened the air.

Jason didn't move.

The man charged.

Fast, for someone so massive. The axe came down in a diagonal arc, powerful enough to split stone. Jason didn't dodge. He stepped forward, inside the arc, and his hand lashed out—flat and open, like a hammer wrapped in skin.

It hit the man's chest with a *crack* that echoed like a whip.

The fighter staggered back, gasping, all the air knocked from his lungs. Jason's fingers had sunk into the muscle between his ribs like they belonged there.

The axe clattered to the floor.

Jason didn't wait. He moved like a landslide—silent, inevitable. A step, a turn, a strike to the knee. Bone buckled. Another to the neck. The man collapsed, choking, twitching.

Silence fell.

The crowd didn't cheer. Not yet. They weren't sure what they'd just seen.

Jason stepped back, breathing steady. He hadn't even broken a sweat.

The pitmaster—an older woman with one eye and a ring of keys on her belt—stood from the shadows and nodded.

"That's enough," she said. "He's alive. That counts."

She looked to Sable. "He fights again in an hour. If he wins that, the captain will want to see him."

Sable raised a brow at Jason. "Think you'll need that hour?"

Jason glanced at his knuckles. Barely a scratch.

"I'll wait," he said. "But I won't need it."