The voice cut through the pre-dawn darkness like a blade through silk.
Deep. Amused. Dangerous.
Callum's blood went cold, and for a moment—just one terrible, crystalline moment—he understood what it felt like to be prey. Truly prey. Not the kind that could run or fight or bargain. The kind that simply waited for the end.
The four hunters froze.
Their leader—the woman with the curved blade and cold eyes—turned slowly toward the source of the voice. Her hand tightened on her weapon, and Callum saw something he hadn't expected to see from professional cultivator killers.
Fear.
"Who's there?" she called out, and her voice was steady but her stance wasn't. She'd shifted her weight onto the balls of her feet. Ready to run.
Smart woman.
The presence drew closer.
Callum felt it before he saw it—a pressure in the air, heavy and wrong, like reality itself had to make room for whatever was approaching. The sensation crawled across his skin like insects made of ice, and the ten ghosts in his head went utterly, completely silent.
Even the dead are afraid, Callum thought distantly. That's not a good sign.
A figure stepped into view.
Male. Tall—maybe six feet—with a build that suggested lean muscle rather than bulk. He wore dark robes that seemed to drink the light, making it hard to focus on the details. His face was sharp and angular, all hard edges and hollow cheeks, with eyes that gleamed like polished silver in the darkness. His hair was long and black, pulled back from his face with a leather cord.
He looked maybe thirty, though with cultivators, appearance meant nothing. He could be thirty or three hundred.
The man smiled, and it was the kind of smile that belonged on something that hunted for sport.
"Apologies," he said, his voice carrying that same amused tone. "I didn't mean to interrupt your hunt." His silver eyes swept over the four hunters, then landed on Callum. "Though I must say, four Stage Ones against one... that seems excessive."
"This isn't your concern," the leader said. Her voice had lost its earlier confidence. "We have a contract—"
"A death cultivator," the man interrupted, still smiling. "Five hundred spirit stones from the Blackvein Consortium. Yes, I'm aware." He tilted his head, studying Callum like he was an interesting specimen under glass. "Though looking at him, I'd say he's barely Stage One. Hardly worth the effort."
Callum's fingers tightened on the death-touched sword. The man's qi was... vast. Not overwhelming like Morrigan's had been before her binding, but deep and controlled. Stage Two at minimum. Maybe Stage Three.
And I'm dead either way, Callum thought. If the hunters don't kill me, he will. Question is: which death is faster?
"We saw him first," one of the other hunters said—a younger man, maybe twenty-five, with scars crossing his jaw. "Contract's ours."
"Did you?" The man's smile widened. "How unfortunate for you."
He moved.
Callum's eyes couldn't follow it. One moment the man was standing thirty feet away. The next, he was directly in front of the scarred hunter, one hand pressed gently against the young man's chest.
The hunter's eyes went wide. He opened his mouth to scream.
Nothing came out.
His skin turned gray—not the slow corruption of death qi, but instant, absolute. Like watching flesh turn to stone in real-time. The gray spread from the stranger's palm across the hunter's chest, up his neck, down his arms. In three heartbeats, the scarred man had become a statue of ash-colored stone.
The stranger stepped back, dusting off his hands.
The statue crumbled. Just... fell apart. Pieces of what had been a living person moments ago scattered across the volcanic rock like broken pottery.
The three remaining hunters didn't wait. They ran.
The stranger let them go, watching their retreat with that same amused expression. Like a cat that had caught a mouse and decided it wasn't hungry after all.
Then those silver eyes turned to Callum.
"Now then," the man said. "That's better. Less crowded."
Callum didn't move. Couldn't move. His mind was still processing what he'd just seen. Stage One cultivator reduced to ash in three heartbeats. No fight. No struggle. Just touch and death.
That's Stage Three at least, he thought. And I'm alone with him.
"You can put the sword down," the stranger said. "If I wanted you dead, you'd be dust already."
It was the truth. Callum knew it was the truth. But his hand didn't release the weapon.
The man sighed. "Stubborn. I respect that." He settled cross-legged on the ground—casual, relaxed, like they were old friends meeting for tea instead of a cultivator who'd just killed someone and his potential next victim. "My name is Ren. And you, death cultivator, are remarkably stupid."
Callum's jaw tightened. "Excuse me?"
"Walking around the Ashen Wastes with that crude disguise technique." Ren waved a hand dismissively. "You might as well wear a sign that says 'please kill me for the bounty.' Any cultivator with half a brain could sense what you are underneath it."
"It's worked so far," Callum said.
"Against mortals and weak Stage Ones, perhaps." Ren's smile turned predatory. "Against anyone who matters? You're broadcasting your death qi like a bonfire in the dark."
Morrigan appeared beside Callum, visible only to him, her eyes locked on Ren with an intensity that made the air feel colder.
"He's right," she said quietly. "Your Ash Cloak is pathetic. I taught you the basics, but you haven't practiced enough. Every competent cultivator within a hundred feet can see through it."
Thanks for the vote of confidence, Callum thought.
"So what do you want?" Callum asked Ren. "If you're not here to collect the bounty—"
"I'm not," Ren interrupted. "The Blackvein Consortium's politics bore me." He stood in one fluid motion, brushing ash from his robes. "But I am curious. Death cultivation is... rare. Most who attempt it go mad within the first few consumptions. Yet you've made it to Stage One. Barely, but still."
He knows, Callum realized. He knows exactly what I am and how far I've come. How?
"Ten consumptions," Ren continued, as if reading Callum's thoughts. "Five mortals, five Stage Ones. Your soul should be fracturing by now. The contamination alone..." He trailed off, studying Callum with those unsettling silver eyes. "But you're still coherent. Still rational. Interesting."
"I'm leaving now," Callum said, taking a step back toward the gap in the ruins.
"Are you?" Ren's voice carried a note of amusement. "Running from me would be pointless. I'd catch you in three steps."
"Then why not kill me already?"
"Because," Ren said, and his smile took on a different quality—less predatory, more... calculating, "I think we might be useful to each other."
Callum stopped. "Useful how?"
"You're heading to The Scar, aren't you? To train, to grow stronger, to consume more corpses in that wonderful death qi-saturated canyon." Ren took a step closer. "But you don't know the first thing about what you'll find there. The beasts. The other death cultivators. The territorial disputes."
"And you do?"
"I've been there." Ren's eyes glinted. "Multiple times. I know which areas are controlled by whom. Which beasts are worth hunting and which will kill you before you can blink. Which death cultivators might teach you and which will gut you for practice."
Information, Callum thought. Valuable information. But nothing is free in the Wastes.
"What's the cost?" he asked.
Ren's smile widened. "Smart question. The cost is simple: when you reach Stage Two—and you will, with proper guidance—you'll owe me a favor. One task. No questions asked."
Every instinct Callum had screamed danger. Open-ended favors were how people ended up dead or enslaved or worse. Morrigan had warned him about cultivation world debts—they bound deeper than contracts, enforced by oath and qi and the very cultivation base you'd sworn on.
But the alternative was stumbling into The Scar blind. Alone. Weak. Against beasts and cultivators who actually knew what they were doing.
"He's lying," Morrigan said flatly. "No one offers help without strings attached. And Stage Threes don't befriend Stage Ones unless they want something specific."
"I know," Callum murmured.
"Then refuse. Walk away. We'll figure out The Scar ourselves."
Callum looked at Ren. At those silver eyes that held secrets and danger and knowledge. At the remains of the hunter scattered across the stone—a reminder of what real power looked like.
I'm going to regret this, he thought.
But he was already regretting most of his life choices. What was one more?
"One favor," Callum said. "At Stage Two. Nothing that requires me to kill innocents or betray my path."
Ren's smile became genuine—or at least, a better imitation of genuine. "Deal." He extended his hand.
Callum hesitated, then reached out.
Their hands clasped, and Callum felt something settle into his cultivation base—not painful, not invasive, just... there. A mark. A binding. The promise made real.
He'd just sold a piece of his future to a man he'd met five minutes ago.
Definitely going to regret this, he thought.
Ren released his hand and gestured northeast. "Come. We have a day and a half to The Scar, and much to discuss." He started walking, confident that Callum would follow.
Which he would. Because what other choice did he have?
Callum fell into step beside the stranger, the death-touched sword heavy at his hip, ten ghosts whispering warnings he was already ignoring.
Morrigan floated on his other side, her expression carved from ancient stone and bitter experience.
"This will end badly," she said.
"Probably," Callum agreed.
But he kept walking anyway.
And behind them, in the ruins where four hunters had ambushed a death cultivator and one had died for it, the sun finally began to rise over the Ashen Wastes.
The light revealed ash and stone and scattered remains.
And a single figure watching from the distant ridge—too far to have intervened, close enough to have seen everything.
The watcher smiled beneath their hood and disappeared into the volcanic rock like smoke dissolving in wind.
Three players now circled the death cultivator.
And none of them had shown their true hand.