The Man’s Decree – Chapter 5840

"The Thousand-Year Frostblood Lotus springs from the Blood-Soul Frostpool buried beneath the Eternal Ice Plains at the pole of level ten. It drinks a thousand years of frozen venom and subterranean lifeblood, flowering for only three days each century..."

"The Jadeheart Marrow dripped once in ten millennia from the molten crystal veins at the pit of level eleven's infernal Lava Abyss, tempered by the purest earthfire and soil spirits; it anchors body and soul alike... And..."

"The Nine-Orifice Divine Soul Herb sprouted only inside spectral caverns or dreambound labyrinths of level twelve. each blade opening nine tiny vents that breathe raw soul force, an unrivaled tonic for the spirit."

Any one of those treasures could launch wars. To seek all three was to wade into a storm of blood.

Vermilion was a stranger on level ten, his power merely middling here. Alone, he would be swallowed before he ever glimpsed the first bloom.