The Man’s Decree – Chapter 6332

Morning came to Snowfall Hollow. The snow peaks caught the first light and gave off a faint wash of gold.

Ice Seal had cleared out the square in the middle of town. Thick rugs made from beast hide had been spread across the ground, and braziers had been lit all around it. Flames danced inside the braziers, throwing bright light over the whole square and pushing back the cold that seeped down from deep in the mountains.

One hundred thirty-seven rescued cultivators stood in the square. They still had on the same tattered clothes from the mine.

Some of them didn't even have shoes. Their bare feet rested on the freezing ground. Their bodies were gaunt, all bone and no flesh. Their faces looked paper-white. Their eye sockets had sunk deep, and their cheekbones jutted sharply. But the dead blankness was gone from their eyes.

From the moment they had been pulled out of the mine, that emptiness had started to fade bit by bit, and something else had taken its place-something hard to put into words. It looked like hope. It looked like expectation. Like a tree that had been bent under pressure for far too long, and had finally been given the chance to straighten its back again.