COZMART: Corner Shop of Visiting Gods

The Azure Dragon's triple-layered barrier hung over the camp like an aurora, three concentric lattices humming against distant bombardments. Every concussion out on the ridge rippled the dome, but inside the air stayed cool—insulated insanity.

Finn was first through the barrier, collapsing onto a pile of soft, illusory furs. He wheezed for a moment, eyes wide. "I nearly got killed by a negotiation. Negotiation!"

Willow strolled in shortly after, armour still spitting residual sparks. She unhooked a dented pauldron, let it clatter. "I landed on an infantry battalion," she said. "They apologized for existing."

Eathan ignored them—eyes on the ghostly timer burning overhead:

[TIME REMAINING]:

63:31:49

Below it was the emergency exit seal that the commentators had mentioned. He squinted at it suspiciously, prodding the glowing rune, half-expecting teeth.

Behind him, Willow folded her arms, brow raised. "Seriously, intern? Don't tell me you're already looking for escape routes."

"Clearly, you haven't read enough webnovels." Eathan shot her a look. "First rule of survival in a pocket dimension: always confirm the fire exit. Trust me, I'm saving our lives here."

The seal responded, flaring to life.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO EXIT ROUND THREE OF THE 39TH REALM-BARRIER GAMES?

NOTE: Your team will automatically be eliminated from ranking considerations.

Below the question displayed two simple prompts—[YES] and [NO]—as if mockingly straightforward. Eathan's shoulders slumped in visible relief.

"We're good." He exhaled. "I honestly thought we'd end up sealed inside some murderous nightmare sabotage with no way out."

From a lotus-cushion, Quine Long arched a brow. "How oddly specific."

Eathan ignored him, grabbing the seal and tucking it into his pouch. After a deep breath, he turned toward the team, trying to look authoritative despite the shredded hoodie and dirt streaks.

"Okay, agenda," he began, eyes darting between them. "This situation obviously sucks, but we have a relatively straightforward way out."

Chewie tilted her head. Finn actually sat up. Willow watched, sceptical.

Eathan listed rapidly, fingers held up one by one. "First, intel—we need to learn about these different factions, what their deal is, what they want. Second, we find Mister White, convince him that this is all just a really bad dream he can wake up from. Third, if he doesn't buy the dream angle, we resort to Step Three, which is to negotiate peace using Step One's intel."

Finn nodded, the picture of morbid optimism. "Right, we walk up to the universe's meanest cat god, gently tell him 'buddy, you're just in a bad dream', and kindly ask him to stop murdering everyone. Love it."

"That's it?" Willow snorted. "That's the master plan? We politely tell the ruthless god of judgment this is all a dream and ask him to wake up?"

Chewie's gaze flickered toward Eathan. "Genius."

Eathan exhaled slowly, mustering confidence from nowhere. "Look, we all know Mister White—he might be terrifying, but he's rational. He can listen, even if he pretends otherwise," he said, gesturing toward the long-haired man yawning in the corner. "Plus, we have a huge advantage here—the Azure Dragon's on our side. No one slams the door on him, so we can easily get access to the faction leaders. We collect stories, present a solution, commander listens."

Before he could continue, Chewie interrupted with a lift of her hand. "Tiny reminder, since it seems that we forgot something important—" she said, "—like being thrown three thousand years backward into one of the bloodiest wars of realm history. Smack in the Age of Sundering."

At that, Eathan blinked twice. "Come again?"

"Indeed," Quine Long said, tone turning lecture-hall smooth as he leaned forward, fingers interlaced. "Welcome to the Southeastern Ridge. You've been dropped into the climax of a two-century bloodbath."

Night-market memories of cracked talismans and sect legends punched Eathan in the gut. He swallowed, voice suddenly quiet. "Age of Sundering? That's actually canon?"

Chewie nodded once, arms crossed. "A massive collapse of spiritual boundaries—node membranes ruptured, leylines went rogue, cities vanished overnight. Entire provinces aged centuries in seconds, boundaries between realms have never been so blurred."

"A wonderfully chaotic era." The dragon smiled. "A carnival of extinction. Demon Prince Cang on one side, Ascendant Alliance on the other, mortals in the blender."

"You're saying this is that kind of war?" Finn looked increasingly pale as he threw the team a look. "And it's lasted for two hundred years?"

Chewie gave a single nod, arms crossed over her chest. "It's a conflict primarily between Demon Prince Cang and the Ascendant Alliance. Cang wanted this island—it had a uniquely potent geomantic structure. Perfect qi breeding ground for his demon armies."

Eathan swallowed. "And the mortals were just..."

"Caught in the middle, mostly," Quine Long said, as if recounting an old, trivial story. "The Ascendant Alliance uses them as frontline fodder. Easily expendable, easily replaced."

Silence hung in the air. Willow's expression darkened; Finn quietly clenched his fists.

"...The MSR allowed this?" Eathan asked.

"The MSR didn't exist back then." Chewie shrugged. "Instead, it was the War Council, and they didn't care."

"War Council?"

"Mm-hm. The Council back then was not your present diplomatic mess," said Quine Long. "Think militaristic, brutally efficient, and utterly disinterested in mortal life."

He smiled faintly, eyes hooded.

"Until, of course, demonic qi started corrupting the mortal leylines, destabilizing spiritual domains in surrounding regions. That got their attention."

Finn let out a breath, nodding slowly. "Then they intervened, I'm assuming."

"More specifically," Quine Long said, "they sent Bai Hu—Supreme Judge-Executor. You know him as Taeril White, your beloved commander. He's better known here as the Pale Judgment. His job was simple: eliminate the problem. Completely."

Eathan shifted uncomfortably. "And did he?"

"Eventually." Quine Long shrugged. "After mortal sectors were razed, after spiritual nodes were corrupted, after the Kunlun Anchorage—the island's central spiritual nexus—was on the brink of collapse. He grew tired of the war's tediousness."

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

"He destroyed the entire island. Erased it all," Chewie finished bluntly.

Silence again.

Finn managed a weak laugh, disbelief mingling with dread. "Commander White did… that?"

"Different millennia, different standards."

Quine Long tilted his head toward Eathan, quietly amused. "Still think you'll reason with him?"

Under his emerald eyes, Eathan finally straightened, voice firm despite unease. "Still, we have to at least try. Commander White isn't the same person now. He's ruthless, sure, but he's rational."

Willow's brows furrowed. "You really think we can talk diplomacy with him? This version of him?"

"He's the White Tiger. Every version of him we've met can think rationally," he said. "Especially since this one is just amnesiac. We have to give him the benefit of the doubt."

Finn interjected, raising his hand. "Okay, great speech, Eathan. But say he doesn't believe us and gets angry. What's our backup?"

Eathan brandished the glowing emergency seal again. "Then we get the hell out of here."

"...Fine." Chewie heaved a resigned sigh, pushing herself to her feet. "Your funeral."

"Then let's do it right—starting with the mortals." Willow cracked her knuckles, stepping forward at once. "If anyone deserves their story heard first, it's probably them."

Eathan nodded gratefully at their reactions. He glanced at the Azure Dragon. "You can get us easy access, right? Nobody will refuse the Azure Dragon."

"Naturally." Quine Long leaned back. "But honestly, a waste of breath, vessel. You hardly need conversations to understand their minds. Mortals are transparent enough—desperate pawns tossed between forces they barely understand."

"No. We absolutely need to talk to them," Eathan said. "Every disaster I've read about happens because big players dismiss the little voices and end up overlooking important clues. We aren't making that mistake."

Quine Long watched him with an unreadable gaze, then a smile curved. "Earnestness—so nostalgic."

Eathan didn't respond, stepping forward purposefully. "Alright, plan overview: we talk to the mortals first, then the cultivators, then the demons. Afterward, we'll have enough intel to make an appeal to Mister White."

Finn flopped onto the rugs again. "If we're still breathing."

They divided tasks under a bruised moon. By the time the ward dimmed to night-light, the plan—ragged, idealistic—was set. At dawn, they would walk back into history's worst morning and try to talk a god out of genocide.

***

If there was one thing Eathan had learned about being in a war zone among immortals, it was that there was no such thing as morning and night.

The Southeastern Ridge had no dawn—just a permanent bruise overhead, crimson-grey and crackling. By the time he woke beneath it, three-fifths of Team 001 were already gone. He poked his head outside, decided it was "morning," and followed Chewie back into the war.

Dust muted their footfalls. Blood already blackened the dirt, stiff under his soles. The Mortal Coalition's camp crouched ahead, tents patched with talisman paper and hope. As soon as they passed into sight, General Shen Hai emerged from the largest pavilion, armour unbuckled, eyes burning through fatigue.

"You've returned," he acknowledged, tone carefully neutral. "Is this good news, or should we start digging deeper trenches?"

"We're still collecting intel." Eathan forced a smile that felt like cardboard. Following the general back inside the pavillion tent, he and Chewie took a seat at the center platform. Shen Hai offered them tea, Eathan refused with a polite shake of his head.

"About Lord Qing Long," the general said. "Is his arrival here our miracle, or another calamity?"

Chewie shrugged, muttering under her breath, "Comes down to how loudly people insist on annoying him."

"We expect… nuanced participation. Nothing catastrophic on the itinerary." Eathan threw in diplomacy like a life-ring. "We're trying to make this end as painlessly smooth as possible, you see. And so we've been wondering, general—why keep your lines in the meat-grinder? From what I gather, this is largely a war between the Ascendant Alliance and the demons. Demons against cultivators. Another mortal charge only fattens the butcher's bill."

At his question, Shen Hai only shook his head, sadness flickering briefly behind darkened eyes.

"Because the butcher's bill is written on our soil." He looked past Eathan, past the smoke. "We never had illusions about our worth compared to the cultivators and immortals, but this is our land. If we kneel, we're livestock. If we fight, we're men. Even doomed men can choose how to die."

Behind him, Captain Liang Yun—barely older than Eathan himself—stepped forward, helm tucked beneath one arm. "Cultivators call us 'mud walls,' expendable flesh shields because we can't cultivate qi. Abyssal Legion call us 'incubators', aiming to turn our home into a blood-soaked nursery for demons. The immortals call us nothing at all. They watch from above, playing their divine chess games while we bleed out."

Anger sharpened every word.

"So we answer in steel."

Shen Hai laid a calming hand on the captain's shoulder but didn't contradict him. "Karma's a wheel," Liang Yun added, softer. "One day it rolls over everyone."

Eathan shivered—he'd read that line in textbooks, but hearing it from a bleeding boy his age made it colder.

Chewie only shrugged. "Mortals have always been the board," she said. "You're simply noticing the squares are red."

***

The hills above Kunlun Gorge rose like broken fangs—red dirt, black shale, and a lace of defensive wards that shimmered turquoise in the noon glare. Quine Long drifted through the first barrier as if it were a bead curtain, sea-teal robes sliding around sigil light. Behind him, Willow picked careful footing, and Finn stumbled, still getting used to solid ground again.

As they reached deeper into the Ascendant Alliance encampment, a second screen of light parted, and two cultivators stepped out to intercept.

The woman—tall, crisp braid, robes cut with silver thread—dipped her chin to the dragon. "Lady Fei Qian," she said, voice as even as temple bells. "And Master Ouyang. We oversee the leyline stabilization efforts here."

The elder beside her moved like weathered jade—slow, deliberate—and bowed. "Azure Dragon," Ouyang's tone held that brittle courtesy people reserve for earthquake guests. "Your presence here—does it mark intervention, or merely observation?"

Quine Long offered a cryptic smile. "Neither. Or both. It depends on the weather."

Ouyang exhaled softly, understanding better than to press. Instead, he turned his scrutiny on the mortals in tow. Finn tried a polite wave; Willow just stared back like a loaded crossbow.

"Your arrival is… unexpected," he decided. "But the Ridge welcomes all willing hands during this tumultuous time."

"We're here to understand the situation better—maybe find a way to put an end to this war," Willow said.

Ouyang exchanged a cautious look with Fei Qian. Then, he gestured toward the barriers around them. "Come, then. It's easier to understand once you've seen it yourself."

As they walked through the ward barriers, the camp unfolded before them. Terraces cut into canyon walls where cultivators knelt in concentric rings, threads of pale-gold qi lacing from their palms into cracked ley-stones. Farther in, burly ascetics hammered fresh arrays into iron plates; runners darted with talisman scrolls, preparing to return to the bloody front lines. Everywhere the air tasted metallic, overcharged.

"Most cultivators here belong to the patch crew," Fei Qian said, catching Finn's wide-eyed survey. "If the qi network collapses, the Mortal Realm buckles from here to the poles, and repercussions will extend far beyond this battlefield. Our blades are secondary."

Finn pointed at a squad of mortal soldiers dragging ammunition crates. "So the humans…? A collaboration?"

Ouyang hesitated, then spoke carefully, "Collaborating is perhaps too generous a term. Guidance and protection of mortals is within our responsibility. Their presence is… helpful for frontline stabilization."

"Buffer layer," Fei Qian added without a blink. "They can't channel qi, but they can absorb casualties."

Willow picked up on the undertones, her jaws knitting. "Absorb?"

"I understand your discomfort, warrior. But mortals cannot harness qi. Their inability places them naturally in support positions," Fei Qian said, as if soothing a child. "By serving as the initial barrier, they enable us to maintain essential leyline repair."

"You mean you use them as meat shields?"

Fei Qian turned toward Willow, as if appraising the warrior standing before her. After a long second, approval flickered briefly through her expression.

"Numbers, warrior," she explained. "Mortal numbers shield us from unnecessary depletion of cultivators. The magnitude of this crisis may be beyond their capable comprehension, yet their sacrifice remains necessary."

Willow's glare could have sharpened steel. Finn cut in before someone got impaled. "But you said it yourselves, that protection towards mortals is a part of your responsibility."

"Responsibility, yes. But the greater responsibility is to ensure the stability of the Mortal Realm," Ouyang said. "If we falter in repairing the leylines, it's not merely one island or one generation lost—it is centuries of imbalance and suffering."

Finn fell silent, uncomfortable but unable to counter the logic fully. After a pause, he spoke again, offering cautious optimism. "We're hoping to speak directly to the White Tiger. If he understands the strain here, maybe he'll—"

"—sheath the sword he's been sharpening for centuries?" Fei Qian's smile was thin. "Brave thought."

She regarded Finn, this lanky mortal with panic in one eye and stubborn hope in the other. "You carry strength, child, and perhaps conviction as well. But confronting the White Tiger is not negotiation—it's facing unyielding steel. His mercy vanished long ago."

Finn swallowed. "Still better than sitting out the avalanche."

"Lord Qing Long, a word from you might carry." She turned to the Azure Dragon, carefully choosing her next words. "The Four Guardians exist through and share karmic bonds... perhaps your words carry more weight than ours."

Teal eyes slid her way—distant, like deep water under ice. Quine Long, who had remained silent through the entire exchange, looked at her with a lingering smile.

"Weight means nothing to a blade already falling," he said. Even Ouyang shivered at the chill in that voice.

"Of course, Azure Dragon." Fei Qian inclined her head immediately. "Forgive our presumption."

As the cultivators moved respectfully aside, Finn leaned closer to Willow, voice barely audible over the murmuring qi around them. "This negotiation gig keeps levelling up."

"Can't have that happening," Willow said. "We need a jailbreak."