Chapter 15 · The Gatekeeper's Gambit - Chapter 15: He Steals the Rejects Back

The execution bolt hung in the air above them like a spear made of lightning and judgment, and Mo Han had maybe thirty seconds before it punched through the kid's chest and turned him into ash. The mark on the boy's wrist was still glowing that sick purple color, the kind that said the tower had already written him off as worthless.

Yun Sheng was yelling something, her voice high and sharp, but Mo Han was not listening because he was too busy calculating whether he had enough time to pull this off before Wei Tiegu's little automatic murder system finished the job.

He did not have enough time. He knew that. But he also knew the rules, and the rules had a gap, and if he was fast and if Su Jin did not decide to let him burn for dragging her into this mess, then maybe—maybe—he could flip the tower's verdict before the bolt landed. The problem was that the only person who could authorize a mark reversal at this stage was someone with flame authority.