The transition was instantaneous and disorienting. One moment, Li Yu was standing on the blood-soaked soil of the Iron-Web Gorge. The next, the world inverted, folded in on itself and expanded outward in a wash of silent white light.

  Li Yu stumbled slightly as he planted his feet firmly to catch his balance. He gripped his staff, his knuckles white and swung it in a wide defensive arc before his vision even cleared.

  "Sentry!" he commanded.

  Hum.

  The blue avatar detached from his body instantly and materialized at his back with a spear of condensed ice ready. Li Yu breathed a sigh of relief. Whatever this box was, it didn't block his own abilities.

  He reached for his necklace to call out Si Luo and Bai Ruo but his hand grasped only the frayed end of a simple string.

  "Damn," Li Yu muttered. "Looks like they knew and only brought me into this place."

  He straightened up and dusted off his robes. He looked around. He was standing in an endless expanse of white sand. Above him, there was no sun. There was only a diffuse and sourceless luminescence that cast no shadows. The air was still and smelled of absolutely nothing. It was a vacuum of sensory input.

  "A pocket dimension," Li Yu analyzed aloud. His voice sounded flat in the dead air. "High-grade. Stable. What an impressive treasure."

  He took a step and the white sand was crunching softly under his boots. "Hello? Anyone home? Or did you just kidnap me to leave me in a sandbox?"

  Space rippled twenty meters in front of him.

  Five figures materialized from the distortion. They didn't appear with a flash or a bang; they simply faded into existence as if they had always been standing there and Li Yu just hadn't noticed them.

  It was of course the group from the canyon.

  The Grandma was leaning on her cane, looking around with a critical eye. The Aunty was adjusting her sleeves and looking annoyed. The Scholar was fanning himself, observing Li Yu like a specimen in a jar. The Young Man in the crimson armor was glaring at him with undisguised contempt.

  And the Lady in white stood in the center, her presence anchoring the reality of this artificial world.

  Li Yu leveled his staff at them. The Sentry mirrored his stance, aiming its spear at the Grandma.

  "You have a strange way of inviting people for tea," Li Yu said, his voice cold. "Kidnapping a Commander in the middle of a war zone? The Alliance isn't going to like this."

  "The Alliance," The young man scoffed. He spitted on the pristine white sand. "As if we care what a collection of primitives here thinks."

  "Hao," the Lady said softly.

  The Young Man shut his mouth instantly, though he continued to glare. The Lady took a step forward. In this pristine white space, she looked even more ethereal, like an ice sculpture come to life. Her eyes were ancient and deep. They locked onto Li Yu’s.

  "My name is Gongsun Yue," she said. Her voice was melodious but carried a heavy undertone. "This is my retainer, Hao. My aunt, Gongsun Lan. My advisor, Scholar Mo. And our elder, Granny Gui."

  She gestured to each of them in turn. It was a formal introduction, strangely polite given the circumstances.

  "Okay, Gongsun Yue," Li Yu said while keeping his guard up. "I'm Li Yu. Now that we've exchanged names, care to explain why I'm in a box? What do you people want with me? You are far too powerful to be just passing by and curious"

  "We did not wish to cause a scene," Gongsun Yue said. "But there is something only you can do. I have been waiting a very long time to meet you. Or rather... to meet the one I am bound to."

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  "Bound to?" Li Yu frowned. "What are you talking about? Stop talking in riddles and tell me."

  "It is an Oath. An Oath sworn by my lineage. Things are... complicated. I am not allowed to say much." She said. She then took a deep breath.

  "Li Yu," she said. "I need you to release me from my Oath. Or I will have to kill you."

  Li Yu blinked. He lowered his staff slightly in genuine confusion. Nothing this lady has said since he met her has made any sense.

  "Release you?" Li Yu asked. "Lady, I’ve never met you before in my life. I didn't even know you existed until ten minutes ago. How can I hold an oath over you?"

  "It does not matter that we have not met," Gongsun Yue said, her hands clenching into fists at her sides. "The Oath is woven into my soul. It binds me and my family to the one who holds the key. You are the key. Therefore, you hold my chains."

  Li Yu stared at her with genuine interest. "What chains? What does this oath make you do?"

  "I cannot say," she whispered back.

  "Okay," Li Yu rubbed his temples. "Let me get this straight. You kidnapped me because you think I'm someone else. And now you want me to release you from a promise I never asked for, concerning a subject you can't talk about?"

  "I know it sounds mad," Gongsun Yue admitted. "But it is the truth. This oath blinds me... it is crushing me. It restricts my freedom. It binds me to a destiny I do not want. Only you can break it."

  "How?" Li Yu asked.

  "You must speak the words," she said intensely. "You must say: 'I, Li Yu, release Gongsun Yue from her servitude. The debt is paid. The chain is broken.' That is all. Say it, and I will return you to your army. I will even give you treasures that this realm has never seen."

  "And if I don't?" Li Yu asked.

  "Then the oath demands that I eliminate the bond by eliminating the holder," she said, her eyes glistening. "I do not wish to kill you. You seem... innocent. But I will not live as a slave to a ghost any longer."

  Li Yu looked at the five of them. They were powerful. Insanely powerful. The Grandma alone had sealed space with a tap of her cane. If they wanted him dead, they probably could have tried it already.

  But something about this smelled wrong. The fact that he was still here proved that. There was something more to this. The oath that she was referring to clearly did more than this.

  "You can't tell me what the Oath is?" Li Yu asked.

  "No," she shook her head.

  "Why not?"

  "Because the rules forbid it," Scholar Mo spoke up and snapped his fan shut. "To speak of the nature of the oath to the Oath-Holder before the oath is fulfilled... the penalty is eradication. Not just of her, but of her entire bloodline."

  "Convenient," Li Yu muttered. "So I'm supposed to just trust you?"

  "Yes," Gongsun Yue pleaded. "Please. Just say the words."

  Li Yu looked at the white sand. He thought about it. Just say a sentence, get some loot and go home. It was the easy way out. But Li Yu was a person who now planned. A person who knew things were never so simple and who analyzed risk. And this risk was undefined.

  "What if the Oath is important?" Li Yu asked while looking back up.

  "It is a shackle," Gongsun Yue insisted. "Nothing more."

  "Is it?" Li Yu countered. "What if the Oath is 'I promise not to destroy the world'? What if it's 'I promise to seal away an ancient evil'? If I release you and you turn out to be a monster, or if your freedom triggers something terrible... that's on me."

  "It is nothing like that!" she cried.

  "Then explain it," Li Yu crossed his arms. "Give me a hint. Give me context. You say you can't tell me the nature of it but surely you can tell me why it exists."

  "I... I cannot," she stammered. She looked terrified, glancing up at the fake white sky as if expecting a lightning bolt from beyond the sky. "You just have to trust me."

  "Then I can't do it," Li Yu said firmly. The air in the pocket dimension grew heavy.

  "You refuse?" Hao stepped forward. His hand went to the hilt of a massive war glaive that appeared next to him. "You refuse to grant my Mistress her freedom? You, a peasant cultivator who doesn't even know the vastness of the cosmos?"

  "I refuse to sign a contract I haven't read," Li Yu corrected. "I don't know you people. You kidnapped me. You threaten me. And now you want a favor? That's not how it works."

  "It is not a favor!" Hao roared. "It is her life! You are nothing! You are just a biological coincidence! You are unworthy of her service!"

  "Hao, stop," Gongsun Yue warned.

  "No, Mistress!" Hao drew his glaive. The weapon was a masterpiece of crimson metal and was etched with runes that seemed to bleed light. "Why do we beg? He is weak. He is ignorant. If he will not speak the words, we kill him. The Oath breaks if the holder dies. It is the same result!"

  "We cannot simply kill him," Auntie Lan spoke up. "The oath taken has more rules and conditions than that, Hao. Remember it."

  "I remember," Hao sneered. "We cannot fight him using a higher cultivation or we shall die."

  “Yes that is right. It is there for both parties' benefit. It is there to make sure that we don’t have to serve a fool but also there so that they cannot be bullied due to age.” Auntie Lan spoke again.