The wooden door creaked shut, sealing the small, dimly lit room from the outside world. The room was poor. The walls were peeling, the window was patched with paper to keep the wind out, and the furniture consisted of a single wobbly table and a hard bed.
But to Kaelen, this room felt safer than the Golden Palace of the Divine Realm.
"Young Master, eat," Uncle Hwan urged, placing a cracked ceramic bowl on the table.
Inside the bowl was a single steamed bun. It was cold. It was hard. It had probably been sitting in Hwan's pocket all day, saved from the servant's meager lunch. Next to it was a cup of hot water—not tea, just water—because tea leaves were too expensive for them.
Kaelen sat down. He looked at the bun. In his past life, he had feasted on Dragon Liver and Phoenix Marrow. He had drunk wine that had been aged for ten thousand years.
He picked up the cold, hard bun. He took a bite. It was dry and tasteless.
"I am sorry," Hwan whispered, standing in the corner, his head bowed in shame. "It is dry. Tomorrow... tomorrow I will beg the kitchen staff for some soup to go with it."
Kaelen chewed slowly, swallowing the dry lump with difficulty. But then, he looked at Hwan. He saw the old man's anxious eyes, watching every bite Kaelen took, as if Kaelen were eating a royal feast.
"No, Uncle," Kaelen said softly. "It is delicious."
He wasn't lying.
"The food in the Heavens is cooked with divine fire," Kaelen said, his voice distant, "but it is often served with poison and deceit. This bun... this bun is seasoned with loyalty. It is the best meal I have had in five hundred years."
Hwan didn't understand the "five hundred years" part. He thought Kaelen was just being poetic. A sad smile touched the old man's lips. "You talk like an old poet today, Young Master. Since you woke up, you seem... older."
"Maybe I just had a long dream," Kaelen replied.
He finished the bun to the last crumb. Then, he looked at Hwan's leg. The old man was shifting his weight constantly, grimacing in pain. It was an old injury from years ago when Hwan had been beaten by a guard for protecting a young Kaelen. It flared up whenever it rained.
"Come here, Uncle. Sit," Kaelen commanded gently.
"Oh no, Young Master! I cannot sit while you—"
"Sit."
The authority in Kaelen's voice was soft but absolute. Hwan sat on the edge of the bed, confused.
Kaelen knelt on the cold floor. He rolled up Hwan's trouser leg. The knee was swollen, purple, and twisted.
"Young Master! What are you doing? You shouldn't touch my dirty legs!" Hwan tried to pull back, horrified that his master was kneeling before a servant.
Kaelen held the leg firm. "Still."
Kaelen closed his eyes. He summoned the Dragon Blood Qi from his dantian. He had very little energy left after the fight and healing the fox. Using more now would delay his own recovery. It would leave him weak for tomorrow's danger.
But he didn't hesitate.
'Power is useless if it cannot protect those who matter,' Kaelen thought.
He placed his warm palm on the swollen knee.
"This might sting," Kaelen warned.
A soft, golden warmth flowed from Kaelen's hand into the old man's knee. It wasn't enough to cure the bone completely—that would require high-level pills—but it was enough to soothe the inflammation and ease the pain.
Hwan gasped. The gnawing, icy pain that had tormented him for ten years suddenly vanished, replaced by a comforting heat.
"My leg..." Hwan stared at Kaelen, tears streaming down his face again. "The pain... it's gone."
Kaelen stood up, slightly pale. He wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead. "It is only temporary relief. Once I reclaim my position in the family, I will buy the Bone-Knitting Pill to fix it permanently."
Hwan looked at Kaelen with a mixture of worship and fear. "Young Master... who are you? You have no cultivation, yet you defeated guards. You healed my leg. Are you... possesssed by a god?"
Kaelen walked to the window and looked out at the moon.
"No, Uncle. I am not a god," Kaelen said, his back turned. "I am just a man who realized that being 'kind' and being 'weak' are two different things. I will be kind to you. But to the rest of the world..."
His eyes narrowed as he looked at the dark roof of the building across the courtyard.
"...I will be a nightmare."
"Go to sleep, Uncle. I need to meditate."
Hwan nodded, wiped his eyes, and limped out of the room—walking better than he had in years. "Goodnight, Young Master."
As the door clicked shut, the warmth in Kaelen's eyes vanished instantly. It was replaced by a sharp, cold alertness.
He didn't turn around. He continued staring out the window at the empty night sky.
"You have been watching for an hour," Kaelen said to the empty air. "If you wanted to kill me, you would have done it when I was healing the old man. Since I am still alive, come out."
Silence hung in the air for a few seconds.
Then, a soft, musical laugh echoed from the roof.
"Sharp senses. Very sharp senses for a 'cripple' with no cultivation base."
A shadow detached itself from the darkness of the roof. A figure leaped down, landing in the courtyard as lightly as a feather.
It was a woman.
She was dressed in tight-fitting black night robes that accentuated her curves. Her face was covered by a black silk veil, revealing only a pair of enchanting, fox-like eyes that seemed to glow in the dark.
She stood in the mud, yet not a speck of dirt touched her shoes.
'A cultivator at the Spirit Ocean Realm,' Kaelen analyzed instantly. 'Far stronger than anyone in the Silver-Iron Clan. Who is she?'
The woman walked to the window, separated from Kaelen only by the thin paper frame. She leaned against the wall, her eyes studying him with intense curiosity.
"I saw what you did to Steward Pang," she said, her voice like velvet, smooth but dangerous. "And I saw the golden light you used on the servant. That was not normal Qi. It was ancient. Pure."
Kaelen turned to face her. He didn't back away. "And?"
"And," the woman tilted her head, "I am curious. The rumors say the Young Master of the Silver-Iron Clan is waste. A broken branch. But the boy I see tonight is... a hidden dragon."
"Curiosity kills the cat," Kaelen said calmly.
"I am not a cat," the woman chuckled, her eyes narrowing playfully. "I am a tiger. And tigers are hard to kill."
She suddenly flicked her finger.
Whoosh!
A burst of invisible pressure—Spirit Pressure—slammed into the room. It was meant to test Kaelen, to make him kneel. A normal Body Refining cultivator would have collapsed instantly, vomiting blood.
The air in the room became heavy, like lead. The table creaked.
But Kaelen didn't kneel.
He stood straight. He looked into her eyes.
In his mind, the Dragon Soul roared. A majestic, terrifying aura exploded from his soul—not physical strength, but pure Will. It was the Will of an Emperor who had ruled the Heavens.
'You want me to kneel?' Kaelen's eyes flashed with a cold, golden light. 'Even the Heavens do not dare to make me kneel!'
The woman's smile froze.
She felt it. For a split second, she didn't see a boy in a run-down room. She saw a giant, towering figure looking down at her from the clouds. She felt a primal fear, the kind a rabbit feels when a dragon flies overhead.
She instinctively took a step back, her breath hitching.
Then, the feeling vanished. Kaelen was just a boy again, sweating slightly, looking tired.
The pressure lifted.
The woman stared at him, her chest heaving slightly. The playfulness was gone from her eyes, replaced by shock and a hint of respect.
"Who... are you?" she asked, her voice serious now.
"I am Kaelen," he replied simply. "Just a boy who wants to sleep."
The woman looked at him for a long time. She realized he wouldn't tell her his secrets. Not tonight.
"Interesting," she murmured. She reached into her sleeve and threw something through the open window.
Kaelen caught it. It was a small token made of purple gold, engraved with the image of a Violet Lotus.
"My name is Jiara," she said. "I am an appraiser at the Violet Gold Pavilion in the city. If you survive your family's little Assessment tomorrow... come find me. I think we have business to discuss."
"And if I don't survive?" Kaelen asked, fingering the cold token.
Jiara laughed, leaping back onto the roof. "Then you were not a dragon. You were just a worm. Good luck, little boy."
She vanished into the night.
Kaelen looked at the token in his hand. The Violet Gold Pavilion was the largest trading guild in the continent. This token was valuable.
"She was testing me," Kaelen whispered to himself. "She suspects I have a powerful Master behind me. Good. Let her suspect. Confusion is a weapon."
He sat on his bed. The encounter had drained him, but it also confirmed something important: The world was bigger than just this small clan. There were strong people out there.
And he was still too weak.
"Tomorrow is the Family Assessment," Kaelen said, closing his eyes and entering a meditative state. "Jareth. Garret. The Elders. They are all waiting to see me fail. They are waiting to kick me out."
The corners of his mouth curled up in the darkness.
"Let them wait. Tomorrow, I will not just pass. I will shatter their understanding of reality."
The night deepened. In the silence of the room, the faint hum of the Abyssal Dragon Scripture began to resonate, like a heartbeat preparing for war.