Su Nian expected luxury.
She did not expect order.
The Duan estate ran like a living machine—quiet footsteps, doors that opened before you reached them, staff who appeared at the exact second a glass became half-empty. It wasn't warmth. It wasn't comfort. It was control so perfect it felt like a threat.
After her needles were packed, Su Nian stood and tried to retreat the way she always did after treatment—step back, lower her eyes, leave before anyone could decide what to do with her.
Duan Yichen did not give her that option.
"You're staying," he repeated, as if the sentence had been carved into the air.
Madam Duan exhaled slowly, regaining composure now that her shock had settled. "Yichen, we can arrange accommodations, but we don't even know—"
"You don't need to know," Yichen said calmly. "I do."
Su Nian looked at him. "You barely know my name."
"I know your hands made my toes move," he replied, and the bluntness of it made the room feel smaller. "That's enough."
It wasn't romantic. It wasn't tender. It was the kind of statement men with power made when they had already decided.
Su Nian's instinct screamed at her to refuse. To leave before the Duan family's world swallowed her whole and named it hospitality.
But the black qi wrapped around Yichen's leg shivered, irritated, as if it had overheard her thoughts.
It didn't want her to leave.
That alone made staying the correct choice.
"I'll stay," she said, "but I'll set terms."
Madam Duan's eyebrows rose. "Terms?"
Su Nian nodded. "I'm not here as your family's possession. I'm here as a physician. If you want my help, you don't threaten me, you don't lock me in, and you don't send people to 'watch' me."
Silence.
Then a soft laugh—unexpected.
Duan Yichen's mouth curved slightly. "Bold."
"Practical," Su Nian corrected.
Madam Duan's lips tightened, but she didn't argue. She'd just watched her son's foot move. She would swallow a great deal for that.
A door opened, and a young man in a white coat practically stumbled into the living room like he'd sprinted through the estate.
He froze the moment he saw the needles.
Then he looked at Yichen's leg.
Then at Su Nian.
Then, with the careful tone of someone approaching a wild animal, he asked, "Is… is the leg still the same leg?"
Madam Duan's face darkened. "Dr. Fang."
Dr. Fang raised his hands defensively. "I'm sorry, Madam! I only mean—Young Master hasn't moved his toes in months and now he's—he's toe-ing." He nodded, as if "toe-ing" was a medical term. "We must confirm the toe status."
Duan Yichen looked mildly entertained. "Toe status: alive."
Dr. Fang's glasses slid down his nose. He pushed them up with a trembling finger, staring at Su Nian as if she'd performed a public crime.
"What did you do?" he whispered intensely. "You can tell me. I'm a doctor. I can handle it."
Su Nian answered evenly. "Silver needle acupuncture."
Dr. Fang blinked once. Twice.
Then, in the solemn tone of a man announcing a funeral, he said, "I went to medical school for ten years."
Madam Duan snapped, "Dr. Fang!"
Dr. Fang ignored her. He took a step closer to Su Nian, eyes shining with desperate curiosity. "Miss Su, if you're practicing forbidden medicine, I will not report you. I will only ask to observe. Maybe… hold a clipboard."
Su Nian's mouth twitched. "You can observe. You cannot hold my needles."
Dr. Fang looked wounded. "Not even one?"
Duan Yichen's gaze slid toward him. "Not even half a needle."
Dr. Fang sighed like a man sentenced to poverty.
Su Nian turned back to Yichen. "I need to assess the full root. What happened in the accident?"
Yichen's expression cooled. "A truck ran a red light."
"That's not what I mean."
A pause.
Then he said, "My brake failed."
Madam Duan stiffened. Dr. Fang made a small, horrified sound.
Su Nian felt the black qi on Yichen's leg tighten at those words, like it enjoyed reliving its work.
"Someone tampered with your car," she said quietly.
Yichen's gaze sharpened. "Yes."
"Do you know who?"
"I have suspects," he replied. "In my world, you always have suspects."
Su Nian nodded once. "Then we need to treat the qi and trace the person feeding it."
Dr. Fang looked scandalized. "Trace… the person feeding— Miss Su, are we discussing an illness or a vampire?"
Su Nian looked at him calmly. "Both sometimes."
Dr. Fang shut his mouth. Then opened it again. "I knew I should've become a dentist."
Yichen's eyes stayed on Su Nian. "You're not afraid."
"I am," she said truthfully. "But fear doesn't change what exists."
Something shifted in his gaze—not softness, but recognition.
Madam Duan cleared her throat, forcing her authority back into place. "Fine. Miss Su will stay. But she stays under Duan protection. For her own safety."
Su Nian didn't like the phrasing, but she understood the implication.
The Su family wouldn't ignore her absence forever.
And now that she'd touched the Duan family's heir, she would attract attention from things worse than her own blood.
A maid stepped forward. "Miss Su, your room has been prepared."
Su Nian followed, her suitcase rolling quietly over the polished floor.
As she passed the hallway mirror, she caught her reflection—and behind her shoulder, a thin smear of black qi drifted like smoke, trailing her steps.
It wasn't hers.
It had latched onto her from Yichen.
A warning.
Or a mark.
She kept walking anyway.
Behind her, Duan Yichen watched her go, his expression unreadable.
Then he flexed his toes again—slow, deliberate—like he wanted to prove to himself it was real.
The black qi quivered.
And somewhere far away, the Su family's morning quiet finally broke.