Yuqin returned to the cellar, the air thick with the scent of damp earth and the ozone-tinged residue of recent magic. The molekin brothers were clustered around a crate of tools, their fur matted with dust. One of the younger ones, a plump fellow with velvety brown fur, twitched his prominent nose, sniffing audibly. "Boss," he squeaked, his voice echoing in the quiet space, "you smell that? Somethin'... sweet? Like night-blooming jasmine after a rain..."
Tumblesnoot, the leader, tilted his head, his own whiskers quivering as he took a deep, investigative sniff—only to have his snout pinched shut by Yuqin's slender fingers. "Stop sniffing the air and focus on the task," she chided, her tone firm but not unkind. Yet, even as she deftly steered their attention to a schematic of the mining rig, her own gaze flickered, thoughtful and assessing, towards the dark, yawning mouth of the mine shaft. She knew the source of the fragrance. It clung to the cool, still air—a clean, subtle aroma of herbs and something uniquely feminine. It was the scent of the Captain, of Yao, lingering after a recent bath. A strangely intimate detail in the gritty surroundings.
A day and a half later, deep within the crystal seam, Yao's consciousness felt frayed, stretched thin like over-spun silk. Her reserves of psyche-restorative elixirs were drained to the last dregs, the empty vials cool against her skin. With a final, weary exertion of will, she retracted the shimmering, semi-corporeal tendril—an extension of her very being—from the heart of the psychic geode. As the luminescent appendage coiled back into her palm, it deposited a single, warm, pulsating object. It was the size of a goose egg, its surface a milky, opalescent white, shot through with pulsing veins of cerulean light that swirled like captured nebulae. A protective cocoon, humming with a latent, dreaming potential that vibrated against her soul.
Of course,she thought, the mental sigh a heavy weight in the silence of her own mind. Her head throbbed, thoughts moving through viscous exhaustion. The vein isn't a boundless ocean, just an exceptionally pure, ancient well. All that condensed energy, dreaming in the dark for eons, and it only birthed this one, fragile little life.The irony was not lost on her.
She attempted a binding immediately, a pulse of her will, feather-light, brushing against the shell's psychic signature.
Chime.The sound was crystal-clear in her mental space. Subject: Psyche Sprite. Status: Dormant, pre-hatching. Requires significant infusion of psychic-attuned resources for awakening. Initiate feeding protocol?
Feed it with what? The ore is still in the ground!The internal grumble was a familiar, tired companion. With movements that were careful despite her fatigue, she stored the precious egg within the Flayer's Private Sanctum—a pocket dimension of shadows and whispers that now cradled her most volatile secret. She emerged from the shaft, blinking against the comparative glare of the cellar's floating magelight orbs, and issued the orders to begin excavation, her voice hoarse but steady.
Yuqin was already there, her form silhouetted by the gentle glow of the equipment she'd brought. She studied Yao, her sharp eyes missing nothing—the dust ground into the fabric of her clothes, the faint shadows bruising the skin beneath her eyes, the way she held herself with a weary tension. "I depart for Boluke the day after tomorrow," Yuqin stated, her tone carefully neutral, giving nothing away. "I will not be able to remain here. What are your instructions?" She meticulously avoided any mention of Yao's own inevitable journey, not wanting to reveal the intricate web of suspicion she was weaving.
Yao met her gaze, and in that silent exchange, a flicker of understanding passed—an appreciation for the unspoken discretion. "I will station a guardian here. A sentinel. Even if Lan Luoqi's hounds come sniffing with their magic, it will sense them. Your role is to vanish, seamlessly, as if you were never here. As long as no human error betrays us, the vein remains a ghost. If it could have been found by their machines, it would have been, long ago."
"True," Yuqin conceded, then her voice softened, layered with a complex mix of resignation and a newfound, wary leverage. "Though, I suspect... even if they were to discover it now, they might not dare to act. It seems... in their shifting calculus, the daughter of a 'mere' academic researcher holds a certain... ambiguous value. They cannot ascertain the true nature of the bond between my mother and... that woman. My 'aunt.'" A faint, bitter smile touched her lips. "Despite my denials, Mother and I have been receiving a steady stream of 'kind regards' and subtly probing inquiries from all quarters lately. It's a curious sort of armor."
Yao had drawn the same cold conclusion. But a psychic-attuned vein was a siren's call, a temptation too profound to trust to the fickle, invisible shields of high-society politics. For true peace of mind, for the safety of this impossible treasure, only one guardian would suffice. She left her little locust, now a formidable Level 30 beast thrumming with dense, predatory energy, nestled within the farm's ley-line matrix like a sleeping dragon—a silent, voracious sentinel bound to her will.
The mining commenced with a quiet efficiency. Within a day, the first yield of rough, psychically-glowing ore was extracted, its inner light spilling into the cellar like captured moonlight. The division was swift, fair. The tangible, weighty reality of the treasure solidified their fragile, pragmatic alliance. With the seven molekin brothers and the latent locust standing watch, the immediate, palpable risk seemed to recede, leaving only the ever-present hum of potential danger.
As anticipated, the formal announcement of the Fu family's "engagement" acted like a spell of binding silence. The aggressive, circling postures of the Teng and Lan families stilled, their energies withdrawing into watchful, calculating stillness. The game had changed tiers.
Back in the heart of the farmhouse cellar, Tumblesnoot heaved off his comically oversized safety helmet with a grunt, sending a cloud of fine, golden dust motes dancing in a wayward sunbeam that pierced the gloom. He sat with a solid thump, pulling out a loaf of travel-bread. His brothers gathered around him, a circle of expectant, furry faces. But instead of reaching for their shares of the raw, luminous ore fragments glittering on a sack, they began, one by one, to pile them gently before him.
"Boss, these are yours."
"Yep, you take 'em all!"
Tumblesnoot's furry brow furrowed deeply, his whiskers drooping. "Have you all eaten bad mushrooms? Lost your minds? Take your shares! You won't get stronger gnawing on plain roots! How will you protect yourselves out there, huh? The world isn't this cellar!"
The smallest of them, Diggle, shuffled forward. He shook his head, his large, liquid-dark eyes earnest in the half-light. "Boss, we ain't the brightest pebbles in the stream, we know that. But we know strength should be gathered, like roots, not scattered like chaff. Look at the Captain-sister, and Miss Shen... they're so young, spring saplings, and look at the storms they already walk through..."
"You're the one who's not thinking! I'm only six! By their long-year count, when they were seven, they couldn't have beaten me in a dig!" Tumblesnoot puffed out his cheeks, a perfect picture of stubborn, youthful pride.
Diggle nudged the small, glowing pile closer with a careful paw. "So you gotta get even stronger! Our gifts... they're for the deep earth, for making things grow. Yours... yours is for the wide sky. Remember before? You could only lead us to scrounge in muddy drains for scraps. Then your gift woke up, a spark in the dark, you became an Arcanist, and we got to eat bread that wasn't moldy, sleep in a dry burrow! If you get even stronger, we'll do even better! When this mine is done... we can make this farm proper. A home. With real soil, not just rocks."
Tumblesnoot fell silent. The other six nodded vigorously, their expressions open, unguarded, and filled with a simple, profound sincerity. They held no love for the clash of spells or the glory of combat. They cherished the weight of a full belly, the scent of turned, fertile earth, the silent, steadfast rhythm of seed, tend, and harvest. Looking at their familiar, trusting faces, Tumblesnoot saw the raw, unvarnished truth. They weren't lying. And the world beyond their carefully dug tunnels... it wasa terrifying, beautiful, and dangerous place.
"And Boss," another brother, usually quiet, piped up shyly, "We know not all the pointy-ears and spell-slingers are good. Shadows walk among them. But you met two who are. Real good. Like... like the first sister, from the cold place..."
At the mention of the past—of a tiny, fierce girl with eyes too old for her face, who'd shared her last piece of hardtack with a shivering litter of molekins in a garbage-strewn alley—Tumblesnoot's eyes glistened, reflecting the ore's soft light. He looked down, his voice thick, barely a whisper. "Alright, alright, shaddup. I get it. After this... I'll ask the sister. About the land. You lot... you'll have a good place. A proper warren, deep and safe."
The molekins broke into wide, toothy grins. They scrambled for their pilfered soda cans, the cheap metal cool in their paws, and clumsily clinked them together in a toast. The sound, bright and tinny, echoed with a startling joy in the dusty, treasure-filled cellar.
The mining progressed with a smooth, untroubled rhythm that felt almost unnatural to Yuqin's inherently cautious nature. Her mind, sharp as a honed blade, kept circling back to Oxus. If it is him behind the mask... would the Teng and Lan truly remain idle, like snakes in the sun?The answer scrolled across the public viewscreen on the passenger airship to Boluke, delivered in the calm, neutral tones of a news caster, cold and final.
"...Fu Consortium Announces Strategic Marriage Alliance with Newly Appointed Xie Clan Head, Oxus..."
Yuqin stared, the bite of spiced cake in her mouth turning to dry ash. Beside her, Shen Yunyou glanced at the screen, a faint, troubled line appearing between her elegantly arched brows. She was silent for a long moment, watching the distant clouds streak past the viewport. "The world often forces compromises," she murmured, her voice so low it was almost stolen by the hum of the engines, "that carve pieces from a soul one would rather keep whole."
Yuqin said nothing. She understood the brutal, silent arithmetic at play. A hidden mine. A marriage of cold, political convenience. The person behind the silver mask was even more ruthless than she'd imagined—ruthless enough to turn that calculating blade upon their own future, their own identity. The realization was a cold stone in her stomach.
Her reverie was broken by her mother's quiet, uncharacteristically vulnerable question. "If you were ever cornered, my little fox, with no path left but a terrible one... would you make such a choice? Trade a part of your spirit for the chance to keep breathing?"
Yuqin heard the tremor beneath the steady words, a fragility that had taken root since the day Zhou Miao had smiled her terrible, knowing smile and walked away. She reached over, her smaller, smoother hand closing firmly around her mother's, which felt suddenly cold. "Mom," she said, her voice clear and certain, cutting through the airship's murmur, "I believe nothing in this world, no secret, no power, no glittering city, matters more than our family staying together. Youare my anchor. My only necessary shield."
Shen Yunyou's fingers tightened around hers, a silent, desperate pact. A slow breath escaped her. "Good," she whispered, and this time, the ghost of a real, weary smile touched her lips, smoothing the worry line. "I believe that too."
Yao traveled in the Xie family's private skiff, a vessel of polished dark wood and silver inlay that felt more like a relic than a transport. It was not large, nor opulently appointed, but it was hers alone now—a hollow victory. The autopilot hummed a serene, mindless tune, charting a course through the star-dusted velvet of the night sky, leaving her in the profound quiet of the main cabin. She sat on the floor, a thick, worn rug woven with fading phoenix patterns beneath her, surrounded by a scattered, glittering mound of low-grade psychic-attuned gems. They were pea-sized, each pulsing with a faint, hungry light, like a swarm of captured fireflies.
One by one, then in greedy, desperate handfuls, she fed them to the milky, dormant egg cradled in the hollow of her lap. The sprite within, a creature of a higher, more refined order of existence, absorbed the simple, crude energy with silent, effortless ease. The journey passed in a hypnotic, monotonous rhythm: the soft crunch-sighof crystal dissolving into light, the gentle, eternal thrum of the elemental engines, the breathtaking, indifferent tapestry of alien constellations swirling past the wide observation pane.
Midway through the voyage, as a particularly dense nebula painted the cabin in washes of violet and emerald, a delicate chime, like a silver bell struck deep under pure water, resonated not in the air, but in the very core of Yao's being.
Chime.Psyche Sprite has achieved primary consciousness. Having imprinted upon your psychic signature as its sole energy source and point of reference during gestation, it is statistically probable (94.7%) it will assign a maternal designation. Prepare for bonding.
Well, that's... phenomenally awkward,she thought, the absurdity cutting through her fatigue.
The opalescent shell did not crack; it dissolved. It became wisps of shimmering, liquid light that spiraled upwards like inverse rain before vanishing into the cabin's atmosphere. In her palm, where the egg had been, sat a creature of impossible, crystalline beauty. Its body was a teardrop of solid, flawless diamond, so clear it seemed a lens into another, simpler world. Its head was large and round, dominated by enormous, luminescent eyes the color of a twilight sky moments before the stars appear. Delicate wings, seemingly spun from captured starlight and the memory of spider-silk, fluttered on its back, scattering microscopic prismatic lights across the rug. It blinked those vast, intelligent eyes at her... and spoke. Its voice was the sound of glass wind chimes stirred by a gentle, predawn breeze.
"Hey mister, what's the scenario?"
Yao stared, utterly dumbfounded. Do I look like I have a 'scenario'? Do YOU?
Almost unconsciously, a reaction to the sheer weirdness, she reached up and tugged the simple leather tie from her hair. The dark, silken cascade, longer now than she was used to, fell loose around her shoulders and down her back. The sprite's head tilted, a movement of pure, avian curiosity. Then, in a sparkle of refracted light so fast it was a blur, it zipped through the air, a living comet, and came to rest, nestling contentedly against the hollow of her throat with a soft, chiming sigh of perfect satisfaction.
"Mommy!"
Yao let out a long, slow breath that stirred the fine hairs on her forehead. Ah. Now I'm beginning to understand why Tumblesnoot's attitude did a full flip after the mask came off.
The sprite was... aesthetically driven. Decidedly so. But its potential, as she fed it the remaining chunks of raw psychic ore, watching it absorb the energy with a silent, radiant bliss, was nothing short of staggering. She focused inward, pulling up its status screen, which hovered in her mind's eye like ghostly script.
Psyche Sprite (Infant Stage)
Level: 5
Innate Talent 1: Meditation Amplification. While the bonded host is in a meditative state, increases psychic absorption, refinement efficiency, and spiritual focus by 500% for one hour. Cooldown: One hour.
Innate Talent 2: Combat Pscyhe Regeneration. During periods of active conflict or high stress, grants the host a continuous regeneration of 50 Psyche points per second for one hour. Cooldown: One hour.*
No base attributes. No active skills. No tricks. Just two monstrous, passively world-altering talents. The meditation boost alone was on par with the profound, life-changing effects of her newly acquired Viridian Blood. Combined, her effective meditation speed was now tenfold. In raw, untethered cultivation efficiency, she could theoretically match, perhaps even surpass, the elite young talents groomed in the great city-academies.
But... her foundation was still garbage-tier, a shack built on sand. She was using the "Harmonious Stream" method—the most basic, publicly-available meditation technique taught in grimy communal halls for a pittance. It was the multiplier that mattered, the cruel mathematics of advantage: 1 x 10 was 10, but 10 x 10 was 100. The gap between her and the true scions was not a stream, but a canyon.
A swift, ruthless inventory of her spatial rings and hidden pockets confirmed her material poverty: 200 S2 cores, glowing with dense, seductive promise, and little else of immediate, convertible value. The clothes on her back, the skiff around her (for now), and a head full of dangerous secrets. Once again, she was destitute. A pauper queen.
The academy will provide a better method, but it'll be standard issue, the same given to hundreds. Custom meditation puppets, attuned to my specific neural pathways... the materials cost a fortune. Skill books for advanced Light Ray manipulation, for the Radiant Burst techniques I only glimpsed...A familiar, throbbing pressure began to build behind her eyes, a headache born of existential arithmetic. How does one make serious, rapid money in a place like Boluke, where the shadows are deeper and the players are giants?
Her brooding was abruptly shattered as the skiff entered a region of turbulent ionic storms over the vast, black expanse of the Serpent's Tail Sea. The vessel shuddered, its stabilizers whining in protest. It passed a automated maritime checkpoint, its identifier blinking a friendly blue on a controller's screen in a lonely orbital tower. The man on duty, bored, logged its passage, sent the standard clearance ping, and opened the layered energy barrier for its safe, scheduled passage.
As the skiff's blip moved beyond his sector, into the empty stretch reserved for private travel, the controller stood, stretched his arms until his joints popped, and made his way to the station's small, sterile facilities. Inside a stall, he activated a slim, illegal signal-jamming device from a hidden pocket, its surface cool and matte. From another, he retrieved a burner communicator, its casing plain, grey, and utterly untraceable. His fingers, calloused and sure, danced over the tiny keys, inputting a brief, pre-agreed sequence of code. No words. Just coordinates and a confirmation glyph. Task complete, he pried open the device's side with a thumbnail, removed the crystalline data-chip, and dropped it into the toilet. He watched, impassive, as it swirled once, twice, in the blue cleaning solution, and vanished with the flush.
Simultaneously, on a private island resort cloaked in expensive obscurity and magical dampeners miles away, a hidden hangar bay set into a cliffside slid open with a whisper of displaced sand. Not a civilian skiff, but a sleek, predatory attack fighter—all matte black angles, cold ceramite, and deadly, purposeful lines—shot out over the churning, moonlit waves. It moved silently, a shadow detached from its source. Minutes later, far from any standard shipping lane, over a desolate stretch of water known for sudden squalls, its ventral weapons bay irised open. A single, focused lance of crimson energy, silent and precise as a surgeon's cut, speared into the darkness below.
Five seconds later, a silent, blossoming flower of white-orange fire erupted in the empty bay, a brief, violent sunrise at midnight. The Xie family skiff, its polished wood and silver inlay, its autopilot still humming its serene tune, disintegrated into molten debris and scattered, burning splinters, plunging into the fathomless, indifferent depths.
Yao's commercial airship, a massive, whale-like vessel named the Sky Barge, docked with a soft shudder at the Boluke Provincial Aeronautics Hub. It was her first time in the provincial capital, and the scale of it stole her breath, pressing against the viewport. The hub was a titanic, breathtaking fusion of architectural madness—part retro-industrial fortress with exposed iron girders and hissing steam vents, part crystalline fantasy palace with glowing, floating spires that pulsed with inner light. Massive vessels of every conceivable design—winged galleons with elemental sails, streamlined teardrops of enchanted crystal, brutish ironclads bristling with defensive runes—descended into its glowing, cavernous maw, only to disappear into spatially-expanded docks that defied all conventional physics.
"It's... immense," she breathed, the condensation from her breath fogging the cool glass.
"The world holds wonders and horrors in equal measure, far beyond the walls of our quiet city," Shen Yunyou said softly, a hand coming to rest on her daughter's shoulder, her touch both grounding and wistful. "You will see many more extraordinary, and terrible, things."
Inside, Yao's expectations of a sterile, hyper-tech, futuristic metropolis were utterly dismantled, replaced by a vibrant, chaotic, living tapestry. She found herself on cobblestone paths that wound under vaulted glass ceilings where artificial sunlight, perfectly tuned, dappled through genetically engineered glowing vines. Quaint wooden tea houses with paper lanterns painted with protective sigils sat nestled beside establishments displaying flickering holographic menus that changed with a passerby's glance. The air was a rich, overwhelming tapestry of scents: hot engine oil and ozone from a passing maintenance golem, roasting spices and sizzling meat from a dwarven street vendor's cart, the damp, fertile smell of real soil from stunning indoor gardens where trees with silver leaves grew, and underneath it all, the constant, low hum of active, layered magic. A shirtless, tattooed elder fanned a clay stove where a rich, mysterious broth bubbled; his partner, a woman with eyes like polished stones, served bowls of steaming, hand-pulled noodles to a diverse clientele of humans, elegant beast-kin with intelligent faces, and other, stranger races—folk with bark-like skin or feathers for hair. Molekin like Tumblesnoot were a common sight, bustling as porters or merchants, though few looked as well-groomed or carried themselves with such a contented, proud air.
Walking the slightly damp, ancient-feeling flagstones, under red-lacquered railings that framed serene bamboo groves, Yao felt a peculiar, unexpected sense of peace amidst the grand, overwhelming chaos. It was a city that lived, breathed, and devoured, all at once.
"Hungry? Shall we find a proper meal before the orientation?" Shen Yunyou asked, the universal, timeless refrain of mothers transcending worlds, cultures, and the very fabric of magic.
Yao was. Ravenously. She let her mother lead, following her through the flowing crowds to a famed "Suzhou-style" tea house she remembered from her past life here. The sign was elegant calligraphy on aged wood. "But it's a tea house?" Yao ventured, eyeing the delicate porcelain cups on display.
"Sells the finest, most spiritually calming leaves from the eastern peaks," her mother said, a playful glint in her eye. "And serves the most sinfully comforting, memory-laden food this side of the province. You'll see."
The establishment was bustling, a cacophony of chatter, clinking porcelain, and the sizzle of woks. As more people streamed in behind them, drawn by the reputation, the manager—a man whose perfectly composed aura and stillness subtly screamed 'Level 30+ Arcanist' to Yao's newly sensitive perceptions—gave a slight, almost imperceptible nod to a attendant. The space around them breathed. The walls seemed to stretch, the ceiling lifted gracefully, and new tables, booths, and even a small decorative pond with koi seamlessly integrated into the existing layout, accommodating the influx without a single patron needing to squeeze or complain. It was breathtaking, casual magic.
"Spatial-stones? Isn't that prohibitively expensive for a restaurant?" Yao whispered, her voice full of genuine amazement.
Shen Yunyou smiled, a real, warm one that reached her eyes and made her look younger. "You think he maintains it with personal mana and a pile of crystals? Look closer, my clever girl. Every establishment in this hub has the same capability. It's woven into the lease." She leaned in, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial murmur. "This entire aeronautics hub... it's a retrofitted, stabilized Purple-grade spatial artifact. A decommissioned Imperial military dreadnought, the Indomitable Will, from the last continental war. It has a... storied and bloody past. The foundations are soaked in old power."
As they were shown to a table by a window overlooking an interior courtyard, Yao's sharp, newly-enhanced eyes noted the unusual concentration of youths her age or slightly older. The very air in their vicinity seemed to vibrate, to thicken, with poorly-contained arcane energy—a telltale sign of powerful young adepts whose abilities had recently surged, blooming beyond their fine control. She spotted several faces from the tri-city ranking broadcasts, their features now sharpened by stress and ambition. Dozens, maybe over a hundred candidates for the elite academy selections were gathered here, a river of hope, fear, and arrogance flowing through the cozy, magical tea house.
Her observational trance was cut short as a nearby table emptied with a scrape of chairs. Before the departing patrons even reached her aisle, Yao felt it—a subtle but undeniable pressof aura, dense, confident, and cold, like walking into an invisible wall of still, deep water. Four figures strolled down the aisle, and the crowd parted for them as naturally as reeds before a gentle, inevitable current. Even the manager offered a slight, respectful bow from the waist, his professional mask perfect.
The girl had hair the color of liquid sapphire, a cascade of it flowing over her shoulders like a silken cape. Her features were a masterpiece of playful, sharp-edged beauty, and she wore a gown that seemed woven from a peacock's discarded tail, shimmering with iridescent feathers that shifted hue with her every movement, clinging to her tall, willowy frame like water. "Everyone swore this place was divine," she drawled, idly twirling a strand of her perfect hair around a finger. "It's merely... adequate. Tolerable. Grandfather's personal chef in Skyholm could do this in his sleep, blindfolded."
Beside her, a boy with fiery red cropped hair and a single, winking ruby stud in one ear smirked, a flash of white teeth. "What did you expect from a commoner establishment, Lian? You actually trust those net reviews from the unwashed masses? Right, Zhao?" He nudged the tallest of the group with an elbow.
This youth, 'Zhao', simply kept his hands in the pockets of his impeccably tailored trousers of charcoal-grey silk, his expression one of detached, icy boredom that seemed etched into the very bones of his face. He didn't deign to reply, didn't even blink. His silence was a weapon.
The girl, Lian, pouted, a theatrical, practiced expression, then looped her arm through that of the fourth member, a boy with a gentle, open face and kind eyes. "A-Feng! They're being absolute beasts!"
He laughed, the sound warm, easy, and completely at odds with the other two, and ruffled her hair with an affection that seemed genuine. "Don't worry, I'll challenge them to a duel for your honor later. First blood to the victor."
"Please, A-Feng, you?" she giggled, the sound like bells, then shot a mock-glare at the icy Zhao. "How about we team up? You and me against Zhao? Make him sweat for his arrogance."
They bantered with the effortless, unconscious arrogance of those born not just to wealth, but to rule the very ground they walked on. Their subtle but unmistakable clan sigils—a coiled sea serpent, a flaming phoenix, a mountain split by lightning—embroidered on lapels and cuffs, marked three of them as scions of major Blue-Blood families. The fourth boy, A-Feng, moved with the same innate, unshakeable confidence, his simple but exquisitely cut clothes hinting at wealth, even without the heraldry of ancient blood.
As they passed, Yao felt the cold-eyed boy, Zhao, glance her way. It was the briefest flicker, less than a heartbeat, but it carried a weight, an assessing pressure that sank into her marrow. A primal, instinctive alarm shrilled in the base of her skull. A fine, cold tremor, unrelated to the temperature, traced its way down her spine. Predator, her instincts screamed.
At the exact same moment, she felt her mother's hand, resting on the table, tighten almost imperceptibly around her own. A silent communication of tension.
Once the quartet had vanished into the crowded hub beyond the tea house doors, the air itself seemed to lighten, to become easier to breathe. Yao looked at Shen Yunyou, who had schooled her face into a mask of calm neutrality, though her knuckles were white where she gripped her teacup. "A little intimidating, that lot?" her mother asked lightly, though her eyes were watchful, scanning Yao's face.
"No," Yao said, forcing her voice to be steady, flat. She focused on the sensory details around her—the warmth of the porcelain cup in her hands, the aromatic steam rising from the tea, the complex, savory smells from the kitchen. "It just makes me think this place must actually be quite good. Exceptional, even."
"Oh?"
"A noble's fussy palate," Yao said, picking up her chopsticks with deliberate calm, "is seven parts cultivated arrogance and three parts genuine, atrophied taste. A need to feel distinct, elevated, to remind everyone of the chasm. It's a performance, not a preference." Unlike a certain someone who exists between and outside such simple, tired categories,she thought privately, the ghost of a wry smile in her mind. For a fifteen-year-old, she possessed a painfully clear, almost surgical understanding of the less savory corners of human—and elven—nature.
Shen Yunyou studied her for a long, silent moment, her gaze searching. Then, something in her own posture relaxed, a fraction. She simply reached over and smoothed a stray, rebellious hair from her daughter's forehead, her touch tender. "Of course," she said, her voice regaining its usual, warm wryness. "My taste has always been infinitely superior to the hereditary aristocracy. It's why I chose your father, and it's why I order the braised pork belly here. Now, let's eat."
They ate, the food simple in concept yet exquisite in execution, listening to the buzz of conversation that rose and fell around them like the tide. Talk of the selections was the water in which they all swam.
"...only 35 from our city made the cut, needed over 50,000 points, the barrier is insane..."
"...Jingyang's the perennial bottom feeder, I heard only 15! Pathetic, really, why do they even get slots?..."
"...why bother wasting thought on the trash cities? Boluke City itself has 782 qualifiers! The other two in their exam group are utterly eclipsed, drowned out..."
"...heard a rumor the top 300 scores, the real elite, all came from just those three cities. Boluke, Shanyuan, and Qinghe. Not a single outlier. The 'Iron Triangle' they're calling it..."
Yao's expression grew solemn, but she kept eating, methodically, savoring each bite as if fortifying herself. Her resolve, a cold, hard crystal in her gut, seemed to grow denser, more focused with each murmured statistic, each veiled insult. Shen Yunyou watched, and finally, a faint, proud light began to ease the deep-seated worry in her gaze.
After the meal, they followed the posted, glowing sigils to a designated assembly hall within the hub's central spire. Staff wearing the unified, imposing insignia of the Four Great Academies' recruitment union moved with the efficient, dispassionate grace of well-oiled machines. "All candidates for the Four Great Academies' selection trials, gather here for transport to the designated lodgings! We depart at noon sharp! Have your identification and admission tokens ready!"
Joining the gathering crowd, Yao felt conspicuous under the appraising, competitive looks of other candidates and the curious stares of travelers. Her mother, however, seemed to glow with a quiet, fierce, defiant pride. "You know," Shen Yunyou whispered, leaning close so her words were for Yao alone, "I once received a national award for my research on crystalline resonance. A big ceremony, ministers shaking my hand. It never drew half as many looks, inspired half as much... attention... as this. Out of an entire province of examinees, tens of thousands dreaming, how many stand here now? Xiao Qi, you have truly, truly made me proud."
Yao felt a hot, unexpected flush warm her cheeks and the back of her neck. She ducked her head slightly, focusing on the pattern of the marble floor. "...Thanks, Mom."
The academy's designated hotel was not a hotel in any conventional sense. It was a sprawling complex that defied easy categorization—a multi-story wooden inn built in an ancient, pagoda-inspired style around a vast central courtyard that was open to the sky. But the courtyard was dominated by a large, octagonal dueling platform of polished white stone, encircled by a shimmering, semi-transparent energy dome that hummed with contained power. Inside the dome, a kinetic, flashing ballet of combat was already underway—a pre-trial skirmish, a testing of blades.
Yao's gaze swept over it, analytical, then stuck, narrowed. The combatants... she knew them. From Jingyang.
It was Jian Feilan and two others from their lower-tier ranking bracket.
Strange,she thought, her mind clicking into a cold, assessing mode. He's arrogant, has a temper, but he's not foolish. Why pick a fight here, on hostile, unfamiliar ground, the night before the trials that determine your entire future?It reeked of poor judgment or external manipulation.
On the platform, Jian Feilan was being systematically, almost casually, dismantled. A sneering youth with a sleek, coiling water-serpent familiar that moved with liquid grace controlled the entire battlefield, herding them into punishing zones of effect. "Get up, Jingyang gutter-trash!" the boy, Cao Jian, yelled, his voice amplified slightly by the dome. "Or are you done already? Should I get a mop?"
Some in the surrounding crowd of watching candidates—a mix of boredom, curiosity, and bloodlust on their faces—frowned. "Cao Jian, that's enough. You've made your point, get down."
"Yeah, save your mana for the actual exams tomorrow! This is just sad."
Cao Jian manipulated his serpent, its aqueous form constricting Jian Feilan's allies, their struggles growing visibly weaker, their mana flickering. "Hey now, fair's fair! I merely stated a fact—Jingyang is weak. Provincial backwater. This one," he jabbed a dismissive thumb at Jian Feilan, who was trying to push himself up on trembling, blood-slicked arms, "couldn't accept a simple truth, challenged me! I refused, twice! He insisted, called me a coward! I'm just granting his wish!" His tone was performatively reasonable, a villain savoring his stage, playing to the crowd. "Look, it's simple: they admit, publicly, they lost. Shout that Jingyang is the weakest—which is just common knowledge, folks—and I let them go. I'll even be generous, magnanimous! I'll forget the minor wager we agreed to. See? I'm a reasonable man."
The crowd's murmurs grew uneasy, a mix of disgust and voyeuristic fascination. It was cruel, purposefully humiliating... but technically within the unwritten, brutal rules of pre-trial posturing. The hotel staff, stationed at the edges in simple uniforms, watched with professional detachment; dueling culture among young arcanists was entrenched, even expected—a way to bleed off tension and establish early hierarchies.
Jian Feilan, his face a mask of blood, swelling, and utter, impotent fury, clenched his jaw so hard Yao heard the grind of his teeth from where she stood. A single, stubborn tear of pure frustration mixed with the blood on his cheek, cutting a clean track through the grime, but he refused to open his mouth. His pride, it seemed, was the last thing he had left.
Yao took a sharp, quiet breath. The scene was a trap, a play. She leaned close to her mother, whispered a few quick, terse words. At Shen Yunyou's slight, tight nod, she stepped forward, out of the shadow of a pillar. "Excuse me," her voice, clear and calm as a mountain spring cutting through swamp air, sliced through the ugly noise. It was not loud, but it carried. "We from Jingyang acknowledge our current... comparative limitations. This match is beyond these contestants. Brothers, please, come down. The platform is not worth your dignity."
Her youth, her frank admission devoid of shame or bluster, and her polite, cutting tone acted as a sudden balm, a dash of cold water. The sneering, hot energy in the room softened, shifted. Some looked embarrassed. Cao Jian, robbed of his climax, his dramatic finish, scowled, his handsome face twisting. "Fine. Spoil the fun." He made a show of dismissing his water serpent, which dissolved into a puddle that then evaporated. "But hey, little sister, you're young to be here. Not bad. Must have cheated well." He smirked, looking her up and down. "Care for a one-on-one? Just us? Show us what Jingyang's real, hidden hope looks like. If you have any."
His friends, a rat-faced boy and a burly one, hooted. "Oho, ditching us for the new blood, Cao Jian?"
"Typical! Can't resist a pretty face, even a scrawny one!"
Yao ignored them as if they were gnats. She moved to help a limping boy off the platform steps, her movements efficient. Jian Feilan, his face a ruin of shame, pain, and a dawning, horrified gratitude, muttered through split, puffy lips, "Thanks. You shouldn't have. Idiot. Get out of here. Now. Don't get targeted."
She fully intended to. Her role was to defuse, to observe, not to engage. But as she turned, her mind already planning the swiftest route to the anonymity of the crowded hall, Cao Jian shifted, deliberately blocking her path. His eyes, now sharp and intensely assessing, scanned her like a merchant appraising a questionable gem. "Little sister, wait. I heard a rumor. There's actually someone decentin Jingyang. Pulled off some crazy stuff in that big instance. You guys teamed up, right? You were there. Is hehere? The famous Oxus? Do introduce us. We," he spread his hands, grinning, "are always interested in a good... sparring session. Educational, you know?"
How does he know that?Yao's mind raced, cold and swift. His city, Suming, wasn't part of their tri-city exam group. The information was too specific, too targeted. The pieces didn't fit a random bully. Something felt deliberately orchestrated, a snare within a snare. "I wouldn't know," she said, her voice flat, neutral, giving nothing away, not a flicker of reaction to the name 'Oxus'. "He may not have arrived yet. The roads are... uncertain. If you're truly interested, I suppose you could wait." She planned to slip away the moment the circle of onlookers broke, to find a shadowy corner and assess this new variable.
She didn't get the chance.
The main, arched double doors of the inn's grand hall swung open with a soft groan of ancient wood. Evening light, dusty and gold, silhouetted the figure who entered. At first glance, they looked unremarkable. Average height, decent, fine-boned features, good skin that seemed to hold a faint, pearlescent sheen. They carried an air of unassuming, almost delicate prettiness that could be dismissively called 'soft'. But there was a new stillness about them, a quiet gravity that hadn'tt been there before, like a blade recently sheathed but still warm from the forge. The weight of leadership, however newly, violently, and unwillingly acquired, had settled on their shoulders, changing their bearing.
They walked with a direct, unconcerned pace, neither hurried nor hesitant, straight to the registration desk, ignoring the ongoing scene at the platform.
"Name?" the clerk droned, not looking up.
"Oxus."
The clerk glanced up, then did a double-take, comparing the face to the image on his slate. "Oxus? The, uh... from Jingyang?"
"That's me. Is there a problem?" The voice was even, a touch weary.
"None. Identity confirmed. Welcome. Your key."
As Yao—for it was her, of course—finished and turned, a carved wooden room access token dangling from her finger by a leather thong, she found her path blocked by the smirking, now intensely interested form of Cao Jian.
"Oxus?" The smirk widened into a grin of genuine, predatory delight.
Yao glanced from the token to him, her expression blank, bored. "A match?"
"Exactly! We've heard of you. Quite the show in the exams. Legendary stuff. Care for a warm-up? Gets the blood flowing for tomorrow. Four versus four. Standard wager. Nothing serious." His tone was all fake camaraderie.
Yao leaned slightly, her gaze sliding past him with deliberate slowness to the battered, bleeding forms of the Jingyang group being patched up by a hotel healer whose hands glowed with soft green light. "Like them?" she asked, the two words dropping into the sudden quiet like stones.
Cao Jian waved a dismissive hand, as if brushing away cobwebs. "No, no, they're nothing like you. Cannon fodder. You're the real deal, aren't you? The actual top scorer of the three cities. The truenumber one. The shadow behind the pretty scores." He said it loudly, clearly, ensuring the candidates from Gao Yang and Dong Chen, who were indeed scattered through the crowd, would hear.
The provocation was blatant, a spark thrown deliberately into dry tinder. Yao considered him for a beat, her head tilting a fraction, as if studying a mildly interesting insect. Then she nodded, once, a shallow, almost imperceptible dip of her chin. "You have a good eye."
A few stifled snorts, muttered curses, and sharp intakes of breath came from the crowd. The sheer, bald audacity of claiming the title so casually! Cao Jian was momentarily taken aback, then his grin turned wolfish, excited. "Not as shy as the rumors said! I like that! Come on, brother, let's have a proper go. Four versus four. We'll make it interesting—a small wager, to keep it honest."
"Pass," Yao said, already moving to step around him as if he were furniture. "My private skiff just exploded over the Serpent's Tail. I'm broke. Can't afford to lose my socks, let alone place a wager."
"We don't have to wager much..." Cao Jian's voice took on a wheedling, persuasive tone. "Just a token. For honor."
Yao paused, looked at him directly, and in that look seemed to see straight through the ploy, the false friendship, to the pathetic, greedy little core beneath. She made to move on, her body already turning away. Then she stopped. A hand rose to her temple. Her eyes lost focus for a second, glazing over. Her shoulders slumped a fraction, the weary posture deepening into something resembling confusion. "...Alright," she murmured, her voice slightly slurred, distant. "How... how much?"
Cao Jian's pupils dilated almost imperceptibly. A tiny, nearly invisible red dot, like a pinprick of hellfire, flickered for a split second on Yao's forehead, right between her brows. His smile turned predatory, triumphant, utterly vile. "How about... whatever you have on you? You area clan head now, however minor. Should be carrying something worthwhile, right? A token of your... station."
"Right. Clan head." Yao's voice was vague, agreeing. She fumbled at her belt, pulling a small, nondescript leather pouch. It looked empty. "Then I'll wager... two hundred of these."
With a motion that seemed both careless and definitive, she upended the pouch over a nearby stone table used for holding drinks. The contents spilled out with a series of heavy, solid clacksthat echoed in the now-silent hall.
Two hundred S2-grade energy cores.
They were not large, each the size of a grape, but they glowed with a deep, inner fire—a core of condensed, vibrant life-force that was palpable even across the room, a pressure against the skin. The sound of their impact was a thunderclap in the dead silence. Even the arena regulator, an older man with a face like weathered leather and eyes that had seen too much, looked over from his post. His eyes narrowed at the sheer, obscene value on display, then flicked to Cao Jian's group, his expression grim. He shook his head slowly, a silent sigh of resignation and disgust etched on his features.
Cao Jian and his three companions froze, their smirks melting into masks of stunned avarice. The sheer, audacious wealth was staggering, a king's ransom in a merchant's purse. Even among Blue-Blood scions, two hundred S2 cores represented a fortune most would never personally control, a significant portion of a minor clan's entire liquid assets. This was the chasm between a scion's generous allowance and a clan head's treasury, however depleted. They were playing in leagues that were not just different, but alien to each other.
Is Oxus completely, utterly insane?!The thought screamed in the minds of every onlooker.
After a stunned heartbeat, naked, overwhelming greed crushed the last vestiges of caution in Cao Jian's eyes. This was a windfall beyond their wildest, most avaricious dreams. "Deal!" he barked, the word sharp, before anyone—especially the dazed-looking Oxus—could reconsider. "Four versus four! You pick your team... anyone in the hall!" He gestured grandly, already seeing the cores in his own vault.
"Fine..." Yao's voice was still faint, dreamy. She scrawled her name on the duel agreement parchment one of Cao Jian's lackeys produced, her signature unsteady. "...I'll find people..." Her gaze swept the room. It was a slow, unfocused scan. It passed over Yuqin, who stood rigid, her face pale. Yuqin gave a minute, almost imperceptible shake of her head, a warning in her eyes. The Lin siblings were nowhere to be seen. Jian Feilan's group was out of commission, surrounded by the healer's persistent green glow.
Cao Jian and his friends exchanged smug, victorious, disbelieving looks. Who can he possibly find at this hour? He knows no one!
Yuqin, watching with a cold, analytical eye that missed nothing, saw their micro-expressions shift through a rapid sequence: initial, jaw-dropping shock at the scale of the wager, then a flash of panic (was it too much?), then a swift, calculating assessment, and finally, settling into a hard, greedy certainty. Their confidence was unshaken, even bolstered. That meant they were sure of two things: Oxus had no allies of any consequence in this hall, and Oxus himself was compromised, deeply and thoroughly, likely through the mental interference she'd just witnessed—the red dot, the sudden docility. The two hundred S2 cores were already counted in their minds, weighed, and spent. A done deal.
Just as a cold coil of nausea and anxiety tightened in her stomach, three figures detached themselves from the crowd near the back, near the archway to the kitchens. They stepped forward, one after the other.
"Me."
"I'll join."
"Count me in."
Luohe Sanqian, his expression as impassive and unreadable as carved jade, his presence a sudden pool of stillness. The bald Lu, cracking his knuckles with a grin that showed a missing tooth, his body humming with barely restrained violence. And Pang Ci, bouncing on the balls of his feet with nervous energy, his eyes wide but determined.
The team was complete.
The crowd murmured in surprise, a wave of noise. Cao Jian's group was momentarily taken aback, their smugness faltering. But they quickly reassessed, their eyes flicking over the three. Their primary, secret concern had been the girl from the rumors—the one with the monstrous, Blue-grade gosling familiar. These three? The bald one looked like a common brawler, the short one was pudgy and unremarkable, and Luohe Sanqian, while having a reputation from Dongchen, was from a second-tier city at best. Manageable. Distractions. The real prize was the compromised clan head and his cores.
As both teams moved towards the platform steps, Yao suddenly staggered, clutching her head as if struck. "Damn it..." she hissed, her voice gaining a sudden, sharp edge of real pain and fury. "...someone's... in my head! A worm!" In the same fluid, explosive motion, her raised hand snapped forward, palm out. A searing Radiant Burst, pure, blinding, and vicious, shot across the room like a lance of solidified sunlight, followed instantly, in the same breath, by a concussive Light Explosion that shattered the air with a sound of tearing canvas.
BOOM!
The attacks weren't aimed at Cao Jian. They slammed, full-force, into a bespectacled, scholarly-looking youth who had been quietly observing from the sidelines near a stone column, a book in his hand. Chen Yi. He was caught completely off-guard, his mental defenses finely tuned for subtle, sustained influence, not for repelling a brutal, direct physical assault. The dual spells hit him square in the abdomen. The light burned, the explosion lifted him off his feet and hurled him into the unforgiving stone column with a sickening crunchof breaking ribs. He slumped to the floor like a sack of grain, coughing up specks of bright red blood amidst the dust, his glasses shattered.
"Hells—! Chen Yi!"
"It's Chen Yi!! The mind-bender from Suming!"
"Oh, for fate's sake... Chen Yi, his specialty is mental illusions and compulsion... my mentor warned me about his type, never look them in the eye for too long..."
"So... he was... puppeteering?!"
In the ensuing uproar, Yao leaned heavily against a carved wooden pillar, a thin, convincing trickle of crimson leaking from the corner of her mouth. She looked wanly, breathlessly, at the arena regulator who had dropped down from his post, his face grim. "I was set up," she stated, her voice weak but dripping with furious indignation. "They used illusions... mental compulsion... to force me into the wager... Can I report this assault? This is beyond dueling."
The regulator, an old hand who had seen every dirty trick, every poisoned blade, and every glamoured lie in the book, looked from her to the groaning Chen Yi, to the pale, startled faces of Cao Jian's group. He shook his head, his face like stone. "Mind-affecting skills are a legitimate, if dishonorable and widely despised, tactic outside of sanctioned, refereed matches. A formal complaint to the hotel won't nullify a signed duel contract. You can forfeit, but only if bothparties agree to dissolve it. The wager is part of the contract."
"And my cores?" Yao asked, the picture of pained, righteous victimhood.
"Only if they agree to cancel the match. Otherwise, they are part of the pot. Winner takes all."
The pieces snapped together for everyone watching with a nearly audible click. The "scholarly," "reasonable" Chen Yi had been the one "sympathizing" with Jian Feilan earlier, likely the one who mentally nudged him into the foolish challenge, stoking his pride, and then targeted Yao for the big score. A two-stage trap. He just hadn't counted on his control being detected and broken so violently, or the retaliation being so immediate, physical, and public.
Jian Feilan and his friends, now halfway healed, exchanged horrified, dawning looks of understanding and shame. They had been played, utterly and completely. Yuqin's earlier confusion evaporated, replaced by a cold admiration for the brutal, elegant counterstroke. So that's the play. And the counter-play.
But with Yao apparently injured, pale, leaning on the pillar, the trickle of blood stark against her skin... could she even fight? Was the gambit over?
Luohe Sanqian glanced at her, his gaze cool, assessing, and utterly devoid of sympathy. "In your state, stay down," he said, his voice flat, final. "The three of us are sufficient."
Bald Lu blinked. "Huh? Are we? I mean, I'm game, but..."
Pang Ci's eyes went wide with panic. "Bro, we are notsufficient! That's Cao Jian! He's top ten Suming!"
Yao lifted her head, a flicker of her usual, sharp, calculating self breaking through the pallor of her performance. "If we lose," she asked, her voice a pained rasp, "do we split the two hundred cores four ways? An even split?"
Luohe Sanqian didn't miss a beat. "No. You pay. You were the one compelled to bet. If we win, we take a cut. A finder's fee for the cleanup."
Yao stared at him, her expression blank for a second before morphing into one of pure, unvarnished betrayal. "..."
What the actual, unmitigated hell!
Luohe Sanqian,ruthless, turned on his heel and strode onto the platform, not looking back. The other two, Bald Lu and Pang Ci, suddenly relieved of any financial liability for the astronomical wager, exchanged a frantic look, shrugged in unison, and scrambled after him with renewed, if slightly desperate, vigor. At least they weren't on the hook for the money!
"Hey! That's three against four!" Jian Feilan yelled, pushing past the protesting healer, his face a patchwork of healing bruises. "If Oxus can't fight, get someone else! I'll do it! I owe them!"
The three on the platform ignored him completely, as if he were a ghost. Cao Jian's group, initially rattled by their accomplice's very public, very painful exposure and incapacitation, now saw a golden, shining opportunity. Oxus was down! Truly hurt, mentally addled, or both! These three idiots from the backwater cities actually thought they could win a 3v4? Against them? It was a gift from the heavens!
"Fine! The match stands! Let's go! No more delays!" Cao Jian barked, slapping his hand on the duel contract to seal it before anyone else could intervene or Oxus could change his mind. The energy dome around the platform snapped shut with a deep, resonant humthat vibrated in the chest, sealing them in.
The crowd watched, a sea of faces pressed close. Most saw a foregone conclusion, a tragedy about to happen. Pity for the Jingyang trio warred with morbid, eager curiosity. Credits were already changing hands in hushed side-bets.
"Heard that Luohe guy from Dongchen isn't a total pushover. Took out a mini-boss solo. Maybe he's been sandbagging?"
"Maybe. But still, three against four, and Cao Jian's crew are all top twenty from Suming, they train together... the Jingyang guys would have to be idiots or have a death wish..."
Before the sentence could finish, Pang Ci, standing on the platform looking comically small and out of place, closed his eyes, took a deep, centering breath, and made a swift, intricate gesture with his chubby fingers—a summoning sigil drawn in light.
Honk.
The sound was absurd. A plump, snowy-white gosling materialized in a puff of frost-tinged air and the smell of a clean, cold pond. It blinked beady black eyes, shook its tail feathers with an air of mild irritation, and then—multiplied. Not an illusion. Four identical, utterly furious, paddle-footed balls of fluff now stood where one had been. And as one, with a coordinated fury that was terrifying in its absurdity, they launched themselves across the platform. Their speed was a blur, their trajectory unpredictable, weaving through the legs of Cao Jian's water serpent like it was standing still.
Honk! Honk! HONK!
"What in the nine hells—?!"
A second of pure, unadulterated, feather-flying chaos ensued. Cao Jian and his two remaining combatants (the rat-faced boy and the burly one) were suddenly dancing a frantic, undignified jig, dodging, blocking, or swatting at frantic, needle-sharp pecks that tore through fabric, drew thin lines of blood, and targeted eyes, throats, and knees with malicious precision. They looked instinctively, desperately, towards their fourth member, their dedicated healer, a girl with kind eyes now wide with shock, for support, for a cleansing wave, for anything.
She was already sprawled on the polished white stone, utterly unconscious, a large, cartoonish lump rising on her forehead where a gosling had descended from a short, improbable hop and landed a perfect, concussive peck. The bonkhad been audible throughout the hall.
The match had transformed in the space of two heartbeats: Three serious, skilled attackers + one absurdly powerful, multiplicating, tactical-nuisance support pet vs. Three injured, suddenly, catastrophically healer-less combatants.
Cao Jian, parrying a whip-crack of pressurized water from Luohe Sanqian while simultaneously dodging a gosling's beak aimed at his eyeball, screamed in dawning horror, fury, and the bitter taste of a scam turned. "SHE WAS FAKING! THE BLOOD! SHE'S FINE! THEY'RE CHEATING! THIS IS A SETUP! OXUS, YOU CHEATING, TWO-FACED SCUM!"
Below, outside the dome, Yao straightened up from the pillar, the movement smooth, assured. Under the stunned gaze of the entire hall, she pulled a plain white linen handkerchief from her sleeve. She dabbed delicately, almost fastidiously, at the "blood" on the corner of her lip. Then, she reached into her pocket, pulled out a red, berry-flavored lozenge, and popped it into her mouth, crunching it with apparent satisfaction.
Oh. It was just candy. Theatrical, delicious candy.
The arena regulator fixed her with a long, utterly flat, utterly unamused stare that spoke volumes about his career choice and his opinion of dramatic adolescents. Then, his eyes shifted past her, and he gave a slight, formal bow from the waist as a new figure approached through the parted crowd.
The man was young, perhaps only in his late twenties, but wore a carefully trimmed, precise goatee that added an air of deliberate, old-world sophistication. His robes were of a subdued, impossibly expensive grey fabric, cut in an elegantly古朴 style that whispered of generations of money and effortless, ingrained confidence. He moved with the polished, feline grace of a seasoned courtier and socialite, a charming, knowing smile playing on his lips that didn't quite reach his keen, assessing eyes.
"Oxus," he said, the smile widening, showing perfect teeth. "At this point, given the imminent... familial ties, you really should start calling me 'Elder Brother,' you know. It's only proper."
He paused, letting the title hang. "I am Fu Qiang."
Yao turned slowly, one hand slipping casually into the pocket of her trousers, the other meticulously folding the now-stained handkerchief into a neat, precise square. She held it for a beat, then tossed it with a flick of her wrist into a nearby bronze waste receptacle. It landed without a sound. She regarded the man with a lifted eyebrow, a cool, appraising look. So this is Fu Qiang. The architect of the convenient cage. Younger than I imagined. More... polished. More dangerous.
"Since I'm the one marrying into the family," she said, her voice clear, carrying, and devoid of all the previous weakness or pain, "the one providing the... political bridge, does the Fu family provide a dowry? Or is the groom expected to arrive empty-handed, just grateful for the roof?"
The question hung in the air, absurd, audacious, and breathtakingly rude. It stunned the onlookers into a deeper, disbelieving silence. Several choked on their own spit.
Fu Qiang's polished, perfect smile froze on his face, a crack in the porcelain. His eyes widened a fraction. "...What?" The word was flat, disarmed.
Yao sighed, a world-weary, profoundly put-upon sound that seemed to carry the weight of her exploded skiff, her murdered family, her newly acquired title, the mine, the sprite, and the general, overwhelming ridiculousness of her current existence. She gestured vaguely with the hand still in her pocket towards the platform, where Cao Jian was now being pecked relentlessly while trying to fend off Bald Lu's enthusiastic fists. "You see? This is the tragic reality. This is precisely why I'm forced to sell my body, my future, and what's left of my dignity, just to make ends meet. The economy is brutal."
As the last, dry word left her mouth, a series of final, decisive thudsechoed from the now-silent arena, cutting through the stunned silence she had created. The match was over.
The energy dome dissipated with a soft sigh of releasing magic. Luohe Sanqian, Bald Lu (knuckling a bleeding lip but grinning), and a beaming, ecstatically victorious Pang Ci stood over the groaning, thoroughly defeated, feather-dusted forms of Cao Jian's team. The white goslings honked once, triumphantly, and vanished in four simultaneous puffs of cold air.
At that exact moment, in a small, steamy, familiarly grimy noodle shop a few blocks from the academy hotel, the air rich with the smell of pork bone broth and chili oil, Lin Chengxiu slurped a mouthful of rich noodles. "How did she know?" he mused, swallowing. "How did she know she'd be specifically targeted, ambushed, and know to ask us to be on standby, out of sight? The message was... precise."
Lin Hengjing picked a plump shrimp from her bowl with chopsticks held in a perfect, delicate grip. She ate it, then wiped her lips with a paper napkin. "Two possibilities, non-exclusive," she stated, her voice calm. "One: she was attacked en route. The explosion of her skiff was not an accident. She survived, deduced the attempt would continue here, in a more subtle form. Two: she has enemies operating on a different board entirely, independent of the local Teng and Lan squabbles. Enemies with longer reach and different motives." She took a sip of tea. "Also, she has eyes in the hotel. Someone on payroll. Or someone who owes her. Information is her first weapon."
She set her cup down. "And she has resources. If she appears broke now, it simply means she's already spent them. On what, is the question."
She didn't know if Luohe Sanqian and the others had been paid. Pang Ci, that nervous, clever little guy, had probably volunteered out of sheer, abject terror and a keen sense of which way the wind was blowing. Only those who had truly faced Oxus in the crucible of the instance, who had seen the calm, terrifying calculus behind those eyes, understood that the points on a leaderboard were a fleeting illusion. The real power was in the will to do anything, to become anything, to survive.
The real question lingered, unspoken between them, hanging in the fragrant steam of their soup: Who was behind Cao Jian? Who had the means, the motive, and the cold patience to manipulate events from the deepest shadows, using pawns like Chen Yi without ever revealing their own face, their own sigil? The game, it seemed, had not ended in Jingyang. It had simply changed venues, and the players had become much, much more interesting.