Immortality Starts With Face

The
gentle, almost subliminal thrum of the spirit-stone powered engine, a
monotonous vibration that permeated the very structure of the flying
vessel, was a stark and unwelcome counterpoint to the tempest of
emotions that had begun to churn within the breast of Zhang Wei, City
Lord of Qingshan Town. They were homeward bound from Fallen Star City, a
journey that, by all rights, should have been marked by a quiet,
burgeoning satisfaction. He should have been feeling a palpable sense of
accomplishment after the unexpected triumphs of the auction.

He should have been happy.

Ecstatic, even!

And
indeed, the pragmatic bureaucrat in him, one meticulously sculpted by
generations of Imperial "public servants," the inheritor of a long and
unbroken line of Zhang ancestors dedicated to the Empire's intricate
clockwork… did indeed feel some measure of contentment. Young
Jiang Li, that inscrutable enigma wrapped in the disarmingly unassuming
guise of a provincial youth, had not merely stirred the stagnant waters
of that auction; he had unleashed a veritable storm of spirit
stones, forging connections with merchants, guilds, and powerful
families alike. Connections that promised, with an almost dizzying
certainty, to rapidly elevate Qingshan Town from its long slumber as a
forgotten, dusty backwater into a burgeoning, vibrant hub of commerce
and opportunity!

Zhang
Wei's own personal coffers, long accustomed to but a modest trickle of
bribes (ahem… "administrative fees!") and the town's
perpetually-strained treasury, would both swell considerably as a
result.

Nor did he fail to
appreciate the more immediate, tangible benefits – such as the two
exquisitely large barrels of hellaciously expensive spirit wines, worth
many thousands of spirit stones, that were gifted to him by his new
friend – a delightful, intoxicating bonus that promised many pleasant
evenings of quiet, decadent indulgence.

Things
were definitely looking up in his life! A more comfortable future,
perhaps even one with a more respectable posting closer to the beating
heart of the Azure Province (if he played his cards with the requisite
acumen and discretion) seemed more likely by the minute. These were the eminently sensible, reassuring thoughts that should have occupied the forefront of his mind.

And yet his gaze, heavy with an unidentifiable yearning, kept drifting, drawn by an invisible current.

Across
the cabin, its interior surprisingly spacious and appointed with a
restrained, functional luxury, Jiang Yue was a beacon of restless
vitality. Her spear – undoubtedly a formidable mid-grade artifact that
seemed to drink in the ambient light, leaving faint shadows dancing in
its wake – leaned against the bulkhead beside her, a silent promise of
lethal grace.

She was
currently regaling the group: himself, Lin Ruolan (who piloted the
vessel with an air of quiet, unwavering competence, her slender fingers
moving deftly over the glowing control runes), and his new friend, the
enigmatic Jiang Li – with an exhilarating tale of her adventurous past.

Her
voice, rich and resonant, possessed a captivating timbre that painted
vivid, almost tangible pictures of crumbling, forgotten tombs nestled in
treacherous mountain ranges; of ancient, cunningly wrought traps that
guarded secrets best left undisturbed; and of the pure, unadulterated
thrill of discovery – and unearthing relics from ages long past.

Her
laughter, when it came – and it came often, unbidden and unrestrained –
was a cascade of genuine, infectious mirth that seemed to fill the
cabin with a vibrant, almost tangible energy.

Her
every movement – from the way she gestured emphatically with her hands
to the subtle shift of her weight as she leaned forward to emphasize a
point – spoke of a lithe, coiled power, a readiness honed by countless
challenges. She was an Amazon, a warrior woman carved from the very
essence of the wild, untamed frontiers she so clearly loved, her spirit
as boundless as the horizons she sought.

She
was, Zhang Wei thought, (his heart clenching with a familiar, dull ache
that was equal parts admiration and a despair he dared not name) … magnificent.

And
he, Zhang Wei, in the stark, unforgiving glare of her brilliance, felt
like a fading shadow. A poorly rendered imitation of a man.

His
own Mid-Foundation Establishment cultivation, a respectable enough
achievement for a City Lord of such a remote, strategically
insignificant posting as Qingshan… now felt like a poorly constructed,
crumbling dam against the vibrant, surging flood of her Qi. He
could sense it clearly when he got close to her: an almost physical
pressure in the air around her body – the purity, the sheer untamed
potency of her energy, a stark and painful contrast to his own, which
felt…stagnant, turgid, like a once-flowing river now choked with silt
and weeds.

After all, his
current cultivation had been achieved not through arduous,
soul-tempering meditation or life-or-death battles in a qi-rich,
perilous wildernesses, but through the steady, uninspiring, and,
ultimately, limiting consumption of the cheapest grade of Nine Essences
Pills he could find. Their myriad impurities were a subtle, insidious
poison that had long since woven itself into the very fabric of his
meridians, capping his growth potential with an unyielding finality.

He'd
accepted it, of course. Years ago. The invisible ceiling on his
ambitions, the quiet relegation to the ranks of the unremarkable. Golden
Core? Pffft. That was but a distant, unattainable star, a
shimmering mirage in a desert of mediocrity, a pipe dream for younger,
more foolish, more hopeful men.

But
now, in Jiang Yue's incandescent presence, that weary acceptance felt
like a leaden cloak, heavy and suffocating, its weight pressing down on
his very soul. For the first time in decades, a profound, gnawing insecurity, sharp and barbed, was taking root in the barren soil of his heart.

He was unworthy.

The
thought, stark and unadorned, was a bitter draught, burning its way
down his throat, leaving behind a taste of ash and regret. What could
he, a man whose spirit had long ago sought refuge in the mundane,
possibly offer a woman who danced with Discovery and laughed in the face
of danger?

His mind,
unbidden, as if seeking escape from this uncomfortable present, drifted
back through the murky, silt-laden waters of years. He thought back to
more interesting times, when the name Zhang Wei was not yet
synonymous with quiet resignation and the administration of a backwater
frontier town.

The Zhang Clan of the Imperial Capital.

Theirs was not a
name whispered in awe for dazzling martial prowess, vast wealth, or
audacious political maneuvering. No, the Zhangs were a different, more
subtle breed. For twelve centuries, through dynastic upheavals and the
slow, grinding changes of eras, they had served. First the Celestial
Phoenix Dynasty, its glories now faded into legend and song; then, after
its inevitable, fiery collapse, the currently reigning Heavenly Dragon
Dynasty, its power seemingly unshakeable.

The
Zhang Way was that of an unwavering, pragmatic loyalty, a
chameleon-like ability to adapt and endure; their specialty – the
intricate, often labyrinthine machinery of Imperial bureaucracy. Law,
order, the meticulous maintenance of stability – these were the
unglamorous but essential pillars upon which the Zhang Clan had built
its unspectacular – but enduring – legacy. His own grandfather, the
current Patriarch, was a formidable figure, a High-Grade Golden Core
cultivator whose infrequent pronouncements, delivered in a voice like
stones grinding together, carried the immutable weight of an unyielding
mountain, a man whose pragmatic, world-weary gaze seemed to penetrate
all pretense, all artifice.

The
family's ambition was not a roaring fire, but a slow, creeping vine,
patiently, persistently placing its scions in an intricate network of
mid-level positions throughout the vast, sprawling Empire – a web of
quiet influence, of ears that heard every whisper and eyes that missed
no subtle shift in the political currents, ensuring the Zhangs always
knew which way the winds were blowing. Always ready to bend, but never
to break.

They were not
conquerors, stewards, nor kings. Their strength lay not in overt
dominance, but in their indispensable utility to whoever was in charge.

The Zhangs were, first and foremost, survivors.

He, however, in the flush of his youth, had once dreamed of more,
of a destiny painted in bolder, more vibrant colors. He remembered a
younger version of himself: a boy whose heart beat with a fierce,
reckless rhythm, whose eyes saw not the dusty, ink-stained ledgers of
bureaucracy but the gleaming, seductive promise of glory, of a name that
would echo through the annals of the Empire.

He'd
even shown talent – a distinct spark that had surprised even his
stern-faced, traditionalist tutors. Metal affinity, yes, like many in
his line, a solid, dependable foundation. But his comprehension of Qi
manipulation, his intuitive, almost instinctive grasp of complex
techniques, had been… notable. He would be somebody, he had
once vowed to himself in the fervent, secret solitude of his youth – not
just another anonymous, interchangeable cog in the vast, bureucratic
machine. He had envisioned himself a great General, perhaps, leading
Imperial legions to victory on some distant, war-torn border, or a
renowned Justicar, his name synonymous with unshakeable integrity, his
pronouncements shaping the course of justice across entire regions.

Then came Ling Xiaoli. Lady Ling Xiaoli.

Her
name, even now, after all these years, was a splinter of razor-sharp
ice lodged deep in his memory, a wound that had never truly healed. The
only daughter of a powerful Marquis, her beauty was a celebrated, almost
mythical masterpiece in the Capital's gilded, perfumed circles, her
talent in the fluid, deceptive water arts a whispered legend among
cultivators.

He had been
utterly, hopelessly smitten, a common moth drawn inexorably to a
dazzling, fatally indifferent flame. He'd pursued her with the reckless,
single-minded abandon of youth.

Composing excruciatingly terrible poetry that he'd dared to read outside her walls.

Fighting ill-advised, entirely unnecessary duels in Her name against other hapless suitors.

Squandering
a significant portion of his yearly allowance on extravagant,
ostentatious gifts she accepted with a polite, distant smile that never
quite reached the cool depths of her grey eyes.

He'd
risked his nascent reputation, and the carefully cultivated good
opinion of his clan elders, all for a fleeting glance, a carelessly
dropped word, a momentary, illusory flicker of her attention.

The humiliation, when it inevitably came, was not a private sorrow, but a brutal, public spectacle.

It
happened at a grand banquet hosted by the ambitious Third Prince, a
glittering affair filled with the Capital's elite. Ling Xiaoli, radiant
in silks the precise color of a summer twilight sky, had been formally,
irrevocably betrothed to a certain Young Master Fan, a rapidly rising
star from an ancient Ducal house, a man whose cultivation already
touched the formidable late stages of Foundation Establishment, whose
family's influence and power dwarfed that of the respectable – but
ultimately secondary – Zhang clan.

Zhang
Wei had been there – an insignificant, forgotten guest relegated to a
distant, shadowed table – when the engagement announcement was made. He
remembered the polite, almost mechanical applause, the murmur of
insincere congratulations, and Ling Xiaoli's dazzling, triumphant smile,
directed solely, exclusively, at her magnificent betrothed.

She hadn't even spared him a cursory glance!

It
was as if he, and all his desperate, heartfelt efforts, his very
existence, had been utterly and completely erased from her world. The
searing pain of that public erasure, that casual, devastating dismissal,
was compounded by a colder, sharper, more insidious fear.

A
cousin, Zhang Jun – an ambitious man with an uncanny talent for
navigating the treacherous, shark-infested currents of clan politics
(his own aspirations carefully concealed beneath a veneer of affable
mediocrity) – had approached him days later, in the quiet anonymity of a
secluded temple garden. His words were silken, his smile sympathetic,
almost mournful – but the message, delivered with surgical precision,
was clear as poisoned ice.

"Wei," he'd said, his voice a low, conspiratorial murmur that barely disturbed the tranquility of the garden, "your recent… exuberance… has been noted, and, shall we say, discussed by the elders. They appreciate youthful spirit, of course. A certain passionate élan can be interesting from time to time. But discretion,
dear cousin, is the very bedrock of our family's continued prosperity.
Lady Ling Xiaoli, as you must now surely understand, is far beyond your
station. To persist in any further unseemly displays of attachment would be… most unwise. For you. And, more importantly, for the family."

The

unspoken threat hung heavy and suffocating in the air between them, the
specter of censure, of being relegated to the most insignificant,
career-ending postings in the farthest, most desolate corners of the
Empire, of having his vital cultivation resources curtailed. Perhaps
even the faint, chilling whisper of a more permanent, more final solution if his 'exuberance' became a genuine liability to the clan's carefully constructed image.

He'd
looked into Zhang Jun's placid, unreadable eyes and seen not a shred of
familial concern, but the cold, reptilian calculation of a rival
ensuring a potential competitor was neatly, efficiently, and permanently
sidelined.

That was the
turning point. The precise moment the vibrant colors of his youthful
dreams had bled into a dull, monotonous grey. The confluence of brutal
public humiliation. The ego-shattering realization of his own profound
insignificance in the grand, indifferent chessboard of the Capital's
power plays. And the veiled, yet unmistakable, threat from within his
own clan.

"What is the point?" he'd asked himself then, the fire in his belly dwindling to a mere flicker, then to cold, dead embers.

What
is the point of striving, of risking everything, for a glory that would
always be tantalizingly out of reach, for a recognition that would
never, ever come from those whose validation he so desperately sought?

He
saw – with a sudden, horrifying clarity – the endless, grinding
attrition of souls within the Capital's opulent, suffocating walls, the
brittle smiles that masked daggers of ambition, the alliances that
shifted like desert sands beneath a fickle wind. He saw the grim,
cautionary fate of those who aimed too high, who dared too much – and
fell too hard, their dreams shattered.

Their names forgotten.

And so, Zhang Wei had made his choice, a choice born of disillusionment and a desperate yearning for peace.

He retreated.

He consciously, deliberately, embraced the family's long-standing tradition of quiet, unassuming service.

When
the City Lordship of Qingshan Town – a remote, impoverished,
strategically irrelevant speck on the vast Imperial map – became
available, he had actively, almost eagerly, sought it. He saw it as an
escape. A sanctuary. A haven from the crushing pressures, the lethal
intrigues, the constant, soul-wearying vigilance required to survive in
the Capital. Here, at least – far from the glittering heart of the
Empire, he could breathe. Here, he could simply… be.

And for many long, uneventful years, it had been enough. A quiet life. A modicum of local respect. The slow, unremarkable, predictable
progression of his days. He had even, for a time, entertained a faint,
foolish hope that in this isolation, he might rediscover some lost part
of himself… but that, too, had faded with the passing seasons.

Until Jiang Li arrived.

An
unexpected pebble dropped into the stagnant pond of his existence. The
"trash" of the Jiang family, they'd called him, a discarded,
ambitionless youth.

He'd expected to find a listless, resentful, perhaps even broken young man.

Instead,
he found a vibrant young man in command of a powerful presence and an
unnerving, preternatural calm. A young man with of hidden, unfathomable
depths. A young man who spoke of deathly intrigues with a
disconcertingly straight face and scattered gold taels and priceless
spirit stones like they were common, worthless pebbles.

And now, this.

Entire warehouse districts newly under construction.

Renovation and city expansion projects in progress on an unprecedented scale.

A fortune of over a million low-grade spirit stones, made seemingly overnight.

His town's destiny irrevocably rewritten.

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A
friendship, unexpected and surprisingly genuine, had begun to form
between them, a fragile shoot of warmth in the barren landscape of Zhang
Wei's carefully guarded emotions. He felt a genuine warmth towards
Jiang Li now, a burgeoning protective instinct that surprised him with
its intensity.

His reverie, a bittersweet journey through the ruins of his past, was shattered with the force of a physical blow.

Jiang
Yue, mid-sentence in her captivating tale, her voice still echoing with
the thrill of a daring escapade, suddenly went rigid. Her animated
expression vanished as if wiped clean by an invisible hand, replaced by
one of deadly, absolute seriousness. Her eyes, which had been sparkling
with laughter and mischief only moments before, widened, their focus
sharpening, locking onto something beyond the vessel's hull, something
unseen, unheard by the others.

The very air in the cabin seemed to crackle with a sudden, inexplicable tension.

"Ruolan!" Her voice was a whipcrack, devoid of its earlier warmth, sharp as honed steel.

"Hard
northeast! Climb! Maximum speed! Now!" Lin Ruolan, startled by the
abrupt, urgent command, nevertheless reacted instantly, her training
taking over. Her hands became a blur over the glowing control panel, the
vessel groaning in protest as it lurched violently, angling sharply
upwards, its formations whining with the sudden strain.

"Little
Li," Yue continued, her voice tight, strained, her hand already a blur
as it closed around the familiar haft of her spear, "if you have any
life-saving defensive or escape artifacts, anything at all, now is the
time to get them ready. Stay in here. And try not to die."

Zhang
Wei opened his mouth to ask, to voice the confusion and dawning fear
that clawed at his throat, to understand the sudden, terrifying shift in
atmosphere, but the words died on his lips, stillborn. The vessel screamed,
a high-pitched, tortured whine of stressed spirit materials and
overloaded defensive formations, as a colossal shockwave, visible as a
ripple of distorted air, slammed into their port side with the force of a
giant's fist.

A brilliant, searing flash of white light momentarily blinded them, which was followed by the acrid smell of ash and ozone.

Alarms, shrill and insistent, blared through the cabin, a frantic, metallic chorus of doom.

He didn't need to ask.

He
extended his spiritual sense, a familiar – if rusty – exercise, his
mind racing to interpret the sudden influx of hostile intent he hadn't
experienced in decades.

His heart plummeted into the icy depths of his stomach.

Seven.

Seven
distinct, malevolent Qi signatures, like a swarm of angry, venomous
hornets, swarming towards them with predatory speed and precision.

Four in the early stages of Foundation Establishment, their auras sharp and aggressive.

Two, like himself, in the mid-stages, their power more consolidated, more dangerous.

And
one… one that pulsed with a suffocating pressure, a palpable miasma of
threat that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end and his
skin crawl even from here.

Late Foundation Establishment.

This
was no random encounter with opportunistic, disorganized bandits. This
was a planned ambush: a professional, well-balanced hunting party, their
coordination chillingly evident.

Before
he could fully process the horrifying implications, before the
paralysis of shock could truly take hold, Jiang Yue was already a blur
of focused, explosive motion. With a guttural grunt of exertion, she
kicked open the side hatch of the vessel. The wind roared into the cabin
like a hungry beast, snatching at their clothes and hair, threatening
to tear them from their moorings. Her spear was in her hand, no longer
merely held, but an integral part of her – a natural extension of her
arm, her will. And without a moment's hesitation, without a backward
glance, she launched herself into the turbulent, unforgiving sky.

A
strange, almost forgotten impulse, a reckless, primal surge of
something he hadn't felt in years, not since the fires of his youth had
been so cruelly extinguished, propelled Zhang Wei forward after her.

"Your
Lordship!" Lin Ruolan cried out, her voice thin with terror, her face a
mask of pale alarm – but he was already moving, his body acting on an
instinct deeper than thought, deeper than fear.

He
might tell himself, later, that it was simply his duty as City Lord.
That he had the responsibility to negotiate with bandits within his
jurisdiction.

But the
deeper, truer reason for his actions was singular: the indelible image
of Jiang Yue, alone, a solitary warrior against a storm, facing seven
hostiles. He was, he realized with a jolt that was both revelation and
condemnation, far more worried for her than even for himself. The
thought was a brand, searing itself into his consciousness, as
terrifying as it was undeniably, irrevocably true.

He followed her out into the maelstrom.

The
air outside was a chaotic, deafening symphony of whistling wind, the
crackling, spitting energy of mobilized Qi, and the distant, muted roar
of the escaping vessel's wake.

Below, the ground was a distant, rushing, indifferent blur of greens and browns.

All
around them, seven figures, cloaked, with the upper part of their faces
masked in identical, anonymous black, their intentions chillingly
clear, had formed a loose, inescapable encirclement.

The
leader, a tall, powerfully built man whose Late-Stage Foundation
Establishment aura pressed down like a physical weight, making the very
air seem thick and hard to breathe, drifted forward with an arrogant,
unhurried confidence.

"A
wise decision to come out," the leader's voice was distorted by his
mask, taking on a metallic, grating quality, but it carried an
unmistakable undercurrent of arrogant confidence, of absolute certainty
in their victory. "Now, hand over the wealth you so audaciously acquired
in Fallen Star City, every last spirit stone, and perhaps, just
perhaps, we'll --"

He didn't get to finish his monologue.

Jiang
Yue, an embodiment of implacable, pitiless violence, exploded into
motion. There were no fancy, ostentatious techniques. No elaborate,
time-wasting war cries. Just a brutal, direct, terrifyingly efficient application of speed and raw, unadulterated power.

One moment she was twenty zhang
(about 80 yards) distant, a defiant silhouette against the bruised sky.
The next – she was upon one of the Early Foundation Establishment
bandits, a man who had barely registered her intent. Her spear, a streak
of dark, vengeful lightning, thrust forward with unerring accuracy.
There was a tell-tale crack of a broken sound barrier, followed by a sickening, wet, percussive crunch.

The bandit's head didn't just get pierced; it simply disintegrated,
exploding in a grotesque, obscene spray of crimson mist, bone
fragments, and brain matter that was almost instantly – mercifully –
scattered by the relentless wind.

The
shocking brutality of it – the almost casual violence of Yue's act –
stunned the remaining attackers for a bare, infinitesimal fraction of a
second. Their confident postures faltered, a flicker of disbelief in
their hidden eyes.

It was all the invitation Zhang Wei required.

The
City Lord, his Metal Qi surging through his meridians like a
long-dammed river finally breaking free, roared, a sound of primal fury
and desperate, cornered defiance. A colossal, two-handed
greatsword, a hulking metal monstrosity far too large and heavy for any
normal man to wield effectively, a relic from his more audacious youth,
materialized in his grip. Simultaneously, a thick, circular shield of
condensed, shimmering metal, easily five chi (about 5.5 feet)
in diameter and inscribed with defensive runes, spun into existence,
orbiting him like a loyal, protective moon, instantly deflecting a
hastily launched, crackling fireball from one of the Mid-Stage bandits.

He
found himself facing two
cultivators. Their eyes, visible as narrow slits in their masks, held a
mixture of surprise and undisguised contempt.

He should have been able to handle them easily, if he could summon the focus and precision of his younger days.

But
his Qi, so long accustomed to placid, gentle circulation for
maintaining health rather than fueling combat, responded sluggishly,
feeling thick and unwilling in his meridians. His movements, once sharp
and instinctively precise, felt heavy, clumsy, out of sync. His
greatsword, though impressive in appearance, felt unwieldy in his
unaccustomed hands, its balance off.

He
parried a shimmering wind blade, the impact jarring his arms to the
shoulders, and his orbiting shield shimmered violently as it absorbed a
vicious barrage of needle-thin metallic projectiles. He was being
rapidly pushed back, forced into a desperate, ungainly defense. The
bitter, acrid taste of his own profound inadequacy filled his mouth, a
familiar poison.

Across the aerial battlefield, a few dozen zhang
away, Jiang Yue was a maelstrom of controlled destruction. She was a
whirlwind of earth-yellow Qi, her spear a dancing, lethal dragon, its

tip a blur of black-silver light, as she single-handedly, impossibly,
engaged three opponents – the other Mid-Stage bandit and two more
Early-Stage ones.

She was magnificent,
a heroine descended from myth. Her spear thrust, parried, swept – each
movement a testament to years of brutal, unforgiving, life-or-death
combat, each action economical, precise, and devastatingly effective.
Her style was not elegant in the refined manner of the Capital's
academies; it was raw, powerful, and utterly pragmatic, honed in the
crucible of real conflict.

She
smoothly deflected a spear made of jagged metal qi, its touch promising
a perforated death, then sidestepped a barrage of insidious poison
bolts that sought to sap her strength, and then, with a furious,
earth-shaking roar, her spear blurred, becoming a dozen phantom images,
leaving a deep, horrific gash across the Mid-Stage bandit's shoulder,
forcing him to cry out in agony and stumble back in the air, his Qi
shield shattering like brittle glass.

She was holding all three of her opponents at bay.

No, it was more than that.

She was actually – unbelievably -- pushing them back!

A wild, improbable, intoxicating hope surged in Zhang Wei's chest.

Maybe… maybe we can win this!

The
thought was a delicate, iridescent butterfly, taking flight in the
midst of a hurricane, only to be brutally, unforgivably crushed.

The
Late-Stage leader, who had been observing the unfolding chaos with an
almost academic detachment, his head cocked as if analyzing their every
move, finally, decisively, intervened.

He vanished. Not with a flicker or a blur – he was suddenly just… gone.

Zhang
Wei's spiritual sense screamed a frantic, belated warning an instant
before the man reappeared, heralded by a violent gust of emerald-tinged
wind that reeked of ozone: directly, impossibly, behind Jiang Yue – who,
although already reacting, would prove just a fraction of a moment too
slow.

A palm, wreathed in
coruscating emerald wind that pulsed with destructive energies slammed
into Jiang Yue's right shoulder with the force of a battering ram. A
sickening, obscene crack echoed even over the howl of the wind and the clash of Qi, a sound that lanced through Zhang Wei's heart like a shard of ice.

Her
cry was a raw, broken sound of pure agony, her body arching
unnaturally, her trusted spear falling from suddenly nerveless, spasming
fingers, tumbling end over end into the abyss below.

Before
she could even begin to fall from the sky, a golden chain, thin as a
striking viper and glowing with a malevolent, pulsating light, shot from
the leader's sleeve with an impossible speed. It snaked around Jiang
Yue's torso with horrifying, almost sentient precision, binding her arms
cruelly behind her back, crossing between her breasts and across her
hips in a way that Zhang Wei, even in his terror and rage, found
disturbingly, perversely suggestive – before cinching brutally tight and
even looping around her mouth and throat to gag her, stifling her
pained gasps.

Her struggles were brief, violent.

And futile.

The
fierce light in her eyes, that untamable fire, dimmed, replaced by a
mixture of excruciating pain and incandescent, helpless fury, before she
was unceremoniously, contemptuously, knocked from the sky: a broken
doll, a fallen angel, plummeting towards the distant, indifferent earth.

"YUE!" Zhang Wei screamed, his voice cracking, tearing from his throat, his heart a block of solid, agonizing ice.

The distraction, born of horror and despair, would prove decisive.

The
two Early-Stage opponents he faced, sensing his momentary, critical
lapse in concentration, pressed their advantage with ruthless
efficiency. A coordinated attack – one feinting high with a dazzling
flurry of light, drawing his shield upwards, the other sweeping low with
a scything leg attack imbued with a heavy earth Qi. His shield,
reacting to the feint, would have blocked the fake high attack – but the
low sweep connected with brutal force against his knees, sending him
tumbling through the air. His balance was lost. His greatsword – far too
heavy to control in his disorientation – flew from his grasp. Before he
could even attempt to recover, a Mid-Stage bandit – the one Yue had
wounded earlier, his face contorted in a mask of vicious satisfaction –
was upon him. A heavy, crushing blow to the side of his head with a
metal-gauntleted fist, a flash of agonizing pain, and then darkness
encroached, briefly swallowing his consciousness.

When
his senses, dull and aching, reluctantly returned, he was on the cold,
damp ground, his head throbbing with a nauseating, relentless rhythm,
his limbs bound tightly, painfully, with some kind of Qi-infused chain
that bit into his flesh. The gritty taste of blood and dirt was thick in
his mouth.

A few feet
away, Jiang Yue lay, similarly bound, her face as pale as death, her
breathing shallow and ragged, the angle of her broken shoulder grotesque
and unnatural. The golden chain artifact still held her cruelly, a
glittering serpent coiled around its prey.

The
bandits, their cloaks spattered with drying blood, were gathered around
their leader, who was meticulously wiping a non-existent speck of dust
from his sleeve with an air of bored disdain.

"Do
we kill them, Boss?" one of the Early-Stage cultivators asked, his
voice rough and eager, his eyes glinting with bloodlust. The leader let
out a sigh, a sound of profound inconvenience, as if dealing with a
particularly annoying fly.

"Were you often dropped on your head as a child, Feng?" he drawled, his voice dripping with contempt.

"This one," he gestured dismissively with a flick of his wrist at Zhang Wei, "is an Imperial City Lord. As in, a sanctioned official of the Heavenly Dragon Empire. Have you any idea
what kind of hornets' nest we'd stir up if we were foolish enough to
kill him here? The entire Azure Province, from the Governor down to the
lowest magistrate, would be crawling with Golden Core bastards from the Capital within a fortnight, maybe less. They wouldn't bother with things like trials or investigations. They'd simply cull every independent cultivator, every single unaffiliated group, in a thousand-li radius –just to make a statement. We don't need that kind of attention."

He paused, his gaze, cold and reptilian, devoid of any discernible emotion, falling on Zhang Wei.

"No,
we let him go. Qingshan Town is a forgotten mudhole at the arse-end of
nowhere. He can't do anything to us anyway. He'll lick his wounds, count
his blessings, and be grateful he's still breathing."

Then, his gaze shifted, slowly, deliberately, to Jiang Yue, and a truly unpleasant, predatory smile stretched his lips beneath the mask concealing his nose and eyes.

"Now her,"
he said, his voice taking on a thick, lascivious tone that made Zhang
Wei's blood run cold and his stomach churn with a mixture of rage and
nausea, "her, on the other hand, we'll have some… fun with before we finally dispose of her. Such a spicy, fiery thing she is! It'll be a shame, to break her too soon."

He chuckled – a dry, rasping, mirthless sound that scraped along Zhang Wei's nerves like rusted iron.

"Hold
her here for now. I'm going after that flying ship. The real prize, the
source of all that lovely wealth, is still up there."

With
a final, contemptuous glance at his bound, helpless captives, the
leader shot into the sky, a streak of malevolent emerald light, heading
northeast in pursuit of Lin Ruolan and Jiang Li.

The
wounded Mid-Stage bandit, clutching his still-bleeding shoulder,
swaggered over to Zhang Wei, his masked face radiating smug superiority.
He kicked him lightly, contemptuously, in the ribs.

"Well, City Lord," he sneered, his voice thick with mockery, "didn't you hear the Boss? Pathetic, privileged cur.
Off you go, then! Crawl back to your miserable, dirty little town.
Don't pollute our presence further. Or… do you want us to rough you up a
bit more before you slink away? Give you a few more broken bones to
remember us by?"

Zhang Wei's head swam. A tidal wave of pain, despair, and a suffocating, soul-crushing helplessness washed over him.

He looked at Jiang Yue, bound, broken, her fate sealed – a fate worse than death.

He thought of Jiang Li and Lin Ruolan, now being hunted by that monster, their chances of escape slim to none.

And then, a memory, sharp and visceral as a freshly opened wound, pierced through the suffocating fog of his pain and despair.

The
banquet. Ling Wei's beautiful, indifferent face. His cousin Zhang Jun's
silken, dismissive, soul-chilling threat. The crushing weight of his
own insignificance, the burning shame of his retreat, the precise moment
when his spirit had broken and he had chosen the path of least
resistance.

When he had chosen to give up.

He
remembered the taste of ash and bile in his mouth, the hollow, echoing
emptiness in his soul as he'd walked away from the Capital, vowing to
never again take dangerous risks. To never again dare to reach for
something beyond his grasp.

He looked at Jiang Yue again, at the stubborn, indomitable defiance still flickering in her pain-filled eyes.

He looked in the direction the bandit leader had flown, a disappearing speck of malice against the vast, uncaring sky.

These scum.

These arrogant, cruel, degenerate parasites.

They thought him a coward.

They thought him broken.

And perhaps, for many, many long years, he had been.

But
something inside him, something he thought long dead and buried beneath
thick layers of pragmatism, cynicism, and carefully cultivated
resignation, began to stir. A spark. A tiny, defiant flicker of the fire
he thought had been extinguished forever.

His pride.

Not
the arrogant, foolish pride of his youth, but a deeper, more
fundamental, more elemental pride. The pride of an Imperial Official,
however minor, however insignificant in the grand scheme. The pride of a
man who, despite all his failings and compromises, still believed in
some semblance of order, some measure of justice in a world too often
ruled by brutality. The pride of someone who had, however briefly,
however unexpectedly, tasted genuine friendship and seen true,
breathtaking courage embodied before his very eyes.

Lord
Zhang had given up on personal advancement long, long ago. That dream
was a faded ghost, a poignant, mournful echo from a distant past.

What did he truly have left to lose now?

His
comfortable, stagnant cultivation? His quiet, ultimately meaningless
life, ticking away in predictable, unvarying increments?

He
realized, with a sudden, shocking clarity that cut through the pain and
fear like a bolt of lightning, that he cared more – infinitely more –
for Jiang Yue's safety and Jiang Li's survival, than for the hollow,
empty shell of his own truncated future… or for avoiding the temporary,
excruciating pain that was sure to come.

It
wasn't a rational thought. It was a primal roar from the very depths of
his soul, a desperate, defiant assertion of will against an uncaring,
predatory world. His hand, still bound as it was, twitched, his fingers
curling into a fist. His mind, suddenly sharp and focused, raced.

There was one last, desperate gamble.

A small, unassuming pill, tucked away in a hidden compartment of an emergency storage ring he wore – not on his finger, of course, where it might be easily found – but on his toe, a relic from a time when he'd still imagined he might face dangers that required such desperate, life-altering measures.

It was called the 'Crimson Phoenix Soul-Burning Pill'.

Its
name was whispered in hushed, fearful tones in certain circles, a
brutal contingency of last resort. Its core function was both beautiful
and terrifying in its simplicity: when taken, it would violently,
unnaturally agitate the imbiber's Qi, burning away precious essence to
temporarily boost their potency to unimaginable, unsustainable heights.
From his current Mid-Foundation level, it could – for a few minutes –
grant him the terrifying power of a Late-Stage Foundation Establishment
expert; perhaps, even slightly beyond that. For a few scant minutes, his
cultivation and body would be able to transcend their limits.

The cost, however, would be catastrophic.

The
use of that particular pill was known to inflict extensive,
irreparable, (and likely agonizing) meridian damage. He would be lucky
to retain any cultivation at all afterwards, likely becoming a spiritual
cripple. Further advancement – already a forgotten dream – would become
an absolute impossibility. Even his very lifespan, the years allotted
to him by the heavens, would likely be significantly curtailed.

It
was the kind of pill most cultivators – those with even a sliver of
remaining ambition, a shred of hope for their future – would consider
blasphemous. Even possessing such a thing would already be a desecration
of their hard-won path, a virtual pact with oblivion.

But his path, he knew with a certainty that was both liberating and terrifying, was already a dead end.

He looked upon the bound Jiang Yue yet again, his heart ablaze with a cold fury.

These trash.

These vermin.

They dared to threaten his companions?

They dared to bring their lawless, savage violence to his domain?

They dared to underestimate him, Zhang Wei, City Lord of Qingshan Town, public servant – however flawed – of the great Heavenly Dragon Empire?

Emotions
he hadn't truly felt since the fiery passions of his youth began to
build within him, a glacial inferno threatening to consume him whole.

He would show them.

Oh, he would show them all!

With a guttural grunt, ignoring the searing, protesting pain in his head and ribs, Zhang Wei gave the mental command.

The pill – no bigger than a single mustard seed, dark as congealed blood – materialized directly, obediently, in his mouth.

....

....

....

He swallowed.