Chương 24: Too Late to Kneel (2/3)

"Who knows? A cultivator of my caliber might just warm her up."

The words dripped with such shameless arrogance that several nearby mercenaries visibly recoiled, their expressions twisting between disgust and secondhand embarrassment.

"Eldest Brother Zhao's might is unmatched in the Outer Wards!" the first lackey declared, bowing so deeply his forehead nearly touched his knees. His voice rang out with performative zeal, each syllable pitched to carry across the hall. The lackey's spine curved into a perfect arc of submission, his grimy hands pressed flat against his thighs, knuckles white with exaggerated deference.

"To fell a Red-Stamp mark is like crushing dry rot! The Deaconess will surely recognize that she is in the presence of a true dragon among men!"

The man's breath came in short, excited gasps, as though merely speaking of his master's greatness elevated his own pitiful existence.

"Hehe! Truly, how could a mere merchant woman resist such heaven-shaking martial prowess?" a second lackey chimed in, brandishing a hooked dagger toward the cowering crowd. The blade caught the amber glow of the hall's spirit lamps, throwing wicked slivers of light across the scarred tabletops. His grin was wide and yellow-toothed, lips peeling back like a feral dog's. He swept the dagger in a lazy arc, point trailing through the air as if carving invisible throats, his shoulders swaggering with borrowed menace.

"When Boss brings back that head, the Silk & Ash Chamber won't just pay him—they'll be begging him to become an honored Guest Elder! By next month, we'll all be drinking thousand-year spirit wine from jade cups!"

His free hand gestured wildly, fingers splayed wide as if already grasping phantom riches. Spittle flew from his lips, landing on the floorboards in glistening droplets.

"Forget warming her up, Boss!" the third lackey laughed, slapping his thigh hard enough that the crack echoed over the din of the hall. The sound snapped through the air like a whip strike, drawing winces from nearby cultivators. His palm left a visible red mark through the torn fabric of his pants, and he threw his head back, cackling with unrestrained glee. His eyes gleamed with vicious humor, cheeks flushed with the intoxication of vicarious power.

"Once Deaconess Su witnesses your supreme Dao of the Blade, she will probably abandon the Chamber and beg to become your dual-cultivation partner!"

The lackey's voice cracked on the last word, rising to a shriek of sycophantic delight. He doubled over, clutching his stomach as if the sheer brilliance of his own flattery had wounded him with mirth.

The surrounding mercenaries lowered their heads, jaws clenched and eyes fixed on the floorboards. Shoulders hunched inward, bodies curling into themselves like beaten animals. The stink of their fear was palpable—acrid sweat mingling with the cloying incense, a sour note that cut through the sandalwood and cinnamon.

A few shifted their weight, fingers twitching toward weapon hilts before thinking better of it. Knuckles hovered over leather-wrapped grips, trembling with aborted intent. One man's hand fell away entirely, fingers curling into a white-knuckled fist at his side instead. Another swallowed audibly, his Adam's apple bobbing in his throat like a trapped stone.

Shi Yan, standing at the edge of the crowd, processed the scene with narrowed eyes and a faint glint of bewilderment.

Wow. As expected, they are really good at flattering.

His lips twitched—barely a flicker, gone before it could settle into expression. The corner of his mouth pulled fractionally to one side, a ghost of sardonic amusement that died stillborn on his face. His eyes remained flat, cold, the brief spark of incredulity snuffed out as quickly as it appeared.

He didn't care about this barbarian cultivator's romantic delusions. He only cared about the logistics.

If pulling that Red-Stamp bounty was the fastest way to get a private audience with the Deaconess, then the bounty belonged to him.

Without a word, Shi Yan stepped out from the crowd and walked straight toward the board.

His approach was utterly silent. His boots made no sound against the hardwood despite the moisture still clinging to the soles. Each footfall landed with perfect, deliberate weight distribution—heel to ball, pressure dissipating across the entire sole in a soundless glide. The damp leather kissed the polished floor without a whisper, leaving faint wet prints that evaporated almost as quickly as they formed.

The crowd parted instinctively, bodies shuffling aside before conscious thought registered the movement. Shoulders turned, torsos twisted, feet scraped backward in hurried, graceless steps. Eyes widened and darted away, refusing to meet the approaching figure. The sea of flesh opened like a wound, leaving a clear path through the packed hall.

His projected aura sputtered weakly around him—a pathetic flicker of Cinder-Blood stage Qi, thin and barely cohesive, like dying embers struggling against a cold wind. The air around his shoulders rippled with faint distortion, a heat-haze shimmer that pulsed irregularly, guttering like a candle on the verge of extinction. To any spiritually-attuned observer, he appeared fragile, exhausted, a cultivator clinging to the lowest dregs of power.

One of Zhao's lackeys spotted him approaching the restricted area.

"Hey! Are you blind, beggar? Step back before I break your legs for—" The lackey's voice was harsh and grating, tinged with the shrill confidence of a man who believed his master's shadow rendered him invincible. He thrust one scarred hand out, palm open, fingers splayed like a barrier. His lips curled back from stained teeth, spittle flecking his lower lip as he snarled.

Shi Yan didn't even acknowledge the lackey's existence. He simply maintained his pace, slipping past the man's extended arm with a fluid, frictionless shift of his shoulders, completely invalidating the guard.

His body moved like water—no wasted motion, no hesitation. His shoulder dipped a fraction of an inch, torso rotating on a perfect axis, and the lackey's hand swept through the space he'd occupied a heartbeat before. The straw cloak whispered softly, brushing past the lackey's outstretched fingers without resistance.

The lackey's hand swiped through empty air, fingers closing on nothing. His momentum carried him forward half a step, off-balance, before he caught himself with a grunt of confusion. His boots scraped against the floor, arms windmilling briefly as he staggered. His face contorted—brows furrowing, mouth falling open in dumb shock—as his brain struggled to process what had just happened.

"Is that guy suicidal?"

"An early-stage Cinder-Blood? He's practically a mortal! Iron-Cleaver Zhao killed three men last week for breathing his air!"

"He's dead. The fool is already a corpse."

The murmurs rippled through the crowd like wind through dead grass—hushed, urgent, carrying the weight of certainty. Heads leaned together, lips moving rapidly behind cupped hands. Eyes tracked Shi Yan's advance with morbid fascination, the kind of attention reserved for watching a man walk willingly into a bonfire.

Ignoring the murmurs, Shi Yan stopped squarely in front of the massive wooden board.

The polished surface loomed above him, dark wood gleaming under the spirit lamps. Hundreds of jade slips and parchment contracts overlapped in chaotic layers—blues and greens and whites forming a patchwork quilt of desperation and opportunity. At the very top, separated by a carved border inlaid with gold leaf, the Red-Stamp commissions glowed with soft crimson radiance. Blood-ink characters pulsed faintly, as if written with still-living Qi.

He raised a mud-stained leather glove and casually plucked the glowing Red-Stamp bounty from its peg.

His fingers closed around the jade slip with unhurried precision, thumb and forefinger pinching the smooth, cool surface. The slip came free with a faint scrape of wood, the peg rattling slightly in its socket. The jade slip pulsed faintly in his grip, its crimson light washing across his knuckles for a brief moment before he rolled up the parchment and tucked it into his belt with practiced efficiency.

The motion was smooth, mechanical—fold, tuck, secure—executed with the muscle memory of someone who'd handled far more dangerous items in far worse circumstances.

The silence that fell over the Vermilion Pavilion was deafening.

The ambient noise—clinking ceramic, scraping chairs, the distant grunts of combat from the back hall—all cut off as if someone had severed the world's throat. The sudden absence of sound pressed against eardrums like a physical weight, oppressive and suffocating.

The sycophantic laughter of the lackeys died instantly in their throats, choking off mid-cackle.

Mouths snapped shut with audible clicks of teeth. Eyes bulged, pupils contracting to pinpricks. One lackey's face drained of color so rapidly it took on a waxy, corpse-like pallor. Another's jaw went slack, lips trembling as his brain scrambled to catch up with what his eyes had just witnessed.

Grins froze and melted like wax. Iron-Cleaver Zhao's lecherous smirk vanished, replaced by a dark, murderous scowl that carved deep lines into his scarred face. His jaw clenched so hard a vein bulged at his temple, thick and pulsing, snaking down toward his cheekbone like a lightning bolt frozen in flesh. His nostrils flared wide, breath hissing through them in sharp, furious bursts. The tendons in his neck stood out like steel cables, straining beneath sun-darkened skin.

The dense, oppressive pressure of his Tier-1 Peak, Obsidian-Frame aura flared violently.

The air itself seemed to thicken, humidity condensing into invisible weight that pressed down on every body in the hall. Weaker cultivators staggered, knees buckling slightly under the sudden crush of spiritual pressure. Tables groaned, wood creaking as if bearing an impossible load. The spirit lamps flickered, flames guttering and bending away from Zhao's position as though repelled by his fury.

The stench of charred flesh and sulfur rolled outward in a wave, acrid and choking, mixing with the sharp metallic tang of blood Qi.

"You lowly, fucking rat," Iron-Cleaver Zhao growled as he stepped directly into Shi Yan's personal space, towering over the cloaked figure.

His shadow fell across Shi Yan like a shroud, blotting out the lamplight. The massive broadsword on his shoulder shifted with the movement, nine blackened rings clinking softly against the blade's spine, a sinister chime that resonated in the hollow silence. If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

His bare chest heaved, sweat glistening in the ridges of muscle and scar tissue. Droplets rolled down the twisted landscape of old wounds—burn marks puckered and shiny, blade cuts raised and pale, puncture craters dark and deep. His pectorals flexed with each breath, veins mapping his skin like rivers of dark ink. The stench of old blood and cheap alcohol rolled off him in waves, thick enough to taste—iron and rot and fermented grain, a miasma of violence and indulgence that clung to the back of the throat.

"Are you tired of living? That mark belongs to me."

Each word was bitten off, consonants snapping like breaking bone. Spittle flew from his lips, flecking the air between them. His eyes burned with unhinged fury, pupils dilated wide and black, ringed with bloodshot white. The cords of muscle in his shoulders bunched, coiling like springs ready to unleash devastation.

As the brute loomed over him, Shi Yan's vision subtly flickered. A transparent blue screen popped into existence, locking squarely onto the towering leader: [Entity Recognized: Independent Rogue Cultivator] [Cultivation Resonance: Tier-1 (Ash-Marrow Realm – 3rd Stage: Marrow-Rot)] [Threat to Current Vessel: NEGLIGIBLE] [Estimated Yield: 150–200 Dao Embers] Marrow-Rot, not Obsidian-Frame.

His cold gaze clinically dissected the man's posturing, pupils tracking minute details—the faint tremor in Zhao's left calf, the uneven distribution of Qi flow betraying hollow bone density, the way his spiritual pressure emanated outward in uncontrolled bursts rather than steady, concentrated force. He's projecting a heavier Qi-signature to intimidate the crowd, but his actual bone density is hollow.

A paper tiger.

He had fought true Obsidian-Frame terror at the bottom of the abyss. The Abyssal Overseer had carried the sheer, suffocating weight of a moving mountain—Qi so dense it had warped space itself, every movement dragging reality like a ship's anchor through deep mud.

Compared to that genuine nightmare, this man was a joke—a bully relying on unstable Qi-tricks or cheap pills to puff up his chest and scare weaker mercenaries. The kind of third-rate thug who crushed ants and called himself a dragon.

Not to mention...

To be honest, I'm really tired of this kind of small drama. He pinched his brow in irritation beneath the shadow of the hat, thumb and forefinger pressing against the bridge of his nose as if physically restraining a headache. It's just that this is the only bounty that guarantees a high yield.

He exhaled very slowly, the sound lost in the tense silence of the room. His breath misted faintly in the humid warmth, dissipating like smoke. The air leaving his lungs was measured, controlled—a soldier's exhale, bleeding off tension without broadcasting weakness.

Intending to simply leave with his prize, he turned sideways to walk past Zhao.

His shoulder rotated, body angling toward the open path. His weight shifted onto his leading foot, ready to disengage. He'd already dismissed the man from consideration, catalogued him as irrelevant, filed him away under "handled without engagement."

Enraged by the smaller man's silence and casual dismissal, Zhao brought his massive hand up.

Thick, dark Qi coated his knuckles like hardened steel, crackling faintly as it condensed. The air around his fist shimmered with heat distortion, wisps of black smoke curling off the compressed energy. His fingers curled into a brutal claw, each knuckle the size of a stone, calluses thick as armor plating.

He reached out aggressively, grabbing Shi Yan's cloaked collar with a grip that could crush stone. His fingers dug into the fabric, fully intending to crush the man's throat and collarbone into dust. The straw cloak bunched in his fist, coarse fibers creaking under the pressure. Zhao's forearm flexed, bicep swelling grotesquely as he prepared to demonstrate exactly what happened to insects who forgot their place.

"Bow to me and hand it over!" Zhao roared, lifting Shi Yan an inch off the floorboards by the collar. The straw cloak rustled violently, shedding droplets of rainwater that scattered across the polished wood like thrown pearls. Shi Yan's boots left the ground, toes hovering above the floor, body suspended by the iron grip around his neck.

For the first time, Shi Yan slowly raised his head.

The movement was deliberate, controlled, the brim of his bamboo hat tilting upward to reveal his face inch by inch. First his jaw—sharp, hard-edged, utterly expressionless. Then his lips—a thin, bloodless line. Finally, his eyes.

His cold, dead eyes met Zhao's furious stare from beneath the rim of the bamboo hat.

Flat. Unblinking. Empty as a winter grave. There was no fear in them, no anger, no flicker of humanity whatsoever. They were the eyes of a man staring at an insect, calculating only whether the effort of crushing it was worth the caloric expenditure. Pale irises caught the lamplight and reflected nothing back, swallowing illumination like twin voids.

"Release now," Shi Yan said coldly, his voice devoid of even a trace of emotion. Each syllable fell like a stone into still water—flat, final, without echo. He didn't flinch at the sight of the dark Qi coating Zhao's hand, nor did he look at the massive broadsword slung over the man's shoulder. His gaze remained locked on Zhao's face, unblinking, pupils dilated slightly in the shadow of the hat brim.

"This is your last chance."

The words carried no threat, no bluster. They were a statement of fact, delivered with the same tone one might use to report the weather.

"Heh! This mute finally speaks! So what?!" Zhao barked, his grip tightening as the Qi around his fingers prepared to crush bone. Veins bulged along his forearm, thick as rope, pulsing with each surge of spiritual energy. His lips peeled back from his teeth in a feral grin, spittle flecking his scarred chin. Gaps where teeth had been knocked out formed black voids in his snarl, giving him the appearance of a grinning skull.

"You think words will save you, worm?! I'll grind your bones to—" Shi Yan didn't flare a majestic aura. He didn't shout a technique name.

His [39 Agility] and [39 Physique] activated simultaneously.

Moving faster than the untrained eye could process, Shi Yan's right hand shot up, his iron-hard fingers clamping over Zhao's thick thumb and wrist.

The movement was a blur—arm snapping upward like a striking viper, leather glove creaking as his fingers locked into position with surgical precision. His thumb pressed into the pressure point on the inside of Zhao's wrist, nail digging into the gap between tendon and bone. His remaining fingers wrapped around the outer wrist, grip tightening with the inexorable force of a mechanical vice. The leather of his glove creaked with the force of his grip, seams straining, stitching groaning under the load.

In the same millisecond, he pivoted his hips, dropped his center of gravity, and drove the palm of his left hand brutally into the space just above Zhao's elbow joint.

His body moved with the efficiency of a machine—hips rotating, weight sinking, left arm extending in a perfect straight line. The heel of his palm struck with the full force of his [39 Physique] concentrated into a contact point the size of a copper coin. The impact was delivered at the precise angle necessary to hyperextend the joint, leverage multiplying force exponentially.

He applied a devastating, textbook close-quarters joint lock, using the massive man's own downward momentum against him.

Physics and anatomy conspired against Zhao. His pulling force became his own enemy, weight and momentum channeled through Shi Yan's immovable grip and redirected into catastrophic shear stress on the elbow joint.

CRACK.

The sickening sound of a bone snapping backward echoed like a gunshot in the silent pavilion.

Sharp. Wet. Final. The noise cut through the air with visceral clarity—not the clean snap of dry wood, but the organic crunch of living bone breaking under load, accompanied by the wet pop of cartilage and tendon tearing loose from their moorings.

Zhao's arm bent the wrong way—horribly, visibly wrong—the joint dislocating with a wet, grinding pop.

The limb folded at an angle nature never intended, radius and ulna twisting outward while the humerus remained fixed. The elbow bulged grotesquely, skin stretching taut over displaced bone. White fragments pressed against the inside of the flesh, visible as pale shadows beneath sun-darkened skin.

The primary meridian running through his forearm was instantly severed. The dark Qi coating his fist sputtered, flickered, and completely died, evaporating like steam off cold iron. The black energy unraveled, threads of condensed Qi fraying and dissipating into formless mist. Within a heartbeat, his hand was bare—just flesh and bone, powerless and pale.

For a fraction of a second, the massive brute froze. The pain hadn't even reached his brain yet, but the sheer, impossible shock paralyzed him.

His body locked rigid, every muscle seizing simultaneously. Eyes widened until the whites showed all around his irises, pupils contracting to pinpricks. His mouth hung open, breath caught halfway in his throat, frozen mid-inhale.

Iron-Cleaver Zhao stared wildly at his own limp hand, fingers twitching uselessly, then up at Shi Yan's unblinking eyes.

His gaze dropped to his ruined arm—fingers dangling like dead fish, wrist cocked at a nauseating angle, forearm swelling rapidly as blood pooled beneath the skin. Then his eyes snapped back up to the cloaked figure before him, pupils darting frantically across Shi Yan's expressionless face as if searching for an explanation, a justification, anything to make sense of what had just happened.

"My... my Qi...?" Zhao gasped, his arrogant sneer collapsing into raw, unadulterated terror as his brain scrambled to comprehend how a weakling had bypassed his defenses.

His voice cracked, rising to a strangled wheeze. The color drained from his face in a cascading wave, bronze skin turning sallow and gray. His pupils dilated, sweat beading instantly across his brow—fat, oily droplets that rolled down his temples and dripped from his jaw. His uninjured hand came up, trembling violently, fingers hovering over his ruined arm as if afraid to touch it.

"Impossible... what the fuck did you do to my meridi—"