The first attacker came through the broken doorway with his sword raised.
Leng Yao caught the blade with one hand.
Dark energy spread across the steel.
The sword cracked from tip to guard.
Before the man could retreat, Leng Yao drove his palm into his chest.
The attacker flew backwards through the doorway and struck two men behind him.
They went down together.
More cultivators entered through the windows.
Glass shattered across the clinic.
Feng Baoshu moved towards the rear wall with the pendant case under one arm.
Two men blocked him.
The first swung a hooked blade.
Feng Baoshu bent beneath it and struck the man’s ribs.
The impact lifted him from the floor.
The second attacked from the side.
Bai Qingyu’s cane hit his ankle.
His foot folded.
Feng Baoshu caught him by the collar and threw him through a medicine shelf.
Wood split.
Bottles burst across the floor.
Bai Qingyu turned her head towards the sound.
“That shelf was expensive.”
Feng Baoshu stepped over the fallen man.
“Send the invoice to your family.”
Three cultivators surrounded Leng Yao.
They moved together.
One high.
One low.
One behind.
Their spiritual pressure struck first.
Leng Yao’s inverted core opened.
The pressure entered his meridians.
Dark energy thickened around his arms.
The first sword came for his neck.
Leng Yao stepped inside the attack and caught the cultivator’s wrist.
He pulled the man forward, using his body to block the second strike.
A blade entered the first attacker’s back.
The man screamed.
Leng Yao pushed him aside.
His elbow broke the second cultivator’s jaw.
The third attacked from behind.
Bai Qingyu shouted, “Left.”
Leng Yao turned.
A spear passed beneath his arm.
He seized the shaft and pulled.
The attacker stumbled forward.
Leng Yao drove a knee into his stomach, tore the spear from his hands and struck him across the throat with the blunt end.
The man collapsed.
Bai Qingyu faced the doorway.
“Six more outside.”
“You can count them?” Feng Baoshu asked.
“Footsteps.”
“Useful.”
“Your breathing is louder.”
“I am fighting.”
“So am I.”
A blade flashed towards her back.
Bai Qingyu dropped.
The weapon passed above her head.
She swept her cane across the attacker’s knees.
He fell.
She struck his throat before he reached the ground.
The movement was fast.
Precise.
Not enough to defeat a stronger cultivator, but enough to punish carelessness.
Leng Yao understood why the Bai family had not killed her.
They did not consider her a threat.
That had made them lazy.
A wave of spiritual force hit the clinic.
The remaining windows exploded inward.
The walls shook.
A man stepped through the ruined entrance.
He appeared to be in his early forties.
His white coat bore the silver crest of the Bai family.
Unlike the others, he made no attempt to hide his cultivation.
Ninth gate of Mortal Ascension.
The strongest person on the mountain.
Bai Qingyu went still.
“Second Uncle.”
Bai Shuren looked around the destroyed clinic.
His gaze passed over the injured men, Feng Baoshu and Leng Yao.
Then it settled on Bai Qingyu.
“You embarrassed the family.”
“You brought twenty men to my clinic.”
“You refused to come home.”
“That was the point.”
Bai Shuren entered.
The floor cracked beneath each step.
“You no longer have the right to refuse.”
Bai Qingyu tightened her grip on the cane.
“What does my father want?”
“The clinic.”
“You already have hospitals.”
“This land contains a medicinal spring.”
Leng Yao looked towards the rear garden.
He had sensed the spiritual density when they arrived, but it had been too faint to identify beneath the herbs and formations.
The clinic had not been built here by accident.
Bai Shuren continued.
“Your grandfather concealed it from the family.”
“He gave me the property.”
“He was ill.”
“He was a physician.
He knew what he was signing.”
Bai Shuren’s jaw tightened.
“We can resolve this privately.”
“You broke my door.”
“You will receive another.”
“You broke my shelves.”
“They are shelves.”
“You threatened my staff.”
“They were told to leave.”
Bai Qingyu lifted her cane.
“They work here.”
Bai Shuren looked at Leng Yao.
“And why is the Shadow Sovereign here?”
“He brought me something.”
The pendant glowed inside Feng Baoshu’s case.
Bai Shuren sensed it.
His expression changed.
“What is in that box?”
“Nothing that belongs to you,” Leng Yao said.
Bai Shuren released his spiritual pressure.
It filled the clinic.
The remaining attackers dropped to one knee.
Even his own people struggled beneath it.
Bai Qingyu’s face lost colour.
Her cane struck the floor as she fought to remain standing.
Feng Baoshu stepped in front of her.
Leng Yao did not move.
The pressure entered his body.
His inverted core pulled.
Bai Shuren felt it immediately.
The pressure weakened around Leng Yao and thickened everywhere else.
“What technique is that?” he asked.
Leng Yao continued absorbing.
“Stop.”
Bai Shuren raised one hand.
White spiritual energy gathered above his palm.
The temperature inside the clinic fell.
Ice spread across the broken windows.
Leng Yao recognised the technique.
White Meridian Palm.
A Bai family art designed to freeze spiritual circulation on contact.
Bai Shuren moved.
Fast.
His palm struck Leng Yao’s chest.
Cold entered his body.
The technique spread through his meridians, sealing one pathway after another.
Leng Yao’s right arm went numb.
His core slowed.
Bai Shuren struck again.
Leng Yao caught the second palm.
Ice covered his fingers.
Bai Shuren’s energy continued entering him.
The inverted core pulled at it.
For several seconds, the two forces locked together.
Then a fracture inside Leng Yao’s core opened.
The white energy disappeared into it.
Bai Shuren’s eyes widened.
Leng Yao tightened his grip.
“You should have stopped after the first strike.”
He twisted.
Bai Shuren’s wrist broke.
The older cultivator grunted and drove his other hand towards Leng Yao’s throat.
Feng Baoshu intercepted it.
Their palms collided.
The clinic floor split.
Bai Shuren stepped back.
Feng Baoshu did not.
The old butler struck him twice.
One blow to the chest.
One beneath the ribs.
Bai Shuren crossed both arms and absorbed the attacks, but each step pushed him closer to the entrance.
Leng Yao followed.
Bai Shuren saw him coming and kicked a broken table into his path.
Leng Yao struck it aside.
The older man formed a seal with one hand.
Ice spears appeared behind him.
Eight in total.
They launched together.
Leng Yao’s shadow rose from the floor.
The first spear entered it and vanished.
The second followed.
The shadow expanded.
The remaining spears disappeared inside.
Bai Shuren stared.
Leng Yao raised his hand.
The spears emerged from the ceiling above their creator.
Bai Shuren threw himself aside.
Ice tore through the floor where he had stood.
Feng Baoshu appeared beside him.
His fist struck Bai Shuren’s face.
The man crashed through the entrance and rolled across the stone path.
Outside, the remaining Bai cultivators moved to protect him.
Leng Yao stepped through the doorway.
“Leave.”
Bai Shuren pushed himself upright.
Blood ran from his mouth.
“You interfere in Bai family business.”
“I was already here.”
“This has nothing to do with you.”
“Your men attacked me.”
“You refused to surrender our property.”
Leng Yao looked at the clinic.
“Which property?”
Bai Shuren pointed towards the case Feng Baoshu carried.
“The pendant.”
Bai Qingyu turned towards him.
“You knew about it?”
Bai Shuren did not answer.
That was enough.
Bai Qingyu’s face hardened.
“My grandfather gave it to me.”
“He stole it from the family.”
“He found it.”
“He was instructed to prepare it for a suitable heir.”
“And you decided that heir was not me.”
“You cannot see.”
The words landed harder than the spiritual pressure had.
Bai Qingyu stood in the ruined doorway.
Her face remained calm.
Her hand did not.
The cane trembled against the ground.
Bai Shuren continued.
“The inheritance requires ocular meridians.
Yours are blocked.”
“My grandfather treated me for twelve years.”
“He failed.”
“He kept trying.”
“He wasted family resources.”
The pendant’s golden light intensified.
The thread connecting it to Bai Qingyu pulled tight.
The correction system appeared before Leng Yao.
Candidate distress threshold reached.
Inheritance integration probability increased.
Deliver the object.
He ignored it.
Bai Shuren saw the light through the case.
“Give it to me.”
“No,” Bai Qingyu said.
Her uncle looked at her.
“You have no use for it.”
“It is mine.”
“You are not an heir.”
She stepped outside.
One of the Bai cultivators moved towards her.
Leng Yao’s shadow wrapped around the man’s ankle.
It pulled.
He hit the ground.
No one else moved.
Bai Qingyu stopped several metres from her uncle.
“I left the family.”
“You were removed.”
“I stayed gone.”
“You survived because we allowed it.”
“I survived because Grandfather taught me how.”
Bai Shuren raised his unbroken hand.
White energy gathered again.
“You have mistaken tolerance for weakness.”
Bai Qingyu lifted her cane.
“No.
You mistook blindness for helplessness.”
He attacked.
The White Meridian Palm crossed the distance between them.
Leng Yao could have stopped it.
He did not.
Bai Qingyu turned her body.
The palm missed her chest and struck her shoulder.
Ice spread down her arm.
She staggered.
Bai Shuren reached for her throat.
She stepped closer.
Not away.
Her cane struck the inside of his broken wrist.
Bone shifted.
Bai Shuren shouted.
The cane reversed and hit the side of his knee.
He dropped.
Bai Qingyu placed the metal tip beneath his chin.
“You still breathe before every attack.”
Bai Shuren froze.
She could not overpower him.
But she had learned his rhythm.
Leng Yao understood.
Tao Mingde had not spent twelve years teaching a blind girl to wait for a cure.
He had taught her to function without one.
The pendant case shook in Feng Baoshu’s hand.
Golden light poured through its seams.
Immediate delivery required.
Candidate survival at risk.
Bai Shuren’s spiritual energy surged.
He struck Bai Qingyu with a burst of pressure.
She flew backwards.
Leng Yao caught her before she hit the ground.
Her frozen arm hung at her side.
Blood ran from the corner of her mouth.
“Can you stand?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“That was not the question.”
“It was.”
She pulled away from him and found her balance.
Bai Shuren rose.
Murder filled his face.
The Mandate around the clinic thickened.
It wrapped around his anger.
The black mark in Leng Yao’s palm burned.
Dark text appeared.
Existing desire: family authority.
Mandate influence: restraint suppression.
Heaven was pushing Bai Shuren.
Not controlling him.
Removing the final reason not to kill his niece.
He formed another seal.
This one took longer.
The energy around his body turned white.
Frost spread across the entire courtyard.
Feng Baoshu opened the metal case.
The pendant rose on its own.
It flew towards Bai Qingyu.
Leng Yao caught it.
The golden thread pulled against his grip.
Release the inheritance.
Bai Qingyu turned towards the sound of the jade vibrating in his hand.
“Give it to me.”
Leng Yao looked at her damaged shoulder.
“You may die.”
“I heard you the first time.”
“You have not studied the technique.”
“Neither has my uncle.”
Bai Shuren completed the seal.
A white formation appeared beneath his feet.
The frost surrounding the clinic rose into the shape of dozens of blades.
Feng Baoshu moved towards him.
Leng Yao raised one hand.
“Wait.”
The old butler stopped.
Bai Qingyu held out her good hand.
“This is my risk.”
Leng Yao looked at the golden thread.
Heaven wanted the inheritance delivered.
But the bond had already begun turning black before the battle.
Not because of his interference.
Because Bai Qingyu had rejected Heaven’s authority over the decision.
Leng Yao placed the pendant in her palm.
The system flashed.
Delivery complete.
Integration initiated.
Reward processing—
Bai Qingyu closed her fingers around the jade. Read this novel at g.com for the best experience.
“No.”
The golden interface flickered.
She could not see it.
She had not heard its command.
Still, the pendant reacted to her refusal.
The golden thread darkened.
Black spread from her hand towards the inheritance.
The system stopped.
Recipient response invalid.
Bai Qingyu pressed the jade against her chest.
“I accept my grandfather’s inheritance.”
The pendant cracked.
Golden light burst outward.
She continued.
“Not Heaven’s.”
The thread snapped.
The sound did not enter the air.
It passed through the world beneath it.
Every cultivator in the courtyard froze.
The frost blades shattered.
Bai Shuren’s formation collapsed.
Black light flowed from the pendant into Bai Qingyu’s eyes.
She screamed.
Leng Yao caught her as her legs failed.
Blood ran from beneath her closed eyelids.
The jade dissolved against her palm.
Golden fragments entered her body.
The correction system filled Leng Yao’s vision.
Mandate bond severed.
Inheritance ownership reassigned.
Heavenly claim rejected.
The black mark in Leng Yao’s palm pulsed.
Dark text formed over the golden message.
New rule recorded: natural ownership can override designated causality.
The two interfaces collided.
Gold and black broke across Leng Yao’s vision.
Then both vanished.
Bai Qingyu opened her eyes.
For the first time, her pupils were visible.
They were not black.
Seven thin rings surrounded each pupil, turning slowly beneath a layer of grey.
She stared ahead.
Not at the sky.
Not at the clinic.
At Leng Yao.
Her face changed.
“You look worse than you sound.”
Feng Baoshu laughed once.
Leng Yao ignored him.
“You can see?”
“Shapes.”
Bai Qingyu blinked.
The rings inside her eyes slowed.
“Light.
Energy.”
She looked towards her uncle.
“And weaknesses.”
Bai Shuren stepped back.
Bai Qingyu raised her cane.
A thin black line appeared across his chest.
Only she seemed able to see it.
She moved.
Her cane struck the line.
Bai Shuren’s spiritual circulation stopped.
His cultivation collapsed in the middle of his next breath.
He fell to both knees.
Bai Qingyu stood over him.
Her eyes returned to cloudy grey.
The seven rings disappeared.
She swayed.
Leng Yao caught her shoulder.
“Limit?”
“One strike.”
“Cost?”
“I cannot feel my face.”
“That is probably temporary.”
“Probably?”
“I did not create the technique.”
Bai Shuren tried to rise.
Feng Baoshu placed one foot against his back.
He returned to the ground.
The remaining Bai cultivators lowered their weapons.
Without Bai Shuren’s pressure supporting them, none wanted to continue.
Feng Baoshu looked at Leng Yao.
“What do we do with them?”
“Send them home.”
Bai Qingyu turned her face towards him.
“They attacked my clinic.”
“Then charge them.”
“That is not what I meant.”
“I know.”
Bai Shuren lifted his head.
“The family will not accept this.”
Bai Qingyu crouched beside him.
Her vision had already faded, but she faced him without hesitation.
“Tell my father the spring stays with me.”
“You cannot protect it.”
She pointed her cane towards Leng Yao.
“He can.”
Leng Yao looked at her.
“We did not agree to that.”
“We can negotiate.”
Feng Baoshu sighed.
“She learns quickly.”
Leng Yao looked at the damaged clinic, the medicinal garden and the place where the pendant had disappeared.
The correction system returned.
Its voice had changed.
The tone remained cold, but the certainty was gone.
Candidate Bai Qingyu removed from designation.
Chosen allocation failed.
Cause: irregular entity interference.
Leng Yao read the final line.
Warning: unclaimed inheritance authority detected.
The system believed the authority was unclaimed.
It was wrong.
Bai Qingyu placed one hand over her eyes.
Black light moved beneath her fingers.
The Seven Aperture Eye had accepted her.
Not as Heaven’s replacement for Shen Mingzhi.
As its original owner.
Leng Yao looked west, towards the golden threads he had seen from Shanghai.
Some had belonged to people chosen by Heaven.
Others may have belonged to people Heaven had robbed.
That distinction changed everything.
Bai Qingyu straightened.
“I want three things.”
Leng Yao looked at her.
“Repairs for the clinic.
Protection from my family.
And everything you know about the pendant.”
“You are in no position to demand three things.”
“I can reduce it to two.”
“Which two?”
“Protection and information.”
“The repairs?”
“I will add them to your invoice.”
Feng Baoshu looked away.
Leng Yao almost smiled.
Almost.
“Pack what you need,” he said.
Bai Qingyu frowned.
“Why?”
“You cannot stay here.”
“I am not leaving my clinic.”
“Your family knows the inheritance awakened.”
“So?”
“They will return with someone stronger.”
She considered that.
“How long?”
“Until we secure the mountain.”
“We?”
“You asked for protection.”
“That does not give you ownership.”
“No.”
Leng Yao looked towards the medicinal garden.
“But it gives me responsibility.”
The correction system displayed one final warning.
Multiple causal deviations detected.
Escalation request submitted.
Awaiting higher authority.
Leng Yao’s expression hardened.
The system that had tried to kill him was not the highest power involved.
Something above it had been watching.
Something had now been asked to intervene.
He turned towards the road.
“Baoshu.”
“Yes?”
“Call the estate.”
“For transport?”
“For soldiers.”
Feng Baoshu took out his phone.
“How many?”
Leng Yao looked at the black energy moving beneath Bai Qingyu’s closed eyes.
“All of them.”