Up on the balcony, Jiu Zui took a long, relaxed swig from his wine gourd, grinning from ear to ear. "That’s my disciple," he chuckled. "Extort them blind."

"I am officially seizing the assets of this auction house!" Ji’an declared, marching toward the groaning auctioneer. She grabbed the man by the collar of his lavish, jewel-encrusted robes, hauling him up to eye level. "Where is the vault? And where are the keys to the rest of the cages?"

"T-The keys are on my belt!" the man wept, terrified of the soot-stained chef who hit like a falling mountain. "The vault is behind the stage! Please, take it all! Just spare my life!"

Ji’an snatched the heavy iron keyring from his belt. She didn’t let him go, however. She cocked her arm back.

"This is for the bruise on his cheek," Ji’an said coldly.

CLANG!

The flat of the spatula connected with the side of the auctioneer’s head, instantly knocking him unconscious. He slumped to the floor, entirely out of commission.

What followed was a masterclass in chaotic, righteous retribution.

Ji’an tossed the keyring to Lin Xuan, who was watching his supposedly weak, disgraced older sibling dismantle a criminal syndicate with wide-eyed awe. "Xuan! Open the cages! Let everyone out!"

While the thirteen-year-old scrambled to unlock the heavy iron doors lining the perimeter of the pit, freeing dozens of terrified mortals, demi-humans, and kidnapped rogue cultivators, Ji’an went to work on the slaver’s vault.

It was locked with a heavy blood-seal array. Ji’an didn’t have time to decipher the magic.

She simply channeled maximum Yang Qi into her spatula, heating the iron until it glowed a blinding, incandescent white, and melted the heavy iron hinges completely off the vault door.

Inside were mountains of low- and mid-grade spirit stones, spatial rings filled with stolen artifacts, and chests of rare herbs.

Ji’an opened her own premium spatial ring and began shoveling the loot inside with the ruthless efficiency of an experienced supermarket sweep.

"Fifty million," Ji’an muttered to herself as she cleared the final shelf. "Five million for the bid, multiplied by ten for the audacity tax. The math checks out."

She walked back out to the pit. The freed captives were huddling together, unsure of what to do.

The Drunken Sovereign was still keeping the slavers and guards pinned to the floor with his aura, casually leaning against the balcony railing.

Ji’an reached into her newly acquired hoard and pulled out a massive handful of spirit stones. She tossed them onto the dirt floor in front of the captives.

"Take the travel funds and scatter!" Ji’an ordered. "The suppression on the guards will lift in five minutes! Get to the surface and run!"

The captives didn’t need to be told twice. They grabbed the stones, weeping tears of gratitude, and bolted for the subterranean exits, disappearing into the labyrinth of the Black Market.

Ji’an walked back over to Lin Xuan. The boy was trembling, clutching the empty keyring, looking at Ji’an as if she had just descended from the heavens.

"Come on, brat," Ji’an sighed, the terrifying martial aura melting away as she reached out and ruffled his dirty hair. "Let’s get you out of this sewer."

The flight back to the Celestial Sword Sect was entirely different from the trip down.

Instead of screaming in terror, Ji’an sat cross-legged near the neck of Jiu Zui’s massive flying wine gourd, her Silk-Weave cloak wrapped tightly around the shivering, traumatized form of her little brother.

Lin Xuan was clinging to her arm, his silver-flecked eyes wide as he stared down at the clouds rushing past beneath them.

"You live... up there?" Xuan whispered, pointing a trembling finger toward the towering, majestic peaks of the Celestial Sword Sect, piercing the cloud line. "But Stepmother said you didn’t have the spiritual roots to even wash dishes for the immortals."

"Like I said, Xuan. The woman is a fountain of misinformation," Ji’an snorted, rubbing the boy’s cold shoulder to generate some friction. "I’m not just washing dishes. I’m running the kitchen. And I’m currently a Sect Martial Uncle, which means I technically outrank half the people on that mountain."

Jiu Zui, standing at the rear of the gourd, let out a booming laugh. "Don’t sell yourself short, kid! You just robbed the premier black market of the Northern Territories blind and walked out without a scratch! You’re a legend in the making!"

When they finally touched down on the wild, overgrown grass of the Drunken Peak, the sun had fully set, casting the mountain in shadows.

Ji’an didn’t waste a single second. She went into full, terrifying Asian-Mom/Head-Chef triage mode.

"Master, stoke the fires in the bathing hut!" Ji’an ordered, pointing her spatula at the Sovereign. "Xuan, strip out of those filthy rags. You smell like a wet dog that rolled in an open grave."

"T-Third Brother, I can wash myself!" Xuan protested, his pale cheeks flushing with aristocratic embarrassment as Ji’an unceremoniously marched him toward the small, wooden bathhouse behind the kitchen.

"You have cuts that are infected with subterranean necrotic Qi, you idiot," Ji’an scolded, shoving him inside. "If you wash yourself, you’ll miss a spot, and your arm will rot off. Sit in the tub and don’t move!"

For the next hour, Lin Xuan endured the most aggressive, thorough scrubbing of his young life.

Ji’an boiled massive cauldrons of fresh mountain spring water, infusing the bath with a mild concentration of crushed Spirit-Mint and Purifying Lotus Leaves she had scavenged from her stash.

She scrubbed the grime, the dried blood, and the stench of the slave pit off the boy, ignoring his embarrassed whining.

Once he was clean, she applied a cooling, translucent green salve to his bruised wrists and the cut on his cheek.

The medicinal paste, formulated from the premium herbs Jiu Zui had bought earlier that day, instantly numbed the pain and accelerated the cellular regeneration.

Finally, she tossed him a set of her old, clean Outer Sect gray robes.