Even though he had heard that Dahua City was larger than Zahn City, it was hard for Wu Jian to picture what that meant until he actually saw it, but he was stunned when he did.

The city was huge.

He looked out the window of the carriage and stared in awe at the buildings that were several stories high. Zahn City’s largest building was the Auction House, but all of the buildings here were at least the same size as the Auction House, and quite a few were even larger.

They passed a pagoda just then. He tilted his head to stare up at it. The towering construct with at least seven levels rose into the sky like a goliath. Arrayed around it were several smaller buildings, but that was a relative term since each building was larger than the largest buildings in Zahn City.

It was also very lively. The wide street was paved with brick and so many people tread upon it. A sea of heads filled his vision with a cornucopia of color.

While everything looked chaotic, there seemed to be a measure of order to the chaos. People on foot traveled along the outer parts of the street. Meanwhile, carriages traveled up and down the center. One thing Wu Jian had noticed was that while this road was big, it only allowed carriages to travel one way.

“It’s to avoid accidents,” Zhou Lihua said as if she had read his mind.

“With so many people present, I imagine they want to avoid creating roads with two lanes. There’s always a chance they’ll crash into each other,” Wu Meiying added.

Unlike Wu Jian, she did not seem as enthralled by the city. He wondered why. This was also her first time visiting a city larger than Zahn City.

“That sometimes happens in the Imperial Capital,” Hou Jingshu confessed. “I have never seen it personally happen, but Father once mentioned he kept getting complaints about it on one of our streets. Turns out the street wasn’t wide enough to accommodate two carriages. He had to use taxpayer spirit coins to widen the road.”

“Your father sounds like an awfully important man,” Zhou Lihua said with a speculative gleam in her eyes.

“Y-yes, well… he is rather important. Ah ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha… ha…”

Hou Jingshu nervously laughed as she rubbed the back of her neck and looked away from Zhou Lihua, who wore a mischievous smile. Fortunately, the woman didn’t say anything else.

They continued traveling down the road. Their procession attracted a bit of attention. It seemed even here, a carriage being protected by a group of horse riding cultivators was unusual. Several people pointed and a few began whispering to each other, though Wu Jian could not hear what was being said, what with being inside of a carriage.

I bet they’re just wondering which important personage is traveling inside. I wonder what they would say if they knew their princess was inside.

The thought amused him.

“This is our stop,” Zhou Lihua said as the carriage slowed to a stop.

Zhou Lan opened the door, stepped outside, and held out her hand to help Zhou Lihua down. Everyone else just got out on their own.

As he stepped outside, Wu Jian looked at the building before them in shock… and maybe disappointment. With all the grandeur he had seen during the small ride through Dahua City, he had been expecting them to show up at a mansion, but what he found instead was a small hovel that wouldn’t have looked out of place in Zahn City.

“This is where you wanted to go?” asked Hou Jingshu, nose wrinkling.

Zhou Lihua gave her an indulgent smile. “I know it doesn’t look like much, but I recommend you not judge the person who lives here by the appearance of their house. You’ll greatly regret it.”

As he stared at the home—and he used the term loosely—Wu Meiying leaned in and whispered in his ear. “This place looks like a dump, but I imagine whoever lives here is like a tiger in gazelle’s clothing.”

“You think so?” Wu Jian asked before he noticed the way her eyes were glazed over.

She nodded. “I know so.”

With that ominous last comment, the group traveled through a very small garden, walked up to the wooden door, and paused as Zhou Lihua knocked three times. The members of her bodyguard detail stood around at a position that gave them three-hundred and sixty degree vision. If someone attacked, they would be able to respond immediately.

“Master Wong. Master Wong, are you there?” asked Zhou Lihua, knocking again.

“Go away!” came a response after several knocks. The voice sounded… not quite old, but not young either. It reminded Wu Jian of sandpaper, rough and scratchy.

“I apologize for coming to you… but I was hoping you would listen to my request,” said Zhou Lihua.

“I know what you want! You want to become my apprentice, just like everyone else who comes to me! I’ll tell you right now! I’m not accepting apprentices anymore. I will never take on another apprentice so long as I live! Now scram before this father teaches you a lesson!”

Zhou Lihua sighed as she twirled one of her bangs between her fingers. She turned to them and smiled, though it was far too brittle for Wu Jian’s taste.

“Master Wong Jiu is a Fourth Tier Alchemist, a rarity even in the Imperial Capital,” she explained.

“What is a Fourth Tier Alchemist doing all the way out here and living in this… this hovel?” asked Hou Jingshu.

“I heard that!” a voice came from inside said “hovel.” “Why I’m out here is none of your damn business! Leave now!”

While Zhou Lihua looked like she was about to suggest they leave, a red-faced Zhou Chao stormed up to the door and began banging on it.

“Hey! Just who do you think you are?! You have no right to speak to Lady Zhou Lihua like that! Come out here this instant!”

“Go back home and drink your mother’s milk, brat! I’ve no interest in you or this Lady Zhou whatever her name is! Get gone! Scat! Beat it!”

“Why yooou!!!”

Zhou Chao looked like he was about to break the door down. Zhou Lihua was seconds away from stopping him, but the door opened before she could anything. It was only enough for the owner to stick his hand out. Wong Jiu slammed some kind of pill into the young man’s face. It exploded, causing a cloud of something that looked like green chalk to cover Zhou Chao’s head; the man began screaming seconds later.

“MY EYES! BLAST IT! MY EYES! THEY BUUURN!!”

“Hmph! That’s what you get for trying to break into my house. That’s what we call breaking and entering, you know. You’re lucky to get away with just this. If you dare to keep bothering me, don’t expect me to be this polite next time,” Wong Jui said as he withdrew his hand and slammed the door shut.

“Oh, boy. That looks painful.” Wu Jian stared at Zhou Chao as the other man rolled around on the ground, digging the heel of his palms into his eyes.

“I don’t envy him, but he kind of deserved that,” Hou Jingshu said.

Wu Meiying said nothing, busy as she was staring at the door. He had no idea what she was thinking.

“What should we do now, My Lady?” asked Zhou Lan.

“We don’t have much choice,” Zhou Lihua said. “We’ll find an inn to stay at. Then we’ll… Wu Meiying?”

Everyone turned to Wu Meiying as she walked up to the door and knocked just once. The response was immediate. A loud voice shouted “Go away!” Anyone else might have heeded those words, but Wu Meiying did not.

“Master Wong, I understand why you banished yourself from the Alchemist Association. You feel responsible for not stopping your apprentice from committing those crimes, and then she was expelled from the Alchemist Association, and you felt so guilty for not guiding her properly that you chose to live in obscurity out here. I understand that. However, I think you should stop running away like this,” Wu Meiying said.

A loud sound like something being slammed into the ground and shattering echoed behind the door, followed by loud stomps. The door was thrown wide open seconds later. A man stood in the doorway. He looked like a middle-aged man with graying sideburns and dark eyes. If he cleaned himself up, he’d probably have the appearance of a distinguished gentleman, but with his bloodshot eyes, disheveled hair, and rumpled clothes, he looked less dignified and more destitute.

“What would you know about me, Missy? Don’t presume to think I’ll let some child barely out of diapers lecture me! I am not running away! This is—”

“It’s not penance,” Wu Meiying interrupted with a swift chop of her hand. “If you really wanted to repent, you would listen to what we have to say.” She smiled at Wong Jiu, though Wu Jian couldn’t say it was a pleasant smile. “After all, your apprentice is the one causing trouble in our city.”

With just those few words, Wong Jiu’s entire countenance changed. His face paled, his mouth opened, and his eyes went wide. He stood there like a stone statue for several minutes. When he finally came to, he pursed his lips and stepped aside.

“I’ll let you kids in… but just you four.” He pointed at Zhou Lihua, Wu Meiying, Wu Jian, and Hou Jingshu. “The rest of you can wait outside.”

While the four of them walked into the house, Zhou Chao recovered and tried to also go inside, but he was unable to when Wong Jiu slammed the door in his face. He banged on the door several times. However, the sound eventually stopped. Perhaps one or more of the other bodyguards had prevented him from attempting to break down the door again.

“Sit wherever you want. I don’t have any tea, so you’ll have to make do with water,” he said.

“Water is fine,” Zhou Lihua said with a smile.

Wu Jian sat between Wu Meiying and Hou Jingshu, while Zhou Lihua sat in front of them at a small table, her feet tucked underneath her bottom. Wong Jiu set down five glasses, grabbed a pitcher filled with water, and filled them up. As he did, Wu Jian looked around the house. It wasn’t much. This single-room house had a small fuuton, this table, and a small area in the very center for cooking. There was literally nothing else.

“Thank you,” Zhou Lihua said as she took a sip of water.

Wong Jiu grunted as he sat down. “I’ve let you inside. Now talk. What’s this about my apprentice causing trouble in your city?”

“Perhaps I should be the one to explain the situation,” Zhou Lihua coughed into her hand. “It all started about a month and a half ago…”

Since this was her show, Wu Jian, Wu Meiying, and Hou Jingshu let her do all the talking. Zhou Lihua explained how Tian Hao had come to live in Zahn City and was now refining alchemy pills for the Ming Family, how she tried to have Wu Jian kidnapped so he could be made into her plaything, and how she had even hired mercenaries to do her bidding. Wong Jiu’s face became more strained the longer she spoke, until it looked like he was having a heart attack.

“I… see. So my apprentice hasn’t learned a thing since she was expelled from the Alchemist Association. She’s still causing so many problems,” Wong Jiu muttered in a bitter voice as he closed his eyes. Wu Jian thought he saw some moisture gathering around his eyelids, but Wong Jiu blinked several times and focused on them once more. “And? What is it you want from me? Do you want me to bring my apprentice to heel? I regret to tell you that’s impossible. If I were capable of such a thing, I would have done it before she could be expelled. This old man has not the heart to properly punish that girl.”

“We are not asking you to try and reign in your former apprentice,” Zhou Lihua said. “What I am actually looking for is an alchemist who can compete with her. Tian Hao has introduced pills into Zahn City’s market, which not only gives her incredible power but has disrupted the city’s economy. Many shops have gone out of business. What’s more, the habit that got her thrown out of the Alchemist Association is still going strong. I’m told she has kidnapped several young boys and made them into her slaves, though it is just a rumor and we have been unable to prove it.”

Wu Jian stared at the young woman in shock. So he wasn’t the only person that wretched woman had set her sights on? This was something he hadn’t known, but it filled him with disgust.

“So you want me to make alchemist pills and sell them in Zahn City?” the older man asked for clarification.

Zhou Lihua nodded. “I wish to hire you as the Zhou Clan’s alchemist for the Zahn City branch. You’ll refine pills that we will sell on the market through the Wu Clan in exchange for certain privileges. Our hope is that by providing competition, we can restimulate the economy.” She paused. “This might also be your one and only chance to atone for failing to stop your apprentice from assaulting those kids.”

Wong Jiu was silent for the longest time, but none of them rushed him to answer. He looked like he was thinking about the situation very deeply. They didn’t want to interrupt.

“Give… give me a day to think it over,” he said at last. “I’ll have an answer for you tomorrow.”

“Very well.” Zhou Lihua stood up, and Wu Jian, Wu Meiying, and Hou Jingshu followed suit. “We will come back tomorrow. Thank you for listening to us.”

“Yeah. Sure.”

Wong Jiu didn’t look like he was going to see them out, so they saw themselves out, exiting the small house to find Zhou Chao pacing back and forth while the others watched him warily. When they exited, everyone turned to them. Zhou Chao was the first to speak.

“Well? How did it go?”

“As well as can be expected.” Zhou Lihua shrugged. “Wong Jiu said he will give us his answer tomorrow. In the meantime, we should find a place to stay the night. Zhou Kang, I’ll leave finding our lodgings to you.”

An older man with gray hair, wrinkles lining his eyes, and a refined mustache bowed to her.

“Please leave everything to me, Lady Zhou.”

Following Zhou Lihua, Wu Jian entered the carriage, helped Wu Meiying and Hou Jingshu climb in, and settled down. As the carriage trundled through the streets, he crossed his fingers and prayed Wong Jiu would give them a positive answer tomorrow.

***

The inn they booked rooms at was called the Roaring Dragon Inn, which was a high-class inn that had been made famous thanks to their Roaring Dragon Wine—a house specialty that couldn’t be bought anywhere else. It was a nice inn. Rather than a single building, it consisted of a complex. There were several buildings spaced several meters apart, and each one contained about five rooms for people to sleep in.

After a bit of arguing, it was decided that Wu Meiying and Hou Jingshu would sleep in the same room as Wu Jian. This was decided when Zhou Lihua tried to convince the other two girls to sleep with her. Wu Meiying had adamantly refused and said she was sleeping with Wu Jian. Zhou Lihua had then teasingly suggested that maybe she could sleep with him too, but while Wu Meiying said she had no problem with it, Hou Jingshu had big problems with it.

“There is absolutely no way I could possibly let you sleep in the same room as Wu Jian! Wh-why?! W-w-w-what do you mean ‘why?’ It… it’s just because it’s inappropriate! If anything, I should be sleeping with him! Er… what I mean is… he and I are… engaged… so it’s only… natural for us to…”

She had then devolved into incoherent mumbling after that, but it was basically the clincher that decided who was sleeping in which room. Zhou Lihua had been forced into the same room as her two bodyguards, Zhou Chao, Zhou Kang, and the last member of their bodyguard detail had another room, and his room with Wu Meiying and Hou Jingshu was the last.

Once everyone had their rooms, Zhou Lihua gave her guards free reign to do as they pleased and dragged Wu Jian, Wu Meiying, and Hou Jingshu off to explore the city with her. They wandered the streets, looked into shops, and tried out food from various food carts and stalls. Wu Meiying was right there with the Zhou Clan heiress, eyes sparkling as she dragged Wu Jian by the arm to try out every kind of food available. Even though Dahua City and Zahn City were only a few days apart, there was a much larger variety of food.

“This meat bun is a local specialty. They apparently use a combination of tofu and ground beef with medicinal herbs that help digest the food. While they’re popular because of their taste, I’m told you shouldn’t eat more than one because they make you go to the restroom,” Zhou Lihua said.

Hou Jingshu stared in horror at her half-finished meat bun. “I’m… not sure I want to eat this anymore…”

“You’ll be fine. It’s just one,” Wu Meiying said cheerfully as she munched on her food. She finished quickly, then began licking her fingers clean before, finally, looking at him. “How is it, Jian?”

“It’s good. I wouldn’t say it’s great, but it is tasty,” Wu Jian said. He’d already finished his meat bun and was just walking alongside the girls.

A loud crashing sound suddenly echoed in front of them, and they all stopped just as the door to a shop exploded and a figure came flying out, crashing on the ground just a few feet from them. The person scrambled up, then prostrated themselves in supplication.

“Please! I beg of you! Stop wrecking my shop!”

“You dare to make demands of me?! Do you not know who I am?!” a familiar voice shouted from inside.

I recognize that voice… Wu Jian thought with a start.

“I… I know who you are… but please… all I asked you to do was pay for what you ate…”

A man came marching out of the shop, chest puffed up with a sense of self-importance. He was dressed in a sky blue hanfu with white streaks like currus clouds decorating it. Wrinkles lined his face, which was surrounded by shock white hair.

Wu Jian’s eyes widened in shock as the man pressed his foot on top of the poor shop owner’s head and pushed the other man’s face into the dirt.

“You would ask the advisor of the Great Tiger Sect to pay for his meal? You should be honored I even deigned to step foot in this establishment!”

“Wu Wei…?”

He had not meant to say anything, but the name had slipped out before he could stop it. Wu Wei froze. Then he turned to face them. His eyes locked onto Wu Jian, then Wu Meiying and finally Hou Jingshu. Rage appeared within his eyes. With a sneer that hid his fangs, he greeted them.

“Well… if it isn’t the young heir of the Wu Clan and his little whores. I never expected to find you in Dahua City. This place is much too large for the heir of such a small clan. Small fish like yourself should continue swimming in small ponds where a larger, more powerful fish won’t eat you.”