Chapter 381: Come To Replace Him
Lingyun kept smiling until the crowd closed behind him.
The happy-go-lucky expression quickly disappeared the second Rouxi could no longer see his face.
He slipped between two stalls selling weapons and dried food, crossed behind a stack of shipping crates, and entered a narrow corridor marked with three black lines. A guard at the entrance started to lift one hand, but Lingyun walked past him without slowing.
"Restricted area," the man called after him.
Lingyun lifted his hand up and waved at the man behind him as he continued toward the stairwell. "I know."
Confused by his response, the man hesitated long enough to lose his chance to stop him.
The corridor had been used for storage in Lingyun’s last life, although someone had already started converting it into offices. New walls divided the space, cameras had been mounted near the ceiling, and a thin wire stretched across the bottom of the stairs to alert the guards above.
Different decorations.
Same mistakes.
Lingyun stepped over the wire and reached behind the first camera. A flame no larger than a sewing needle slid from his fingertip, entered the casing, and burned through the connection without melting the plastic around it.
The camera’s light went dark.
Lingyun watched it for half a second. No sparks. No melted casing. Not even enough smoke to draw attention from the guards above.
Good.
Rouxi would want the place intact when she took it over.
Not that she would know that she had taken it over. Not if she didn’t want to.
Burning through the corridor would’ve been faster, but it would also damage whatever supplies, records, and people were worth keeping. He had already decided the market belonged to her. There was no point ruining the gift before she received it.
Lingyun lowered his hand and stepped over the wire.
Two men waited at the top of the stairs. Both wore the current head’s symbol on their sleeves, and both recognized him before he reached the final step.
The taller guard lowered his weapon slightly. "Wei Lingyun."
Lingyun stopped in front of them, bringing up yet another smile. But this was one he would never show Rouxi.
The second man glanced toward the stairs behind him. "Is the Dragon Head here?"
"Yup," he said, nodding his head. He wasn’t wrong. Yuche was somewhere in the market, keeping their woman busy while Lingyun took care of business.
"Then what does the Triad want?"
"This isn’t Triad business."
The guards exchanged a look, confusion written all over their faces. Lingyun watched the moment they decided his smile made him harmless enough to question.
"What is it, then?" the taller man asked.
"Personal."
Lingyun moved before either guard understood the answer.
A thin line of fire passed through the first man’s gun, separating the barrel from the grip. Before the broken pieces hit the floor, Lingyun caught the second guard by the wrist and drove him face-first into the wall.
The taller man reached for a knife just as Lingyun flicked two fingers.
Fire wrapped around the man’s hand and tightened. It didn’t spread to his sleeve or scorch the wall behind him. It burned through skin and tendons until the knife dropped from fingers that no longer worked.
The scream echoed down the corridor.
Lingyun tilted his head. "You should be quieter. There are customers downstairs. We don’t want them to get worried or upset."
The second guard tried to push himself away from the wall. Lingyun drove a knee into the back of his leg and felt the joint give beneath the impact.
Neither man would be following him any time soon.
He left them alive and continued along the upper level, studying the market through the gaps in the railing. Below him, sellers shouted prices, buyers argued over food, and Rouxi stood at a core stall with Yuche beside her. Lingyun couldn’t hear what she was saying, but the merchant’s face suggested she had already insulted his stock.
She was so perfect.
Lingyun turned away before she could look up and crossed into the next warehouse.
The restricted level held everything worth protecting. Locked rooms lined one side of the passage, their doors marked with inventory numbers. Weapons, medicine, fuel records, ration lists, names of traders, and enough information to control half the people downstairs sat behind cheap locks and badly trained guards.
The healers worked beneath the same roof.
The core merchants paid fees for protection.
People came from every faction to buy things they couldn’t admit they needed.
Rouxi liked supplies. She liked useful people. More than anything, she liked staying home while the rest of the world brought its problems somewhere else.
Owning the black market solved all three.
She could sit on her couch, eat snacks, and send Lingyun whenever she wanted something.
It was the perfect gift.
He reached the final corridor and found four more guards outside a set of double doors. These men were better prepared. Their weapons were already raised, and one had an earth shield covering his chest and forearms.
The man in front stepped forward. "Head Luo wasn’t told to expect you."
"He wasn’t expecting me the first time either," Lingyun replied.
The words meant nothing to them.
That was fine. It meant something to him.
One guard fired.
Lingyun turned his shoulder as the bullet passed, then sent fire racing along the weapon’s metal frame. The shooter dropped it with a curse, but the heat had already reached the ammunition.
Lingyun closed his fist and the rounds inside melted without exploding, rendering their guns completely useless.
Lingyun smiled again, although there was nothing warm left in it. "Be grateful that I’m trying not to damage the building."
The earth user charged.
Lingyun waited until the shield was close enough to touch before slipping one narrow flame beneath its edge. The fire crawled along the man’s skin, following the gap between his armour and throat.
The shield collapsed as the guard clawed at his neck.
The remaining men tried to retreat through the double doors.
Lingyun burned through the locking mechanism behind them.
The doors sealed shut.
For the next minute, the corridor filled with screams, the smell of cooked flesh, and the sharp crack of joints breaking. Lingyun never allowed the flames to spread beyond the bodies he chose. The walls remained untouched. The inventory doors stayed closed. Even the wooden sign beside Head Luo’s office survived without a scorch mark.
When the last guard fell, Lingyun wiped a streak of blood from his cheek and opened the double doors with a melted key taken from the floor.
Head Luo sat behind a heavy desk at the far end of the office.
The room was almost exactly as Lingyun remembered it. Maps covered one wall, weapons filled a locked cabinet, and a wide window overlooked the market below. The chair was different, but that hardly mattered.
Lingyun had sat behind that desk for years... and he planned to do so again.
Head Luo looked at the bodies in the corridor before turning his attention back to Lingyun. He was an older man with thick shoulders and silver threaded through his hair. Two armed lieutenants stood behind him, while another man waited near the window with one hand hidden inside his jacket.
Head Luo leaned back in his chair. "Did Jian Yuche send you?"
"No."
"Then you’ve made a serious mistake."
Lingyun walked into the room and closed the doors behind him. "I’m taking the market."
For one silent second, no one moved.
Then Head Luo laughed.
It started quietly before growing loud enough that the lieutenants joined him. The man near the window didn’t laugh, but his hand tightened inside his jacket.
"You came alone," Luo said once he caught his breath. "Either Jian’s right-hand man is much more arrogant than I’ve heard, or much stupider."
Lingyun looked around the office again, taking stock of what Rouxi would own once he finished.
The maps could stay.
The weapons were useful.
Two of the lieutenants might be worth keeping if they learned quickly.
Head Luo was becoming increasingly unnecessary.
Lingyun raised one hand. A thin flame appeared above his palm, no larger than the blade of a knife.
"I didn’t come to challenge you," he said.
Luo’s smile faded.
Power rolled out from behind the desk, heavy enough to make the windows tremble. The air inside the office thickened, pressing against Lingyun’s chest as though the room had suddenly sunk underwater.
The flame above his palm shrank.
Head Luo stood, his laughter gone as the pressure continued to build around them.
Lingyun looked at the struggling fire, then slowly lifted his eyes to the man across from him.
At last, Luo understood.
Lingyun hadn’t come to negotiate for a place beneath him.
He had come to replace him.