Azure Cloud's underbelly breathed through the Black Market—a labyrinth beneath the commercial district where identities dissolved like sugar in tea. Lin Xuan navigated its passages with sixteen-year-old confidence in a twelve-year-old frame, grey cloak swallowing his stature.
The mask he purchased cost half his monthly allowance: plain ceramic, expressionless, sealing spiritual aura. Crippled Crow, he named himself—a wandering cultivator with damaged meridians seeking medicinal herbs.
"Registration for tournament," he rasped at the hidden desk, voice altered by technique found in stolen scrolls.
The clerk examined his concealed cultivation—Qi Refinement fourth layer, carefully displayed.
"Age verification?"
Lin Xuan produced forged papers. The Black Market's forgers were artists; this document claimed sixteen years, supported by subtle aging makeup and height-enhancing boots.
"Entry fee: fifty spirit stones."
Extortion. He paid, counting stones saved through three months of selling copied techniques to desperate outer clan members—another secret enterprise.
The tournament bracket posted in three weeks. Lin Xuan had time to prepare, to study opponents. His previous life's knowledge provided advantages: he knew which techniques each prominent youth would use, their weaknesses, their teachers' limitations.
But knowing and executing differed. His body remained twelve, regardless of soul experience. Strength, speed, endurance—all inferior to sixteen-year-old competitors.He needed advantages beyond technique.The Black Market's medicine shops offered possibilities. Lin Xuan examined ingredients with expert eyes, recognizing combinations that pharmacists missed. Dragon's Blood Grass mixed with Frozen Heart Petals created temporary meridian expansion—painful, dangerous, but effective for short bursts of enhanced power.He purchased carefully, avoiding attention. The recipe came from his previous life's pill dao studies, knowledge that had made him famous—and ultimately murdered.
Three weeks of intensive preparation followed. Days, he played the sickly third young master. Nights, he became Crippled Crow, training in abandoned warehouses, testing medicines on himself, mapping tournament grounds through bribery and stealth.The tournament's true prize wasn't sect recruitment. Lin Xuan sought the Azure Cloud Codex—ancient text hidden in the city library's restricted section, containing maps of spiritual veins. In his previous life, Iron Bone Sect had claimed it, using Lin Feng's access.This time, Crippled Crow would reach it first..