8:00 PM – The Thorne Estate

​Ian spent the entire day locked in a heavy, dreamless sleep, his body desperately trying to recover from the sheer exhaustion of his soul assimilation and the intense physical strain of his earlier cultivation attempts. The grand bedroom was entirely pitched in darkness, save for the pale moonlight bleeding through the heavy velvet curtains.

​He was only pulled from his deep slumber by a soft, rhythmic knock on the heavy oak door of his bedroom.

​"Who is it?" Ian called out, his voice still thick with sleep and his throat dry.

​"Young Master, it’s the guard," a young knight answered from the hallway, his voice muffled by the thick wood. "There is a maid here with a tray of food. She claims the Young Mistress asked her to bring you dinner."

​Ian sat up slowly, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and feeling the quiet rumble of his empty stomach. "Let her come in, and you step inside as well," he instructed.

​"Understood, Young Master."

​The heavy door creaked open, spilling the warm, orange light of the hallway torches into the dark room. The young knight stepped inside first, his hand resting casually on the hilt of his sword. He was followed closely by a maid carrying a polished silver tray laden with roasted meat, warm bread, and a silver goblet of water.

​The knight stood at rigid attention by the door, but Ian could feel the man’s curious, lingering eyes scanning his body.

​Guess the rumors were true, the young knight thought to himself, staring in absolute awe. The Young Master is totally healed. He doesn’t even look like a guy who was fatally stabbed just yesterday. I was one of the patrolmen who found him bleeding out in the forest... I saw how much blood soaked the soil.

​"You can place the food on the table by the window," Ian said smoothly, watching her every movement. The savory smell of the roasted meat filled the room, making his stomach growl, but his mind remained sharply on edge. "Ah, and I also want you to taste the food first. Take a bite of the meat and a sip of the water. I don’t have much trust in people nowadays."

​The maid visibly flinched. The tray in her hands rattled slightly as her grip tightened. She kept her head bowed, hiding her eyes in the shadows. "Young Master, there is no need for that. I wouldn’t dare do anything to your food."

​"What’s your name?" Ian asked, his tone dropping its warmth and turning completely cold.

​"Jenna," she answered quietly, her voice trembling slightly as she continued staring at the floor.

​"Look at me, Jenna," Ian commanded.

​Reluctantly, the girl raised her head. Her eyes were wide, and she looked absolutely terrified.

​"You see, Jenna, I specifically told my little sister that absolutely no one is to disturb me in this room—not even for food—until my mother returns," Ian said, his eyes narrowing dangerously. "And since my little sister is the only family I have here at the estate right now, I know for a fact she wouldn’t send a random maid to my room in the middle of the night." 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

​Jenna’s eyes widened in sudden, raw panic. "Please forgive me, Young Master! They have my family!"

​Before Ian could say another word, the maid collapsed to her knees, the silver tray clattering loudly onto the wooden table. She buried her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking violently.

​The knight at the door gasped in shock, immediately drawing his broadsword an inch out of its scabbard with a sharp hiss of steel.

​"Who has your family?" Ian demanded, leaning forward on the edge of the bed.

​"There were three men who came to my house this morning," Jenna sobbed, heavy tears streaming freely down her cheeks and dripping onto her apron. "I don’t know their names or what they looked like under their cloaks. They told me I had to do whatever they said. They said if I didn’t fulfill the order exactly, they would kill my husband and my child... sniff..."

​"Continue," Ian urged, his heart sinking slightly.

​"They gave me a small vial with green liquid inside," she stammered, pointing a trembling, pale finger at the roasted meat on the silver tray. "They said I should empty the sedative into your food, no questions asked. I did what I was told. I didn’t care what would happen to you, Young Master. All I could think about was protecting my baby!"

​Ian frowned deeply. The raw, guttural desperation in her voice tugged violently at his heart. This brutal world was not for the weak, and the innocent always seemed to suffer the most. The residual soul of Ian Thorne swelled with overwhelming empathy for the poor woman. Someone just wanted him dead, and now an entire innocent family was going to be harmed because he happened to survive the first assassination attempt.

​"Young Master, I don’t care if you kill me, but please, you have to save my family!" she begged, crying into the cold marble floor.

​Unable to help himself, Ian stood up from the bed and walked slowly toward her.

​"Young Master, you shouldn’t get close—" the knight warned, stepping rapidly forward, his protective instincts kicking in.

​Ian raised a hand, stopping the knight in his tracks. "It’s alright. I know it’s a risk, it’s just... I feel sorry for her that her family was harmed because of me. Because someone out there just wants me dead."

​Ian genuinely felt the pain of what the maid was going through. He reached down, placing his hands gently on her trembling shoulders to help her to her feet.

​As soon as he pulled her up, the desperate, tear-soaked expression on her face instantly vanished like smoke in the wind. Her lips curled into a wicked, mocking smirk. Her eyes, previously filled with terror, were now completely dead and hollow. She let out a soft, chilling laugh.

​"Tsk. This mission was so easy that I didn’t even have to put much effort into my acting skills," the maid whispered maliciously, her voice entirely different now. "I didn’t even say the part about how they tortured my husband."

​"Wh—what?" Ian stammered, completely dumbfounded. He didn’t know what was going on until he looked down.

​In a blur of motion so fast Ian couldn’t even track it, she had drawn a serrated dagger from beneath her apron and plunged it directly into his stomach.

​But instead of tearing through his flesh and spilling his blood, the knife only went in by the very tip. It felt exactly like she was stabbing a solid piece of cured ironwood. A dull, heavy pressure bloomed against his stomach, but there was no piercing agony.

​Shock flashed across the assassin’s face as she realized her lethal strike hadn’t pierced him. She instantly let go of the hilt and jumped a few steps back with feline agility, leaving the knife stuck lightly in the fabric of Ian’s shirt.

​"Young Masterrr!!!" the knight yelled in absolute panic, drawing his sword fully and charging forward.

​"Don’t move!" Ian yelled back, his voice booming with unnatural authority.

​The commotion had abruptly drawn the attention of the hallway patrol. The heavy doors burst wide open, causing three more heavily armored knights to rush in, their boots thundering against the floorboards.

​"I said stay back! Follow my orders," Ian commanded without taking his eyes off the maid. The knights stopped dead in their tracks, but their swords were already drawn and leveled at the assassin, meaning they were absolutely not planning to let this woman leave the room alive today.

​"You noble brat, is your skin made of wood or something?" the assassin said while smirking, quickly regaining her composure despite the terrible odds. "Maybe I just didn’t put that much strength into it. I will just increase the strength the second time I stab you."

​"Second time?" Ian chuckled, pulling the dagger from his shirt and tossing it to the floor. He mirrored her dark smirk. "There will be no second time. I only let my guard down because I genuinely felt sorry for you there. But because of you, I might just test something that I got earlier."

​Ian was actually happy. He had finally found the perfect test buddy for the technique he got from the system.

​He wasn’t too worried about his safety. When she stabbed him the first time, he didn’t feel much pain at all, and looking at the wound beneath his torn shirt, the tiny scratch was already healing fast. Furthermore, there were four heavily armed knights cornering her; they would not let him die, and if anything dangerous happened, they would immediately intervene and cut her down.

​But the most important reason of them all was to find out if he could gain any Prosperity Points from the System by defeating her himself. Because he didn’t know anything about how the System operated, and because the System never spoke or provided any rules, he was completely in the dark. He had to try out new things, risk his own neck, and experiment with his environment to see what worked.