He couldn’t be a wastrel anymore. If he was going to protect Lin Ji’an, his little disciple, then he needed to step up. He needed to be a Master worthy of the boy.

"The kid needs some gear," Jiu Zui muttered to himself, scratching his stubble. "A spatula is funny, and it clearly works on mid-level ghosts, but if a Golden Core elder decides to test him, he’s going to get squashed. I need to buy him defensive artifacts. High-tier stuff. Rings of absolute shielding, and amulets of spatial distortion."

He patted his robes. Dust puffed out.

He was entirely, spectacularly broke.

"Right. The Black Market Auction in Cloud-Burst City is next week," Jiu Zui plotted, a wicked, entrepreneurial grin spreading across his handsome, rugged face. "I can raid the sect’s alchemy pavilion for some premium pills, forge the Sect Leader’s signature, sell them at the auction, and buy the kid a whole armory. Yes. Perfect parenting." 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

But before the shopping spree, he had to find the inheritance.

He moved to the very back of the hall, tearing away a thick tapestry of overgrown vines that had fused with the stone wall.

Behind it was a heavy, iron-bound wooden chest, sealed with blood-runes that pulsed faintly in the dim light.

Jiu Zui bit his thumb, pressing a drop of his blood against the seal. The chest hissed, the iron latches snapping open with a heavy, ancient groan.

He opened the lid.

Inside, resting on faded red velvet, were the tools of the Glutton.

There was a massive, rectangular meat cleaver forged from Abyssal Meteor-Iron, its blade carrying a terrifyingly heavy, dormant gravitational Qi.

Beside it rested a set of throwing knives disguised perfectly as silver chopsticks, and a wok that looked heavy enough to deflect a dragon’s breath.

Jiu Zui reached out, his hand trembling slightly as he touched the cold, blackened handle of the cleaver. The memories of his best friend rushed back, bitter and sweet.

"I found someone to carry your fire, Hao," Jiu Zui whispered to the empty room, a rare, melancholy smile touching his lips. "The kid’s just as arrogant as you were. He’s going to turn this sect upside down. And I’m going to make sure he has the tools and power to do it."

He closed the chest with a resounding slam, hoisting it onto his broad shoulder.

"Alright, kid," the Drunken Sovereign declared to the mountain. "Let’s get you armed."

.

.

.

Meanwhile, miles away on the freezing, isolated summit of the Eternal Cloud Peak, Lin Ji’an was currently engaged in a battle far more dangerous than ghosts or demons.

She was fighting for her life against the sheer, unadulterated cuteness of a sociopathic ice dragon.

They were sitting on the stone steps of the rear courtyard.

The remnants of the destroyed training dummies littered the snow around them, but the air inside their immediate bubble was pleasantly, confusingly warm.

Wangchen sat with his knees pulled slightly toward his chest, holding the jade lunchbox on his lap. He had just taken the final bite of the crispy, honey-glazed pork belly.

Ji’an watched him chew. The satisfying crunch of the perfectly rendered skin was audible in the quiet courtyard.

Xie Wangchen’s dark, usually bottomless eyes were closed, his long eyelashes resting against his pale cheeks.

A look of profound, almost religious culinary bliss softened the harsh, aristocratic lines of his face.

He swallowed, letting out a soft, barely perceptible sigh of contentment.

"So?" Ji’an asked, leaning back on her elbows, trying to maintain her smug, arrogant chef persona while her heart did a frantic, traitorous flip-flop in her chest. "Was it worth the one-minute clear time? Did I deliver on the crackle?"

Wangchen opened his eyes. He turned his head to look at her.

"It was perfect, Brother Lin," Wangchen murmured, his voice a low, gravelly vibration that sent a completely involuntary shiver down Ji’an’s spine. "Everything you make... is perfect."

He didn’t just say it like a compliment; he said it like a sacred vow.

He looked at her with an intensity that felt heavy, a dark, possessive devotion that was entirely at odds with his angelic, pristine appearance.

’He is doing it again,’ Ji’an panicked internally, her pulse accelerating. ’He is looking at me like I am the only source of heat in the universe. System, I need an adult! I am wearing a gender changing artifact and smelling like soy sauce. Why is there so much sexual tension coming from?!’

Ji’an desperately tried to break the heavy, intoxicating atmosphere.

She sat up straight, intending to grab the lunchbox and make a hasty, tactical retreat before she did something stupid like pat his head again.

But as she reached for the box, her eyes caught something.

There, on the very corner of Wangchen’s pale, perfectly sculpted lips, was a tiny, sticky smudge of the dark soy-honey glaze.

It was a microscopic imperfection on a flawless canvas. And to a chef, leaving sauce on a customer’s face was a service failure.

To a human being with eyes, it was both devastatingly distracting and attractively distracting.

Ji’an’s brain stalled.

Without thinking, driven by a lethal combination of domestic instinct and the hypnotic pull of the boy sitting next to her, Ji’an didn’t reach for her handkerchief.

She leaned forward.

Wangchen froze. His breath hitched audibly in the quiet courtyard.

Ji’an closed the distance between them, invading his personal space until she could feel the faint, icy chill radiating from his skin.

She raised her hand, her gaze dropping entirely to his lips.

With her thumb, she gently, deliberately wiped the smudge of sticky glaze from the corner of his mouth.

The physical contact was electric. Her thumb was warm, calloused from chopping and fighting; his skin was cool, impossibly smooth, and incredibly sensitive.

Wangchen’s dark pupils dilated so fast they nearly swallowed his irises entirely— a violent, searing jolt of electricity shot straight down his spine.

The air around them didn’t freeze; it did the exact opposite.