"System," Jin Hao commanded, his internal voice eerily calm, devoid of all panic. "Are there any detection arrays in that room?"
[Scanning... Negative. The room relies on physical patrols. No spiritual alarms detected.]
"Good."
He placed his hands flat against the iron grate. He channeled a surge of his Late Stage Foundation Establishment Qi into his palms, heating the metal instantly. He melted the hinges, the iron turning to glowing slag. He lifted the grate away without a sound.
He positioned himself over the hole.
He dropped.
He fell fifteen feet, landing in the center of the stone platform with a heavy hockwave that blew the bone dice off the table.
The seven guards froze. They stared at the figure that had just dropped from the ceiling. He was covered in sewer muck, a dark hood obscuring his face.
"What the… " the guard holding the wine jug started to say.
He never finished the sentence.
Jin Hao moved. He was a blur of pure violence. He used the overwhelming physical disparity between a Late Stage Foundation Establishment expert and a group of Qi Condensation mortals.
He stepped into the guard's guard, grabbing the man's throat with his left hand. Jin Hao squeezed.
The sound of crushing cartilage echoed loudly in the cavernous room. The guard's eyes bulged, the wine jug shattering on the floor and his body went limp instantly.
"Intruder!" one of the guards at the back screamed, fumbling to draw his sword.
Jin Hao spun, using the dead guard in his hand as a projectile. He hurled the corpse across the table. It slammed into the screaming guard, sending them both tumbling backward into the dark water of the trench with a heavy splash.
"Kill him!"
Three guards lunged at him simultaneously, their cheap iron swords gleaming in the torchlight.
Jin Hao stepped into the strikes. A sword bit into his shoulder, cutting the fabric of his cloak, but scraping harmlessly against his supernaturally dense skin.
He grabbed the blade with his bare hand. The guard gasped, trying to pull it back, but Jin Hao's grip was iron. Jin Hao snapped the blade in half with a twist of his wrist.
He drove the broken half of the blade directly into the guard's eye socket.
The man dropped like a stone.
Jin Hao ducked under a horizontal slash from the second guard, sweeping his leg out. The guard's feet flew out from under him. Before the man could hit the floor, Jin Hao brought his boot down in a vicious stomp directly onto the man's face.
The skull caved in with a sickening crunch. Blood and brain matter sprayed across the stone tiles.
The third guard halted his attack, dropping his sword. His face was devoid of color. He took a step back, his hands raised in surrender. "P-Please! We were just following orders! The Patriarch… "
"I don't care," Jin Hao snarled.
He grabbed the man by the sides of his head. With a brutal wrench, he snapped the guard's neck. The crack echoed loudly, followed by the dull thud of the body hitting the floor.
Silence returned to the prison block, broken only by the splashing of the guard drowning in the trench and the ragged breathing of the two remaining guards, who had backed themselves against the far wall.
They were staring at him in absolute terror.
Jin Hao reached up and pulled back his hood.
The guards' eyes widened in recognition.
"Jin Hao?" one of them whispered, disbelief overriding his fear for a second. "The... the trash from the branch family?"
"Trash?" Jin Hao said, his voice a low owl.
He raised his right hand.
A blinding white gold flame erupted around his hand and forearm. The heat was instantaneous, evaporating the moisture in the air and casting harsh, dancing shadows across the dungeon walls.
The guards screamed, turning to run toward the heavy iron door leading up to the main estate.
He thrust his palm forward. A wave of white gold fire, shaped like a massive hand, roared across the room.
It hit the guards before they could take three steps.
The Celestial Fire Purging Palm incinerated the flesh. The two guards didn't even have time to scream. In an instant, they were reduced to piles of white hot ash on the stone floor. The iron door behind them melted, sagging on its hinges.
Jin Hao lowered his hand. The flame extinguished, leaving the room dimly lit by the torches once more.
He ran to the back of the room, splashing through the shallow edge of the water trench to reach the chains.
"Father," Jin Hao said, his voice cracking. He reached up, grasping the heavy iron cuffs binding his father's wrists.
Jin Ren's breathing was so shallow it was almost imperceptible. His skin was ice cold.
Jin Hao channeled his Qi into his hands, heating the iron links until they glowed red, then ripped them apart with a sharp tug.
Jin Ren's limp body fell forward. Jin Hao caught him, grunting under the dead weight.
"I've got you," Jin Hao whispered, easing his father onto the stone floor. He quickly checked the man's pulse. It was faint. "System. Scan his condition."
[Scanning... Target is in critical condition. Severe internal hemorrhaging. Multiple fractures. Acute spiritual depletion. Life expectancy without immediate high grade medical intervention: Two hours.]
"Two hours," Jin Hao repeated, his jaw clenching. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small jade bottle he had looted from the cargo ship earlier. He uncorked it, the smell of potent herbs filling the air.
"System, is this Healing Pill safe for him?"
[Affirmative. It will stabilize the internal bleeding and halt the deterioration of the meridians, but it will not cure the structural damage.]
Jin Hao forced the pill into his father's mouth, massaging his throat until the man reflexively swallowed. Almost immediately, a faint flush returned to Jin Ren's pale cheeks. His breathing deepened slightly.
"It's enough for now," Jin Hao muttered.
He stood up, looking around the blood soaked prison block. He looked at the melted door, the crushed skulls, the piles of ash.
He reached into the heavy burlap sack he had slung over his shoulder. He pulled out the Thunder Fire Annihilation Orbs.
He wedged one orb into the hinges of the melted iron door. He placed another beneath the wooden table the guards had been using. He set three more at the base of the load bearing stone pillars that supported the ceiling of the dungeon.
He walked to each orb, pressing his finger against the rusted iron shell, injecting a tiny spark of his Qi. The faint orange light beneath the rust began to pulse faster.
He walked back to his father and hoisted the unconscious man over his shoulder in a fireman's carry. He adjusted the weight, ensuring his father's broken ribs weren't pressed against his armor.
"Hang on, old man," Jin Hao whispered. "We're going to a new home."
He walked back to the center of the room, looking up at the melted hole in the grate fifteen feet above.
He crouched low, gathering the strength in his legs. With a powerful jump, he launched himself upward, carrying the weight of two men. He grabbed the edge of the stone tunnel with his free hand and hauled them both up into the foul smelling darkness of the sewer.
He started moving, his night vision guiding him through the muck.
He retraced his steps, moving as fast as he could while carrying a body.
He reached the intersection. To his left was the path to the exit grate. To his right, the short tunnel leading to the concealed bunker filled with Dragon Breath powder.
He stopped.
He shifted his father's weight, drawing his stolen sword again. He channeled a dense concentration of fire Qi into the blade until the steel glowed cherry red.
He hurled the glowing sword down the right hand tunnel. It spun through the air, crashing into the heavy brick block he had pushed aside earlier, sparking brightly against the stone.
He turned left and sprinted toward the exit grate.
He saw the moonlight shining through the opening ahead. He pushed his legs harder.
He burst out of the tunnel, splashing into the stagnant canal water and scrambled up the muddy bank into the alleyway.
He took three steps away from the wall.
The ground beneath his feet shuddered violently.
A deep THUMP echoed from deep within the earth. The stone wall of the Jin Estate vibrated.
That was the prison block.
Jin Hao kept walking, putting distance between himself and the wall.
Five seconds later, the ground heaved upward, tossing Jin Hao onto his knees. A deafening roar tore through the night, a sound so loud it physically hurt his ears.
Behind him, a massive section of the Jin Family Estate's outer wall simply ceased to exist. It blew outward in a storm of pulverized stone. A pillar of blinding orange flame shot hundreds of feet into the night sky, illuminating the slums as brightly as the midday sun.
The shockwave hit him a second later, a wall of rushing air that blew his hood back and sent debris clattering against the buildings around him.
Jin Hao stayed on his knees, shielding his father's body with his own.
He slowly turned his head to look back.
Where the western edge of the Jin Estate had been, there was now a massive sinkhole. Several pavilions had collapsed into the crater, their wooden frames catching fire instantly. The defensive formation flickered, warped and then shattered completely, unable to contain the localized earthquake.
Screams began to echo from within the burning ruins. Alarm bells began to ring wildly across the city.
Jin Hao stared at the inferno. The heat washed over his face, drying the sewer muck on his skin.
A slow smile spread across his face.
He hoisted his unconscious father higher onto his shoulder, adjusted his grip and turned his back on the fire.