While the lower levels of the Golden Cauldron Union burned with midnight oil, the atmosphere in the most secluded courtyard of the Cao Clan estate was thick with a completely different kind of heat.
With the city's marketplace practically bursting at the seams from their unprecedented midday sales, Patriarch Cao Yan was completely occupied.
He was locked away at the clan's primary distribution headquarters, personally managing the mountain-sized stacks of gold and spirit stones flowing into the family ledgers and ensuring the outer dispensaries remained fiercely guarded.
Because of this, the most luxurious guest pavilion was left entirely quiet, save for the soft, rhythmic clinking of a porcelain teacup.
Shen Yu sat back comfortably on the plush, silk-lined sofa, his dark outer robes loosely undone at the chest.
Sitting incredibly close to him, practically draped over his lap, was Cao Yan's wife, Cao Shuying.
Shuying was an opportunistic woman to her very marrow.
