Yù Méi's laughter echoed through the Cloud Pavilion's hall, but it did not break the mercenaries' trance. They remained frozen, their bulging eyes fixed on their empty palms, unable to process how weapons forged in steel and blood had turned to sand and dust. Their mortal brains refused to accept the impossibility of the scene.
Yù Méi stopped laughing.
The predatory anxiety that had tingled in her muscles since the night before demanded movement, demanded impact. The promise of carnage bubbled in her blood, but the silence of the hall was irritating her. If they were not going to start, the Untouchable Petal—who that morning was far more the Impatient Petal—would do the honors.
She did not charge the big man directly ahead. Yù Qíng occupied the center of the hall, and her sister hated having blood splattered near Zhì Yuǎn. Instead, Yù Méi spun on her heel and launched herself in an explosion of speed to the right, straight at the mantis‑thin mercenary who moments before had brandished the paired hook‑swords.
The man blinked. It was the only movement he had time to make.
Yù Méi used no technique, no polished stances from cultivation sects. She used the absurd brute strength forged in years of fire and wide‑open pores. Her right fist sank into the thin man's abdomen. The sound of ribs cracking echoed through the luxury restaurant like a bundle of dry sticks being trampled by a chariot. The mercenary doubled over, his eyes bulging from their sockets, all the air expelled from his lungs in a sharp wheeze. Before he could fall, Yù Méi grabbed the collar of his leather tunic, yanked him down, and drove a clean, brutal knee into his face.
Teeth flew through the air, clinking against the polished wood floor like silver coins spilling from a torn pouch. The thin man collapsed, knocked out instantly, his face transformed into a mask of blood and fractured bone.
The sound of flesh yielding finally roused the other three.
The big man roared, forgetting the absence of his hammer, and charged with clenched fists. The scar‑faced man attacked from the left, and the woman with dark braids tried to flank her from the right. Three elite mortal cultivators at the Organ Purification stage, attacking in unison with killing intent.
Yù Méi bared a savage smile.
The big man's fist, the size of a small millstone, struck Yù Méi square in the shoulder. At the same time, the scarred man delivered a lethal kick to her ribs.
For a normal cultivator of that realm, those blows would have shattered the skeleton and ruptured internal organs. For Yù Méi, whose hyper‑dense bones and muscles had been flooded and remade by the world's free Qi, the impact was laughable.
The fair skin of her shoulder merely reddened slightly, as if she had taken a slap in winter. Her ribs did not even creak. Their punches felt like the angry strikes of small children.
"Is that all?" Yù Méi taunted, genuinely offended.
She grabbed the big man's arm, which still rested against her shoulder. Her fingers closed around his wrist like iron pincers. With an aggressive twist of her hips, she yanked the giant's arm downward and drove her elbow against his joint. The mercenary's elbow bent backward with a sickening crack. He howled, falling to his knees, but Yù Méi silenced him immediately with a front kick to the chest, sending his hundred‑and‑twenty kilos of muscle flying across the hall until he crashed into and shattered a cedar pillar. He slid to the floor, motionless, his ribs caved in.
The scarred mercenary tried to retreat, his eyes filled with belated terror. He turned toward the exit—the heavy doors the Patriarch himself had ordered locked minutes before.
"No one leaves!" Yù Méi roared, her blood boiling.
She dug her fingers under the top of one of the heavy round tables of solid wood and hurled it with a single hand. The table flew across the hall and smashed against the double doors, blocking any chance of escape with a barricade of sharp splinters and cracked planks.
The woman with braids took advantage of Yù Méi's distraction and leaped, aiming a concentrated strike with the edge of her hand straight at the back of the young woman's neck. The Petal ducked by pure predatory instinct, spun on her heel, and delivered an uppercut from below. Her fist caught the mercenary's jaw, lifting her off the ground with the impact; she spun in the air before crashing heavily onto a row of luxury chairs. The woman passed out before the wood even finished splintering under her weight.
Only the scarred man remained.
In panic, he tried to run toward one of the curtain‑blocked windows, but Yù Méi leaped, covering the distance in two strides. She grabbed him by the neck from behind, lifted him off the ground with the ease of someone picking up a basket of dry leaves, and slammed him onto the floorboards with crushing force. Before he could let out a scream, Yù Méi stomped heavily on his right calf. The bones of his leg snapped with a grotesque crack. The mercenary screamed until his voice failed, curling into a fetal position, immobilized and weeping.
On the other side of the hall, the dark comedy unfolded in deepest silence.
The Patriarch of the Thunder Clan, a wealthy man and a fifth‑stage cultivator, had tried to take a trembling step back when the first tooth flew through the air. He was a businessman. His mental calculations now screamed that he had not only lost his pride and his fortune; he was about to lose his life. But his legs refused to obey.
Yù Qíng remained gracefully seated at the table, her posture erect and untouched, pouring a cup of tea. She had not lifted a finger. Yet a thick, oppressive thread of her dark, dense Qi pressed down on the Patriarch's shoulders like a steel anchor. He was suppressed, nailed to the wood floor by pure killing intent, his knees trembling hysterically without being able to bend or retreat. He was forced to watch the destruction of his elite "investments" in seconds.
"Stay where you are and watch the spectacle, Patriarch," Yù Qíng murmured, her sweet, drawling voice cutting through the sound of flesh being crushed. "My husband's tea would grow cold if the dust of your escape reached this far."
Zhì Yuǎn remained like a bored god. His eyes barely registered the bloodbath, his fingers tracing the silent flow of the Dao in the air. The mortal fury of those mercenaries was nothing to the hungry universe that rested within him.
The carnage finally ceased.
The refined Cloud Pavilion was unrecognizable. Splintered chairs and overturned tables formed piles of debris. Pools of blood stained the fine wood, and the four greatest mercenaries the city's gold could buy lay scattered like broken dolls. No one was dead. But all would rather be.
In the center of the destruction, Yù Méi stood.
Her breathing was deep and ragged, her full chest rising and falling in a rapid rhythm. The elegant emerald‑green tunic was spattered with dark blood, and her knuckles were swollen and painted scarlet.
She cracked her neck, the sound loud in the silent hall, and slowly turned her face toward the Thunder Patriarch.
The businessman choked on a pathetic sob. The contrast was terrifying: the panting blonde aberration, bathed in the blood of others, surrounded by loose teeth and groaning bodies, opened a radiant smile for him—the genuine joy of a child who had just finished her favorite game.
"Whew…" Yù Méi said, wiping a drop of sweat and blood from her forehead with the back of her dirty hand. She tilted her head, her eyes sparkling with adrenaline. "You don't have any more bodyguards hidden around here, do you?"
Yù Méi's question hung in the air, laden with lethal promise. She took a step toward the Patriarch, her bloodied fists dripping onto the polished floor of the Cloud Pavilion.
The man tried to retreat, but the pressure of Yù Qíng's Qi on his shoulders kept him pinned to the spot. His knees finally gave way, striking the wood with a dull thud. He, the great Patriarch of the Thunder Clan, a cultivator of the fifth mortal realm who commanded the city's fear and respect, now trembled uncontrollably. Cold sweat ran down his face, mingling with the panicked tears he could not hold back.
"What a pity," Yù Méi sighed, cracking her neck once more. The mask of the "Untouchable Petal" had given way to a genuine, carnivorous smile. "My shoulder barely warmed up. You know, Patriarch… your son cried at the first bone I broke. I wonder if the father's blood is thinner than the son's. Shall I start with your legs? Just to make sure you don't run away while we talk about… what did you call it? Ah, yes. Interest."
The Patriarch choked. He looked at the blood‑spattered blonde girl, then at Yù Qíng, who remained seated at the table like a bored deity.
"N‑no… please…" the man's voice was a broken squeak, his business arrogance completely annihilated. "Mercy… I beg you…"
"Méi," Yù Qíng's voice cut through the air. It was sweet, soft, and absolutely terrifying. "Enough of the mess. You are spattering blood near the table."
Yù Méi pouted, crossing her arms and staining the green silk red.
"But sister, he came to kill us. And he locked the doors! The least he owes us is a little fun. I bet I can make him pass out with just three broken fingers."
Yù Qíng set down the porcelain cup with a light clink. She did not look at her sister. Her black, unfathomable, icy eyes descended on the kneeling man.
"We are not barbarians, little flower," Yù Qíng said, her tone exuding the patience of one teaching a child. "Fun does not buy new fabrics. And the Patriarch is a businessman. Businessmen do not pay their debts with bones, do they, Patriarch? They pay with gold."
The Patriarch seized that phrase like a drowning man seizing a rope. His trembling hands flew to his own belt, fumbling with the heavy pouch he had brought to bribe guards or pay mercenaries.
"Yes! Gold!" he sobbed, throwing the pouch at Yù Qíng's feet. The coins clinked loudly. "Here! Two thousand gold coins! That's twice what my son… twice the compensation for the trouble! Take it all and let me go! I swear the Thunder Clan will never cross your path again!"
Yù Méi looked at the pouch on the floor and let out a short, harsh laugh.
"Two thousand coins?" She took another step, raising her right fist stained scarlet. "The owner of that dusty shop gave us a thousand coins for a bear hide and a handful of claws. Do you think the life of the mighty Thunder Clan leader is worth the same as two dead bears? Sister, let me break his jaw. The insult is worse than the delay."
The Patriarch cowered, covering his head with his arms, expecting the impact of a force that turned iron to dust.
But Yù Qíng only sighed, a poetic and elegant sound.
"You are so impulsive, Méi." Yù Qíng rose. Her bare feet glided over the wood, stopping a centimeter from the cowering man. "Remember what I taught you yesterday at lunch? About the seed and the tree?"
Yù Méi crossed her arms again, nodding. "I remember. Hungry tree, big roots, fertilizer."
"Exactly." Yù Qíng tilted her head, her black hair cascading like a waterfall of living ink. She smiled at the Patriarch, a smile that froze the man's soul. "The Patriarch is an intelligent man. He understands that the Thunder Clan has many shops in this city. Many mines. Much gold. And my husband… my husband has an entire sky of needs. Two thousand coins do not even pay for the fact that you let his tea grow cold."
The pressure on the man's shoulders increased. The bones of his clavicle began to crack under Yù Qíng's killing intent. The message was clear: the difference between life and death was not an apology; it was the purchase price.
"E‑everything!" the Patriarch screamed, desperation shattering any barrier of pride. He frantically pulled a pendant of dark‑green jade from inside his robes, tearing it from his neck until the silver cord snapped. His bloodied hands raised the artifact like an offering to a merciless goddess. "The Golden Vault Medallion! It is the key to the Thunder Clan's main treasury in the eastern district! It holds more than eighty thousand coins in bars and funds… low‑grade spirit stones… elixirs! That's eighty percent of my family's entire wealth! Take it!"
Yù Qíng did not bend to pick it up. With a slight flick of her finger, the medallion floated from the floor and settled gently into her pale palm. She examined it for a second, turning the smooth stone in the setting sun's light, then tucked it into her silk sleeve with the utmost naturalness.
"Eighty thousand coins and treasury funds," Yù Qíng murmured, her voice returning to its usual sweetness. She looked at her sister. "See, little flower? When the tree is immense, we do not need to dirty our hands cutting the branches. We only need to look at the trunk with the right tool, and all the fruits fall on their own."
Yù Méi huffed, clearly disappointed, though her eyes gleamed at the absurd sum they had just stolen.
"I still think I should break at least one little finger of his. The pinky. Just for the insolence of kicking people out of the restaurant and making us wait."
"The terror he will carry in his bones for the rest of his miserable life is worth far more than a broken finger," Yù Qíng replied, turning her back on the ruined man.
She walked back to the table and turned her eyes to Zhì Yuǎn, who still watched the wind beyond the window—impassive, untouchable, indifferent to the bloodbath and the colossal extortion that had just occurred in his name.
"My love," Yù Qíng said, her voice melting into pure, blind devotion. "The smell of fear in this hall has become unbearable, and the wind is no longer pleasant."
Zhì Yuǎn finally blinked. He rose from his chair. His charcoal‑gray tunic and black silk cloak did not have a single wrinkle, not a single stain. He walked among the crushed bodies and the blood on the floor as one walks through an empty garden.
"Then let's go," Zhì Yuǎn said, simply.
The restaurant's door, which had been locked from the inside with heavy oak beams, swung open in a silent, ghostly manner before they even touched it—the locks transformed to dust by his invisible will.
The trio stepped out into the golden afternoon light, leaving behind a destroyed restaurant, four agonizing mercenaries, and a Patriarch kneeling in his own blood, weeping for the loss of his fortune, his pride, and the illusion that mortals like him could offend the heavens without paying the price.
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