SON OF THE MANOR

CH5

The midnight storm roared like a furious beast across the eastern peaks, but Long Jingchen moved through the blinding sheets of rain without making a sound. He held his little sister tightly against his chest, shielding her frail body from the freezing wind with his dark, wet cloak. High above the ridges, massive golden beams of spiritual energy sliced through the clouds, sweeping the mountain layout in a frantic search grid.

The Chu Family Patriarch had unleashed the sect's high-tier detection arrays, hunting desperately for the mysterious thief who had siphoned away Chu Tianyou’s entire gold core. Jingchen looked up at the flashing golden lights, his violet eyes completely calm as a faint translucent screen hummed silently behind his eyelids. The SSS-rank technique was perfectly active, masking their signatures and turning them into complete phantoms.

[SOVEREIGN CLOAKING TECHNIQUE WORKING AT OPTIMAL LEVEL... MAXIMUM ENEMY SCAN EVASION SUCCESSFUL.]

"Brother, where are we going?" Xiaoxiao whispered into his neck, her voice trembling softly as she heard the distant, thumping war drums of the search teams. "The whole mountain is glowing. The guards are everywhere."

"We are going to a place where they keep the medicine you need, little one," Jingchen replied softly, his voice cutting through the sound of the thunder. "Don't be afraid. They can scan the dirt all night, but they will never find us."

He leaped over a high stone wall, landing weightlessly on the wet tiles of the Central Medicine Pavilion before slipping through a loose ventilation hatch. The internal corridors were dark, smelling heavily of crushed spiritual roots, roasted charcoal, and toxic alchemical fumes. Jingchen glided into a narrow storage room, carefully laying Xiaoxiao down inside a deep, secure alcove hidden behind a massive stack of ironwood crates.

"Stay hidden right here, Xiaoxiao," he whispered, wiping a cold raindrop from her forehead while placing the cheap cleaning rag back into his hand. "I need to enter the inner chambers to get the components for your cure. If anyone comes near, do not make a sound."

"I promise, brother," she murmured, curling her small legs tight against her chest and holding her breath as she looked up at him with absolute trust. "Please be careful. Don't let them catch you."

Jingchen nodded, his face turning back into a cold, completely unyielding mask of stone the moment he stepped out of the shadows. He adjusted his torn janitor's rags, letting his posture slouch into that of a broken, miserable slave as he walked toward the inner alchemical furnace rooms. To look for clues about the vault map and get the ingredients, playing the role of a low-level cleaner was his best cover.

The air inside the main furnace hall was suffocatingly hot, thick with a heavy, poisonous green smoke that made the throat burn. At the center of the room stood a massive, thousand-degree bronze cauldron, its spiritual fire flickering wildly and threatening to explode. Master Shen, the corrupt Head Alchemist and a loyal Chu family sycophant, was pacing frantically, his face pale with pure terror.

"No, no, no! This cannot be happening!" Master Shen shrieked, pulling at his long robes as he stared at the blackening slag dripping from the cauldron's valves. "The King-Grade pill is collapsing! The Palace Master’s inspection is at dawn! If this refinement fails, the Patriarch will flay me alive!"

"Master Shen, the spiritual charcoal is completely spent, and the core flames are turning volatile!" a junior alchemist yelled, backing away from the heat in a panic. "We need a massive burst of organic spiritual essence to stabilize the core right now, or the furnace will burst!"

Shen’s wild, desperate eyes scanned the room, hunting frantically for a scapegoat to cover his own monumental failure. His gaze locked onto Jingchen, who was quietly scraping the toxic ash from the floorboards near the corner of the wall. A sick, murderous grin instantly broke through the alchemist's panic.

"You! You worthless, mana-less piece of trash!" Shen roared, pointing a trembling finger at Jingchen as the guards rushed into the room. "The spiritual charcoal was sabotaged, and I saw you touching the storage bins earlier! You are the reason my pill is failing!"

Jingchen didn't argue or lift his head, keeping his eyes fixed on the dirt to hide the violet light expanding in his pupils. He knew exactly what the alchemist was doing, but he chose not to fight back openly, calculating the massive turning point about to unfold.

"Master Shen, I am just a cleaner," Jingchen said, his voice feigning a desperate, pathetic shake that made the guards laugh. "I haven't touched the charcoal."

"Shut your mouth, slave!" Shen screamed, his face twisted in pure, aristocratic malice. "Guards, seize this ingrate! Hurl his worthless body directly into the open cauldron gates! Let his miserable, trash essence serve as the fuel to stabilize my holy flames!"

The two massive guards grabbed Jingchen by his shoulders, lifting him off his feet and marching him straight toward the blistering mouth of the bronze giant. The heat was immense, enough to melt iron, but Jingchen remained completely still as they threw him through the heavy iron doors, slamming the locks shut behind him.

"Burn well, you useless rat!" Shen gloated from outside, laughing hysterically as he cranked the heat valves to their maximum level. "Your death will save my life, and that is the only value a slave like you will ever have!"

Inside the fatal, blistering cage, the thousand-degree crimson flames wrapped around Jingchen’s body like a swarm of hungry fire dragons. But he didn't scream, and his skin didn't burn; he simply stood upright, his slouched posture vanishing as he connected with the entity in his soul.

[CRITICAL THERMAL LEVEL DETECTED. INITIALIZING ASSET REPOSSESSION: THERMAL INVERSION.]

[HIJACKING FURNACE ENERGY CHANNELS... DIVERTING 100% OF EXTRACTED CALORIC VALUE INTO HOST MERIDIANS.]

A massive golden array erupted within the bronze walls, completely reversing the flow of the destructive heat. The terrifying, blistering energy was instantly transformed into pure, liquid power that poured straight into Jingchen’s celestial ivory skeleton. His cosmic rivers widened further, absorbing the furnace's entire lifecycle to temper his marrow and push his foundations to an even more terrifying peak.

At the same time, the system's golden light extended toward the ruined herbal mixture at the bottom of the cauldron. Jingchen watched calmly as the chaotic, blackening slag was re-filtered, the system effortlessly completing Master Shen's ruined King-Grade pill to a flawless, divine grade within seconds. But as the pill crystallized, Jingchen reached out, embedding a devastating Karmic Backfire Trap deep within its core.

"When the Patriarch eats this," Jingchen whispered, his voice echoing inside the burning chamber like a dark promise. "Your whole lineage will feel the weight of the ashes you tried to make me."

[REFINEMENT COMPLETE. REPOSSESSING RAW NINE-SUN STALKS FROM THE HERBAL EXTRACTION FLOW.]

With a single thought, the system siphoned the purest essence of the ingredients into his hand, forming a glowing, golden pill that pulsed with the heat of a miniature sun. The heavy iron doors of the cauldron suddenly burst open from the internal pressure, a massive cloud of thick, black smoke billowing out into the main hall.

Master Shen rushed forward, falling to his knees as a brilliant, flawless gold pill floated out of the smoke and landed gently on his tray. "A miracle! A legendary grade pill!" Shen wept with joy, greedily clutching the treasure as he looked at the empty, smoking furnace. "The trash was completely vaporized, and his grease stabilized the fire! Clean this room up before the inspectors arrive!"

Slipping out through the thick, heavy smoke under the cover of his cloaking technique, Jingchen didn't look back at the gloating alchemist. He moved like a shadow, his hand holding the newly refined Nine-Sun Restoration Pill as he glided back to the hidden alcove. He dropped to his knees beside the crates, pulling Xiaoxiao out of the dark corner into his arms.

"Brother!" she gasped, her eyes widening as she felt the vibrant, healing warmth radiating from his body. "You're back. Did you find it?"

"Open your mouth, Xiaoxiao," Jingchen said softly, placing the golden pill against her dry lips. "Drink this. The pain ends tonight."

The moment the medicine slid down her throat, a wave of bright, golden starlight exploded within her small frame. The lingering frost in her marrow was instantly burned away, her shattered internal organs and hollowed-out veins knitting back together in a beautiful, rapid flash of divine light. For the first time in six long years, her pale face turned rosy, and her suppressed royal bloodline began to hum with the terrifying aura of a sleeping Empress.

"Brother... it doesn't hurt anymore," Xiaoxiao whispered, her eyes shining with an energetic light she had never possessed in her life. She stood up on her own two feet, her movements light and fluid. "I feel so strong. I feel like I can fly."

"You are strong, Xiaoxiao," Jingchen said, his hand gently resting on her head, his mind already calculating the next phase of his vengeance. He had to locate the vault map, wherever it was hidden on this mountain, to find the truth behind his parents' suspension. He chose to keep the secret about their father and mother hidden for now, vowing to tell her only after he had successfully torn the doors off the vault and saved them.

"But listen to me carefully," Jingchen warned her, his violet eyes turning dead serious. "The Three Sovereign Houses still control this palace. To keep my power a secret until I can breach their vault, you must continue to play the victim. Can you do that for me?"

Xiaoxiao looked at his face, her intelligent mind instantly understanding the immense, calculative stakes of his game. She lowered her posture, letting her shoulders slump as she feigned a weak, breathless look. "Like this, brother? I can act like the trash they think I am."

"Perfect," Jingchen murmured, a cold, dangerous smile touching his lips. "Let’s leave this pavilion before the next sweep hits."

But just as they stepped out into the pavilion's central courtyard, a heavy, metallic net woven from spiritual silver descended from the sky, slamming onto the stone with a thunderous echo. A high-level Chu execution squad, led by a ruthless elder named Chu Feng, stepped out from the shadows of the pillars, their faces twisted in pure triumph.

"We found them! The blood trail from the broken shack leads right to this sector!" Chu Feng shouted, his sword flashing with a heavy, brown earth light. "You thought you could hide in the medicine halls, you runaway slaves? Master Tianyou wants your heads for the guard you murdered!"

Jingchen looked at the silver net pressing against his shoulders, his core energy pulsing with a dark fury that wanted to shatter the guards into pieces. But he forced his power down, maintaining his absolute mask to prevent a premature war with the entire sect patriarchs before he had the map. He fell to his knees, pretending to struggle against the ropes like a weak commoner.

Xiaoxiao played her part flawlessly, letting out a weak, breathless whimper as she collapsed into the dirt, acting completely limp and helpless. A brutal guard stepped forward, ruthlessly yanking the Azure Heart Pendant straight from Jingchen’s neck, snapping the silk cord with a sharp pop.

"Look at this pathetic cockroach," the guard mocked, tossing the Saintess's pendant to Chu Feng with a loud laugh. "Without the woman's trinket, he’s just a piece of meat waiting for the butcher. Get them into the transport cage immediately!"

The guards rough-handled them, dragging Jingchen by his hair across the cold, wet pavement and hurling them into a heavy steel cage on the back of a spiritual transport. The metal bars locked into place with a loud, absolute snap as the vehicle began to speed toward the main palace dungeon for a public interrogation.