Five days passed with Jun Jie locked in his room again.
The difference was that this time he was not dying of self-inflicted disgrace. He was waiting.
Waiting, checking the market, pacing, checking again, writing three more titles he refused to respect, and checking again. The room stayed clean now. Windows open. Incense burned low instead of choking the air. The bed no longer looked like a crime scene. Even so, the courtyard outside had begun whispering again. Jun Jie could hear the servants sometimes.
The young master had shut himself in again.
Some men never learned.
Jun Jie lay on the bed with one arm under his head, staring at the floating panel above him.
[Current listings: 4]
[Buyer activity: Moderate]
[Watchlist additions: 127]
[No completed sales.]
His mouth flattened.
"Moderate activity," he said. "That sounds like a polite way of saying no one has bought anything."
[That is because I am polite.]
[Unlike you.]
Jun Jie sat up. "Five days."
[Yes.]
"I've been in this room five days."
[Yes.]
"And my first big step toward greatness is waiting for strangers across dimensions to buy porn."
[Correct.]
"That sounds insane when you say it like that."
[I did not make it insane.]
[I only formatted it.]
Jun Jie dragged a hand through his hair and swung his legs off the bed. The challenge in the council hall felt much closer now. Two days left. Qin Zhen's name had weight enough to make even his memories tense. The strongest disciple of his generation did not spend his mornings waiting on a market window and praying for depravity to convert into capital.
He walked to the table, glanced at the brush and blank paper there, and almost sat down to write another entry.
The panel flashed before he could.
[Buyer bidding spike detected.]
Jun Jie froze.
The next line appeared immediately.
[Listing: Low-Grade Smut Novel, My Disciples Are Crazy About Me]
[Current buyer count: 3]
His heartbeat picked up. "Three?"
[A bidding contest has begun.]
That woke him up faster than any pill could have.
He stepped closer, eyes fixed on the panel as numbers started moving. Not slowly either. The price jumped once. Then again. One bidder dropped out. Another took the lead. A fourth entered late and pushed the price high enough to make Jun Jie stop breathing for the space of a second.
"You're telling me people are fighting over this garbage."
[Correction.]
[They are fighting over your garbage.]
A final flash crossed the panel.
[You have sold: Low-Grade Smut Novel, My Disciples Are Crazy About Me]
[Buyer satisfaction: Extremely High]
[Reward obtained: 50,000 Origin Points]
Jun Jie stared.
He read the lines once. Then again.
Fifty thousand.
Even Nya took a breath before answering.
[...That is an absurdly good price.]
Jun Jie turned toward the table slowly, as if sudden movement might make the window disappear. "Say it again."
[I am surprised.]
He pointed at the panel. "No. The number."
[50,000 Origin Points.]
His laugh burst out before he could stop it, raw and sharp and very close to disbelieving. "For that."
[Yes.]
[Apparently one buyer found the title irresistible, another found the setting exotic, and the winner appears to have a weakness for arrogant masters and morally compromised disciples.]
Jun Jie put a hand over his mouth and shook his head once.
'Fifty thousand.'
The number felt unreal until another line cut through it.
[current currency: 30,000]
His expression changed immediately.
"Right."
[Yes.]
[Debt first.]
"The system really knows how to ruin a good moment."
[It is called accounting.]
He stared at the new total. Thirty thousand. Even after the debt, it was more than enough to matter. Enough to change something real. Enough to stop flailing and start climbing.
"What can I do with thirty thousand?"
Nya answered without delay.
[If you want to survive your promise to the Patriarch, stop thinking about techniques for killing others and fix your own body first.]
Jun Jie leaned against the table. "Meaning?"
[Meaning Jun Jie's body was born good and maintained like trash.]
[Your frame has talent.]
[Your foundation does not.]
A new panel unfolded before him.
[Body Tempering Realm]
[Primary purpose: Strengthening flesh, bones, tendons, and physical foundation.]
[Current evaluation: Incomplete. Neglected. Impure.]
Jun Jie's jaw tightened.
"So I start there."
[You start there again.]
[Properly this time.]
That made sense. Qin Zhen stood where he stood because he had climbed from the ground with discipline. Jun Jie could not cheat the first step by pretending it was beneath him. If this body's base remained muddy, anything built on top of it would crack.
"What do I buy."
The market answered under Nya's guidance, item by item.
[Recommended purchase: Iron Blood Tyrant Body Art — Perfect Edition]
[Recommended purchase: Marrow Cleansing Pill x3]
[Recommended purchase: Explosive Step — Flawless Comprehension]
Jun Jie read the list. The first would give him the sect's own body art in its proper form, not the flawed version most disciples learned. The pills would scrub the filth from his marrow and force his body back into line. Explosive Step was movement, speed, angle, timing. In a fight, that could be the difference between taking a blow and breaking the man who threw it.
"Show me the cost."
The numbers rose.
High enough to sting.
Not high enough to stop him.
Jun Jie exhaled once. "Do it."
The panel brightened.
[You have purchased: Iron Blood Tyrant Body Art — Perfect Edition]
[You have purchased: Marrow Cleansing Pill x3]
[You have purchased: Explosive Step — Flawless Comprehension]
[current currency: 2,500]
Jun Jie stared at the last line. "That dropped fast."
[Power is expensive.]
[Ignorance is often worse.]
Three things appeared on the table in faint pulses of blue. A black-gold manual bound with metal thread. Three white pills inside a jade vial, each one no larger than a fingernail and dense with medicinal fragrance. And last came knowledge itself, folding into his head with such sudden force that his hand shot to the edge of the table.
His body moved before he fully understood why.
Weight shifting through the feet. Force exploding through the calf. Breath cut short at the exact right instant. A step that was not merely fast, but violent in its efficiency.
Jun Jie grabbed the table harder until the dizziness passed.
"That one," he muttered, "I felt."
[Flawless Comprehension.]
[You understand it.]
[Your body does not yet deserve it.]
He gave the manual a long look, then opened it.
The first page alone was enough to make his face cool.
This was the Iron Blood Tyrant Body Art stripped of every clumsy compromise. Lines of circulation ran cleaner. Tempering routes linked properly. Earlier bottlenecks were broken open with brutal clarity. It did not read like a sect manual. It read like someone had taken a hammer to every lie, excuse, and mistake accumulated over generations and left only the version strong enough to survive.
Jun Jie turned another page.
Then another.
His pulse rose with each one.
'This is monstrous.'
[That is why you bought it.]
He set the manual down and uncorked the vial. A sharp medicinal scent rose immediately, bitter and metallic.
"And the pills."
[They will cleanse marrow, scour impurities, reopen damaged internal pathways, and hurt quite a lot.]
Jun Jie gave her a flat look. "Quite a lot."
[Yes.]
[You may scream.]
"I won't."
[That confidence is adorable.]
He swallowed the first pill.
For one heartbeat, nothing happened.
Then the world caught fire inside his bones.
Jun Jie's back bent violently, one hand slamming against the table so hard the wood cracked under his palm. Heat tore through his limbs, not like flame on skin, but like molten metal poured into the core of him and hammered through marrow, joints, and tendons. Every neglected inch of the body answered at once, every impurity dragged screaming to the surface.
His teeth clenched so hard his jaw shook.
A breath tried to leave him as a shout. He forced it into a ragged hiss instead.
The second wave hit worse.
His knees almost gave out. He caught himself on the table, sweat breaking across his skin in an instant as dark filth seeped from his pores and ran down his arms in thin black streaks.
"Nya—"
[Do not stop.]
[Circulate according to the manual.]
[Page three. Tyrant Bone Route. Move the heat downward.]
Jun Jie snatched the manual, eyes half-blurred from pain, found the line, and dropped into a cross-legged position on the floor with more stubbornness than grace. His breathing came rough at first. The heat inside him thrashed like something trying to tear free. He forced it into the route shown by the text.
Down the spine.
Across the ribs.
Into the limbs.
Back through the core.
Again.
Again.
Pain stayed with him, but it changed shape. Less chaos. More forging.
[Good.]
[Do not chase the pain.]
[Command it.]
Jun Jie shut his eyes and obeyed.
The room disappeared piece by piece. The table. The incense. The cracked wood beneath his palm. The challenge waiting in two days. Even Qin Zhen's name drifted to the edge of him and fell away.
There was only the body.
The heat.
The circulation.
The feeling of old weakness being dragged out by the roots.
By the time the first pill finished its work, Jun Jie's robes were soaked through and his skin was striped with black filth, but the shape inside the pain had changed. His flesh felt denser. His bones rang differently. His breath no longer scattered the way it had before.
He opened his eyes slowly.
The room looked the same.
He did not.
Nya's panel hovered before him, quiet for once.
[Good.]
[Now meditate.]
Jun Jie wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. "That's meditation?"
[No.]
[That was the body learning to stop being embarrassing.]
He almost laughed, but the exhaustion in his limbs stole the force from it.
"Guide me."
The panel brightened.
[Close your eyes.]
[Follow the Iron Blood Tyrant Body Art.]
[Do not think about Qin Zhen.]
[Do not think about your father.]
[And absolutely do not think about writing a sequel yet.]
Jun Jie closed his eyes anyway.
Outside the room, the sect continued on as always.
Inside it, with sweat, blood, filth, and fifty thousand points' worth of degenerate luck behind him, Jun Jie began to temper his body for real.