Dust motes drifted through the silence of Grandmaster Feng’s cramped library. Grandmaster Feng, his usually placid face now a mask of alarm, leaped to his feet. “Duke Jian? A lockdown? Demonic contagion? What madness is this?” His voice, typically a low rumble, was strained with disbelief. I, Shen Luan, felt a familiar weariness settle over me. He Jian, the predictable, infuriating fly. His father’s early arrival was no coincidence; it was a calculated escalation. He Jian wasn't just attempting to isolate me; he was cornering me, creating an inescapable crucible. He wanted to force my hand, to extract my methods and knowledge, and then, no doubt, discard me like a withered root. “The sick ward,” I stated, tone dry. “That will be my isolation pen. Easy to watch, separate from the student halls, yet close enough for him to lean on me.” Grandmaster Feng cursed under his breath, a string of alchemical epithets I hadn't heard since my last life, when a junior had accidentally transmuted a rare Earth-Heart Stone into common gravel. “This is an outrage! I will not stand for it! I will confront Duke Jian myself!” “You will do no such thing,” I countered, rising to my feet. “He Jian’s father is a Duke of the Empire, not a bumbling apprentice. Any direct confrontation will only make you an obstacle, not an ally. He seeks a public spectacle, a pretense for his son’s grandstanding. Resist now, and you provide him the justification. Better to appear to comply.” I walked over to the table, picking up the parchment notes I had drafted from the ancient texts. “He thinks he has me trapped. He doesn’t realize I now have a potential path.” Grandmaster Feng stared at me, his fury warring with reluctant respect. “A path? Under these circumstances? Boy, your audacity is either profound wisdom or utter folly.” My personal confinement began, as predicted, in the dilapidated recovery hall. The hall reeked of dried bitterroot and vinegar, familiar scents to a healer, but meant here as a humiliation. Sentries in the bronze livery of Duke He’s household blocked the only door, hands resting on iron pommels. My movements were restricted, my tools confiscated, and even Pangzi, usually a creature of boundless freedom, was kept close, huddled in my robes, agitated and hungry. Days blurred into a monotonous cycle of silence and strategic inaction. I spent my time feigning despair, occasionally pacing like a caged beast, while mentally cross-referencing ancient medical treatises and piecing together fragments of forgotten lore. Pangzi, however, grew increasingly restless. He’d dig at my robes, chittering indignantly, his nose twitching towards the small, contained sample of Void-Tainted Nightshade I’d tucked beneath a floorboard. Its malevolent energy, though faint, seemed to prickle his Gourmand senses. Then, on the third afternoon, the oak door creaked open past the sentries. Lady Xiang An stood there, a solitary beacon in the dim hallway. Her jade-green robe, usually vibrant, seemed muted against her pallor. The faint, nearly invisible trace of her malady was now a distinct, shimmering aura around her, a tell-tale sign of its accelerating decay. She held my gaze without wavering. “Shen Luan,” she said, voice measured. “The sentries claimed you were dangerous. I ignored them.” She stepped inside while the men in bronze shifted outside, unwilling to lay hands on their young master’s betrothed. I merely nodded, my gaze sweeping over her, assessing the progress of her decay. “You should not be here. The Crimson Soul Decay spreads faster whenever your meridians fluctuate under stress.” She ignored my warning, moving closer, her presence filling the stale air with an unsettling warmth. “He Jian grows impatient. He speaks of 'expediting treatment' and ‘unorthodox methods.’ He does not care for my well-being, only for the facade of it. He wants to control the narrative of my recovery, and you are… an inconvenient truth.” Her voice dropped to a near whisper. “I do not love him. I never have. And I fear what he will do if he believes he cannot control you, or me.” A tremor ran through her hand, which she subtly pressed to her side. Her confession, raw and unadorned, cut through my usual medical detachment. For a brief moment, she was more than a walking collection of symptoms. She was a person, vulnerable and desperate, caught in a gilded cage. Something pulled behind my ribs, separate from my professional instinct to preserve a rare constitution. Pangzi, still burrowed in my robes, suddenly erupted in a flurry of agitated chitters. He sprang onto my shoulder, his tiny claws digging in, and began jabbering, his whiskered snout pointed insistently at a faded, dust-covered map of the Seven Rings I’d tacked to the wall. It was an old, hand-drawn chart, depicting the various lecture halls, training grounds, and, most prominently, the colossal Jade Mountain that formed the institution's backdrop. “What is it, little glutton?” I murmured, keeping my posture calm. Pangzi chittered louder, tapping a claw furiously, not at any building, but at the sprawling, intricate contours of the mountain itself. He moved his paw in a circular motion, tracing invisible lines, then pointed down, as if indicating something deep beneath the surface. The text had called the Celestial Anchor a relic. But ancient cartographers often rendered subterranean veins as icons. Pangzi was not smelling stone; he was catching the scent of concentrated spirit marrow pooled beneath the foundation. The rite’s diagrams called for balancing five polarities at a convergence point. Severing her curse without rattling the celestial seal did not demand an enchanted talisman; it required a cavern where the earth’s natural ley lines pinned the soul in place. If the stabilizing ground lay directly under the academy, Duke He’s cordon mattered little. I only needed access to the mountain's root caverns. Just as I was about to speak, to share this incredible breakthrough with Xiang An, the door flew back against the wall, rattling the iron latches. A dozen armored retainers filed into the narrow ward, spears drawn. And striding through their ranks, a sneer plastered on his handsome face, was He Jian himself, flanked by two hulking brutes. “The farce concludes, Shen Luan,” He Jian declared, stepping across the threshold. “My father requires your presence in the courtyard. The elders will witness what happens to vermin dabbling in forbidden arts.” Gauntleted hands locked onto my shoulders and pinned my wrists behind my back. Xiang An stepped forward, but two spearmen barred her path. “Careful with the robes,” I said evenly. “Duke He will have to pay for the silk when this farce ends.” They hauled me out into the corridor, boots scraping on stone. I caught one last glimpse of the map on the wall. The path beneath Jade Mountain existed; I merely had to survive the son of a duke long enough to reach it.

A Prison of Jade and Lies