Grandmaster Dan Chen stood on the third-floor balcony of the Alchemy Pill Tower, his violet master robes billowing in the morning breeze.
His mocking laughter drifted across the crowded plaza, echoing off the stone facades of the trading houses. Beside him, Deacon Huo and several senior alchemists sneered down at Dr. Gu Qinghe, Little Guo’er, and Lin Mo.
“Across the street?!” Dan Chen chuckled, tapping his golden belt with two fingers. “Chairman Lin, you truly are a merchant who knows nothing of heaven and earth. Do you know who owns that fifty-acre lot directly opposite my tower?”
Dan Chen leaned over the carved gold railing, gesturing toward the sprawling, walled estate across the avenue.
Behind high stone walls stood ancient wooden tea warehouses and courtyards shaded by three-hundred-year-old camphor trees. It was the largest single commercial parcel in the eastern district, sitting directly in the heart of the trade route.
“That property belongs to Old Man Chen,” Dan Chen said with supreme arrogance. “An old tea merchant who retired forty years ago. For thirty years, my Pill Tower offered him three billion stones, then four billion, and finally five billion stones to turn that land into our auxiliary warehouse! He threw our deacons out with a broom every single time!”
