The morning market was already humming with the desperate, low-margin commerce of the impoverished when Pei Jing stepped into the mud.
He didn’t walk directly to the central square. Instead, he skirted the base of the eastern limestone ridge. There, the office boards of the Red Mist Management League were posted on grease-stained pine boards.
A crowd of ragged fighters had gathered around the central notice board, their breath misting in the cold air.
Pei Jing stood at the outer edge, his bamboo hat tilted low, observing the wooden placards hanging beneath the thatched roof.
Underground SPIRIT CAVES (MONTHLY LEASE): Upper Slate Chamber: 15 Low-Grade Stones. Ward Array Grade 1. Dry. Middle Iron Cell: 8 Low-Grade Stones. Ward Array Grade 1. Mild Damp. Lower Mud Hole: 3 Low-Grade Stones. Ward Array Crude. Sulfur Venting. NOTICE: All leases payable on the 1st of the month strictly in advance. 1-stone key deposit needed. Non-fighters strictly banned from lower galleries.
Pei Jing’s eyes narrowed slightly at the final clause: Non-fighters strictly banned.
In the eyes of the market administrators, a mortal was not a tenant. A mortal was livestock or prey. If a man without active spiritual fluctuations walked into the underground leasing office flashing three whole spirit stones, he wouldn’t receive an iron key. He would receive a slit throat in the stairwell, and his three stones would be logged as “unclaimed office salvage.”
