The twin cliffs of Red-Maple Pass rose like rust-colored stone blades against the pale noon sky. Across the narrow throat of the canyon, three iron chains as thick as a man’s waist hung stretched between two granite watchtowers. Dark green corpse-poison glistened on the heavy links, blocking the highway completely.
Two hundred armored Black-Wind Noble Guards stood in tight ranks behind the chains. Their black iron breastplates caught the cold sunlight, and their heavy crossbows were cranked back with armor-piercing bolts aimed down the road.
At the front of the blockade stood Captain Hu. He was a burly man with a jagged knife scar across his nose and a Rank 3 Mid cultivation base pulsing in angry red waves around his iron boots. He chewed on a willow twig, his narrow eyes locked on the approaching caravan with undisguised greed.
Inside the warm cabin of the [Rank 3 Spring-Shock Luxury Caravan], Gu Changsheng didn’t even put down his wooden soup ladle. He stood calmly beside the simmering clay pot of white radish and pork-bone broth, sprinkling a pinch of chopped green onions over the golden surface.
On the lower bunk, seven-year-old Su Nuannuan rubbed her eyes with a small fist and sat up under her goose-down quilt. The bump-free floor heating had given her the best nap of her life. She yawned like a kitten, hugging her [Pink Healing Watering Can] against her chest.
“Papa,” Nuannuan said softly, blinking her big dark eyes at the red maple leaves outside the window. “Are we at the capital already?”
“Not yet, sweetheart,” Gu Changsheng said, glancing back with a warm smile. “We’re about to pass a mountain tollbooth run by some very impolite tax collectors. Nian’er, bring your sister a cup of warm honey water, then hand me that wooden tray of maltose beads by the stove.”
“Right away, Dad,” nine-year-old Gu Nian said. He handed Nuannuan a wooden cup so she could wet her throat, then carried over a tray holding forty round, amber-colored sugar balls.
Gu Changsheng rested two fingers on the edge of the tray and opened the [Dad’s Care-Package Upgrade Box] in his mind.
[Input 1: Wild Cliff-Honey Maltose Balls]
[Input 2: Ten-Year Pine-Resin Glue]
[Input 3: Su Nuannuan’s Sweet-Attraction Herb Powder]
[Upgrade Cost: 10,000 DP -> Output: Honey-Glue Candy Marbles (Rank 3)!]
A faint golden shimmer passed through the forty amber spheres. Immediately, they began to glow like priceless Rank 3 spirit-essence pills, giving off an irresistible aroma of caramelized honey and rich medicinal qi.
In the original book, Captain Hu and his Black-Wind Noble Guards extorted every merchant caravan crossing Red-Maple Pass to fund Second Prince Qian Ye’s secret cavalry, Gu Changsheng thought dryly. He divided the glowing marbles into two small cloth pouches. *Anyone who couldn’t pay five hundred silvers got thrown into the canyon ditch and blamed on mountain bandits.
Let’s see how much he likes collecting tolls when he’s glued to his own boots.*
“Keep your hands inside the window sill when you roll them out,” Gu Changsheng told the two kids, handing one pouch to Gu Nian and the other to Su Nuannuan. “Wait for my nod. We don’t want any blood splashing on our new wheels before lunch.”
“Got it, Dad,” Gu Nian said, his small face serious as he weighed the pouch in his palm.
“Nuannuan won’t let the bad men touch our oxen!” Su Nuannuan declared, patting her pink watering can before hopping onto the cushioned bench beside her brother.
Outside on the highway, ten yards in front of the iron chains, a battered silk wagon lay tipped on its side. Plump silk merchant Boss Lin knelt in the gravel with a bruised cheek, clutching a bolt of satin while two Black-Wind soldiers kicked his crates.
“Please, Captain Hu!” Boss Lin begged. “This silk already has an official Azure-Cloud tax stamp!
Taking my mules and demanding three hundred silvers will bankrupt my shop!”
“Azure-Cloud stamps are toilet paper at my pass!” Captain Hu spat his twig onto Boss Lin’s hat.
Right then, the [Rank 3 Spring-Shock Luxury Caravan] glided silently around the bend, its bronze wheels hovering six inches above the gravel on white cloud-cotton cushions.
The two hundred Black-Wind Guards froze at the sight of the gleaming cedar cabin and the mouth-watering steam of pork-bone soup drifting from the chimney. Captain Hu forgot all about Boss Lin, striding into the road to slam his iron gauntlet against the caravan’s guard-rail.
“Halt! By order of the Sky-Crown Border Inspectorate!” Captain Hu bellowed, spotting the bronze Azure-Cloud Prefecture license plate between the spirit-oxen.
“An Azure-Cloud plate?
Every wagon from Azure-Cloud is suspected of smuggling! Step down and empty your pockets!”
Gu Changsheng slid open the kitchen window and rested one elbow on the sill, holding his wooden soup ladle. “Morning, Officer. We’re just a family heading to Sky-Crown City to pick up my eldest boy.
How much is the regular road toll?”
Captain Hu caught a whiff of the simmering marrow broth and the glint of Auntie Qin’s silver-inlaid herb cabinets. His greed flared hot.
“For an unregistered luxury wagon from Azure-Cloud, the inspection fee is five hundred silver taels in cash, plus both spirit-oxen!” Captain Hu barked, resting his thumb on his broadsword hilt.
On the driver’s bench, Grandpa Fu clicked his [Jade-Abacus Cane]. “Under the Great Qian Commercial Code, the highway toll for a four-wheeled carriage is twelve coppers! You’re overcharging by four hundred and ninety-nine taels and nine hundred and eighty-eight coppers!”
“My sword is the code here, old blind man!” Captain Hu sneered, pointing at seven-year-old Su Nuannuan and the glowing pink artifact in her lap. “And hand over that pink watering can the girl is holding!
My seventh concubine needs a pot for her orchids, or my archers will impale your spirit-oxen right now!”
Inside the cabin, the temperature dropped ten degrees.
Su Nuannuan gasped, hugging her [Pink Healing Watering Can] tight against her tummy. “No! Papa made this for Nuannuan!
You’re a bad robber!”
Beside her, nine-year-old Gu Nian stood up straight, black-gold Chaos light flaring in his pupils as his fist clenched on the sill. “Touch my sister’s watering can and I’ll smash your teeth into your stomach.”
Gu Changsheng calmly laid his warm palm atop Gu Nian’s head and slid a piece of candied ginger into Nuannuan’s mouth. Instantly, the Chaos light in Gu Nian’s eyes settled back into warm trust, and Nuannuan bit down on the sweet ginger.
Threatening my oxen and robbing a seven-year-old’s toy? Gu Changsheng looked at Captain Hu like a chef looking at a dead fish. Looks like your retirement starts today.
“Five hundred taels is heavy to carry in silver,” Gu Changsheng said smoothly. “Envoy Zhao, step out and tell Captain Hu who we’re working for—use your best court voice, or Grandpa Fu is canceling your lunch bowl.”
Behind the caravan, Envoy Zhao’s stomach growled at the threat of losing his radish broth. Hopping out in his bright Pink Chore Apron, he puffed out his bruised chest and screamed through his missing teeth:.
“STAND DOWN, YOU BLIND IDIOTS! THIS IS HIS HIGHNESS SECOND PRINCE QIAN YE’S SECRET TREASURE INSPECTION! ANY GUARD WHO DRAWS A BLADE WILL HAVE NINE GENERATIONS SENT TO THE SALT MINES!”
Captain Hu squinted at the barefoot official in the frilly pink apron. “Lord Envoy Zhao?! Why are you wearing a kitchen apron and pulling a cabbage cart?!”
“It’s a stealth disguise, you moron!” Envoy Zhao sobbed, covering his toothless mouth. “And Master Gu is carrying the tribute pills!”
Before Captain Hu could process that, Gu Changsheng gave his children a dry nod. “Kids, pay the toll.”
“Okay, Dad!” Gu Nian and Su Nuannuan chirped, tipping their pouches out the window and rolling all forty glowing [Honey-Glue Candy Marbles] beneath the guards’ boots!
Clack-clatter-roll!
Forty golden amber spheres bounced across the stones, flooding the canyon with the intoxicating scent of wild cliff-honey and Rank 3 spirit-essence.
Up on that spice rack, Grandpa Yao’s [Rank 3 Jade-Turtle Plush Doll] snickered. “Even a Rank 4 alchemist would mistake that glaze for Royal Nine-Turn Honey Pills!”
Captain Hu’s eyes turned bloodshot with greed. “Rank 3 Royal Honey Pills?! Each one is worth two hundred silvers!
Grab them!”
Discipline vanished. Captain Hu lunged flat on his stomach to scoop up a dozen marbles, while over a hundred and fifty armored Black-Wind Guards dived headfirst into the pile like starving carp.
The instant Captain Hu’s gauntlets closed around the first marble and seventy guards piled onto his back, the hidden binding runes snapped shut.
ZZZT-GLUE!
Forty marbles burst into webs of indestructible golden honey-resin threads. Captain Hu tried to lift his hand, only to find his iron fingers welded solid to his own beard, and his beard glued fast to his lieutenant’s breastplate.
“Captain! My spear is stuck to your helmet!”
“Don’t touch me! Your elbow is glued to my nose!”
Every panicked kick fused more iron plates together. Within five breaths, Captain Hu and nearly two hundred armored guards were welded boot-to-helmet and beard-to-shield into a groaning, twenty-foot-tall sticky human sphere in the middle of the road!
Gu Changsheng leaned out the window, picked up his long iron fire-poker, and gave the giant ball of glued guards a light tap on the side.
Boing-roll!
The twenty-foot ball of clanking armor and muffled curses rolled three yards sideways into the roadside ditch, pulling the heavy iron blockade chains cleanly off their stone hooks as it went. The highway ahead opened wide.
“Look, Dad!” Su Nuannuan clapped her small hands and giggled, her eyes crinkling into bright moons. “The bad robber turned into a giant candied hawthorn ball!”
“A very low-quality hawthorn ball,” Gu Changsheng agreed, wiping his hands on a towel. “Too much iron, zero nutritional value. Nian’er, what did we learn?”
“Never eat candy off the ground,” Gu Nian said solemnly, watching Captain Hu’s muffled boots spin upside down at the top of the sticky sphere. “Especially when Dad made it for someone else.”
Inside the cabin, both children felt the lingering shadow of the checkpoint threat vanish completely [Gu Nian Darkening: 10% -> 8% | Su Nuannuan Darkening: 8% -> 6%].
Beside the ditch, silk merchant Boss Lin stared with his mouth wide open at the twenty-foot ball of helpless border guards, where Captain Hu’s face was currently plastered flat against a corporal’s armored backside.
For three years, Captain Hu had bled every merchant on the northern road dry. Now the entire garrison looked like a giant ball of flypaper.
“Hah! Hahaha! Heavens have eyes!”
Boss Lin jumped to his feet, hitching up his torn blue coat with tears of pure joy in his eyes.
As the [Rank 3 Spring-Shock Luxury Caravan] glided smoothly past his righted silk wagon. Boss Lin pulled a heavy silk pouch of silver coins from his sash and tossed it with both hands toward the driver’s bench.
“Benefactor! Hero of Azure-Cloud!” Boss Lin shouted, bowing low in the gravel.
“Take these one hundred silver taels to buy sweet tea for your two little angels!
Wait until I tell every merchant guild in Sky-Crown City how you cleaned up Red-Maple Pass!”
Clink-catch!
Grandpa Fu caught the hundred-silver pouch cleanly in one hand, tapped his [Jade-Abacus Cane] twice against the bench, and tossed Boss Lin a small porcelain bottle of Auntie Qin’s bruise ointment in return.
“One hundred silver taels logged under Road Maintenance Tips!” Grandpa Fu called back courteously. “Rub that salve on your cheek, Boss Lin—it’s complimentary from the Gu Family Peace Pharmacy!”
Behind the caravan, Envoy Zhao trotted past the ditch in his Pink Chore Apron, his eyes wide with terror as he looked at the twenty-foot ball of his former colleagues.
“Zhao... you pink-aproned traitor...” Captain Hu’s muffled voice gurgled through a mouthful of sticky maltose as the ball rocked back and forth.
“I’m reporting...
to the Eastern Palace...”
“Good luck writing a report with your nose glued to Sergeant Ma’s kneecap!” Envoy Zhao hissed back, jogging faster so he wouldn’t get left behind by the warm exhaust vents.
[System Notification: Red-Maple Pass Checkpoint Cleared with Zero Bloodshed!]
[Gu Nian Darkening: 10% -> 8% | Su Nuannuan Darkening: 8% -> 6%]
[Merchant Guild Word-of-Mouth Spreading: Daily Income +520,000 -> +560,000 DP/day!]
As the caravan zoomed out of the northern mouth of Red-Maple Pass onto the flat plains of Sky-Crown Prefecture. Captain Hu twisted his trapped wrist inside the sticky human ball, desperately trying to reach the emergency jade tally on his belt.
Instead of pulling the tally free, the crushing weight of seventy armored guards rolled directly over Captain Hu’s hip.
CRACK-BOOM!
The high-grade royal communication jade shattered under two tons of glued iron armor. A blinding beam of blood-red emergency light erupted from the ditch. Shooting three thousand feet into the noon clouds and streaking due north toward the golden roofs of Second Prince Qian Ye’s Eastern Palace in Sky-Crown City!