The crimson system alert flashed across Gu Changsheng’s eyes, chiming like a kitchen timer over a boiling pot.
[SYSTEM ALERT: Unhatched Child #5 (Ao Xing) holding the Planetary Core is under direct right siphon attack! Vitality has dropped to 9%!]
Gu Changsheng didn’t blink. His deadpan face stayed calm, though his fingers tightened slightly on the wooden edge of the breakfast table.
“Nine percent,” Gu Changsheng muttered, his voice flat and cold. “That vanguard drill is chewing through my baby’s nursery faster than termites in damp pine.”
Around the courtyard porch, eleven-year-old Gu Nian set his chopsticks down with a sharp click against his bowl. A thin ring of black-gold flame flickered in his pupils, and the morning air around his yellow bunny apron grew heavy enough to make the teacups rattle.
Twelve-year-old Ye Xiao stood up so fast his round glasses slipped down his nose. His hand rested instantly on the hilt of his [Homework-First Bamboo Ruler Sword].
“Dad, if their vanguard is siphoning Little Fifth at the core, the mantle pressure down there will crush any Rank 5 cultivator flat within five miles,” Ye Xiao said. “We can’t dive three thousand miles at Foundation Establishment.”
“Which is why nobody is leaving this porch at Rank 5,” Gu Changsheng said, turning away from the floating hologram.
