The scarred Slave Boss twirled his ten-foot iron rod between his thick leather gloves and sneered down at Gu Changsheng.
“Did you hear me, friend?” the Slave Boss rasped, tapping the tip of his iron rod against the corroded black bars of the cage. “A rich young master from Frost-Pine Town sent a runner an hour ago to reserve this poison brat for twenty silver taels.
Unless you’re willing to pay one hundred silver taels on the spot to break my reservation—and sign.
A waiver saying you won’t blame our Black-Sand Market when her skin rots your hands off—take a walk.”
Around the cavern, the dozen masked buyers in fur cloaks glanced over with cruel amusement.
“One hundred silver for that cursed little monster?” the fat buyer in the fox mask chuckled coldly. “Last week when they brought her in from Red-Clay Village, a guard accidentally brushed against her arm without a leather glove.
His whole palm turned purple and blistered inside ten breaths!
Even if you gave her to me for free, I wouldn’t let her near my house!”
Inside the corroded iron cage, six-year-old Su Nuannuan flinched at the man’s words.
She tucked her bare, frostbitten feet deeper under the torn burlap sack she wore for a dress. Pressing her forehead against her bony knees so nobody would look at the ugly purple veins pulsing across her cheeks.
Nuannuan is dirty, the six-year-old girl thought, biting her lip so she wouldn’t cry out from the bruise where the iron rod had poked her ribs. *Grandma touched Nuannuan’s fever and got sick. The village uncles threw rocks and said Nuannuan is a poison bug.
Nobody wants a poison bug.*
Standing in front of the cage, Gu Changsheng didn’t reach for Grandpa Fu’s silver pouch.
Instead, he looked at the ten-foot iron rod in the Slave Boss’s gloved hands, and then at the four guards holding barbed whips by the cavern wall.
“Captain Gu Tie,” Gu Changsheng said quietly.
Behind him, Rank 2 Early Guard Captain Gu Tie stepped forward and cracked his iron-hard knuckles with a sound like splitting walnuts: “Here, Patriarch.”
“Hold Nian’er’s hand for ten seconds,” Gu Changsheng said. Reaching behind his shoulder to unhook the matte black-gold [Rank 3 Nine-Flavor Earth-Fire Chef Wok] strapped to his back. “And make sure none of the masked buyers or guards in this cave leave before we take attendance.”
The scarred Slave Boss blinked at the eighteen-inch black-gold cooking pot in Gu Changsheng’s right hand and burst out laughing.
“A kitchen wok?! Haha! Did you come to the Black-Sand Slave Market to stir-fry noodles for us, pal?
Boys, break his legs and throw the kid in a cage too!”
The Slave Boss lunged forward, thrusting his ten-foot iron rod straight at Gu Changsheng’s chest with eight hundred pounds of Rank 1 Mid force!
Gu Changsheng didn’t even bother dodging.
He took one calm step forward across the black sand and swung the flat bottom of the [Rank 3 Nine-Flavor Earth-Fire Chef Wok] like a flyswatter!
CLANG—SNAP!
The solid one-inch iron rod struck the indestructible Rank 3 dark-gold wok and bent ninety degrees like a piece of boiled spaghetti!
Before the Slave Boss’s brain could process how a kitchen wok had folded a ten-foot iron rod in half. Gu Changsheng took a second step and slapped the flat bottom of the wok squarely across the Slave Boss’s scarred face!
BOOOOOOM!
Twelve hundred pounds of Rank 1 Peak strength—amplified by [Father’s Authority]—launched the two-hundred-pound Slave Boss off his boots like a cannonball! He smashed backward through two empty wooden cages in a shower of flying pine splinters, bounced twice across the black sand. Collapsed at the foot of the cavern wall with his eyes rolled back and his jaw dislocated!
Across the cavern, Captain Gu Tie moved at the exact same instant.
Like an armored bull charging through a chicken coop. The Rank 2 Early guard captain knocked the four whip-wielding market guards unconscious in four punches and barred the tunnel ladder with a heavy oak beam. The dozen masked buyers dropped to their knees with their hands over their heads screaming for mercy!
Gu Changsheng didn’t spare the unconscious Slave Boss a second glance.
He slung the wok back over his shoulder and walked straight up to the black iron cage in the back corner.
Seeing the tall man stop right in front of her bars, six-year-old Su Nuannuan shrank all the way back against the cold rear iron grate. Her tiny body shaking like a wet sparrow in the snow.
Gu Changsheng reached out with both bare hands and gripped the two central iron bars on either side of the heavy padlock.
“Wait—no! Uncle, don’t touch the bars!”
Nuannuan’s eyes flew wide open in panic. Forgetting her own fear of being hit, the six-year-old girl cried out in a hoarse, trembling little voice that whistled slightly through her missing front milk-tooth:.
“The iron has Nuannuan’s dirty purple mist on it! If you grab it without thick leather gloves, your hands will blister and rot off! Don’t touch it, Uncle!”
Gu Changsheng looked into the little girl’s terrified, tear-filled eyes—saw that even after being starved, beaten with an iron rod. Locked in a cage like an animal, her very first instinct was to warn a stranger not to hurt his hands on her poison—and his heart ached with a fierce, protective warmth.
“A little purple mist can’t hurt Dad’s hands,” Gu Changsheng said gently.
CRACK—SCREEEECH!
Channeling twelve hundred pounds of Rank 1 Peak Blood Qi into his ten fingers, Gu Changsheng wrenched his arms apart and ripped the thumb-thick iron cage door right off its rusted hinges. Tossing it aside onto the black sand with a heavy thud!
Without the iron bars holding it back, a dense cloud of sour. Dark-purple miasma—the uncontrolled leakage of the [Innate Ten-Thousand-Poison Empress Body] that had been building up inside the starving six-year-old’s meridians for months—rolled out of the open cage door!
Behind Gu Changsheng, Captain Gu Tie gasped in alarm: “Patriarch, careful! That purple mist is corroding the stone floor!”
Even eight-year-old Gu Nian took a quick step forward, ready to throw his own wool cloak over his father’s arms.
Gu Changsheng didn’t take half a step back.
Instead, he dropped to one knee right in the open doorway of the cage, unfastened the thick, warm fox-fur cloak he had brought from home. Held both bare arms wide open toward the trembling six-year-old girl in the straw.
“N-no! Stay back, Uncle!”
Su Nuannuan pressed her small back hard against the rear bars, big hot tears spilling down over the throbbing purple veins on her hollow cheeks. She hid her bare, purple-stained hands behind her back.
“Nuannuan is a poison monster! Last month when Grandma held Nuannuan’s hand in the snow, Grandma’s skin turned black and she never woke up! If you hug Nuannuan, your arms will rot off too!
Please don’t touch me, Uncle—Nuannuan will walk into the bug jar by herself!”
Hearing a six-year-old child say Nuannuan will walk into the bug jar by herself so a grown-up wouldn’t get hurt, Gu Changsheng didn’t wait another heartbeat.
He leaned straight into the dark-purple poison mist, wrapped the warm fox-fur cloak completely around Su Nuannuan’s freezing, stick-thin body, and scooped her up barehanded into a tight, warm hug against his chest!
Hiss—sizzle!
Where the concentrated purple poison mist of an unawakened Poison Empress brushed against Gu Changsheng’s bare wrists and forearms, his Rank 1 Peak skin immediately stung and blistered like hot oil splashing on flesh.
Yet Gu Changsheng’s arms didn’t flinch or loosen by a single hair’s breadth.
He tucked the little girl’s tangled head under his chin. Resting one broad, warm palm gently over the back of her freezing ears while the heat of his vigorous Blood Qi soaked through the fox-fur cloak into her bones.
Across the cavern, eight-year-old Gu Nian stood beside Captain Gu Tie, watching his father hold the trembling six-year-old girl right in the middle of the purple poison mist without letting go.
Even though Gu Nian was eight years old now and tried hard to look like a tough martial artist in his yellow bunny slippers, his small throat felt tight. He remembered the day his father had stepped in front of Scar-Face Liu’s iron boot to shield him.
“Captain Gu Tie,” Gu Nian whispered fiercely, his small fists clenched at his sides, “look how thin she is. That ugly scarred man hit her ribs with an iron pole and didn’t even give her a coat.”
“The Patriarch is here now, Little Master Nian,” Captain Gu Tie said in a low, gruff voice. The big Rank 2 veteran’s own eyes were red as he looked at the forty ragged orphan children peering out from the wooden cages along the walls. “From tonight on, nobody in Frost-Pine County will ever lay a finger on her again.
And as soon as the Patriarch finishes healing her, I’ll carry six of these kids on my own shoulders all the way back to the mansion kitchen!”
In the wooden cages nearby, several of the older orphan children who had seen the Slave Boss beat Nuannuan for days stared in silent shock at Gu Changsheng’s broad back.
“That tall uncle didn’t even put on leather gloves...” a ten-year-old boy with a bruised cheek whispered through the wooden bars to his younger brother. “Everyone in the cave said the little girl in the back cage was a cursed monster, and he just wrapped her in a fur coat and called her his kid...”
“Who told you that you’re a poison monster?” Gu Changsheng said in a soft, steady voice right beside Nuannuan’s ear. “You’re just a six-year-old little girl who caught a bad winter fever and didn’t have a doctor to give her sweet medicine.
To Dad, Nuannuan isn’t dirty at all—you smell sweeter than spring honey.”
Wrapped inside the soft fox-fur cloak and held against a chest that was warmer than a summer stove, six-year-old Su Nuannuan froze completely.
For a whole year since the purple veins had appeared on her cheeks, nobody had touched her without an iron rod or a pair of tongs. Even the village dogs had barked and run away from her shadow.
Yet this tall, gentle uncle was holding her barehanded against his own heart, even while her purple mist was burning red blisters across his wrists!
“U-Uncle... your wrists are turning red...” Nuannuan sobbed, her tiny hands clutching his collar as she tried weakly to push herself away so she wouldn’t hurt him.
“Put Nuannuan down!
It hurts!”
“It doesn’t hurt a bit,” Gu Changsheng smiled warmly, kissing the top of her messy hair as he slammed open the three-slot interface of [Dad’s Care-Package Upgrade Box] in his mind. “Hold onto Dad’s neck for three seconds, Nuannuan. Let Dad turn that bitter medicine in your tummy into sweet candy.”
Right now, his account held 9,160 DP.
To permanently cure and transform an uncontrolled Empress-tier innate physique like the [Innate Ten-Thousand-Poison Body] so the child would never accidentally harm someone she loved again required a massive. High-tier fusion—and Gu Changsheng didn’t hesitate to spend a third of his entire fortune on the spot!
Into Slot 1, he locked onto [Su Nuannuan’s Rampaging Ten-Thousand-Poison Miasma & Blocked Poison Meridians].
Into Slot 2, he loaded [One Hundred Jars of Auntie Qin’s Aged Hundred-Flower Medicinal Honey] stored in the pharmacy inventory.
Into Slot 3, he placed the priceless jade vial containing [The Remaining 50% Portion of Thousand-Year Earth-Heart Milk]!
“System, execute an emergency Child #2 Innate Physique Perfection Fusion!” Gu Changsheng commanded silently. “Cost: three thousand Dad Points!”
[ DAD’S CARE-PACKAGE UPGRADE BOX — EMPRESS PHYSIQUE REDEMPTION! ]
* Target Child #2: Su Nuannuan (Age 6 | Innate Poison Empress Body)
* Input 1 : [Uncontrolled Ten-Thousand-Poison Miasma]
* Input 2 : [100 Jars of Aged Hundred-Flower Medicinal Honey]
* Input 3 : [Thousand-Year Earth-Heart Milk (50% Portion)]
* Cost : 3,000 DP (Remaining Balance: 6,160 DP)
* Immediate Effect: Hugging Child #2 barehanded through lethal.
poison mist shattered 30% of her lifelong self-hatred on contact!
* Nuannuan Stats : Darkening Meter 82% -> 55% (-27% MASSIVE DROP!)
Happiness/Warmth 4/100 -> 62/100!
* Daily DP Income: +6,500 DP/day -> +7,000 DP/day!