The throne hall's air thickened with ozone and crushed myrrh. Lin Hao's boots ground against marble veined with dormant spirit stones—their crystalline fractures exhaling faint wisps of glacial mist. Four Treasures' talons flexed against his collarbone, detecting the blind custodian's spiritual pressure like a stormfront pressing against feathers.

  "Begin."

  Elder Mo's command cracked like a whip. His milky eyes flared with ultraviolet light, casting jagged shadows across murals of ancient wars. Lin Hao's retinas burned as fractal patterns unfolded within the old man's irises—geometric proofs solving for infinity.

  Resistance proved futile. The probing energy bypassed muscle and bone, bypassing Four Treabytes' firewalls through quantum entanglement. Lin Hao tasted lithium bitterness as his ocular nerves lit up—

  —memories not his own erupted. A desert where sand grains counted themselves. A glacier preserving the last scream of an extinct civilization. A library whose books bled ink that pooled into sentient shadows.

  "Fascinating."

  Elder Mo's whisper carried the weight of collapsing stars. His breath stank of petrified amber and event horizon radiation. Lin Hao's left pupil contracted involuntarily—a microscopic black hole spinning at nine-tenths light speed.

  "Negative."

  The verdict shattered the vision. Elder Ying's ceremonial sword clattered against obsidian floor tiles. "But the historical records—"

  "Are flawed." Elder Mo's staff struck marble, releasing shockwaves that crystallized airborne dust into diamond shards. "This child's ocular structure mimics Reincarnation Eye patterns through happenstance. A cosmic joke."

  Lin Hao's tongue found copper filings in his molars—Four Treabytes' emergency coolant neutralizing neural overload. He bowed with courtesan precision. "May I take my leave?"

  The walk from the throne hall became sensory warfare. Frost patterns on corridor windows replicated Elder Mo's iris fractals. Distant sparring energies from training grounds smelled of ionized panic. Four Treabytes' threat analysis updated—Target acquired. Yang Chengji confirmed northeast quadrant.

  The ambush came perfumed with ambition. Yang materialized from light distortions, his boots crunching salt crystals laid to repel evil spirits. Four Treabytes parsed his aura—vanilla narcissism layered over neutron-star density.

  "You're shorter than described."

  Yang's sneer carried the crispness of breaking cervical vertebrae. His fingers brushed a jade pendant carved with the Yang dynasty's phoenix crest—its eyes hollow sockets awaiting stolen fire.

  Lin Hao's smile mirrored the pendant's emptiness. "And you smell like cheap rebellion."

  The insult struck truer than intended. Yang's fist ignited with stolen stellar plasma—a bootleg supernova contained by inferior dampening fields. Four Treabytes calculated burn patterns: Third-degree epidermal carbonization. Survival probability 12%.

  Wolf Spider struck first.

  Its neurotoxin fangs found Yang's ankle through lightweave armor seams. The prince's scream harmonized with Four Treabytes' victory chime—Target mobility neutralized.

  "Execute protocol."

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  Lin Hao's whisper triggered bioluminescent venom sacs in Wolf Spider's abdomen. Yang collapsed mid-sneer, synapses freezing between arrogance and agony. The spider's mandibles clicked a countdown—five seconds until nervous system liquefaction.

  "Hold."

  Elder Mo's voice vibrated through stonework. The blind custodian materialized from shadow fractures, his staff's tip glowing with captured sunlight. Wolf Spider's carapace blistered under the radiance—

  —retreating with predator's grace into ventilation ducts. Yang's twitching body levitated into emergency stasis, his sneer preserved like an insect in amber.

  "Disappointing."

  Elder Mo's sigh carried the weight of dying stars. His staff traced burning runes above Yang's frozen form. "The cycle continues."

  Grilled Fish and the Princess

  The scent of charred cedarwood and seared fat permeated the dormitory courtyard. Lin Hao's boots crunched over gravel dusted with crushed spirit herbs—their medicinal tang clashing with the smoky richness of roasting meat. Four Treasures' talons flexed against his shoulder, cataloguing the chemical composition of basting sauces through airborne particulates.

  "Careful—the tiger fish spines are venomous when raw."

  Qin Yu's warning carried the metallic aftertaste of poorly concealed insecurity. His hands trembled slightly as he turned skewers of frost boar meat over crackling firestones. Three female students clustered nearby, their perfume notes—jasmine, midnight orchid, glacial musk—warring for dominance in the smoke.

  The blue-haired princess stood apart. Yan Xinyue's ice-dragon scale hairpins refracted firelight into fractal patterns across her cheekbones. When she breathed, frost crystals formed briefly on her lower lip—a congenital defect or controlled technique? Four Treabytes' thermal scans proved inconclusive.

  Lin Hao's fingers found the tiger fish with hunter's precision. His knife flashed—scales flying like shards of malachite glass. The blade's edge hummed with residual energy from yesterday's combat drills, slicing through cartilage with molecular precision.

  "Let me demonstrate proper heat distribution."

  His voice cut through Qin Yu's bluster. The grill flared as Lin Hao channeled wisps of fire qi through his fingertips—not enough to reveal cultivation depth, just sufficient to caramelize the fish skin into a lattice of golden hexagons. The scent profile shifted—charred lemon grass merging with fermented chili paste from his dimensional pouch.

  Yan Xinyue's nostrils flared. "You're using Skyfire Peppers from the Southern Archipelago."

  "Compensating for inferior ingredients." Lin Hao's smile contained exactly thirty-two percent self-deprecation. His blind eyes tracked her pulse rate through air displacement patterns—elevated 18%, pupils dilated 0.3 millimeters.

  The first bite transformed the courtyard.

  Crisp scales shattered between Yan Xinyue's teeth like sugar glass, releasing vapors that tasted of ocean depths and volcanic soil. Qin Yu's earlier roast became ash in comparison—a fact written plainly across his crumbling smirk. Four Treabytes analyzed chewing patterns: Subject A (female) exhibits 73% increased dopamine production. Romantic attraction probability: 62%.

  "You've trained under a master chef." Yan Xinyue's frost crystals melted as she spoke.

  "Hunger is the best teacher." Lin Hao rotated another fish, its skin blistering in fractal spirals. "When your world lacks light, other senses compensate."

  The princess's glacial musk intensified—a pheromonal response Four Treabytes flagged as curiosity bordering on infatuation. Qin Yu's jealousy radiated like poorly shielded reactor core, his fingers crushing an empty spice jar to powdered ceramic.

  Their banter continued through seven courses. Lin Hao parsed every microexpression—the twitch of Yan Xinyue's left earlobe when lying, the way Lei Meng's Adam's apple bobbed three times before speaking. By dessert course (caramelized spirit dates stuffed with crushed moonpearls), the social hierarchy had realigned.

  As twilight painted the courtyard in ultraviolet hues, Wolf Spider's encrypted transmission vibrated against Lin Hao's wrist: Target acquired. Yang Chengji's evening patrol route mapped. Elimination probability: 94%.

  Yan Xinyue's frost-pale fingers brushed his arm. "Will you attend the Stellar Convergence Festival?"

  Lin Hao tilted his head, allowing firelight to gild his profile. "Do princesses often invite blind men to dances?"

  "Only those who cook like demigods." Her laughter crystallized the humidity between them. Four Treabytes detected nineteen separate chemical compounds in the resulting frost flowers—three with hallucinogenic properties.

  The rejection came gently, coated in seventy-proof charm. "Alas, this demigod has scrolls to study."

  Later, while Qin Yu regaled Lei Meng with exaggerated tales of past romantic conquests, Lin Hao retreated to his chambers. The scent of grilled fish lingered on his sleeves—a useful mask for the acrid tang of Wolf Spider's neurotoxin vials being prepared.

  Yan Xinyue's parting glance burned colder than any frost technique.