"Cough, cough! We're merchants, not rebels!"
"This token isn't something a rebel should have. I once saw it in my father's study," Su Min said calmly.
"Hmm?"
The shopkeeper froze upon hearing her words. Suspicion flickered in his eyes as he studied Su Min. In his mind, she must be a powerful figure at least in her forties or fifties. After all, even Zhao Yiping—the one hailed as the number one hero of the martial world—addressed her respectfully as "senior." As she spoke, Su Min subtly dipped her finger into her tea and traced a character onto the table—"永" (eternal).
"Hiss—"
Seeing the water stains forming the character, the merchant sucked in a sharp breath. Very few people knew about this. How could this young girl possibly know? Nominally, they were affiliated with Prince Fu, the emperor's half-brother. Prince Fu, being talentless and indulgent, had been banished to the southern frontier and made king there, serving more as a figurehead than a real ruler.
Because of his harmlessness, even during times of turmoil, the emperor had largely left him alone. The fact that this girl knew about the secret token meant her status was far from ordinary. Especially considering that the "Rebellion of Prince Yong" had only ended less than a decade ago, with the last Prince Yong executed. Their ties to Prince Yong were even more deeply hidden—only a dozen or so people were privy to them.
And the shopkeeper was one of them. He hadn't been banished here as punishment; rather, he had been stationed here for a critical task. It was because Su Min, the only alchemist in the region, could concoct pills capable of recruiting powerful warriors.
That's also why Su Min had no hesitation revealing her identity now. Since she had already clashed with those factions, it was inevitable they would become mortal enemies, regardless of who she used to be.
"Let me think..."
Seeing the shopkeeper fall into deep thought, Su Min didn't rush him. Instead, she lightly flicked her sleeve, and the water stain on the table evaporated completely.
"You... are Minister Su's daughter?"
The shopkeeper, sharp as he was, soon pieced it together. After all, everything traced back to the scandal eight years ago. No one knew what the emperor was thinking back then. He had mobilized hundreds of thousands of troops, even set mountains ablaze, and still came away empty-handed. Worse, the mountain god had evidently been enraged, cursing the surrounding counties with famine for an entire year.
It triggered a domino effect of disasters. It wasn't that Su Min had "brought calamity upon the nation"; rather, Great Wei had already been teetering on the edge, and the incident had simply lit the fuse. Now, Su Min had been forgotten by the world, having kept a low profile for years. Great Wei itself had descended into chaos internally, and if not for the Demon-Slaying Division monitoring everything, wars would have broken out already.
But he—this shopkeeper—had not forgotten. And who could have imagined that Su Min would appear before him now? He couldn't help feeling a little absurd. The girl before him was only about twenty, yet even martial heroes aged fifty or older called her "senior" without her blinking an eye. Ordinary young women would have been furious at such an implication about their age. But this one... no wonder she had once played hundreds of thousands of soldiers like a game of chess.
"What assistance do you require, miss? The lord deeply regrets the events of the past. Minister Su was young, loyal, and ultimately fell victim to treachery..."
"Enough. That's all in the past," Su Min interrupted coldly, waving aside the shopkeeper's attempt at flattery.
She was well aware of what had happened back then.
Not just in the detached way one might read about tragedy from a dusty scroll—no, the memories were hers. Ingrained. Not learned, but lived. Though she had transmigrated into this body the day it was almost bought back to brothel the by brothel hounds, something deeper had bound her to it from the start.
Even now, if she closed her eyes, she could recall the scent of iron bars, wet straw, and blood. The stifling dampness of the prison cell clung to her skin like mold—cold and inescapable.
The girl she'd once been, the original Su Min, had huddled on cracked stone, her hair matted with ash and soot, her nails torn from clawing at the walls during those first nights of screaming.
She remembered the sound of her cousin choking on his own blood in the next cell over. The way her aunt—once a dignified woman in the Su household—had whispered lullabies through cracked lips, until silence took her, too.
And her father... The last image of him was not his execution, but his face as he turned, half-knelt, hands bound behind his back, blood trailing from the corner of his mouth, and smiled at her through the bars. A smile full of grief and apology.
"Endure," he had mouthed. And then he was taken away.
Though she—his daughter, his legacy—had not been tortured or violated like others, spared by status or by someone's command, the weight of helplessness had been its own kind of torment. Days blurred into weeks. No sunlight, only slivers of light from a crack high above the stone ceiling. The guards rarely spoke. When they did, it was always with that sneering tone of men who believed loyalty was just another form of stupidity.
She hadn't cried. Not after the first week. The tears had run dry.
Even now, years later, those memories weren't separate from her. They were bone-deep. A girl had suffered in that body—and she, Su Min, though born of a different world, had inherited everything: the pain, the fury, the cold numbness that followed.
Sometimes she dreamed of things she had never seen: her mother's garden in early spring, fragrant with plum blossoms; the way her father used to recite poetry over evening tea; the golden threads of her ceremonial robe on her tenth birthday. These weren't dreams—they were impressions that surged up like tides. Residual soul echoes. Carried through time like bloodlines.
And with them, the deepest truth of all: This world had never shown her mercy.
The Emperor hadn't just killed the Su Clan. He had erased them. Not merely to suppress a rebellion they hadn't joined—but to offer up their bodies, their memory, their ashes to the ambitions of a woman lurking behind silk veils and demonic arts. That woman—the one who had fed on girls like cattle to sustain her cultivation—had demanded Su Min be spared. Because her talent, her innate qi, was too precious to be discarded.
A future vessel. A living feast.
That was the mercy the Emperor had granted.
Su Min opened her eyes, staring calmly at the shopkeeper before her. His expression was cautious—reverent, even—but she no longer craved that kind of gaze. Let them kneel, flatter, offer up hollow respect now that the tides had turned.
It meant nothing.
What she wanted had never changed.
Not their pity. Not their approval. But their names—the ones who had stood by, who had looked away, who had whispered lies to survive. She remembered them all.
She had no interest in correcting the record. Let history rot with its lies. Let them believe what they wanted. She would write her truth in actions, not words—and when the time came, even the blind would see.
The past had burned. The ashes remained. And she carried them like embers in her chest, banked but still smoldering—waiting for the right breath of wind to reignite.
Someday, they would see what rose from that fire.
And none would be spared its light.
"I have here ten Body Tempering Pills. They can help talented individuals swiftly reach the Body Refining Stage. I need you to find me ten such people—and prepare a batch of special materials for me as well."
"No problem. Give me a month—I'll find the candidates," the shopkeeper responded eagerly, his eyes gleaming. He immediately understood Su Min's intent. In this chaotic world, cultivators were the true masters. Whether it was the court's Demon Queen or their own faction, both sides were scrambling to recruit talents.
By selecting these ten carefully, they would secure two major benefits: First, these individuals would form the future resistance against the imperial court. Second, the selected candidates would surely be highly talented—and the Body Tempering Pill would save them decades of hard cultivation. This was even more precious than detoxification pills!
"Thirty days from now, I will return. In addition to the ten candidates, I require these materials as well. No matter what, you must procure them for me," Su Min said, handing over a list. The items listed were all body parts from monsters and beasts. The tiger demon from earlier was certainly not the only monster she had encountered over the years—just the most ferocious one.
After she finished refining her ring, she would need to start forging her own magical weapons. Yet until now, the supplies given to her had mostly been medicinal herbs; the materials from monsters had all been appropriated for weapon crafting elsewhere.
"Understood. I'll arrange everything immediately," the shopkeeper promised without hesitation. He knew that even if he wanted to stop her, he couldn't. Su Min came and went as she pleased. Besides, he needed to report this encounter to his superiors as soon as possible. There was an old bond between their families. Back then, the noble families had special rights to recommend officials—and it was through their recommendation that Minister Su had risen to power.
That was why they had been implicated during the scandal—though, in truth, the punishment had been unusually severe. Normally, mere recommendation wouldn't warrant execution or exile, just demotion or reassignment to a remote post. In any case, Su Min—with her identity and strength—was now someone they had to win over at all costs.
"May this help me step onto the Path of Merit and awaken new powers and techniques," Su Min murmured to herself as she left the royal residence, narrowing her eyes against the sunlight.
Cultivation wasn't something that could be rushed. In the early stages of the game, a single breakthrough often took one or two years of in-game time—barely a moment to players, but a disaster for someone living through this era of upheaval.
Thus, if she couldn't afford to shut herself away in cultivation, she would have to find other ways to increase her combat strength.