Morning came quietly, the way it always did when nothing had gone wrong yet.
Zhao Ming woke before the rooster, breath shallow, eyes open to the dark beams of the ceiling. For a heartbeat he waited for pain that didn't come—the white-hot pull at the shoulder, the dead numbness down an arm that should no longer obey him. Nothing. His hands lay where he had left them, whole, steady, young.
He flexed his fingers once. Then again.
The room smelled of boiled millet and wood smoke. Outside, someone coughed. A bucket clanged against a well. Normal sounds. Dangerous sounds, because normal was how it always started.
Twenty.
He had crossed it yesterday. In his last life, that age had meant nothing except that men expected him to die with fewer excuses. In this one, it marked a point he had learned to fear. The frame had begun after his twentieth birthday. Not with chains or blades, but with paper.
Not again, he thought, and felt the thought land like a weight, not a plea.
He sat up slowly, testing balance, listening. His father's boots were by the door. His brother's voice carried from the courtyard—too loud, laughing at nothing. His mother was already awake; she always was. The house moved around her, not the other way around.
Zhao Ming washed his face, the cold water shocking him fully into the present. The reflection that stared back was his own—too smooth, too unmarked, eyes that looked like they belonged to someone polite. He practiced the expression that had kept him alive before: attentive, unassuming, slightly slow to anger. He had learned that men trusted quiet sons more than clever ones.
At the table, his brother slapped him on the shoulder hard enough to rock him.
"Twenty already," Zhao Liang said, grinning. "I was killing bandits at that age."
"You were stealing chickens," their mother said without looking up.
She sat at the head of the table, back straight, sleeves rolled, hair bound tight. The tigress of the house did not waste words. She placed bowls down with a firm clack that set the rhythm for the morning.
Zhao Liang laughed. "Mother remembers only my worst moments."
"She remembers the moments that keep you alive," their mother replied. Her eyes flicked to Zhao Ming. "Eat. And don't wander today."
Zhao Ming took the bowl with both hands. "Yes, Mother."
He ate, listening more than tasting. His father joined them, quiet, already thinking about the day's duties. A military household did not speak much over breakfast. Orders were for outside.
When the bowls were empty, Zhao Liang leaned back, stretching. "Come with me tonight," he said casually, as if suggesting a walk. "We'll celebrate. You're twenty now. You should see things."
Their mother's chopsticks paused midair.
Zhao Ming's gaze did not change, but something inside him tightened. He knew the shape of that sentence. He had heard it before, spoken with the same careless pride.
"Where?" their mother asked.
Zhao Liang grinned wider. "Fragrant Pavilion."
The name landed like a dropped plate.
In his last life, Fragrant Pavilion had been music and silk and laughter, a place where men talked too freely because the wine was good and the women listened better than officials. It had been where he first learned that secrets were cheaper than swords—and where someone had first decided his family was useful to ruin.
Zhao Ming lowered his eyes to his bowl.
Their mother set her chopsticks down slowly. "No."
Zhao Liang opened his mouth. "Mother—"
She cut him off with a look. "You think twenty makes you wise? You think a pavilion makes you a man?" Her voice was calm. That made it worse. "You will go, you will drink, you will forget yourselves. Then you will come home loud, and tomorrow you will be sloppy."
"We won't cause trouble," Zhao Liang said quickly. "Just a celebration."
Zhao Ming spoke before he could stop himself. "We'll eat early," he said. "And come back before the second watch."
Both of them looked at him.
His mother studied his face, eyes sharp. "You don't like that place."
"I don't dislike it," Zhao Ming said carefully. "I just don't see the need to stay long."
She held his gaze. Then she nodded once. "Fine. Eat, drink a little. No debts. No promises. And if anyone mentions favors—"
"We leave," Zhao Ming said.
Zhao Liang blinked. "When did you become so—"
"Quiet," their mother said. "That's good." She pointed a chopstick at Zhao Liang. "And you—no gambling."
"Yes, Mother," Zhao Liang said, chastened.
When they left the table, Zhao Ming felt her hand on his sleeve. "You're thinking too much," she said softly. "That's dangerous."
He bowed his head. "I'll be careful."
She snorted. "You always say that." But she let him go.
Outside, the city was already awake. Xiapi breathed like a living thing—vendors calling, carts creaking, guards arguing about fees they pretended were rules. Zhao Ming walked beside his brother, eyes moving, counting.
He remembered another morning like this. Different sun. Same smells.
—
In his second life, it had begun with a clerk.
The man had come with a smile and a document rolled neatly under his arm, seal wrapped in red cord. He bowed low, respectful to a military household, apologetic about the interruption.
"Routine reconciliation," he had said. "Warehouse slips. Just a signature."
His father had frowned, read, hesitated. Zhao Ming had stood behind him, already uneasy, eyes drawn to the seal. Not the magistrate's main seal. A subsidiary office. Grain management.
"Who issued this?" Zhao Ming had asked.
The clerk had smiled at him like one does at a child. "The office of supply."
"Which office?" Zhao Ming had pressed.
The smile had tightened. His father had signed.
Two days later, rumors began to move faster than carts.
A military household hoarding grain. A ledger discrepancy. A garrison family selling rations through the docks. Small abuses, spoken softly, repeated loudly.
Zhao Liang—older, hotter-blooded then—had argued with a yamen runner who used the word order like a weapon. There had been shoving. Someone had bled. It had been remembered.
The night they came, they did not knock.
Paper had answered every protest. Seals had crushed every truth. Zhao Ming had learned that a signature was heavier than a spear.
He had survived by running. He had learned to fight because men hunted him. He had learned to plan because fighting alone only delayed death. He had learned to ask the right questions too late.
Who signed? Where was the seal kept? Which warehouse mattered?
By the time he knew, his father and brother were already names spoken carefully.
—
Back in the present, Zhao Ming slowed his steps as they passed the market. He watched hands exchange coins, watched who watched whom. He noted a new face at the grain stall, a man who pretended not to be counting sacks.
"Why Fragrant Pavilion?" he asked his brother lightly.
Zhao Liang shrugged. "Because everyone goes there. Because you learn things." He smirked. "And because you stop being so stiff."
Zhao Ming smiled thinly. Everyone goes there, he thought. And everyone leaves something behind.
He let his brother talk, half-listening, mind already turning the city over like a board. In his last life, he had learned the levers too late. He had learned that strength was a knife, useful but short. Grain was a rope. Information was the hand pulling it tight.
If he wanted to stop the frame, he needed more than vigilance. He needed a base that did not answer to paper.
A gang.
Not any gang. The wrong one drew too much attention, or too little. In Xiapi, there were two that mattered early. The dock boys who skimmed convoys and knew every receipt by smell. And the line enforcers at the relief kitchens, who controlled hunger with sticks and smiles.
In his second life, the first rumor had come from the kitchens.
Start there, he thought. Or start with the men who drink with them.
Fragrant Pavilion was both.
By the time dusk came, music already spilled into the street like perfume. Lanterns painted the door in warm light. Zhao Liang's shoulders loosened as they approached, the tension of duty falling away. Zhao Ming felt the opposite. His spine straightened.
Inside, the air was thick with incense and wine. Laughter rose and fell in practiced waves. Women moved like they owned the place, because in many ways they did. Men leaned close, voices low, secrets cheaper by the cup.
Zhao Ming stepped in and felt the city turn its face toward him.
Not openly. Just enough.
A familiar cadence drifted from a nearby table, a phrase he had heard shouted in another life, in another place, followed by blood on stone. He stilled, then let the sound pass.
His brother clapped a hand on his back. "Relax," Zhao Liang said. "It's just a drink."
Zhao Ming nodded, polite, watchful. As a server led them in, his eyes moved—counting exits, noting who drank on whose tab, listening for names.
In his last life, this doorway had led to ruin.
This time, he intended to own what lay beyond it.