The broker retreated one step.
Just one.
In the world of cultivation, that single step was a confession.
The valley screamed.
Not in sound—but in Qi.
Formations unraveled like rotted cloth. Control arrays inverted. Suppression runes shattered under the weight of Unchained Path, turning obedience into resistance.
Captives straightened.
Eyes sharpened.
Breaths aligned.
Xueyi's voice cut through the chaos. "Move! Those who can fight—protect the wounded!"
They listened.
Not because she commanded.
Because they wanted to.
The broker snarled and raised his hand.
A Nascent Soul domain unfolded—Golden Ledger Domain.
Illusory chains, contracts, and seals manifested in the air, each etched with runes of ownership.
"Everything has a price," he intoned. "And everything here is mine."
The domain pressed down like law itself.
Several newly freed cultivators collapsed, blood spilling from their mouths.
Xueyi's aura flared in fury.
I stepped forward.
"You're right about one thing," I said calmly. "Everything has a structure."
I raised my hand.
And rewrote the accounting.
I didn't contest his domain.
I entered it.
The chains wrapped around me—contracts of servitude, clauses of obedience, interest compounded in soul-binding script.
I read them.
All of them.
Then I corrected them.
Cracks spiderwebbed across the golden seals.
"What—" the broker gasped.
"Your mistake," I said, "was assuming people are assets."
I pulled.
The chains reversed.
They latched onto him.
The Golden Ledger Domain shuddered.
Collapsed inward.
The broker screamed as his Nascent Soul projection fractured, laws he had relied on rebounding into his own foundation.
Blood poured from his eyes.
Impossible.
Unthinkable.
Xueyi struck.
One clean arc of moonlit steel.
The broker's head hit the stone platform and rolled to my feet.
The valley went silent.
For a long moment, no one moved.
Then the formations died completely.
Lanterns flickered out.
The market—
Ceased to exist.
I exhaled.
"That," I said, "was overdue."
System notifications flooded in.
[Major Event Completed — Talent Market Destroyed]
World Impact: High
Hidden Networks Disrupted: 3
Nascent Soul Entity Eliminated
Rewards:
• Principle Comprehension ↑↑
• Reputation Shift: Feared / Revered
• New Faction Flags Raised
The captives gathered.
Some bowed.
Some cried.
Some simply stared.
A few stepped forward—eyes burning with something dangerous.
Hope.
A young woman with torn sect robes knelt. "We owe you our lives."
I shook my head. "No."
I looked at them.
"At some point," I said evenly, "you'll have to decide what to do with the freedom you just got."
I turned away.
Xueyi joined me at the valley's edge.
"This will echo," she said.
"Good," I replied. "Let it."
She studied me. "You didn't just destroy a market."
I smiled faintly.
"I changed the supply chain."
As we left, smoke rose behind us.
Not from fire.
From collapsing greed.
A final system message pulsed, slower than the rest.
[Faction Seed — UNCHAINED PATH]
Status: Dormant
Followers Detected: 17
Potential: Unknown
I paused.
Then laughed softly.
"Well," I said, "that escalated."
Xueyi smirked. "You keep doing that."
We walked on.
Behind us, the world scrambled to respond.