The door clicked shut behind Fairy Gou-Na.
I stared at the empty wooden frame. Then, I slowly turned my head to look at my boss, who was already writing her name down in our client ledger.
"Boss," I said flatly. "We don't have any boob-growth pills."
"I am aware, Junior Associate," Lo Yu rasped, not looking up from his parchment. "We are Litigation Masters, not apothecaries."
"Then why did you just promise a pair of highly illegal, body-altering supplements to a shut-in gooner in exchange for her unwashed sweatpants?!"
Lo Yu set his brush down. He gave me a look of deep, disappointed pity.
"Because we need an inside agent for the Jade Water Sect tournament, He Lu. She controls the registration. She controls the locker assignments. Without her, you are walking into a meat grinder blind. Procuring those pills is no longer a legal matter. It is a survival matter. Go get them."
I threw my hands in the air. "From who?! We just sued the only guy in town who makes them!"
"Then you had better go practice your negotiation skills," Lo Yu smirked, picking his brush back up. "I expect the pills by sundown. Do not disappoint me."
I groaned, rubbing my temples. I was a lawyer. I was supposed to be filing paperwork, not running black-market hormone errands. But Lo Yu was right. If I was going into an arena full of Foundation Establishment prodigies, I needed Gou-Na on my side.
I grabbed my coat and marched out into the red-light district.
Ten minutes later, I pushed open the crystal doors of the Heavenly Pill Pavilion.
It looked completely different. The soft, heavenly spotlights were turned off. The floating display pedestals were empty. The place looked like an Apple Store going through a hostile bankruptcy.
Standing behind the Genius Bar, packing hundreds of vials into a massive cardboard box, was Grandmaster Pill-Cauldron. Without his gaudy gold chains and slicked-back hair, he just looked like a tired, greasy tech-bro.
The bell above the door chimed. The Grandmaster looked up.
His eyes widened. His face twisted into a mask of pure, unadulterated hatred.
"You," Pill-Cauldron hissed, dropping a vial of lotion. "You! You got my license suspended! I had to pay two thousand stones in damages! I'm ruined!"
"Good afternoon, Grandmaster!" I said cheerfully, leaning against the crystal counter. "I see the liquidation sale is going well."
"Get out!" he screamed, reaching for a heavy mortar and pestle. "Before I test a poison pill on your tea!"
"Relax, relax," I held up my hands, dropping the cheerful facade. "I'm not here to sue you. I'm here for a transaction. Off the books. I need a bottle of the Twin-Peak Expanding Lotus pills."
Pill-Cauldron froze, the heavy stone pestle raised above his head. He lowered it slowly, squinting at me.
"You want my pills?" he scoffed. "The same pills you just legally classified as a Class-Two Tort and a structural hazard?"
"I have a client with very specific aerodynamic goals," I lied smoothly. "I know you have a stash in the back. Name your price. I have mid-grade spirit stones."
Pill-Cauldron stared at me. A slow, greasy, incredibly malicious smile spread across his face. He leaned over the counter, his eyes gleaming with the manic energy of a disgraced scientist.
"Keep your stones, Litigation Master," the alchemist whispered. "My license is suspended. Money cannot buy me the ingredients I need for my underground research. If you want the Twin-Peak pills... we barter."
I narrowed my eyes. "What do you want? Rare ginseng? A glowing boar tusk?"
"No," Pill-Cauldron breathed out, his voice trembling with dark ambition. "I am trying to synthesize a new, revolutionary gravity-defying elixir. I need an ingredient so potent, so deeply fermented in the struggle against physics, that it cannot be bought. It must be harvested."
I didn't like where this was going. "Harvested from what?"
"You've seen her," Pill-Cauldron whispered, his eyes wide. "The milk tea crone who wanders this district. The one whose... inventory... hangs to her waistline."
My stomach instantly tied itself into a knot. "No."
"Yes," the alchemist hissed, slamming his hands on the counter. "Three hundred years of gravity pulling on those massive, leathery Yin-sacks! The localized friction! The heat! I don't want her tea, He Lu. I need a vial of her underboob sweat."
I physically recoiled, gagging. "Are you out of your mind?! That's a biohazard! That's a war crime!"
"That is the price!" Pill-Cauldron yelled triumphantly. "Bring me one standard vial of the crone's under-crevice fermentation, and I will give you the expanding pills! Do we have a deal, lawyer?!"
I stood there in the dim, empty apothecary. I thought about the tournament. I thought about the prodigies waiting to vaporize me. I thought about Gou-Na's stained sweatpants.
The cultivation world was a nightmare.
"Fine," I whispered, my soul leaving my body. "Give me a vial."
I will spare you the details of the next two hours.
Some things are not meant to be recorded in the annals of history. Let it just be known that it cost me exactly four low-grade spirit stones, a lot of intense gagging, and a deeply uncomfortable conversation involving earthly memes to convince the crone to let me swipe a glass vial under her waist-length assets.
When I returned to the firm and slammed the glowing blue bottle of Twin-Peak Expanding Lotus pills onto the wine barrel, I smelled like sour milk and ancient despair.
Lo Yu didn't ask questions. He just smiled, packed the pills into a pouch, and told me to get some sleep.
Three days later, I stood at the massive, towering white-jade gates of the Jade Water Sect.
It was intimidating. The gates were eighty feet tall, flanked by massive statues of water dragons. Thousands of cultivators milled about the entrance. There were sword-cultivators floating on flying blades, beast-tamers riding massive spirit-tigers, and elegant disciples draped in silk that cost more than my entire life.
And then there was me.
I was wearing a simple, dark-grey martial arts tunic. I had a wooden practice sword strapped to my waist that I had bought at a discount stall. Standing next to me was the goat, actively trying to eat a decorative floral arrangement near the registration desk.
"Remember your cover," Lo Yu whispered through the transmission talisman in my ear. "You are 'Young Master He', a wandering independent cultivator. You rely on earthly techniques. Do not let them check your Dantian, or they will realize you have the spiritual capacity of a wet sponge."
"I've got the Quickshot Seal, Boss! I'm practically invincible!" I whispered back, adjusting my tunic. Ever since my incident at the Glass Lotus, my core had a tiny, faint spark of Qi. It wasn't much, but it kept me from instantly shattering if someone bumped into me.
I stepped up to the registration pavilion. Sitting behind the desk, looking perfectly serene and professional in her pristine sect uniform, was Fairy Gou-Na.
She saw me approach. Her eyes briefly flicked down to my crotch, then to the pouch at my belt, before snapping back up to my face.
"Name and Sect affiliation?" Gou-Na asked loudly, playing her part for the surrounding guards.
"He Lu," I said, leaning on the desk and sliding the small bottle of pills across the jade surface. "Independent Cultivator. I believe I have a wildcard entry."
Gou-Na's hand shot out like a striking viper, making the pills vanish into her sleeve with terrifying speed.
"Ah, yes. Young Master He," Gou-Na smiled, her eyes shining with goblin gratitude. "You are assigned to Locker Room Four. Your first qualifying match is this afternoon."
Before she could hand me my jade entry token, a heavy hand slammed down on the desk right next to mine.
"An Independent Cultivator?" a sneering voice echoed.
I turned. Standing next to me was a quintessential, arrogant Young Master. He wore flowing silver robes embroidered with roaring tigers. His hair was perfectly styled, and he radiated a suffocating, aggressive Yang aura. He looked down his nose at me with absolute disgust.
"The Inner Sect Tournament is for the elite," the Young Master scoffed, crossing his arms. "Not for dirt-covered peasants who bring farm animals to a martial arts arena. I am Senior Brother Bai of the Raging River Sect. Move aside, trash, before I shatter your meridians."
The surrounding crowd went quiet. Several cultivators paused to watch the confrontation. This was a classic cultivation trope. The arrogant senior brother bullying the underdog.
Usually, this is where the protagonist reveals a hidden, heaven-defying power and slaps the bully's face.
I didn't have hidden power. I had a law degree.
"Senior Brother Bai, is it?" I asked, pulling a small, rolled-up legal pad and a piece of charcoal from my tunic.
Bai sneered. "What is that? A surrender treaty?"
"No, it's a preemptive tort claim," I said loudly, uncapping my charcoal. "I just want to get your full legal name on the record before you commit Class-Two Assault and Battery with intent to cause grievous bodily harm. Do you have a trust fund, or should I list the Raging River Sect as a co-defendant for failing to train their disciples in basic public liability?"
Bai blinked, his arrogant sneer faltering. "What?"
"I am an independent contractor invited by Sect Law Enforcement," I lied smoothly, tapping the parchment. "If you lay a single finger on my meridians, I will slap you with a lawsuit so heavy your great-grandchildren will be paying off my emotional distress settlements in the spirit-mines. Now. Are we going to have a legal issue, Bai?"
Bai stared at me. He looked at my legal pad. He looked at the goat, which had stopped eating the flowers and was now staring at his silver robes with a cross-eyed, hungry intensity.
Cultivators knew how to fight swords and spells. They had absolutely no idea how to fight aggressive litigation.
"You... you are a madman," Bai muttered, taking a step back. "You hide behind paper! We will see how your 'lawsuits' hold up in the arena!"
He spun on his heel and stormed off, his silver robes whipping behind him.
The crowd whispered in shock. A mortal had just bullied a Foundation Establishment cultivator into retreating using nothing but a piece of charcoal.
Gou-Na leaned over the desk, her eyes shining with pure, unadulterated goblin lust.
"That was the sexiest thing I have ever seen," Gou-Na whispered, slipping me my jade entry token and leaning closer. "The sweatpants are under the desk. Bring me the legal code later, lawyer."
"Professional boundaries, Fairy," I gulped, snatching the token and the heavily soiled grey sweatpants. "Where is Locker Room Four? I need to go get robbed."