The kitchen looked like it had survived a divine tribulation. The range hood was charred black. The walls were plastered with dark soy sauce and flour dust. The rice cooker had been split clean in half. Jade Lin stood in the doorway with her hands on her hips, her brand-new apron still spotted with fire-extinguisher foam, her eyes sharp enough to fillet me alive.

"Ethan Lu, you tell me right now — are you going to tear this kitchen apart and redo it yourself, or do you want me to help?" She was holding a spatula, its handle crusted with burnt scallions.

I crouched on the floor picking up grains of rice, muttering under my breath: Honey, you really can't blame me for this. Who knew that drawing cultivation sigils with dark soy sauce would catch fire? Next time I'll try vinegar — maybe I can draw a numbing paralysis talisman, and when Baizhen Pavilion's people show up, we can just acid them into kneeling on the spot.

"Don't you dare mention Baizhen Pavilion!" Jade Lin slammed the spatula down on the table. "Captain Zhang just told us yesterday that the inspection report came back clean, and you pull this? Can't you just learn to behave? One more time I catch you messing around with cultivation nonsense in this house, and I'm throwing that stupid ring of yours in the toilet!"

I mumbled under my breath: "That thing's soul-bound to me. Even if you flush it, it'll find its way back..."

River poked his head out from the bedroom, clutching his Ultraman figurine. "Mama, don't throw the ring! Daddy uses it to make a lightsaber and peel potatoes!"

I frantically shot my son a look. Jade Lin let out a long sigh and turned to rummage through the fridge. "Fine. We're eating instant noodles for lunch. You clean those soy sauce handprints off the wall — they look like a crime scene."

I stared at the lopsided string of runes smeared across the wall. The longer I looked, the more they resembled what the Old Geezer had called a "Reeking Scale Talisman." While Jade Lin wasn't watching, I quietly channelled my spiritual energy. The moment my fingertip grazed the runes, the soy sauce mark suddenly burned hot, and a thread of black qi seeped up through the plaster — carrying the exact same rancid stench as the seafood section of the wet market.

Ding! Secondary Surveillance Talisman from Baizhen Pavilion detected. Tracking function now active. The Old Geezer's voice detonated inside my skull. Rookie, now it gets interesting. Someone planted a listening talisman inside your wall. My guess — that black scale the gold-rimmed glasses fellow tossed last time.

I nearly bit through my own tongue. No wonder I'd felt watched at the market yesterday. Baizhen Pavilion had buried a surveillance talisman right inside my home. I dropped my voice to a whisper: "Old man, how do I get rid of it? Will it explode?"

"Explode? No. It'll just broadcast everything you say." He gave a contemptuous snort. "Though you just poked it with spiritual energy, which is the same as handing them your GPS coordinates. Expect a 'surprise' at your door any minute now."

The words had barely left his mouth when the doorbell chimed — ding-dong. River bounced over to answer it. On the doorstep stood a young man in a delivery uniform, cradling a large cardboard box.

"Mr. Lu? Package for you — could you sign here, please?" The man's smile was rigid as carved wood. Mirrored sunglasses covered half his face. At his cuffs, a scale-pattern tattoo peeked out.

My stomach dropped. This was no delivery man. This was a Baizhen Pavilion operative. I took the box from him, then let my grip go conveniently slack. The box hit the floor with a thud, and a squat black jar rolled out — its mouth sealed with blood-red wax.

System alert: Danger! The jar contains concentrated Reeking Scale Powder. Contact with air will corrode spiritual energy. Seal the mouth with sword qi immediately!

I grabbed the Breaker Cleaver off the counter and pushed spiritual energy into the handle. But the delivery man snapped his hand up, and a jet of black qi shot toward the jar. Without thinking, I swung the blade at the black qi — only for the sword qi to veer off course and split the cardboard box into four pieces. The concentrated Reeking Scale Powder hissed out of the jar's mouth, and wherever it touched the floorboards, white smoke billowed up.

"Daddy! The floor's smoking!" River scrambled behind Jade Lin in terror.

Jade Lin had just stepped out of the kitchen. She took one look at the scene, snatched the broom off the wall, and started beating the delivery man with it. "Scammer! You dare bring hazardous materials into my home?!"

The man clearly hadn't anticipated Jade Lin's ferocity. He staggered backward under the broom strikes. His sunglasses clattered to the floor, revealing a fish-scale scar curled at the corner of his eye. He swore, spun on his heel, and bolted. By the time I chased him into the hallway, there was no one left — only a thick, lingering reek of raw fish.

I walked back inside and stared at the corroded pit in the floor, fury rising in my chest. Baizhen Pavilion has gone too far. They've actually brought the fight to my home.

The Old Geezer spoke up abruptly: "Rookie — when you slashed that black qi just now, your spiritual energy resonated with the meteorite-iron chopping block. Look at the edges of that pit."

I glanced down. Around the rim of the corroded hole, a ring of dark-gold sword qi had solidified — perfectly even, as if measured with a ruler. Jade Lin crouched beside it and prodded the edge with one finger. "Not bad, Old Ethan. You cut through the floor like it was tofu."

End of Chapter 15: The Kitchen Catastrophe and the Fishy Delivery