A thunderous crack split the air as iron cleaver met poisoned blade. Sparks burst in cascading showers, hissing as they fell into oil puddles scattered across shattered tile. The kitchen, once a sanctum of steel and spice, had transformed into a charnel house. The pungent perfume of crushed herbs clashed with blood's metallic tang. Lanterns swung wildly on chains overhead, spitting flame and smoke that curled in serpentine coils.
Lin Tian felt the weight of every breath clawing at his lungs. Poison fog pressed against his skin, seeping into cuts and scrapes, leaving behind a crawling numbness. Across the tiles, shadows moved like predators circling a wounded stag.
A black-robed man lunged from Lin Tian's right, daggers glinting a sickly green under the fractured glow of spirit flames. His footfalls were silent, as though the man floated inches above the floor. Poison qi billowed around him in a shifting haze, viscous and alive.
Lin Tian pivoted, muscle memory driving his blade in a high arc. The cleaver met the man's forearm. Bone cracked like splintering bamboo. The attacker shrieked, staggering back, blood pulsing in rhythmic jets. A spray of crimson misted Lin Tian's cheek, warm as it spattered across his jaw.
There was no time to dwell. Another figure hurtled from the smoke, wielding hooked knives. The woman's face was half-hidden behind a veil soaked in black fluid. Lin Tian dodged the first blade, blocked the second. But the third caught his shoulder—a shallow cut, yet the edges burned cold as ice.
He staggered, feeling his veins pulse with freezing venom. His heart hammered so violently he felt it echo in his teeth.
But he refused to fall.
Snatching a wok from a stove, he pivoted and hurled it edge-first into her skull. A hollow thunk. The woman dropped like a puppet with its strings cut, knives clattering across the floor.
All around him, chaos reigned. Screams tore the air. Ironbone disciples battled black-clad intruders amid overturned tables and spilled broths. Flames licked the rafters where oil had splashed. The sacred scent of five-spice powder turned acrid in the heat.
Lin Tian seized a pot of boiling golden broth, twisting the handle with expert flicks of his wrist. He flung its contents in a precise arc over three assailants rushing him together. The scalding liquid struck them mid-charge, sizzling across their faces and necks. They fell back, clutching at smoking skin as shrieks rose in shrill crescendos.
A blade thrust for his ribs from the left. Lin Tian dropped to one knee, letting it whistle over his head. His cleaver rose in a vicious uppercut. The blade dug into the soft flesh beneath the attacker's jaw, splitting tongue and palate in a single brutal stroke. A wet gasp escaped the man before he slumped, lifeless.
Lin Tian yanked his cleaver free. Blood dripped in thick streams down the tempered steel.
Another blow from behind. He spun, catching a glimpse of red-glowing eyes before a fist crashed into his chest. Lin Tian stumbled backward, breath knocked from his lungs. Pain radiated through his ribs like lightning. Poison qi surged around the attacker—a black swirl of biting cold and stinging heat.
The man's voice was a low growl. "Enough games. You're no cultivator. You're a cook. Stay in your kitchen."
Lin Tian spat blood, eyes cold as iron. "Cooking is survival."
He lunged, slashing his cleaver sideways. The enemy's dagger deflected the blade with a shower of sparks. Their weapons tangled, each man's arm trembling from the force. Poisoned breath wafted from the man's mouth, rank as rotting leaves.
With a sudden twist, Lin Tian slammed the flat of his cleaver into the man's temple. Bone gave way under the blow. The black-robed figure dropped, twitching, his skull dented like soft metal.
Bai Yue stumbled into view through rolling smoke. His robes were stained crimson, eyes wild. He clutched a ladle slick with blood. "Senior Lin… there's too many…!"
Lin Tian grabbed his arm, shaking him hard enough that Bai Yue's teeth clacked. "Listen to me. Find Elder Lu. Tell him to block every entrance. Drive them toward me."
"But—"
"GO!"
Bai Yue hesitated, then vanished into the haze, coughing.
Lin Tian turned, scanning the battlefield. His entire body pulsed with exhaustion and pain. The poison seared under his skin, threatening to drown him from the inside. Still he held his ground, cleaver gleaming.
He saw them moving between the pillars—black silhouettes, shifting like ink across paper. For every one he dropped, two more replaced them. Their footsteps were soft as silk on tile. Their weapons exhaled poison vapors so thick they glowed faintly under flickering lantern light.
One assassin hurled twin daggers, aimed low. Lin Tian snapped a cutting board off a table and blocked both blades with a sharp thud. He flung the board into the assassin's chest and followed it with a brutal knee to the sternum. Ribs splintered audibly.
A woman lunged from his blind side, needle-thin spikes glistening with black resin. Lin Tian pivoted, but not fast enough. One spike grazed his thigh, leaving a searing line of white-hot agony. The pain shot up his spine in convulsing waves.
But pain was fuel. He lashed out with the cleaver, burying the blade in her chest. Blood gushed over his hand, slick and steaming.
He staggered, dragging himself upright. Each breath rasped like knives sawing through his throat. His vision blurred, edged in crimson.
Still the assassins came.
One after another. Blades. Chains. Poisoned needles. Dark shadows, countless and merciless.
Lin Tian knew they wanted to wear him down, to bleed him out until he collapsed in his own kitchen.
He clenched his jaw and forced himself to stay upright.
Then the main doors exploded inward.
A figure stepped through the shattered entrance, framed by spirals of drifting smoke. His robes were black silk woven with silver glyphs that shimmered like a web of moonlight. His eyes glowed faintly red, casting reflections on the blood-smeared tiles.
He was tall, whip-thin, his skin a pale gray under the lantern glow. When he spoke, his voice was calm, smooth, and inhumanly soft.
"So this is the legendary chef who meddles with balance."
Lin Tian wiped blood from his mouth. "I've been waiting for you."
The man inclined his head slightly. "Your dishes disrupt the darkness. You think you can rewrite cultivation with flavors. But some roads exist for a reason. Chaos sustains the strong."
Lin Tian's voice was ragged. "Then tonight, chaos finds resistance."
A ripple of poison qi unfurled from the man's body. Dark tendrils spiraled outward, the temperature plummeting in an instant. Lantern flames guttered low, flickering blue as if gasping for breath. The kitchen's walls seemed to shrink inward, shadows pressing close like a closing fist.
Lin Tian could barely see. Even sound seemed muffled under the weight of that poison aura.
"Let me show you," the man whispered, "how fragile a chef truly is."
He vanished. Reappeared behind Lin Tian, dagger poised.
Lin Tian twisted, cleaver intercepting the strike. Sparks erupted, illuminating their faces inches apart. The man's eyes were twin furnaces of crimson malice. His poisoned dagger hissed where it touched Lin Tian's steel, black venom sizzling against the blade's edge.
They broke apart, then collided again in a flurry of strikes. Each clash sent echoes ringing through the ruined kitchen. Steel shrieked on steel. Spices flew in bursts of color as they crashed into tables and racks.
A vial of black powder exploded between them, blinding Lin Tian. A knee crashed into his chest. He staggered, coughing blood, vision swimming.
The enemy's hand closed around Lin Tian's throat, squeezing.
"You're nothing," the man whispered. "A cook playing at war."
Lin Tian gurgled, struggling for air. Darkness pressed in. His free hand scrabbled along a shattered table. His fingers closed around a porcelain jar.
He smashed it into the enemy's face.
A geyser of bright red spirit pepper powder exploded into the man's eyes. The assassin screamed, staggering back, clawing at his face as blood and red powder poured down his cheeks.
Lin Tian inhaled raggedly and lunged, cleaver rising in an overhead arc.
The blade crashed down, biting deep into the man's shoulder. The assassin howled, dropping to one knee, poison qi sputtering around him like dying embers.
The kitchen fell silent for one trembling heartbeat.
Then another wave of assassins poured in.
Lin Tian staggered to face them, body trembling from poison and blood loss. The leader struggled to rise, one arm hanging limp where bone jutted through torn flesh.
"Kill him!" he screamed. "Kill the chef!"
Lin Tian raised his cleaver again, though it felt impossibly heavy. His eyes burned like twin coals.
A dozen black-robed figures converged, blades raised.
He planted his feet. Spoke through bloodied lips.
"Come. Let me show you… the taste of defiance."
They charged. Steel flashed. Poison qi howled like winter wind.
Lin Tian's cleaver swung to meet them. The clash was deafening, a rolling thunder of steel and shrieks. Sparks showered over spilled broth and shattered spices. Blood fanned out in crimson arcs.
Somewhere behind him, Bai Yue screamed his name.
Lin Tian roared, driving forward, cleaver carving a path through a black tide. He no longer felt the poison. No longer felt his wounds. His entire world narrowed to the rhythmic crash of his blade against theirs.
As the attackers closed in, pressing him back against burning stoves and overturned tables, Lin Tian's voice dropped to a hoarse whisper.
"Cooking… is life… and death."
And then the black tide engulfed him, shadows slamming him to the blood-slick floor as steel rose and fell.