The Magical Materials Syndicate, Sector 7 Branch, was a monument to industrial butchery. It was a massive, windowless concrete fortress that ran 24x7 in multiple shifts but with same workers from slum overworking themselves to death.

  Lin Jue walked past the loading docks, dodging heavy forklifts carrying the severed, armor-plated limbs of Mutated Boars.

  The noise was deafening.

  Giant conveyor belts fed monster carcasses into grinding maws of enchanted steel, operated by exhausted workers in heavy rubber suits.

  'So this is where the meat gets ground,' Lin Jue thought, wrinkling his nose at the stench. 'It’s loud, it’s toxic, and the safety rails look like they were installed for the sake of it.'

  He bypassed the main processing floor and climbed the metal stairs to the elevated, glass-walled Administrative Office overlooking the assembly lines.

  The air-conditioning inside was aggressively cold, a stark contrast to the sweaty hellscape below. Sitting behind a massive steel desk was Manager Zhu.

  He was an overweight, greasy-haired man stuffed into a cheap suit, wearing a tie that looked like someone had vomited human skin onto a piece of silk.

  He wasn't a Mage; he was a corporate parasite who thought managing slum workers made him royalty.

  Lin Jue didn't bother knocking.

  He walked in, unzipped his backpack, and placed exactly 5,000 physical Federal Credits onto the polished steel desk.

  "I'm here to pay Shen Mei's debt," Lin Jue said smoothly. "And buy out the remainder of her employment contract. Terminate it."

  Manager Zhu looked up from his terminal. His eyes darted from the faded cheap clothes to the thick stack of cash. Greed instantly overrode his surprise.

  "Ah, Shen Mei's boy," Manager Zhu leaned back in his leather chair, steepling his chubby fingers. "A hard worker. But you see, 5,000 credits only covers the baseline debt. To terminate a labor contract early requires a 'Processing Fee,' an 'Equipment Depreciation Tax,' and a 'Replacement Inconvenience Surcharge.' The total comes to 12,000 credits. Plus tip, if you want it stamped today."

  [Hey! This guy is clearly lying! My current Version allows me to act as your assistant. Do you want me to check upon the database?]

  Lin Jue didn't get angry.

  He didn't yell. He just stared at Zhu’s terrible tie and sighed.

  'ARIA. Run the Federal Labor Codes for Sector 7.'

  [Cross-referencing... Federal maximum for early contract termination is 200 credits. The rest is fictitious extortion. Also, his tie is a crime against visual aesthetics.]

  Lin Jue opened his backpack and pulled out the rest of the physical cash he had squeezed from Old Jin. He placed the remaining stacks on the desk. Manager Zhu physically leaned forward, licking his lips.

  "Twelve thousand," Lin Jue mused, his voice dripping with mild fascination. "Manager Zhu, did you know that under Federal Code 88-J, corporate extortion against a registered civilian carries a mandatory penalty of ten years in a frontline penal battalion?"

  Zhu’s smile vanished. "What did you say?"

  "I'd hate to see you drafted to the Kaiju front lines, Zhu," Lin Jue continued conversationally. "You don't strike me as the 'dodging giant monsters' type. You look more like the 'dying of a heart attack during the mandatory warm-up jog' type."

  [From Manager Zhu's sudden panic and insulted pride, +150!]

  "You little slum rat!" Zhu slammed his hand on the desk, his face flushing dark red. He reached toward the red security panic button on his intercom. "I'll have the mercenary guards break your legs and take the cash as a 'trespassing fine'!"

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Lin Jue glanced at his mental Stat Matrix.

  [Qi Pool: 100/100]

  'I am absolutely not spending even one point of Qi on a guy wearing a short-sleeved dress shirt,' Lin Jue decided.

  He didn't use an ancient martial art. He didn't channel magical energy. He just relied on the sheer, terrifying passive density of his Iron-Ox bones.

  Lin Jue casually placed his right hand flat on Manager Zhu's solid steel desk. He leaned his weight forward.

  The thick, reinforced steel buckled under his palm as if it were made of warm putty. A perfect, hand-shaped crater caved into the metal, the sheer kinetic pressure warping the desk’s structural frame.

  Zhu’s hand froze an inch above the panic button. He stared at the ruined steel, then slowly looked up at the scrawny high schooler in front of him. His brain simply stopped functioning.

  Lin Jue calmly slid exactly 5,200 credits across the warped metal.

  "Five thousand for the debt. Two hundred for the legal termination fee," Lin Jue said, his voice entirely devoid of inflection. "Stamp the paperwork, Zhu."

  [From Manager Zhu's abject, paralyzing terror, +300!]

  Zhu didn't say a word. He grabbed his official corporate seal with trembling hands, aggressively stamped Shen Mei's release forms, and practically shoved them at Lin Jue.

  Lin Jue folded the papers, tucked them into his jacket, and turned away. "Pleasure doing business. Buy a new tie."

  He walked out of the office and onto the steel catwalk overlooking the factory floor. He needed to find his mother's sector and pull her off the line.

  Down below, the massive main conveyor belt was carrying a fresh haul of monster carcasses toward the automated dismantling saws.

  At the center of the belt lay a massive, ink-black beast. It was a Tier-2 Shadow-Wolf, easily the size of a delivery van, its fur matted with dried blood.

  It was supposed to be dead.

  But as Lin Jue walked across the catwalk, his heightened Iron-Ox senses picked up a faint, rhythmic sound over the grinding machinery.

  A heartbeat.

  The beast wasn't dead. It was in a deep magical coma.

  The conveyor belt lurched forward. The massive, diamond-tipped circular saws descended from the ceiling, aiming to decapitate the wolf.

  The moment the screaming blades grazed the wolf's thick hide, its golden eyes snapped open.

  A localized shockwave of dark mana erupted from the beast's body.

  The diamond-tipped saws shattered into shrapnel, raining down on the factory floor. The Shadow-Wolf roared—a sound that shook the dust from the rafters—and leaped off the belt, landing gracefully among the terrified workers.

  Chaos erupted. Sirens began wailing, flashing strobes of red emergency light across the blood-stained concrete.

  Workers screamed, dropping their tools and scrambling for the exits.

  “Someone save me!!”

  “Quick! Quick seal the room! Don’t let wolf escape!!”Manager Zhu screamed at his assistant.

  “But…but there are workers inside?”

  “Who cares about them! We can compensate their family with few credits! We can’t let the reputation of entire factory sink!”

  Lin Jue looked toward the Administrative Office. Manager Zhu assistant was frantically smashing a different red button on his ruined desk.

  Instead of the Corporate Security Mages jumping down to fight the beast, the factory's automated Containment Protocol activated. Massive, foot-thick tung-alloy bulkheads slammed down from the ceiling, sealing off the central processing zone.

  They weren't trying to save the workers. They were isolating the damage to protect the expensive machinery in the adjacent sectors.

  Lin Jue watched from the catwalk, safely inside the sealed zone. Down below, three generic factory workers—thankfully, none of them were his mother—were trapped.

  They beat their fists against the reinforced glass observation windows of the bulkhead, begging the security guards on the other side for help.

  The guards just watched. The Shadow-Wolf turned its massive head, its golden eyes locking onto the trapped workers.

  It stalked toward them, dark Stardust leaking from its jaws.

  Lin Jue’s anger spiked, hot and bright. This was how the Syndicate treated slum workers. Like disposable meat.

  He didn't scream in rage. He didn't blindly charge in.

  Lin Jue reached into his pocket, pulled out his cheap, cracked smartphone, and hit record.

  He filmed the terrified workers, the stalking Kaiju, and the security guards standing safely behind the glass, doing absolutely nothing.

  'Accounting Rule Number Three,' Lin Jue thought coldly. 'If you're going to do something stupid and heroic, make sure it pays out later. This video is premium corporate blackmail material.'

  He pocketed the phone and pulled up his interface.

  'ARIA. I need to close the distance before that wolf snaps their necks.'

  [Activating Ancient Movement Art: 'Shadow Step'.

  Warning: Cost is 30 Qi. You will be severely depleted. Do you wish to proceed?]

  'Worth it.'

  Lin Jue vaulted over the railing of the fifty-foot catwalk.

  As he plummeted toward the concrete floor, he channeled the Qi in his meridians. The air around his boots violently warped. He didn't hit the ground; he simply vanished into a blur of motion.

  The Shadow-Wolf lunged, its jaws opening wide to snap a worker in half.

  A deafening echoed through the containment zone as the air imploded.

  Lin Jue reappeared directly between the massive beast and the screaming workers, his fist already pulled back.