The kitchen was no longer a kitchen.
Steam drifted like clouds over an immortal mountain. The aroma—sweet, sharp, rich—seemed to sink past the tongue and straight into the marrow. Knives trembled in their racks. Jade counters buzzed like restless insects. Even the great bronze stove emitted a low hum, as though bowing before some unseen presence.
Yan Chen stood at the heart of it all, one hand on the wok, the other gripping the ladle like a lifeline. He was sweating, but not from heat. His Qi was surging on its own, rising from his dantian, threading through his arm, pouring straight into the broth.
He couldn't stop it. He didn't even want to.
"This smell…" a kitchen disciple whispered, his eyes wide. "I feel… stronger just breathing it in!"
Another gulped down saliva. "My meridians are tingling…"
A thud broke the trance—Elder Su, the grizzled man who had presided over the sect kitchens for forty years, had dropped his cleaver. He stepped forward, jaw slack, eyes darting from the shimmering broth to the faint glow that had begun to gather above it.
"Impossible," he muttered. "Not even the Grandmasters could—"
A sharp crack ripped through the chamber. Tiles on the ceiling shifted. Outside, clouds churned unnaturally, gray spirals coiling above the Perplexing Spice Sect like a dragon stretching after centuries of sleep.
The disciples paled. Some stepped back. A few instinctively circulated their Qi, ready to bolt.
Yan Chen swallowed hard. "...Uh-oh."
Ding!
The voice in his head came like a bell toll—calm, crisp, far too amused for his liking.
> [Flavor Realm advanced: Mortal Taste → Spirit Infusion]
> Congratulations, cultivator. Your dish has achieved resonance beyond mortal palate. Heavenly attention detected.
> Warning: spontaneous breakthroughs may provoke envy, suspicion, robbery, assassination, or divine curiosity. Proceed with appetite.
Yan Chen blinked. "Proceed with appetite? That's not a safety warning!"
The wok burped.
Not boiled. Not bubbled. Burped—a deep, guttural sound that seemed to vibrate against his soul. Ribbons of emerald Qi spiraled upward, curling into symbols no mortal tongue could name. They spun slowly, like a wheel of secrets waiting to crush the unworthy.
A shout cut through the rising panic. "There! He's burning the Core!"
Qi Hu stormed in with his usual entourage—two wide-shouldered lackeys carrying baskets of ingredients that suddenly seemed pointless in the current chaos. His smug grin widened when he saw the glowing broth.
"What did I tell you?" Qi Hu jeered, loud enough for everyone to hear. "Give the mortal an apron, he'll cook up calamity! Look at this mess—sect property in ruins, Qi storms in the rafters. Are you trying to poison the Mountain itself?"
A few disciples exchanged wary glances. Elder Su looked conflicted. Even he, a man of culinary pride, could not fully grasp what was happening.
Yan Chen, for his part, didn't rise to the bait. He simply stared at Qi Hu for a heartbeat, then dipped his ladle into the broth, stirred once, twice—and smiled.
"Ruins?" he murmured. "No, Qi Hu. This is refinement."
The broth pulsed.
The kitchen shook.
Outside, thunder rolled across a clear sky.
---
Bai Yun arrived like a breeze.
One moment the air was thick with tension and Qi, the next it carried a faint, crisp floral note. Disciples instinctively stepped aside. Her jade-green hair glimmered under the flickering lanterns like captured moonlight, her robes unstained, her expression calm—a calm that warned of sharpness beneath.
She didn't look at Yan Chen.
She looked at the broth.
"This… resonance," she said softly, her eyes narrowing. "It matches the Mountain Core."
Elder Su's jaw dropped. "The Core? Impossible! No dish has stirred it since—"
"The Great Feast of Ascension," Bai Yun finished, stepping closer, eyes still fixed on the swirling galaxy in the wok. "That was a thousand years ago."
Her gaze flicked to Yan Chen at last, sharp, curious, dangerous. "Who taught you to channel Qi through taste harmonics?"
Yan Chen hesitated. Lying was pointless. "No one."
"Impossible."
"I followed instructions," he clarified, tapping the heavy tome tucked into his apron. "Old ones."
Her brows drew together. "Show me."
He shook his head. "Not yet."
---
Qi Hu saw his chance. He stepped forward, voice dripping with false outrage. "Sect prodigy Bai Yun, this man is unstable! He's channeling forbidden arts, attracting storms into the kitchen! What if he ruptures the Mountain Veins? What if the broth explodes? We can't let some wandering mortal experiment at the heart of our sect!"
Murmurs rippled through the disciples. Fear is contagious, and Qi Hu wielded it like a cleaver.
Yan Chen sighed.
He was really hoping to keep a low profile for at least a week.
He gave the broth one last slow stir.
The air snapped. Symbols above the wok tightened into a single, pulsing ring. A faint, harmonic chime echoed from nowhere and everywhere at once. The Qi in the room pressed against everyone's chest like invisible hands.
"Get away from it!" Qi Hu barked, edging backward even as he gestured for his lackeys to move forward. "Smash the stove, disrupt the cycle—"
They moved.
Yan Chen moved faster.
He didn't even look. A flick of the wrist. The ladle spun in his palm like an old friend returning from war. He struck the counter with a sharp *clang*, and the very air rippled.
Invisible pressure slammed the two lackeys back against the wall, harmless but firm, like a bouncer escorting drunks from a sacred hall.
Yan Chen exhaled. "You boys really should read the menu before touching the chef's work."
Then the wok roared.
A column of golden light shot upward, piercing the ceiling tiles like paper, spiraling high into the clouds above the sect. Thunder cracked. Wind howled. Lanterns burst into sparks that fizzled harmlessly before touching the floor.
Every single person in the kitchen fell silent.
Then, from deep within the sect's mountains, a deep, resonant gong tolled, once, twice—low, heavy, absolute.
Bai Yun's eyes widened. "The Summoning Tone," she whispered. "The Mountain Core is calling."
Yan Chen's stomach turned. "Calling who?"
Bai Yun looked at him like he'd just asked whether knives were sharp. "You, obviously."
A hush fell. Even Qi Hu didn't speak. His mouth opened, then closed, then opened again—but no words came.
The column of light began to fold inward, condensing, twisting, shrinking, until all that remained was a single golden spoon, no larger than a child's hand, hovering just before Yan Chen's chest.
It drifted closer.
And closer.
And settled, humming softly, into the pocket of his apron.
Elder Su fell to his knees. "A Heavenly Utensil… granted by the Core itself…"
From somewhere far below, like the voice of an ancient god echoing through stone and Qi, words rumbled through the air:
> "He who stirs the Dao with flavor… step forth. The Sect awaits."
Yan Chen stared at the spoon.
At the broth.
At Bai Yun.
At the storm still boiling quietly above the mountain.
He muttered, almost to himself, "...I just wanted to make lunch."