The office door opened softly.
Su Meilan stepped inside, as she had been doing more and more lately, almost out of habit, checking on Adrián's little "world" every so often.
The moment she crossed the threshold, her gaze stopped.
Fresh cuts marked Adrián's face. A thin streak of dried blood clung to his lip, and a bruise had begun to darken one cheek.
"Well..." she murmured, more to herself than to him.
Adrián barely looked up from his desk, completely absorbed in the blueprints for a new raw-material transportation project.
Su Meilan walked closer. Without realizing it, her fingers brushed the edge of the cut on his lip as she pointed toward something on one of the diagrams.
The contact lasted only an instant.
Yet it was enough to send a faint shiver through both of them.
A heavy, ambiguous silence settled over the room, one so complete that even the wind outside seemed unwilling to disturb it.
Adrián blinked.
Instead of reacting to her touch, his voice cut straight through the moment.
"Transportation is the bottleneck."
Su Meilan slowly withdrew her hand, as though she had only just realized how close she was to him. She straightened her posture, recovering her usual composure.
"...Excuse me?"
Adrián turned one of the scrolls toward her.
It wasn't a cultivation diagram.
Nor was it a spiritual map.
Just simple lines.
Arrows.
Cargo routes.
Distances.
"Everything in this world moves inefficiently," he continued. "Too slowly. Too expensively. And it's far too dependent on high-level cultivators."
He pointed to a route marked in red.
"Land routes. Caravans. Spirit beasts. Armed escorts. Three weeks to move materials that should take three days."
Su Meilan folded her arms.
"Flying ships are expensive. We can't afford one yet."
"Exactly," Adrián nodded. "And only the great sects, imperial clans, or irreplaceable ancient relics possess them. They're not a solution."
"They're a privilege."
That caught her interest.
"So what's your proposal?" she asked.
"Steal one?"
Adrián shook his head.
"Build one."
He picked up another scroll.
This one contained stranger sketches.
Long wings.
Curved surfaces.
Something that looked neither like an artifact nor a spirit beast.
Su Meilan frowned as she leaned over the table to study it.
"That's not an artifact," she said quietly, disbelief coloring her voice.
"No," Adrián confirmed as he stepped closer and pointed to part of the wing.
"It has no cores... no runes... no formations," she whispered.
Her fingertip accidentally brushed the edge of the paper as she traced one of the lines.
The touch was almost imperceptible.
But once again, a small shiver ran through both of them.
Their eyes met.
And lingered just a heartbeat longer than they should have.
Neither the wind nor the distant hum of the city dared interrupt them.
She silently examined the design.
Out of habit, her spiritual sense swept across the parchment...
And found nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
It was like looking at a lifeless piece of wood.
"Then..." she asked at last, reluctantly lowering her gaze to the blueprint.
"How does it fly?"
Adrián looked up and met her eyes.
For a brief moment, her closeness became tangible.
Sunlight streamed through the window, dancing across her features.
He felt his heartbeat quicken ever so slightly.
"It doesn't fly," he said.
"It falls."
"But it falls with such precise control that the world mistakes it for flight."
The silence that followed was different.
Not awkward.
Dense.
Su Meilan pressed her lips together.
A chill ran down her spine.
In her world, nothing moved without obeying Heaven.
Nothing existed without a core connecting it to the Dao.
And yet...
This simply worked.
There was no challenge to Heaven.
No arrogance.
No concentrated qi.
Only...
Results.
And those results were frighteningly effective.
Adrián leaned in a little farther, pointing toward an internal mechanism sketched on the parchment.
His shoulder brushed hers.
Neither of them moved away immediately.
It was only an accidental touch.
Yet both of them felt it.
The closeness carried an unexpected warmth.
A subtle current neither of them fully understood.
Su Meilan took a slow breath, trying to regain her composure.
Their eyes met once again.
For a single moment, everything else disappeared.
The world.
Its rules.
Even Heaven itself.
There was only the blueprint...
And the idea of something that ignored the laws of the Dao.
"This..." she finally said softly, curiosity and unease mingling in her voice.
"This is disturbing."
"You don't have to understand it yet," Adrián replied with a faint smile, one carrying a trace of quiet complicity she couldn't miss.
"It just has to work."
As they exchanged the blueprints, their fingers brushed across the table once more.
A gentle, inevitable warmth spread through both of them.
Neither wanted to be the first to pull away.
The underground workshop of the Jade Pavilion smelled of ozone, hot metal...
And Su Meilan's subtle perfume.
It wasn't a place for traditional refinement.
There were no cauldrons.
No formation altars.
Instead, rows of workbenches, precision tools, and craftsmen worked quietly alongside disciples, each focused on their task.
At the center of the workshop stood the skeletal frame of what resembled a bird of prey.
It had been built from spirit silver alloy and treated spiritwood.
It had no feathers.
Only structural ribs.
Reinforced spars.
And carefully assembled control panels.
Its craftsmanship was far too refined to be improvised.
"Elder Mu designed the main frame," Adrián said, almost as though he had read the question from her expression.
"Before he retired, he was the sect's greatest master craftsman. He built spirit ships..."
"...back when they still used wind oars."
Su Meilan studied the structure more carefully.
Now she saw it.
The elegance of the joints.
The weight distribution.
The way the spiritwood naturally absorbed vibrations.
"So you didn't build it yourself."
"I'm not a blacksmith," Adrián answered naturally.
"I simply explained what I needed."
"Lightweight."
"Strong."
"Symmetrical."
"He handled the rest."
"...Then we argued about it for three straight days."
The corners of Su Meilan's lips curved upward before she could stop herself.
Adrián tightened a bolt with a precision wrench while continuing.
"The wings' angle of attack generates lift. That's pure physics."
"But takeoff and initial acceleration require an extra push."
Su Meilan ignored the craftsmen working nearby and walked toward the rear section of the aircraft.
A jade core had been connected to a network of copper pipes and sealed chambers assembled by disciples specializing in energy arrays.
She reached out to inspect the design.
"The original array was too rigid," she murmured.
"Elder Mu thinks in terms of structural stability."
"Not dynamic flow."
Her fingers traced one of the chambers.
"I modified it."
"If we inject qi in short bursts through these combustion chambers, the thrust will remain constant."
She paused, almost tasting the unfamiliar word in her mind.
"It's not magic, Adrián," she added quietly.
"It's..."
"...propulsion."
Their fingers brushed across the control panel.
This time...
Neither of them moved away.
The silence that followed crackled with electricity, broken only by the distant sounds of craftsmen pretending not to watch.
Su Meilan looked up.
For just one moment, the Pavilion's strategic partner and the sect's representative disappeared.
Only a woman remained.
A woman watching a man who didn't forge artifacts...
He forged ideas.
And knew how to bring together the right people to make those ideas real.
"If this flies..." she whispered, her face only inches from his.
"You'll destroy the very concept of distance."
Adrián swallowed.
His pulse raced.
Not from danger.
But from a chemistry that had never appeared in any profitability report or business strategy.
He opened his mouth, ready to say something—
Perhaps something that, for once, wasn't cynical—
When...
[DING]
A mechanical bell echoed through his mind with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer.
[System Alert: Main Story Event Activated]
Mission: Selection Tournament of the "Child of Heaven."
Requirement: Register immediately.
Final Objective: Reach the finals and be publicly defeated by Ye Chen.
Note: The Child of Heaven requires prestige to consolidate his political influence.
Failure Penalty: Erasure of the user's soul.
Adrián closed his eyes and slowly exhaled.
The moment evaporated like steam dissolving into cold air.
"Is something wrong?" Su Meilan asked, noticing how his expression had suddenly become distant, sharp, and calculating.
"Nothing," he replied with a tired smile.
"It looks like I have to go play gladiator."
"The sect is about to choose its next 'Child of Heaven.'"
Su Meilan blinked, caught off guard by the abrupt change in tone.
"You're going to participate?"
"You don't need that sect anymore."
"The Merchant Pavilion can offer you the same..."
"...or even more."
Adrián lowered his gaze toward the unfinished aircraft, running his fingers along the elegant curve of its fuselage.
"I know," he finally said.
"But my grandfather belongs to the sect."
"It's a family tradition."
He looked back at her, a mixture of irony and resignation in his eyes.
"And his greatest dream..."
"...is for someone of his bloodline to reach the very top."
Silence settled over the workshop once again.
The aircraft waited.
So did the craftsmen.
And Heaven...
still had no idea what was about to hit it.