Chapter 744 - -744

Chapter 744: Chapter -744

A hot, unmistakable metallic tang of fresh blood bloomed in the back of her throat, signaling that the internal stitches Ren’s mother had so carefully applied the night before were inevitably tearing back open under the extreme physical stress.

Cold, clammy sweat plastered her dark hair to her forehead, stinging her eyes as her vision occasionally grayed out at the edges, threatening to drag her down into unconsciousness.

Her lungs were burning, screaming for oxygen in the thick, humid air of the packed bazaar. The original body she inhabited was fundamentally weak, sheltered, and deeply malnourished. It was entirely unequipped for this level of physical trauma. She was currently running on nothing but pure adrenaline, sheer spite, and the terrifying willpower of a seasoned warlord who absolutely refused to be beaten by geography.

"Host, your heart rate is redlining! Stop! If you puncture your lung right now, you will drown in your own blood before you even reach the end of the street!" the System shrieked, finally managing to break through the mental static. It flew desperately alongside her, a streak of golden light completely invisible to the angry crowd, its digital interface flashing with critical red hazard warnings. "You cannot fight a gang of timber haulers in this condition! You are going to die!"

Heena gritted her teeth, ignoring the AI completely. She clamped her left hand hard over her ribcage, manually pressing her forearm against the tight linen bindings to keep the fractured bone from shifting further inward and piercing her lung.

She was not a hero. She was a monster, a ruthless conqueror who had manipulated empires and drowned entire dynasties in blood to achieve her goals. She didn’t care about the lives of the commoners she was shoving into the mud, and she certainly didn’t care about the moral high ground. But she owed a debt.

Ren and his mother had shielded her when she was vulnerable, and in Heena’s universe, debts were paid in full, with exorbitant, terrifying interest. Nobody touched what belonged to her, and nobody used her name as a cheap excuse to ruin an innocent man.

She rounded the final sharp corner of the market district, her boots skidding on the loose gravel as she finally approached the perimeter of the south alley.

The chaotic, overlapping noise of the general market slowly began to warp. The collective haggling, laughing, and cursing of the vendors gave way to a different, far more sinister kind of commotion. The dense crowd ahead of her was no longer moving fluidly; it was bottlenecking, forming a thick, impenetrable ring of voyeuristic onlookers craning their necks toward the entrance of the clinic’s quiet street.

The sheer density of the mob forced Heena to slow her breakneck sprint. She slammed her shoulder against the rough timber of a corner stall, her chest heaving violently as she gasped for air, leaning heavily against the wood to keep her trembling legs from giving out entirely.

Through the gaps in the whispering, pointing crowd, she could hear the sickening sound of splintering wood, followed immediately by the desperate, hoarse scream of an older woman.

"Get your filthy hands off my son!"

Heena pushed off the timber stall, the exhaustion and the agonizing pain in her chest vanishing beneath a sudden, suffocating wave of pure, icy rage. She tightened her grip on the coarse salt pouch in her waistband, her dark eyes locking onto the dense wall of commoners blocking her path. She didn’t have the breath left to ask them to move. She simply lowered her shoulder and violently shoved her way into the mob, ready to introduce the East Timber Guild to the absolute worst mistake of their lives.

Heena didn’t ask the gawking commoners to move. She jammed her elbows into soft ribs, stomped her heavy boots onto toes, and ruthlessly shoved her way through the dense wall of bodies.

When a spectator turned to curse at her, the words died instantly in their throat. The sight of the pale, striking woman with dead, bloodshot eyes, a bruised jaw, and a blood-stained tunic was so terrifyingly unhinged that the crowd instinctively recoiled, parting like the red sea to let the demon through.

Heena stumbled out of the mob and into the clearing of the south alley, taking in the scene with the cold, hyper-analytical gaze of a battlefield commander.

The quiet, respectable front yard of the clinic had been entirely desecrated. The heavy wooden front gate was splintered into jagged shards, torn completely off its hinges. Parked directly in the center of the narrow alley was a garish, bright red sedan chair—a stripped-down, cheap version of a wedding palanquin used exclusively to transport low-ranking concubines through the back doors of wealthy estates.

Standing beside the palanquin was Mrs. Lynn. The timber merchant was a broad, deeply unattractive woman in her late fifties, her neck thick with rolls of fat and draped in heavy, ostentatious gold chains. She watched the violence unfolding in the courtyard with a look of smug, sadistic entitlement, fanning herself lazily with a painted silk fan.

Inside the courtyard, the situation was critical.

Ren’s mother, the fierce, pragmatic woman who had terrified Heena with a stick just hours ago, was currently on her knees in the dirt. Blood trickled down the side of her weathered face from a nasty gash on her forehead. Despite being clearly beaten, she was desperately clinging to the ankle of a massive, tree-trunk-thighed timber hauler, trying to drag the thug backward.

"Let him go! He is a decent boy! He belongs to no one!" Old Lady Lin shrieked, her voice cracking with raw, maternal terror.

"Shut up, you old hag!" the massive timber thug snarled, raising her heavy, iron-toed boot to kick the older woman squarely in the ribs.

Ten feet away, Ren was fighting with a frantic, wild desperation that completely shattered his usual calm, polite demeanor. His neat linen robes were torn at the shoulder, his hair completely undone and falling into his panicked eyes. Two brawny female haulers had him pinned by the arms, dragging him backward through the dirt toward the red sedan chair while he kicked and thrashed.

"Mother!" Ren screamed, his voice breaking as he saw the heavy boot rising toward his mother’s chest. "Don’t touch her! Please!"

Mrs. Lynn let out a wet, rattling laugh, snapping her fan shut. "Throw the little vixen into the chair. Since he likes to throw his virtue to stray dogs in the dark, he can spend tonight warming my bed. If he bites, break his fingers!"

Heena’s mind went entirely blank.

There was no grand strategy anymore. There was only the absolute, undeniable instinct to kill.

She didn’t shout a heroic challenge. She didn’t announce her presence. She simply moved.

Digging her hand into the linen pouch at her waist, she pulled out a massive handful of the extra-coarse white salt and the crushed, fiery red dried chilies. She crushed the mixture violently in her fist, letting the sharp salt crystals grind the dried capsaicin into a lethal, weaponized powder.

Heena closed the distance in three silent, impossibly fast strides, slipping entirely under the massive timber thug’s peripheral vision just as the woman swung her iron-toed boot forward.

Instead of trying to block the kick—which would have shattered her own frail arms—Heena grabbed a fistful of the thug’s coarse tunic and violently yanked herself upward, bringing her face inches from the giant woman’s startled eyes.