Chapter 1: A Cornered Beast Still Fights

In the ninth year of Hongwu in the Great Ming, the backstage air of the capital's Liyuan Theatres hung thick with the rot of cheap tobacco and moldering timber. Lin Che leaned against a blotchy wooden pillar, his fingertips absentmindedly rubbing at a still-damp tea stain on his lapel while his mind remained preternaturally clear.

On this seventh day since his transdimensional crossing, he had finally sorted out the identity of the body’s original owner—a down-and-out storyteller ruined by a drinking habit and crushed under high-interest debts. Right in front of him, Manager Wang’s greased-up face was pushed in alarmingly close, the hot breath puffing from his nostrils practically bathing Lin Che’s face with a heavy stench of sulfur.

"Three days, Lin Si," Manager Wang’s voice grated like sandpaper over a tabletop, piercing and heavy with menace. "If you can't hand over the silver, strip that wretched hide off your back to pay off the debt. Don't play dead with me—those casual walk-ins out front aren't going to buy your little sob story."

Lin Che lowered his eyelids, masking the cold flash of light at the back of his gaze. He didn't rush to talk back, quietly tuning into the chaotic emotional fluctuations radiating all around him. Anger, agitation, contempt... those emotions whispered like a rising tide right against his ears. At that very moment, deep within the recesses of his mind, the activation criteria for the Resonance Storytelling System quietly clicked into place.

He closed his eyes, drew in a deep breath, and sucked all those negative emotions right into his body, refining them into an even sharper sensory awareness. He heard the idle loafers backstage chuckling with an underlying current of anxiety; he heard the restless stirrings hanging heavy in the dead air over the performance stage outside. He knew his opportunity had arrived.

In the dawn of this chaotic era, only by seizing human hearts could one survive inside this man-eating capital.

Seeing Lin Che stand there in silence, Manager Wang grew even more incensed. He grabbed a fistful of Lin Che’s collar, hauling him straight up off his feet. The surrounding loafers immediately burst into crude laughter—sharp and spiteful, as though mocking a dying cockroach.

"What? Cat got your tongue?" Manager Wang spat a glob of phlegm right beside Lin Che’s feet, his gaze as contemptuous as if he were looking at a piece of garbage. "I'm doing you a favor, giving you face by letting you get up on that stage to spin yarns and work off what you owe. If you dare pull any more tricks, see if I don't throw you straight into the river to feed the fish right now!"

Lin Che didn't struggle. His body went limp as water, sliding smoothly downward along Manager Wang’s pulling force, though the corner of his mouth hooked upward in an extremely faint curve.

Inside, his mind coldly mapped out the tactical situation: Manager Wang was frantic to offload his debt liability because Eunuch Zhang from the Directorate of Ceremonial was coming at the end of the month to inspect the theatre's operations; if Lin Che failed to deliver material that brought the house down, Manager Wang would have to step in and handle it himself, which would only make things far messier.

Right now, the Subconscious Anchoring feature of Lin Che's system was operating at full throttle, and he sharply picked up an unusual aura leaking through the crack in the backstage door. It belonged to a middle-aged man dressed in plain grey civilian clothes whose energy ran deep, sitting quietly in a corner with a gloomy cloud of unresolved heaviness locked between his brows.

It was the oppressive weight exclusive to high-ranking power—and the exact crack Lin Che was about to pry wide open.

Lin Che pushed past the idle loafers crowding around him, smoothed down his tattered scholar’s robe, and walked with steady strides toward the front hall. Manager Wang hissed a vicious curse from behind: "Looking to die! Just watch how I finish you!"

Lin Che didn't look back. His footsteps echoed with crystalline clarity in the empty backstage, every single step striking precisely upon the restless emotional nodes of his audience. The moment he stepped onto the stage, the noise from the crowd below erupted like boiling water. Most of the casual patrons sat with their arms crossed, eyes glazed over—clearly having had their enthusiasm worn thin by the mediocre acts that came before.

That grey-robed middle-aged man had yet to lift his head, yet the ice-cold field of pressure radiating off his entire person managed to freeze the surrounding air by several degrees. Lin Che stood dead center on the stage, holding no clapper and wielding no folding fan—possessing nothing save a pair of eyes that shone with a somewhat piercing clarity.

As he looked out at those bored, resentful, and indifferent faces below, a "hook" line targeted specifically at the current emotional blind spot rapidly formed in his mind. He knew the conventional storytelling methods used for *Judge Bao Solves the Case* were thoroughly worn out; only by striking directly at the most sensitive nerves of the Great Ming officialdom—corruption and frame-ups—could he detonate a thunderclap across this dead silence.

He took a deep breath, his voice cold yet falling like dropped gold and jade: "The world sings of Judge Bao's iron-clad impartiality, but what if the corrupt official grasps an imperial edict in his hand? What if the framing mastermind stands backed by the Dragon Throne? Can this clear sky still render a verdict?"

The moment those words dropped, the previously clamorous theatre plunged into absolute silence. Every single gaze locked onto Lin Che, the emotional pivot from sheer curiosity to utter shock spinning fast enough to induce vertigo. The grey-robed man’s brow twitched faintly, a trace of imperceptible turbulence flashing deep in his eyes—a reflex reaction to being precisely pricked right where it hurt.

Lin Che didn't pause. He smoothly unfurled the plot, cleverly weaving classic segments from *Judge Bao Solves the Case* together with modern political metaphors. He wasn't recounting how an upright official swept away abuses; instead, he detailed how the "hidden hands behind a miscarriage of justice" step-by-step drove clean men toward the abyss while orchestrating an even larger conspiracy from the shadows.

His voice stayed level, yet every single word was worth a pearl, accurately striking the unspeakable resentment harbored in the hearts of the scholars and literati present over the dark reality of state affairs. A young scholar suddenly slammed his hand down on the table, his eyes reddening as he roared, "Good! Finally, someone dares speak the truth!"

Following right behind, an even greater wave of applause and cheers surged forth like a rising tide. The corners of Lin Che’s mouth twitched upward; he sensed the audience’s immersion levels spiking through the roof as intangible Voiceprint Coins began converging from all directions, warm and substantial like a long-awaited rain during a severe drought.

Over in the side wings, Manager Wang was running around in frantic circles, his face turning from red to white, and from white to greenish-blue. He snapped in a low growl at a servant boy standing nearby: "Hurry, get that crazy little bastard down off there! He's courting death and bringing disaster down on our heads!"

With his calves trembling, the servant boy moved to step forward, only to be frozen in his tracks by the deafening roar of sound rolling off the stage. The crowd’s enthusiasm had thoroughly exploded; casual patrons dug out bits of silver, raining them toward the platform like drops of rain. The crisp, pleasant sound of silver coins striking the wooden boards drove the surrounding spectators into an even greater frenzy as they rushed to join in.

Standing right within the halo of light, Lin Che felt the Voiceprint Coins flooding into his system while the opportunity to redeem his very first intelligence payload materialized in his mind. He acutely perceived that those individual coins represented far more than mere wealth—they were fragments of crucial intelligence.

He glanced toward the corner. That grey-robed middle-aged man still hadn't left; his gaze pierced straight through the crowd, locked relentlessly onto Lin Che. That look was as cold as a blade, laden with appraisal and murderous intent, as though watching an ant trying to peer into the abyss. Alarm bells rang shrilly in Lin Che’s mind—he knew the real danger had just arrived.

The cheers below swelled like a tsunami, shaking the weathered old beams of the Liyuan theatre until they hummed. Standing high upon the platform, Lin Che didn't rush to bow out, instead letting that fervent resonance ferment naturally within the air.

He sensed the very last wisps of warmth lingering in the audience's emotional blind spots, his fingertips tapping lightly against the wooden clapper to slow the rhythm and firmly catch that wave of feeling before it broke past the dam. Right now, the Resonance Storytelling System in his head was operating at high speed, its subconscious anchoring function swiftly capturing the faint pulse of those converted Voiceprint Coins down in the crowd.

He didn't choose to redeem them immediately—that would be far too superficial. He needed a deeper level of predictive foresight. With his gaze lowered slightly as if adjusting his cuffs, Lin Che utilized the script deduction function to simulate Manager Wang’s next reaction in the span of a heartbeat.

The simulated scenario unfolded in his mind: Manager Wang’s face was ashen, torn between his greed for wealth and his terror of trouble. He would never blow up on the spot, because doing so wouldn't just alienate the high-ranking figures startled by the performance; it might also draw the dreaded attention of the Embroidered Uniform Guard. The system’s optimal projected path was that Manager Wang would swallow his insults, retreat into the shadows, and secretly plot how to retaliate or take control of Lin Che.

A subtle, unnoticeable smirk curved Lin Che’s lips. He knew the real game had only just begun. At the same time, he acutely caught the scent of an unreleased chill in the surrounding air—the distinct, signature aura of the Embroidered Uniform Guard. A moment later, a wild card was about to step onto the board, and the origin of that variable was none other than the name yet to be revealed upon the stage.

"Gentlemen, whose hand did Judge Bao's execution arrow ultimately point toward?" Lin Che’s voice suddenly soared, punching straight through the full-house cheers. He dropped his tone into a lower register, making it even sharper and cleaner, every syllable falling like a drumbeat against human hearts. The venue instantly hushed, all eyes re-focusing entirely upon him.

Taking a deep breath, Lin Che tossed out his carefully engineered cliffhanger: "The mastermind is no outer barbarian, but a pillar of the imperial court—one who wields supreme authority and commands the border passes. His name is inconvenient to utter at this very moment, but each of you sitting here holds your own scale in your heart."

The moment the words left his mouth, the crowd erupted into an uproar. The buzzing chatter was no longer mere astonishment; it carried an undertone of probing, panic-stricken whispers. Lin Che’s gaze swept across the house, locking precisely onto the corner. That middle-aged man in civilian clothes, who had previously hidden behind the rest of the crowd, now slowly stood up.

His gaze had turned as sharp as a dagger, staring fixedly at Lin Che as though trying to pierce straight through this thin layer of theatrical artifice and reach the raw truth lying underneath. Lin Che felt a jolt of alarm; he knew this gambit was walking a tightrope, but only by leveraging this massive wave of public pressure could he carve out his sole pathway to survival.

The atmosphere below hit a fever pitch as the crowd roared its approval. Under the watchful eyes of the masses, Manager Wang turned pale with a greenish tinge—torn between his love of money and his dread of disaster, he ultimately chose to swallow his wrath and quietly backed off into the shadows, secretly scheming how to exact revenge on Lin Che or bring him to heel. Taking advantage of the chaos, Lin Che brought this segment of the story to a temporary close, cupped his hands, and bowed off the stage.

The system chime sounded; his balance of Voiceprint Coins looked quite respectable, bringing him a measure of inner calm. Yet his gaze didn't linger on the wealth; instead, it locked tight onto the plain-clothes man who still hadn't left his seat.

The moment he stepped off the stage, Lin Che sensed a freezing gaze trailing close behind him. Without missing a beat, he straightened his robes, his peripheral vision sweeping toward the main entrance where two Embroidered Uniform Guards wearing red hats were striding briskly and heavily into the theatre.

Blending into the dimness of the crowd, Lin Che relied on his sharp hearing to isolate the peculiar cadence of their footsteps. Those steps were steady and powerful, every impact falling on a precise, unyielding beat—definitely not the tread of ordinary house guards or personal retainers. Alarm bells shrieked in his mind as he confirmed it was none other than Shen Qianji, the famously cold-blooded and razor-sharp Hundred Man Commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard.

Instead of marching straight up to Manager Wang, Shen Qianji wove through the clamorous crowd like a grey ghost, coming to a halt right at the backstage entrance. That pair of chilling eyes pierced through the gloom, staring unblinkingly at Lin Che hiding away in the shadows.

A playful, chilling sneer curved Shen Qianji’s lips, his gaze utterly devoid of warmth, as if he were looking at an ant attempting to peer into the abyss. Lin Che held his breath, feeling the influx of Voiceprint Coins rushing into his system while the prospect of his very first intelligence exchange flickered before his eyes.

He acutely perceived that those individual coins represented far more than mere wealth—they were fragments of crucial intelligence. He glanced toward the corner. That grey-robed middle-aged man still hadn't left; his gaze pierced straight through the crowd, locked relentlessly onto Lin Che. That look was as cold as a blade, laden with appraisal and murderous intent, as though watching an ant trying to peer into the abyss.

Alarm bells rang shrilly in Lin Che’s mind—he knew the real danger had just arrived.