Asset Scrutiny

The derelict warehouse yawned around them, a cavern of rusting metal skeletons and deep shadows. Specks of dust danced in the occasional beams of weak, pollution-filtered light piercing through cracks high above. The air they inhaled tasted stale, metallic and carried the faint ghost scent of lubricants and industrial solvents long evaporated.

Li Fang had deployed his scavenged signal jammer near the main collapsed entrance. A battered, jury-rigged device purchased with nearly his last Credits after the Ghost Candle diversion. It emitted a low subliminal hum, creating a small bubble of electronic silence, preventing probes from reaching them.

It became a fragile pocket of privacy in Neo-Tian's perpetually monitored sprawl.

Xie Ruolan moved with an ingrained poise that seemed utterly out of place despite the grime and the lingering adrenaline of the chase.

She'd chosen an overturned, heavy-duty crate as her seat, wiping its surface clean with a precise, economical gesture before settling down on it.

Her simple, dark utility clothing couldn't entirely conceal the bearing of someone accustomed to command, to boardrooms where billions of Qi-Credits and lifetimes of karmic debt were discussed over meticulously prepared tea – not to mention her beauty that was too way out of the league of someone from the Lower Layers like him.

She kept the metallic data-case resting securely on her lap, her fingers never straying far from its surface. Her sharp and unnervingly perceptive eyes scanned Li Fang before sweeping the warehouse, assessing structural weaknesses, potential ambush points and energy signatures.

It was the instinct manifested from her lifetime of navigating treacherous environments, both physical and financial.

The tense standoff after their escape, where she'd evaluated him with the intensity of a Bank auditor reviewing a high-risk soul-collateral loan, had resulted in this wary, temporary truce.

She clearly calculated that survival was the optimal strategy and Li Fang, despite his ragged appearance and dubious methods, represented the only available variable that wasn't immediately hostile.

"Venture capital?" Xie Ruolan finally echoed Li Fang's earlier, deliberately provocative term. Her controlled voice cutting through the warehouse gloom.

She tapped a perfectly manicured fingernail against the crate.

"An intriguing euphemism. Especially coming from…" She paused, her gaze sweeping over his worn clothes and the scavenged tools visible in his satchel, "...a scavenger operating in the Lower Layers with…"

She consulted her internal memory, likely running his public citizen ID the moment they stopped running. "... A documented Karmic Equity score deep into negative territory and multiple outstanding debt flags with the CRB. This is intriguing."

Her tone wasn't mocking but merely the detached analysis of a financier assessing an improbable asset class. "Your public profile screams insolvency, not investment."

Li Fang scratched his cheek as he leaned against a rusted girder, trying to catch his breath without showing weakness.

"My public profile is… deliberately understated," He countered evasively, acutely aware of how threadbare his deception sounded. "My situation is… fluid. You see, it was constantly evolving."

He decided to dangle the bait, the core of his improbable operation. "Let's just say I have access to a unique… funding source. One that was intangibly swimming past the sea of the city's restrictions. A silent partner, if you will. It allows for direct Qi infusion based on assessed potential, not existing collateral or credit scores."

He watched her reaction closely. "Like offering 'Ascension Spark Loans' to struggling cultivators. Provide them the pure Qi they need for a breakthrough attempt, repayment automatically collected only if they succeed, tied directly to their advancement."

A flicker. That's all he saw. A slight, almost imperceptible arching of her perfectly sculpted eyebrow, a momentary stilling of her analytical gaze. Genuine surprise. It was the first crack he'd seen in her icy composure.

"Direct Qi lending?" She repeated slowly, the implications clearly spooling through her high-speed thoughts. "A normally improbable venture."

She paused for a moment, her lips thinning as she processed the audacity and the sheer disruptive potential. "Manifested principal, bypassing traditional merit systems, circumventing Sect-Corp resource controls… With repayment contingent entirely on a cultivation breakthrough? That's not just unconventional, Li Fang. It's fundamentally heretical to Neo-Tian's entire economic structure. The established Sect-Corps. The Void Sect, Prosperous Sun, Omni-Credit, all of them. They build their multi-trillion Credit empires precisely on controlling the flow of Qi and cultivation resources. They enforce scarcity. You're proposing… giving it away? Based on nothing more than predictive potential?"

"Oh. I didn't say we're giving it away for free," Li Fang corrected, pushing off the girder, feeling a surge of confidence from her reaction, given that she understood the implications.

"We're investing it. A high-risk, high-reward spiritual venture. The return comes directly from their success, a percentage of their advancement. It's self-selecting. Only those truly capable benefit and repay." He played his trump card. "My first borrower, designation IronOx_7, just broke through to Qi Condensation Stage 3 a few hours ago using one of these loans. The spiritual contract triggered the repayment. A percentage of his breakthrough's energy release was automatically siphoned. It worked."

Xie Ruolan fell silent again, her sharp eyes distant and seemingly lost in complex internal calculations.

Li Fang could almost see the spiritual spreadsheets unfurling behind her gaze, the risk models running and the profit projections materializing.

"The risk profile…" she murmured, almost to herself, "is astronomical. Borrower default rates in that demographic approach eighty percent under normal circumstances. Then there's the risk of Qi deviation incidents during breakthrough. Those were messy and often attracted the Celestial Revenue Bureau's attention."

She ticked off points on imaginary fingers. "Purity variance in the infused Qi causing unforeseen physiological or spiritual compatibility issues… The potential for karmic entanglement between lender and borrower beyond the contract terms… Regulatory blowback if discovered…"

Her gaze snapped back to him as sharp as ever. "And the foundational question remains: how do you generate the principal Qi? Manifesting pure, unaligned Qi suitable for cultivation infusion requires either a massive personal cultivation base operating at peak efficiency, access to rare Source Energy converters, or… something else entirely."

"That's where my unique funding source from my associate comes in," Li Fang said, sticking to his deliberate vagueness, gesturing again towards the empty air where the QFS interface hovered in his vision. This system designated her as an important asset to acquire. If it means getting her onboard, he'd even explain to her how the rogue AI works. At least, within its suggested instruction.

"It's my silent partner. It handles Qi manifestation based on its own analysis, and manages the spiritual contract enforcement through resonance tracking."

"I see. An AI," She stated, and in a way that's not a question this time. Her perception was unnerving for Li Fang but that's to be expected from someone like her.

Li Fang wryly grinned and nodded.