Han Lin sat in the dark. It wasn't the cold, wet darkness of the river. It was empty. He couldn't feel his legs. He couldn't feel the pain from the hammer. He was just a mind floating in nothing.
"Am I dead?" he asked out loud. His voice didn't echo. It just existed.
"Yes and no," a voice replied.
A light appeared. It wasn't a sun or a lamp. It was a person made of glowing white lines. The figure looked like a man, but he was too tall and had no face.
Han Lin didn't scream. He didn't cry. He looked at the glowing figure the same way he looked at a rival executive across a boardroom table. He analyzed. No exits. No weapons. The entity has all the power. I need to talk my way out of this.
"You are Han Lin," the light-man said. "You were a hard worker. You were smart. But you were killed by a hammer in a dirty river. Does that make you angry?"
Han Lin thought about it. "No. Anger is a waste of time. I prepared a contingency. Even if I died, my rivals are ruined. Their bank accounts are frozen. The evidence of their crimes is already at the police station. I won. I just didn't survive the victory."
The light-man laughed. It sounded like bells ringing. "I like you. Most souls just beg to go back. You are already thinking about the score. I have a proposal. There is a world far from yours. It is called the Heavens. It is a place of power, sects, and cultivation. It is a place where the strong eat the weak."
"Sounds like the corporate world, just with more swords," Han Lin said.
"Exactly. I will send you there. You will start over. But there is a catch. The family you will be born into is failing. They have many enemies. If they die, you die again. Do you accept?"
Han Lin narrowed his eyes. "I want to keep my memories. I want my brain to work exactly as it did before. My foresight, my ability to predict people, my knowledge of traps. If I go in blind, I'm just a victim. I don't plan on being a victim twice."
"Done," the light-man said. He waved a hand. "Go. Show me how a 'genius schemer' handles the Heavens."
The darkness swallowed Han Lin again.
The Smallest Board
The first thing Han Lin felt was heat. Then, a loud noise. He tried to move his arms, but they were short and fat. He tried to speak, but only a high-pitched cry came out.
Status report, he thought. I am an infant. My muscles are weak. My vision is blurry. I am in a wooden box... no, a cradle.
A woman picked him up. She smelled like flowers and expensive soap. This was his new mother, Lady Su. She looked tired. Her eyes were red like she had been crying.
"My sweet Lin'er," she whispered. "I hope you never have to see the trouble we are in."
Han Lin didn't cry. He stayed quiet and listened. This was his first rule of business: Gather information before making a move.
Over the next few weeks, he learned everything he could. He was in the Lin Clan. They used to be rich and powerful, but they were losing a "trade war" with a rival family called the Zhang Clan. His father, Lin Feng, was the head of the house. He was a strong man, but he was too honest. In Han Lin's experience, honest men were the easiest to rob.
One afternoon, his older sister, Lin Xiao, came into the room. She was about seven years old. She sat on the floor near his cradle and started to meditate. She was trying to "cultivate"—gathering the energy of the world into her body.
Han Lin watched her. He noticed she was breathing too fast. Her face was turning red.
She's doing it wrong, Han Lin thought. She's forcing the energy. If she keeps this up, she'll pop a blood vessel.
He needed to help her. If his sister became strong, she would be his first "bodyguard." But he couldn't talk. He had to be subtle.
When Xiao reached the most dangerous part of her meditation, Han Lin let out a sharp, rhythmic giggle. Heh. Heh. Heh. Haaa. The sound broke her focus. She opened her eyes and looked at him, frustrated. "Lin'er! I'm trying to practice!"
Han Lin didn't stop. He kicked his tiny legs in a specific rhythm—slow, then fast, then a long pause. He pointed his finger at a painting on the wall of a slow-moving river.
Xiao looked at the painting. Then she looked at her brother. She was a smart girl. "Slow... then fast... then wait? Are you telling me to breathe like the river?"
She tried it. She slowed her breathing to match the rhythm of his kicks. Suddenly, her face relaxed. A faint blue glow appeared around her skin. She gasped, her eyes wide. "I did it! I broke through the first stage!"
She ran over and hugged the cradle. "You're a lucky charm, Lin'er!"
Asset one: Secured, Han Lin thought. She thinks it was luck. Good. It's better if they don't know I'm the one pulling the strings yet.
Spotting the Traitor
By the time Han Lin was six months old, he had identified a major problem. There was a spy in the house.
Every night, a maid named Yuan would come in to clean the room. But she didn't just clean. She would linger near his father's desk in the corner, looking at the scrolls.
Han Lin watched her through half-closed eyes, pretending to sleep. He saw her take a small piece of charcoal and rub it over a blank paper to see the indentations of what his father had written previously.
Classic move, Han Lin thought. She's working for the Zhang Clan. She's stealing the shipment routes.
He couldn't tell his father. He couldn't write. But he had a plan.
The next day, his father was in the room, holding Han Lin while talking to a captain of the guards.
"The shipment of spirit stones leaves at dawn," his father said. "We will take the mountain path. It's dangerous, but the Zhangs won't expect it."
The maid, Yuan, was in the corner, dusting a vase. Han Lin saw her ears twitch.
Han Lin waited. When his father put him back in the cradle to sign a document, Han Lin "accidentally" grabbed a bright red ink pot on the table. He threw it.
The ink didn't hit the floor. It hit a specific map—a fake one that Han Lin had "pushed" toward the edge of the desk earlier by wiggling his body. The ink soaked into a path that led through the "Dead Man's Canyon."
"Oh, you little rascal!" his father laughed, picking up the ruined map. "Now I have to use the backup map."
His father pulled out a different map—one that showed a completely different route—and started marking it. He left the "ruined" red-stained map on the desk to dry.
The maid saw the red map. She saw the father marking the "new" route in a hurry.
That night, Han Lin watched her sneak in. She copied the "red" map. She thought she had the secret.
Two days later, news reached the house. The Zhang Clan's hitmen had been waiting in Dead Man's Canyon for an ambush. But the Lin Clan's shipment had taken the river path instead. The Zhangs had wasted their resources and been embarrassed.
His father came into the room, looking confused but happy. "It's strange. It's like they knew exactly where we weren't going."
Han Lin lay in his cradle, sucking on a wooden toy.
Contingency 1: Complete, he thought. The spy gave them the wrong info. The rivals lost money. The family is safe for now.
The Long Game
As Han Lin grew, he realized this world was much bigger than a corporate office. There were people who could fly, people who could destroy mountains, and people who lived for a thousand years.
But the rules were the same. People had wants. People had fears. If you knew what a man wanted, you could lead him by a rope. If you knew what he feared, you could make him your slave.
He was now one year old. He could walk, though he pretended to be clumsy. He could speak, though he only said simple words like "Mama" and "Hungry."
He sat in the garden, watching his father train with a sword. He saw the Zhang Clan's messengers coming to the gate, looking angry. They were demanding "taxes" that the Lin Clan didn't owe.
They are getting desperate, Han Lin analyzed. When a rival gets desperate, they make mistakes. I need to give them a big mistake to make.
He looked at his small hands. He was an ant in this world of giants. But he remembered what he told himself in the dark: Even if I am an ant, I will crawl to the top.
He began to draw lines in the dirt with a stick. To his mother, it looked like a baby doodling. To Han Lin, it was a layout of the Zhang Clan's estate based on everything he had overheard from the messengers.
He found the weak point. The grain silos. If those burned, the Zhangs would have to buy food from the Lins.
He just needed a way to start a fire without being blamed.
"Lin'er, what are you drawing?" his mother asked, walking over with a smile.
Han Lin looked up at her with big, innocent eyes. He pointed at the drawing and then at the kitchen where the fires were burning.
"Fire," he said, acting like a confused child. "Big fire."
His mother laughed. "No, sweetie. No big fires here."
But his sister, Xiao, was watching from the doorway. She remembered the "river breathing" he had shown her. She looked at the dirt drawing. She looked at the direction he was pointing—toward the Zhang estate.
She narrowed her eyes. She was starting to realize her little brother wasn't normal.
Han Lin smiled inwardly. Phase one of the Heavenly Synthesis is beginning. I have a sister who suspects me, a father who is too nice, and an enemy who is about to go hungry. Let's see how they handle a genius in a diaper.