The merchant made a sound. It was short. Controlled. It was also the sound of a man's chest wall being removed.
The son came to his feet.
The aura pressed him back before he covered a single step—not forcefully, not with the theatrical violence of a technique deployed in battle, simply with the implacable tonnage of a power difference that did not need to exert itself to be absolute. The young man's legs locked mid-step. His cultivation strained in all directions and found nothing to purchase. He stood, half-risen, unable to take a step forward, unable to retreat, trapped in the cruelest geometry of helplessness—close enough to reach out and touch, too far to accomplish anything by it.
"Let—" His voice cracked. He recovered it. "Let them go." The next words cost him something visible. "Please. The—the bride is young. She has nothing to do with—"
