The air inside the limestone drying kiln smelled of baked chalk and old heat.
Outside the two-inch-thick cold-iron door, the underground medicine cave was drowning in green sulfur gas and boiling leech-oil.
Inside, the silence was total.
Lu Chen sat cross-legged upon the flat limestone hearth.
His broad back rested against the curved stone wall, his bare torso glistening with sweat that evaporated the instant it beaded on his skin.
He placed the leftover two four-pound bricks of refined ox animal fat before him.
Without pause, he broke the cold animal fat into chunks and burned up them.
Eight pounds of pure, dense animal fat dropped into his stomach tract in less than three minutes.
