The canyon road narrowed into a frozen cleft carved through towering walls of black dark rock.
Beyond the outer checkpoint wooden wall, the wind lost its wide howl, compressing into a piercing, metal shriek that echoed between the sheer granite cliffs.
The heat plunged steadily past thirty degrees below zero.
At this depth of cold, iron axles shrank against their wheel-boxes. Every revolution of the mule cart produced a dry, painful shriek of tortured timber.
Lu Chen walked at the head of the cart, his bare hands resting on the frozen hemp traces.
Every breath he exhaled vented a dense column of white steam that rose four paces into the freezing gloom.
His baseline blood heat remained locked at seventy point zero degrees.
Thirty-six blazing bright Asura channels circulated high-pressure Yang-heat through his skeletal frame, preventing his joints from stiffening under the arctic chill.
