The copper bell of the central watchtower hung thirty paces above the stone floor, silent after the slaughter.
The midnight air inside the belfry was twenty degrees below freezing.
Frost clung to the heavy oak timbers in jagged, needle-sharp rime.
On the flat stone slabs, the charred residue of seven shadow-fiends still sizzled. It bubbled into foul-smelling grease that smoked against the sub-zero chill.
Lu Chen stood motionless in the center of the chamber.
Steam vented in slow, rhythmic pulses from beneath the collar of his boiled leather tunic.
His baseline heat sat at seventy degrees.
The heat radiated outward in nested waves. That kept a ten-pace circle of granite flat stone slabs fully dry. Meanwhile, the rest of the high tower crusted over with blue frost.
