Dawn broke over Sunset Peak in bands of cold gold.
Austin sat on his new porch bench with his feet on the railing and a cup of hot pine-needle tea in his hands. The air smelled of fresh timber and warm stone.
Three Golden Sun-Crows preened on the cabin roof, their feathers clicking like brass shears. In the courtyard, Li Xiaoyao had begun his morning work. He moved at a steady pace, drawing his bamboo broom through the dew in flat, careful strokes.
Austin sipped the bitter tea.
“The base is running well. No lag. Clean timber. If someone would patch the bird noises, I’d give this place a nine out of ten.”
Before he could take another sip, the mountain shook.
THUD-THUD.
Hundreds of iron-shod hooves pounded up the trail. Red dust rose above the pines.
Three hundred heavy cavalry emerged from the trees. Riders in scale armor carried lances, polearms, and bows. Their horses wore black iron barding.
Patriarch Bai Tian led them on a massive, two-horned Iron-Hoofed Rhinoceros. Bai Chen rode beside him on a nervous white stallion. Fear whitened the young man’s knuckles, but his face still wore a mean, hopeful smile.
The column spread out twenty paces from Austin’s fence, blocking the narrow ridge with a wall of spears.
Austin lowered his tea and opened the alert.
He rubbed sleep from one eye.
“Look at that formation. Three hundred mounted units on a twelve-foot trail. A two-hundred-foot drop on one side, boulders on the other. No scouts, no flank protection. This AI couldn’t steer a wheelbarrow through a barn door.”
Bai Tian halted his mount. He looked over the timber cabin, the black courtyard, and Austin in his old hemp shirt.
“Chu Yuan!” His roar shook needles from the pines. “Three days ago, you were starving in the mud. Now you use ancient illusions to cheat the sect, steal Nine-Yang Sun-Gold, and humiliate my son!”
He drew the Heaven-Iron Cleaving Sword. Gray earth-qi crawled along the black blade, and loose gravel rose into the air around him.
“Hand over the immortal treasury beneath this peak! Kneel and accept the Bai Clan’s slave mark, and I may let you live. Refuse, and my riders will turn your cabin into kindling!”
Austin took another sip and fished a pine needle out of his tea.
“These bandit captains talk forever. Is there no way to skip the cutscene?”
Li Xiaoyao held his broom and watched the riders. Bai Chen had offered him food and rank for one betrayal. Now he stood on the other side of the fence. He was scared, but he did not put down the broom or step away from Austin.
Bai Tian’s face turned purple.
“YOU DARE MOCK ME? IRON CAVALRY, CHARGE! LEAVE NOTHING ALIVE!”
“KILL!”
Three hundred voices roared. The front rank of fifty armored horses surged forward and struck the thin copper wire.
BZZZZZT—KABOOM!
Violet fire raced along the boundary. The charge collapsed in a shower of shattered lances and melted armor. Fifty riders flew backward into their own ranks, tangled among screaming men and kicking horses.
Before the second rank could stop, the Sun-Crows launched from the roof.
SCREEEEEECH!
Their golden wings spread wide. The largest bird opened its beak and breathed a cone of white fire across the front line.
Armor melted. Spear shafts dripped like wax. Riders tore off their burning gear while panicked horses bolted through the reserves.
“DIVINE SUN-CROWS?” Bai Tian’s mount stumbled backward. “He keeps ancient divine birds as poultry?”
“Father, I told you!” Bai Chen clung to his rearing horse. “He’s an ancient demon! We have to run!”
“SHUT UP!” Bai Tian’s fear only fed his rage. “Kill the master, and the beasts will scatter!”
He leaped from his rhinoceros and rose forty feet into the air. His Peak Foundation aura burst around him. Thirty feet of gray sword light extended from his blade as he dropped toward Austin.
“NINE HEAVEN SPLITTING DRAGON SLASH!”
The strike could have cut a stone tower in half.
Austin did not put down his cup. He did not even take his feet off the railing. He leaned one shoulder against the porch post and waited.
CLINK.
The sword stopped three inches from his collarbone.
Then it vanished.
The moment it touched the heat around Austin’s body, the steel flashed white and turned into glowing vapor. A faint red mist drifted away.
Bai Tian landed on the porch in a deep crouch, his hands still raised for the killing blow.
Only three inches of charred sharkskin handle remained between his fingers.
The plateau went silent.
Bai Chen slid out of his saddle and landed in the mud.
Austin lowered his cup. He looked at the smoking stub, then at Bai Tian.
“One swing and the whole blade falls apart. Who sold you that junk? Cheap metal, no proper heat treatment. You got robbed, buddy.”
Bai Tian stared at his ruined heirloom.
Seven generations of clan glory had vanished in a puff of smoke.
“My sword...” Black blood ran from the corner of his mouth. “My seven-generation ancestral blade... He called it cheap metal...”
Li Xiaoyao stepped up to the porch with his broom.
“Master, the boundary is cluttered with loose iron, noisy beasts, and foreign garbage. Shall this student clear the cache?”
Austin waved a hand. “Yeah. Clear it. All those bodies are hurting the frame rate.”
“Student obeys.”
Li Xiaoyao set his feet, drew a breath, and swept the broom in one broad, level arc.
SWWWWIIIISH!
A hundred-yard crescent of sword wind tore across the plateau. It caught Bai Tian, Bai Chen, and all three hundred cavalry. Men, horses, armor, and siege crossbows lifted into the air and tumbled backward down the trail in a roaring mass of bruised limbs and broken gear.
The noise faded into the valleys.
The courtyard was clean again. Empty air. Bare black stone. Silence.
Austin took another sip of tea and nodded at Li Xiaoyao.
“Much better. Smooth sixty frames.”