Sixty seconds after Grandmaster Ouyang’s shout, the quiet corner around Table Ninety-Four became a purple-robed riot.
The cobblestones shook. Three thousand blacksmiths, sect elders, merchants, princes, and Imperial Academy scholars came stampeding through the garden arches.
Dignity died first. Good manners followed three steps later.
Flying swords collided overhead and showered sparks onto the canvas awnings. Jade pendants snapped from silk belts. Gray-bearded patriarchs threw Foundation-level elbows to get past lifelong friends. Fine shoes trampled the city chrysanthemums into the mud.
Two alleys away, spice sellers choked on chili dust raised by the rush. Market stalls groaned in the spiritual wind. Old mortar flaked from the walls and fell over startled goats.
Nobody cared.
“CLEAR THE ROAD! THE HEAVENLY SWORD SECT OFFERS FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND HIGH-GRADE SPIRIT STONES!”
“THE CROWNING SUN CARAVAN BIDS THREE SPIRIT VEINS AND THIRTY CLOUD BARGES!”
“TEN MILLION STONES! TWELVE PRIVATE ISLANDS! NAME YOUR PRICE, PATRIARCH!”
“THE SEVEN-STAR PAVILION OFFERS TWO SPIRIT MINES AND A ROYAL CHEST OF NINE-CYCLE ELIXIRS!”
Men whose names could silence a province shoved one another like dockworkers fighting for day work. Deeds written on gold foil flew overhead. Iron chests of jade coins slammed onto the stones. Greed filled the air until it smelled of hot copper.
Behind Table Ninety-Four, Austin sat on an overturned pine crate and took another bite of his solar egg.
He chewed, swallowed, and rapped his cardboard sign with a yellow grease pencil.
TAP. TAP. TAP.
The dry little sound cut through the noise.
“Hey. Can any of you boys read a sign?”
The shouting faltered. Three thousand people stared at him.
Austin pointed to the words.
“NO CASH BIDDING. BRING PLANS OR A TRADE OFFER.”
He let his voice carry across the courtyard.
“I don’t want spirit stones. Their value jumps every time a mine opens or collapses. I don’t want cloud boats either. Half of them are green timber held together with wire and prayers. The rot alone would bankrupt me. And keep your ancient mirrors. I’ve got a whole quarry of this alloy back home.”
He tapped the sign again.
“I need high-pressure ram pump plans, double-acting pneumatic cylinders, and precision gear-cutting manuals. I also need a scrap agreement with clear grades, honest scales, and regular collection days. Bring clean drawings or sensible terms and we can talk. Bring shiny rocks and you’re wasting my time.”
Silence fell.
Elders exchanged stunned looks. One stuck a finger in his ear, as if Ouyang’s shout had damaged his hearing.
He refuses cloud ships and ancient treasures for water pump drawings?
“Is this boy mad?” a white-bearded sword elder sputtered. “That is Cosmic Star-Steel! The ancient sutras say it can split the heavens, and he wants drainage sketches?”
“Blasphemy!” a guild smith cried. “He’s trading the bones of stars for ditch-clearing pamphlets!”
“I’VE GOT THEM!”
A ragged shout came from the back of the crowd.
“OUT OF MY WAY, YOU WINDBAGS!”
An old man forced his way through the silk robes with the wild energy of a loose flywheel. His gray clothes were stained with oil and forge soot. White hair stood out from his temples. He smelled of sulfur, pine rosin, and old grease.
Under one arm, he carried a dented bronze drawing tube green with age.
Master Tang had once been chief mechanic of the Imperial Machine Division. Fifty years earlier, while other smiths carved fire runes into swords, Tang had taken apart First Epoch clockwork puppets and studied pressure vessels.
The Imperial Academy called his work godless mortal rubbish. It cut his pay and sent him to a leaky shed beside the canal.
Tang stumbled over an abandoned coin chest and caught himself against Austin’s table. He slammed the bronze tube onto the pine boards.
“I have them, Foreman! By the ancestors’ rusty gears, I have them!” he gasped. “I found them beneath the Northern Desolation forty years ago. The Academy called them worthless because they have no sword chants, no spirit runes, and no dragon script. Just the scribbles of ditch-diggers!”
His blackened fingers twisted off the cap. He slid out a thick roll of amber parchment and spread it across the table. Two iron pipe nuts held down the corners.
Austin leaned in.
The moment he saw the ink lines, his HUD came alive.
Austin’s eyebrows rose toward his hard hat.
The drawings were clean and complete. Every part had measurements. The cylinder plans showed bore finishes, piston gaps, and seal grooves. Nothing had been left to guesswork.
A slow grin spread across his face. He had just unlocked heavy machining and automated production in one trade.
“Look at that. Dual wiper seals. A double-acting ram built for continuous work. Standard gear teeth with every tolerance listed. No mystic mumbo-jumbo. Just honest engineering.”
He looked at Tang.
“Deal.”
Austin turned to Xiaoyao, who was guarding the mules with his chest puffed out.
“Wrap two of the Stellar-Steel bars in burlap and give them to Master Tang. Keep both hands under the load. Two bars is forty pounds of condensed star. Drop that on your instep and you’re done.”
“Understood, Patriarch!”
Xiaoyao wrapped the bars carefully and placed them in Tang’s hands.
The old mechanic’s knees buckled. He pulled the bundle against his chest and began to sob. Tears ran into his beard.
“The machine path is real,” he cried. “The ancients knew. Good craft outlasts the vanity of swords.”
Three thousand cultivators groaned behind him.
“Two bars of cosmic metal for old parchment!”
“I would have searched every storm drain in the province if I’d known!”
“He gave divine metal to a madman who sleeps on rusty wrenches!”
Austin ignored them. He rolled the parchment with care, slid it into his leather drawing tube, and tightened the brass cap.
“Top-tier trade. When we get back to Sunset Peak, Floor Two gets an automated fifty-ton press. We’ll stamp boiler plate by the truckload.”
Ouyang picked up the broken handle of his chisel and looked at Austin’s revised sign. “You also want a standing scrap agreement?”
“One that works after the expo crowds go home,” Austin said. “No secret prices. No buyer rejecting a load after hauling it away.”
Ouyang called over two guild factors instead of summoning more guards. They drafted a short agreement at the next table. The guild would post monthly prices for three tested scrap grades, use sealed weights at pickup and delivery, and pay within ten days. Sunset Peak could refuse any load or buyer. A neutral guild clerk would settle grade disputes, and either side could end the agreement with thirty days’ notice.
Tang read the terms before Austin signed. “Add a floor price for clean machine steel,” he said. “Otherwise they can label your best offcuts as furnace waste.”
Ouyang agreed. Xiaoyao copied the final page for Sunset Peak’s files. It was not a huge victory, but it solved the problem: the workshop now had known prices, regular collection days, and someone accountable when a scale reading looked wrong.
Before the crowd could offer land or marriage contracts, a brass fanfare sounded from the palace walls.
Nine dragon-mouth horns roared across the capital.
“BY DECREE OF IMPERIAL GOVERNOR ZHAO, THE CENTENNIAL GRAND TOURNAMENT OF CANGLAN HAS BEGUN!”
“ALL REGISTERED SECTS, LICENSED GUILDS, AND APPROVED APPLICANTS MUST REPORT TO THE GRAND MARTIAL ARENA FOR THE OPENING CEREMONY AND PRELIMINARY TEST!”
Austin looked toward the huge black-glass arena above the upper district.
He adjusted his hard hat and pack, scratched Pug behind the middle head, and jerked his chin at Xiaoyao.
“Opening ceremonies. Let’s see what kind of prizes and carnival games they’ve got.”