On the fortified northern castle wall of the Floating Mountain, the thunderous sound of crunching sky brass had finally subsided, replaced by an awestruck silence that hung over two hundred thousand mortal defenders.
Standing atop a massive granite firing low roof wall, Old Man Tie lowered his blackened brass spyglass from his left eye. His right arm—grafted from iron-hard meteor-iron and pulsating with veins of molten golden titan-essence—rested heavily against the polished timber crank of an eight-fathom siege engine. A broad, tusky grin slowly parted the bear beastman’s thick iron-gray beard.
He threw his massive head back. A roar of belly laughter erupted from his barrel chest, rattling the stone tiles along the low roof wall like an avalanche.
“Bwahahaha! Look at the little boss!” Tie Shan bellowed, slapping his iron thigh with a resounding CLANG. “Not even two minutes! Didn’t even leave a brass bolt for scrap! He ate their entire nine-fold sun-cooker like a basket of fried sesame twists!”
Beside him, thirty elite bear smiths and fifty wolf scouts erupted into raucous cheering. Across the lower terraces, human archers and rogue fighters leaned over the castle walls, raising their fists toward the heavens where the semi-clear sapphire blob hovered in peaceful, round perfection.
