A Foundation Establishment beast could leave part of its will in its own marrow. For three hundred years the dragon had hunted the mire, feeding on spirit herbs and crushing every beast that challenged it. Its heart was still now. The instincts that had kept it alive were still in the fat along its spine.
Heat could wake them.
On the fourth day, at the sixth bell, Pei Jing checked the cauldron. The hearth held at four hundred and twenty degrees Celsius. The broth inside was still simmering. Five rings of herbal light turned inside it, green, red, ochre, white, and black.
The first ten gallons of blood had cooked down. He added the other four carboys a little at a time, waiting for each addition to reduce before the next. Then he stirred in the six ounces of Earth-Stalactite Silt. He uncapped all twelve cold-jade flasks and poured the twelve pounds of marrow into the broth, a pound from each.
A shriek tore out of the cauldron. The marrow curled in on itself like a hurt snake and drove the five rings away. The cold qi in the marrow drove the hearth gauge down eighty degrees in a minute. If it fell much farther, the whole batch would harden into a lump of grease.
