At the sixth bell on the second day, the vault shook with the pulse of the earth veins. Pei Jing came out of his sheltered cleft into the fourfold weight of the Outer Ring Dais. He ate two strips of dried beast meat and a handful of dried lingzhi, then drank eight ounces of cold water.
The first day had taken him to ten percent. He knew what four times his usual weight did to his stance. He could stop a falling cleaver without breaking his wrists. He’d seen the narrow currents that carried the swords around the hall. Today he wanted to know where those currents came from.
He drew the Cloud-Splitter and took his place in the dark stone circle. The twenty-eight-inch blade pulled at his shoulder.
He meant to make a thousand slow chops in two hours. Seven and two tenths of a second for each complete form, from the lift through the stop.
He raised the cleaver. Here, his forty-pound weapon weighed as much in his hands as a hundred and sixty pounds would at the surface. When he swung it fast, its own motion could carry it through the weak parts of his form. This slow practice made him hold up every inch of steel.
