Thirty thousand feet above the Great Void Sea, there was no weather. Pei Jing heard only the dry hiss of space folding. Below him, black water stretched for twenty thousand miles between the Eastern Azure Continent and the Western Desolation.
In the months since he had first touched the intake, he had trained along the sea’s known currents. The first route drills had finished the consolidation he’d begun above Iron Peak. After that, he made his soul hold its shape during the long folds instead of letting the force settle on his body alone. At first the armor shifted with every landing. After months of correcting the strain, the whole shell held through a crossing and stayed steady when he touched down. That was when he reached Middle Nascent Soul. He could now take steps of thousands of miles, though an unfamiliar landing still slowed him.
He planted his left foot against the bend in space and let his Five-Elemental Chaos Spirit Root tighten around it. The water below vanished. He came out ten thousand miles farther west with a jolt that went through his knees and into his ribs.
Step. Fold. Settle.
He stopped in the Western Desolation. Heat met him at once. He stood on a red sandstone mesa with dunes three hundred paces below. The wind smelled of hot shale and bitter salt.
