Forty thousand feet above the Central Sea, Pei Jing sat on a ledge of frozen cloud. Ice dust passed over the sleeves of his wool robe. Through breaks in the cloud, he could see blue water bending away in both directions.
He was waiting for a courier.
People in the halls kept more qi-blood in their marrow. Pei Jing had watched the feeder current weaken, so the Dominion was already taking less in its steady draw. The same change reduced the amount the network could seize at the next harvest. Alpha’s dispatch register marked the inspection carriage’s entry fold at forty thousand feet, five miles north of this ledge. When a feeder fell short, an envoy crossed there at the next change of watch. He’d come early enough to see the passage open.
While he waited, Pei Jing drew the essence from fifty high-grade spirit stones. The heat woke his Armored Nascent Soul.
He spent two hours practicing short folds into the wind. At that height, if he came out facing the wrong way, the wind could turn him before his feet found anything to stand on. He practiced drawing the blade as he came out and holding it steady while the air rushed past. On the thirty-sixth pass, he heard no whistle from the edge.
