Four hundred feet of sheer crimson sandstone blotted out the afternoon sun, turning the Grand Gorge into a canyon of cold amber shadow.
Between the towering cliffs, the river narrowed to less than eighty paces as the barge glided deeper into the chasm. The air carried a strange, dry hum, vibrating like a struck bronze bell.
Up on the foredeck, a dozen young cultivators stood shoulder to shoulder against the railing.
They were apprentices and clan scions from the rural counties, traveling toward Red-River City for the Nine-Cauldron entrance trials. Every one of them had their heads tilted back, their eyes wide as they stared up at the sheer rock face above.
Carved directly into the crimson stone were three colossal characters of Dao calligraphy, each thirty feet tall: SEVER THE SKY.
The ancient strokes had been gouged into the cliff by an Iron Bone grandmaster three centuries ago. Lingering sword intent still radiated from the stone cuts, pulsing with a sharp, hypnotic rhythm that made the river water ripple in unnatural circles.
“Look at the vertical slash,” a young man in silk robes breathed, clutching his silver-inlaid blade. “The pressure alone makes my blood boil. If I can comprehend even a tenth of this sword rhythm, my breakthrough is guaranteed.”
Beside him, two other apprentices sat cross-legged on the cedar deck, sweating profusely as they tried to attune their meridians to the ancient cuts.
One of them suddenly gasped, clutching his chest. A thin trickle of bright red blood leaked from the corner of his lip as the overwhelming force of the ancient sword intent threw his internal Qi into violent disorder.
“Don’t force your meridians to match the second stroke,” the silk-robed youth warned, puffing his chest out proudly. “A grandmaster’s intent requires iron discipline. You must drink in the rhythm stroke by stroke, letting the ancient will reshape your soul.”
Back near the cargo stanchions, Kaelen Vance suddenly sat bolt upright in his hammock.
A sharp, prickling warmth was scratching at the front of his skull. The moment his gaze brushed the edges of the first character, the bronze stele in his mind shuddered violently.
[Track 3 (Alchemy & Comprehension): Involuntary Intent Ingestion Detected] [External Dao Residue Threatening Spontaneous Epiphany] [Warning: Active Comprehension Will Reset Sloth Timer to 00h 00m]
Spontaneous epiphany?
Kaelen felt a cold sweat break out across his neck.
Ancestors protect me, Kaelen thought in pure terror. A Dao biohazard! If my brain accidentally figures out that dead swordsman’s footwork, my seventy-two hours of laziness die on the spot!
He did not hesitate for a fraction of a second.
He reached into his sleeve, whipped out a folded strip of thick black silk, and tied it tightly across his eyes with a double knot. He pulled his wool blanket all the way up over his ears, burying his face in his dried buckwheat pillow.
“Steersman!” Kaelen bellowed through the blanket. “Put your back into the sweeps! Row! Get us through this gorge before my brain catches fire!”
The oarsmen blinked in confusion, but the urgency in Kaelen’s voice made them pull harder on the ash sweeps.
At the railing, the silk-robed youth turned around and sneered.
“Look at that coward,” the youth scoffed, laughing loudly for the other apprentices to hear. “He takes one look at the Grandmaster’s blade marks and ties a rag over his face. He’s suffering from Dao vertigo!”
His companion snickered into his sleeve. “Country bumpkins can’t handle true martial resonance. A single glance at genuine intent turns their stomach into curdled milk.”
Barnaby Holt took a step toward them, his single fist clenching around his mallet. “Watch your tongue, whelp, before I teach your teeth how to swim.”
Before Barnaby could swing his arm, Mina Vance stepped quietly past him.
Her blue eyes were ice-cold. She held a steaming earthenware cup of jasmine tea in her small hands, her expression completely calm as she walked toward the tea table where the laughing youth had set his silver cup.
She did not draw a weapon. She merely rested the tips of two slender fingers on the edge of the cypress tabletop.
A silent, pale frost rippled across the wood grain.
The frost spread like a creeping spiderweb, touching the base of the youth’s silver teacup. Within half a heartbeat, the steaming tea inside the cup turned into a solid block of dark ice. The liquid froze so rapidly that the expanding frost cracked the silver rim with a sharp PING.
The youth turned to pick up his cup to take a boastful sip.
He grabbed the handle and yanked. The cup did not budge. The bottom was welded to the cypress wood with iron-hard frost.
He pulled harder, bracing his shoulder.
CRACK.
The handle snapped clean off in his fingers. The shock jarred his wrist, sending him stumbling backward onto the wet deck with an undignified yelp. Cold water soaked through the seat of his silk trousers.
The surrounding apprentices fell instantly silent, staring at the shattered handle and the ice creeping across the table.
The silk-robed youth scrambled to his feet, clutching his bruised wrist in dismay. He glared at Mina, but when he saw the faint blue frost still dancing across her knuckles, the anger drained from his face.
“An awakened Yin-vein at twelve years old,” another apprentice whispered, hurriedly stepping behind a cargo barrel. “That’s no country bumpkin.”
Barnaby leaned against the timber railing and let out a harsh bark of laughter. “Keep staring at that cliff wall, boy! Maybe the dead grandmaster will teach you how to thaw your trousers!”
Mina took a slow sip of her own tea and walked back to Kaelen’s hammock without looking back once.
“Drink your tea while it’s hot, Brother,” Mina said softly, sitting on her pickle crate. “The air is very chilly near the cliffs.”
Kaelen remained buried under his blanket, his voice muffled by wool. “Did we clear the writing yet?”
“Another two hundred yards,” Sera Thorne said, leaning against the post while keeping an eye on the subdued apprentices. “Keep the blindfold on. I’m not letting seventy hours of peace get ruined by a dead man’s graffiti.”
Kaelen nodded fervently beneath the blanket.
People spend thirty years climbing mountains to find enlightenment, Kaelen thought, shaking his head. They don’t understand the horror. An epiphany is nothing but unpaid overtime forced on you by the heavens.
The roar of rushing water gradually softened. The heavy shadow of the canyon lifted as the gorge widened into a broad, placid river basin.
Ahead lay the Great Water Lock of the Red-River Prefecture.
Massive granite gate towers flanked the river, connected by thick iron chains that regulated the water level. Dozens of flat-bottomed cargo barges and merchant punts were clustered before the lock gates, waiting for the heavy sluices to turn.
Barge tenders ran along the timber catwalks, shouting commands and tossing guide ropes.
A small scow loaded with bundles of dried firewood bumped gently against their port side. Among the scow’s laborers was a hunched figure in a patched oilskin coat, wearing a wide reed hat that shadowed his face.
The figure caught a trailing hemp line, swung himself over their gunwale with effortless grace, and ducked into the shadows beneath Kaelen’s canvas awning.
Sera’s hand dropped to her dagger pommel, but she stopped halfway.
The man pushed his reed hat back by an inch, revealing a sharp, fox-like face with narrow, intelligent eyes and a thin mustache.
“Peace, Lady Sera,” Deacon Vane purred in a smooth whisper. “I would never dream of boarding a vessel without paying the customary respects to Master Ash.”
Barnaby let out a low whistle. “Deacon Vane? How did you reach the gorge locks before us?”
“Fast courier skiff down the eastern canal,” Vane said, dusting river grime from his coat. “The Black-Crow Market does not travel by oxen cart when silver is waiting to be counted.”
Kaelen pushed his blanket aside and untied the black silk blindfold, blinking in the bright sunlight.
“You’re late, Vane,” Kaelen said, rubbing his eyes. “Tell me you brought the earnings. Lounging on this damp deck is expensive.”
Deacon Vane smiled, his teeth flashing in the shadows. He reached beneath his oilskin coat and pulled out a heavy, ironwood lockbox banded with polished brass. He set it on the pickle crate beside Mina.
“Four days of uninterrupted sales at the Ashford Pill Market, Young Master,” Vane said, tapping the brass lid with a manicured finger. “Sixty Low-Grade Spirit Stones, exactly fifteen stones per day. Elder Sterling sends his regards and assures you that fifty veteran mercenaries are guarding the manor walls night and day.”
Kaelen lifted the lid. Inside lay sixty perfectly cut spirit stones, glowing with cool, crystalline light.
He scooped three stones into his palm and felt their dense, pure Qi. Combined with his travelling reserve of four hundred and fifty stones and the thirty stones Sera had collected from the river warden, his wealth now sat at five hundred and forty spirit stones.
He closed the lid with a satisfying CLACK.
“And the city?” Kaelen asked, looking at the merchant broker.
Deacon Vane’s smile faded slightly. He pulled a rolled sheepskin map from his inner pocket and spread it across the crate, weighting the four corners with spent bronze coins.
“Red-River City is on fire with rumors,” Vane murmured, keeping his voice below the noise of the creaking lock gates. “The Nine-Cauldron Guild’s autumn examination has drawn over five hundred candidates from across the province. But Branch Master Orson’s faction is tightening the noose.”
“How tight?” Sera asked, stepping closer to study the ink markings.
“His son, Young Master Orson Junior, has leased every private alchemy courtyard near the Grand Fire-Vein,” Vane explained, tracing a long red line through the harbor district. “The boy claims he needs them for his personal study. In truth, it’s a deliberate squeeze. Any candidate who can’t afford an official guild booth will have to refine pills over cold charcoal on the muddy riverbanks.”
Barnaby spat onto the deck. “Vile swine! In my day, the Fire-Veins were open to anyone with a bronze voucher!”
“Times have changed, Old Barnaby,” Vane said smoothly. “Orson has spent twenty years turning this river into his family pond. If you don’t bow to the young master, you don’t even get chimney soot.”
Deep within Kaelen’s chest, the Fallow Slate resonated with a deep, echoing bronze chime.
[The Fallow Slate: Stage 2 Tri-Track Milestone Reached] [Sloth Preserved: Zero Involuntary Comprehension Triggered] [Track 1 (Cultivation Vessel): 72h 00m / 720h (73x Active)] [Track 2 (Martial Combat): 72h 00m / 720h (73x Active)] [Track 3 (Alchemy & Comprehension): 72h 00m / 720h (73x Active)] [Total Liquid Reserves: 540 Low-Grade Spirit Stones] [Countdown to Lunar Fallow Surge: 648 Hours Remaining]
Seventy-two hours. Seventy-three times multiplier across every track, and five hundred and forty Low-Grade Spirit Stones stacked in his travelling chest.
Before Kaelen could pull his straw hat back over his eyes, Deacon Vane leaned closer, his voice dropping to a barely audible whisper.
“There is one more matter, Young Master,” Vane murmured, glancing toward the massive stone towers rising beyond the lock gates. “A matter concerning your fugitive family.”
Kaelen paused with two fingers on the rim of his hat. “My father?”
“Baron Derrick Vance and your first brother Cassian arrived in Red-River City yesterday afternoon,” Vane whispered. “They didn’t check into an inn. My scouts spotted them entering the fortified compound of the Crimson Vulture Sect in the Upper District.”
Sera’s hand tightened on the wooden post. “What do they have left to trade? The barony stripped their stipends.”
“A parchment deed,” Vane replied, his narrow eyes glinting in the shadow of the canvas awning. “Derrick Vance carried a forged land title transferring the northern iron mines and Vance Manor to the Crimson Vulture Sect. In return, he demanded an outer elder’s seat and a sack of Iron Bone pills.”
Kaelen stared up through the woven straw of his hat as a cold, quiet annoyance stirred beneath his ribs.
A forged deed to my nap room, Kaelen thought. First Brother and Father truly have a death wish.