An immense bronze gong boomed across the steaming caldera, signaling the start of the seventy-two-hour conclave.
The sound wave rolled across the volcanic lake, churning the green mineral waters into frothing foam. High on the crater rim, hundreds of thousands of spectators unleashed a deafening roar.
Instantly, ninety-nine circular stone platforms erupted into blinding flame.
On Platform Two, an elder of the Blood-Star Sanctuary threw handfuls of scarlet mineral powder into his furnace, conjuring a roaring cyclone of Crimson Spirit Fire. On Platform Three, a grandmaster from the Void Lotus sect unleashed freezing blue flames, chilling the surrounding air into frost.
Across ninety-nine stations, grandmasters sweated blood. They hovered over roaring flues, their eyes bulging with strain as they channeled their spiritual energy into precise thermal layers.
Apprentices dashed across bronze chain bridges carrying heavy lead buckets of spirit charcoal, crushed monster marrow, and jade canisters of distilled spring water.
Every alchemist was locked in a brutal race against time. They were desperate to establish their initial thermal core before their competitors could seize the ambient Qi of the caldera.
On Platform Fifty, an overeager junior master misjudged his furnace draft. A gout of black sparks erupted from his chimney, singing his beard and scorching his silk sleeves to ash.
