Beneath the quicksilver lake and the green jade stone floor, the true root of the Axis Mundi took form as a huge stone stand of crystal-clear dark rock.
Qiao Ming moved along the eastern outer edge of the dais, his bare soles gripping the wet edge of the basal curb. The rock here was distinct from the fiery glass of the throne above. It was dark, dense olivine dark rock quarried during the foundation of the world, veined with bands of tightly packed magnetic iron that made the delicate needle of his star compass shudder with low, rhythmic pulses. Every step he took left a brief, pale imprint of skin oils upon the dark rock before the chill stone drew the moisture into its tiny pores, returning the surface to its dry, slate-black matte finish. The stone smelled of deep stone salts, iron oxides, and the unbending cold of things buried beneath ten mountain-crushing pressure of water.
He paused at the edge of the descent where the green jade dais met the upright plunge of the foundation stone stand. Twelve hundred arm-lengths wide at its base, the stone stand dropped into the black hadal abysses of Entry hall 876, disappearing into the underground ocean that fed the lower water gates of the realm. Down in those lightless depths, one hundred and forty-four dowels of stone-hard hardwood pinned the dark rock mass directly to the ancient world-size crust. Those pins had been cut from ancient forests before the sea rose to…
