High in the dark rock vault of Entry hall 899, eight hundred arm-lengths above the green jade dais, the diamond Meridian Eye between the First Sovereign’s brows flared with sky-high bright glare.
It wasn’t a stationary beam. The turquoise light projected upward against the diamond star-patterns embedded in the arched ceiling, setting the seventy-two ancient star-patterns into rapid, forward sky-high motion. The sky ephemeris of the ten-thousand-year flood cycle unfolded across forty leagues of underground rock, displaying the inexorable exact convergence of the sky ocean with the terrestrial sphere.
Qiao Ming stood beside the Sovereign’s huge left foot, his bare soles anchored firmly into the warm green jade pavers. He tilted his weathered head back, watching the silver star-tracks rotate across the ceiling.
For thirty years, he had studied the hand-drawn tide tables left by Old Master Lu, correlating the ebb and flow of underground drain tubes with the cycles of the moon. Now, he watched the projection of the ancient heavens. He saw the grand cosmic engine that governed all water. The star-pattern of the Water Dragon was climbing toward the sky zenith. Meanwhile, the Deep-sea Ox dropped into the lower nodes. When those two sky bodies intersected, the sky cloud-veil that protected the four continents would rupture under the weight of the sky waters.
