The chime that rang from Frank’s navel was not the metal ping of an ordinary spiritual breakthrough.
DING.
It was a deep, omnidirectional sound pulse that rang through the land-wide bedrock. It shook at the deepest hum of the planet’s iron core.
Across the Great Da-Qi Imperial Capital, every suspended dust particle froze mid-air. The wind stopped. The fountain jets in the royal palace courtyards hung suspended like glass sculptures. And two hundred thousand spectators felt the gravity pull beneath their feet shift by half a degree toward the center of the arena.
In the northern trade quarters four miles away, baked-clay tea cups ceased rattling on wooden shelves. Birds gliding over the palace towers hovered motionless in the sky, caught in a momentary time stall, as if the air pressure of the entire province had been locked into a singular, unmoving vise.
Inside Frank’s lower belly, the five-hundred-carat, fifty-seven-faceted lab-grown diamond pellet had locked into total heat-powered balance.
Under five hundred mountain-crushing pressure of isotropic squeezing, the tetrahedral carbon lattice was as clear and cold as the void between stars. Every covalent bond was heavy with sky crystal-clear posture. It formed an iron-hard ball-shaped pressure vessel capable of containing the core of a dying red giant.
And then—
Around the mid-belt outer rim of the diamond core, nine nested rings of blinding, purple-gold solar fire snapped into existence with a rhythmic series of tiny sonic cracks:
SNAP-SNAP-SNAP-SNAP-SNAP!
Nine nested rings.
Nine sky solar orbits.
The hydrogen atoms captured from the white-hot fiery water vapor and healing dragon essence were drawn into the diamond’s gravity slipstream. Guided by the tiny helical rifling of Frank’s main spirit veins, the atoms collided under fourteen million Degrees of star-heat of heat flux, initiating self-sustaining, clean stellar hydrogen fusion!
In Frank’s eyes, the Heavenly Bug Tracker screen exploded with brilliant golden fireworks, cascading tracking data streams, and heavy system chimes!
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
A column of pure, solid, purple-gold solar light erupted from Frank’s body, shooting straight upward into the cloudless blue sky!
The light was not scorching. It didn’t burn the hair, blister the skin, or singe the clothes of anyone nearby.
It radiated a warm, life-affirming, golden bright glare that washed across the entire Great Da-Qi Empire. In the royal palace gardens, dead winter plum trees burst into fragrant pink blossoms in five seconds flat. Crippled elders across the capital found their aching joints flooded with youthful life-force. And the stale, polluted waters of the Northern Dragon Spring were purified into sparkling, sky sweet water!
High above the continent, the brilliant pillar of purple-gold solar radiance pierced through the clouds, lighting up three neighboring mortal kingdoms in broad daylight!
Nine ghostly, five-clawed golden solar dragons—formed from pure, pure stellar fusion energy—showed up within the light, circling Frank’s body in a grand, soaring sky-high dance, letting out majestic roars of ancient sky respect!
ROOOOOOOOOOOAR! ROOOOOOOOOOOAR!
The sound majesty of the dragons echoed through the marrow of every living soul within a hundred miles.
On the VIP viewing balcony, Chief Judge Pill King Dan Kui fell flat onto the polished marble floor. His dignified silver hair spilled wildly across his robes, tears wetting the stone, his hands clawing at his yellow hard hat in total, weeping religious ecstasy.
“The Nine-Pattern Golden Core!” Dan Kui screamed, his trembling voice carrying the reverie of an ancient pilgrim who had witnessed the creation of the heavens. “The legendary Core of the Ancient Sages! The scriptures of the First Epoch declared that only once in ten billion years does a Sage of Heaven forge the Nine Solar Orbits within mortal flesh! He has forged an Immortal Sun in his belly!”
Emperor Yan dropped to both knees beside Dan Kui, tossing his golden dragon ritual saber onto the flat stone slabs as if it were a child’s worthless wooden stick.
“A Living Immortal...” the Emperor choked, his royal crown askew, tears carving clean trails through the soot on his cheeks. “A Heavenly Celestial Sage has dropped upon Great Da-Qi! The royal dynasty is blessed! We’re witnessing the birth of a Sun God!”
Behind them, the three hundred grandmasters of the Potion-maker Guild sank into the dust one after another. Their foreheads struck the marble in wild, rhythmic supplication. Many clawed at their robes in shame, recalling how they had scoffed at Frank’s tool bucket and copper wrenches mere days before.
All two hundred thousand spectators—generals, sect masters, merchant barons, and street sweepers alike—pressed their foreheads into the dust of the tiered stands, chanting in thunderous, rhythmic waves that shook the mountains:
“Greetings to the Solar Grandmaster! Greetings to Master Lu!”
Over in the Ironwood Peak staging area, Frank’s three students stood in rigid, disciplined formation, fully unmoved by the frantic religious fervor sweeping the arena.
Shen Shitou adjusted his silver-steel heavy tool belt, clicked his heavy brass pen, and scribbled rapidly onto a parchment clipboard.
“Heat holding stable,” Shitou muttered in a deadpan flat voice, his stone-cut jaw set firm. “Internal pressure holding at half a million bar. Zero micro-fractures in the foundation. Master’s squeezing math was within point-zero-two percent of nominal building limit.”
Jiang Ling’er wiped a streak of grease from her cheek with the back of her leather work glove. Her fiery eyes glowed with deep vocational enlightenment.
“Look at that burning smooth speed,” Ling’er whispered, her voice filled with awe. “Zero soot. Zero ash. Not a single drop of unburnt fuel escaping the stack. That’s what Master meant by clean burn. The Potion-maker Guild’s four-thousand-year history of pill refining is nothing more than primitive open-pit wood fires compared to this.”
Niu Mang adjusted his yellow hard hat and tapped his heavy spirit-level against his knee.
“The load-bearing symmetry of those nine dragon rings is flawless,” Niu Mang murmured. He took careful stone-built notes. “Equidistant sky-high spacing. Perfectly balanced torque. When we lay the foundation for the new Ironwood Peak blast pavilion next month, we must replicate that exact outward load spreading.”
Meanwhile, Frank stood in the center of the roaring light, his hands shoved casually into his denim pockets.
He looked down at his stomach.
Deep inside his Dantian, the steady, rhythmic hum of the fusion dynamo felt like a well-tuned four-metal tube diesel engine idling smoothly on premium grade fuel. No shakes, no carbon soot, zero heat leakage, and not a single rattle in the valve train.
“Level thirty-five,” Frank muttered, scrolling through his newly unlocked screen sub-menus. “Passive fifty-meter test range unlocked. Core heat perfectly controlled. No more need to light spirit charcoal for soldering irons.”
Frank blinked, and the world transformed in his eyes.
The passive fifty-meter test scanner cast a faint, emerald-green CAD grid over everything within range.
He could see the exact pulling stress lines running through the arena floor. He could spot thirty-four hairline micro-fractures in the royal balcony’s load-bearing marble arches. And he could see the severe deep wear in the arena’s outer retaining walls where the Potion-maker Guild had skimped on iron rods two hundred years ago.
“Substandard aggregate in those concrete pillars,” Frank noted with mild disgust. “Too much sand, not enough lime. One moderate earthquake and that entire VIP pavilion is coming down like a house of dry leaves. I’ll need to bill the Emperor for an emergency load-bearing retrofit before we leave town.”
Frank extended his right hand.
With a tiny mental flick, he channeled a tiny trickle of stellar fusion heat from his diamond core through the minor fire channels of his forearm.
A pinpoint flame of pure, semi-clear purple star-fire ignited at the tip of his thumbnail. It burned steadily with a quiet, high-hum hiss:
PSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS.
It burned cleanly at ten million Degrees of star-heat, perfectly contained by the magnetic boundary layer of his Level 35 Qi field. It didn’t singe his cuticle. It didn’t scorch his fingernail. And it radiated zero blasting heat beyond a tiny outer edge.
“Nice pilot light,” Frank nodded, inspecting the needle-thin purple jet. “I can braze copper pipe, anneal silver-steel fittings, and sweat brass joints without carrying an oxy-acetylene tank or buying expensive spirit charcoal. That’s at least four hundred copper coins saved per plumbing job.”
The blinding pillar of purple-gold solar light slowly condensed. It folded inward like heavy silk curtains, until it was drawn back into Frank’s navel angled slats.
High above, the nine golden solar dragons gave one final, ringing roar of sky farewell before dissolving into a warm, glittering golden mist that settled harmlessly over the arena floor like morning dew.
The blinding solar glare faded, and the midday sunlight returned to normal.
In the center of the smoking stage, lying in a puddle of scorched ash and melted bronze melted rock waste, Grandmaster Ouyang slowly dragged himself upright.
The former supreme sovereign of the Potion-maker Guild had lost his violet-gold robes, his ritual silver crown, and his dignified three-foot beard. He sat in his blackened, shredded silk underwear, his skin covered in soot, his eyes rolled back in glassy stupor.
He clutched a melted, eight-inch bronze pipe rim bolt against his bare chest like a baby doll, rocking back and forth on his haunches, giggling hysterically as he mumbled nonsense syllables into the ash:
“Giggle... Bubble... The big pot went boom... Nine pretty dragons flew up the chimney... Hehehe... Shiny yellow hat... Pretty yellow hat...”
His Golden Core was fully shattered by the spiritual backdraft. His four hundred years of training had evaporated into thin air. And his mind was permanently reduced to the mental capacity of an eighteen-month-old toddler.
Frank walked past him without breaking stride. He didn’t even cast a downward glance at the former guild master.
“Classic total failure due to unqualified personnel,” Frank muttered under his breath, shaking his head. “Running an unlisted pressure vessel without safety valves. Ignoring five in a row red-line pressure warnings. Bypassing main relief lines with duct tape and positive thinking. He’s lucky he only suffered a total neural blowout instead of turning into greasy vapor on the back wall.”
Frank stopped at the edge of the smoking blast crater.
Before him lay the twisted, blackened carcass of the thirty-foot Nine-Dragon Ancient Cauldron.
The huge bronze vessel had collapsed fully under the force of Frank’s aimed shear kick. The upper hemispherical dome had been snapped cleanly along the chalk guideline, blown safely upward into the high air where its striking force had scattered into the clouds.
The lower belly of the cooking pot was cracked wide open like a roasted walnut, the six-inch-thick cast bronze plates peeled backward like the petals of an iron flower.
Frank stepped over the mangled bronze heavy beams, his steel-toed work boots crunching softly on the scorched dark rock.
He conducted a quick post-incident load-bearing survey.
“Aimed venting was ninety-eight percent effective,” Frank murmured. He tapped the snapped edge of the main intake pipe rim with the toe of his boot. “All explosive striking force was channeled vertically at an eighty-two degree angle. Zero collateral load-bearing damage to the outer edge seating. The chalk line held the stress concentration perfectly.”
And then, his gaze dropped to the focal point of the rupture.
Right at the south intake coupling—the exact sharp-angled point where the four-million-degree star-fire stream had been funneled through the chalk ‘X’ before being drawn into his core—something was glowing with intense, multi-colored bright glare.
Deep within the cooling pile of white healing ash, beneath three layers of fused bronze melted rock waste, thirty perfectly round orbs were pulsing with soft, rainbow-bright light.
Frank bent his knees, reached his leather-gloved hand into the smoking debris, and brushed aside the soot.