The four sword attendants didn’t see a miracle of spark grounding. They saw their own impending executions. If word reached the High Elders of the Sovereign Sword Pavilion that the Seventh Young Master had been stripped of his royal trousers, dumped into fermented cow dung, and had voluntarily shoved his noble feet into mortal peasant boots, the four attendants wouldn’t merely be dismissed. They would be flayed alive and hung from the clan’s old family lightning towers as a warning to future escorts.
“Young Master, wake up from this enchantment!” the senior attendant shrieked, his voice climbing into desperate hysteria. He drew his four-foot flying sword, its polished steel edge flashing with jagged purple lightning runes. “This mortal is an agent of the Nether Fiends! He used dark witchery to corrupt your divine sword bone! Strip off those hideous cowhide boots at once! Let’s butcher this insolent ditch-digger and burn his cart to cleanse your honor!”
The other three attendants drew their blades all at once, forming the “Four-Directional Cloud-Severing Formation.” Four sword beams of sharp purple energy came together, aimed directly at Frank’s throat. General Zhao shouted from the castle walls, ordering his archers to draw their bowstrings. But the attendants were already launching forward at faster-than-sound speed.
Frank didn’t reach for his claw hammer. He didn’t draw his measuring tape. He reached into his leather tool pouch. He unhooked a heavy-duty forged high-pressure crimping tool with long yellow spun-glass handles and a ten-ton squeezing die. From his left cargo pocket, Frank pulled a five-foot length of flat, braided bare-copper bonding strap fitted with heavy brass ring terminals. He strolled past the four charging sword tips as if they were midges dancing over an irrigation ditch. He stepped straight up to Murong Seven.
“Hold the blade steady, kid,” Frank said calmly.
“Master?” Murong Seven blinked, his eyes still shining with leftover tears of spark epiphany.
Frank slipped the brass ring end-post over the threaded brass handle knob nut at the base of Murong Seven’s six-foot old family thunder blade. He tightened the nut with a flick of an open-ended wrench, then took the other end of the braided copper strap. Then he slid it into a heavy brass grounding eyelet riveted directly to the thick leather tool belt around Murong Seven’s waist. Frank brought the high-pressure crimper down on the end-post lug.
PUMP. PUMP. CRUNCH.
Ten tons of high-pressure force squeezed the copper barrel into a solid, cold-welded six-sided bond. “Equipment chassis is now bonded to your grounding harness,” Frank announced. He tapped the crimped connection with his thumbnail. “Nonstop loop flow pushback: zero point zero two ohms. You’re fully bonded. Try a nonstop load test.”
The lead attendant reached them, his sword plunging downward in a lethal thrust aimed straight at Frank’s collarbone! “Die, mortal dog!”
Murong Seven didn’t think. He didn’t calculate sword forms or recite ancient mnemonics. He simply moved by pure builder instinct, raising his six-foot old family blade in a level high-block.
CLANG!
The four attendants’ swords struck Murong Seven’s blade at the same time. Under normal circumstances, four convergent sword beams would have created an overwhelming back-EMF surge through the blocking weapon, discharging thousands of volts of reactive current into the defender’s wrists and shattering their bones. Instead, the instant the four blades made contact, the braided copper bonding strap between the sword handle knob and Murong Seven’s belt flared with blinding orange soft glow!
ZRRRRRRRRT!
All of the incoming spark violence was instantly sucked down the copper strap, conducted through his bonded chassis harness, down the heavy copper ground rod, and dumped straight into the land-wide bedrock. Zero shaking reached Murong Seven’s wrists. Zero heat entered his dantian.
Finding a path of total zero pushback, Murong Seven’s own internal sword bone responded with easy power. He swept his blade in a casual, two-handed circular arc.
SHZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZT!
A clear, ball-shaped dome of pure violet star-fire blossomed outward from his sword tip. It stretched ten feet in every direction. The star-fire shield didn’t crackle or spit sparks. It hummed with the smooth, balanced tone of a sixty-cycle commercial power yard.
The four attendants’ flying swords struck the star-fire dome.
BAM! BAM! BAM! BAM!
The enchanted steel blades didn’t pierce the barrier. The intense heat energy of the steadied star-fire instantly softened the metal. The four heirloom swords bounced off the humming dome like rubber twigs, their hardened steel tips melting into blunt, glowing bronze blobs! The bone-shaking pressure wave threw all four attendants backward through the air. It sent them skidding thirty yards across the mud on their stitched silk backs.
Murong Seven stood in the center of the courtyard. He was surrounded by his shimmering, perfectly ball-shaped violet star-fire dome. He lowered the blade. The dome smoothly collapsed back into the steel with a gentle click.
He looked down at his blunt, melted opponents groaning in the mud. Then, he looked at the braided copper strap connecting his sword to his belt. A fierce, sudden clarity ignited in Murong Seven’s eyes.
“Insolent, blind fools!” Murong Seven’s voice boomed across the castle. It shook with the power of a man who had seen the true stonework of Heaven. He marched toward his groaning attendants, his heavy rubber boots thudding against the stone with the unbending rhythm of an iron piston. “You dare raise your swords against Master Lu?! You dare call this divine building witchcraft?!”
The lead attendant clutched his singed wrists, whimpering: “Young Master... Your noble bloodline... The Sovereign Sword Pavilion...”
“My clan’s elders are criminal charlatans!” Murong Seven bellowed, his voice echoing off the high castle walls. “For three hundred years, the Sovereign Sword Pavilion has been running uninspected circuits! For three hundred years, our ancestors forced every child of the Murong clan to cycle four hundred and eighty volts through silk slippers with zero earth ground!”
He grabbed the charred, tattered remains of his five-thousand-gold purple silk robes with both hands.
RRRRRRIP!
With a furious heave, Murong Seven tore the royal silk robes from his body, hurling the shredded purple fabric into the mud and stomping it beneath the waffle-tread rubber soles of his work boots! “Flammable, ungrounded garbage! Class-A fire hazard! Zero arc-flash rating! My clan’s elders are running an unpermitted heavy-duty death trap and calling it an immortal sect!”
He spun around, marched straight back to Frank, and dropped to one knee in the mud. “Master!” Murong Seven cried, his voice ringing with total devotion. “This student was blind! I was trapped in the darkness of ungrounded vanity! Teach me the True Way of the Coherent Circuit! Teach me the sacred laws of Ohms and Amperes! I’ll abandon my clan, forsake my inheritance, and follow you into the foundation trenches of Heaven!”
Frank stood looking down at the bare-chested young master, scratching his chin through his work stubble. A neon-amber system window snapped into focus in his vision.
Frank let out a slow sigh and rubbed his neck. “I swear, every time I fix a piece of equipment, another kid throws himself on the floor. I don’t need students, Murong. I need an apprentice who can pull heavy copper wire through wet ditches without whining about his manicure.”
Murong Seven snapped his head up, his eyes blazing with determination. “I can pull cable, Master! My sword bone can channel ten thousand current units! I’ll dig the ditches with my bare hands!”
“Don’t dig with your hands, that’s what shovels are for,” Frank grunted. He reached into his flatbed cart. Then he pulled out a bundle of heavy-duty canvas work gear. Frank tossed a pair of bright, neon-orange bright twill overalls, a pair of clear tough clear glass safety goggles, and a heavy yellow plastic hard hat into Murong Seven’s lap. “Put those on. High-vis orange with retroreflective silver striping. If you’re going to work on my job site, I need to see you from two hundred yards away so the crane doesn’t back over you.”
Murong Seven clutched the neon-orange overalls to his chest as if they were royal dragon robes woven from sky starlight. “The Sacred Vestments of Clear sight! The armor that turns away the blind chaos of the world!”
He scrambled to his feet, stepping into the heavy orange overalls with respectful haste. He pulled the suspenders over his broad shoulders, adjusted the brass buckles. Then he snapped the clear safety goggles over his eyes. Finally, he lifted the yellow hard hat, holding it above his head with both hands.
“By this crown,” Murong Seven proclaimed, setting the yellow plastic helmet firmly upon his brow and clicking the chin strap shut, “Murong Qi is dead! I’m now Murong Seven, Apprentice Wireman of Ironwood Peak!”
Shen Shitou stepped forward. He handed him an eight-foot solid copper rod and a heavy iron sledge. “Welcome to Class 404,” Shitou rumbled, his stone-like face showing the faintest trace of test. “Keep your back straight when you swing the hammer.”
“Yes, Senior Brother!” Murong Seven shouted, saluting with his copper rod.
Jiang Ling’er smiled faintly, adjusting her brass pressure gauge, while Niu Mang offered the new apprentice a dry stalk of wild thistle to chew on. “Chew on this,” Niu Mang advised. “Stops the dust from sticking to your teeth when you’re trenching.”
“Thank you, Brother Niu!” Murong Seven accepted the thistle, wedging it proudly between his teeth, standing tall in his clunky boots, orange overalls, and yellow hard hat.
The four sword attendants watched from the mud, shivering in disbelief. “The Young Master... Has joined a sky construction guild...” the lead attendant whimpered, trembling in the dirt.
Frank picked up his clipboard and tapped it against his palm. “All right, crew, the circus is over. Break time is officially done. We’ve got two hundred poles to plant and twenty miles of copper wire to string along the northern outer edge before nightfall. Move out!”