The six-inch hole in the gold-trimmed bronze roof of the Hall of Ten Thousand Sages didn’t let in daylight. Through the clean, circular puncture, one saw only the total, choking void of the darkened heavens. A sky the color of dried squid ink.
Around the rim of the puncture, the five-inch-thick cast bronze plate had not melted into melted rock waste. There were no drip marks, no scorch marks, and no discoloration from heat rusting. The ancient sky warding runes carved into the bronze—symbols of protective sun-dragons that had guarded the mountain for thirty hundred years—were cut cleanly in half, and where they were cut, the magical light of the runes didn’t flicker or bleed into the metal. The runes simply ceased to exist.
Frank unclipped his twenty-four-foot folding light metal ladder from Shen Shitou’s rigging pack. With two swift flicks of his forearms, he snapped the hinged joints into place. He listened for the sharp clockwork click of the spring-loaded locking pins engaging. He leaned the rubber-footed rails against the nearest inside scaffold beam, gave the ladder a vigorous shake to verify footing balance. Then he climbed up through the roof small roof-dome.
He was wearing his Level-B PPE. Clear tough clear glass face shield over his safety glasses, thick black rubber gauntlets over his leather gloves, and his denim overalls zipped up to the throat.
