“Stop them! Don’t let those outsiders put a single pipe on our glacier!”
Elder Bing He scrambled out of the warm slush puddle, his wet white beard already beginning to stiffen again in the minus-two-hundred-degree wind outside the train’s steam zone. He waved his empty sleeves furiously at his five hundred Law-Enforcement Disciples. “Get up, you lazy fools! Why are you still sitting in that puddle?! Draw your backup daggers and slash their iron pipes!”
Down in the warm puddle, the five hundred disciples looked at each other awkwardly.
“Uh, First Elder,” a chubby outer disciple said, hugging his knees in the warm water. “Our backup daggers were also forged from Secular Ice-Iron. They melted into soup spoons when the steam hit us. Plus, my legs are cramping terribly from the cold. I don’t think I can stand up for at least an hour!”
“Mine too! Ouch, my knee!”
“First Elder, I think I sprained my dantian when I landed! I have to stay in this warm puddle to recover my Qi!”
All five hundred disciples lay back down in the warm water at the exact same time, closing their eyes and letting out long, happy sighs as the residual heat from Star-Train No. 1 warmed their frozen bones.
