Inside the central dining hall of the System #82 Municipal Prison & Rehabilitation Center, three hundred kitchen attendants in white aprons stood holding their soup ladles in stunned silence.
In the middle of Serving Line #1, sticking vertically out of a fifty-foot steaming stainless-steel tray of Slow-Braised Fire-Worm Over Steamed Spirit-Rice, was a pair of heavy Golden-Crow bronze battle boots.
CLINK—CLACK!
Before the boots could even stop twitching, Old Wei—who had teleported ahead to the prison moon to oversee inmate intake—stepped casually up to the serving tray, pulled out a pair of fused Rank 8 Qi-Calming Heavy Iron Shackles, and snapped them neatly around Great General Jin Xiao’s ankles and wrists.
“Careful with the rice tray, Brother Wei,” the head prison chef sighed, shaking his ladle at the hole in the glass skylight above. “Old Guo spent forty minutes simmering that five-spice worm gravy! Now we have to scoop out the middle section where his helmet landed and feed it to the pigs.”
“BLURGH—PTUI!”
With a muffled roar, Great General Jin Xiao pushed himself up out of the mountain of fluffy white spirit-rice and glistening brown gravy!
His crimson hair was plastered flat against his forehead with thick, savory star-anise sauce. Two slices of slow-cooked Meat-Belly Giant Potato were stuck to his shoulder pads like extra medals, a green scallion ring hung over his left ear, and Hong Ling’s yellow “IMPOUNDED — VIP REPEAT OFFENDER” sticker was still glued firmly to his chest where his golden breastplate had shattered.
