Outside the shattered remains of Toll Booth #88, General Tie Zhan stood only five feet tall, yet his compact, barrel-shaped body glowed like a miniature red sun fresh out of a cosmic forge.
Inside his belly, the three Supernova Heavy Pork Buns had completely melted into his blood and marrow. Three billion tons of compressed neutron-star mass flowed seamlessly through his Iron-Anvil Body Art meridians. Every time his heart beat—THUMP! THUMP!—waves of heavy crimson heat rippled across the cracked Grade-8 Space Asphalt, blowing loose wood splinters and gravel fifty yards away.
Above his bald, scarred head, golden sun-rings spun with a low, metallic hum.
“Ahem!” Tie Zhan burped out a puff of golden scallion-scented steam, patted his iron-hard stomach, and pointed a thick finger up at the thirty-five-foot-tall Vanguard General Gu Shan. “All right, tall idiot! Now I am seventy percent full. Are you going to kneel down and pay Abacus Su for my soup bowl and the toll booth, or do I have to come up there and break your kneecaps?”
General Gu Shan stared down at the five-foot human whose head barely reached the top of his spiked iron shin-guard. Even though his instincts warned him that those golden pork buns were no ordinary food, thirty thousand years of Titan-Bone Martial Dynasty pride refused to let him back down in front of a man one-seventh his height!
