In the wide backyard courtyard of Willow-Breeze Lane at 7:30 AM, one hundred newly cast, five-foot-wide [Rank 4 Star-Iron Cauldrons] stood arranged in ten neat rows of ten. Their deep blue metallic surfaces still humming with the warmth of Grandpa Yao’s and Master Dan-Chen’s overnight forging fire.
Standing beside the cauldrons in his yellow [Trainee Bowl-Scrubber #2] apron, former Royal Chief Alchemist Master Dan-Chen , at Rank 4 Early. Wiped the forge sweat from his forehead and looked at Gu Changsheng , at Rank 4 Early-Peak, with a mixture of deep reverence and logistical worry.
“Patriarch Gu,” Master Dan-Chen asked earnestly, “Grandmaster Yao and I used all fifty tons of the Moon-Mirror Lake Rank 4 Star-Iron to cast these one hundred indestructible cauldrons before dawn. Butler Fu already holds the rental deeds to one hundred street-corner shops across all nine districts of Sky-Crown City. B-But there is a massive problem!
Even with five Rank 4 Immortals in our household, we cannot be in one hundred shops across nine districts at the exact same time to control the Warm-Hearth Pill-Fire! If ordinary mortal cooks light the fires under these hundred cauldrons without Rank 4 Immortal Qi, the soup won’t be able to dissolve the Rank 3 Cold-Marrow Frost-Worm Poison in time!”
