The river smelled of ozone, stale marsh mud, and copper filings.
Lin Ke stood at the rusted iron mooring bollard of the Grand River Ferry Hub, his boots grinding into wet limestone grit. The shaking came through the soles of his boots. Not the gentle, organic roll of river water against stone, but a jagged, thirty-cycle stutter that set his dental fillings shaking in his jaw.
In his lower dantian, the Nine-Turn Glass Core spun with a cold, glassy chime.
The core was a sight switch of tightly packed crystal, early-stage and freshly steadied from the bloodbath of his foundation consolidation. Every seven breaths, the surrounding flow of underground energy dropped off a cliff, plummeting by forty percent before surging back in a violent, ragged spike that made his glassy spirit veins ache like frostbitten glass.
“The River Dragon is displeased!” an elder wailed from the raised ritual pier fifty paces downriver.
Elder Han, dockmaster of the Iron Ferry Crossing, wore water-silk robes stained with wet soot and animal fat. Behind him, four sweating acolytes dragged an ox toward the boat ramp. The beast bellowed in terror, its hooves sliding on river grease. Meanwhile, a bronze fire bowl belched clouds of choking musk and frankincense into the morning fog.
