The mistake made by the elders above was not a minor error. It was a dead-short across the main sky bus.
In their wild panic to shut down the screaming consoles, someone had jammed a ritual jade scepter into the main emergency dump lever, welding the contact points into a solid bridge of fused brass.
Down in Foundry Nine, the liquid silver gauges exploded at the same time.
CRACK-CRACK.
“They did it,” Master Bao Hong roared. He jumped off his tool bench as the iron ceiling began to rain sparks. “Those gold-trimmed idiots upstairs locked the main shunt! The whole sky charge is bouncing back down the spreading pipes! If that surge hits Vault Two, the ten thousand barrels of refined star-fire will ignite like a star! The entire mountain blows off its roots!”
“Drop the emergency blast doors!” a scribe foreman screamed, lunging for the inner wall lever.
“DO NOT TOUCH THAT LEVER!” Lin Ke barked, his voice cutting through the rising panic like an iron blade.
In his sea of mind, Lin Ke evaluated the blast doors.
