The emerald beam didn’t burn. It dissolved the shape of matter.
When the green light swept across the narrow high walkway, the three-inch steel handrail didn’t melt or splash in molten droplets. It simply ceased to have map points in three-space-folding space, vanishing into an instant spray of grey exact dust.
“Incoming!” Lin Ke shouted.
Meng Shan planted his broad feet. That brought his five-hundred-pound slab shield up with an explosive heave.
The emerald beam struck the face of the shield with a dry, hollow hiss like sand flung against silk.
Three inches of solid spirit iron were planed off the shield’s front face in a heartbeat, boiled away down to total nothingness.
The recoil slammed into Meng Shan’s arms like an avalanche. It drove the giant back two paces, his boots gouging deep furrows into the metal floor grating.
“It’s shaving through the iron!” Meng Shan roared, his biceps knotting into cords of strained tendon. “No weight to the blow, Lin Ke—it’s just deleting the bulk! Another hit and it cuts my forearms in half!”
