Elder Qian backed away along the narrowing narrow high walkway until his spine slammed hard against the cold, seamless dark rock of the chamber wall.
His right arm hung limp and useless at his side, blood dripping from his shattered elbow through his torn scarlet silk sleeve. The seven-ringed brass staff—the symbol of his Core Formation power and fifty years of sectarian dominance—lay sixty feet below, half-sunk in the sapphire waters of the restored drainage sump.
All twelve of his deathsworn retainers were dead, crippled, or drowned in the deep trenches.
The narrow high walkway shuddered beneath Elder Qian’s trembling boots as the last traces of the purple foul fog cleared through the high Precursor air-flow chimney pipes. Below them, the vast underground cathedral of Valve Station Delta lay silent, lit up only by the sapphire bioluminescence of the restored pool and the cold amber glow of the emergency pressure bezels. The bodies of the twelve deathsworn retainers lay scattered across the raised stone road and sunk in the deck drains, their weapons broken, their mercenary contract fulfilled in blood.
Standing before him on the narrow high walkway was Lin Tao.
The youth’s charcoal linen tunic was damp with water drops, his face calm, calm. Then it fully untouched by the purple Rot-Bone Miasma that was slowly draining away through the Precursor ceiling vents. In Lin Tao’s right hand, the four-inch cold-drawn steel land-mapper metal pen rested lightly against his fingers. Its needle-sharp plumb point reflected the pale amber light…
