The morning wind swept through the mountain pass. It carried the sharp scent of scorched copper and damp valley mud.
Across the broad pear-wood table, Scribe Wu’s official fiscal ledgers lay unrolled like funeral shrouds. The heavy sheets of star-iron pressed parchment were covered in tiny rows of dark vermilion ink, detailing thirty years of systemic extraction from the Southern Sovereign Basin. Each column represented hundreds of thousands of bushels of grain, tons of smelted ore, and casks of refined spiritual oil drained from mortal homesteads.
Lin Tao sat on an upturned munitions crate, his four-inch land-mapper metal pen resting between his calloused fingers.
Beside him, Tie Shan stood with his back braced against an ancient boundary stone. The giant’s left arm was securely bound in clean linen wraps, resting comfortably across his chest. In his uninjured right hand, he held his fourteen-pound star-iron pry-bar, its chisel tip resting lightly upon the dirt road.
“The numbers don’t balance, Scribe Wu,” Lin Tao said. He tapped the edge of the thick parchment with his metal pen.
Across the table, Scribe Wu trembled so wildly that his bronze office chops clattered against the wood. “T-they balance perfectly, Surveyor Lin! I swear upon the old family altars of Province Seven! Every bushel, every grain measure, every drop of refined oil is accounted for under royal law!”
