The third watch brought the arrival of the master himself.
A blare of bronze trumpets echoed down the spiral stairwell. It was followed by the rhythmic chanting of sixty acolytes carrying incense censers of gold-trimmed filigree. Through the smoky haze of the central walkway strode Grand Potion-maker Yan, an Eighth-Rank Pill Master of the Imperial Court.
Yan was a tall, skeletal man dressed in sweeping robes of crimson and cloth-of-gold, his long white beard braided with gold wire and tiny jade beads.
His face was pale, waxy, and sharp as a carving chisel. His eyes glowed with the unnatural amber soft glow of a man who had burned up too many liquid silver-laden longevity elixirs. Floating beside his shoulder was a ritual refining scepter carved from fiery green jade, streaming a choking aura of late Core Formation spiritual pressure that forced every laborer and stoker in Row Eight to drop to their knees on the grease-slicked stone.
Lin Tao didn’t drop right away.
Beside him, Tie Shan stood motionless like an iron monolith, his good hand resting casually on his pry-bar. Lin Tao reached out with a subtle nudge of his elbow, prompting the giant to take a measured, casual knee behind the iron coal hopper, shielding his defiant stance from direct view.
