The high-pressure shock wave struck Row Eight with the force of an artillery barrage.
Through the underground floor plates, a deep, bone-jarring THUD blew up beneath their boots as eighty thousand gallons of discharged salt water slammed into the ninety-degree return header tee. The copper pipes overhead buckled and groaned, their iron hanger brackets showering rusted flakes into the air. The pressure spike surged to thirty sea-weights. The entire western wing of the foundry shuddered, stone dust falling from the ceiling like gray snow.
In traditional potion-made lore, this was the moment when Cauldron 084 inevitably choked and cracked.
Vessel 084 sat at the very end of the line. Because of that, the reflected high-pressure hammer slammed directly into its discharge valve. That created an instant back-pressure wave that locked its cooling jacket in a state of high-pressure bubbling blast. The salt water inside the jacket would flash into white-hot steam. It formed an insulating vapor blanket that prevented the crucible from cooling, baking the reagents into worthless cinder.
Every master stoker knew the sound: the hollow, rattling groan of a starving water jacket. He was followed by the acrid stench of burned medicine.
Lin Tao didn’t let the hammer strike.
