Chapter 200 — Drinking the Fire

CHAPTER 200

Drinking the Fire

Shi Feng didn't move.

Foundation grades ran from Mortal up through Earth, Sky, Heaven, Immortal and Divine. Shi Feng had never told anyone which grade his was. He had never told anyone what his bones were like either. Almost nobody had even guessed.

This man had looked at him once, over a potato, and said it as if reading a price tag.

“You've been drinking the fire,” the stranger added, and took another bite.

“I walked through it,” Shi Feng said.

“You walked through it and it walked into you.” The stranger chewed, swallowed and pointed the stick at him. “Six rings of cavern fire, and your qi isn't boiling. Your skin split, and it's already pulling shut. That's not endurance, junior brother. That's lunch.”

“Junior brother?” Shi Feng asked.

“You’re new here, and I got here before you,” the stranger said cheerfully. “That makes you my junior brother. Don’t worry, I won’t demand a bow over lunch.”

Shi Feng set the potato stick down on the rock. He did it slowly, so his hand wouldn't give anything away.

He thought, He knows about my foundation, and he knows what my body does with heat. He might know the rest. If he talks, Martial Palace has a target by the end of the month.

He had very little to fight with. Late Foundation Establishment against a man whose qi he couldn't even feel. A sword wouldn't help. Words might.

“Say your conditions,” Shi Feng said.

The stranger blinked. “My what?”

“I want to know whether you’ll keep quiet,” Shi Feng said. “You’ve seen things I hide for a reason. If you want something from me, say it now.”

The stranger stared at him for three breaths. Then he started to laugh.

It was a huge, helpless laugh, loud enough to echo off the walls and make the lava ripple. He doubled over, nearly dropped his potato into the fire, and caught it at the last second with a wounded cry.

“Conditions!” the stranger wheezed. “A foundation I can't even grade, a belly that eats fire, and the first thing he does is ask what I want! Oh, I like you. I like you a lot.”

“I wasn't joking,” Shi Feng said.

“I know you weren’t joking,” the stranger said, wiping his eyes. “That’s why I like you. Relax, little junior brother. I won’t tell anyone about your grade, your bones, or your fire-eating belly. Finish the potato.”

“Why?” Shi Feng said.

“Because I’d like some company without frightening it away,” the stranger said. “Nobody’s crossed that ridge without screaming for two years. You managed it and still had the nerve to bargain with me.”

“That's all?” Shi Feng said.

“That's all.” The stranger lifted his potato in a small toast. “On my potatoes.”

Shi Feng studied his face. Clan elders and brokers often smiled while they lied, but this man’s amusement seemed real. He still couldn’t be sure. The difference in their strength left him little choice except to judge the promise itself.

Shi Feng thought, I can't tell. But my word is worth something, and so is a man who says his word is a potato. I'll take it.

“Then I'll take your silence as a yes,” Shi Feng said.

“You do that,” the stranger said.

Shi Feng picked up the potato again. It had cooled a little, and he finished it. The stranger watched him eat with an air of deep satisfaction.

“What else do you know?” Shi Feng asked.

“About you? Enough.” The stranger tapped his own chest. “Your qi runs thick for your stage, and I'd bet it's thicker when you're not hiding it. Your bones hold more than your skin lets on. Past that, I'd only be guessing.”

“Then guess,” Shi Feng said.

“You want me to make guesses and then blame me when they’re wrong?” the stranger asked with a grin. “No, little junior brother. Earn the rest, and we’ll talk again.”

“That's not an answer,” Shi Feng said.

“I know,” the stranger said, quite pleased with himself. “I’ve had plenty of practice dodging questions.”

Shi Feng stood. He had expected the man to name a price, or at least to look smug. He did neither, and that made him harder to read. His legs were stiff, his arms burned, and he had nothing more to ask that the man would actually answer. He tied the ragged edge of his sleeve so it wouldn't catch.

“The board says ring four,” Shi Feng said. “I want it to keep saying that.”

“It will. I like four. Four's the number of a modest, hard-working outer disciple.” The stranger nodded slowly. “You've done this before. Hiding things.”

“Only when it's necessary,” Shi Feng said.

“Always necessary, junior brother. Always. Beyond the sky there is another sky, and beyond people there are other people.” The stranger turned back to the fire and shifted the second stick a little to the left. “Go on. Take the ridge slowly. It cools the farther you walk from me.”

Shi Feng started across the narrow path. Halfway over, he stopped and looked back.

“You usually sit lower than this,” Shi Feng said. “Don't you?”

The stranger didn't turn. “Do I?”

“You said nine is where it gets rude,” Shi Feng said.

“Nine's where I keep my good chair.” The stranger poked the fire. “But the potatoes burn there. So I come up to seven for company.”

Shi Feng looked at the tunnel mouth behind the island, where a darker, redder light came up from the deep. The crowd at the entrance had said elders reached ring seven and no further.

He thought, A man who keeps his chair on ring nine. And I just told him to name his conditions.

Shi Feng decided he would not ask what the stranger was. Some questions were best left until after the potato was digested.

He walked up the slope and into the dark.