Chapter 297 — The Sky Is Too Wide

CHAPTER 297

The Sky Is Too Wide

The door of the Thunder Cliff chamber opened a hand's width, and a roasted sweet potato came through first.

The thirty days were over. The runes had gone white in the night, and the seal had let go of the door.

“Eat,” Lin Langtian said. “You'll want something in your stomach before the sky falls on you.”

Shi Feng took the potato and stepped out onto the cliff top. After a month of stone walls, the wind felt strange on his face.

Then he looked up.

The clouds had covered the whole range. They were black at the edges and a deep bruised purple in the middle, and they kept rolling outward. The sun was gone. Far below, the roofs of Artificer Hall looked like a handful of dropped tiles.

“How big is a normal tribulation cloud?” Shi Feng asked.

“For Foundation Establishment?” Lin Langtian held out his hands, about the width of a courtyard. “This big. Maybe a bit more if the cultivator is a genius.”

“And this?” Shi Feng said.

“The sect, two neighbouring mountains, and part of the river,” Lin Langtian said. “You’ve managed to make everyone look up, Junior Brother. Not that they can miss it.”

Shi Feng peeled the potato and ate half of it. Thunder rolled somewhere in the cloud, slow and deep, like a giant clearing his throat.

“Is that bad?” Shi Feng asked.

“It's bigger,” Lin Langtian said.

“That wasn't an answer,” Shi Feng said.

“It’s all I can tell you,” Lin Langtian said, clapping his shoulder. “I have to leave before it starts. Standing beside you would get me struck too. Don’t die, Junior Brother. I’ve already spent the funeral money.”

He strolled to the cliff path and went down it whistling. At the bend he turned.

“And Junior Brother? Eat the lightning slowly. You'll get indigestion,” Lin Langtian said.

Shi Feng didn't answer. He sat down at the edge, set the potato skin on a rock and closed his eyes.

Shi Feng checked himself one last time. A month’s cultivation had put Thunder-Calming herbs through his meridians and Thunder-Marrow into his bones. There was still no core. He thought, Master said seven in ten. Then I need to be one of those seven.

Down on the eastern slope, the whole sect had come out to watch.

Nearly three hundred people stood on the grass, outer-court disciples at the back and inner-court ones in front. Elders had found rocks to sit on. Cui Hong had brought his arrival board, and nobody knew why. Somebody was selling roasted chestnuts.

At the very back, an old man in a patched robe leaned on a broom and stared at the clouds. Nobody looked at him. They had eyes, and failed to see Mount Tai. A few outer disciples took him for the night sweeper who had wandered out to see the fuss.

“Old man, you're blocking the view,” a boy said, and shoved him gently aside.

“Sorry,” Li Changyuan said, and shuffled two steps left.

He Zhen stood on a flat rock with his brush case under his arm. Counting the bolts had become his job, and the size of the cloud made him nervous. He looked up before addressing the waiting disciples.

“I count aloud,” He Zhen said to the crowd. “One bolt, one number. Nobody speaks until I finish.”

“Elder, how many will there be?” a girl called.

“Nine,” Elder Tian Luo said, from beside him. “For a Foundation Establishment cultivator, nine is the full set.”

“Nine isn't many!”

“Nine is what they say when the cloud is the size of a courtyard,” He Zhen said grimly. He looked up. “This cloud isn't.”

The crowd went quiet for a moment. Then the betting started again, softer.

“Last chance. Who's on survive?”

“Ten stones, survive.”

“Twelve against! The cloud's too big!”

“Who’s Mu Er?” Wu Qiang muttered, pretending to study the list. “Sixty on survive. Never heard of him.” He kept his face straight while Zhu Liu stared very hard at the sky.

Zhu Liu, standing three rows back, became very interested in the sky.

“Nobody,” Sima Lan said beside him, without turning her head. She held her chalk board against her chest. Her face was calm, but the chalk had left a white mark across her knuckles. “A very foolish nobody. Be quiet.”

“Yes, Attendant,” Zhu Liu squeaked.

Gongsun Ce stood a little apart in his grey robe, writing in a thin book.

“Against,” Gongsun Ce said, when the pool-keeper looked his way. “My two hundred stands. For the ledger.”

“Only for the ledger?” Sima Lan asked coldly.

“I like to see the numbers move,” Gongsun Ce said. He kept writing. His brush was a little less steady than usual.

Above them, the cloud turned.

It moved slowly, like a millstone, round and round above the cliff. In the centre, a white light gathered, small at first and then not small at all. The air smelled of iron. Every hair on every arm along the slope stood up.

“It's starting,” someone whispered.

“Quiet!” He Zhen barked.

White fire split the sky.

“One!” He Zhen shouted.