Chapter 301 — The Cost of a Cliff

CHAPTER 301

The Cost of a Cliff

The first thing Shi Feng heard when he woke was a broom.

A broom scraped nearby while Shi Feng tried to place the sound. Cold stone pressed against his back. His stomach was empty, and even lying still hurt. He kept his eyes shut until he knew who was beside him.

“He'll be out until morning,” a voice said. It was Lin Langtian, and it was quiet. Shi Feng had never heard him use that voice before.

“Hm,” Li Changyuan said. The broom kept scraping.

“The cliff top is glass. Four zhang across and half a zhang deep. Half of Thunder Cliff will have to be rebuilt,” Lin Langtian said.

“Hm,” Li Changyuan said.

“Old man, aren't you going to say anything?” Lin Langtian said.

The scraping stopped.

He kept his breathing slow. Shi Feng thought, They think I’m asleep. If I sit up, they’ll stop talking. A month ago he would have asked at once. Now he waited to hear what they said without him.

“Heaven looked,” Lin Langtian said.

It was not the loud, cheerful voice. It was low and flat, like a man reading a name off a gravestone.

“I saw it,” Li Changyuan said.

“It didn't look at the others on that slope. It looked at him. For the length of a whole breath, it held there and looked,” Lin Langtian said.

“I know,” Li Changyuan said.

“It has never done that for a Foundation Establishment cultivator. Not once, in all the...” Lin Langtian stopped. When he went on, the cheer was back, a little too fast, like a man putting his hat on in a hurry. “In all the old books I've read. I read a lot of old books. Very clever fellow, me.”

“Heaven looks at many people,” Li Changyuan said.

“Does it?” Lin Langtian said.

“Many. Most don't notice,” Li Changyuan said. The broom began again, slowly. “It's a big book, Lin Langtian. Heaven keeps a lot of columns. It counts everyone, and it's very patient. A man should only worry when it starts writing his name larger than the others.”

“It wrote his name larger today,” Lin Langtian said.

“A little,” Li Changyuan said.

“That's already too much. A tall tree catches the wind,” Lin Langtian said.

“Hm,” Li Changyuan said. “Then he'll have to pay for it. Heaven keeps books too.”

The wind sang faintly across the glass. Shi Feng was troubled. He thought, They’re talking about me, but I don’t understand what they mean. He remembered each line instead of interrupting with questions they might refuse to answer.

“You covered the watcher,” Lin Langtian said.

“I brushed a fly,” Li Changyuan said.

“A fly that sees ten li,” Lin Langtian said.

“Then it should have had better manners,” Li Changyuan said.

“Elder Shen Tuo is going to report that the Hall's cloud was a fraud. He'll say it was set up by an array,” Lin Langtian said.

“Let him. Nobody believes an eyewitness who is blind,” Li Changyuan said.

Lin Langtian laughed. It was a short, honest laugh, and it sounded tired. Then he said, very quietly, “Seven in ten, you said.”

“It was seven in ten,” Li Changyuan said.

“It wasn't, and you know it,” Lin Langtian said.

“Hm,” Li Changyuan said, in an entirely different tone. “Perhaps I rounded up.”

That was all. The broom scraped for a while, and then there was the sound of a man sitting down heavily on rock.

Shi Feng opened his eyes.

The sky above him was full of stars. He lay on his back at the edge of the crater, wrapped in somebody's cloak. His skin was no longer black. It was pink and new and sore everywhere. Under his navel, something round and slow-turning sat where his dantian had been, full of nothing, waiting. A core. His own.

Two shadows sat against the rock a few steps away. Lin Langtian was peeling a sweet potato. Li Changyuan leaned on his broom and looked at the glass.

Both of them turned to look at him.

“Junior Brother!” Lin Langtian cried, jumping up and abandoning the potato. His familiar cheer returned. “You’re awake! A Golden Core, and the jade can’t even grade it! Your senior brother’s so proud he may start crying. Don’t look at me like that.”

“Don't cry,” Li Changyuan said. “Tears are a waste of salt.”

Shi Feng sat up slowly. Every muscle protested. He looked at Lin Langtian, then at Li Changyuan, then at the great glass crater that had once been the top of Thunder Cliff.

Four zhang across and half a zhang deep. Cracks ran down the cliff face as far as he could see. A whole wall of the chamber had fallen into the valley.

“Thank you for waiting,” Shi Feng said.

“Of course!” Lin Langtian beamed.

“Who's paying for the cliff?” Shi Feng said.

Lin Langtian's smile froze. Li Changyuan stopped sweeping.

Li Changyuan pointed the broom at him. “I knew it,” Li Changyuan said sorrowfully. “A genius survives that tribulation, opens his eyes, and asks me about the bill. Couldn’t you wait until morning?”

“Somebody has to,” Shi Feng said.

“I'm weeping,” Lin Langtian said. “Inside.”