On the third day after the fissure was sealed, White Snow burned through the roof of the Iron Bone Stockade.
It was a roof of rough timber, already letting in wind and rain. One uncontrolled blast of her flames burned a hole thirty feet wide straight through it. Broken wood rained down with sparks, nearly landing on the Mechanism Control Panel Tie Xiaoqi had just repaired.
"Fat bird!" Old Ironhead's iron hand rattled as if it were about to fall apart. "I told you to cultivate, not tear the place down!"
"An accident! A complete accident!" White Snow hopped out of the smoke and dust, her feathers blackened with soot. "I just wanted to try that move..."
"And you tried your way into a fire?"
"The fire wouldn't do what I told it!"
Tie Xiaoqi poked her head out of the corner, looked at the huge hole in the roof, then at White Snow's soot-blackened appearance. She pressed her lips together, not quite daring to laugh.
White Snow shook out her feathers. She knew she was in the wrong, but her frustration burned hotter than fire-no matter what she did, she could not reproduce that strike from three days ago.
"Come here." Old Ironhead waved his iron hand and headed deeper into the cavern.
White Snow obediently followed. They passed through two narrow mine tunnels and reached a recess surrounded by stone walls. Old Ironhead fished half a star source stone out of a crack in the wall and tossed it onto the ground.
"The fire you used that day wasn't ordinary phoenix fire."
White Snow froze.
"I've lived in the Wasteland for seventy years, and I've seen cultivators with phoenix bloodlines fight three times." Old Ironhead fixed his single eye on her. "Their fire was pure gold. It swept