The Pill Master had his own idea. "Feed him spirit blood," he said. "Plenty of it. Drink until he drops dead of it! Every dose of spirit blood raises his constitution a little more. Drink enough, and even if it never ignites a spirit body, his body will be tougher than any spirit body ever born!"

"One punch to kill a dragon."

The Village Head laughed. "That will scare the bastards outside the Ruins to death."

The two exchanged a smile. The Pill Master walked out of the room and pulled the door shut.

The next day the villagers brought in several more Dark-Boned Tigers, Azure-Scaled Jiao Serpents, Thunder-Plumed Sky Birds and Dark-Shelled Spirit Tortoises. With a goal in front of them, those old men and old women threw themselves into the work with furious energy, until the Pill Master flew into a rage: "Force that much spirit blood on him at once and it will burst him open!"

The Silent Smith, who had dragged in two Thunder-Plumed Sky Birds, split his lips in a grin and snickered, heh heh, his mouth empty of a tongue.

"Shen'er can take it!" Granny Zhu had utter faith in Shen Mu.

The Pill Master glared at them and said no more, but took out the insect eggs and went on refining blood. Trouble came anyway. This time there was rather too much of the Four Poles blood, and after Shen Mu drank it his body swelled up as though pumped full of air, until the old men and women were frantic with worry, terrified he would go off with a bang.

The Pill Master took out several hollow silver needles and drove them into Shen Mu's back and the crown of his head. From the needle eyes, streams of red, blue and purple qi hissed and spurted outward.

After a moment the needles stopped venting. The Pill Master drew them out and glared at the old folk again. "Step by step. One step at a time. You want to stuff him fat in a single mouthful, and all you will do is burst him. He is still overfull as it is, and you will all have your work cut out for you. In a while the Butcher will drill him on the blade, Master Huo will drill him on the fist, and Lame Weng, you take his legs and help him digest."

"Shen'er, come practice the blade!"

The Butcher planted both hands on the ground and vaulted up, landing atop a lone wooden post. He had no lower body; his torso stood on the stake, level with Shen Mu's height.

The Butcher gripped two butchering knives. They were nothing like ordinary butchering knives, which run less than a foot long, carry a round wooden handle, and wear an edge curved like a moon with three quarters of it sliced away. His knives had the same shape but stood several sizes larger: three feet two inches of blade, thick along the spine, thin at the edge, polished to a gleam. The two blades joined together looked like a pair of arched gates, frightening in their size.

The butchering knife in Shen Mu's hand was of that same size, but he had only the one, and a heavy one it was, some twenty catties to the blade. In ordinary times the boy could barely lift a single knife; but since he had drunk the Four Poles blood, his strength had grown so far beyond what it was that he could raise a butchering knife one-handed and barely feel the weight.

"Grandpa Tu, look out!"

Shen Mu charged the Butcher on his post, knife in one hand. The Butcher roared with laughter; half a man and he still cut a figure of towering bravado.

Night Cleaves a Thousand Cities' Wind and Rain!

Shen Mu's lone blade wove up and down, his feet shifting as he hacked at the Butcher; the blade-light came faster and faster, the wind whistling, strike and sound running together into one sheet.

"Too slow, too slow, you are far too slow!"

The Butcher bellowed, his twin blades whirling like rain, the clang and clash of their blows like a cloudburst battering pear blossoms. "Faster! Faster still! Your butchering knife can be faster yet! The move is called Night Cleaves a Thousand Cities' Wind and Rain, and what it demands is speed, the butchering knife falling swift as wind and rain in the dark, drenching the whole city! Faster, I say!"

The blade-light quickened, three silver dragons threading up and down around the wooden post; the wind grew louder, and the hiss of blade-qi blended into it. Where it touched ground, deep gashes sprang up all at once.

Blade marks.

"Good, that is the speed I want! The faster your blade, the stronger your blade-qi. But you are still not fast enough. Fast enough that your blade-intent is a wildfire, burning, burning again!"

The Butcher was like a man possessed, wielding his knives in a whirl that dazzled Shen Mu's eyes. "Burn! Burn! Let your blade burn, let your qi burn, let your spirit burn! After the burning comes divine ability!"

Whoosh!

His blade passed through the air, and from the friction it caught, whooshing, into flame; the two knives streaked to and fro like a pair of fire dragons, more terrifying with every turn.

The fire dragons lunged straight at Shen Mu, and he had no way to block them. Then suddenly the two dragons soared skyward, tearing apart the black night above Hidden Remnant Village, a sight beyond all dread.

Shen Mu stood dazed. The Butcher's blade was truly terrible.

Above the village the darkness surged in and swallowed the fire dragons, the blade-light, the blade-qi, all of it.

That darkness had life in it. It seemed enraged that the Butcher had raised a blade against it, and an unbearable black pressure bore down upon the village as though to devour it.

But then the stone statues at the four corners of the village blazed a little brighter, and drove the darkness back.

"Thieving sky!"

The Butcher stood on his stake, a knife in each hand, and howled at the heavens, half mad: "One day I will split this black open! One day I will slaughter my way back! What they cut from me was my waist, and what I lost was my legs, but not my head! I will kill..."

"Grandpa Tu has gone mad again. But Grandpa Tu's blade is so fast. He has refined his blade art into a divine ability. When will I be able to match his speed?"

Shen Mu looked up at the raving Butcher with admiration, set down his butchering knife, and went to find one-armed Master Huo.

"The Butcher's blade must cut out fire before it counts as a divine ability. My fist must strike out the sound of thunder before it counts as mine!"

Master Huo's face was grave. His single arm clenched into a fist, and his bones crackled in long volleys of popping. He said coolly, "Shen'er, when you can hold lightning in your hand, your fist will have some small accomplishment to its name. The Butcher's blade is quick; my fist breaks the limits of sound, breaks the bonds of air, and bursts out with matchless force! One arm can train a fist. One arm is a thousand arms. One hand can still give out the sound of thunder, the thunderclap itself!"

Boom!

A muffled thunder rolled forth. It was the fist Master Huo had thrown, exploding like the crash of thunder.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

A whole chain of thunderclaps followed. Shen Mu's eyes could not catch the speed of Master Huo's punches; the afterimages of those fists made it seem that the one-armed Master Huo was no longer one-armed, but had grown a thousand arms.

Faster and faster flew the fists, and those thousand arms seemed to hold lightning in their palms, crackling arcs of electric light; every blow was rolling thunder, every blow splashed lightning!

"This is the Myriad-Armed Vajra of the Eight Thunderclap Arts! When your fist is faster than sound, you can command the thunder. One punch, one palm, can destroy a man's soul and body alike and leave him in ruin through ten thousand kalpas, never to be reborn!"

Master Huo drew back his fist and said in a deep voice, "Attack me with the Eight Thunderclap Arts I taught you. Strike out thunder. Hold lightning in your hand. Command the thunder!"