Chapter 17: The Weight of Borrowed Stone

The morning sun was a pale, watery thing, struggling to pierce the greasy window of Uncle Zhang's back room. Leo lay on the cot, staring at the ceiling, the First Fracture cold against his chest. The Stone-Root Staff technique was a solid weight in his mind, a memory that wasn't his, a set of movements that felt both alien and inevitable. He'd gone to sleep with the image of Su Han's smug face and...