The magical energy pushed violently against the inside of his grey stone skin. It wanted to break free. It wanted to turn back into blinding silver light. It wanted to roar and smash the pale monsters crushing him. “No!” Han Feng commanded his own body. “Hold it in!” He fought a brutal, silent war inside his own shell. He used every single ounce of his willpower to keep the stone from cracking. He imagined wrapping thick iron chains around his own boiling blood, holding it down. But the pressure kept rising. The heat was melting his human organs inside the rock. His lungs felt like they were filled with hot lava. His brain felt like it was baking in an oven. If he held this stillness for much longer, he would not turn to stone. He would melt himself into a puddle of dead grey sludge. Then, he felt something on his face. The pale Sound-Eaters had finally given up. They could not find any food in the cold grey rock. They jumped off him and climbed the walls, disappearing into the d

"We do not fight the army," Han Feng said to his friends. His silver eyes blazed with sudden determination. "We make the canyon fight for us.""How?" Grim shouted over the roaring engine of the tank. "This canyon reflects sound," Han Feng said, pointing to the red glass walls. "The tank’s drill is spinning at incredible speed. It is creating a massive, continuous vibration. If we can capture that vibration...""...and bounce it back," Su Yan realized, her eyes widening. She understood the physics of his power. "Yes," Han Feng said. "If we trap the sound of their own machine in a perfect acoustic loop, the vibration will multiply a million times. We will build a sonic bomb using their own noise. But I cannot do it alone."Han Feng turned to Nila. "Guardian of the Ocean Lung," he said urgently. "Can you make a wall of ice? A perfectly smooth, flat wall of ice directly in front of that tank?"Nila nodded. "Yes, but the drill will shatter it in one second.""I only need one second," Han

The plasma balls hit the ice. The heat of the plasma and the cold of the magic ice fought violently. The ice wall hissed, turning into thick white steam. Nila fell to her knees, gasping for air. Her nose began to bleed. She was pushing her dying magic past its limit. Grim stood right behind the ice wall, holding his thick iron scrap up, ready to block anything that broke through. Behind them, Han Feng dropped to his knees. He placed his dark, obsidian hands flat against the red dirt. "Su Yan," Han Feng said urgently. "I need your eyes. The magnetic pull in the dirt is twisting my vibration-sense. I cannot see the fault line clearly. I need the Symbiosis."Su Yan did not hesitate. She dropped to her knees beside him. She reached out and placed her warm, human hand firmly on his cold, dark shoulder. Instantly, their minds merged. The 360-degree sensory sphere blossomed in their heads. The golden light