"I did everything correctly."
Sun Luguo let out a laugh, the hoarse sound breaking the silence.
"No."
Kyrian looked at him, his expression a mixture of frustration and curiosity.
"Where did I go wrong?"
The old man approached the anvil and picked up one of the fragments with a pair of tongs, his experienced eyes examining the surface.
"You understood the technique." He turned the fragment over, pointing at small marks on the metal.
"Your Qi flow was correct, and the amount of energy you used wasn't too far off either. You followed every step of the method with precision."
"Then why did it explode?"
"The rhythm."
The old man tapped the fragment with his finger, producing a metallic sound.
"You induced too much Qi at intervals that were too short. You didn't give the metal enough time to breathe."
"But the method says to use the hammer as a channel."
"Yes. But the hammer isn't a bomb." Sun Luguo smiled, a smile that was more instruction than amusement.
