Cook Ding carves an ox so perfectly his blade never dulls — he finds the spaces between joints, moves through the gaps in the structure. When Lord Wen Hui praises him, Cook Ding says: 'What I follow is the Dao, which goes beyond mere skill.' Hex 48 (The Well) is the deep source — water below wind, the inexhaustible resource that serves everyone who draws from it. Ding's skill is not personal talent; it is access to a pattern that was always there. Hex 50 (The Caldron) shares Cook Ding's name (dǐng) — and the same concern with transformation through precise knowledge of structure. The Well is the source; the Caldron is the vessel. Cook Ding works in the space between them — drawing from the deep pattern and transforming the raw material without waste or violence.