Yun Je and Lu Hu stepped inside. Sweat had already begun beading on their faces.
Inside stood great pillars, and a royal carpet stretched across the floor. Along its sides sat the ten Family Elders. Atop four steps sat Clan Leader Tunxo Miang Ming, his wife Qing You beside him, and Advisor Niang Ming at his other side.
Because Qing You was Chinese, many in the hall resented her — they believed the Leader should have married a woman of his own country.
Both Tunxo Miang Ming and Qing You wore ceremonial robes of pale blue and ivory silk, richly embroidered in gold, red, and black, with ancient symbols worked into the fabric. His headdress rose like a golden fan crowned in feathers and carved ivory; hers was a smaller silver-white crown atop dark hair. Together they looked less like a married couple than figures stepped out of some ancient imperial court.
Niang Ming, beside them, had a face sharp as a wolf's, and wore the long cap of a scholar.
Before her husband could speak, Qing You spoke first, her gaze lowered. "You claim my son killed your servant?"
Fury filled her eyes.
Yun Je stammered, "Y-yes, Clan Leader's wife."
"Lies!" Qing You's voice cracked through the hall. "My son isn't capable of that. He's far too timid — he wouldn't even think of killing someone, let alone do it!"
The fury in her gaze alone was enough to silence them both. Pressure bore down on Je and Lu Hu, crushing and merciless, and it only grew as her anger built.
Tunxo Miang Ming laid a hand on his wife's arm. "My dear. You must stop. I know how much you worry for our son." Then his eyes turned cold, fixing on the two men below. "Yun Je. You've kept us waiting by invoking our son's name. If your claim proves false, I promise you — your entire clan will be destroyed."
The Elders glared at them with open fury. Niang Ming alone simply watched, saying nothing.
After a moment, the pressure lifted. Je and Lu Hu rose on trembling legs. Keeping the Clan Leader waiting was punishable enough on its own — if their excuse didn't hold up, far worse awaited them.
Pressing a hand to his chest, Je forced out, "Clan Leader — please, just a moment — hear us out."
He gestured to Lu Hu. "He has proof. He saw it happen with his own eyes."
Lu Hu stepped forward, bowed, and drew out a sealed fragment of broken wall. A faint purple aura — one-star strength — pulsed from within it.
At the sight of it, Tunxo Miang Ming's expression hardened. "Bring Shree Yan before me."
A short while later, Shree Yan arrived, thinking to himself as he walked: *I knew this plan of theirs wouldn't hold up.*
He greeted his parents with a bow, then the Elders. "Mother, Father — why have you called for me?"
His voice was soft — soft enough that no one hearing it could have guessed what he was truly capable of. Lu Hu, who had watched this same young man kill with his own eyes, found himself briefly stunned by the gentleness of it.
Qing You's tone softened. "Son. Did you kill his servant?"
"No, Mother," he said easily, as though hearing the accusation for the first time.
Qing You turned to Lu Hu. "You said you saw it yourself."
"I did!" Lu Hu insisted. "Don't lie, Young Master — I saw it with my own eyes. And there was a girl with you. Where is she? Bring her here too."
Inside, Shree Yan allowed himself a private smile. This was exactly what he'd been waiting for.
The Clan Leader ordered Yi Ner brought forward. She arrived and bowed low, her manner perfectly unremarkable.
Lu Hu turned on the two of them. "Did you go to the Lawati shop?"
"We did," Shree Yan said.
"Why?"
"To buy a hidden stone."
"Prove it."
Shree Yan held up a broken fragment of his own — a hidden stone, its aura glowing gold.
The hall fell silent at the sight of it.
Lu Hu's composure cracked. *Shit — he has proof too.* He held up his own fragment. "Then explain this! Isn't this your aura — purple, just like his power?"
Shree Yan shook his head. "No."
"Then prove it isn't!"
Shree Yan extended his hand, and a golden-star aura bloomed from his palm — unmistakably his own, and nothing like the purple mark on the fragment Lu Hu held.
He had planned this from the start: suppressing his true aura to leave behind the false purple trace, knowing someone would eventually come demanding proof.
*And if this doesn't shake him enough,* Shree Yan thought, turning the small gift over in his fingers, *there's always this. In my previous life, once I gave him something, he never took it off again.*
Memory stirred — a girl from that other life, who used to seek him out just to tell him stories that mattered to no one but her.
*I wonder how she survived, in that life,* he thought. *Strange, seeing her face again here.*
Without seeming to notice what he was doing, he pressed his thumb to the small red button on the gift.
Yi Ner cried out — a sudden, wrenching pain that dropped her to her knees.
The hall erupted into alarm.
"What's happening?" Qing You demanded. "What's wrong with her?"
Shree Yan turned wide, frightened eyes toward the crowd. "Mother — Father — look, in his hand! That must be doing it!"
"No!" Yun Je stammered, panic rising. "I don't know anything about this — I didn't do this!"
Even as he denied it, his hand moved again over the item.
Yi Ner's screams grew worse.
"Yun Je!" Lu Hu shouted from across the hall. "What are you doing to her?"
"I don't know!" Je's voice cracked. *A mortal woman gave me this. How could it possibly be hurting her like this?*
He had no way of knowing — Shree Yan had built the formation himself, tied directly to his own will.
"Enough!" Tunxo Miang Ming's voice cracked through the hall. "What exactly do you think you're doing — here, in the Rana Clan, in front of me?"
Qing You rose. "You accused my son falsely, and now that your lie has failed, you try to murder his maid in front of us? You and your entire family will die for this."
Neither man could speak. The Elders closed in around them from every side.
Je and Lu Hu dropped to their knees, begging. "I didn't do it — I didn't do it—" Je kept repeating, but no one was listening anymore.
Shree Yan stepped forward. "Mother. Father. Let my maid and I handle this."
His parents exchanged a look. After a moment's consideration, they granted permission.
Power and talent are what conquer the weak, Shree Yan thought, watching the two men tremble before him. There was a time when I was called a genius in name only, without the strength to prove it, without a voice of my own. Not anymore.