Wang Ben spent the morning preparing.
Not physically. The preparation was mental. Wang Ben reviewed everything he knew about Wang Feng, sorting through facts and weighing implications.
[SUBJECT: WANG FENG]
[Source: Clan records, common knowledge.]
[Position: Grand Elder, Enforcement Hall.]
[Cultivation: Core Formation, mid-stage.]
[Notable: Strongest combat cultivator in Wang Clan. Survived Darkwood Ape miasma nine years ago.]
[Connection to Host's father noted.]
The last point was interesting. Wang Feng had been dying from a Darkwood Ape's miasma. Wang Tian's grade-seven pill attempt had failed. Yet somehow, the Grand Elder had survived.
How?
Wang Ben set the question aside. It might be relevant. It might not. But knowledge was a weapon, and he intended to enter this meeting as prepared as possible.
The Grand Elder's study occupied a corner of the Enforcement Hall, a building that radiated quiet menace even in broad daylight. The cultivators who passed through these halls did so quickly, heads down, voices hushed.
Wang Ben announced himself at the door and waited.
"Enter."
The voice was deep and rough, like gravel scraped across stone. Wang Ben pushed open the heavy wooden door and stepped inside.
The study was smaller than he'd expected. No grand displays of wealth or power. Just functional furniture, weapon racks along the walls, and scrolls stacked in careful order. A single window let in afternoon light, illuminating dust motes that drifted through the air like lazy spirits.
Wang Ben's attention snagged on the scroll cases nearest the desk. He could read the labels from here: Defensive Array Deployment, Blackwood Patrol Formations, Beast Behavioral Patterns of the Northern Frontier. The Grand Elder's collection was practical, not academic, but it was deeper than anything Wang Ben had access to in his own room.
The walls were thick, the stone well-fitted. Formation lines were carved into the doorframe, their patterns visible even without spiritual sense. Two hands had worked here. The Patriarch's precise, methodical arrays layered over older lines that followed the stone's natural grain. Wang Ben recognized the older style. Li Cheng's work, from before he disappeared into the Blackwood five years ago. His grandfather had always traced formation lines as if listening to something in the stone itself.
Grand Elder Wang Feng sat behind a simple desk, his massive frame somehow contained by a chair that looked too small for him. He was built like a mountain carved by storms, broad-shouldered and thick-armed, every line of his body speaking to centuries of combat cultivation.
And then there were the scars.
Three jagged lines ran from Wang Feng's left temple to his jaw, old wounds that had healed into ridges of pale tissue. The marks of a Darkwood Ape's dying strike. A permanent reminder of the battle that had cost Wang Tian everything.
"Wang Ben." The Grand Elder's eyes were dark and assessing. "Sit."
Wang Ben took the chair across from the desk, keeping his posture straight but not rigid.
"You know why you're here," Wang Feng said. It wasn't a question.
"You've been watching me, Grand Elder. I assume you have questions."
The old warrior's brow rose a fraction. "Direct. Good. I don't have patience for games." He leaned back. "Tell me about the wolf."
Wang Ben had expected this. The Jade Snow Wolf, the battle that had started everything visible.
"It was a qi condensation beast, but poisoned. Weakened. I targeted its injured leg to accelerate the poison spread, then finished it when it collapsed."
"You were early-stage body refinement at the time."
"Yes."
"And you won." Wang Feng's voice was level. "An early-stage cultivator, alone, against a qi condensation beast. Even weakened, that creature should have killed you."
"It was poisoned. Barely standing."
"And you knew that before you fought it." The Grand Elder's eyes never left Wang Ben's face. "I've read the reports. The wolf. The expedition. The patrol observations your team leader has been filing." He paused. "I have questions."
Wang Ben said nothing. There was nothing safe to say.
"Your father was the same way, once." Wang Feng's voice softened almost imperceptibly. "Before his fall. He could look at a set of ingredients and know what pill they would become. Could examine a patient and see what no one else could." A pause. "You remind me of him."
"I've heard stories."
"Stories." The word carried weight. "Let me tell you a story, then. Nine years ago, I was dying. Darkwood Ape miasma, spreading through my body like poison fire. Every physician said I had days. Maybe hours."
Wang Ben listened, not daring to interrupt.
"Your father came to me. Told me he could save me. Said he'd attempt a grade-seven pill using his Spirit Fire. Everyone told him it was beyond his cultivation. That the refinement would destroy him. He didn't listen."
Wang Feng's scars seemed to deepen in the afternoon light.
"He tried anyway. And when it failed... when the fire consumed his meridians and shattered his cultivation... he apologized to me. To me. As if his sacrifice was something to be sorry for."
Neither of them spoke.
"I should have died that day," Wang Feng said. "Instead, your father paid the price. And I have spent every day since trying to be worthy of that cost."
"Why are you telling me this, Grand Elder?"
Wang Feng held him with a look that left no room for evasion. "Because your family is in danger, and I think you already know it."
He leaned forward, and the air in the study thickened. Even sitting, the Grand Elder radiated power that pressed against Wang Ben like physical weight.
"Whatever you're doing, whatever's helping you see what you see... can I trust it?"
Wang Ben met his eyes. "Yes."
Wang Feng studied him for a long moment. Then he settled back in his chair.
"Good enough." Wang Feng's tone shifted, becoming businesslike. "You're being wasted on basic patrol duty."
"What are you proposing?"
"Direct assignments. From me, personally. Watching. Listening. Following threads." Wang Feng's eyes were hard. "The Xue Clan is moving against us. We know their visible actions. But they're spending resources they don't have, which means they have backing we can't see. I need someone looking into it."
"You want me to investigate the Xue Clan's outside backing," Wang Ben said.
Wang Feng's eyebrows rose. "You already know about that."
"Zhao Yu's father found financial discrepancies in the forge commissions. The numbers don't add up."
"And how long have you known this?"
"Since yesterday."
"Yesterday." Wang Feng stared at him, then stood and moved to the window. His bulk blocked much of the light. He stared out at the training grounds below.
Wang Feng didn't ask anything else. He turned from the window, and the silence was its own kind of answer.
"Keep your secrets. But keep them well." He returned to his desk, pulling a jade token from a drawer. "This gives you access to the Enforcement Hall records. Scout reports, patrol logs, trade ledgers. Go through them. Tell me what you find."
He held the token out. His fingers lingered on it an extra beat before releasing it, as though the jade carried more weight than its size allowed.
Wang Ben accepted the token, feeling its weight in his palm. Cool jade, carved with the Wang Clan's seal.
"There's one more thing," Wang Feng said. "Your father."
"What about him?"
"He's been restored. After nine years, he's whole again." The Grand Elder gave nothing away. "I don't know how. I don't need to know how. But I want you to understand something."
He placed both hands flat on the desk, and the room seemed to shrink around him.
"Your father has been given a second chance. I will not allow anyone to take that from him." His voice hardened. "The Xue Clan. Their backers. Anyone. I will destroy them personally."
It wasn't a boast. It was a statement of fact, delivered with the certainty of a cultivator who had spent centuries turning statements into reality.
"I understand, Grand Elder."
"Good." Wang Feng straightened. "Come find me each week, or whenever you find something significant. And Wang Ben?"
"Yes?"
"Your father is proud of you. He doesn't say it often, but I see it when he speaks of you."
Wang Ben bowed and left the study, the jade token heavy in his pocket.
He passed through the Enforcement Hall's main corridor on his way out. Faint lines ran along the base of the walls, so old they'd nearly faded into the stone. He traced them with his eyes. They connected, floor to wall to ceiling, the whole building threaded through with a design he couldn't read. Something about the pattern held his attention longer than it should have. How each line fed into the next, how nothing was wasted. He didn't understand what he was seeing, only that it was there, and that it was deliberate.
Near the entrance, Patriarch Wang Tiexin stood beside one of the junction points where several lines converged. His fingers brushed the stone with the ease of long familiarity, pausing at a faded node as a musician might rest his hand on an old instrument. He didn't seem to notice Wang Ben watching. After a breath, the Patriarch lowered his hand and continued down the hall, his steps unhurried.
The afternoon sun was warm on his face as he walked back toward the training grounds. Wang Feng's guilt meant his loyalty came with expectations. He would watch Wang Ben closely. But for now, the clan's strongest warrior was on their side.
Wang Ben sat on a stone bench at the edge of the training grounds, turning the jade token over in his fingers. Enforcement Hall records first. Then informant reports. Then trade ledgers.
The investigation would start tonight.