Three days passed.Not a word from Ling Yue.Not a single mention of the shrine incident.Yet Yao Yi felt the noose tightening.
Disciples avoided his gaze more than ever. When he stepped into the training yard, conversations stopped mid-sentence. Even elders who once offered nods now kept their eyes fixed ahead.
The Sect knew.They just hadn't decided what to do yet.
On the fourth night, an order arrived.
A black-robed envoy appeared at his door, silent as moonlight, and handed him a jade token. It shimmered faintly with the emblem of the Inner Council: a sun split into three.
"Elder Summit," the envoy whispered. "Tonight. Don't be late."
Then he vanished into the bamboo like smoke.
The Council Hall stood atop Starfire Ridge—a jagged outcrop overlooking the Ten Sun Valley. Few disciples ever climbed so high. It was where judgment was passed, secrets were buried, and Sect history was rewritten in silence.
Yao Yi walked alone.
No escort. No warning. Just the weight of every footstep on stone.
When he entered, twelve elders sat in a half-circle. Robes of silver, crimson, and midnight. Each bore a different emblem—sun, sword, scale, feather. All eyes turned to him.
At the center sat Elder Silvermoon.
His gaze was calm. Too calm.
"Yao Yi," he said. "Step forward."
Yao Yi bowed, then obeyed.
"You entered the ancestral shrine without permission," a bald elder said coldly. "And triggered a seal that has not responded in centuries."
Another elder—a woman with eyes like flint—added, "Such an act is punishable by expulsion, or worse."
"But," Silvermoon cut in smoothly, "the seal responded only because of him. Which means…"
He paused. Silence fell.
"...the mark has chosen."
The council rippled with murmurs.
"That mark," said the flint-eyed elder, "has brought disaster in every generation it appeared. Entire sects have fallen over it."
"But it also saved ours once," Silvermoon replied. "Twice, in some records."
"Legends," someone muttered.
"No," said another voice—Elder Whisperthorn, blind but sharp. "I felt it when the mirror awakened. That was real. And old. Very old."
The room quieted.
Silvermoon looked at Yao Yi. "Do you understand what you carry?"
Yao Yi hesitated. "Only fragments. But... it's not just power. It's memory. Blood. Something ancient."
Silvermoon nodded.
"You're no longer a student," he said. "You're a question. A threat. A possibility."
The word hung there.
Possibility.
"Until we understand the extent of your connection to the mirror and the mark," Silvermoon continued, "you'll be placed under observation. But not imprisoned."
He glanced at the others. No one objected. A few looked annoyed.
Yao Yi exhaled.
Then Whisperthorn spoke again. "Send him to the Ravenwatch Border."
Heads turned sharply.
"That's madness!" Flint-eyes snapped. "That's an active war zone."
"Precisely," said Whisperthorn. "If he survives, he proves worth. If he falls… the mark dies with him."
Silvermoon's lips thinned, but he did not protest.
Yao Yi stood very still.
He understood now.The trial had never ended.It had simply changed form.