Fortunately - or maybe because this happened often - there was a part of the room that clearly had been set aside for these sorts of duels already. It wasn't like the stone ring outside, which had been raised from the floor to show the action more clearly. This was sunk into the floor slightly, and the floor was the same dark wood that comprised the entirety of the room.

  Two positions had been set out, marked with small squares of a well-polished, white wood, very clearly delineated against the darkwood flooring. Lady Jin appeared in a flicker of motion without having crossed the space in between, the hem of her dress momentarily flapping before settling down. Her feet stepped exactly onto the white square, while they waited for Librarian Zhu to make his final arrangements.

  Wu Hao had followed the others and made way for the duel to take place, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Jin Qilong. It was a headying feeling, being in a room with this many different qi signatures. There must have been dozens if not more cultivation techniques, each leaving traces everywhere.

  With the Red Dawn Sect, everything had been locked away more. Emotions and qi both. It had been vastly easier to parse, while if he tried to focus on a single person's qi right now it felt like five different threads were pestering him constantly, demanding attention of their own.

  He distracted himself by turning to Jin Qilong.

  "I don't get it," Wu Hao murmured. "Why's he doing this? Librarian Zhu, I mean."

  Jin Qilong looked pensive. "Clan rules state that the punishment for theft depends on the severity, but... honestly, it's death, invariably. It's part of why I had to ask mother to let you live - well, that wasn't really theft, anyway, I think... Not like when, er. You know."

  "Huh," Wu Hao said. Good to know. He'd been risking death talking to Lady Jin in ways he hadn't even thought about, then? Interesting. It didn't deter him from thieving in the future, that was for sure. It only barely deterred him from getting caught.

  "It's so harsh because it's treated as an attempt to undermine the clan rather than enriching oneself," Jin Qilong explained. His voice changed a little, into that teacher's-pet word-regurgitating tone that he used whenever he explained things. "You can't take away benefits. You've heard mother about the topic. The problem is when it's at the clan's expense."

  "So what was Shan Guoxi referring to?" Wu Hao said. He received a baleful look from one of the men next to him, one of the guards - but one without a red saber patch anywhere. Oddly enough it was the same man who'd killed Wu Hao thrice now. "He said that the punishment depends on how much was stolen."

  "That's Elder Shan to you," the guard snapped.

  Wu Hao shrugged.

  "Respect your elders," the guard ordered. "A pup does not bark at its betters, boy."

  "Whatever," Wu Hao said. Giving him another angry look, the guard shook his head and switched places with another man, heading off in a different direction.

  "Oh," Jin Qilong said. "Er. It doesn't really come up that often, but if you steal more than a given amount, which is defined as being some fraction of what a branch earns per month, it's not just death for the offender. It's death to multiple generations."

  Wu Hao frowned. "What's that mean?"

  "You don't just die," Jin Qilong explained. "The clan sends people to kill your parents, your siblings, and your children. Attempts at rebellion are punished with extinction to the third generation, which - well - basically your entire family is wiped out. Razed to the ground, including the cats, the dogs, and the servants. Nothing is allowed to remain alive or standing."

  Jin Qilong looked a little green, despite him being the one who'd explained it in the first place. "They're... rare missions, but those are very profitable. Because you can just take what you want and no one can stop you, and considering the risk they're well compensated above that too."

  "Oh," Wu Hao said, stunned into silence.

  He'd thought that Father was cruel, but at least he seemed to limit his cruelties to his own charges. Extermination, the way it was handed out as a punishment here, was something else entirely.

  "I think Librarian Zhu chose the trial by combat to help his family," Jin Qilong speculated. "Even if he loses, it ends with his own death. His grandson's one of the students in our group, so this way his children aren't caught up."

  Sure, Wu Hao thought. Something still churned in his belly at the thought of an entire family just being destroyed like that. A single mistake and even children would be destroyed without remorse. At the same time, though, there was something about Shan Guoxi that made Wu Hao unsure that that was all there was to it.

  Librarian Zhu growled something under his breath, then raised his saber.

  "I am Zhu Lingqi," he spoke, loudly and clearly. "Librarian of the Heibei branch of the Jin Clan. Quasi-first-grade martial artist. I beg that our sabers reveal the truth."

  He made a short bow, raising again with his eyes fixed on Lady Jin.

  "Wei Qinghe," she said, in a bored tone. "Head of the Red Saber Battallion. Wife of Jin Murong. First-grade martial artist."

  Wu Hao had thought that she was a second-grade martial artist. Apparently he had been wrong. That was odd.

  She didn't bother bowing, and Librarian Zhu bristled, but held his tongue. The elder with the mustache stepped in, casting a helpless look at both of them.

  "We of the elder's council now bear witness to trial by combat," he wheezed. His hand raised up in the air. "As befits the Dao of the saber, justice lives only at the edge of sharpened steel. Let the sabers reveal to all whose word is law."

  His hand twitched, before he swung it down like an executioner would swing his axe. "Begin!"

  "I warn you, Lady Jin," Librarian Zhu said threateningly. "A local snake cannot be threatened by a foreign dragon. I would ask that you take me seriously, otherwise -"

  "Men of the Jin clan," Lady Jin rebuked him, "are men of action, not of hesitant weasel-words. At least draw your saber before I rend your head from your shoulders."

  Librarian Zhu's eyes flashed with anger and his qi reared its head, coiling outwards as it reached out to cover his saber. The smell of musty books crept into Wu Hao's nose, only to fade away as spots of dried blood flaked off from the saber's handle.

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  Wu Hao glanced to the side, wondering if anyone else saw it, too. He still had difficulty believing sometimes that not everyone could see and smell qi, as he did. Again, though, it seemed that no one else was seeing it, because he caught no whispers as Librarian Zhu's qi took almost physical shape. It settled around his shoulders like a coat, the edges a ragged patchwork of paper stained in red.

  Distantly he wondered if Librarian Zhu was aware of the shape his own qi took, and more distantly still he wondered if it'd looked like this before he'd become a librarian.

  But everyone's eyes weren't on Librarian Zhu. They were looking at Lady Jin.

  Golden light spilled from everywhere in the room, gathering near Lady Jin and building itself up. It was her qi, Wu Hao realized. She extended a single, graceful hand like a woman asking for a dance, then twisted her wrist. Her fan remained closed, and as she moved Wu Hao caught sight of a second fan. It lay against her thigh. Apparently she wouldn't need it.

  Lady Jin whirled with a single step, her arms bending to the side as she spun. Her qi rose, crushed in upon itself in a dizzying array of patterns that were impossible to follow, and continued building and building. Qi so bright that Wu Hao had to fight not to close his eyes spilled from her sleeves, her skin, her eyes, and the scent of perfume overpowered his senses so thoroughly he could almost taste it.

  "Dragon Claw Fan Art," she said softly, and despite the storm of qi her voice was perfectly audible. "Blue Bridge Tryst."

  The battle fan whipped fully open, flattening into a quarter-circle of steel edges. Its entirety had been worked with ink and paint and thread, until the entire thing shone under the light. Wu Hao could make out fine-grained fish scales, a single claw, a roaring antlered head - and then he saw nothing, because with a single twitch of Lady Jin's hand it disappeared into nothingness, too fast for even his enhanced sight to track.

  Librarian Zhu bellowed a war cry and rushed forward, flickering into a blur that would take him to Lady Jin's side.

  "Bloodbound Blade Art," he bellowed. "Red -"

  But then, equally abruptly, Librarian Zhu's shape resolved again into his own, but he was still clearly in the middle of taking a step and speaking. His saber had been raised, his qi was still in motion, and yet he had stopped. There was a look of confusion on his face, which soon turned into a bitter realization. His mouth dropped open, as if to speak.

  Then his head slid off his shoulders, leaving blood bursting from the hole in his neck where his head had been. Lady Jin reached out with a single hand and caught the spinning fan easily, as if she'd simply tossed it with a wave of her hand.

  "Disappointing," she remarked, and turned away. Behind her there was a loud thump as Librarian Zhu's head hit the ground, followed seconds later by the rest of his body collapsing first to its knees, then slumping entirely to the ground, but she paid all of that no mind.

  Instead, Lady Jin grimaced at the blood that had spattered across her fan, clacked it shut, and handed it to one of the guards with a red saber patch, who were all standing stock still. "Get me a new one."

  "As the Lady commands," the guard said crisply, and taking a reverent hold of the fan he strode away, walking out of the room easily.

  "This makes me the winner," Lady Jin said to the council of elders. "Librarian Zhu has lost the trial, and is therefore guilty. Does anyone wish to dispute this outcome?"

  Her voice rang out among the gathered people there. There were eruptions of qi - Shan Guoxi fought to keep the blandly polite look on his face the same as it had been despite the best efforts of his eyebrows to frown deeply, another elder stared at Librarian Zhu's headless corpse with such a look of utter despair that it seemed as if he might have been the one decapitated.

  "Lady Jin has grown in strength again," Shan Guoxi managed. His face had returned to its blank smile.

  She sighed. "I wish I had the time to stand still and enjoy life. Unfortunately, life conspires to make me grow stronger even if I try to rest. What can I do but bow to the will of the heavens?"

  You don't like her, Wu Hao reminded himself. You really don't like her, even if she's making these men look like clowns. It's amusing until it's you she's set her whims on exploiting.

  One of the elders, cheek spasming, bowed. "As you say, Lady Jin."

  "It is as I say," she acknowledged. "Now, as the one who called this meeting, as the greatest authority in this room, I believe that's all. Please inform Fu Yue that the clan leader's wife is expected to be at every single meeting, sick child or not. Anything less is a dereliction of duty. I trust this has been an example of my feelings towards dereliction of duty."

  "Yes, Lady Jin," another elder said quickly.

  She nodded, fixed the sleeve that had crept up her arm slightly and apparently exposed more of her white-jade skin than she wanted it to, and marched over to him and Jin Qilong.

  Lady Jin stopped near the both of them.

  "What did you learn?" she asked Jin Qilong.

  Jin Qilong's mouth worked as he tried to get his thoughts in order. It took a little longer than she'd hoped.

  "To finish things quickly," he tried.

  Lady Jin's qi spoke of some muted boredom with his answer, and he sagged back into himself as she just nodded.

  "It'll do," she said. "In three days, the prefectural governor will be here. This morning, news has reached me that he'll be bringing his child along. You're to receive her as a host should."

  She didn't say that he shouldn't disappoint her, but it was implied, nonetheless.

  With that, Lady Jin walked away. Her guards peeled away alongside her, though Wu Hao had begun to have his doubts about who was guarding who, exactly.

  The moment she'd left the room, several people sank to their knees, finally let go of long-held breaths, wrenched their eyes away from the cooling corpse of Librarian Zhu, whose blood was still pooling on the darkwood floor. Even Jin Qilong and Wu Hao watched, transfixed.

  "You understand now?" Jin Qilong asked. "That's what she expects me to be like."

  Wu Hao could only mutely nod.