Mist still clung to the fields when the third bell faded.
Li Yan stared at the lantern above Yunhe, then at Xu Pingsheng. "They heard that all the way up the mountain," he said. "We should move."
The old keeper pressed a parcel of dried cakes into Pingsheng's hands and bowed to the earth. "Leave the rest to us, young sirs. If the Lantern misbehaves again, we will shut our doors and wait."
Pingsheng nodded. The shards in his sleeve had cooled. The wheel behind his heart turned once, slow as a warning.
They took the road back. Wind combed the valley in long, gray strokes. For a time they walked without speaking, the way men do who have said too much to the world already.
Li Yan broke first. "So," he said, chewing the word. "You pulled a Thread in front of half a town. That's… new."
"It was killing them."
"I know." He kicked a pebble. "I was there. I also enjoy not being dead. The Sect enjoys rules for the same reason."
Pingsheng did not argue. The mountain shouldered up from the fields. Pine began to crowd the path. Somewhere above, another bell struck, once, like a nail driven into wood.
They were a mile from the gate when a shadow crossed the road. A paper crane spiraled down, unfolded in midair, and became a strip of black-lacquered bamboo etched with silver seals. It stopped at Pingsheng's chest and clung there like frost.
Li Yan swore softly. "Disciplinary summons. They didn't even wait."
The seal warmed, sank through cloth, and left a faint ring of cold on the skin beneath—no pain, only the sense of being counted.
"Don't peel it," Li Yan said. "It peels you first."
Pingsheng touched the spot. "I wasn't going to."
They passed under the outer arch as the sun bled into cloud. The Sect moved as it always did—disciples crossing courts, bells, smoke, the long breath of an old machine—but eyes followed them now, sliding away when met.
At the Ash Hall door, Instructor Han appeared like a blade drawn without sound. "Report."
Li Yan spoke quickly, cleanly: errand delivered, Yunhe stable, anomaly encountered, contained. He did not say by whom.
Han's gaze settled on Pingsheng. "Elder Qinghe requests you at the Pine Court."
Li Yan caught his sleeve as they parted. "Say as little as possible," he whispered. "Even silence can be quoted."
Pine Court was a small square garden cut into the slope. A single pine grew slightly crooked in the center, made more beautiful by the flaw. Elder Qinghe stood with his hands behind him, looking at the tree as if it were reciting something he'd heard before.
"You came," he said without turning.
"The summons helped," Pingsheng said.
Qinghe's mouth moved—almost a smile. "Show me."
Pingsheng drew one shard from his sleeve. Blue light breathed within the glass, faint as memory. He set it on the stone railing. The air around it cooled. The pine's needles trembled and then were still.
"You forced a Lantern to release a Nether Thread," Qinghe said. "And you redirected it."
"It was already feeding," Pingsheng answered. "On a woman's years. On the town. I cut the rope."
Qinghe finally looked at him. "You cut into Heaven's rope, boy."
Pingsheng did not look away. "Then Heaven tied it wrong."
Silence threaded the space between them. Far below, the outer courts clattered with bowls and chores. Above, a hawk traced a slow circle and vanished into cloud.
"At dawn," Qinghe said at last, "the Disciplinary Hall will ask what you did and who taught you to do it. You will not lie. You will not tell the whole truth. You will say: the Lantern faltered; a Thread bent; you held it long enough for it to unbend."
"That's not what happened."
"It is what they can bear." Qinghe's voice thinned. "They are not the only ones listening."
The summons seal on Pingsheng's skin pulsed, once, in agreement.
Qinghe reached for the shard and then did not touch it. "Keep those hidden. Never display what you cannot afford to lose. And never show all the rings you can turn."
"I have one," Pingsheng said.
Qinghe's eyes said he did not believe that and did not want to be convinced. "Return to the Outer Court. Do not leave your quarters. At first light you will be brought to the Hall."
He paused. "If they ask who kept you from dying in Nanshan—if they ask why you lived—say: my mother told me to."
Pingsheng's throat tightened. "She did."
"Good." Qinghe exhaled. "Then let that be true in every place where truth is allowed."
Night came down in steady rain. The Outer Court dormitory smelled of straw and wet stone. Li Yan sat cross-legged on the next pallet over, staring at the ceiling as if words were written in the rafters.
"They'll carve you," he said finally. "Not with knives. With vows."
"I won't bow."
"Try not to say that part out loud." Li Yan rolled to face him. "If they cut you out of the Sect, I'm not following. I like eating."
Pingsheng almost smiled. "Eat now, then."
They shared the dried cakes from Yunhe. Rain stitched the world. Somewhere deeper in the mountain, a bell struck midnight.
The summons seal cooled to ice.
Boots sounded in the corridor before dawn. The door slid open. Two enforcers stood in the rain, robes the color of cloud, eyes like sheathed blades.
"Xu Pingsheng," one said. "Disciplinary Hall."
Li Yan sat up, hair wild. "I'll come as witness."
"You'll come as broom if you come at all," the enforcer said without looking at him.
Pingsheng rose. He tucked the shards into his sleeve and tied the cord twice. The wheel behind his heart turned, once, and went still.
He followed the enforcers into the wet gray of morning. The mountain wore a hood of cloud. Lanterns along the path burned steady and strange, as if watching.
At the foot of the cliff, the Hall's doors waited—ironwood banded in black, carved with a spiral of names that disappeared into the stone above.
The rain thickened, blurring ink into the carvings.
"Walk," the enforcer said.
Pingsheng did.
If Heaven decrees silence, he thought, then I will answer plainly.
He stepped across the threshold.