Chief Referee Tie Zheng walked across the cobblestones, his simple gray cotton tunic fluttering in the evening breeze.
He was eighty years old, with deep lines carved into his weathered face and a silver beard that reached down to his chest. In his right hand, he carried a polished jade tablet engraved with the scales of judicial balance.
As he approached the Taichu banquet tables, several former outer disciples stood up nervously.
In their eyes, a chief tournament referee was an untouchable celestial authority whose word determined life and death in the arena.
“At ease, everyone,” Lin Mo said, waving a hand to keep his employees seated. “Nobody stands on ceremony during dinner.”
Lin Mo stood up and greeted the old man with a slight, respectful nod.
“Chief Referee Tie,” Lin Mo said. “To what do we owe the honor? Did our janitors violate arena noise ordinances?”
Tie Zheng let out a dry, self-deprecating chuckle. He set his jade judicial tablet onto the corner of Lin Mo’s table.
