The silence in the Hall of Ten Thousand Sages was broken not by an immortal chant, but by the trembling shuffle of silk slippers across cold dark rock.
Chief Proctor Zhong Shan, his face drained of every drop of blood, carried a tray of polished purple dragon-wood. Beside him walked Hall Master Xuan Ji, the five-hundred-year-old patriarch walking with his head bowed so low that his midnight-black hair brushed the hem of his hemp robes, his hands clasped before him in the stance of a humble first-year novice approaching the old family altar.
On the purple dragon-wood tray rested two items.
The first was a medallion carved from sky Star-Jade, eight-sided in shape and glowing with the soft radiance of eight twisted together star-patterns: the 8-Star Master Teacher Medallion. In the three-thousand-year history of the Jiuzhou Continent, only three had ever been cast. It was the ultimate pedagogical credential in existence—granting the bearer open power to inspect, decommission, or recompile any sect, academy, or court body across all mortal nations.
Beside the medallion lay a key. Nine inches long, forged from an unknown star-fallen alloy that seemed to bend surrounding light around its teeth, it was etched with thirty-six tiny gear teeth along its tube-shaped shaft. The Sovereign Key to the Sages’ Sanctum Gate, the master key that could unlock the deepest vault of the First Epoch.
