The smell of royal red stone always carried the bitter tang of arsenic and dried ox gall.
Lin Ke stood in the fourth rank of the outer smelting pavilion. His hands were tucked inside the frayed sleeves of his grease-stained work tunic. Fifty paces ahead, on the raised dark wood dais of the Grand Assembly Hall, twelve Imperial Iron Guards stood in locked formation. Their black iron breastplates reflected no light at all.
Between them stood Grand Inquisitor Chu Jue.
The Judge was tall, lean. Then he draped in the heavy plum-colored brocade of the Imperial Ministry of Punishments. At his waist hung the Imperial Lineage Seal. A massive bronze disc chased with coiled golden dragons that emitted a steady, low-hum like an unshielded power transformer.
Chu Jue didn’t look at the outer students. He looked at the sect’s high elders as though inspecting sheep waiting for slaughter.
“By decree of the Ministry of Punishments, under seal of the Grand Yan Censorate,” Chu Jue said, his voice flat, clear, and shaking with the easy power of an Early Golden Core master. “The Spring Core Registration is now in effect across Iron Sword Province.”
He tapped a lacquered black jade casket resting on an ebony stone stand beside him.
