Aldwyn chuckled, low and dangerous as distant thunder.

"Thirteen years ago, the Hongmoon heir stole from his fellow examinees. Among his victims was someone who suffered greatly—a cascade of ruin that began with simple theft and ended in the dirt of disgrace."

Kage's response came without hesitation.

"He failed because he was incompetent. He got caught. He left evidence like iron shavings at a forge. He let his victims die when keeping them alive would've been strategic. And most critically—" His smile returned, sharp as fresh-broken glass. "—he couldn't justify his actions when questioned. I can."

Arch-Harmonist Zera leaned forward. Her ordinary voice suddenly carried the weight of a smith's hammer poised to strike.

"Then justify them. Now."

Kage clasped his hands behind his back, posture perfect, tone forged into certainty.

"Every hundred years, an Impure crisis sweeps across the Mistral Archipelago. The rising tide of corruption signals the next cycle's approach. It couldn't have been easy for mere students to lure a Wretch-rank Impure into the Silent Groves. If my guess is correct, they stumbled into luck. Yet this proves the storm gathering on our horizon." He paused, letting the words settle like sediment. "Don't you need bloodlines capable of weathering what's coming?

"With iron and tempest in my veins, I'm forged for greatness. But I'm not gambling on potential. What you cannot do—because you must wear the mask of virtue—I can accomplish without that burden. Look at the examination's survivors. They'll prove sharper than any blade you've honed in years. You can already see it."

The three Elders stiffened fractionally.

'Good.'

"You test for harmony because you need harmony to maintain order and draw students to your gates. But you're tempering a generation who will hesitate when steel must be drawn. Who will value cooperation over survival. Who will die clutching each other's hands, singing unity hymns while Impures tear them apart."

His voice dropped, each word deliberate as hammer strikes.

"I robbed those students because I refused to lose. I killed the Impure because I refused to die. And I stand here now, challenging your entire examination system, because your methods are forging exactly the kind of cultivators who will shatter when it matters most."

Supreme Himura's river-smooth voice carried an undercurrent of strain. "You presume to know better than six centuries of academy tradition?"

Kage's smile turned almost gentle—the kind worn by blades before they cut.

"I presume nothing, Lord Supreme. I only know I've lived in a world where morality is weakness. Where no pretense, no mask, shields you from the oppression of strength. Good, evil, strength, weakness—I come from a place where clear lines divided these things. People knew where they stood."

Kage let silence build before continuing.

"Take, for example, the fact that you'll dare make scapegoats of my brothers only because I allowed it. Such is the weight of a Great Clan. You need that mass to make them answer for their sins. And they aren't special. They're simply the offspring of power. Not goodness, not evil—just power."

He spread his arms, addressing all three Elders.

"So yes. I believe at least one of you agrees with me. One of you looked at this examination and thought: 'This isn't enough. These children need real danger. Real choices. Real consequences sharp enough to cut.'

"One of you allowed that Impure into the Silent Grove—not through negligence, but because you wanted to see who would truly survive versus who would merely *perform* survival for your observers."

His hands dropped.

"And whichever one of you it was—thank you. That Impure taught me more about my edge in ten minutes than your seven-day trial could have taught in a week."

Silence filled the Chamber like winter descending on the Highlands. The three Elders stared down at him, three storms gathering force.

Finally, Aldwyn spoke, his hammer-voice carrying something that might have been respect.

"You are either the wisest fifteen-year-old we've ever encountered... or the most dangerously arrogant."

Kage met his gaze without flinching.

"Perhaps I'm both. But I'm also the one who killed the Impure, aced your examination, and now stands asking: If your system is so perfectly forged, why am I the only one questioning its temper?"

He let that settle before delivering his final strike.

"Unless, of course, previous students have asked. And you silenced them—which would prove my point about your methods producing obedience rather than excellence."

Arch-Harmonist Zera laughed. Actually laughed, the sound echoing through the open Chamber like wind through mountain passes.

"Himura, Aldwyn—I believe we've found something genuinely interesting this year."

Supreme Himura's river-voice still carried disapproval, but curiosity threaded through it now like jade veins through stone.

"The boy is dangerous."

"The boy is honest," Aldwyn corrected. "Brutally, perhaps recklessly so. But honest."

He leaned back on his throne, studying Kage the way a master smith examines a blade fresh from the forge.

"Very well, Son of Ironstorm. You've challenged our methodology. Now answer this: If not harmony, what should we test for?"

Kage didn't hesitate.

"Adaptability. Ruthlessness when the storm demands it. Mercy when strategy calls for it. The ability to recognize which moment demands which response. Don't test whether students can cooperate—test whether they know when cooperation serves their purpose and when it becomes dead weight dragging them under."

His voice hardened to tempered steel.

"Train students who can survive alone but choose to work together when advantageous. Not students who work together because they're too brittle to stand alone."

Arch-Harmonist Zera tilted her head. "And if such training produces monsters?"

"Then at least they'll be living monsters," Kage replied, his words falling like an executioner's blade. "Instead of harmonious corpses."

Silence settled over the Chamber. The weight of his words from the past ten minutes hung in the air like storm clouds before lightning.

Then Arch-Harmonist Zera von Tsubaki leaned forward, her gaze cutting across the distance between them.

"If I'm correct, you're among the few who received the riddle of the Severed Blade. What is your answer?"

Kage stood silent for a long moment, his reflection fractured in the obsidian beneath his feet—a blade broken and reforged in dark glass. When he spoke, his voice carried none of the earlier edge. Just quiet certainty, polished smooth.

"What remains of a man who has cut away every part of himself he deemed corruption?"

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