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"You're the one who wrote this?" Su Jin slammed a jade slip onto Mo Han's desk hard enough to split the wood.
The door behind her was still smoking. Heat rolled off her crimson robes, and the ward marks around the frame curled into black ash.
Mo Han didn't look up. He finished the line he was writing, set down his brush, and reached for the slip. "Morning to you too."
"Don't get cute."
"I wasn't. Your entrance just made a strong case for better manners."
Her aura surged. The ink bottle beside his hand rattled, and a thin line of smoke rose from the desk.
Mo Han picked up the jade slip and checked the crack. "Good news. The contract's still readable."
"It's trash."
"It's regulation."
"It's designed to fail people."
"It's designed to test them. That's the job."
Su Jin leaned over the desk, both palms flat against the wood. Her eyes held gold flecks, bright as coals. "Don't hide behind your title, Keeper. I know exactly what you are. Bottom-rank. No backers. No sect. No one important standing behind you."
Mo Han pushed his chair back and stood. He wasn't taller than her, but he didn't give her an inch of space. "Then you already know how little I have to lose."
Her fingers pressed harder. The desk smoked beneath them.
"You think you can stall me to make yourself look important?"
"No. I think you came here to take the trial."
"Under this contract?"
"Under the contract you brought back into my office."
For half a breath, her eyes dropped to the jade slip. Then she snatched it up.
"Fine," she said. "Show me where you hid the trick."
"Read it."
"I am reading it."
"Out loud, if you want my help."
She shot him a look sharp enough to cut paper, then fed qi into the slip. Glowing characters unfolded between them, filling the office with pale gold light.
Mo Han watched her scan the clauses. He'd rebuilt the contract overnight, pulling old rules from the archives and stitching them into the current trial template. He'd left no obvious weakness. No clean loophole. Nothing she could attack without admitting she hadn't read the whole thing.
Su Jin's expression tightened.
"Three years," she said.
"That's the maximum term."
"If I fail, I serve as your trial assistant for three years?"
"If you fail, you serve as my assistant until the term ends or I release you."
"That's not a penalty. That's ownership."
"It's a service bond. The Tower uses them all the time."
"Not for preliminary qualifications."
Mo Han tapped the third page of floating characters. "Not often. Still legal."
Her gaze followed his finger. "And if I pass?"
"The bond ends when the trial is certified."
"By you."
"By the trial board. I submit the result. The board confirms it."
"So you can fail me whenever you want."
"You can check the archives before you sign."
Her eyes narrowed. "You keep saying that."
"Because you keep accusing me instead of reading."
The heat in the room climbed another degree. Mo Han's sleeve began to smolder near the cuff. He slapped it out and held her stare.
"I'm Su Jin," she said. "Crimson Flame Sect. Inner disciple. Fifth-stage Golden Core. I don't fail preliminary trials."
"Great. Then the assistant clause won't matter."
"You expect me to believe that?"
"I expect you to decide whether your pride is worth three years."
That landed. Her jaw flexed.
Mo Han could almost hear the calculation behind her silence. Walking away meant giving up her place in the sect rankings. Taking the trial meant trusting a Keeper she already despised. Refusing to sign would put her in front of the Tower Council with a complaint but no result.
She didn't need him to explain any of that. The contract had already done the explaining.
"You're enjoying this," she said.
"I'm enjoying the part where you finally read the terms."
Su Jin flicked her wrist. The glowing contract snapped shut and struck his chest like a thrown blade.
Mo Han caught it before it hit the floor. "That isn't a signature."
"I haven't decided."
"You decided when you broke through my ward and walked in here."
"I decided to ask questions."
"You set the door on fire."
"It was in my way."
"And now the contract's in yours."
Her stare dropped to the jade slip in his hand. For the first time, he saw something besides anger. Not fear. Su Jin didn't look like someone who had ever let fear choose for her.
She looked cornered.
That made her more dangerous.
"What happens if I refuse?" she asked.
"You leave."
"That's it?"
"That's it."
"And the trial?"
"You don't take it."
"Then you don't have an assistant."
Mo Han's mouth almost twitched. "Correct. I won't have an assistant. You'll have no reason to complain about the contract."
The answer irritated her more than a threat would have. Her aura pulled tight around her body, no longer spilling across the room. She was done trying to intimidate him. Now she was looking for a way to win.
Good. That was the first useful thing she'd done all morning.
"You wrote this to trap someone," she said.
"I wrote it to make the trial enforceable."
"Same thing."
"Depends on whether the person signs without reading."
Her thumb dragged across the jade slip's edge. A thin red line opened in her skin.
Mo Han's attention fixed on it. "Don't."
She looked up. "Worried?"
"I'm giving you one last chance to read the footnotes."
"You should've led with that."
"You would've called it a warning."
"It is a warning."
"No. It's a courtesy."
She smiled then, and the expression carried no warmth at all. "Keep your courtesy."
She pressed her bleeding thumb to the signature line.
The jade flared.
Cold raced through the office. The characters tore free from the slip and wrapped around Su Jin's wrist in a bright, tightening band. They climbed her forearm, sank beneath her skin, and locked into place below her elbow.
Her breath caught.
"What did you—"
"You signed the trial contract."
"Break it."
"I can't."
She burned the mark with a burst of qi. The flames struck the contract seal and vanished without leaving a scar.
Su Jin tried again, harder. The windows shook. The floorboards cracked beneath her boots.
Mo Han stayed beside the desk, though every instinct told him to move. "Stop feeding it power."
"You don't give me orders."
"I do now."
The seal tightened.
Su Jin's hand snapped toward his throat.
Mo Han triggered the emergency ward. A transparent barrier slammed between them, catching her fingers inches from his neck. The impact sent a crack through the room's remaining window.
Her face was suddenly close to his. Heat pressed against his skin. He could feel her breath, quick and furious, and the faint tremor in the hand pinned against the ward.
"Take it off," she said.
"No."
"I'll burn this office down around you."
"Then the Tower will charge you for the repairs."
"You think this is funny?"
"I think you should've read clause three."
The barrier flickered. Su Jin noticed. So did Mo Han.
Her eyes moved to the control talisman on his belt.
"Don't," he said.
She drove her knee into the ward instead.
The barrier burst apart.
Mo Han stumbled back. Su Jin seized the talisman, but the contract mark on her arm flared before she could crush it. A line of gold shot from her wrist to the wall behind him.
The trial board woke.
Black stone turned bright, and golden characters raced across its surface.
SU JIN, CRIMSON FLAME SECT.
BOUND TO TRIAL KEEPER MO HAN.
DURATION: THREE YEARS OR TRIAL COMPLETION.
STATUS: ACTIVE.
The entire lower tower chimed.
Su Jin released the talisman. Her hand curled slowly into a fist.
"You planned this," she said.
"I planned for the board to register a valid contract."
"You planned to bind me in front of the whole tower."
"I didn't summon the witnesses."
"You knew they'd hear it."
Mo Han glanced at the board. More names had begun appearing beneath hers, disciples gathering for the trial announcement.
He picked up his cold tea and took a drink. "You're right. That part was useful."
Her expression went still.
"You're going to regret this," she said.
"Probably."
"I'll report you to the Tower Council."
"After you finish the trial."
"I'll make sure you never administer another one."
"Then pass quickly."
The trial bell rang below them.
The contract mark yanked Su Jin's arm toward the office door. She dug her heels into the floor, but the seal dragged her one step forward.
Mo Han grabbed the jade slip and followed. "Your first assignment starts now."
"Where are you taking me?"
He looked at the golden line forming beneath her name on the board. His confidence vanished.
The system had selected the trial site without asking him.
A second bell struck. The office door began to open, and the contract pulled Su Jin toward the darkness beyond it—