Chapter 158 — The Enforcer's Badge

CHAPTER 158

The Enforcer's Badge

He Zhen's room contained a repair bench, three stools and a shelf crowded with spare puppet joints.

The delegate cleared a space by moving two cracked elbow plates onto the floor. He didn't summon attendants or ask Shi Feng to stand while he remained seated.

“Show me the badge first,” He Zhen said.

Shi Feng took it from his ring.

The metal had darkened around its edge. One corner carried the mark of a hard impact, and the reverse bore a number beneath Artificer Hall's old seal.

He Zhen picked it up with both hands.

For several breaths, he said nothing.

Then he turned it over, touched the damaged corner and let out a quiet breath.

“Xu Changhe always caught this against his belt hook,” He Zhen said. “He kept promising to change the hook.”

Shi Feng set the journal beside it.

“He left these in the passage where he died,” Shi Feng said.

He Zhen opened the journal near the middle. Ordinary handwriting crowded the page, with a repair diagram squeezed into one margin and a correction crossing half the next line.

The delegate's thumb stopped beside the note about filing.

“He wrote this after a disciple jammed the western gate,” He Zhen said. “I remember the shouting.”

There was affection in the complaint. It made Xu Changhe seem less like a dead man beside a dangerous passage and more like someone who had once annoyed living people for ordinary reasons.

Shi Feng found he preferred that.

He gave a brief account of the place: the excavation, the trapped passage, the remains and the things left within reach. He described what he had personally seen without pretending he knew Xu Changhe's final thoughts.

He didn't mention Mo Tianheng's ring or the possession attempt. Those belonged to another part of the ruin and another secret.

He Zhen listened without interrupting.

“Was there enough left to bury?” He Zhen asked.

Shi Feng answered honestly about what he had been able to do there.

The delegate bowed his head for a moment.

“Thank you for telling me plainly,” He Zhen said.

“I practised the sword method,” Shi Feng said. “The repair diagrams helped me understand some ordinary mechanisms too. I copied what I needed before bringing the original.”

He Zhen nodded.

“You didn't pretend the return movement was yours,” He Zhen said. “That's enough for me to begin with.”

“Was he a sword elder?” Shi Feng asked.

“An enforcer,” He Zhen replied. “A good swordsman. He could repair the tools disciples actually broke and make sound equipment without wasting half the storehouse. People forget how useful that is when they start talking about legendary refiners.”

Shi Feng looked at the journal. Nothing in it had claimed otherwise.

The skill had been practical, tested and written by a man who corrected his own mistakes. That had made it useful long before anybody in Qingyun recognized the name behind it.

“Iron River Sword Art,” He Zhen said. “Piercing Current, Turning Wave, Returning Tide. He liked people who could bring the sword home without making a second opening.”

Shi Feng remembered the puppet pole turning into the next target.

“He explained the return carefully,” Shi Feng said.

“He had to,” He Zhen replied. “Most young men only wanted the first strike.”

The delegate closed the journal and placed the badge on top.

“Are you returning these to the Hall?” He Zhen asked.

“Yes,” Shi Feng replied.

“Any condition?” He Zhen asked.

“No,” Shi Feng said. “They belong with people who knew him.”

He Zhen studied him, then bowed from his stool.

Shi Feng returned the bow.

There was no burst of hidden power, no second inheritance awakening from the metal, and no sudden declaration that the whole sect owed him its future. The badge had done what a badge should do. It had carried a name home.

He Zhen wrapped it and the journal in clean cloth.

“I'll enter the return in the Hall record,” He Zhen said. “The report of his death too. You won't need to repeat it for every clerk who asks.”

“That would help,” Shi Feng replied.

The delegate smiled faintly.

“I know our clerks,” He Zhen said.

A knock came at the door. An attendant brought the preliminary trial sheets and asked for He Zhen's confirmation of the puppet scores.

The delegate checked the numbers in front of him. Shi Feng looked away while the other candidates' entries were visible, giving the official room to complete the work properly.

He Zhen sealed the sheet and handed it back.

“The final list will be posted shortly,” He Zhen said.

Shi Feng stood.

“Then I won't keep you,” Shi Feng replied.

At the door, He Zhen paused with a hand on the wrapped journal.

“Whatever sect you eventually choose, keep practising the method honestly,” He Zhen said.

“I intend to,” Shi Feng replied.

That answer required no larger pledge. He had learned from Xu Changhe because the method suited him. The return of the badge didn't turn every Artificer Hall disciple into a trusted friend.

It did give him a clearer reason to look at the Hall with interest.

Outside the equipment court, Li Changyuan sat on a low wall eating roasted beans from a paper cone.

He looked at the repaired puppet joint in Shi Feng's hand. He Zhen had given him the discarded piece to examine, with no claim that it was valuable.

“Another broken thing?” Li Changyuan asked.

“A shoulder joint,” Shi Feng replied.

“Does it slap?” Li Changyuan asked.

“Not anymore,” Shi Feng said.

The old man looked disappointed, then offered the cone. Shi Feng took a few beans and sat beside him until the bell for the posted results sounded.

They didn't discuss the badge. Li Changyuan asked whether the furnace inlet had been cleared, and Shi Feng told him the flame had steadied afterward.

“Usually helps,” Li Changyuan said.

Shi Feng finished the beans and went toward the notice court.

Behind him, the old man folded the empty paper and put it in his pocket rather than dropping it on the ground.