She was not composed. Her eyes were wet with the specific, involuntary warmth of maternal pride that does not ask permission.
Tianlong stood.
The crowd went silent again.
He rose from the stone seat without hurry, his full height arriving in the afternoon light, his open-collared robe moving in the mountain wind. He descended the platform steps. He walked to the edge of the inner disciple section, his bare feet on the stone, and stopped.
"Well done," he said.
His voice carried to the high tier. To every corner of the gathered assembly. Not because he raised it — simply because it went where he intended it to go.
He was looking at Liang Wufei.
The young man straightened. His cultivation base steadied with the effort of maintaining composure under a direct ancestral gaze.
