The inner disciple's name, Wen Dao learned later, was Han Feng. He had been at Qi Condensation Level Two for eight months. He was known as one of the calmer senior disciples.
He did not announce himself. He moved.
Qi Condensation cultivators were different. Wen Dao felt it immediately — not just stronger physically, but the quality of their movement was different. There was intention behind it that Body Tempering fighters didn't have yet. As if each movement was connected to something deeper.
Han Feng's first strike carried a thin coating of qi. It hit Wen Dao's forearm block and the impact carried an extra push — not just physical force but a push that went deeper, rattling into the bone.
Wen Dao staggered.
He recalibrated instantly. Body Tempering could not match qi-enhanced attacks directly. He needed to not be where the attacks landed.
He moved. Fast. Using his Level Five body to create angles.
Han Feng tracked him calmly.
The next exchange: Han Feng feinted, Wen Dao read the feint correctly, moved — but Han Feng had already corrected from the feint. His second attack was from a different angle, anticipated.
This was reading being used against reading. Han Feng was not predictable in the way Body Tempering opponents were. He had enough cultivation depth to change mid-movement.
New problem.
Wen Dao changed approach. He stopped trying to read and started trying to make Han Feng respond instead.
He attacked. Fast combinations, going to different spots — shoulder, hip, knee, ribs. Not trying to land clean hits. Trying to make Han Feng commit to specific defensive positions.
The Iron Question Fist used against a higher opponent: ask questions they have to answer, then read the answers instead of predicting.
Han Feng defended efficiently. But the nature of defense requires commitment to a position. Each defensive commitment was information.
On the nineteenth second, Wen Dao landed his first clean hit — the inside of Han Feng's left elbow, hitting the nerve cluster. The arm numbed briefly.
Han Feng blinked.
He stepped back. He reset. He looked at Wen Dao with new attention.
'You hit me,' he said. Not angry. Surprised.
'Your left elbow nerve cluster,' Wen Dao said, continuing to move, keeping distance, not giving Han Feng time to fully reset. 'Your guard closes from that side slightly when you extend right. It creates a window of approximately 0.3 seconds.'
Han Feng processed that. Then he attacked differently — he stopped his previous pattern entirely and used a new one.
'Better,' Wen Dao said, and started reading the new pattern.
The five minutes were long. Very long. He took significant damage — three qi-enhanced hits that would leave deep bruising. He lost ground consistently. He was running backward for much of it.
But he was upright.
At the two-minute mark, the jade pendant activated. Not the inheritance mark — the pendant itself. It pulsed once against his chest and his body absorbed it. A surge of clarity — not power, but clarity. He read three moves ahead of Han Feng for exactly four seconds.
In those four seconds, he landed two more clean hits.
At four minutes, Han Feng used a qi burst. A full-force compression strike that hit Wen Dao's guard and sent him across the room.
He hit the wall. Slid down it.
He got up.
He was still up.
The bell rang. Five minutes.
Elder Chu looked at the unknown elder.
The unknown elder looked at the floor where Wen Dao stood, breathing hard, bleeding from the nose, one eye partially swollen, upright.
'Conditional inner disciple status approved,' Elder Chu said. 'Report to the inner disciple wing at the new month.'
Wen Dao nodded. He looked at Han Feng.
'You hit me three times,' Han Feng said. He seemed to be working something out.',
'The second one — the right shoulder — was lucky,' Wen Dao said fairly.
Han Feng looked at him for a long moment. Then he nodded once, the way people do when they've seen something they'll be thinking about.
He left.
Outside the assessment room, in the corridor, three Grey Peak outer disciples were waiting. They had heard about the assessment somehow. News moved fast in sects.
They looked at Wen Dao's bruised face.
'You failed?' one of them said.
'I passed,' Wen Dao said, and walked past them.