I stood there, still processing what I had just experienced. The sensation of Fist Qi still vibrated in my mind—like the echo of a powerful strike that had shaken me to my core.
And then, suddenly, my interface flashed red. A warning message appeared before my eyes:
WARNING!
Violation of Fist Garden regulations detected!
Remain in place until authorised personnel arrive!
I blinked.
What?!
My first instinct was to look around. The garden was quiet. No alarms, no security cameras turning toward me, nothing to indicate I had actually done anything wrong.
I had just been standing here, watching.
I quickly opened my contacts and dialled Diego 098.
The dial tone dragged on, and when his voice finally came through, it sounded different from usual.
"What the hell did you do?"
So he already knew… whatever this was.
"Nothing!" I shot back, offended. "I was literally just standing here!"
A brief pause.
"Well, not many people cultivate while walking around!" he snapped.
"I wasn’t cultivating…" I started to protest, but even to me, my voice didn’t sound entirely confident.
"Stay put. I’m coming."
The call cut off.
Another massive qi fist crashed into its target, and once again, I felt it—strength, determination, hardness.
I glance at the message again, trying to make sense of it. Had I accidentally cultivated? What does my cultivation level say?
77/2467.
Lower than the last time I’d checked, but given the natural qi dissipation, everything seemed normal.
Did I seriously just absorb one lousy unit of qi by accident and now I was in trouble for it?
I didn’t even have time to properly get annoyed before I heard the low hiss of jet engines.
I turned sharply and saw Diego 098 soaring toward me on a sleek black board—like a futuristic surfboard with built-in thrusters.
I’d seen something similar before—one of the cadets in the metro had been carrying one. But carrying wasn’t riding.
I need one of those.
I wonder how much they cost.
Diego descended sharply, slowed, and tilted his board onto its edge—like a snowboarder braking on a slope. Except snowboarders had snow resistance to stop them. Whatever was stopping this surfboard was a mystery, since it never touched the ground—just wobbled slightly and hovered in place.
Diego hopped off, waved a hand, and the board shot off into the air.
His arrival caught the attention of the cadet practicing the giant fist technique, but Diego ignored him and turned straight to me.
"You’re sure you weren’t doing anything?" he demanded. "You weren’t cultivating?"
"No!" I repeated, feeling a little more nervous now. "At least… not intentionally."
He sighed, like he had expected a different answer.
"Let’s see…"
He tapped something into his interface, then narrowed his eyes suspiciously.
"What?"
"What changed?" he asked.
"What do you mean?" I frowned.
"Before the system flagged you—what changed?" he pressed.
"Uh… I think I felt Fist Qi," I admitted. That was the only thing that had come to mind. But that was exactly why I had come here in the first place, and Diego knew that!
"How exactly? What were you doing?" 098 wasn’t letting up.
"I was observing the technique…" I gestured toward the cadet, who was still watching us.
The cadet raised both hands slightly, as if to say ‘what?’Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work!
"Show it again," Diego called over.
Right at that moment, another hiss of jet engines reached my ears.
I turned my head—and saw another cultivator approaching. Black jumpsuit. Breathing mask. No horns. His hair was completely grey—probably the first human I had seen in the garden without an armour.
His board was the same as Diego’s, and he controlled it with just as much ease.
He braked with the same maneuver, then jumped off—but unlike Diego, his surfboard remained floating just above the ground.
"What’s going on here?" the man asked lazily, his gaze flicking from me to the cadet on the platform. "This the one who screwed up?" he added, pointing at me.
"Unclear, sir," Diego replied, then impatiently gestured at the cadet.
The cadet reset his stance. Qi thickened around his hands and in the air above the target, forming a massive fist. He struck downward.
The qi projection dropped like a cannonball—but this time, the impact was noticeably weaker than before. I guess, he was nervous about the audience. But even so, I still felt it. Not as strongly as before, but I felt it.
"Well?!" Diego demanded.
"Yeah," I nodded. "I felt it."
Diego threw a punch to the side, and a silver projection burst from his fist.
The sensation was fleeting, but I caught it.
"Huh…" I commented. "It’s there, but weaker. Much weaker—and shorter."
"Shorter?" Diego echoed.
"The feeling fades faster."
Diego visibly relaxed and turned back to the gardener.
"Looks like we’ve got an enlightenment, sir. The cadet observed someone else’s technique, and it gave him a deep understanding of Fist Qi. His root jumped up by three points. No qi absorption detected."
The gardener looked at me differently now.
"Congratulations, cadet," he said, then hopped back onto his surfboard.
Tilting the nose of the board sharply upward, he shot into the sky, kicking up a cloud of dust in his wake.
So, no punishment after all. At least, the gardener—or whatever they called the staff managing the garden—had no interest in punishing me. Still… that felt too easy.
I turned to Diego for confirmation.
"So, I’m not getting penalised?"
The red warning window in my interface vanished. I quickly checked my stats.
Fist Root had indeed grown—from 23 to 26.
"Nothing to punish you for," Diego shrugged. "Your Root increased, so the system assumed you were cultivating. Since you didn’t have permission, the warning triggered automatically."
"The system can’t tell the difference between cultivation and an enlightenment?" I asked.
"Enlightenments aren’t exactly common."
He clapped his hands together.
"Alright, that’s enough wandering around for today. Get to work!"
"Whatever you say!" I agreed cheerfully.
"Come on, I’ll show you your section."
As we turned to leave, the cadet on the platform called out.
"Hey!"
He spread his arms, clearly asking what the hell was that?
Diego jabbed a finger at me and yelled back.
"Enlightenment. From your technique."
"No way!" the cadet said, unconvinced.
"It was awesome!" I shouted, flashing him a thumbs-up.
Diego nudged me forward, clearly not as amused as I was.
The thinhorn led me to a new section of violets. The drones were already waiting there, and out of the kindness of his heart, Diego assigned me a slightly larger area than before. Not that I minded—after everything that had just happened, I needed time to process. And mindless work was perfect for that.
Honestly, I needed to settle down. The sudden stroke of luck had left me buzzing with energy, and I had no idea where to put it. It felt like my whole body was itching, and thanks to the hypersensitivity formation, it felt way too real.
Work helped distract me a little.
The metal spider-drones scuttled between the rows as usual, carefully harvesting flowers. One by one, the baskets filled up, and all I had to do was receive them and seal them. But now, in the qi saturating the air, I could sense subtle differences. Like I had learned to distinguish between different kinds of wine.
Well… one specific kind, at least.
The sensation of Fist Qi hadn’t faded. I could still feel a trace of what that cadet’s technique had radiated, lingering in the flowers I sealed into the baskets.
That was a Fist Qi.
Even when I got distracted—by the drones, or by an itch in an annoyingly hard-to-reach spot—I could easily return to the feeling. I could find it in the air, at the flowers. And deep inside me, I had the distinct sense that the same energy was stirring.
This shift took me a little over forty minutes. I checked my balance—another point down, reducing my debt to -8. Slowly but surely, I was crawling my way toward positive numbers.
Next stop: Armour Hall.
The queues had nearly vanished, and only two platforms were still running fittings. The entire armour removal process took me less than five minutes. I stretched, bracing myself for the jarring sensation of losing my heightened perception—but this time, the hit wasn’t as bad.
The world dulled a little, colours losing some of their intensity, but it didn’t drain my muscles like before. The fatigue was lighter. The itching was gone. The exhilaration of my enlightenment still carried me. Or maybe… the enlightenment itself was more than I truly understood.
Since I still felt fine, I decided not to linger on the bench this time.
But I did slip the ring off my finger again. I still remembered how easily Tariq had wiped the floor with me last time. Better to avoid any potential conflicts until I’d properly recovered.
Time to check in with Kate.
I dialled her number as I headed down into the metro.
"Listening," she answered.
Her voice was calm this time, but I still asked:
"Can you talk?"
"Yeah."
"I had an enlightenment."
"You mean, like… you figured something out? Or a full-on Enlightenment?"
"I think the second one. I felt Fist Qi, and my root jumped up by three points."
"Whoa! Congrats… Why has that never happened to me?!" she immediately complained.
"Maybe because you’re not a genius like me."
"You’re a little shit, not a genius!" she snapped. "Don’t be rude to your mentor!"
"How am I not supposed to be rude when my mentor calls me a little shit?"
"You started it!"
"Wow, what a mature argument."
"Yeah, yeah… You’re a giant, stinky pile of crap!"
"I appreciate your recognition."
"A-ha, don’t overdo it, genius," she scoffed. "You should rest for today. Tomorrow, Flow Chamber at 10:45. Brew your tea at 10:15—finish drinking it by 10:25. Twenty minutes should be enough to get to the Meditation Hall. And don’t get into anything before then!"
I nodded, then remembered she couldn’t see me and muttered:
"Got it."
"One more thing."
"Listening."
"You can start picking your first technique. The list of available ones is on the library page."
Shit, techniques!
I still had that orange Earth technique. And now I had more ways to put it to use. Maybe I should ask Novak about it.
I hesitated, and the image of the cadet in blue-green armour popped into my mind. His technique had been interesting.
"Hey, do you know what technique lets qi fists arc and change direction in midair? Saw one like that in the garden today."
"Well, with enough understanding, any technique lets you control your fist projection."
"The fist flies about twenty meters and doesn’t detonate…" I added.
"Look up Flowing Fist. That’s the only one that comes to mind."
"Thanks!"
Alright.
"No problem. See you tomorrow?"
"Yeah, later."
The call ended.
I stepped into the train, found an empty seat, and pulled up my interface to check the technique list.
It would’ve been easier on my tablet, but I was too impatient to wait.