It was the first morning in a week when, figuratively speaking, I stopped running and actually looked around. I finally paid attention to my own lot and asked how they were doing.
With Denis, things were predictably awful. He’d traded Flow Chamber cleaning for the Palm Garden, following mine and Bao’s example — but no one there let him just wander around and observe other people’s techniques. Bao, on the other hand, said he’d arranged a schedule like mine quite easily. Ninety minutes of work, thirty of walking around.
Marlon didn’t go to the Garden at all. His mentor allowed him to watch his training sessions, and since their roots were fully in sync — the mentor cultivated both point and air — Marlon had already learned to distinguish both types of qi, putting him ahead of the rest of us. He’d even spent some kitchen-earned points on two blue techniques — air and point — and was already practising the movements.
His mentor clearly followed a different philosophy than the one Kate subscribed to.
Denis and Bao still hadn’t found a mentor, but they’d arranged for a reassessment through the med staff. Denis had increased his time limit to 22 minutes, Bao had reached 16. Marlon had also been reassessed — twice, actually — and was now at 23.
I was still ahead of the lot for the moment, but the others weren’t slacking. They were working hard to catch up. None of them said it out loud, of course, but the competitive vibe was impossible to miss. I could feel them breathing down my neck. And here, there were hundreds just like them...
I had to remind myself again that I didn’t need to outrun everyone. But, as Bao once said back when he was being a smug arsehole — statistically, only one person from a room makes it through.
That was more or less what I was thinking about when I left the cafeteria and headed for Rene’s hall.
Kate interrupted those unpleasant thoughts.
Incoming call: K. L. Wong
Accept / Decline
"Fancy a coffee?" she asked cheerfully.
"I take it your raid went well?"
"Mmm..." she paused. "There were some... ‘adventures’, but overall, I came out with a massive profit!"
"Oh? So we’re heading to that fancy cafe and you’re treating your poor mentee?"
"You’re still richer than me!" she huffed — then cooled off quickly. "Everyone pays their own way!"
"Deal," I said. "Now? I’m almost at the hall. Rene’s."
"I figured you’d go with him. You’re sticking to your two-hour limit, right?"
"Yep."
"Great! Get to training. I’ll see you in two and a half hours," she said.
The hall looked almost exactly the same as yesterday: the same three second-period cadets, the same sharp impacts echoing off the walls, making my ears ring. Rene placed me in the same corner.
"Same routine — shoulders, elbows, fists, then a full cycle," he said. And even though it still felt like I was flailing more than learning, Rene noted some progress.
"You’re actually getting a lot closer to the hologram," he said after asking me to run through the full technique instead of starting a new cycle of elbows. I spent five minutes waving my arms, trying to stay inside the red silhouette.
"Your movements aren’t perfect yet, but they’re getting there. And more importantly — your body’s starting to move as a system, not as a collection of parts. Now, another cycle."
"Shoulders-elbows-fists, or the technique itself?"
"The first one."
"Why? If I’m getting better—"
"Did you see it?" he cut me off. "Did you see yourself getting better?"
"No," I admitted.
"Then how are you going to know you’re doing it right? How will you know you’re heading in the right direction?"
"So doing them separately lets me see the blue flashes — which means I’m getting it right..." I realised.
"Exactly. The blue flashes will give you the will to keep going. The red hologram will just make you hate the technique and the training."
"Bit like self-hypnosis, then?" I asked.
"It’s not the fists that strike," Rene tapped his temple, "it’s the mind."
Instant déjà vu. That phrase felt like it came straight out of some old Earth workout routine... Bench press? Deadlift?The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
Anyway, not important right now.
I took a ten-minute break, then turned the session into a bit of a game — a competition with myself. I ran short sets of five punches per arm, counting how many times I fell out of the hologram and it lit up red. The idea was to lower that number each round.
All I managed by the end of the session was to set a few personal records and jot them down in my notes — targets to beat next time.
Shoulders – 3, Elbows – 6, Fists – 13.
Yes, there were only ten punches total — but somehow, I managed to fall out of the hologram and snap back in twice per punch. Rene had been right — the red hologram was infuriating.
Which is exactly why a cup of good coffee and a pastry was just what my nerves needed. As I entered the café, I was immediately hit by that smell — none of that synthetic sludge from the vending machines, but real coffee, rich and aromatic: vanilla, chocolate, roasted beans.
The café was small but elegant. No gaudy touches — just the right colours, deep wooden tones, soft lighting, and a hush so calm it felt wrong to raise your voice. Light jazz seeped gently from the speakers, not as background noise but as part of the space itself.
Instead of the standard plastic furniture, there were proper chairs with deep seats, smooth tables that didn’t creak when touched, and a large panoramic window overlooking part of the academy complex. Beyond the glass — the tower blocks of the dorms, outlines of domes that covered training grounds, and above it all — the deep sky of Verdis. Since it was still relatively early, the stars were faint, Earth wasn’t visible at all, but another moon was — a pale crescent hovering in the upper-left corner of the view.
The place felt... too civilian. As if no one here had ever cultivated, broken through, or beaten each other half to death. Like a quiet island that had somehow gotten lost inside an academy where everyone was sprinting forward.
I chose a seat by the window, sat down, and messaged Kate that I was already there — she replied that she’d be a few minutes late, but showed up almost immediately.
The left side of her face looked like it had been cut out from someone else entirely — and grafted on. The skin was an angry, unhealthy pink with a slick shine to it. Her eye had a blood-red sclera, though the pupil stayed sharp. Her eyebrow was short, like it had been bleached out or burned off. Her lashes on that side were nearly gone. The hair — cropped to a fuzzy buzz cut, just a couple of centimetres long, with the same raw pink skin underneath.
And despite all that, she was grinning like she’d just come back from a holiday.
Kate walked over with her hands in her pockets...
"What’s that under your eye?" she asked suddenly, yanking her left hand out and pointing straight at my face.
"Bloody hell!" I flinched, nearly leaping out of the chair.
Her hand was the same sickly pink, grotesquely deformed and two or three times smaller than I remembered.
"Boo-hoo-hoo!" Kate cooed playfully, wiggling her tiny fingers. "Let me touch you."
"What the actual hell?" I caught her stunted hand mid-air — and she clamped it around my thumb. Her mini-fingers were just long enough to wrap around it.
The touch felt foreign — too sticky and too smooth.
I shook my hand to free myself, and Kate burst out laughing.
"You should’ve seen your face!" she said.
"I saw you!" I snapped back. "That was enough! You look like you got shoved through a shredder!"
"Well..." she hesitated, and this time shivered for real. "It was something like that. Got chewed up by Metal Ants."
She dropped into the chair, bracing herself with both hands — one normal, one tiny. I immediately pictured Tariq’s minuscule teeth.
"It’s going to grow back, right?"
"Nope. It’ll stay like this forever," Kate replied — but couldn’t keep a straight face. "Relax, couple more pod sessions and it’ll be back to normal." She raised her good hand and called over the barista.
We placed our order. I went with a sugarless latte and a raspberry croissant. Kate got a cappuccino and a slice of strawberry cake. She took the coffee in her right hand and the fork in her left — which made it look absolutely massive — but she still managed the cake just fine.
"Alright, spill it!" she said, clearly enjoying the drink.
So I told her. And didn’t forget to mention — three times — that I could’ve broken through the first time.
After the third time, Kate warned me.
"You bring it up again, I’ll slobber all over this little finger," she held up her left index, "and stick it right into your ear!"
I flinched, imagining something small, smooth, wet and sticky squirming around in my ear canal.
"Come on, admit it — you were wrong," I objected, though not quite as fiercely now.
"No. I exercised caution — and at the time, it wasn’t unjustified. You had no reason to risk it. End of story. Now tell me how you’re doing with Chain Punch."
"What do you mean, 'how I’m doing'? I’ve only just started learning the movements."
"You’re spending two hours just on movement drills?" she asked, surprised. "I thought you’d go straight for projection. You were so eager to get some real power under your belt..."
"Yeah, well, I figured projection without the technique wouldn’t do much good."
"In that case, you can train longer."
Kate gave me full permission to practise the movements as much as I wanted and wherever I wanted. The training hologram could be activated in my room, in the shower — anywhere, really. Still, it was probably smarter to go to one of the many training halls and do it in a designated area. Just in case my genius kicked in and I accidentally landed a real projection on a wall — or worse, on a roommate.
Then she brought up Alan — and that it was time for me to order a new set of armour. From there, we veered into my conversation with him about formations, gauntlets and techniques. Next, Kate wanted me to pick a movement technique, then a proper offensive skill for doing real damage, and finally something ultimate — something that could finish a fight outright.
That reminded me of Doc’s advice — what he said about internal techniques. What was it called... right, the focusing technique. Supposedly it would help me pick up other techniques faster — boost my learning speed overall.
Kate gave it some serious thought. She used internal techniques herself, but they were geared toward supporting external ones — enhanced shielding, faster qi circulation...
In the end, she said "no".
"To study internal techniques properly, you need solid control over your inner qi. First — Chain Punch, another stronger offensive technique, and a movement technique. After that, you can study your Focusing if you still want to. But honestly, very few serious fighters use it at the first stage — and we need to get you ready for duels."
Well, that made sense. If you needed three techniques just to be ready to handle internal qi training, you already had a solid combat kit. Add an ultimate move — and that’s a full loadout.
"You were against me entering duels, though," I reminded her of an earlier conversation.
"Eventually, you’ll have to," Kate said. "None of us got out of it. And the experience won’t hurt."
I looked at the pink side of her face and nodded. No — experience definitely hurt. Which is exactly why it’s better to earn it in the arena… than out in the field with Metal Ants.