After the lunch break, the squad reconvened on the stone training ground. Dust hung in the air. Sunlight hit the tile at a low angle, casting long, sharp shadows behind the line of initiates now in matching tunics.

  Captain Shen paced before them.

  “You’re in time. Good.”

  His tone had not changed.

  “Today marks the beginning of your life as cultivators. Warriors of the Empire.”

  He stopped. Turned.

  “During the next month, you will be trained. Trained to obey. Trained to cultivate. Trained to fight. That will be your mantra.”

  He raised his voice—not shouting, but louder than before.

  “Obey. Cultivate. Fight.”

  He waited for the echo of silence. It came quickly.

  “Your training will be divided into two parts. Mornings—you will receive education in geography, politics, history, strategy, and the fundamentals of cultivation theory.”

  “Afternoons,” he continued, “are for martial training. You will learn the fist, the sword and shield, and the spear and halberd. The first is your body—your first and last weapon. The second, an extension of your elemental affinity. The third, to master the battlefield.”

  “If you excel, you may earn the right to study additional weapons—Guandao, Fangtian Ji, bows, and more.”

  He looked down the line, as if expecting defiance.

  “Questions?”

  There were none.

  “Good.”

  He nodded to an assistant, who wheeled out a polished rack of weapons and armor.

  “Choose what suits your instinct. Not your ego. You will live with your choices.”

  The line moved forward in turns.

  Xo walked straight to the Guandao, his hand resting on the hilt like he already knew its weight. He lifted it, spun it once, and nodded. For armor, he chose a medium steel cuirass and reinforced gauntlets—solid, functional, built for balance and battlefield awareness.

  Liu Shen studied the rack quietly. Then he selected a pair of twin hooked swords, elegant and balanced, and a set of heavy plate armor—layered, reliable, built to endure. He adjusted the buckles himself, double-checking the straps like someone who'd worn armor in his mind a thousand times before.

  Lei Shui passed over the blades without hesitation and knelt beside the archery sets. He chose a longbow, light in draw but precise, and a leather breastplate to stay fast on his feet. His expression never changed.

  Nozomi approached last. Her hand hovered over the curved blades, then settled on a simple, refined katana with a midnight sheath. She drew it half an inch, just enough to test the edge and droped her old rusty sword. Then she picked up a set of leather armor, fastened with minimal buckles, built for movement.

  No one commented.

  But everyone watched.

  Captain Shen folded his hands behind his back.

  “The first kata begins now.”

  The first real lesson began not long after.

  Not in a classroom. Not in a courtyard.

  But in the sandpit behind the main barracks—bare earth, uneven footing, and a cold wind carrying the last whispers of winter, sharp enough to sting.

  "Drop lower," barked one of the instructors, pacing behind the line of recruits as they held plank positions, sweat already dripping onto the ground. "You’re not balancing a scroll on your spine. You’re anchoring it to survive."

  Liu Shen didn’t flinch. His breath was steady, arms trembling but locked. Dirt clung to his knuckles.

  Lei Shui, three places down, exhaled quietly through his nose, shoulders taut but eyes calm. His form was nearly perfect—he moved like someone who had watched a hundred training sessions but never been allowed to join.

  Xo Kola Qin shifted weight subtly on his forearms, boots digging into the dirt. Not because he was tired, but because his left foot had slipped half a finger-width. That mattered.

  And Nozomi? She didn’t shake. Didn’t groan. But her eyes were sharp, locked ahead, jaw set. Watching. Enduring. She hadn’t said a word all morning.

  When the horn sounded, they moved straight into stances.

  One instructor circled them, correcting posture with a wooden staff, striking shins or shoulders without warning. "You are not dancers," he snapped. "You are not poets. You are weapons in the making. Move like it."

  Behind them, the four from the other group moved with quiet confidence—Kiri and Miri Huang, Bao, and Jin.

  Kiri’s form was sharp, textbook precise, and faster than anyone had a right to be on day one. His strikes were deliberate, measured. He wasn’t showing off—he was making a point.

  Miri, meanwhile, moved like wind over water—graceful, inconsistent, sometimes off-beat, but impossible not to watch. She grinned once when she caught Lei Shui glancing sideways. He looked away before she could say anything.

  Bao didn’t make a sound. His every movement looked like it could crush stone.

  And Jin—well, no one really saw her move. She was just… there. Always in the right stance, always in the right place.

  By evening, after laps around the perimeter wall and kata repetition drills in the dust, the recruits were sent to the mess hall. Their legs burned. Hands blistered. Tunics clung to backs soaked through with sweat.

  The long tables were built for utility. No place cards. No hierarchy. Just benches and bowls.

  Lei Shui sat alone at the end of one table, wiping his hands with a cloth before eating. His fingers trembled slightly from the forms, but he masked it with posture.

  Xo sat across from him, uninvited.

  They didn’t speak at first. They didn’t need to.

  Liu joined them soon after, nodding once. No small talk—just food, methodical and quiet. The unspoken understanding of people who weren’t here to impress.

  Nozomi ate standing, near the edge of the room. Not watching. Just… not ready to sit.

  “You don’t talk much, do you?” Miri’s voice broke the stillness. She’d walked right up to Nozomi, bowl in hand, a slice of steamed lotus root dangling between her fingers.

  Nozomi looked at her, silent.

  “That’s alright. I talk enough for both of us,” Miri said cheerfully, popping the lotus root into her mouth. “Nice blade, by the way. Katana’s a good choice. You swing it yet, or just stare at it like some kind of meditative shrine girl?”

  “I swing it,” Nozomi replied evenly.

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  Miri grinned. “Good. I like shrine girls with bite.”

  She walked away humming.

  By nightfall, they were back on the field. This time: footwork drills, blindfolded stance tests, and balance work along narrow beams. When one recruit slipped, the instructor didn’t bark. He just said, “Again.”

  And again they did it.

  Again and again and again.

  That night, the barracks were quiet. No laughter. No boasting. Just the sound of cloth folding, water basins splashing, and the occasional grunt of someone stretching muscles they didn’t know could ache.

  Captain Shen passed through once, silent, inspecting. He didn’t speak. Didn’t need to.

  On the wall outside the barracks, carved into wood:

  “Obey. Cultivate. Fight.”

  No one slept easy.

  But none of them complained.

  The classroom was colder than expected.

  Stone walls, tall windows, a scent of ink and old paper hanging in the air. Scrolls lined one side of the room, each bound in color-coded ribbon—red for warfare, blue for geography, gold for cultivation theory. Chalk marks stained the floor near the instructor's podium, faded reminders of lessons past.

  The recruits sat in low wooden benches, organized by no obvious order. Morning light streamed through the eastern windows, catching on drifting motes of dust.

  Some leaned forward, already scribbling with charcoal. Others slumped. A few stared ahead with the blank-eyed endurance of people who’d rather be moving.

  Captain Shen did not teach the theory classes.

  That honor belonged to Instructor Yao, an elderly woman with a voice like creaking bamboo and eyes sharper than steel needles. Her robes were faded green, and her hair was tied into a tight knot threaded with carved bone pins. She walked with a staff—not because she needed it, but because it made sound.

  “You will begin,” she said, tapping the end of the staff once on the stone, “with the map.”

  A junior scribe unfurled a wide scroll across the wall: the Blue Sky Empire, sprawling and vast, marked by rivers, mountains, and borders drawn in steady ink.

  “The Empire is composed of six provinces,” she said, “each overseen by an Imperial Lord, advised by a Ministry Circle. But all provinces, all power, flows inward—to Lantian, the capital. That is where the Emperor rules.”

  She pointed to a red mark on the coast. “This is Cheng Island. Fertile. Strategic. Historically independent. Now loyal. Now useful. Your home.”

  Instructor Yao moved on.

  “History: fifteen hundred years of the central dynasty. Four recorded Emperor changes. Two succession wars. One unbroken ideology: Stability through control. Power through cultivation."

  She turned to the board and wrote it out, one word at a time.

  “Each of you is a thread in that tapestry. Your role is not to question the weave. It is to hold.”

  They studied military strategy in theory. Theories of formations. Readings from old campaign journals. Stories of border battles turned by a single Elementalist who stood their ground long enough to burn a siege tower to ash.

  Kiri asked the most questions—clarifying maneuvers, challenging assumptions. His tone was always polite, but edged with pride.

  Miri once asked if you could taunt your opponent into bad positioning. Instructor Yao blinked at her. “If your foolishness works, child, it becomes wisdom. But you will answer for the consequences.”

  Liu said nothing.

  Jin wrote everything.

  Finally came the basics of cultivation theory.

  Yao drew six circles on the board.

  “Water. Fire. Earth. Air. Light. Shadow.”

  Then a blank space.

  “And the seventh. Unknown. Unattainable. The origin of Qi. Or perhaps its grave.”

  She tapped each circle.

  “You do not control the element. You align with it. Your core is your root. You will learn to draw from the world, channel it, and release it.”

  By the end of the second hour, the room was heavy with silence.

  The only sound was the soft drag of charcoal, and the occasional creak of wood under shifting weight.

  Then the bell rang. Not loud. Just two chimes—low and long.

  Instructor Yao closed her scroll.

  “Eat. Stretch. Return to the training grounds.”

  The courtyard's shadows were beginning to stretch across the stone when Kiri spotted Lei seated on the far bench, polishing the brass fittings of his longbow with a cloth that looked more expensive than half the other recruits' boots.

  “Well,” Kiri said, approaching with his usual easy stride and a grin meant for a ballroom, not a training yard. “If it isn’t the Shui family's softest current.”

  Lei didn’t look up.

  “Didn’t expect to see you here, Lei,” Kiri went on. “I figured your father would tuck you into a desk at the Ministry of Naval Affairs by now.”

  “You talk as if you know him,” Lei said, voice calm, controlled. “You don’t.”

  “Oh, come now,” Kiri replied, slipping into a half-lounge against the post beside the bench. “We’ve shared half a dozen banquets, two tutors, and that charming disaster of a duel exhibition in the provincial palace. I know you better than most.”

  Lei’s eyes lifted, sharp and cold.

  “You don’t know me at all.”

  Kiri only chuckled. “Ah. That famous Shui iciness. It's good to know some things survive a few laps around the sparring field.”

  “Some things rot slower than others.”

  The words were quiet. But sharp enough to draw silence between them.

  Kiri raised an eyebrow, amused. “Touché.”

  He looked down at Lei’s bow. “Still favoring the elegant weapons, I see. Tell me—do you ever intend to get close to your enemies, or will you keep sending apologies at a distance?”

  This time, Lei looked at him fully.

  “When the time comes,” he said, “I won’t miss.”

  There was nothing poetic in it. Just certainty.

  Kiri tilted his head, and for the first time, his grin faltered—just slightly. He wasn’t sure if Lei was bluffing. And that bothered him.

  “Well,” Kiri said, stepping back. “May the wind guide your arrow, Shui.”

  He turned and walked away, still half-smiling, but this time quieter.

  Lei’s grip tightened around the bow. He didn’t watch him go.

  A short distance away, Nozomi stood near the training racks, wrapping fresh bandage tape around her left hand. Miri approached with two cups of sweet rice water, handing one over without asking.

  “Drink,” she said. “I saw you nearly take Bao’s shoulder off earlier. That earns hydration.”

  Nozomi took the cup, giving Miri a glance. “Are you always like this?”

  “Like what?”

  “Uninvited.”

  Miri grinned. “Constantly.”

  She plopped down cross-legged on the stone floor beside her, sipping noisily from her own cup. “You’re fast with that katana. Controlled, too. You train with monks or murderers?”

  Nozomi didn’t answer immediately. Then: “Farmers.”

  Miri’s grin widened. “Ah. The third deadliest faction.”

  They sat in silence for a moment. Miri didn't push. Nozomi didn’t leave.

  The drink was cold, and the sun had dipped behind the wall.

  “People like Kiri think you’re the dangerous one,” Miri said eventually. “But I think it’s the quiet ones who are always ready.”

  Nozomi looked at her.

  “I’m not ready.”

  “You look it.”

  On the far edge of the courtyard, where the shade stretched long, Xo leaned against the wall, arms folded, watching the others without really watching.

  Beside him, Liu Shen sat on the steps, quietly whittling a small piece of wood with a dull pocket knife. A half-carved fish shape was beginning to form.

  They hadn’t spoken all day. Not really.

  But Xo had seen how Liu moved. Not flashy, not forced. Just steady. Rooted.

  Liu spoke first. “You fought before?”

  Xo didn’t answer right away. Then: “Enough.”

  Liu nodded. “Your footing’s clean.”

  Xo gave a small grunt. “You don’t waste motion either.”

  They didn’t smile. Didn’t shake hands.

  But something passed between them—acknowledgment, quiet and mutual.

  Liu held up the wooden shape. “Might finish this tomorrow.”

  Xo looked at it. “Don’t make it perfect. People think it’s bought.”

  That made Liu huff—barely. Almost a laugh. He nodded again. Kept carving while Xo left. Then looked at the sky.

  His brow was slightly furrowed—not with frustration, just focus—as he stared off into the empty training field, chewing in steady rhythm.

  His shoulders were dusted with sweat and dirt. His tunic clung to his back. He didn’t care.

  “Do you ever blink?”

  He turned his head, slow and deliberate. Miri stood just outside his personal space, hands on her hips, her braid swung over one shoulder like a rope about to be thrown. She tilted her head.

  “You’ve been staring at nothing for five minutes,” she said. “That’s either a meditation technique or a cry for help.”

  Liu blinked. Once. Then looked away again.

  Miri grinned and sat down next to him—close, but not too close.

  “So what’s your deal?” she asked, leaning back on her palms. “Let me guess—you took a vow of silence after avenging your childhood goat. Or you’re secretly a prince raised by monks and you’ll only speak when you unlock your true form.”

  Liu didn’t respond.

  She glanced at him. “Are you ignoring me, or just… thinking really slowly?”

  He reached into his pocket and pulled out the small wooden carving he’d been working on—a rough fish, still unfinished. He held it out to her.

  She took it, turning it over in her hand.

  “…It’s not bad.”

  “Didn’t ask,” Liu said.

  Flat. No heat. No smugness. Just a simple fact.

  Miri blinked, then burst out laughing. “Oh. You do talk.”

  He didn’t smile. But there was a flicker in his eyes. A shift in weight.

  “I don’t talk much.”

  “Tragic,” she said. “I was going to make you my sidekick.”

  “I’m nobody’s sidekick.”

  “Even better. You’ll be the brooding rival I convert with friendship.”

  Liu looked at her then, really looked.

  And shook his head. “You’re not converting anyone.”

  Miri gave him back the wooden fish and stood.

  “We’ll see.”