The next morning went the same as the last two. Bell, groaning, Sun Hao cursing the bell, breakfast downstairs, then out to the training grounds while the air was still cold enough to see their breath.

  Elder Han was on the platform when they arrived. He waited until everyone had gathered, then spoke.

  “Today is the last foundation technique. The Gale Palm.”

  He raised his right hand with his palm open and his fingers pressed together. Qi gathered around it, visible as a faint distortion in the air, like heat rising off a road. It compressed in front of his palm, tighter and tighter, until the space there looked warped.

  He thrust his palm forward.

  The air cracked. A burst of compressed wind qi shot out and hit the stone wall at the back of the training ground. It left a shallow crater and sent dust raining down from the cracks that spread around it.

  Nobody in the courtyard moved.

  “The Gale Palm channels wind qi through your arm and compresses it at the palm,” Elder Han said. “You are not pushing air. You are building pressure in a small space and releasing it all at once.” He lowered his hand. “If you rush the compression, the qi scatters before it leaves your palm. If you hold it too long, it destabilizes and damages your own channels. The window between those two is narrow.”

  He demonstrated again, slower. Yan Qiu watched how the qi moved down through his arm, pooled at the wrist, then funneled into the palm where it compressed into a tight knot before releasing. Each phase flowed into the next without pause.

  “The breathing method feeds the qi. The footwork positions you. This is how you hit something that is not standing next to you.” He looked across the rows. “Begin.”

  The courtyard filled with the sounds of people failing. Most disciples could gather qi in their arms well enough, but the compression at the palm was where everything fell apart. The qi would pool and scatter, or compress unevenly and shoot off sideways, or just fizzle out with a weak puff that would not have moved a leaf.

  Yan Qiu raised his palm and tried. His white qi flowed down his arm without resistance and reached his wrist cleanly. He pushed it into his palm and tried to compress it.

  It scattered, so he tried again, holding the compression longer. He felt the pressure building, felt it growing, and then it slipped sideways and dissipated through his fingers.

  The third time was the same. The gathering and the flow were fine, but the compression at the end would not hold. It was like trying to close his fist around smoke.

  He looked across the courtyard. Duan Ke was having the same problem. His gold roots let him understand the technique faster than anyone, and Yan Qiu could see him adjusting his approach with each attempt, but the compression kept failing. His palm would shimmer and then go flat.

  Sun Hao was not even getting that far. His red roots gave him power but the Gale Palm needed control, and his qi kept bursting out of his palm in raw, uncompressed waves that had force but no focus.

  Lin Suyin managed a weak pulse on her sixth try. A small push of compressed air that moved the dust at her feet. She looked at her hand with quiet satisfaction.

  Gao Yichen was struggling loudly. “This technique is clearly designed for higher-stage cultivators. Expecting new disciples to perform it on the first day is unreasonable.”

  Elder Han appeared behind him. “Twenty laps.”

  “I was making a valid observation.”

  “Thirty.”

  Gao Yichen shut his mouth and started running.

  Elder Han made his rounds, correcting postures and adjusting stances. When he reached Yan Qiu he watched two attempts and said, “Your qi flow is clean but you are compressing too quickly. Let it pool first. Give it a moment to settle before you squeeze.”

  Yan Qiu tried with the adjustment. The qi pooled in his palm and he waited, letting it settle before applying pressure. It held for a moment longer than before, and when he released it a small burst of compressed air shot from his palm and hit the ground two paces ahead, kicking up a circle of dust.

  After few more tries, it seemed like he was getting closer.

  “Better,” Elder Han said, and moved on.

  After an hour, Elder Han called them back to the platform.

  “That is the end of the foundation techniques,” he said. “You now have the Withered Wind Breathing, the Dust Treading Step, and the Gale Palm. These three form the base of everything you will learn in this sect.” He paused. “In three days, I will test all of you on these techniques. You will demonstrate each one, and depending on the format, you may spar.”

  The courtyard went quiet.

  “The top two performers will receive a set of qi condensation pills, access to one intermediate technique manual of their choice, and personal tutoring sessions with an outer court elder for one month.” He let that sink in. “Three days. Use them well.”

  The disciples broke apart talking. Yan Qiu and Sun Hao walked toward the Supply Hall to pick up the Gale Palm manual.

  “Qi condensation pills and an elder tutor,” Sun Hao said. “That sounds really good.”

  “The pills alone would be worth weeks of normal cultivation.”

  “And an intermediate technique. That is inner disciple level access.” Sun Hao shook his head. “Duan Ke is going to take one of those spots.”

  “Probably.” Yan Qiu thought about the compression problem. Three days was not a lot of time, but the Gale Palm was the only technique giving him real trouble. His breathing method worked fine with his old circulation, and the Dust Treading Step came naturally. If he could figure out the compression, he believed he would have a real chance.

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  They picked up their manuals and headed to the Task Hall.

  Sun Hao stopped in front of the boards and scanned the D-rank section. He was trying to look casual about it and failing.

  “I think I will take something lighter today,” he said. “Herb gathering in the eastern woods, build up some easy points.”

  Yan Qiu looked at him. “The eastern woods. Where Jiang Mei was gathering herbs yesterday.”

  “That is a coincidence.”

  “You are a terrible liar.”

  Sun Hao’s ears went red. “I just want to gather herbs. Is that a crime?”

  “No. But your face is.”

  Sun Hao grabbed a D-rank slip from the board and walked to the counter without looking back.

  Yan Qiu turned to the C-rank section. His eyes found a slip near the middle: Retrieve one intact tusk from a tusked spirit beast. Sector 2, eastern woods. Proof of kill required. Reward: 20 contribution points.

  He pulled it down and registered it.

  Sun Hao was waiting by the door. He looked at the slip in Yan Qiu’s hand and his face changed. “C-rank again? By yourself this time?”

  “It is just a tusked beast.”

  “Yesterday it was just a cub and there were two of us. Today you are alone and the target is bigger.” Sun Hao was serious now. “Are you sure you can handle it?”

  “I will be fine.”

  Sun Hao studied him for a moment, then nodded. “If you are not back by sundown, I am coming to find you.”

  “Deal.”

  They split at the tree line. Sun Hao headed northeast toward Sector 3 with his herb pouch and a grin across his face. Yan Qiu turned east toward Sector 2.

  Sector 2 was denser than Sector 3. The trees grew closer together and the undergrowth was thicker, with tangled roots and low bushes that made the ground uneven. He moved carefully, keeping low and watching for tracks.

  He found them in a clearing past a shallow creek.

  There were three of them, bigger than he expected, each one about the size of a large dog, with coarse dark fur and curved tusks that extended from their lower jaws. They were rooting through the earth with their snouts, tearing up soil and roots. The qi around them was thick and agitated.

  One of them lifted its head and looked at him.

  It charged at him with furious expression.

  The beast closed the distance between them before Yan Qiu could blink. Yan Qiu shifted his feet and the Dust Treading Step carried him sideways. The beast’s tusks cut through the space where his chest had been and he felt the wind of it against his ribs.

  The second one was already coming from his left. He planted his back foot, raised his palm, and pushed. The Gale Palm he managed was nowhere close to Elder Han’s, but at this range it did the job. The compressed burst hit the beast in the side of its head and sent it tumbling into the undergrowth.

  The third came from behind. He heard it before he saw it, the heavy thud of hooves on packed earth. He crouched and brought out his training sword in one motion. The beast lunged over him and he rose into it with a clean upward stroke that caught it under the jaw. The steel punched through and the beast’s momentum carried it past him. It crashed into the ground and went still.

  The first beast had turned and was charging again. Yan Qiu pulled his sword free and set his stance. It came at him head-on with its tusks lowered. He sidestepped at the last moment and brought the blade down in a horizontal slash across its neck. It stumbled three more steps and collapsed.

  The one he had hit with the Gale Palm was getting up, shaking its head and snorting. Yan Qiu closed the distance before it could orient itself and struck it down with one clean stroke through the base of its skull.

  He stood in the clearing with his chest heaving. His qi was nearly drained. The Dust Treading Step, the Gale Palm, and three kills with the sword had burned through almost everything he had, and his channels ached from the strain.

  He crouched beside the largest beast and worked one of its tusks free with his knife, then found the spirit core lodged in its chest, a small dense thing the color of muddy amber. He pocketed both and cleaned his blade on the grass.

  He was about to head back when he heard footsteps.

  Four figures stepped out from the trees on the far side of the clearing. Two girls in silk robes, a boy in silk robes, and an older disciple in standard grey. The older one was broader and had a harder look about him, and the three younger ones hung behind him.

  The senior’s eyes went from the dead beasts to Yan Qiu and the tusk and core in his hand.

  “Well,” he said. “You have got quite some skills. We would like to thank you.”

  Yan Qiu straightened up. “Thank me for what?”

  “For taking care of those beasts and giving us that core and tusk.”

  Yan Qiu glared at him. “What are you implying?”

  The boy in silk stepped forward and reached for the core. The two girls moved in and tried to grab Yan Qiu’s arms.

  “Just give us the core and tusk, will you?” the boy said.

  Yan Qiu pulled free. “Are you guys shameless? Four of you ganging up on one person to take his hard-earned things?”

  “Shut up,” the senior said.

  The two girls and the boy came at him together. Yan Qiu stepped back and read the boy’s movement, the shift in his hips and the drop of his shoulder before the swing came. He stepped inside it and drove his leg into the boy’s waist. The boy folded sideways and hit the ground.

  The girls came from both sides. Yan Qiu drew his sword and performed the Broken Jade Sword Art. Two quick strokes, one for each. The girls were taken back by the speed of it and stumbled away from him.

  “Do not make this tough on yourself,” the senior said. “We already did not want to waste energy on some low-level spiritual beasts for a tusk and a core. Now give those and go. You do not want to be on the bad side of seniors, do you?”

  Yan Qiu knew it would be bad if other senior came at him. He wouldn’t be able to explain them and they would not be in his side. But he was not that phased by it. What he felt was thrill.

  He moved again. He came around behind the senior before the man could react. The senior spun around with wide eyes. “You—”

  Yan Qiu kicked him hard. The girls tried to step in and defend but Yan Qiu used his sword to cut across their hands. They shouted in pain and pulled back.

  The senior fell forward onto his face. And then something happened that Yan Qiu did not expect. Qi started bursting out of the senior’s body in raw, uncontrolled waves. His cultivation was surging, pushing against a boundary. He was near the breakthrough of a stage of Breath Weaving, and the adrenaline of the fight had pushed him to the edge of it.

  The senior pushed himself up with blood on his lip and qi crackling around him. “You are done for.”

  Yan Qiu knew that if the senior broke through right now, he was finished. So he did not wait. He closed the distance and struck the senior in the chest with his palm, disrupting the qi circulation at the moment it was most vulnerable. The surging energy collapsed inward on itself and caused a qi deviation.

  The senior’s eyes filled with blood. He doubled over and vomited, dark red spattering the grass, and his body shook as the collapsed qi tore through his channels.

  “You,” he gasped through the blood. “I will not let you go.”

  Yan Qiu punched him in the throat. The senior’s voice cut off and he grabbed at his neck with both hands with mouth open making him unable to make anything louder than a rasp. His vocal cords were done.

  Yan Qiu turned to the other three. The boy was still on the ground holding his side. The two girls had stopped moving and were staring at the senior with wide eyes. Yan Qiu beat all three of them down until they fainted. He had no choice. He had to silence them.

  He stood there breathing hard, looking at the four bodies on the ground.

  What should I do?

  He could not kill fellow disciples, he had never killed someone. How would he even explain this? Four against one, and he had put all four of them down. That did not look like self-defense no matter how he framed it.

  Leave it. Lets just face it. The worst that could happen is expulsion. Right?

  He would try to explain it to his parents. They would probably understand.

  But there was a heaviness in his chest, and the inside of him wanted to silence those three forever. The senior could not speak and his eyesight was almost gone from the qi deviation. One more punch and it would be gone for good. He could make sure none of them ever told anyone what happened here.

  He threw dirt into the senior’s face and punched him hard, making sure the man could not identify him. Then he tied the senior to a tree with strips torn from the man’s own robe.

  As for the three juniors, he dragged them slowly toward the pavilion, one at a time, until all three were out of the woods and close enough to the sect grounds that someone would find them.

  He walked back toward the outer court with the tusk and core still in his pocket, feeling heavier than he had all day.

  He hoped he would not be expelled from the sect.