It had been a few days since Alex came back from the Wyndhams estate.
Things had, more or less, settled back into their usual rhythm.
During those days, he'd half expected some kind of reaction — a message, a confrontation, something — from the Wyndhams. But so far, nothing. No one had come to question him about what happened.
And for that, Alex was grateful.
Right now, he stood in a wide, open hall — spacious enough that someone could easily play a full game of basketball in it. A soft hum of music drifted from a speaker tucked away in one corner, filling the air just enough to break the silence.
This place was his personal training room, a project he'd converted from what used to be an empty section of the house. The room was mostly bare — a single full-length mirror stretched across one wall, while the rest was open space. No equipment. No weights. No machines.
Alex didn't mind. He didn't need them. This was where he practiced the kind of moves that required freedom — room to move, room to breathe.
He stood there, quietly scrolling through a mental checklist.
'The Buster Skill…' Alex called out in his mind.
Instantly, an interface flickered into view before him — a translucent display showing movement sequences, martial art forms, and stances rotating in 3D.
Using the Pendragon System, Alex had managed to embed Eddie's power skill book, which he'd renamed Buster, into his own system. Through this, he could summon the interface anytime he wanted — with just a thought.
For the past few days since acquiring the skill, Alex had been studying it relentlessly, trying to understand its inner workings and learn the movements it demanded.
He hadn't mastered much yet — not even close — but he'd begun to grasp the fundamentals. And for now, that was enough.
Alex stood in the center of the training hall, the digital interface hovering faintly in front of him. He scrolled through the instructions once more.
'Alright,' he thought, exhaling slowly.
Drawing a deep breath, he began to feel the familiar current of qi flow through and around him. With the guidance from the skill book etched into his mind, he started tracing each movement exactly as shown.
The air seemed to hum faintly.
Then, slowly, he felt something gathering — building — around his right hand.
It wasn't overwhelming, not yet, but it was there: a faint pulse of raw force, responding to his command.
One thing that made Buster easier to grasp was that its energy flow wasn't entirely foreign. The way it directed qi — through the limbs, along the meridians — mirrored the style Alex had already practiced.
He already knew how to channel qi into specific parts of his body at will.
Doing it now came almost naturally.
However, it didn't take long for the complex part of Eddie's skill to appear.
The next step required Alex to bring his qi outside his body.
So far, he'd only learned how to move it within — flowing through his blood, threading through his veins, washing through his muscles and organs like a quiet current. It strengthened him, sure, but it never left him.
Now, this technique demanded something entirely different — projection.
Not that it was impossible. Just… way beyond him.
'Qi projection isn't impossible,' he thought, frowning slightly. 'But only cultivators at Stage Five can do that. Maybe, if you're lucky and naturally gifted, you could pull off a flicker at Stage Four.'
Alex exhaled slowly, watching faint traces of mist rise from his breath.
'But Eddie wasn't that high in cultivation,' he mused. 'Yet somehow… he managed to project his qi. So how the hell did he do it?'
Unbeknownst to Alex, Eddie wasn't like other Paragons. He carried something rare — a mutation, a spark of difference that let him discover the Buster skill in the first place.
Still, Alex's mind wouldn't rest.
If Eddie could bend the rules… maybe he could, too.
An idea began to form in his head — dangerous, untested, but worth a try.
'And what if I use the Peace Energy... I can bring the qi out, right?' Alex wondered.
He didn't waste time thinking it over — he just went for it.
Within his sea of consciousness, the Peace Energy drifted like a pale mist, swirling softly in the endless dark.
Alex rarely tapped into it. For one, he'd already turned it into something like a qi reserve.
The Peace Energy helped him restore qi faster than usual and, over time, had condensed into a misty, spherical core — a secondary reservoir where he stored extra qi. It was his hidden ace. At any moment, he could pull from it to refill his main core.
Thanks to that, Alex had reached a point where he almost never ran out of qi in a fight.
Now, he tried to draw a portion of that Peace Energy out. Slowly, he channeled it through his arm. At the same time, the qi stored in his reserve began to surge, following the flow.
Merging both streams, Alex pushed the energy outward — purging it into his arm.
Then, eyes locked on the system interface before him, he watched to see what would happen next.
One good thing about using the system to train was that it could guide one— correcting ones form and confirming when ones if performed a technique properly.
Right now, the system showed that Alex had taken the right step toward performing the first basic technique of the Buster skill.
Without hesitation, Alex ignited it, releasing the qi exactly as instructed.
Bang!
A thunderous blast echoed across the room. The recoil launched Alex forward — no, yeeted him — straight toward the mirror in front of him.
He smashed into it face-first, the glass exploding into a rain of shards before the rest of his body slammed against the wall.
For a moment, he just hung there, dazed and motionless, before gravity finally remembered him. He tumbled down with a groan, landing hard on the floor surrounded by broken glass.
Pain stabbed through his face, and a dozen tiny cuts burned along his skin — but worse, he couldn't feel his arm.
Panicking, Alex lifted it with some struggle, then exhaled in relief.
"For a moment, I thought I'd lost my arm," Alex sighed, half laughing at his own misery.
His arms were still attached to his body — thank the heavens — but they weren't exactly in prime condition.
The one he'd used to perform the skill was swollen and flushed red, looking like a balloon ready to pop with the slightest poke.
Still, despite the pain, Alex couldn't help but grin. Because one thing was clear: he'd actually done it.
"Now all I have to do is calculate the amount of qi that's enough to perform the skill," he muttered, half groaning, half proud.
Inside his sea of consciousness, his reserve of qi was completely drained — bone dry. And he already knew why. He'd accidentally poured all the stored qi into his arm, nearly blowing it off in the process.
The result might've been ugly, but it also proved something. He could perform the skill.
However, the realization came with a catch — and a painful one at that. He wasn't yet strong enough to channel the technique directly through his core. At least not safely. For now, he'd have to rely on the reserve qi within his Peace Energy mist… and pray he didn't turn his arm into mush next time.
"First thing's first," Alex sighed, looking around at the shattered mirror and cracked wall. "I need to get this place cleaned up before Mom walks in and has a heart attack."
He pushed himself up, wincing as his muscles protested. As he stood, his reflection caught his eye in the cracked remains of the mirror.
With the blood streaked across his cheek and cuts lining his face, Alex's once-handsome features now looked like something straight out of a horror flick. He stared at himself for a moment, half horrified, half amused.
"Guess I've seen worse," he muttered, wiping a smear of blood from his chin.
Then a grin tugged at the corner of his mouth.
'It's been too long since I visited the faction. I really need some action right now,' he thought, confidence returning like a storm.