Two weeks passed in a blur of agonizing meditation and quiet observation.
Inside the dimly lit apothecary, Izuku sat perfectly still on his bamboo mat. He took a slow, measured breath, guiding the heavy drop of liquid energy from his Dantian through the newly forged pathways in his arms and legs. It completed a full, flawless circuit before settling back into his core.
He opened his eyes. A faint, pure light flickered in his green irises before vanishing.
He had done it. He had officially stepped into the first level of Qi Condensation.
"Stand up and let me look at you," Shen Yue commanded from her place at the table.
Izuku stood, stretching his arms. The deep aches from his shattered bones were completely gone, replaced by a thrumming, boundless vitality. Following the instructions of the wooden token she had given him, he pushed a tiny fraction of his energy outward, forcing it to flow erratically through his skin to project a false presence.
Shen Yue narrowed her golden eyes, sweeping her spiritual sense over him.
Instead of the terrifying, bottomless vacuum he usually created, Izuku now radiated a sputtering, incredibly weak energy. It felt jagged and unstable. To any cultivator scanning him without a spiritual sense, he looked like a hopelessly untalented mortal who had barely managed to grasp the absolute lowest rung of cultivation.
"Perfect," Shen Yue said, a genuine smile touching her lips. "It is a wonderfully pathetic aura. You look like trash."
Izuku laughed, rubbing the back of his neck. "Thank you, Miss Shen. I think."
"Do not drop it, even when you sleep," she warned, standing up to gather her medicinal herbs. "If a powerful expert sees through that disguise, they will immediately realize your body is hiding something monstrous."
Outside, the late afternoon sun cast long shadows over the quiet dirt street. The village was peaceful, but a sudden, sharp shift in the wind made the wooden wind chimes above the apothecary door rattle violently.
Shen Yue froze. Her hand stopped inches from a bundle of dried lotus roots.
"Miss Shen?" Izuku asked, noticing her sudden stillness.
"We have a guest," she murmured, her golden eyes narrowing toward the wooden door. "And this time, it is not a mortal playing with a rusted sword."
A quarter of a mile away, marching down the muddy road of the village, a man in dark grey leather armor surveyed the frightened villagers. He carried a sleek, silver-tasseled straight sword strapped to his waist. A silver emblem of a snarling wolf was stitched over his heart.
This was Vice-Captain Lang of the Iron Wolf Mercenaries. And unlike the thuggish Zhao Fen, Lang had actually managed to claw his way to the sixth level of Qi Condensation.
Two weeks ago, his foolish subordinate Zhao had been dragged back to their camp with a caved-in chest plate. Zhao had babbled about a crippled boy with monstrous strength. Lang knew better. Mortals did not warp iron with their bare hands. Someone in this clinic was hiding a high-tier body refinement manual, and the mercenary group wanted it to sell at the black market.
Since Lang had not yet reached Foundation Establishment, he possessed no spiritual sense to scan the area. But he didn't need one. He simply grabbed a terrified merchant by the collar and pointed his sword toward the end of the street.
"The apothecary," Lang barked. "Is the green-haired brat still there?"
The merchant nodded frantically, and Lang dropped him in the mud, drawing his blade with a metallic shing.
Inside the clinic, Izuku's fists clenched instinctively. "Is it the mercenaries? I can fight him."
"Do not be reckless," Shen Yue replied, her expression turning deadly serious. "The man approaching is at the sixth level of Qi Condensation. He is no master, but he has actually learned to mold Qi into basic martial arts. He could send a blade of wind to sever your neck before you even close the distance."
Izuku frowned, but he didn't back down. "Then let's fight him together."
"I cannot," Shen Yue said softly, a shadow falling over her face. "If I use my true cultivation to kill him, the ripples of my energy will spread. The people hunting me will feel it. If they find me, this entire mountain range will be wiped off the map."
Izuku's eyes widened. He didn't know who she was running from, but the sheer gravity in her voice sent a chill down his spine. She wasn't hiding from local thugs; she was hiding from monsters.
If she fought, she would be discovered.
Izuku took a deep breath. He looked down at his scarred hands, feeling the single, incredibly heavy drop of Qi resting in his Dantian. He was only at the first level. The gap between him and Lang was supposed to be a chasm.
"You don't have to fight, Miss Shen," Izuku said, his voice completely steady. He walked toward the door, untying the patch of wood he had used to fix it last time. "Keep your aura hidden. I'll take care of him."
Shen Yue reached out, wanting to pull him back, but something in his emerald eyes stopped her. It was that same terrifying, pure resolve she had seen two weeks ago.
Izuku pushed the door open and stepped out into the muddy street.
Thirty paces away, Vice-Captain Lang stopped. He looked at the scrawny, green-haired boy standing in front of the clinic. Lang scoffed, feeling the sputtering, pathetic aura radiating from the boy.
"First level of Qi Condensation?" Lang laughed, pointing his silver sword at Izuku. "Zhao must have been drunk to lose to trash like you. Hand over whatever martial art manual you found, boy, and I might leave you with one arm."
Izuku didn't assume a fighting stance. He just stood there, the evening breeze rustling his hair.
"Leave the village," Izuku said calmly. "And don't come back."
Lang's eyes flashed with cruel irritation. "I think I will take your legs first!"
The mercenary lunged forward. As he swung his sword, Lang channeled his Qi into the blade. The air around the steel visibly distorted, forming a crescent-shaped blade of pressurized wind that shot directly toward Izuku's chest, fast enough to cut a normal man in half.
Izuku's eyes widened. He tried to tap into the heavy drop of Qi in his Dantian and push it into his legs to dodge, just like he used to do with One For All.
But it felt entirely wrong.
The liquid Qi was sluggish, incredibly dense, and didn't immediately spread evenly through his muscles. Izuku stumbled, his footwork completely uncoordinated. He threw himself desperately to the right, landing hard in the mud.
Whoosh. The wind blade missed his chest but clipped his shoulder, slicing cleanly through his woolen cloak and leaving a shallow, bleeding gash on his upper arm. The magical blade continued past him, violently cleaving a wooden barrel in half.
Izuku hissed in pain, scrambling to his feet. It's too heavy, his mind raced, instantly slipping into analytical mode. My energy isn't like a switch I can just flip on anymore. It's like trying to run with lead weights in my veins. I don't have the muscle memory for this yet.
"What's wrong, boy?" Lang sneered, lazily twirling his silver sword. "I thought you were going to take care of me! You move like a crippled dog!"
Lang raised his sword again. Izuku watched him intently, ignoring the stinging in his shoulder. His emerald eyes tracked every micro-movement of the mercenary's body.
Look at his breathing, Izuku thought, his pupils darting back and forth. When he attacks, his chest expands. He pulls ambient Qi into his core, pushes it up through his shoulder, down into his wrist, and then forces it out of his body through the sword. He is projecting his energy outward to make it sharp.
Lang swung again, sending another wind blade tearing through the air.
This time, Izuku was slightly more prepared. Instead of trying to flood his entire lower body, he guided a tiny, concentrated stream of his heavy Qi strictly into his calves. He pushed off the mud, launching himself sideways. It was still a clunky, ugly dodge, but he cleared the blade completely.
His Qi is thin, Izuku deduced as the wind blade dissipated against a stone wall. It's fast, but it disperses quickly. My Qi is the exact opposite. It's incredibly dense, and my body refuses to project it outward. It pulls inward. So... what if I stop trying to move like him?
"Stand still!" Lang roared, losing his patience. He didn't bother with a ranged attack this time. He channeled all his Qi into his legs and shot forward like an arrow, closing the distance in a blink. Lang raised his sword high above his head, aiming a brutal, two-handed cleave directly at Izuku's skull.
Izuku didn't try to dodge. He didn't have the footwork to escape a close-quarters strike from a seasoned mercenary.
Instead, he planted his feet firmly in the mud. He closed his eyes for a fraction of a second, seizing that single, heavy drop of liquid Qi in his core. He didn't try to spread it through his body. He didn't try to push it out into the air.
He pulled it all directly into his right forearm.
The dense energy compacted beneath his skin, turning his arm into something fundamentally heavier than flesh and bone. He raised his right arm, offering his bare forearm as a shield to intercept the descending blade.
Inside the clinic, Shen Yue's breath caught. She almost broke her cover to stop him. What is he doing?! You cannot block a Qi-infused blade with bare skin!
Lang grinned fiercely, fully expecting his sword to sever the boy's arm and cleave his chest.
Steel met flesh.
CLANG.
The sound that echoed through the street wasn't the sickening tearing of muscle. It sounded like a sledgehammer striking a solid anvil of divine iron.
Lang's grin vanished, replaced by absolute horror. The sheer power of his downward swing rebounded violently up his arms, dislocating his right shoulder with a sickening pop. His silver sword, infused with his sixth-level Qi, bent backward from the impact and shattered into dozens of metallic shards.
Izuku opened his eyes. He hadn't even been pushed back an inch. His sleeve was torn to shreds, but the skin of his forearm didn't have a single scratch.
If I concentrate all the density into one spot, Izuku realized, a fierce, confident light burning in his eyes, it acts like an impenetrable shield.
Lang staggered backward, clutching his ruined shoulder, his eyes wide with terror as he looked at the shattered hilt in his hand. "You... you're not a mortal! What kind of monster..."
Izuku didn't let him finish. Pivoting on his heel, Izuku shifted that dense mass of Qi from his forearm down into his knuckles. He stepped into Lang's guard and drove a simple, perfectly executed right hook directly into the mercenary's jaw.
Lang was lifted completely off his feet. He spun through the air like a broken doll before crashing face-first into the muddy street, instantly knocked unconscious.
Izuku stood over the defeated Vice-Captain, his chest heaving as he slowly let the heavy Qi settle back into his core. He looked at his uninjured arm, clenching and unclenching his fist. He had just fought a cultivator and won, not with raw power, but by understanding his own limits.
The street was dead silent.
From the doorway of the apothecary, Shen Yue slowly lowered her hand, her golden eyes wide in disbelief. The boy hadn't just survived. He had analyzed an opponent five levels higher than him, deduced the fundamental mechanics of Qi manipulation, and invented a countermeasure on the spot.
His comprehension... Shen Yue thought, a shiver running down her spine. It is as terrifying as his vessel.