The carriage wheel hit another rock, sending a jolt through the floor that echoed the tremor deep inside me.

  Leaving Argun… it felt like ripping something out of my chest. Mother’s face, streaked with tears. Father’s forced smile, trying and failing to hide the wetness in his eyes.

  That raw, aching love – it was a new kind of pain, one the numbness of Ki couldn’t touch. I tightened my grip on the ring Father gave me, its cool silver a solid weight on my finger. A silent promise. I will come back. Stronger.

  The thought was familiar, the fighter’s relentless drive overriding the unfamiliar ache of leaving home. Silberstrom College of Blades. The name was a promise, a distant star pulling me away from the village, towards the vast unknown where real power waited.

  Dust motes danced in the sunlight slicing through the carriage window. Hours bled together.

  Thurisgard’s dense green forests gave way to rolling hills studded with jagged grey rock. The trees grew stunted, twisted, clinging to life in the thin, dry air that tasted like grit.

  With nothing else to do, my mind turned inward, dissecting my abilities. Fifty percent Ki control. Two years of brutal effort to reach that milestone. Enough to deflect Father’s wind magic, enough to fell trees without my own bones shattering from the recoil.

  But Father was one man, one element. What about multiple opponents? What about a mage wielding earth, or fire… or ice?

  My shockwaves were potent, yeah, but crude. A shotgun blast against a sniper's precision. Ranged fighters were a weakness. I needed more control, more finesse, more options.

  Survival wasn't just raw power. It was adapting. Anticipating. Overcoming.

  The lack of guards still bothered me. A knot of unease tightened in my gut.

  "Driver," I called out, my voice sounding small against the carriage's rattle. "Is it usual to travel these roads without security?"

  The man grunted, eyes fixed on the rough path ahead. "Depends on the coin, lad. Guards cost extra. A lot extra. This trip alone..." He trailed off, shaking his head.

  They couldn't afford it. They'd scraped together just enough for the passage, trusting the ring Father gave me, trusting me. The weight of that trust settled heavy on my shoulders. This wasn't just about my ambition anymore. It was about validating their faith, their sacrifice.

  Thwip.

  The sound was almost lost in the carriage's rumble, but sharp. Deadly.

  Faster than thought, faster than instinct honed over a lifetime I barely remembered, my head snapped towards the driver.

  He was still facing forward, but something was wrong. A dark sliver, like obsidian but radiating a faint cold, protruded from his temple. A single drop of crimson welled around it. His eyes widened, mouth forming a silent O of impossible surprise.

  Then… his head didn’t just fall. It shattered. A grotesque bloom of razor-sharp ice spikes erupted outwards, a crystalline explosion of frozen blood and bone shards.

  Ambush!

  Ki flooded my system – fifty percent, the dam holding firm. No time to think, no time to react, only act. I kicked the door open, throwing myself out into the blinding sun, hitting the rocky ground in a shoulder roll that sent jolts of pain through muscles already aching from the journey.

  Behind me, the carriage, driverless, veered violently, smashing into a rock face with a final, shuddering groan of splintered wood and tortured metal.

  I came up low, scanning, heart pounding a frantic rhythm against my ribs. Ki sang under my skin, a familiar battle hymn.

  The landscape was a mess of boulders and thorny, stunted bushes – perfect cover. Nothing moved. Only the dry wind whispering through the rocks.

  A sniper. Ice magic. Brutal. Effective.

  But they couldn't hide their life force.

  Closing my eyes for a fraction of a second, I focused, pushing out with my Ki sense, an ability I’d been diligently attempting to refine. Every living thing possessed Ki, a faint shimmer in the tapestry of the world, and though it was often subtle, to a focused Ki user, it could be as clear as sight.

  There. Sixty yards uphill, nestled in the crags. Three distinct signatures. Moving now, cautiously descending, thinking their prey was finished.

  They emerged from the rocks, confidence replacing caution as they saw the wreckage… and me.

  A short, barrel-chested brute clutching a rusty knife, his face splitting into a leering grin.

  A tall, skeletal figure, limbs too long, eyes darting greedily towards the smashed carriage.

  And behind them, the mage. Average height, worn leather armor, short white hair stark against tanned skin. A vicious scar sliced through his left eyebrow, carving a path down his cheek. His eyes, the color of glacial ice, were devoid of warmth, assessing me like a butcher eyes a cut of meat. He carried a gnarled wooden staff that pulsed faintly with cold mana.

  "Well now, ain't this a treat?" the stocky one rasped, hefting his knife. His eyes swept over me, dismissing me as nothing more than a leftover morsel.

  "More 'n we bargained for!" the lanky one cackled, his gaze already calculating profits. "Fresh kid like this'll sell high. Quick work, boss!"

  The scarred mage ignored his grunts, his icy gaze flicking over me with disdain. "Secure the carriage. Capture the boy. Quickly." His voice was flat, cold as the magic he wielded.

  They saw a ten-year-old boy, alone, maybe scared. They didn’t see the decades of combat churning behind my eyes. They didn’t feel the storm of Ki held barely in check.

  A cold, predatory smile touched my lips. Three on one. A mage.

  We weren't in Argun anymore. This was the real world. And the fighter inside me, the one that had dominated arenas in another life, awoke. Hungry.

  My smile, maybe the sudden shift in my posture, gave them pause. The stocky bandit’s leer faltered. "Oi, boss… 'e don't look scared."

  "Just a stupid kid," the mage snapped, impatient. He gestured with his staff. "Deal with him."

  The stocky bandit charged, knife held low in a clumsy grip. The lanky one started circling, trying to flank.

  Amateurs.

  Ki surged through my legs. I wasn't a child. I was a weapon. I met the stocky bandit's charge, blurring past his telegraphed thrust. A single, Ki-enhanced strike, precise and brutal, slammed into his exposed ribs.

  Thud.

  A choked gasp, and he crumpled, clutching his side, breath knocked out of him.

  Before the lanky one could react, I pivoted, a whirlwind. He swung a crude short sword, aiming for my head. Too slow. Too predictable. I dropped low, the blade whistling harmlessly over me, and swept his legs out from under him with a Ki-powered kick that snapped bone. He hit the ground flat on his back with a grunt, the sword skittering away.

  A quick stomp to his throat silenced him permanently.

  Two down. Less than five seconds.

  "Impressive," the scarred mage stated, his voice still flat, but a flicker of surprise crossed his icy features. He hadn't moved, hadn't wasted a drop of mana on his fallen lackeys. He raised his staff slowly. "For a child. But playtime is over."

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  "Is this really the best you can do?" The words echoed my taunt to Father, tasting sharp and satisfying on my tongue. "All this for a child?" My Ki pulsed, the faint white aura around me intensifying almost imperceptibly.

  His eyes narrowed, the scar tissue tightening. "Arrogant brat." He slammed the butt of his staff onto the rocky ground. "Frost Floor!"

  The ground between us instantly slicked over with treacherous ice.

  "Ice Spikes!"

  A blizzard of crystalline shards materialized from the air, faster than arrows, humming with deadly cold as they hurtled towards me. Dodging on ice was suicide. A direct shockwave felt like swatting flies against this barrage.

  Think. Adapt. He expects retreat or a block.

  Instead, I poured Ki into my feet, blasting downwards. The ice beneath me shattered as I launched myself upwards, high above the deadly ground.

  "Foolish!" the mage sneered, tracking my ascent. He anticipated a jump. As I reached the apex, his staff flicked Upwards. "Rise!"

  Jagged spears of ice erupted from the ground below, perfectly placed to impale me as I fell. A deadly trap, sprung with chilling precision.

  Panic clawed at me. I twisted in mid-air, blasting another burst of Ki to shove myself off-course, desperation making my muscles scream.

  Not fast enough.

  Agony.

  Blinding, searing agony ripped through my left side. An ice spike, thick and cruelly sharp, punched through muscle and scraped against ribs. A strangled cry tore from my throat. Nausea surged, the world flickering grey at the edges.

  Focus!

  I landed heavily, staggering, clutching my bleeding side. The impact sent waves of fresh torment radiating outwards. Blood, shockingly warm and dark, gushed from the wound in my side, staining the rock crimson.

  "Should have stayed down, boy," the mage said calmly, already preparing his next spell. His staff glowed with frigid blue light. More spikes formed in the air around him, larger, deadlier.

  Rage, cold and pure as the ice piercing my side, sliced through the pain. This world doesn’t forgive. Neither can I.

  Ignoring the torn muscle, the grating ache against my ribs, I poured Ki into my legs and launched myself forward. A desperate, pain-fueled charge across the remaining distance. Ice spikes whizzed past, tearing through my clothes, scoring shallow cuts across my skin, but I didn't falter. The distance closed rapidly.

  "Full power shockwave!" I roared, not punching the air, but slamming my palm onto the icy ground directly in front of him as I slid the last few feet. I pushed the Ki, forcing it past fifty percent, closer to eighty, feeling the familiar, dangerous strain pulling at my core, threatening to tear me apart from the inside.

  The shockwave wasn't air this time; it was kinetic force ripping through the earth itself. The ground beneath the mage buckled. The ice floor shattered upwards in a spray of deadly shards. His concentration broke, spell fizzling as he stumbled, eyes wide with stunned disbelief at the unexpected tactic.

  My opening.

  Panic finally cracked his icy composure as he scrambled to erect a defensive ice wall. Too slow.

  I was already airborne, an agonizing Ki-burst from my feet launching me clear over the half-formed barricade. With a sharp mid-air twist, I locked onto his position, angling my body downwards, and unleashed one last explosive Ki-thrust from my soles to plummet straight towards him.

  He looked up, his scarred face a mask of disbelief, a faint shimmer of ice desperately trying to form around his body like fragile armor.

  My fist, radiating the white heat of channeled Ki, connected with his face. The impact was absolute. The ice armor vaporized instantly. Bone crunched with a sickening finality. His eyes rolled back, the light extinguished before his body even began its journey. He flew backwards like a rag doll, smashing into a nearby pine with enough force to snap the lower branches.

  A thick, jagged branch punched clean through his chest, pinning his lifeless corpse grotesquely against the trunk.

  Silence.

  Utter, ringing silence, broken only by the wind whistling through the rocks and my own harsh, ragged gasps.

  I collapsed onto my knees, clutching my bleeding side. The world spun violently. Too much blood loss… The edges of my vision turned grey, then black. I fought it, clung to consciousness like a drowning man clings to driftwood, but the darkness was winning.

  Battered. Bloodied. Impaled. But alive. Victorious.

  Need… help… The thought was a faint whisper against the encroaching void.

  Just as the blackness threatened to swallow me whole, a voice, impossibly light and laced with an infuriating amusement, echoed in the sudden stillness.

  "Well, well. Look what the cat dragged in. Making quite the mess, aren't we, kid?"

  Through the dimming haze, I saw it. Perched on a rock stained with the mage’s blood sat a cat. Impossibly black, with eyes like chips of molten gold, regarding me with something between disdain and pity. A faint, ethereal shimmer clung to its form.

  "Honestly," the cat sighed, stretching with an air of exaggerated boredom, like saving my life was a tedious chore. "Some people just can't handle themselves. Lucky for you, I was in the neighborhood."

  The world tilted, blackness swallowing the image of the scarred mage pinned to the tree, the sound of the cat's mocking voice the last anchor before the void claimed me completely.

  Then, nothing.

  My eyes snapped open.

  Not to pain, not to the blinding sun on rocky ground, but to… stillness. A dull stiffness, like waking after a too-long sleep, was the only sensation.

  The searing agony in my side? Gone. The throbbing ache echoing through my bones? Vanished.

  I blinked, vision swimming back into focus. Wood. Dark, sturdy panels forming the walls of a small room, maybe ten feet square. I was lying on a cot, rough blankets piled beneath me. Simple table, no chairs.

  And in the corner, absurdly plush and oversized for the spartan room, a dog bed. Curled into a perfect black sphere on that dog bed, fast asleep, was the cat. The talking cat.

  Panic, cold and sharp, jolted through me. I sat bolt upright, instantly scanning my body, my surroundings. No restraints.

  My gaze dropped to my left side. The shirt fabric was still torn and stained dark with dried blood, a grim reminder. But beneath the tear… smooth skin. Unbroken. Healed. Not just mended, but perfectly restored. Not even a scar.

  Did… did she save me? The memory surfaced – a strange, resonant energy humming around her just before I passed out. This ten-year-old body… it didn't have blood to spare. That spike, the gushing warmth… I shouldn't have survived without immediate, powerful healing. Her healing?

  A soft yawn echoed in the small room. On the dog bed, the cat stretched, a long, luxurious movement, claws extending, back arching with unnerving familiarity. Then, two molten gold eyes opened, fixing on me with an intelligence that was decidedly not feline.

  "Wow," the cat drawled, voice dripping sarcasm thick as molasses. "Mr. Sleepy-Head's finally decided to join the land of the living. Took you long enough. Starting to think I wasted my precious energy patching you up."

  I just stared, my mind struggling to reconcile the talking animal with the impossible healing. "You… you healed me? Completely?"

  The cat hopped off the bed, landing silently on the wooden floorboards. "Well, duh." It flicked an ear dismissively. "You think that hole in your side fixed itself? Honestly, for someone who throws Ki around like confetti, you're not very observant."

  It paused to groom a patch of fur on its shoulder with an air of utter nonchalance. "Consider it a down payment."

  "Down payment?" I swung my legs over the side of the cot, testing my weight. Stiffness protested, but the crippling pain was gone. "For what?"

  "For my invaluable future services, obviously," the cat replied, pausing its grooming to give me an expectant look. "Aren't you going to ask for my name? It's only polite, you know." A flicker of amusement danced in its golden eyes.

  "Though," it added with a haughty flick of its tail, "when you're as fabulous as I am, you don’t need an introduction. But hey," – a mischievous glint surfaced – "you can call me Alina."

  Alina. The name struck a chord, familiar somehow, though I couldn’t grasp why. "Alina," I repeated, the sound strange on my tongue. "How… how can you talk? What are you?"

  Alina sighed dramatically, a theatrical sound from such a small creature. "Questions, questions. Always with the questions. Magical cats don’t just hand out answers, sweetheart. You’ve gotta work for it!" She waved a paw vaguely. "Let's just say I'm… uniquely qualified. And much more interesting than your average tabby."

  She dismissed my query with a flick of her tail. "Now, since I've been so gracious as to offer my illustrious name, perhaps you could return the favor? What do they call you, kiddo?"

  I hesitated. Wary. Talking cat or not, something about her felt ancient and dangerous beneath the playful facade.

  "Nikolai."

  Alina blinked those golden eyes slowly, radiating pure, unadulterated boredom. "Nikolai Nordhil. Yes, I know. Honestly, took you long enough to say it."

  My eyes narrowed. She knew my full name? "How?"

  A smirk played on her feline features, revealing tiny white teeth. "Mwehehe~ Now, where's the fun in revealing all my secrets right away? Let's just say… interesting things tend to catch my attention. Especially interesting things with messy, explosive potential lying half-dead in the middle of nowhere."

  She padded closer, circling the cot slowly, those unsettlingly intelligent eyes scrutinizing me.

  "Now, about you, Nikolai Nordhil. That Ki of yours… messy." She sniffed disdainfully. "Uncontrolled. Nearly got yourself killed back there."

  I felt a prickle of defensiveness, even though I knew she spoke the truth. "I won, didn't I?"

  "Barely," Alina scoffed. "Against third-rate bandits and one barely competent ice chucker. Impressive display of brute force, I'll grant you. Especially that little stunt where you punched his magic. Cute."

  She sat down, wrapping her tail neatly around her paws, looking every bit the ordinary cat, except for the palpable aura of power humming around her. "But brute force has limits. Control is key. And your control?" She shook her head. "Sloppy."

  Harsh, but accurate. The fight had ripped away any illusions I had about mastering Ki in this body. My reliance on overwhelming power, the lack of refined technique when pushed… it was a vulnerability that had almost cost me everything. My discovery of the 'dam' technique was a start, but it felt crude, incomplete.

  "You've got talent, kid," Alina continued, her tone shifting, losing some of the sarcasm, gaining a hint of something calculating. "Raw power leaking out of your pores. More Ki than a ten-year-old body has any right to possess. Not to mention your pure martial arts are excellent."

  She tapped a sharp black claw thoughtfully against the wood floor. "But your Ki, it's unfocused. Untamed. Like a river without banks." Her golden eyes locked with mine, sharp and intense.

  "Listen, kid, life’s a game. You just don’t know the rules yet—and lucky for you, I might just feel like teaching you a few." She leaned forward slightly, a conspiratorial glint in her eyes. "You want to really improve? To harness that power instead of just letting it explode and hoping for the best? There's a way. Something your village elders probably haven't even heard of in centuries."

  A spark ignited within me, curiosity burning away the confusion and wariness. A way to improve? Beyond the 'dam'? Beyond just physical training? Something more?

  "What way?" I asked, leaning forward, caught in her intense gaze.

  Alina smirked, that same infuriatingly knowing feline expression. "Simple, really." Her voice dropped, laced with ancient power and playful arrogance.

  "You need to form a Ki core."