The morning began with the usual sacred rites of Saiyan suffering: me, in a sweat-soaked gi, gring at the rising sun like it owed me money. Granny stood behind me, her arms crossed, her expression that of a Zen monk who could and would kill a bear with a chopstick if sufficiently annoyed.

  Today, though, she seemed… contemptive.

  “Training’s different today,” she said.

  ‘Oh no. That tone. That’s the “this is gonna hurt in a meaningful way” tone.’

  I nodded like a condemned man. “How different?”

  She stepped forward and pointed to the stacked set of training weights—twice what I normally lifted.

  “You’re going to lift them,” she said.

  “Shocking.”

  “With all your senses engaged.”

  I stared at her. “Come again?”

  “All. Your. Senses,” she repeated. “Feel the texture of the bar. Hear your heartbeat. Taste the sweat on your lips. Smell the metal. Focus on the sensation. Most importantly—channel your awareness into your hands.”

  I squinted. “This sounds suspiciously like spiritual enlightenment disguised as torture.”

  “Exactly,” she grinned.

  I sighed and walked up to the weights. They weren’t just heavy—they were obnoxiously heavy, like someone had forged them out of bad decisions and lead.

  I wrapped my fingers around the bar.

  ‘Focus… focus on the grip… listen to the bar? Smell the rust? Lick the… wait, no, don’t lick the weights—focus, Kalbi!’

  I lifted.

  Nothing special happened.

  No revetion. No divine spark. Just the familiar pain of my spine threatening to write a resignation letter.

  Then—WHACK!

  Granny’s fist smmed into my back.

  But this time… it felt different.

  It wasn’t just force. It tingled. Like a shockwave of pressure that rolled through my nerves in a way that was too precise to be just brute strength.

  I stumbled forward and looked back at her, wide-eyed.

  “You used ki in that punch!”

  She smirked. “Took you long enough, monkey boy.”

  “So you can use ki.”

  “Obviously.”

  I frowned. “Why didn’t you teach me this sooner?”

  “Because you weren’t ready. Now you’re starting to feel it. The energy inside you—it’s not just muscles. It’s everything. Focus inward. Find it. Use it.”

  I looked at my palms, breath shallow.

  ‘Ki… energy. Like a spark buried inside me. Not rage. Not fear. Something steady. Like heat in my blood. A hum in my bones.’

  I closed my eyes. Reached inward. Focused.

  And there it was.

  A subtle, glowing pressure. Not visible, but real. Like warmth pooling in my chest and spreading down my arms. My fingers twitched. My skin prickled. It was alive.

  I focused it. Not perfectly—but enough.

  I lifted the weights again.

  This time, they rose easier. Not easy—Granny wasn’t about to let me become spoiled—but easier. Controlled. Like my body had found its missing gear.

  Granny nodded once.

  “You’ve just reinforced your limbs with your own ki. Not bad. For an alien.”

  I grinned, panting. “Wait until I learn how to shoot ser beams.”

  She narrowed her eyes.

  “Not yet, hotshot. First…”

  She walked away and returned dragging something that looked like a literal artifact from prehistoric martial arts.

  A turtle shell.

  It was massive. Weathered. Worn. And at least 50 kilograms by my estimate.

  She tossed it at me.

  I caught it—and instantly dropped to my knees.

  “What the hell?!”

  “Training weight,” she said casually. “Used to belong to a friend. I modified the inside straps. You’ll wear it.”

  “Like, for training?”

  “For everything. Training. Eating. Sleeping. Pooping.”

  I stared at her like she’d asked me to swallow a meteor.

  “You want me to wear this to school?!”

  She smirked.

  ‘Great. Helicopter Granny strikes again. Now I’m the weird turtle boy in css. If there was ever a social suicide method approved by ancient masters, this is it.’

  After barely surviving my morning ki revetion and strapping the turtle shell to my back like a rejected Ninja Turtle, I showered, changed, and stumbled into the living room.

  I was wearing simple martial arts pants and the Roux Dojo symbol-stitched overshirt, sleeveless as always. The shell was fastened over my gi, tight and heavy, with my tail tucked firmly under the waistband like a hidden bomb.

  Sasha walked out of the kitchen with her tablet—and stopped mid-sip of tea.

  She blinked.

  Once.

  Twice.

  “...You’re wearing a shell.”

  “I know,” I muttered. “I’m fully aware.”

  “You look like a mutant backpack.”

  “I know.”

  “Are you pnning to swim to school?”

  I sighed. “Just… just take me to css.”

  We drove in silence. The shell shifted every time we hit a bump. It wasn’t pain exactly—it was humiliation wrapped in discipline. Like a turtle-themed scarlet letter.

  At school, Miss Airi met us at the gate.

  She stared at me with a look reserved for kids who eat chalk or bring roadkill for show-and-tell.

  “…Kalbi,” she said slowly, like I was a rare and potentially dangerous fungus, “what… are you wearing?”

  “It’s a spiritual armor from my dojo,” I said confidently. “Passed down from a friend of my master. It helps me focus.”

  She just nodded with the bnk smile of someone filing paperwork in her brain under Don’t Ask, Don’t Involve the Principal.

  She pced me near the back of the css again, now mentally categorized alongside the snorting twins, crayon muncher, and girl who eats glue like it’s soup.

  We spent the morning learning letters and pronunciations. The shapes were vaguely familiar.

  ‘Looks like English… but they make it sound like a blend of Japanese sylbles. No problem. Memorize the shapes. Add sounds. Bam—literacy unlocked.’

  I ignored the gres, the mutters, and the kid across the aisle who kept chewing on his sleeve like it was delicious.

  Then she showed up.

  Pigtails. Wide eyes. That unblinking stare.

  The one I had beled: AVOID AT ALL COSTS.

  She stomped up to my desk during lunch and stared at my shell.

  “Are you a turtle?” she asked.

  “Maybe,” I said cautiously. “Why?”

  “Because turtles are delicious.”

  I didn’t reply.

  I just stood. Quietly. Scooted to the opposite side of the courtyard. Very quickly.

  School ended.

  I fled.

  At home, Granny was waiting—gi on, eyes sharp.

  We trained.

  This time, she hit harder. Her punches and kicks hummed. They carried force—not just strength, but ki. Each strike crackled against my arms, legs, ribs. I blocked. Deflected. Reinforced my body with my own energy.

  “Don’t just use ki,” she barked. “Feel it. Let it move with you. Let it protect you.”

  “I’m trying!”

  “Try harder.”

  We danced like fire and storm. Her attacks burned. Mine fizzled, sparked. She never slowed. Never broke pace. Every movement was a lesson. Every impact, a wordless instruction.

  After an hour, I colpsed. Panting. Trembling. The shell still strapped to my back like a smug demon.

  I y there until Carl and Sasha returned home.

  Dinner was warm.

  Granny had made grilled fish, rice, and something leafy that looked suspiciously like forest spinach. We sat as a family—me in a damp gi, them in their work clothes, Granny still barefoot like a warrior monk who refuses to be domesticated.

  Carl looked at me with that bright-eyed curiosity he always wore after coming home from work, like my life was a weird comic strip he just couldn’t stop reading.

  “So, Kalbi,” he asked with a grin, “how was your second day?”

  I shoveled a mouthful of rice into my mouth, chewed, and answered with complete deadpan sincerity:

  “Started the day pretending to be a weightlifting monk under a five-foot-tall drill sergeant, then went to school dressed like an endangered species. Learned letters while being stared at by kids who think snorting is a form of communication, barely avoided getting eaten by a girl with murder in her lunchbox, came home, got pounded by a grandma who might actually be part tank, and finished off with a philosophical story about shooting sers from your hands… all while wearing a literal turtle shell.”

  I pointed at my back with my thumb and added, “I am never going to be normal again.”

  Carl’s grin twitched like he was trying not to ugh.

  Sasha blinked.

  Granny sipped her tea like this was all a completely reasonable day for a five-year-old.

  I ate like I’d earned it.

  Which, by now, I guess I had.

  I fell asleep in the same futon beside Granny, the turtle shell now resting at the foot of the bed, waiting for me like a loyal curse.

  As I drifted off, I thought:

  ‘Same day tomorrow. Same training. Same shell. Same snorting kids. Same turtle boy nightmare life…’

  And somehow?

  I didn’t hate it.