The Stargazer's War - Chapter 22

Chapter 22: Exam Day

I returned twice to the focus rooms over the following five weeks, each time equipped with a different specialty herb Nick had tailored for my specific purpose. The process proved remarkably simple: I chewed on a few leaves to reintroduce impurities into my system, then cycled my blood meridian to force them back out through the appropriate avenue.

To fake opening my skin meridian, that meant an hour spent sweating black gunk. For my stomach meridian, it took a different route. At Nick’s recommendation, I fasted a few days before that one to clear the way.

Simulating the pain of meridian opening turned out even easier. I just had to expand my spiritual senses beyond myself to glimpse the qi around me.

Oh boy did that suck.

I felt as if I’d fallen into a star, submerged in blinding light and scorching heat and ear-shattering noise.

I withdrew within the second, a migraine already taking root in my mind. Unbidden I let out a grunt of pain, one I’m certain helped sell the illusion of actually using all that qi to advance my cultivation.

Over each of the two hours I spent there lying to the sect about my progress, only a handful of times did I reach for that deafening inferno. Accustomed as I might’ve grown to the Fyrion’s ambient qi, the planet-wide enchantment only left some ten percent of the world’s qi production spread about its entire surface. The other ninety percent it divided evenly between the seventy-seven focus rooms.

A rough, rough estimate accommodating for the difference in surface area between the focus room and the entire planet, put the qi inside at about a hundred and forty million times as dense as that outside. And Fyrion was just a dwarf planet. I couldn’t imagine the intensity of the focus rooms orbiting the stars themselves.

Actually, fuck imagining. I was pretty damn proud I managed to stay conscious, migraine or otherwise. The thought of trying to acclimate myself to that much qi didn’t even cross my mind. It wasn’t like I’d ever have to fight someone inside a focus room, right?

Anyway, by the time my official sect record considered my bone, skin, and stomach meridians open, I understood why everyone valued focus room hours so highly. Threads, divided evenly between the four people taking up mine—Nick, Charlotte, Xavier, and, sporadically, Elder Lopez—the extra hour meant an entire twenty-five percent more qi than they’d otherwise get.

No wonder Xavier and Charlotte were shooting up the ranks.

More importantly, I had my own advancement to attend to. Ranking be damned. Just over three months into my time with the Dragon’s Right Eye, I’d finally steeled my focus, honed my combat prowess, and “opened” enough meridians to move on from my introductory classes into the intermediate ones.

I just had to prove it.

——

My holopad chimed as I navigated the crowd of sweaty cultivators from the morning workout to the cafeteria for breakfast. I answered.

“Mindy! We all set for today?”

“You’re set,” the reply came muffled, followed immediately my a distinct smacking sound.”

I scowled, not that she could see it over the comm line. “Are you eating?”

She took another bite. “New sushi place just opened down on Hatcher’s Row. I’m making sure it stands up to Elder Langham’s exacting standards.”

“You’re eating sushi? It’s eight AM.”

“It is? Huh. No wonder they were closed.”

My stomach churned at the sound of her swallowing and shoving something else into her mouth before she kept speaking.

“Anyway, I’m calling to let you know your spread’s good to go. Crew’ll be there come noon.”

I blinked. “Crew? I just wanted a—”

“Excuse me? Yes, the pH on this is off by point—”

She hung up.

I exhaled, scooping a smattering of berries into my half-serving of oatmeal before making for our usual table. Absent Charlotte, who usually didn’t bother making the trip back to housing D for breakfast, Xavier and Nick had already dug in, ravenously making headway into their large and massive portions, respectively. Even now my heart skipped a beat seeing Nick wolf down so much food, but I’d long learned to deal with that particular panic response.

I wasn’t in deep space anymore.

“Just got off a call from Mindy,” I greeted them. “Looks like lunch is going to be a bigger affair than I expected.”

“Oh no.” Sarcasm dripped from Nick’s voice. “Not more food. Anything but that.”

Xavier glared down at my meager breakfast. “You do realize you actually need to eat, right?”

“I am eating,” I said, forcing down a spoonful of oatmeal.

Xavier scowled. “Cal, you have fewer calories there than you burned on the track today. How can you expect your muscles to grow if you don’t feed them?”

“I am eating,” I repeated myself, my tone sharpening.

Xavier exhaled and dropped the issue. “You ready for today?”

“As ready as I’m gonna get,” I answered. “Meditation will be a cake walk if I cycle my spine, cycling’s just a matter of showing Chrissy that my sect file shows I have the right meridians open, and the AI puts me at eighty-four percent accuracy with the Dragon’s Fang movements. I only need seventy-five to move onto combat two.”

Nick looked up from his second omelet. “Excited?”

“Extremely. I’m gonna miss the kiddos, but progress is progress. I’ll tell you, I’m not gonna miss my combat instructors. Senior Cadet Long has hated me from day one.”

Xavier nodded. “You do have a talent for aggravating people.”

“Only assholes,” I countered. “It’s not my fault they’re so fun to mess with.”

Xavier sighed.

Nick set down his fork onto a cleared plate and pushed himself to his feet. “Alright, I’m back to work. I’m close to a breakthrough on this apple variant; I’m sure of it. Good luck today.”

“Thanks,” I said. “Good luck with your seeds.”

Xavier waited until Nick was out of earshot before speaking again. “I’m worried about him.”

“Really? He’s seems fine to me.”

“He spends all day cooped up in his room working with those seeds of his. He doesn’t come out. He doesn’t talk to people. He doesn’t work to improve himself.”

I shrugged. “Just because you don’t see it doesn’t mean he isn’t improving himself. There’s more to life than fighting. If he wants to focus on his craft, that’s perfectly reasonable.”

Xavier shook his head. “He’s not well, Cal. He’s skilled at hiding it, but he’s not well.”

I paused a moment to stare at Xavier. To this day I hadn’t a clue how he knew the things he did. He seemed to alternate between complete obliviousness and deep insight, missing obvious social cues—cough cough, Charlotte hitting on him—only to suddenly know for certain the emotional state of a random passerby. Of the entire sect, he was the only one who could gauge my cultivation level, and he did so at little more than a glance.

I think that might’ve been why he was so incessantly honest. What he did or didn’t know about a person was so divorced from what they wanted him to, he’d never learned what thoughts he was supposed to hide.

“Okay. I trust you. What should we do?”

“What else can we do? He’s already seeing a doctor about it. Best I can think of is to be there for him. He needs friends more than anything.”

“Yeah,” I muttered. “I’ll find some time for that after my nine hours of classes, two of working out, combat practice, cycling practice, and preparation to open the two deadliest meridians.” I sighed and glanced down at my holopad. Time to go. “Speaking of…” I stood. “Dinner at C-block tonight?”

Xavier nodded. “Good luck.”

My mind reran the conversation in loops as I bussed my tray and made for the transport platform. Much as I worried for Nick, I fundamentally lacked the time to spend with him. Charlotte and Xavier didn’t have to plan around a busy class schedule, but with Charlotte already gone to housing C and Xavier pushing dangerously close to a promotion himself, they’d have a harder time fitting Nick in around their own training. At least I lived next door to the kid, for all that meant when he rarely left his room.

Painfully appropriately, I found my attention yanked back to own world as I stepped for the last time into the beginner classroom. Senior Cadet Park was off talking with a parent, so I made straight for her counterpart.

I found him tapping away at his holopad. He didn’t look up. “What do you want, cadet?”

I saluted. “Senior Cadet Stevens, sir, I’d like to test out of this class.”

He snorted—snorted! Can you believe this guy? “If you say so, but I’ll have to caution you against it. Your numbers just aren’t there.”

I blinked. “My… numbers?”

He swiped at his holopad. “You average an impulse rating of forty-seven before your focus breaks. The minimum threshold for meditation two is sixty.”

“You guys are measuring this? Why is this the first I’m hearing about it?”

Stevens raised an eyebrow at me. “Did you think we were just hitting you with sticks at random? The Dragon’s Right Eye does have standards, you know. Standards you don’t meet.”

I sighed. I’d been hoping this wouldn’t look too suspicious. “I’d like to try anyway if that’s alright.”

He shrugged. “Your bruises. The test is simple enough: make it through the class period without losing focus. We’ll be hitting you harder than you’re used to. That okay?”

I nodded. “Let’s get this over with.”

Most of the kiddos had already taken their seats by the time Instructor Park called for the class to begin. I caught Stevens whispering something to her as I sat crosslegged on the padded floor, her eyes flashing to meet mine for a moment’s surprise.

Fighting back the sinking feeling Elder Lopez would hear about my sudden burst of progress, I evened out my breathing and descended into my center. Without any real idea what units they used to measure the force of their blows—not that that info would’ve meant anything to me either way—I worried that the numbing effects of my cycling wouldn’t counteract the increase in intensity. I’d tested them before, of course—to great success even—but if the instructors were going to be hitting me that much harder… I just didn’t know.

I supposed I could, if I’d wanted to, hide in the infinite sea for the duration of the test. My focus would’ve survived outright torture so sheltered in those dark waters of uncaring. I chose not to. If I lacked the focus to test out the right way, I clearly still had more to learn from meditation one, Charlotte’s schedule be damned.

Lacking the capacity to cycle more than a few meridians at a time, I opted for my blood, senses, and, of course, my spine. I’d have loved to harden my skin against their blows or reinforce my lungs to help maintain my breathing, but they’d notice if my breath slowed or skin turned corpse-colored. I got away with empowering my senses to drown out the distractions in the deluge of information because the instructors couldn’t see my eyes go all starry night with their lids shut.

I needn’t have worried.

I didn’t even notice the first strike, the icy sensation of spine-muted pain vanishing behind the overwhelming flow of data from my nose and ears. The second caught my attention with the same intensity as Nicki’s heartbeat two spots to my left.

Minute by minute the hours ticked by, the morning class as boring as ever as I distracted myself tracking the senior cadets’ movements by sound alone. Each breath, each step, each thwack of their cane I noted, the pair not even attempting to maintain their surprise against a sense meridian they’d never had guessed I’d opened.

When at last the period ended, my eyes flicked open to find looks not of shock or congratulations, but of scorn.

“Cadet Rex,” Stevens spoke with venom on his tongue, “I’m issuing you a request for your current blood chemistry data. You will accept it.”

My holopad popped open with a biometric data request. I squinted at it. “You think I cheated?”

“You took strikes rated at more than double your previous threshold without even flinching,” Park snapped. “Of course you cheated.”

Shit.

“Well, I didn’t,” I replied, sending over the relevant data. I rubbed at my bruised midsection. “Why’d you go so high above the requirement to advance?”

“You’re hardly the first cultivator to cut corners,” Stevens snarled.

Of course I’m not, you ass. Who in their right mind would want to stick around while you beat them with a stick?

I didn’t say that, however much I might’ve wanted to. Instead I simply shrugged. “I didn’t take anything, if that’s what you’re asking. I improved. I made progress. Isn’t that the point?”

Stevens looked up from his holopad over to Park. “His blood’s clean. Should we check his urine? He’s got his kidney meridian open.”

Park shook her head. “That’s not how he did it, then. No way someone at his level could’ve completely eliminated all traces of narcotics from his blood in three hours, and the effects would’ve worn off halfway through either way.”

“So what now? We let him get away with it?”

“Threads no,” Park said. “Report it to Elder Lopez. Let it be her problem.”

I bit back my sigh of relief at that. I knew exactly what Elder Lopez would do about it, and it had little to do with investigating me for cheating. I made a mental note to tell Charlotte she wouldn’t be getting an extra focus room hour this week.

A look of annoyance flashed across my face as I stood and addressed my soon-to-be former instructors. “Is that all?”

“Pending our meeting with Elder Lopez, that’s all,” Senior Cadet Stevens said. “You’re dismissed, Cadet Rex.”

Despite his words, it was the two of them that left the classroom, no doubt headed directly for the Elder’s office. I waited until they were gone before I too made for the door, albeit for much more delicious purpose.

Sure enough, I poked my head into the hall to find two folding tables, four thermal carts for hot, cold, and frozen foods, and three mortals in black slacks and white button-downs emblazoned with a small logo and the words Roseleaf Catering Co.

I grinned. “Come on in.”

The kid’s watched with wide eyes as the caterer’s filed into the classroom. Being the considerate classmate I am, I’d let their parents know in advance they wouldn’t be needing lunches today, so most of them already knew something was up, but clearly hadn’t expected full on catering. That was fair. I hadn’t expected full on catering.

I addressed the classroom. “Some of you may’ve noticed me talking with the instructors just now. That’s because—pending a few hiccups—I’ve finally tested out of meditation one. This afternoon, I intend to do the same in cycling and combat. Unless something goes horribly wrong, this is the last day of classes we’ll share together.”

A few of the kids, Vihaan included, gaped at the news. Most of them weren’t listening. It was actually kind of cute, watching the way their eyes followed the caterers as they set up the tables behind me.

“So for our last day, I asked my friend to put together a pizza party. She-uh—” I glanced back at the caterers and frantically waved one down before he could deposit a collection of wine bottles onto one of the tables. “She went a bit overboard, but you all deserve it. You’ve been great classmates, even after I showed up and took away your teachers’ attention. After-uh… everything we’ve been through together, I can honestly say you’ve grown important to me. Thank you for welcoming me. Dig in.”

Okay so it wasn’t the most eloquent speech, but the smiles on their faces as they stampeded past me to get to the pizza. Overkill or otherwise, Mindy had at least had the wherewithal to request mostly plain cheese and pepperoni, relegating the handful of gourmet pies to a corner where I and a few of the more adventurous ten-year-olds tried the gamut.

My favorite was spiced with masala and a blend of three cheeses I’d never heard of before. I think if I really pushed myself, I could’ve maybe pronounced one of them.

As the kiddos settled in and enjoyed their lunch, I kept off to the side for a moment’s peace. I was gonna miss these kids. They were loud and obnoxious and, well, kids, but barring Instructor Long’s attempts to paint me as a villain, they were the only ones in this entire godsforsaken sect who hadn’t fallen into petty politics and maneuvering.

How many more years would they have before this place turned them against each other?

“When you said you were going to bring them pizza I didn’t expect… this.”

“Chrissy!” I greeted the cycling instructor. “Please, help yourself. My-uh… friend went a bit overboard organizing all of this.” Per her request, I oh so tactfully avoided sharing Mindy’s name.

She grabbed a slice of some blue cheese monstrosity I hadn’t enjoyed. “I take it this means you were successful with your stomach meridian?”

“I was,” I told her, not technically lying.

A warm smile stretched across her face. “Congratulations, then. You’re ready for cycling two.”

I blinked. “That’s it? You don’t want to… I don’t know, check?”

“Should I? What would you possibly have to gain from lying?”

“Right. Good point. I guess I thought there’d be more of a test. The meditation instructors even accused me of cheating.”

She raised an eyebrow at me. “Did you?”

“No, of course not.”

Chrissy shrugged. “Then it’s not a problem. Congratulations, Cal. You’ve earned it.”

I smiled. “Thanks.”

She directed the kids to return their plates to the caterers as the three mortals packaged up their supplies and cleared out. I took the opportunity to pull Vihaan aside, kneeling before him and drawing the sword from my back.

“I should’ve done this the moment I got it, but we’re going to be seeing a lot less of each other soon, so now seemed like the time.” I laid the weapon over my knee. “This sword is as much a part of your story as it is mine. It seems only fair that you should be the one to name it.”

Vihaan’s eyes went wide as he looked down on his mother’s stellar craftsmanship. “Really? I get to name it?”

“Really.”

He placed a hand on the flat of the blade, Fyrion silver alloyed with the very steel of the freezer cart that’d saved his life. He took a moment, staring at it and chewing his lower lip in thought, before he finally spoke. “Shiver.”

“Shiver?”

Vihaan nodded. “That’s all I did. It was really cold in there.”

I smiled at the sweet simplicity of it. “Shiver it is then.” I placed my hand over his upon the cool metal and put on my most solemn voice. “I hereby dub thee, Shiver, slayer of void beasts, deliverer of sanctuary, defender of the ice cream.”

Vihaan let out a giggle. I counted that as a win.

“Okay, everyone! It’s time to turn our thoughts inwards.”

Vihaan answered to Chrissy’s call to attention, turning away and taking a seat on the padded floor. I returned Shiver to its sheath on my back, my muscle memory long trained to find the specialized slot that made the motion possible.

I shuffled back and took a seat of my own, opting to spend my last class period with Chrissy actually following along with her guided exercises. For obvious reasons I didn’t need help preparing to open my kidney meridian, but every bit I could improve my control or stretch out my qi pathways to increase capacity would prove useful. My… unique access to qi made that latter both particularly easy and especially important.

Three hours or repetitive, focus-intense cycling later, I bid Chrissy one final thanks and joined the kiddos for a last walk down the windowed hallway to combat class.

With a knot of trepidation building in my throat, I made straight for the head instructor and announced my intentions. “Senior Cadet Long, sir.” I saluted. “I’d like to attempt to test out of this class.”

He laughed in my face, a loud and sharp and derisive thing that seemed to punch through the air between us. “No.”

I blinked. “Excuse me?”

“I said no. You’re an upstart mortal that lacks the skill, discipline, and drive to succeed as a cultivator. It would be a stain upon this sect’s integrity to allow you to advance further.”

I fell out of my salute. “That’s absurd. I work as hard as anyone here, and I’ve made good progress.”

Long’s face hardened. “You’re robbing children of valuable instruction so you can play at warrior. I refuse to reward such behavior.”

“Then let me go! The sooner I test out, the sooner you don’t have to deal with me. I’ve reached over eighty percent accuracy with the forms. Sect guidelines only require—”

“Sect guidelines leave the final decision to the lead instructor,” Long snapped.

“C’mon, Bao,” Instructor Davis came to my defense using Long’s first name. “He has been working hard. Give him a shot.”

Long glanced over to Davis then back at me, a thin smile taking shape on his face. “Very well, cadet. If you can preform all ninety-nine steps of the Dragon’s Fang to my satisfaction, I’ll allow you through.”

That didn’t sound good.

I looked to Davis for help.

He offered none.

I bit back a groan, my mind racing for alternatives to going along with Long’s idea, but I found none. He’d offered exactly what I wanted. I gulped, nodded, and stepped directly in to the obvious trap. “Okay.”

“Okay, what?”

“Okay, sir. Thank you, sir.”

As Instructors Davis and Charleston pulled the class away to begin the day’s lesson, I stepped to an empty corner of the dojo and took on a neutral stance.

Long stood to my side, his hands clasped behind his back. “Begin.”

In a single, rehearsed motion, I lunged my left foot forward to lower my stance and reached with my right arm for Shiver at my back, turning my upper body to form a smaller target for the imaginary enemy before me. The Dragon Prepares. I smoothly transitioned into the second step, drawing my sword and twisting my upper body as I advanced with my right foot, the force of the motion bringing my sword between my and my foe. The Dragon Raises His Claws.

I never got to the third step.

Something slammed into my wrist halfway through the step, knocking the blade from my hand and sending it clattering against the floor. I stopped short.

“Your grip is weak,” Bao Long snarled, hands already behind this back once more. “Again.”

I swallowed my retort and knelt down to collect my sword and return it to its sheath. With a nod I resumed my neutral starting position and reentered the first step.

At least this time I saw him move.

Halfway through the first lunge, Long kicked forward, sweeping my back leg out from under me at supernatural speed.

I caught myself on my hands just shy of my face slamming into the padded floor.

“Your footwork is unstable,” Long spat at my prone form. “Again.”

“You cycled for that! I could’ve had perfect footwork and I would’ve fallen.”

“I said, again, cadet.” Long spoke through his teeth.

I scowled and pushed myself upright. “Yes, sir,” I growled.

I was ready for him this time, but no amount of preparation could bridge the gap between ten open meridians and a fully-fledged copper. At least I managed to cycle my spine to deal with the pain.

His fist met my stomach faster than I could even tense for it, doubling me over as it drove the breath from my lungs. His left elbow slammed into my back, knocking me again onto my stomach, where this time he pinned me under his foot.

“You’re weak. You’re pathetic. You’re an insult to every cultivator who trained their entire life to earn their place here.”

I gasped for air, what felt like several hundred pounds of force pressing me into the floor as breath eluded me. “Elder… Lopez,” I wheezed.

Long laughed. “Oh, yes. Elder Lopez told me of your little arrangement. One year to graduate all three beginner classes before you’re removed from the sect. She also so kindly reminded me of the authority afforded me as your instructor.”

I pulled qi through my lung meridian to ease my breathlessness as I parsed his words. They didn’t make any sense. Why would Elder Lopez turn against me? I was feeding her focus hours. She of all people should’ve wanted me to stay.

Shit. If Lopez was behind this, that meant I couldn’t turn to her to fix it. What about Instructor Stevens’ accusations of cheating? Did those come from her too? Was this just another attempt to wring more focus hours out of me, or something more?

There was too much I didn’t know.

Long continued his tirade as my thoughts raced, but I didn’t listen. It was all the same cultivators good, mortals bad tripe he’d been spouting since the day we met. The fact I very much was a cultivator didn’t seem to mean much to him.

By the time he finally lifted his foot and allowed me up, my outrage had cooled from the blaze of indignation to the icy chill of resentment.

I left class early, furiously tapping away at my holopad to schedule a meeting with Elder Lopez. Her secretary sent me a time six days from now. I groaned.

I didn’t like not knowing where I stood. It grated on me, the unanswered questions, the duplicity, the unfairness of it all.

I’d always known there were people at the Dragon’s Right Eye that wanted me gone. Threads, Long had been one of them since I first set foot on this godsforsaken planet. The day’s only revelation was that they’d finally come up with a way to get rid of me.

I had nine months left, nine months to form my core, to deal with Long, to pass through three levels of combat classes. Oddly enough, that first seemed the easiest of the three.

Perhaps it would help with the others.

For all the lingering pain in my stomach and wrist, for all the roiling frustration, all the indignity of being pinned to the ground like an animal, I returned to housing D with my head held high.

Stevens could throw his accusations. Long could yell his slurs. Lopez could play her games. None of it mattered. Nothing mattered. At the end of the day I’d outpace them all. At the end of the day my flails against infinity would ripple out wider than theirs ever would.

Even now, sore and beaten and exhausted of the day’s developments, years behind my opposition and without the connections to contest them, I didn’t stand alone. I didn’t lack for tools at my disposal.

And I still had a few tricks up my sleeve.