Chapter 2:9 Progress

Travis picked up the envelope holding Kevin’s reply with a deep sigh.

He loved almost every aspect of his new role, all of them except this one. Using the outsider as an unwitting spy on his sect was an awful thing to do. It went against his own morality and against the professionalism of the OIM.

Yet it was also a task he couldn’t ignore, not when it was a direct order from the assistant director. The best he’d been able to do was delay for as long as possible.

First, the letter arrived Friday afternoon, late enough that he could overlook it in favor of finishing his work for the day. Then, he’d spent the weekend training instead of coming in for extra work, as he usually did.

Now, mid-Monday morning, he’d run out of excuses. It was time to get it over with.

With another sigh, Travis sliced the envelope open and pulled out the folded sheets of paper. Forehead creased in worry, he ran his eyes over Kevin’s words. As long as the man hadn’t shared anything too confidential, it would be fine.

If he had… then Travis would have some decisions to make.

Despite the tense situation, Travis’ mouth quirked up as he read through the initial paragraphs. It was good to see that Kevin had settled into the sect and made a few friends. That was a good indication of future progress.

That Kevin had a lesson that turned into direct tutoring from an elder was an even better sign. It sounded like he might get pulled into some kind of subtle sect power struggle from it, but that sounded well worth it in Travis' book.

As much as he wanted to rush through to the end, Travis still paused to take a few notes for the outsider's file. While less respected in recent years, Formation crafting was still a solid source of income.

Unless something went wrong, Kevin should have no issue paying back his debt before the accounts division started complaining. If only the other outsiders he’d been stuck with had chosen something so sensible.

It was something he should have expected from a man who was so down to earth in everyday matters, even if his head was in the clouds when it came to his goals.

After the introduction came the response Travis had been forced to elicit. He’d taken the subtle path of asking about interesting stories from the sect, and it seemed Kevin had obliged.

The first one was interesting, providing more detail around how he’d ended up learning from Elder Fischer, but otherwise unimportant. Reading the details made Travis wince in sympathy, even if he was still more than a little jealous of the opportunity.

It was the second story that sent a flood of relief through Travis’ tense muscles. While cultivators vanished in mystic realms all the time, a teacher disappearing when they had a class scheduled was embarrassing for the sect.

More so when they hadn’t managed to find a trace of the man months later. At the same time, there wasn’t any wrongdoing on the sect's part. At worst, the Sect Oversight Committee would give them a slap on the wrist if they’d truly bungled the investigation.

Just what he needed to get that agent off his back without causing any serious problems. Sinking back into his chair, Travis let himself enjoy a moment of relief before he penned a thank you for Kevin.

Thank the heavens nothing had come of all his worries.

After the frantic rush that was his first two weeks, Kevin’s life fell into a more ordered pattern. While his workload never calmed down, his early time investments made him far better able to manage it.

The Twisted Script style had the largest impact, reducing the time he needed to complete formation flags by more than half. Nor was the end of the technique; the more Kevin used it, the faster he grew.

It was far from the only good decision that helped, however. The Qi Barrier tutoring sessions with Amelia pushed him well ahead of the curve for TEQ-109, reducing both practice and study time.

Then there was the early push he’d made on both his flag throwing and martial art training. It would have been easy to let them slide with everything else going on; instead, he’d built a solid foundation to continue learning from.

As the days turned into weeks, the basics slid into place, freeing up even more time. Time that Kevin used to focus on his cultivation, improve his flag lobbing, and spend more time with his friends.

On top of his weekend training sessions with Amelia, he usually met up with her for dinner once or twice per week. Rather than focusing on improving their skills, these more romantic sessions were spent getting to know each other better.

With Brad, it tended to be a couple of lunches a week where they further discussed Xi’an and their plans for the future. After a couple of weeks, the massive man even talked Kevin into working out with him.

It wasn’t as esoteric as improving oneself through cultivation, but Brad insisted that it was worth the effort. Advanced pushed your body beyond its normal limits, so improving your base strength and agility would lead to even further benefits.

That was the theory, at least. So far, it was mostly an exhausting experience, both the effort itself and the sheer disbelief at the kind of weight Brad could lift. Hopefully, it would pay off in the future.

If not, it was still nice to hang out with a friend more often.

In parallel to the developments in his relationships, Kevin’s studies progressed rapidly. Week after week, he continued to impress Elder Fischer with near-perfect formations as he worked through the building blocks.

He even found the time to work through the combat formations Fischer shared in their first practical class. The advanced designs were by far the most complicated he’d ever worked on, yet he managed them nonetheless.

His other studies showed similar progress. In FORM-102, they moved on to analyzing formations solo before moving on to discerning issues. In both cases, Kevin consistently maintained a position in the top three students, often coming first or second.

With Amelia’s tutoring, TEQ-109 was practically easy, and Kevin soon moved from among the worst in the class to among the best. He felt like he could have been the best with more practice. However, the class wasn’t among his highest priorities.

Finally, he moved on from simple footwork in MAR-101 to practicing the style’s blocking motions. The complex circular motions were difficult enough with a good grasp of the footwork, and Kevin found himself glad Miles had forced him to wait.

Beyond all that, he was moving forward with his cultivation faster than ever. With extra free time, he could finally fit more sessions in per day, almost doubling the quantity of Qi he pulled in each week.

Overall, the progress was astonishing, and Kevin would have been more than content if not for one issue.

Kevin cursed under his breath as he saw Karlene brown finish her formations out of the corner of his eye. He would be second, at best, now for the third week in a row.

Every week, he improved, and every week, Karlene continued to take first place. She never pushed further ahead, instead staying comfortable in her existing lead. It was incredibly annoying, as if keeping first place was effortless for her.

Not even Fischer’s flag straightening technique had closed the gap, though learning it had helped. That had been his last hope to catch up, and he was running out of ideas.

With a frown, Kevin glanced back at his own set of flags. Fischer had moved on from throwing a single formation and now had them throwing combinations. The need to have different formations overlapping increased the complexity and reduced the room for error.

Despite the increased difficulty, it looked like all his work was paying off. He might still be behind Karlene, but it looked like this was the closest he’d ever been. If anything, it seemed she’d had a harder time of the sudden difficulty increase than he had.

Perhaps the class wasn’t as effortless for her as it seemed, instead being a combination of her greater physical ability and practice. Perhaps just enough practice to stay ahead if her consistent lead was anything to go by.

It made sense when he thought about it like that. As a more advanced disciple, Karlene no doubt had half a dozen, or more, things she had to keep practicing or lose her skill at. Of course, she wouldn’t push much harder than needed in a single class.

He’d be practicing more than usual in the lead-up to the mid-season lobbing competition, so he’d been able to close the gap. A gap Karlene might well work to widen if she noticed.

Sighing, Kevin turned back to his own work. It was an interesting insight if it was true, but it didn’t help him right now. If he wasn’t careful, he’d miss out on second place as well; John was always nipping at his heels.

He’d already wasted enough time thinking, so Kevin turned back to his next target, aimed, and lobbed in a single, smooth motion. He was partway through the next when another thought struck him.

Should he… hold back a little? Just enough that he wasn’t edging into Karlene’s lead. There were no actual benefits for doing better in class, beyond the illusive goal of impressing Fischer, so it wouldn’t cost him anything but his pride.

And if it meant avoiding any reason for Karlene to practice harder, then pride was a price he’d happily pay. With only two weeks left until the competition in week seven, he needed any advantage he could get if he was going to catch up.

For the rest of the lesson, Kevin followed his new plan. To avoid wasting training time, he focused on throwing as accurately as possible instead of focusing on speed. While this slowed him down enough that he lost third place to John, it actually helped him fix a few tiny issues in his form.

It also meant neither of his two biggest competitors should be thinking of him as the competition. Better yet, John hadn’t pushed into Karlene’s lead much at all; there should be no reason for her to push her training harder.

Though none of that would matter if he couldn’t close the gap in time. He’d pushed hard on skill so far, and it seemed to be working a little. At a guess, he’d put himself at, or even a little better than Karlene in raw skill.

Which mattered not at all compared to the massive difference in their physical abilities. There was no way he could close that gap with skill alone. Not in two weeks, at least.

That meant he needed another plan, and the only thing he could think of was to try and address the physical disparity. If he could edge a little closer, then superior skill might be enough.

The obvious answer was to push for another grade breakthrough. He was close to the sixth grade, he could feel it, and making it in two weeks should be no struggle. If he worked hard, even a week should be doable.

That would give him extra time to grow used to the increases in his physical ability. In the past, he’d seen it throw off his accuracy until he dialed it in, and the last thing he needed was for that to happen again at the competition.

Another breakthrough would also give him ten more merit, bringing him up to twenty. That was enough to buy another technique manual from the library.

Kevin’s face slowly shifted into a grin as an idea began to form. He just needed to break through in time to make use of it.