Chapter 2:8 Breakthrough

The next morning, Kevin found himself with more Formation work left than he’d planned. As lovely as the previous night had been, he’d only finished a little over half his remaining flags.

Finishing would eat into the full cultivation day he’d planned, but there wasn’t anything Kevin could do about it. He needed those flags done by Monday morning, and there was no other time left to do them in.

So, after a quick breakfast, he settled down to plow through them as fast as the Twisted Script Style would allow. While it was usually a bad idea to rush a project, Fischer’s strange brushwork style almost seemed to embrace it.

Instead of making mistakes as he began to speed up, Kevin found himself sinking ever deeper into a trance as his brush danced around unfinished sections of cloth. The only time he made a mistake was when he stopped to think about the process too much; the rest of his flags came out near-perfect.

The work took him most of the morning, but it was worth it to see the full six formations laid out on his floor. It was twice the work he’d done last week, and a close examination showed the quality was at least as high.

If not for the days he’d spent learning the Twisted Script, it would have been done faster as well. Now that initial investment was over, it would pay off in massive time savings next week and every week after.

Just thinking about the extra time was enough to cheer Kevin up, despite losing the bulk of his morning. He was going to be able to focus a lot more on cultivation going forward, as well as put more effort into his lobbing and martial art training.

After assuring himself there were no significant mistakes in his work, Kevin put his formations away and headed for the Fire Courtyard. Three was still plenty of day left, and he might still break through to the next grade if he pushed.

Which was exactly what he did. Upon reaching the courtyard, Kevin first filled his body with a mixture of free-floating Fire and Earth Qi. Then, he sucked in as much Fire Qi as he could stand.

On a normal day, he’d have stopped there; today, he did a second energy gathering cycle to refill his reserves of free-floating Fire Qi. He might not be able to use it all now, but keeping as much stored as possible would mean he could cultivate all day without returning.

Having finished with the courtyard, Kevin returned to his dorm building, ate an early lunch, and then continued cultivating in the comfort of his room. On most days, he used his reserves of free-floating Qi to fit cultivation into little gaps in his schedule; today, he used it to fit in a marathon.

For two hours, Kevin did nothing but pull pure Earth Qi into his sealed land. The whole time he pushed the spiritual void technique ever harder, increasing its speed in tiny increments.

Then he swapped back to Fire Qi. Two hours was enough for most of the Qi he’d pulled in early to burn itself out, producing extra Earth Qi in the process. As annoying as the discomfort of the process was, it was by far the fastest method of cultivation he possessed.

With hours still left until his cultivation session with Amelia, Kevin swapped back to Earth Qi without pause. A second two-hour session drained almost everything he’d stored and left him floating inside of his Sealed Land with pride.

The entire construction seemed to pulse with Qi as it floated in glowing clumps through the air. A few of them still burned with residual Fire Qi, though it was slowing down again after his second two-hour session.

Moreover, Kevin was beginning to experience resistance against pulling more Qi in. It wasn’t much, but there was a definite feeling that he was beginning to run out of room.

The next breakthrough was close.

The logical next step would have been to refresh the dwindling Fire Qi in his sealed Land. However, Kevin’s alarm went off before he could get started. It was time to meet with Amelia.

Seeing her again sent a little thrill of excitement through him, though it was tinged with newfound nerves. Whatever was going on between them was still new enough that he couldn’t help but be worried about ruining it.

Amelia was waiting when he arrived, and her cautious wave seemed to mirror his own feelings.

Seeing that only ramped up Kevin’s own worries, and he had to push himself to address the previous night. Thankfully, Amelia gave him a shy smile when he mentioned how much he’d enjoyed the previous evening, and the awkwardness settled down after that.

After a few minutes of quiet conversation, Kevin led them into the same cycle of cultivation and breaks they’d used last week. Twenty-odd minutes of cultivation followed by a short break to discuss whatever Amelia wanted.

This week, it was about the various techniques she was currently interested in, which turned out to be a fascinating topic. Soon, Amelia wasn’t the only one fully drawn into the conversation, and even Kevin found it difficult to keep to their schedule at times.

It was not only a welcome break after a packed day but also gave him a much better idea of how broad the scope of techniques truly was. For someone who was still struggling to catch up on basic knowledge, it was something of a godsend.

There were even a couple of techniques that sounded like they would be useful for him, though Kevin had no idea when he might have the time to learn them. For now, he took note of the names and put the idea aside for the future.

Bursts of talking about her favorite subject also seemed to help Amelia focus, and she barely seemed to notice that he was slowly increasing the time of each cultivation session.

If anything, the session went a little too well. Almost an hour before they were due to finish, Kevin felt his sealed land begin to shudder in response to the flow of Qi he was pulling in.

After four previous times, he knew the signs and wasted no time in snapping his eyes open. As joyous as reaching the verge of a breakthrough was, Kevin found himself with a few mixed feelings.

As much as he’d been longing for this moment, it was suddenly happening a little too soon. Cutting their session short would be a shame when he knew how useful it was to Amelia. Not to mention embarrassing.

Could he stop cultivating now and hold it off? Kevin paused to sense the situation inside his sealed land, only to frown at what he saw. No, there was no way he’d be able to hold off for another full hour.

Even if he stopped cultivating this instant, the Fire Qi he’d kept topping up inside would continue burning. At this rate, he’d have to rush back just to reach the privacy of his room in time.

Seeing no way out, Kevin acknowledged the situation with a soft sigh. “Amelia, can we talk for a moment?”

Amelia blinked and raised an eyebrow as she stared at him. With a graceful flick of her wrist, she produced a blank page and sent words flowing across its surface.

That was fast; I barely noticed the time passing.

“Ah, that wasn’t a full session,” Kevin chuckled, rubbing the back of his neck. “I’m afraid I’ll have to cut this short. I’ve triggered a breakthrough a little earlier than I expected.”

He got a bright grin in response as Amelia clapped, letting her page float to the ground. Before it could hit the ground, her hand snaked out, catching it again as she continued writing as if nothing had happened.

That is wonderful, Kevin. Please, go and find somewhere comfortable to ride it out. I can hardly begrudge you the early end after you’ve helped me make so much progress to my own breakthrough.

I’ll see you next weekend?

“Thanks,” Kevin sighed again, relived to see how well she’d taken it. He hadn’t exactly expected anything else, but nerves were rarely logical. “Yeah, next weekend,” he continued, rising to his feet.

“If not earlier, maybe we can get lunch someday?” The suggestion sent a sudden pang of regret through him, as Kevin realized he’d barely spoken to Brad since their lunch last week.

He’d been busy, but that wasn’t much of an excuse to be a bad friend. He’d have to make things up to the man next week.

Amelia nodded but otherwise only gave him a shooing motion in response, as if to say he should get moving.

She wasn’t wrong. After a brief goodbye, Kevin sprinted off toward his dorm.

As always, the process of breaking through was rather unpleasant. Previous experiences did little to help with that, and this time felt worse than the others, in any case. The quantity of expelled gunk was larger as well, suggesting it wasn’t just in his mind.

Perhaps it was because the fifth breakthrough was the mid-point of the first stage? He was now more than halfway through, with four more grades until he’d reached the peak of this stage.

Then he’d be only a single major breakthrough away from the second. The very idea was intoxicating. These minor breakthroughs gave significant improvements on their own; how much better would a full stage breakthrough be?

Kevin could hardly wait, but for now, he had to content himself with feeling out the boost he’d just received. By the time he’d cleaned up, it was nearing the time when he usually had dinner, but he was far too excited for that.

Food could wait; now was the time for practice.

Gathering his gear, Kevin hurried off to the Formation courtyard. Making the best of the fading light, he put his improved abilities to the test. For his first few lobs, the changes actually threw him off; after that, they began to pay off.

Each grade breakthrough gave him a slight increase in physical and mental abilites across the board. When it came to something as complicated as flag lobbing, those little improvements multiplied to become far more significant.

Before long, the number of outright misses plummeted, and shots that would have once been ‘good enough’ were now closer to perfect. It was a matter of inches, yet such a change would significantly reduce imperfections in the formation matrix.

Even Kevin’s night visions had improved a little, allowing him to continue throwing later into the evening. All around, it was a solid step forward from where he was yesterday, and all without practicing a single lob.

It went to show just how important advancement was to everything a cultivator did. Given how far ahead of him the other students in FORM-115 were, it said a lot that he was doing as well as he was.

If anything, he should have been doing a lot worse. It was a discrepancy he’d been wondering about until his conversation with Amelia earlier that day.

Quite simply, it came down to time and the number of things a person had already learned. Unless you had a special advantage, like Amelia’s Living Time Constitution, your skills degraded unless you practiced them.

That meant you needed to do upkeep training for anything you wanted to remain proficient at. As busy as Kevin was, all of it was learning new skills. Whereas he could focus on the lessons this season, the more advanced disciples had to balance everything they learned with their existing training.

When he thought about it that way, it seemed likely that he was practicing his lobbing technique more than anyone else in the class. It would explain how he continued improving faster than most of them, despite the gap in physical ability.

If he kept that up while also closing the gap a little, he might have a real chance of winning the mid-season lobbing competition. That was a worthy goal, and it didn’t hurt that it was justification for spending more time on cultivation.

It was a good thing he had that extra time from the Twisted Script style.