157. Long Days
Chapter 157: Long Days
The silence after Freya left was a physical thing. It had weight and texture, thick with splinters and unspoken threats. I righted the single wooden chair that had been knocked over in her explosive entrance and sat by the small, high window of Room 2B, staring out at the patch of Torak sky visible between the mismatched rooftops.
The Mission 4 title glowed in my mind’s eye, a persistent, ominous header: THE IMPERIAL ENVOY. No details. No objectives. Just a name and a countdown to a confrontation I didn’t want and couldn’t avoid.
My body, however, hummed with a different reality. The integrated energy of the Philosopher’s Stone wasn’t a separate presence; it was a fundamental increase in my baseline. My Ki reserves weren’t just refilled; they were deepened, like a well that had tapped into a subterranean ocean. The power was there, warm, steady, and immense. But after the chaos of Fort Defal and the emotional grenade of Freya’s visit, it felt… unrefined. Like I’d been given a library’s worth of books but hadn’t learned to read the language.
I needed to practice. Not just for the coming storm, but to understand what I now was.
A knock came at the ruined doorway. Erik stood there, holding a tray with a bowl of steaming stew, a hunk of bread, and a small ceramic cup of sake. His expression was unreadable.
“Figured you might be hungry,” he squeaked, his eyes flicking to the shattered door frame. “And in need of a drink that doesn’t come with shouting.”
“Thanks,” I said, taking the tray. He made no move to leave, just stood there, a tall, silent monument to unasked questions.
“She calmed down?” I asked, nodding down the hall.
“Calmed is a strong word,” Erik said. “She stopped breaking my property. That’s a start. She left for the estate. The air around her could have frozen a lesser man.” He paused. “Told me what you said. About the energy. That it’s… part of you now.”
“It’s the truth.”
“Truths come in different weights,” he said cryptically. “Some are light as feathers. Some sink ships. Be certain which one you’re carrying.” He gave me a long look, then turned. “I’ll have a new door hung by nightfall. Try not to attract any more wrathful knights before then. Or if you do, direct them to the common room. The tables there have seen worse.”
He left, his footsteps eerily silent on the hall runner.
I ate the stew, a rich, hearty venison broth and sipped the sake. The alcohol was a clean, sharp heat, a minor distraction from the turmoil in my head. As I finished, the late afternoon light, what passed for it in this world, began to slant through the window. I checked my internal, System-adjacent sense of time. Still early. The days here were long, thirty-two hours from dawn to dawn. It was a rhythm I was still adapting to; the extended twilight, the longer stretches of night. It meant more time to train, but also more time to dwell.
I cleared a space in the center of the room, moving the small table and chair against the wall. I sat on the threadbare carpet, cross-legged, my back straight. I closed my eyes.
The first step was always the easiest: turning my awareness inward. After the Stone’s integration, it was like stepping into a cathedral I’d only ever glimpsed through a keyhole. Before, my Ki had felt like a stream, a river. Now, it was a vast, placid lake of potential energy, deep and still. At its center, where my core resided, there was no foreign sun, no separate artifact. There was only a more intense concentration of me, a denser, brighter nexus of my own life force.
Breathing slowly, I began the basic circulation exercise I’d developed through brutal trial and error. I imagined drawing a thread of energy up from the base of my spine, following the path of my central nervous system. The sensation was immediate and effortless. The Ki responded not as something I commanded, but as something that was an extension of my will, like moving a limb. The energy flowed smooth as mercury, warm as blood.
I guided it up through my torso, feeling a corresponding warmth bloom in my chest. No resistance. No strain. It was shockingly easy. The increased reserves meant the energy didn’t feel thin or strained; it was a substantial, powerful current. I split the thread, sending tendrils down my arms to my fingertips. A pleasant, pins-and-needs sensation followed the flow, and I flexed my fingers, half-expecting to see sparks. None came, but I could feel the potential there, like a charged battery.
This was internal manipulation. This was Ki as an enhancement, a fuel. I’d done this in battle, pushing it to my legs for speed, to my arms for strength, hardening my skin for defense. It was crude, instinctive. Now, with focus, I could feel the nuances. I could make the flow in my right arm faster, hotter, while keeping the left cool and steady. I could pool energy in my abdomen, creating a reservoir of power for a sudden explosive movement.
For what felt like an hour, I simply played, exploring the new capacity. I ran the energy in complex loops, spun it into tight coils at my joints, let it diffuse through my entire body in a gentle, strengthening wave. It was… fun. It was mastery on a level I’d never known. The Stone’s gift wasn’t just more power; it was fine control over the power I already had. My Survival Probability of 68.4% suddenly made more sense. With this level of internal command, I was far more resilient, far more adaptable.
But internal manipulation was only half the promise of Ki. In the stories, the true masters didn’t just enhance themselves; they projected their will onto the world. They flew. They fired beams of energy. They created barriers.
I opened my eyes. The room was dimmer, the light through the window a deeper gold. Thirty-two hour days. I’d been meditating for maybe three hours, and it felt like a long afternoon.
My gaze fell on the small ceramic cup of sake, empty now, sitting on the floor beside the tray.
A simple object. Unbroken. Inert.
I focused on it.
The concept was straightforward: extend my Ki beyond the boundary of my skin, wrap it around the cup, and lift it.
I inhaled, centered myself, and reached out with my senses, trying to project my will. I visualized a hand of golden energy, delicate and precise, closing around the smooth ceramic.
Nothing.
The cup sat there, indifferent.
I frowned, deepening my focus. I pushed a thread of Ki from my core, down my arm, and out through my fingertips. I could feel the energy gathering there, a warmth pulsing in my hand. I willed it to extend.
A faint, shimmering distortion appeared in the air just above my fingertips, like heat haze. It lasted for two seconds before dissipating.
Okay. Harder than it looks.
I tried again. This time, I didn’t just push the energy; I tried to shape it, to give it intent. I pictured a thin tendril, like a vine, snaking out from my finger towards the cup. The effort was immense, a mental strain completely absent from internal circulation. It was like trying to write with my non-dominant hand while solving complex algebra in my head. My brow furrowed with the concentration.
A wisp of golden light, faint as a dying ember, flickered from my index finger. It stretched maybe an inch before sputtering out.
A drop of sweat traced a path down my temple. The internal ease was gone, replaced by a grinding, unfamiliar difficulty. This wasn’t about capacity; it was about control on a microscopic level, about violating the instinctual boundary of the self.
I switched tactics. Instead of a tendril, I imagined a field, a bubble of Ki emanating from my palm, enveloping the cup. The mental image was clear, but the execution was like trying to inflate a balloon with smoke. I poured more energy into the attempt, and the heat in my palm intensified, but the field wouldn’t form. The energy just radiated out and dissipated uselessly into the air, warming it slightly.
Frustration bubbled up. I had the power of a legendary artifact fused to my soul, and I couldn’t lift a damn cup.
I took a break, leaning back and breathing heavily. The difference was staggering. Inside my body, Ki was an obedient fluid, part of my biology. Outside, it was like trying to grip water. There was nothing for it to hold onto, no pathways to guide it. It wanted to return to the source, to bleed away into the environment.
Maybe I’m thinking about it wrong,* I thought. *It’s not a hand. It’s not a field. It’s an extension of my will. A command.
I closed my eyes again, trying to shut out the physical world. I didn’t visualize energy leaving my body. Instead, I focused on the cup itself. I imagined it as part of my domain, an extension of my self. I imagined the space between my hand and the cup as not empty air, but as my space, filled with my influence.
Slowly, carefully, I pushed that feeling outward. Not as a projection of power, but as an assertion of reality.
My Ki responded differently this time. It didn’t try to form a shape. It simply… thickened the air. I could feel a zone of influence extending from my palm, a sphere of heightened energy where my will was law. It was incredibly small, no larger than a grapefruit, and maintaining it was like holding a muscle flexed to its absolute limit. My entire arm began to tremble with the strain.
But within that tiny sphere, I could feel the cup. I could feel its contours, its weight, its cool ceramic surface.
Now, lift.
I poured the command into the sphere, the mental equivalent of a grunt of effort.
The cup twitched.
It was barely a movement, a slight rock on its base. But it was undeniable.
Elation surged, followed instantly by catastrophic loss of focus. The sphere collapsed. The cup settled back with a soft clink.
I was drenched in sweat, my head pounding, my channels feeling oddly empty despite the vast reserves. The mental and spiritual exertion was ten times that of running Ki through my body for an hour. It was exhausting in a way physical combat never was.
But I’d moved it. From a foot away, with nothing but my will and my energy, I’d made an object in the world obey.
I looked at my trembling hand, then at the innocent sake cup. A fierce, tired grin spread across my face. This was the real work. This was the path to being more than just a guy who hit things really hard. This was the beginning of true power.
The System hadn’t given me a skill called “Telekinesis.” It had given me the raw materials and the necessity to figure it out. Mission 4 was coming. The Envoy was coming. They would have magic, technology, armies.
I had this. A deep well of power and a stubborn will to learn how to use it.
The light outside was fading into the long, deep twilight of this world. I had hours before true night. I wiped the sweat from my brow, centered myself again, and turned my focus back to the cup.
It was just a cup. And tonight, I was going to make it fly.