Chapter 62: Just Beat Respect Out Of Them
On this particular day, the climb had been harsher than usual. The sun, dulled slightly by the thick aetheric mist around the peaks, offered no relief. And now, per Cassian’s command, they carried half their body weight.
Even for Oliver, it was brutal. His muscles ached from the strain, his breathing ragged as he clambered up steep slopes and clung to jagged ledges with vines dug into his palms.
Yet through it all, his lips had no choice but to move with discipline, quietly reciting the Imperial Slave Value System, syllable by syllable, breath by breath.
But his mind wasn’t on the words.
His thoughts churned elsewhere.
The one-inch punch.
This fighting skill had tugged terribly at his heart. It was the reason he had not moved forward in cultivating the Bottomless-Bellied Desert Bloody Scorpions for more power.
He had replayed every moment from his last match against the Monk. Each strike. Each counter. Each time he felt that indescribable pull in his muscles—that slight quiver of power, that nearly-there sensation like something was on the brink of snapping into place. He knew it was close. So close.
But… something was missing. Something subtle. A breath? A pause? A rhythm? He couldn’t yet name it. But he was close enough to taste it.
When he reached the summit ahead of the others—again—he didn’t leap into the Night Trial immediately as he usually did. The slave sigil in his hand blinked, acknowledging completion. The potion and the bowl of rice came as always, offered by one of the waiting slaves under Roderick’s instruction. But today, Oliver took it without ceremony and walked to his usual corner in the warehouse—his strange little sanctuary.
He sat cross-legged. His fingers clenched, flexed. His eyes closed.
Comprehend. Focus. Feel.