The North Field was a cemetery for forgotten ambitions. Rusted training dummies stood like skeletal sentries in the tall, yellowed grass, and the air here lacked the artificial mana-enrichment of the central campus. To Ria and Kael, it was a place of exile. To me, it was a blank canvas.
"The first thing you must understand..," I said, standing before them with my hands tucked into the pockets of my royal white trousers,
"...Is that the academy's ranking system is based on volume. They measure how much mana you can shove into a technique. But volume is useless without frequency."
I sat cross-legged on the damp earth. Despite the refreshing bath earlier, I could still feel the phantom strain in my thighs from the morning's run. My body was a project under construction, and every movement felt like it was being logged by a celestial architect.
"Close your eyes," I commanded.
"We are going to attempt the breathing without excerting too much force. Most mages breathe with their chest; shallow, panicked, wasteful. I want you to breathe from the zero-point, three inches below your navel."
"What? How?!" Ria exclaimed with surprise and curiosity.
"Don't pull the mana," I whispered, my voice dropping into a rhythmic drone.
"Invite it. Your heartbeat is a drum. Sync the rhythm of your lungs to the pulse of the earth beneath you. If you fight the atmosphere, it will crush you. If you resonate with it, it will carry you."
For nearly an hour, the only sound was the wind whistling through the rusted dummies and the steady, synchronized breathing of we trios. I watched them with my true sight which was an extra skill I got the day before.
Kael's black smoke-like mana began to swirl in a tight, controlled orbit rather than leaking aimlessly. Ria's metal arm stopped sparking, the internal gears finally settling into a hum.
They were learning. Slowly, the defects were beginning to find their own frequency.
The peace was shattered by the rhythmic thud of heavy combat boots on gravel.
"Well, well, well. Look at this pathetic sight."
I didn't open my eyes, but I felt the shift in the air which was a clumsy, aggressive heat.
Four students marched onto the field. They were putting on the red uniforms of the tier-4 silver ranks. Each of them had two stars pinned to their collars, and they carried themselves with the inflated ego of middle-management bullies.
The leader was a boy with a buzzed haircut and a jagged scar across his eyebrow. His name was Jax, a Tier-4 fire-elemental who was known for being Marcus Cinandra's errand boy.
"The north field is off-limits to some E-ranks trash today, Jax sneered, his hand igniting with a flickering, unrefined orange flame.
"We need this space for long-range projectile practice. Move, before I accidentally use your head as a target."
Ria's eyes snapped open, her metal hand clenching into a fist.
"The field was empty when we got here, Jax. Go find a corner in the Martial Pavilion." Ria said with an annoyed tone.
"Hah...hahahahaha!" Jax laughed, a dry, grating sound.
"The Pavilion is for people who actually have a future. This field is for scrap. And since you're already here, maybe we can see how much heat that metal arm of yours can take."
I stood up slowly, my joints popping. I could feel the nebula heart pulsing in my chest, a sun trapped in a cage of ribs. I wished to unleash a wave of gravity that would pin them to the dirt, but I haven't gotten to that level yet as I still have a long way to go to meet up with the system's requirements for high-teir channeling.
"Ria, Kael, stay seated," I said softly.
"But sir--" Kael started, but was interrupted by me.
"Sir?" I smiled while closing my eyes before opening my mouth again to talk.
"With the fact that I am teaching you guys some basics to get stronger doesn't make me your master Kael and Ria. For I myself is imperfect. So do not get the wrong idea. We're all helping each other get stronger."
"This is part of the lesson," I interrupted. I stepped forward, the silver chains on my uniform clinking like a funeral bell. I stood opposite Jax, my expression as calm as a frozen lake.
"You..." I slowly said while raising my chin upward.
"...You have ten seconds to turn around. Unless you do that, your bones might remain intact."
Jax growled, his ego bruised by my lack of fear. "Huh! You think that your royal silk makes you a noble? You're a tier-1 nobody!"
He lunged. It was a classic mistake putting all his weight into a single, flaming right hook. It was powerful, yes, but it was linear.
I didn't block. Blocking required force, and force required my fragile muscles to work. Instead, I used Statistic redirection. As his fist came, I stepped into his blind spot and simply guided him sending him spinning in the air.
I caught his wrist with a touch as light as a feather. I didn't pull, but simply added a fraction of a degree to his own rotation.
"Wha--?" Jax gasped as his own momentum turned against him.
He didn't just miss, he spun. I applied a two-finger pressure to the nerve cluster behind his ear--a zero-point compression. His nervous system misfired, and his legs turned to jelly. Jax slammed into the dirt face-first, his flame extinguishing with a pathetic hiss.
"Jax!" his three cronies shouted, charging simultaneously.
They were all uncoordinated. One tried a low kick, two tried to grab my arms. I moved like a ghost through a graveyard. I wasn't faster than them in a raw sprint, but my economy of motion was perfect. Every step I took was the minimum required to avoid their strikes.
A palm to a solar plexus here. A slight trip-up there. A redirection of an elbow into another's ribs. Within thirty seconds, all four tier-4s were groveling on the grass, clutching their stomachs and gasping for the air I had expertly knocked out of them.
I stood in the center of the clearing, my face expressionless and my white uniform was spotless, not a single speck of dust on the royal silk. To Ria and Kael, I looked invincible. But internally, I was a wreck.
A sharp, metallic taste rose in my throat. I wiped my lip, and my hand came away stained with a thin streak of crimson. My nose was bleeding. The effort of moving that precisely, even without mana, had put a tremendous strain on my unconditioned vascular system.
[WARNING: physical vessel is experiencing micro-tears.]
[Current Integrity: 36%]
[Due to host weak bodybuild,the increase of the daily grind starts as from tomorrow]
"Damnit, Kill me now" I muttered bitterly under my breath. The System was a cruel taskmaster, it didn't care about my pain, only my potential.
Wow Oliver you're amazing never knew you could fight like that--" Ria said while pausing.
"You're bleeding!" Ria cried out, standing up in alarm.
"It's nothing," I lied, my voice steady. I turned back to the groaning tier-4s.
"Go back to Marcus. Tell him the north field belongs to the me now. If he wants it back, he can come himself."
They managed to scrambled to their feet and fled, leaving a trail of dust behind them.
Force is a tool for the weak. Skill is the weapon of the strong. My mind knew the move, but my body suffered for it. If I wanted to burn the tiers down, I have to rebuild my body until they are as strong as my will.
I turned to Ria and Kael, ignoring the throbbing in my head and sat back down, my legs trembling slightly.
"Now... back to the breathing." I said.
...
Two months passef since I started teaching them the breathing technique. The duos improved gradually and at the same time, my daily grind was also increased by the system, giving me trainings that were more weightier than the previous ones. I trained my body till I surpassed my previous weak self. My new body felt incredible. It felt lighter, athletic, and dense with functional power. My deep black hair fell over my eyes which glowed with a sharper, more lethal amber light. I had surpassed my previous weak self entirely. As time pass, Kael and Ria have improved a lot. My efforts had paid off. They could breathe in mana without breaking a sweat.
[QUEST IMPROVEMENT: 45%]
[Both students have broken through to Teir-4 Silver rank status]
"That's some progress". I muttered to myself.
"Alright, now that you guys have mastered Zero-point breathing, we'll move on to the next step." I grinned darkly as I said that.