To Thomas's detective mind, it was sickening. It reminded him of the propaganda used by the most brutal regimes in Earth's history—regimes that burned books and erased people to maintain the illusion of a utopia.
"It's a tyranny of the spirit," he whispered, shoving a particularly flowery scroll back onto the shelf.
He pivoted his focus toward the theoretical manuals of Qi practice. These were far more useful. They spoke of Qi as a universal constant—an energy present in the air, the soil, and even in dead matter. The strength of a superhero wasn't just about the power they were born with, but their ability to "harvest" this energy from their environment.
The scrolls detailed complex networks of internal channels—what Thomas recognised as meridians—and storage centres similar to the dantian of Eastern mythology.
