Ryker woke before dawn with a plan that made perfect sense in the pre-coffee darkness of his room.
His meridians still carried a strange warmth from yesterday's marketplace disaster. It also proved absolutely nothing, because there was no way in hell Ryker was accepting that his entire cultivation future depended on complimenting pretty boys.
He'd consumed over five hundred web novels during his previous life. Stayed up until 3 AM on work nights, phone screen burning his retinas as he binged cultivation stories instead of sleeping like a functional adult. Those protagonists had taught him the real formula: willpower plus unconventional training and cold calculations equals legendary breakthrough.
Zyx's method was too unconventional. Too weird. Too likely to destroy what remained of his dignity.
There had to be normal alternatives.
The beetle materialized on his pillow as Ryker yanked on some clothes, its shell catching the faint pre-dawn light filtering through his window. "You're planning something stupid."
"I'm planning something that doesn't involve social humiliation." Ryker tied his hair back with a leather cord, checking his reflection in the small mirror by his washbasin. A determined expression. Focused. "Physical cultivation. Body refinement. The foundation every cultivator needs."
"The novels lied to you."
"The principle is sound." He grabbed a water flask from his desk, already heading for the door. "A weak body, weak cultivation. A strong body, strong cultivation. Basic logic."
Zyx's antennae drooped. "This is going to hurt you more than it hurts me. I'll watch."
"You do that."
The Ashford family training courtyard sprawled empty in the pre-dawn darkness, stone tiles still slick with morning dew. Training equipment lined the perimeter—wooden striking posts that had survived generations of Ashford fists, spirit stone weights carved with formation arrays, weapon racks displaying practice swords that hummed with faint enchantments.
Ryker had fragmented memories of training here as a child, back when Father still believed his youngest son might amount to something. Before the meridian blockage. Before "trash potential" became his primary identifier.
He dropped into a horse stance in the courtyard's center, his thighs immediately screaming protest.
The novels made this look elegant—protagonists holding perfect stances for hours, sweat glistening artistically as they forged iron wills and diamond bodies. Ryker's legs started shaking at the thirty-second mark.
"Beautiful," Zyx commented from its perch atop a training post. "Truly the bearing of legends. Your knees are wobbling like a newborn deer."
"Shut. Up." Ryker forced the words through gritted teeth, sweat already beading on his forehead despite the cool morning air. One minute. His thighs burned. Two minutes. The burning upgraded to active pain. Three minutes and his legs gave out completely, dumping him onto cold stone.
"Impressive stamina," the beetle said. "I've seen toddlers last longer."
Ryker pushed himself up, ignoring the sarcasm and the way his legs trembled. Physical weakness was expected—this body had neglected training for years while wallowing in cultivation failure. But muscles could be rebuilt through repetition and determination. That's what all the training montages promised.
He moved to the striking post, centering his breathing like the inherited memories suggested. Exhale. Focus. Channel intent into the strike.
His fist connected with wood.
Pain exploded through his knuckles, sharp and completely disproportionate to the damage inflicted. The post didn't even quiver. Ryker's hand, meanwhile, decided to inform him that he was a little bitch.
"Your form is awful," Zyx announced. "Everything from shoulder alignment to hip rotation is wrong. That wasn't a punch, that was flailing."
"Then teach me proper form."
"Why? This is hilarious."
Ryker cradled his reddening knuckles, his mind finally catching up to reality. The inherited memories provided theoretical knowledge—the shape a proper punch should take, the way force should transfer through the body. But knowing and doing lived in completely different neighborhoods. His soul carried twenty-six years of mundane life and zero combat experience. Muscle memory didn't just transfer with reincarnation.
He stared at his hand, watching the knuckles swell slightly. True protagonists adapted instantly to new bodies, instincts somehow included with the meat suit. Reality was proving substantially less convenient.
"Different approach." He moved to the meditation corner, settling onto a worn cushion that generations of Ashford cultivators had used for breakthrough attempts. "Qi circulation. The foundation of all cultivation."
"You tried this yesterday. You know, before you discovered I existed by coughing me onto your expensive sheets."
"I didn't know how to access my dantian properly yesterday. Now I do." Ryker closed his eyes, breathing deep. Four counts in, hold two, six counts out. The technique Zyx taught him, at least, seemed universal. Consciousness drifted inward, finding that warmth below his navel more easily than before.
His dantian materialized in his mind's eye—still murky, choked with spiritual debris, but less stagnant after yesterday's accidental breakthrough. Ryker gathered what little qi he could sense, trying to move it through his meridians
The qi moved forward maybe half an inch before hitting a blockage and stopping cold.
He pushed harder. The energy scattered like smoke, and sharp pain lanced through his chest hard enough to steal his breath.
Ryker's eyes flew open, hand clutching his ribs, gasping.
"And that's what happens when you force qi through calcified channels," Zyx said, far too calm for someone watching their host nearly rupture a meridian. "Like trying to pump water through solid concrete. Keep that up and you'll cripple yourself worse than you already are."
"Then—" Ryker bit off the question because he knew the answer. Emotional something something. Breaking categories. Rizz up femboys. The method he was actively trying to avoid through sheer stubborn denial.
"There has to be another way," he muttered.
The sky lightened from black to deep purple as Ryker systematically tried every technique his mental encyclopedia of cultivation novels had absorbed. Breathing exercises from a dozen different systems—all failed at the same meridian blockages. Attempting to sense and absorb ambient qi from the environment—couldn't even perceive it properly. Trying to force a breakthrough through willpower alone—nearly knocked himself unconscious from the backlash.
By the time actual dawn arrived, painting the courtyard in shades of gold and pink, Ryker sat exhausted in the center of the training ground. Every orthodox method had accomplished exactly nothing except proving his meridian damage was worse than just "trash tier."
It was comprehensively fucked.
"Finished experimenting?" Zyx asked.
"There has to be—"
"There isn't." The beetle scuttled down from its perch to his knee, shell shifting to a more serious purple. "I've trained forty-seven legends across six eras. Some had meridian damage that made yours look like a paper cut. You know what separated the ones who succeeded from the ones who died forgotten?"
Ryker waited.
"They stopped trying to force themself down paths that their bodies rejected. Your meridians are calcified from twenty-six years of rigid thinking—neat little boxes, You want to break through? Start breaking those boxes."
"By flirting with boys?."
"By genuine connection that transcends your comfort zone." Zyx's antennae twitched. "The merchant worked because you actually meant the compliment. Saw him as a person, not a category. Your meridians felt that openness and responded. That's not flirting—that's cultivation. Believe it or not, your soul is much stronger than any i have seen, reincarnation bulshit, but your mind is the cog"
The logic tracked, infuriating as it was. Ryker's analytical mind recognized sound reasoning even when it cornered him into uncomfortable territories.
"Young Master Ryker!" A voice called from the courtyard entrance, dripping with false politeness. "Still attempting to cultivate? How... inspiring."
Ryker looked up to find Wei Jian standing in the archway, flanked by two other young men in expensive robes that screamed minor nobility with major superiority complexes. Wei Jian served as some kind of spokesman for his family's interests at the Academy—handsome in that classical jade-prince way, with the smug confidence with ignorance, someone who'd never experienced real failure.
He also happened to be the person who'd spent three years reminding Ryker that trash stays trash.
"Wei Jian." Ryker stood, brushing dust and sweat from his robes. "Can I help you with something, or are you just passing through to exercise your foul mouth?"
Wei Jian's smile didn't waver, but his eyes flashed. "I heard you had a breakthrough yesterday. How exciting! What rank are you now? Still stuck at Foundation Establishment Rank One after all these years?"
The mockery wasn't even subtle. Foundation Establishment was respectable for most cultivators, but Ryker had been stuck at Rank One for three years while everyone else his age pushed into higher ranks.
"Qi Condensation Rank Three," Ryker said flatly.
The smile on Wei Jian's face widened into something genuinely delighted. "Qi Condensation? My goodness, such remarkable progress! I remember being that rank when I was..." He paused, pretending to think. "Twelve years old? Yes, definitely twelve."
One of his companions snickered on cue. "I reached Foundation Establishment at fourteen. Wasn't that when most of our generation did?"
"Indeed." Wei Jian's attention returned to Ryker with false sympathy that felt like nails on a chalkboard. "But everyone advances at their own pace, don't they? Some people are naturally talented, while others..." A vague gesture at the training equipment Ryker had failed to use properly all morning. "Well, at least you're trying. That's admirable in its own way."
Zyx's voice whispered through their bond, quiet enough that only Ryker heard. "I could teach you a technique right now that would let you break his jaw. Just say the word."
Ryker kept his face neutral. "Not interested in violence."
"Who said anything about violence? I'm suggesting a aggressive dental rearrangement. Totally different."
Wei Jian continued his performance, clearly enjoying his captive audience. "The Royal Academy trials start in twelve days, don't they? Are they even letting you enter? I do hope you're adequately prepared. Would hate to see the Ashford family name embarrassed again. Your father works so hard to maintain respectability despite... well." Another pointed look at Ryker. "Recent setbacks."
Something cold settled in Ryker's chest. Not anger—that was emotion, and emotions led to mistakes according to every black haired guy. But calculation. Assessment. Wei Jian represented everything the cultivation world rewarded: natural talent, family backing, the effortless advancement that marked destined heroes.
Ryker represented the opposite. The trash character. The crippled meridian case study. The person who existed in stories solely to be stepped on by the real protagonist.
Except he'd read five hundred of those stories. He knew exactly how they ended.
The trash who accepted their limitations stayed trash forever. The ones who transcended—through unorthodox methods, unconventional thinking, by breaking every rule the orthodox world followed blindly—those became the legends that made people like Wei Jian irrelevant.
"Twelve days," Ryker said, meeting Wei Jian's eyes with what he hoped looked like cold confidence instead of exhausted desperation. "Should be interesting."
"Interesting? For who? You'll fail spectacularly." Wei Jian laughed, his companions joining with practiced synchronization. "You can barely circulate qi. The Academy trials will eat you alive and spit out the bones."
They left still laughing, voices echoing across the courtyard long after they disappeared through the archway.
Ryker stood in silence, fists clenched hard enough that his swollen knuckles screamed protest.
"So," Zyx said eventually, materializing full-size on his shoulder. "Still planning to avoid my method? Don't go on some demonic shit kid, join the dark side"
"Your method is humiliating."
"You haven't seen the power of the dark side!." The beetle's shell pulsed red. "You're trying to bash through a brick wall with your forehead when there's a perfectly functional door three feet to your left. Yes, walking through that door means doing things that make you uncomfortable. Yes, it means your reputation gets weird. But the alternative is confirming every insult Wei Jian just threw at you."
Ryker took a slow breath. Four in, hold two, six out. The breathing technique did nothing for his qi but helped organize the chaos in his head.
"The merchant," he said finally. "Lian. I need to go back to the marketplace."
"Music to my antennae."
"I need money first. To buy cultivation pills. As a legitimate reason for the visit that has nothing to do with your perverted agenda."
"Keep telling yourself that." Zyx sounded far too pleased.
Ryker ignored that, mind already calculating. Father controlled the family funds, but Mother had her own allowance that she might loan him if he asked. Or he could try gathering spirit herbs in the forest—dangerous, but they sold for decent silver.
Actually, the forest option had merit. Right now, he needed experience, survival, gathering resources, potential cultivation opportunities from ambient mana, and it got him away from the estate where Father might ask uncomfortable questions.
"The forest outside town has a Moonpetal Lotus," Zyx said, reading his thoughts. "A valuable herb that grows near pure water sources. Also happens to be where a certain elf practices sword n the early morning."
Ryker's eye twitched. "No."
"I'm merely providing tactical information. What you do with it is your choice."
"The information suspiciously supports your agenda."
"Reality often supports good ideas. Not my fault you're fighting the obvious solution." The beetle's shell flashed smug magenta. "But fine. Go to the forest alone. Gather herbs. Completely coincidentally run into the beautiful elf who's probably more than half-yin energy given that physique. When your meridians have another breakthrough from casual conversation, you can keep pretending it's coincidence."
Ryker wanted to argue. Wanted to find a logical flaw in Zyx's reasoning. But his analytical mind was backing the beetle's logic even as his pride screamed in protest.
Anyways how did the beatle even know these damn things.
Twelve days until Academy trials. He wanted Wei Jian's smugness choke on itself. Even if "whatever it took" involved befriending people who made Zyx's shell pulse colors that should probably be illegal.
"I'm going to the forest," Ryker said. "To gather herbs. For money"
"Of course. Very pragmatic."
"If there happens to be another person training there, I'll be polite. Professional courtesy between fellow cultivators."
"Naturally."
"This has nothing to do with your agenda"
"Whatever helps you sleep at night." Zyx sounded like it was trying very hard not to laugh.
Ryker headed for the estate armory to requisition a practice sword. If he was going into the forest, he'd at least pretend to be prepared for a spirit beasts, even if his combat skills remained entirely theoretical.
The morning sun climbed higher, painting the courtyard tiles gold. Somewhere in the distance, the Academy bell chimed the hour.
Twelve days.
The countdown had begun, and Ryker's dignity was already losing.