The three clay jars of foul pill slag stayed buried behind the eastern training dummy. Digging up First Brother’s contraband required bending over with a spade, and Kaelen had two full days of uninterrupted rest to prioritize while silence held across the keep.
By the afternoon of the second day, he had found the quietest place on the estate.
He sat on a flat, mossy boulder beside the manor’s lower drainage pond. The murky water was coated with pale green duckweed, broken only by the occasional ripple of a mud carp.
A tall willow tree hung overhead, casting a cool canopy of shade across his shoulders.
In his hands, Kaelen held a six-foot bamboo pole. A length of unbleached hemp string trailed from the tip into the stagnant green water.
Tied to the end of the line was a straight brass sewing pin.
There was no hook. There was no barb. There was not even a speck of dough or an earthworm to tempt a passing fish.
The pin hung three inches beneath the surface, catching the amber light of the autumn sun.
Kaelen leaned his back against the rough trunk of the willow. He tipped his broad straw hat low over his eyes, keeping only the tip of the bamboo pole in view.
[The Fallow Slate] [Current Abstinence: 56 Hours, 40 Minutes] [Current State: True Fallow State] [Current Multiplier: 57x (Stage 1: Mortal Tally)] [Next Milestone: 57 Hours (58x Ready)]
The carp in this drainage ditch are the wisest creatures in the barony, Kaelen thought, feeling the gentle breeze rustle his sleeves. They know there’s no bait on my pin, and I have no desire to disturb their nap. We have achieved complete mutual understanding.
Sera Thorne leaned against the stone embankment in the shade of the willow, her eyes scanning the orchard trail.
“Master Kaelen,” Sera said in a low tone. “You’ve been staring at that straight pin for six hours.”
“Observation is the highest form of rest,” Kaelen answered smoothly. “Water that stays still gathers no silt.”
“Water that stays still also breeds mosquitoes,” Sera remarked.
“Mosquitoes avoid bitter-grass smoke,” Kaelen said. “And Barnaby has been burning bitter-grass in the drying furnace since noon.”
As if summoned by his name, a loud, raspy bellow echoed down the rocky footpath.
Barnaby Holt strode through the willow branches, waving a heavy iron practice sword like a walking cane. His single eye burned with exasperation.
Right behind him came Mina Vance, holding a bundle of freshly gathered ginger roots against her wool tunic. Her small face was pinched with distress.
“I knew it!” Barnaby roared, planting the tip of the iron blade into the soft mud. “Nearly two whole days! Forty-six hours since the stele session, and where is the clan’s third son? Sitting in a bog like an overgrown toad!”
Mina rushed to the edge of the boulder, her eyes wide with worry.
“Brother, please,” Mina pleaded softly. “Uncle Garrick posted the official tournament rosters on the great gate this morning. The qualifiers begin in three weeks. Every junior in the valley is drilling from dawn to midnight.”
Kaelen shifted his grip on the bamboo pole by half an inch.
“Mina, shouting near water disturbs the surface tension,” Kaelen said gently. “It ruins the reflection of the clouds.”
“To the void with the clouds!” Barnaby barked, throwing his hands into the air. “Cassian is swinging fifty-pound stone locks in the upper yard! His arms are the size of smoked hams! Garrick has hired two mercenary instructors from Red-River to drill his squad in shield formations!”
Barnaby leaned over the water, glaring at the straight brass pin.
“And what are you doing?” Barnaby demanded, his voice cracking. “You tied a tailor’s pin to a piece of string! There’s no hook! Even a blind carp won’t bite a straight needle!”
Kaelen sighed quietly, lifting the brim of his straw hat with one finger.
“Old Barnaby, you lack clinical perspective,” Kaelen said in a patient, deadpan voice. “Putting a barbed hook on the line induces extreme cardiac distress in the local fish population.”
Barnaby blinked in disbelief. “Cardiac distress? In a mud carp?”
“Precisely,” Kaelen continued smoothly. “Agitated carp release discordant water-qi into the pond. That disturbed resonance clashes directly with my wood-element liver meridian.”
Barnaby’s face flushed a deep, dangerous crimson. His gray beard twitched violently.
“Discordant water-qi from stressed carp?” Barnaby sputtered, tapping his temple with his wooden ladle. “Are you listening to yourself? It is a puddle of drainage runoff! The only thing in here is pond scum and old cabbage stalks!”
“Pond scum possesses great medicinal cooling properties,” Kaelen replied without blinking. “A cool liver promotes harmonious circulation. An agitated liver leads to high blood pressure. Do you want me to develop apoplexy before thirty?”
Mina stepped closer, tugging at Kaelen’s sleeve with cold fingers.
“Brother, be serious,” Mina whispered, tears threatening her lashes. “Father told the elders that if you forfeit your first match, he will strike your name from the clan ledger. Madam Evelyn is already preparing the paperwork to assign you to the iron quarries.”
Kaelen looked down at his sister’s worried face. The tight knot of anxiety in her shoulders reminded him why he stayed in this drafty barony.
Manual labor in the iron quarries involves ten hours of pickaxe swinging, Kaelen thought. Dust in the throat, no tea, and constant sweat. That would ruin my tally permanently. Therefore, I will simply have to resolve the tournament in thirty seconds flat.
“Mina,” Kaelen said softly, reaching out to pat her head. “Do you trust me?”
Mina sniffled, looking into his clear, calm eyes. “I do, but...”
“Then trust that I have a very thorough training regimen,” Kaelen said. “It simply requires very little movement. Go help Barnaby brew your warming broth. The evening air is turning chilly.”
Barnaby groaned, throwing his hands toward the sky.
“The boy has lost his wits,” Barnaby muttered, dragging his iron sword behind him. “Completely lost them. I’m going to sharpen my cleaver. If I have to carry him into the arena on a handcart, I’ll do it myself.”
Barnaby grabbed Mina’s hand and led her back up the path toward the Third Herb Shed, while Kaelen refused to budge an inch from his mossy boulder.
A moment later, heavy footsteps thudded down the gravel lane from the stables.
Two stable boys rounded the dry stone wall carrying wooden buckets of dirty wash water, laughing loudly and kicking stones toward the pond bank.
Before they could take three steps onto the grass, Sera Thorne stepped out from the hedge shadow. The broken shaft of her Storm-Pike rested across her forearms, its splintered iron ferrule aimed straight at the lead boy’s chest.
“Quiet,” Sera said, her voice flat and cold. “The Third Young Master is convalescing.”
The stable boys skidded to a halt, staring at her stern gray eyes and the iron-shod ash shaft.
“We just need to dump the harness rinse,” the taller boy muttered, backing away.
“Dump it in the northern compost,” Sera replied. “If you splash this pond, I’ll test your balance on the rocks.”
The two youths turned pale, spun on their heels, and hurried back toward the stables without a sound.
Kaelen kept his fishing rod steady, a faint smirk touching his lips beneath the straw hat.
An exceptional bodyguard, Kaelen noted. In a common teahouse, quiet costs ten copper bits an hour. A bodyguard who enforces peace without drawing steel is worth every silver tael.
The afternoon light deepened into rich amber. The wind through the willow leaves whispered a soothing melody, and the pond surface returned to glass.
Kaelen sat in peaceful silence, letting the cool autumn air wash over his skin.
Inside his dantian, the pure spirit river flowed through his five open pulse gates. There was no friction, no blockages, and no burning ache.
A golden chime chimed softly in the center of his consciousness.
[The Fallow Slate] [Current Abstinence: 58 Hours, 00 Minutes] [Current State: True Fallow State] [Current Multiplier: 59x (Stage 1: Mortal Tally)] [Next Milestone: 59 Hours (60x Ready)]
Fifty-eight hours reached. Fifty-nine times output waiting in reserve.
Fifty-nine times, Kaelen thought, feeling a wave of deep satisfaction settle into his bones. Every baseline hour I sit by this puddle is worth fifty-nine hours of grinding. First Brother can swing all the stone locks he wants. He will only exhaust his marrow.
Kaelen kept his bamboo rod steady over the water, letting the straight brass pin hang three inches below the duckweed as the sun dipped toward the western ridge.
Sera stepped forward from the shadows of the embankment.
“Master Kaelen,” Sera said, glancing at the low sun. “The shadows are lengthening. We should return before the night patrols begin their rounds.”
“Not yet,” Kaelen said, keeping his line in the pond. “The carp are just settling in for their evening rest.”
With his free hand, he reached into his inner tunic and pulled out a small, sealed porcelain vial. He held it out without taking his eyes off the water.
“Take this,” Kaelen said.
Sera looked at the vial, hesitating. “What is it?”
“Your weekly bodyguard wage,” Kaelen replied simply. “Two Cloud-Veined Supreme Pulse-Opening Pills.”
Sera froze. Her hand stopped inches from the porcelain as if it were white-hot iron.
“Two Supreme pills?” Sera gasped, her voice trembling. “Master Kaelen, do you have any idea what these are worth? In the market, a single zero-poison pill fetches three Low-Grade Spirit Stones—three hundred silver taels! Two pills could hire a whole squad of mercenaries for three months!”
“Hiring a squad is a terrible idea,” Kaelen said. “Mercenaries are noisy. They spit on the floor, complain about the soup, and track mud across the porch. You’re quiet, you keep your spear clean, and you chase away stable boys without waking the fish.”
He pressed the vial firmly into her calloused palm.
“Go digest them inside the shed,” Kaelen instructed, flicking his wrist to keep the brass pin still. “Circulate your breathing method and open your sixth pulse gate while I keep fishing.”
Sera stared down at the small porcelain vial, her knuckles turning white. For two years, she had been bound by Garrick’s fifty-spirit-stone contract while her meridians starved on cheap rations. Now an exiled third son was handing her six hundred silver worth of flawless medicine as weekly pocket money.
“I won’t waste them, Master Kaelen,” Sera whispered, bowing deeply before hurrying up the orchard trail toward the Third Herb Shed.
Kaelen remained on the mossy boulder, watching the amber light fade across the duckweed while his hookless pin hung suspended in the quiet water.
Ten minutes later, a crisp tremor rolled down the orchard slope from the shed.
Even from the pond bank, Kaelen felt the clean surge of spirit energy snapping into place—smooth, brisk, and completely free of the acrid stench that came from Pill-Poison sediment.
Moments later, quick, weightless footsteps glided down the gravel path.
Sera Thorne returned to the water’s edge. Her gray eyes shone with a clear silver light, and the old stiffness in her right shoulder had vanished completely.
Mortal Pulse Rank 6.
She looked down at her hands, flexing her long fingers. Pure, unpolluted Qi coursed through her arms, vibrating with lean, coiled power.
“Rank 6,” Sera whispered, her voice filled with awe. “My father spent eight years attempting to clear the sixth gate. The Pill-Poison from dirty medicine kept blocking his channels. With these two pills... there was no resistance at all. It melted like warm snow.”
“Pills without poison tend to do that,” Kaelen said, taking a sip of his tea. “Congratulations, Sera. Your salary has yielded a respectable return.”
Sera stepped forward, her posture straighter and more imposing than before. The aura of a Rank 6 martial artist hung around her like a sharp blade.
She reached into her vest, pulled out her battered leather Grudge Ledger, and made a swift pencil stroke on the front page.
“Vorn’s debt remains logged,” Sera said, tucking the book away. “But my debt to you cannot be written in numbers.”
“Then don’t write it,” Kaelen replied. “Paper is expensive.”
Sera leaned closer, her expression shifting into sharp, practical focus.
“Master Kaelen,” Sera said, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “Now that I have reached Rank 6, I can safely escort our goods into the lower town. We need real capital to prepare for the tournament.”
Kaelen looked up. “What kind of capital?”
“The Black-Crow Ghost Market,” Sera said, her eyes gleaming with mercantile purpose. “They hold their monthly high-roller auction in exactly three nights. All the major sect buyers, merchant syndicates, and rogue cultivators gather in the grand pavilion.”
Kaelen lifted his bamboo rod from the water, rubbing his chin as he ran the numbers through his head.
Three nights until the grand auction block opened. That gave him thirty-eight more hours of uninterrupted rest before the final consignment cutoff—just enough time for his Fallow Slate to hit the ninety-six-hour mark and unlock a ninety-seven-times multiplier.
Ninety-seven times extraction, Kaelen calculated. Enough to turn cartloads of bruised weeds into an entire crate of Supreme pills in a single hour.
“Three nights is a tight schedule,” Kaelen decided, rising from the boulder and tucking the dry fishing rod under his arm. “Tomorrow afternoon, you and Barnaby will take three sample pills to Deacon Vane to book our auction lot—while I stay home in my hammock and stack the remaining thirty-eight hours.”