Moon Cultivation [Sci-fi Xianxia]

[Book 2] Chapter 123: No Relief


I was standing in the middle of a mess of meat. Literally. Bones, blood, snot, broken teeth.

Some of the bullies were still twitching. One of them was even trying to get up despite a broken leg, a dislocated shoulder, and the fact that I'd definitely nailed him in the head with a Chain Punch projection.

I really wanted to ask my invisible companion a question.

Adam? What's the situation? Can I relax and breathe now? Or is this exactly when it all kicks off?

Silence.

I took a few steps towards the door to avoid a pool of blood, but my shoes still left bloody prints behind me, and standing with my back to the door wasn't exactly the smartest idea.

Besides, this wasn't my floor.

"And now what?" I asked.

"Go cultivate," Adam replied.

"Don't think I'm in the right shape for that…"

Last time I'd thrown just a couple of projections and ended up with nothing worse than a few teeth knocked out.

Nef feehs! Tariq got lucky. This time his teeth seemed intact. Couldn't say the same for his ribs and possibly his spine.

I doubted I'd be able to focus on cultivation until I knew none of these idiots had died. Their deaths wouldn't have been on me, any more than Harlan's had been. And I hadn't exactly lost sleep over her. She'd chosen her own path…

Kim!

Kim had been useful to me. Without him, that horde of zombies would have buried me.

Was he among them? Had they juiced him too?

I started scanning the smashed faces, automatically ruling out the wrong skin tone or hairstyle. None of the ones around me matched, so I monkeyed my way back up the stairs, dodging pools of blood.

A few cadets who'd been watching the brawl from above quickly scarpered when they saw me. But one stayed.

Kim.

He was wearing gauntlets too, but the moment he saw me, he raised his hands.

His eyes were frightened — a sharp contrast to the drugged-out zombies I'd just floored.

"It's me, man!" he shouted.

Absolutely not the smartest choice of words.

"I know you," I said, wagging a finger at him. "You're from Tariq's gang. He's lying down there, and you're standing up here. And you're the only one of all these… zombies," I couldn't come up with a better word, "who's still got a thinking look in his eyes. How's that?"

"I…" He glanced around.

"You'd better talk, you little shit, unless you want to join your mates!" I barked at him.

He flinched in a way that looked entirely genuine. Probably because it was.

"I decided it was a bad idea," he said, making a tentative move to lower his hands, then thinking better of it under my glare.

"Why? Why were you able to decide that? Your friends didn't seem to be deciding much of anything."

"I… hang on…"

He finally lowered his left hand and pulled an auto-injector from his pocket.

"I figured this thing was way too suspicious, and jabbing myself with it would be a bad idea."

"Congratulations!" I barked at him as if he were just another piece of crap in my way. "You've got a brain! Toss it here."

Kim threw me the injector.

"Clear off," I ordered, and Kim hurried away.

"Nice!" Adam said in my ear. "Hold on to that until Johansson shows up."

I'd barely stuffed the injector into my pocket when I heard the whine of jet engines from above and below. Jet boards…

I quickly moved to the clearest patch of floor I could find — somewhere the boards wouldn't clip me when the cavalry arrived. That spot turned out to be on the landing between the floor where they'd attacked me and the one where it had all ended.

I swung the door open and peered into the corridor, checking whether the Order would be coming from that level.

Not from here.

The racket started from above and below. Then came the shouting, followed by the Order members shifting aside to let the medics through — mostly backing into the corridor so they wouldn't trample the injured.

If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

It all took a while, and the medics were the first to actually get to work. From where I stood, I could see both above and below on the intermediate landings. The upper side was more choked with bodies, and they immediately called for reinforcements, labelling it a mass brawl with several dozen casualties.

"We need all available hands and a few neurosurgeons on standby!" said the woman who was clearly the senior of the pair.

She was making the call without pausing her scan of the injured. Her colleague was doing the same, though he did take a few seconds to throw me a grim look.

I smiled back at him.

The woman paused by a heap of three cadets slumped in the corner and called out to her colleague.

"Critical!" She immediately injected something into him, after which the cadet was carefully loaded onto a stretcher with his neck secured.

More medics arrived, more stretchers…

They worked their way through everyone until they got to me.

The medics from below reached me first.

"And what the hell are you doing standing here?" one of them barked.

"They're the ones who attacked me," I explained. "The Order will definitely want a word."

The medic frowned.

"All of them, just you?"

"Yes."

His eyebrows shot up towards his hairline. He glanced again at the stairs, now cleared of bodies, if not of blood, and nodded.

"They certainly will!" he agreed, then shouted to his colleague below, "Alex, get the Order up here."

The Order's representatives turned out to be the usual pair — this time both women. One had twos on her collar, the other, a set of fours.

"The hero of the hour," the medic introduced me. "This is all him. Alone."

A. Hanamura, an Asian woman with a fourth-stage insignia, wore black gauntlets painted with little pink flowers. She folded her arms, gave me a once-over, and in the space of those few seconds clearly pulled up my file on her interface.

"Fourth place in the monthly tournament… I'm going to need the details," she said.

"Can we wait for Johansson?" I asked. "He'll want to hear this."

"Johansson's already on his way!" Adam reported in my ear.

"Why?" Hanamura asked.

I shrugged.

"I was with Liang Shi at Marco's…"

Understanding flickered in her eyes.

"And does he already know?"

"He knows," I confirmed just as another pair from the Order reached me.

"Then let's go," the woman said.

"What about us?" complained the other team — two male cadets, third rank.

"You're free," she waved them off.

No one argued with a fourth stage.

They took me to an exact copy of the duty room I'd been in before. Sat me down at a table, poured me some tea, and left me there until Johansson arrived.

I'd expected him to start grilling me, but no.

"Got something for me?" he asked from the doorway.

I handed him the auto-injector.

"Ah!" he brightened, snatched it from my hand, and hurried out.

I turned back to the women.

"What now?"

"How should we know?" the senior shrugged.

"Am I free to go?"

"I guess," she said.

"Just get out of there already," Adam's voice cut into my ear.

I actually flinched. I'd forgotten he was still on the line.

I left the duty room.

Where to now?

Definitely not the Cultivation Hall. I was already late, and the question of whether to go or not had answered itself. The Clear Thoughts in my blood was practically screaming that I wouldn't last a full session. I'd be too distracted, so skipping it was for the best.

But I did have questions for Adam.

His voice had stayed calm from the very start of the fight to his last words. When things had gone sideways at Marco's, Johansson's tone had changed, I could tell he was moving, in a hurry.

With Adam, it felt like he'd spent the whole brawl sitting on his arse.

That wasn't the complaint, or rather, not that I'd been fighting while he hadn't. The problem was that they hadn't found the demon!

At least, that's how it seemed to me. Looked like there hadn't been one anywhere nearby. The demons had just juiced the crowd enough to try and tear me apart. But I wouldn't be able to confirm anything until I was somewhere safe and could throw Adam a few questions.

Although I could have hinted.

"What the hell is going on?" I muttered under my breath.

"Not now," Adam said. "We're still figuring it out ourselves. I'll see you home and that's it for today."

I couldn't help glancing over my shoulder.

"No, I'm not hiding in the shadows," Adam said. "Figure of speech. I'll just stay on the line with you until you're home."

So they definitely hadn't caught anyone, and were probably hoping someone might take the bait now.

That night I didn't sleep well. Just in case, I kept not only my amulet on but also both bracelets, even though they were fairly bulky. What's more, my roommates still didn't know about them, and I made sure to be the last to lie down so they wouldn't find out.

Thanks to that restless sleep, they never did — I was the first to wake and the first to get dressed.

A new day should have brought some relief with a return to routine, but routine didn't help.

Rene once again put on a show with his greetings, loudly pointing out to everyone that fourth place in the monthly tournament was even cooler than first in the weekly.

I could have argued with him! In terms of rewards, even third place in the weekly tournament beat fourth in the monthly.

Tournaments…

I really needed to stop wasting time on that nonsense and focus on cultivation. I'd already missed three sessions!

I'd planned to reschedule yesterday's missed one for this evening, but instead, I unexpectedly received an invitation for tea from Novak. Looked like the big boss was ready to share some details, or maybe he wanted to discuss the last tournament and sign me up for a new stunt.

For some reason, my mood still refused to lift to anything like an acceptable level.

All day I sulked and snapped at people like an ill-tempered dog.

That evening, for the first time in ages, my boys and I gathered at the same table for dinner. The usual noise, banter, swapping plates…

I took a plate of larvae from Marlon.

Damn it — they were tasty!

And they were boiled. It's not like I was eating them raw!

Then it was as if a wave rolled through the cafeteria. Something had shifted — cadets started talking differently, a lot of them diving into their interfaces.

One word stood out clearest in all that noise: "ratings."

There was only one ranking that could fire everyone up like that — the level of cultivation ratings.

We checked too.

This time, the top line was different.

Alisa Baturyn — 0/5976.

Wait! I remembered Alisa. She was one of those who'd refused tournaments and focused entirely on cultivation, but last time I checked, literally two days ago, she hadn't even been in the top ten.

Zero out of 5976!

She was the first from our year to break through. Just a few days shy of four full months of training. And the doc had said half a year was the safe mark.

The news of her breakthrough had stirred the cafeteria in an instant, and in just as short a time, it had shut everyone up. Only this was a different kind of silence — a darker one. The first big reminder of how few of us would make it to the second year.

My mood sank even lower. And that was despite my having a decent shot at getting through. My boys didn't feel they had much of a chance, and not another word was spoken for the rest of the evening.

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