Having the threat of Han temporarily pushed to the side was invigorating for Rix. He felt like, at least for now, he could tighten his attention to focus back on the thing he really wanted to be doing — getting stronger.

He showed up at the training yard the next day a bundle of pent-up energy. Much to Luna's chagrin, that morning Wing had insisted she skip training. Luna's practice with her bloodline was apparently yielding fruit, and Wing wanted to discuss the implications.

"I'll see you in the realm and we will kill something," she'd said. "Many somethings." She still hadn't really got all of the lockdown frustration out of her body. In truth, neither had he.

Master Zhen had only just returned from whatever business he'd been attending to, but Rix found him in his usual spot, nose buried in a scroll.

"Good morning, elder."

Master Zhen let out a sound like grinding stones. "Is it? Another rotation of this celestial sphere, another period of my rapidly diminishing lifespan utterly wasted in this… dustbin."

Rix paused. "Uh, I hope you had a good time away, elder?"

"Good?" Zhen's eyes, when they met Rix's, were like chips of flint. "It was everything I expected." The way he said that indicated it was not a good thing. "But I see you, at least, look suitably…untaxed."

Rix felt a flicker of annoyance. "You went away, and then we were in lockdown."

Master Zhen was unmoved. "Excuses are the currency of the untalented, boy." He seemed to be in a particularly sharp mood today, his jaw set firmly in a scowl.

Rix closed his eyes momentarily to steady himself. He wouldn't be drawn in today. He had too much to do. "Well, I'm ready to get taxed now, elder. May I use my hour this week?"

The man's nostrils flared, as though annoyed he didn't get further argument. But he seemed to find his own calm after a moment, because instead of unleashing another volley, he merely grunted and moved off to a training cell, leaving Rix racing to grab his weapon and catch up.

Once they were facing one another on the sand, Master Zhen spoke. "How goes your style progression?"

Rix let out a sigh. "Not well. I don't know what to do about it. I've had a bunch of really tough fights lately, both in the realm and the arena, but they haven't helped."

"The Martial Path isn't something that can be simply brute-forced," Master Zhen replied. "If stubborn application of effort was enough, the world would be overrun with powerful idiots."

"But you said being in life-or-death situations was what made a Martial Soul, elder."

"I said it was part of what made a Martial Soul," the man countered. "Enlightenment doesn't come from how many times you nearly die. It comes from what those moments teach you. Your problem isn't your weapon, boy — it's the vacant space between your ears where understanding should reside."

Rix shoved down his indignation. "So what am I missing? And don't say 'everything'."

That drew the barest hint of a smile from the man. "I have my suspicions." He squared up. "Do your best to attack me using only your style. Periodically, you may inject techniques, but only one at a time."

Rix launched himself forward before the final words had left the man's mouth. Master Zhen remained expressionless, blocking the strike with his forearm. While their first sparring session had illustrated the gulf between their speed and anticipation, when training since then he often opted to simply weather the storm, and the difference was no less marked in that area. Between a mantle fuelled by heavens knew how much mana and a body seemingly harder than stone, Rix's attacks were like a breeze striking a mountain.

Still, he did his best, calling forth his style and letting it settle over his mind. Though still far from a master, obviously, he was growing more comfortable with the style's demands. He knew every attack, every combination, and was growing more adept at weaving them together with every passing day.

A rapid-fire series of blows aimed at the old man's chest pivoted seamlessly into a leg sweep and then a thrust directly into the gut. The Weaponmaster took them all serenely, catching everything on his arms, or in the case of the sweep, on his foot, without even so much as stumbling.

Rix decided it was time. As Master Zhen caught a particularly vicious upward slash between his cupped hands, Rix pivoted, summoning [Force Hammer] and shifting his grip to slam the attack home. Feeling brash, he even injected a little extra speed using Energy Surge, hoping to take his opponent off guard. He'd never used [Force Hammer] on his master before, but it was his most powerful attack. A tiny part of him longed to see it cause the elder even the slightest consternation.

He was, of course, disappointed.

Master Zhen caught the downward swing in one hand, about a foot above his head.

That technique had burst his first arena opponent's head, but now it didn't cause even the slightest buckling of the Weaponmaster's knees. The man shot him a wolfish smile.

Rix snorted in resignation. It was too much to expect, apparently.

Remembering his instructions, he slipped immediately back into his chain of attacks. When he saw a second opportunity, he tried something different, unleashing [Sunspot] then immediately pivoting into a powerful thrust directly at Master Zhen's face. While this time the technique landed, the man had already proven he could fight Rix while blind, and he deflected the follow-up as easily as all the others.

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"Enough," the old master said, folding his hands below his stomach. "It is as I thought. Your problem is not one of execution, but of mindset. Tell me, when you were calling those techniques, what was going through your head besides a gentle breeze?"

Rixed frowned. "I mean, I used the technique the way I normally do, and then I summoned my style again and resumed attacking."

Master Zhen's smile widened. "Exactly! You treat your style like a technique to be activated and deactivated at will. But it is nothing of the sort."

Rix's brow furrowed. "I don't understand. The Quartermaster said I need to concentrate to channel my style."

A cloud passed over Master Zhen's face. "That woman wouldn't know a proper martial foundation if it struck her between the eyes."

Rix wanted to volunteer that she seemed to be perfectly competent, but it felt like a time to keep his mouth shut.

After a beat, Master Zhen sighed. "To some small degree, she is correct. You need to channel to initialise it. But that is done once at the beginning of an engagement. In battle, your style is not a thing you use. It is foundational to your combat — the context within which all your martial expressions occur. When you use a technique, it isn't a divergence; it is an integration."

Rix thought this over. "I'm already doing that to some degree with [Wind Blade]. I've become pretty good at using that with my style."

"Then perhaps you are closer to understanding than your constant confusion suggests," the man said drily.

"So I just need to work on maintaining my style while using techniques?"

"It is not just your techniques, though that will be one of the outcomes," Master Zhen replied. "I can see it in the way you fight, now that I know what I'm looking for. You wield your style like another weapon, something to be controlled. But if you think of your style as just another tool, you'll never truly embody it."

The man raised his hands once more. "We go again. Remember, your style is the trunk. Everything else simply branches from that."

Rix gave a dubious nod, and then re-engaged. Again, he channelled his style, though the lesson had made the process feel unintuitive. The knowledge that he'd somehow been doing it wrong made him hyper-aware of the way the style felt. He found himself assessing every nuance, every shift in his body.

His attacks were noticeably clumsier as he struggled to somehow let his style guide him while not using it. It felt stupid, trying to divorce those two processes. How could you take advantage of something without consciously engaging it?

He didn't even attempt to try a technique. He knew it wouldn't work.

They fought like that for heavens knew how long. Master Zhen remained blessedly silent, allowing, or perhaps forcing, Rix to grapple with this problem himself.

Eventually, he let out a frustrated growl. "This isn't working. I don't understand how I'm supposed to stop thinking about combat altogether. Won't that make me a bad fighter if I operate on instinct alone?"

Master Zhen's lips thinned. Rix could already hear him preparing another verbal jab, but then the man's expression softened ever so slightly. "Set down your weapon and come here," he said, gesturing to a spot about two feet away from him.

Rix did as he was bid.

"You've done the thousand blows for weeks on end. Perhaps I'm getting soft, but I dare say you might even be considered not a total embarrassment in that very specific arena anymore."

The glimmer of praise drew a wry smile from Rix. It was true, he had grown much better. Almost nine in ten punches gave him that sense of perfect feedback by now.

"Go ahead and hit me," Master Zhen said, tapping his sternum.

Rix's brows knitted together for a moment, but he dropped low and unleashed a blow with his whole weight behind it. Though it was a clean strike, as expected, the older man didn't seem to feel it.

"Good. Now, what was going through your mind when you did that?"

Rix shrugged. "Nothing really? I just did it."

A glimmer of amusement appeared in Master Zhen's eyes. "Curious. Did you not need to use your training in some way to make that punch perfect?"

Rix's eyes widened ever so slightly. "No, I guess I didn't."

"And yet you were able to take advantage of what you'd learned while using your conscious mind to assess the target and direct the attack. I'll bet if I asked you to throw out more blows to try and find a way through my guard, you'd have no trouble doing it without ever considering technique at all."

"I imagine so," Rix replied.

The man gave a satisfied nod. "In this way, your style and your punch are the same. A style is like training you already had and are gradually remembering, not movements you can summon to do your bidding. Your intellect and battle sense — and I use those terms generously in your case — should complement your style, not trample all over it."

Rix nodded slowly. That was a framework that made sense to him. "Let me try again."

And so they went.

This time, Rix stopped trying to do anything with his style. He simply let it hover there like a shroud over his mind as he experimented. In the beginning, it was a terrible display. Without actively reaching into the style, he was reduced to fighting the way he had before he'd come to Spiritlock, with no System-led guidance at all. He couldn't believe how graceless and weak his blows were. Had he really fought like that his whole life?

Much like with his qi, his use of his style had always been an act of force. He didn't know to simply sit back and listen to what it had to say.

But gradually, he began to hear it.

As he prepared a blow at Master Zhen's legs, an image suddenly flashed through his mind: a twist of his arms, a drive from his hips. He adjusted, whipping his weapon through the air with a quick, confident swing. Though it had no more of an impact than any of his previous strikes, it felt better. As Master Zhen said, it was like replicating something he'd done a thousand times before, instead of gazing into a book and trying to copy what he saw.

He grinned up at the man, who raised an eyebrow. "If you're waiting for applause after a single decent movement, you'll be standing there until you reach Nova, and I'm sure you can guess when I think that will happen," said Master Zhen. "Do it again."

And so Rix did. He continued exploring, and more suggestions followed, which he did his best to execute. In terms of sheer crispness and power, he was performing worse than he had been a few minutes ago when trying to command his style, but the sensation was completely different. He could feel the possibilities of this approach opening in front of him. It was simply easier. There was a flow to it that he hadn't realised was missing until he stopped getting in his own way. It was clear that, with time, this would be the superior path.

So in the flow of his instincts was he that he didn't even realise he'd used [Force Hammer] until he was bringing his staff crashing down towards Master Zhen's head. The man caught it again with all the difficulty of catching a soulshot ball, but this time Rix didn't feel even a hint of annoyance.

Master Zhen gazed at him, a hint of a smile on his face.

"Have I hit the applause threshold yet?" Rix asked.

The elder snorted. "Not even close. I might consider a stern nod of encouragement if you keep this up."

"I'll take it," Rix replied, pleased to hear a little of the playfulness return to the man's tone.

By that point, their time was up. Rix was a little disappointed that his epiphany hadn't led to an actual rank-up, but he felt more confident than ever that it was just a matter of time.

After he'd stowed his weapon, he exited the armoury to find the old master at his post once more. Unfortunately, the man's face had slipped back into darkness as he stared off into the middle distance.

Rix hesitated, unsure if he should follow through on his instinct. But in the end, he spoke up.

"Are you okay, elder?"

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