Chapter 116: The Curve

The first stable thread of Acquired Energy took Joe eleven attempts. Eight failed cleanly, two held for less than a full circulation, and the eleventh remained. Joe sat motionless in the rented training room and followed it through his body. Ming Jin had always been obvious. Skin, muscle and bone working together to express direct force. An Jin was subtler. Blood Energy passed through the tempered organs and returned carrying a hidden force that could travel beneath an opponent's surface resistance. Acquired Energy was different from both. Joe had spent weeks studying the theory.

Now he finally understood it through experience. Ming Jin and An Jin no longer separated when he relaxed; a thin strand of refined martial energy continued circulating on its own, stable and stored until consumed. A new realm had begun. Joe maintained his breathing for another ten minutes before opening his eyes. Then hunger arrived. He looked toward the concentrated meal and medicine waiting beside the wall. That was becoming predictable. He ate first. Only after the worst of the hunger faded did he call the panel.

Joe Vale

Age: 19

Static Foundation — Lv.5 / Perfection

Dynamic Foundation — Lv.5 / Perfection

Skin Tempering — Lv.5 / Perfection

Muscle Tempering — Lv.5 / Perfection

Bone Tempering — Lv.5 / Perfection

Internal Organ Tempering — Lv.5 / Perfection

Acquired Energy — Lv.1 / 2%

Medicine — Lv.4 / 41%

Disguise — Lv.1 / 68%

Breath Control — Lv.2 / 34%

Joe looked at the new line. Two percent was small, but real. He dismissed the panel and returned his attention inward. His earlier estimate had been approximately correct. Forming Acquired Energy was possible; supplying it was the problem. His body could perform the work far faster than food and ordinary medicine could replace what it consumed. One Effort Equals a Hundred reduced training time, not the resources required to sustain it. Joe smiled faintly. There were worse problems.

-------------

Three weeks later, he was less amused. His ninefold lower tempering had created a reservoir far beyond the standard Acquired foundation, and the energy it accepted demanded greater refinement before it felt truly stable. He needed more quantity and higher quality, both of which consumed fuel. Joe could cultivate fast enough; he could not replenish himself fast enough. That brought him back to damaged spiritual materials. And Foundation. His best experimental results still occurred when whole-body coordination was already established before the medicine entered his system.

The improvement appeared only when correct coordination existed before the imbalance. Static Foundation had trained structure in stillness and Dynamic Foundation preserved it through motion; Joe increasingly suspected both were fragments of a larger principle in which the body remained correctly coordinated without needing to return there after every change. He could approach that state for short periods, though not yet hold it. During those periods medicinal distribution improved and slightly less energy was lost during Acquired condensation, enough to justify continued work.

-------------

Serena began interfering with his research schedule in the second month.

“You're attending dinner tomorrow.”

Joe looked up from the pharmaceutical ledger.

“Who is hosting?”

She paused.

“That was easier than expected.”

“I didn't say I was attending.”

“There he is.”

Joe ignored that.

“Who?”

“Prince Corvin's household.”

Joe closed the ledger.

“The same gathering you rejected for me before?”

“No. Smaller. Mostly candidates, merchants, administrators and people his household thinks may become useful later.”

“That sounds more worthwhile.”

Serena stared at him for a moment.

“What happened to you?”

“Blackwood.”

The joke ended there. Joe continued.

“I could have spent a month traveling there and back. Your branch solved the problem without me leaving Ashbourne.”

“Yes.”

“I understood connections before. I underestimated their reach.”

Serena nodded.

“That is closer.”

“To what?”

“Why people spend three hours eating food they could finish in twenty minutes.”

Joe almost answered, decided against it, and saw that Serena noticed.

-----------

The first dinner went reasonably badly. Joe offended no one, but he also gave most people very little reason to continue speaking with him. A young woman from a caravan family asked how he liked Ashbourne.

“It's been useful.”

She waited. Joe realized more was expected.

“The libraries are better than Blackwood's.”

The pause that followed told him the answer had still been too short.

Later, a junior administrator asked how he had found Montclair support.

“Efficient.”

That conversation died even faster. Serena found him near a window.

“You're doing it again.”

“What?”

“Answering questions like a witness.”

Joe glanced toward the room.

“They asked questions. I answered.”

“They were trying to talk to you.”

“That was also what I was doing.”

Serena closed her eyes briefly. Joe considered the problem. Then asked, “What am I missing?” That improved her mood.

“Most casual questions aren't requests for facts. They're openings.”

“For what?”

“For whatever part of the subject you think is worth continuing.”

Joe looked back toward the caravan heiress.

“So when she asked about Ashbourne, she wasn't asking whether I liked the city.”

“She might have been. She was also giving you somewhere to go.”

Joe thought about that.

“That is inefficiently indirect.”

Serena looked at him. Joe sighed.

“I understand your point.”

“Do you?”

“Not completely.”

“At least you're honest.”

-----------

Joe began studying communication the next week without letting it displace cultivation or medicine. Once a weakness became obvious, he saw no reason to leave it uncorrected merely because it involved people. He read introductory rhetoric, negotiation, etiquette, letters written by skilled administrators, old courtroom arguments, and speeches. He paid more attention to Serena. That annoyed her.

“You're doing it again.”

“Watching?”

“Yes.”

“You change your wording depending on who you're speaking to.”

“Everyone does.”

“Not equally well.”

Serena lowered her paper.

“You really are studying this.”

“Yes.”

She looked almost concerned. Joe went back to reading.

-----------

The next gathering went better, largely because Joe stopped treating every conversation like a problem that needed to end quickly.

When someone asked about Blackwood, he said:

“It is quieter than Ashbourne, but everyone knows everyone else's business. That creates its own problems.”

The merchant laughed.

“My hometown was the same.”

This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

The conversation continued without effort. That was all Joe needed to notice.

Later, Adrian Ferrow mentioned that his family's pharmaceutical workshops discarded damaged spiritual-herb batches. Joe turned toward him.

“How damaged?”

“Depends. Storage failures. Broken roots. Heat exposure.”

“Do you keep processing records?”

Adrian's attention sharpened.

“For regulated materials.”

“I'd like to inspect some of the discarded stock.”

“Why?”

“I'm studying degradation. Buying intact material just to ruin it is expensive.”

Adrian smiled.

“That is a strange sentence from someone Montclair is funding.”

“They are not funding waste.”

“Fair.”

Joe continued, “If the material is already being discarded, perhaps we can arrange something useful for both sides.”

“Such as?”

“If I learn anything commercially useful, your family gets first look.”

Adrian considered.

“That I can work with.”

That was the improvement Serena had been trying to teach him: no performance or clever answer, only enough conversation to reach something useful.

---------

That evening Joe called the panel. A new line appeared.

Eloquence — Lv.1 / 98%

Joe stared at the ninety-eight percent and laughed once, quietly. That explained several things. Apparently, he had spent years becoming almost competent at speaking to people without ever treating it as a skill. Simon had called him a smart-ass more times than Joe could remember. Joe had generally assumed Simon was exaggerating. Perhaps not entirely. His problem had never been that he lacked thoughts. He had simply developed the habit of compressing them until other people were forced to guess at the parts he had removed.

The habit was useful in emergencies and less useful at dinner. Joe dismissed the panel. Two percent remained, which seemed manageable.

------------

Meanwhile, Montclair believed Joe was preparing his second Internal Organ tempering.

Publicly, his first cycle was excellent without being impossible: a gifted practitioner with strong support could complete all five organs in a little under a year at eighteen turning nineteen. The second cycle was harder to explain because repeated tempering normally demanded deeper Blood Energy work and longer recovery. Joe knew that better than anyone, having already completed nine cycles, which was exactly why he waited before revealing the second.

Too fast would look false; too slow would undermine the trajectory he wanted people to see. Four months and nineteen days after his first public completion, Joe returned to the Montclair annex. The physician checked him twice, then called an instructor who repeated the assessment. Heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, and spleen all showed stable second-cycle completion with no hidden injury or circulation disorder. The instructor looked at the date.

“Four months?”

“Nineteen days over.”

The physician was still reading the measurements.

“That makes it worse.”

Joe looked between them.

“Worse?”

“More interesting,” the instructor corrected.

The physician finally put the report down.

“Your first tempering was fast.”

Joe nodded.

“This isn't just fast.”

Joe waited. The man looked at the records again.

“The second cycle is supposed to become more difficult.”

“It did.”

“How much?”

“Cultivation itself was harder. Understanding what my body needed was easier.”

That answer made the instructor pause. Joe continued, “The first cycle taught me where recovery slowed and how my organs reacted to different Blood Energy pressures. I expected the second to be more efficient.”

“Did you expect this?”

“No.”

The answer satisfied them more than false modesty would have. The instructor signed the assessment: Internal Organ II, Complete, age nineteen. The report left the room before Joe did.

----------

It reached the main line that afternoon, not the highest levels, but high enough that Joe's name now landed on desks that had ignored him months earlier. Three officials reviewed the new assessment alongside his older records. The youngest spoke first.

“Four months, nineteen days.”

The older woman beside him nodded.

“After eleven months for the first.”

“That is backwards.”

“Usually.”

A third official turned several pages.

“Look earlier.”

The official traced Skin, Muscle, and Bone through records that were incomplete compared with Ashbourne's but still showed the broad progression: poor childhood resources, late access, then increasingly rapid advancement once better methods and medicine became available. The official traced the dates with one finger.

“This isn't beginning at Internal Organs.”

The woman looked over.

“No.”

“His curve has been improving since the lower realms.”

Silence followed. The younger official frowned.

“Comprehension and resources?”

“Both, partly.”

The older woman closed Joe's file and reached for another. The next file was much older, an archive copy bearing the founding-era seal. The younger official immediately straightened.

“You think that's necessary?”

“I think similarities are worth checking before we invent explanations.”

She opened an archive copy of the Martial Ancestor's early training records, among the most frequently copied documents in the kingdom's martial archives. He had possessed a rare constitution whose exact mechanism was never fully understood, but the pattern was clear: his body adapted unusually well to successful tempering, with recovery and integration improving as cultivation advanced.

Later training built on earlier training more efficiently than expected. His early cultivation had been remarkable; the later acceleration was what made it historical. The woman looked back at Joe's file.

“I am not saying he has the same constitution.”

The third official nodded.

“But similar constitutions are recorded?”

“Yes. Very few.”

The younger official looked uncomfortable.

“The Martial Ancestor is not a comparison we should make lightly.”

“We aren't comparing achievement. We are comparing a pattern.”

The third official tapped Joe's age.

“Nineteen.”

The woman nodded.

“If this had been identified at eight or nine…”

The younger official understood.

“Full elite preparation.”

“Repeated tempering from the beginning. Better medicine. Better instructors. No wasted years.”

The third official leaned back.

“Innate?”

The woman considered before answering.

“If the constitution proved genuine and the rest of his development remained stable?”

She tapped the file.

“I would have expected it.”

The room became quiet.

“And now?”

“Nineteen changes the calculation. Eight years remain before twenty-seven, but that does not make the later stages comfortable.”

The younger official frowned.

“That sounds like plenty.”

The older woman looked at him.

“For Acquired?”

“Yes.”

“For Innate?”

She closed the archive.

“No.”

---------

Serena heard enough of the discussion two days later to understand why the main line had become interested. She found Joe after his afternoon training.

“You've annoyed the main line.”

Joe took the towel she offered.

“I haven't spoken to most of them.”

“That is what makes it impressive.”

He dried his face.

“What happened?”

“Your assessment.”

“I assumed they would notice.”

“They noticed the timing.”

Joe waited. Serena seemed unusually thoughtful.

“One of the archival offices compared your progression to records of adaptive constitutions.”

Joe stopped.

“Known constitutions?”

“Yes.”

“What kind?”

“Bodies that become increasingly efficient at integrating cultivation after successful adaptation.”

The description came uncomfortably close to something Joe understood too well, so he kept his expression neutral.

“How rare, and can they test for it?”

“Very rare. Not cleanly.”

Joe continued walking. Serena followed.

“The Martial Ancestor had the most famous recorded example.”

Joe looked at her; that comparison was more significant.

“Same constitution?”

“No one is saying that.”

“Good.”

Serena glanced sideways.

“You sound relieved.”

“I prefer people not compare me to the founder of the kingdom after two organ temperings.”

“That may be the most socially intelligent thing you've said this month.”

Joe almost replied. Then remembered the panel.

“I'm improving.”

Serena laughed.

------------

The main-line speculation spread quietly rather than publicly. That made it more valuable. Invitations increased. One Montclair branch that had previously regarded Serena's involvement as harmless administration now wanted Joe's schedule copied to its candidate office. Another asked whether he had signed any exclusivity agreement. A third requested access to his older cultivation records. Serena disliked all three. Joe noticed.

“They think your branch found something.”

“They think my branch may have found something.”

“Difference?”

“The second is why they're being polite.”

Joe nodded.

------------

His next conversation with Prince Corvin happened at another small dinner.

By then Joe had attended enough gatherings that he no longer needed Serena within rescue distance. Corvin approached with a cup in hand.

“Congratulations.”

“Thank you.”

“Internal Organ II at nineteen.”

Joe nodded.

“The timing seems to have attracted more attention than the realm.”

“It should.”

Corvin looked amused.

“Your first cycle was excellent. Your second is strange.”

“That appears to be the consensus.”

“Do you believe the constitution theory?”

Joe considered his answer.

“There isn't enough evidence yet.”

Corvin nodded.

“Good.”

“Would it matter that much?”

“Yes.”

Corvin answered without hesitation and continued.

“A talent that makes the first realm fast is useful. A constitution that makes every successful realm prepare the body to learn the next one faster is something else.”

“Compounding.”

“Exactly.”

Corvin took a drink.

“If they had identified something like that when you were a child, your life would have looked very different.”

“Innate?”

Corvin looked at him.

“Possibly more than that, depending on who was making the prediction.”

Joe remembered Serena's wording.

“But now it is only possible.”

“Now you are nineteen.”

“I have eight years.”

Corvin's amusement faded into recognition.

“You think that is a long time.”

“For cultivation, it usually has been.”

“That is because you haven't reached the problem yet.”

Joe became more attentive.

“Innate.”

“Yes.”

Corvin leaned against the railing.

“Internal Organs is difficult. Acquired is expensive. Innate ruins careers.”

Joe waited. Corvin continued.

“There are people who reach Acquired in their early twenties and never cross it. Others reach Acquired Completion with years remaining and still fail.”

“Why?”

“If we knew exactly, fewer would fail.”

Corvin looked toward the room.

“The manuals call it transformation because advancement is no longer just accumulating better martial energy. The body itself has to cross a threshold it was not born beyond.”

Joe thought of the Greyspine manual. Its language had become increasingly cautious there.

“What does failure look like?”

“Usually wasted years. Sometimes damaged potential. Occasionally worse, if someone is reckless.”

Joe nodded, and Corvin continued.

“Eight years is valuable. It is not comfortable.”

Joe finally understood why the archival official had apparently reduced his future from likely to possible simply because he was nineteen. He had been thinking in months, Internal Organ cycles, and Acquired accumulation, all processes he could accelerate through work. Innate was not merely another quantity of work. Eight years suddenly felt shorter.

-----------

The Decennial came up naturally afterward.

“Three years,” Corvin said.

Joe nodded.

“Approximately.”

“You'll enter.”

“If my public cultivation makes it reasonable.”

Corvin smiled slightly.

“Your public cultivation?”

Joe met his eyes.

“My recorded cultivation.”

Corvin accepted the correction without comment.

“The top hundred receive kingdom support, and the top ten receive much more. You know that.”

“Yes. What changes for first?”

Corvin looked toward him.

“First is where the kingdom stops pretending resources should be distributed fairly.”

Joe waited for the rest.

“The champion receives unique access. Rare materials. Inheritances. The best cultivation conditions available for that generation. Sometimes resources that exist in quantities too small to divide.”

“The kingdom concentrates everything on one candidate.”

“Not everything.”

Corvin smiled.

“Enough that the difference matters.”

“And the purpose is Innate.”

“Ultimately.”

That made the tournament more interesting, not for the title but for resources Joe could not reproduce himself. If he could reach first while revealing only what he wanted the world to see, the reward might solve problems he had not yet encountered, especially Innate.

------------

Several days later, Joe finished another social gathering without Serena correcting him once. That alone felt suspicious. He returned to Edwin's house and called the panel.

Joe Vale

Age: 19

Static Foundation — Lv.5 / Perfection

Dynamic Foundation — Lv.5 / Perfection

Skin Tempering — Lv.5 / Perfection

Muscle Tempering — Lv.5 / Perfection

Bone Tempering — Lv.5 / Perfection

Internal Organ Tempering — Lv.5 / Perfection

Acquired Energy — Lv.1 / 24%

Medicine — Lv.4 / 47%

Disguise — Lv.1 / 72%

Breath Control — Lv.2 / 39%

Eloquence — Lv.2 / 3%

Joe looked at the final line. Minor. Apparently he had finally learned how to speak to people, a result that felt more dramatic than the actual improvement. His attention soon returned to Acquired Energy at twenty-four percent.

Publicly, Ashbourne had begun wondering whether he possessed a constitution reminiscent of one recorded in the Martial Ancestor's own history.

Privately, Joe knew the explanation was stranger than any constitution they could imagine, but the mistake was useful. His hidden talents left visible traces, and sooner or later the world needed an explanation for them. A rare adaptive constitution was better than most. Joe dismissed the panel. On the worktable beside him lay three batches of damaged spiritual-herb waste from Adrian Ferrow's warehouse. The first Decennial was roughly three years away. Twenty-seven was eight years away. Yesterday, eight years had sounded generous.

Now Joe was less certain. He picked up the first sample. Acquired could be accelerated, resources could be found, and social connections could be cultivated, but somewhere beyond them waited a barrier that had stopped people with better Roots, richer families, stronger inheritances, and years more preparation than Joe possessed. Joe smiled faintly. For the first time in a while, the road ahead looked properly difficult.