Chapter 146: Progress Is Apparently Not Enough

"Sit up."

I opened one eye.

Professor Selene was standing beside the examination bed with her arms folded. Dream Haven was under my head. I closed the eye again.

"I’m resting my channels."

"Your channels are fine."

"Then I’m resting the rest of me."

"Sit up."

I considered pretending I had fallen asleep between those two sentences, but Selene had known me too long. I sat up. Dream Haven came with me, tucked behind my back.

The examination room had six beds and only one patient, which made it one of the better rooms in Zenith. Quiet. Warm. No immediate responsibilities. Someone had even drawn the curtains far enough to stop the morning sun from becoming aggressive. The conditions were nearly perfect. Selene was the main problem.

She pressed two fingers against the inside of my wrist, and mana moved. Not hers; mine. A small thread rose in answer to the pressure, slipped through the channels of my forearm, and returned toward my core. Selene watched it. I watched Selene watching it. This went on long enough to become rude.

"Still D-Grey?" I asked.

Her eyes lifted. "No. It reverted while you were lying down."

I sat a little straighter.

She stared at me. I stared back. Then she looked down at her clipboard.

"Channel response is normal. No tearing. No stiffness. No rebound pressure."

"Good."

"Core wall stable."

"Better."

"Mana density is where it should be."

"Excellent."

"Your circulation will remain restricted today."

I immediately started sliding back down. "Then why did you make me sit up?"

"Because I’m examining you."

"You were doing that while I was lying down."

"You were falling asleep."

"Those activities can coexist."

"Lie back after I’m finished."

I stopped halfway. Reasonable. I sat up again and pulled Dream Haven into my lap while Selene wrote something down.

D-Grey.

The words still felt strange. I had spent long enough at D-Black that it had stopped feeling temporary; it was simply there every time I checked my status, like a piece of furniture nobody remembered buying. Now it was gone.

I reached inward. The difference wasn’t dramatic. My core hadn’t doubled in size overnight. It didn’t glow, it hadn’t started singing, and I did not suddenly feel capable of breaking a mountain, which was probably fortunate for nearby mountains. But it was different. Denser. Not heavier, exactly; more settled. At D-Black there had always been room around the movement, a little empty space between one current and the next. Now everything turned closer together. Fuller.

Selene tapped my knee with the back of her pen. "Do not cultivate tonight."

"I wasn’t going to."

She looked at me.

"I wasn’t."

"Yesterday you asked me whether half a cycle counted."

"I was gathering information."

"Then you asked whether a cycle slow enough to fall asleep during still counted."

"Different information."

"Then you asked whether unconscious cultivation was possible."

"Useful question."

"No."

"I know that now."

"You knew it then."

There was no proof of that.

Selene set the clipboard down. "Normal theory today. No practical circulation until tomorrow. If anything feels wrong, you report it."

"To Lena?"

"To me."

"Why?"

"Because Lena will heal whatever you do to yourself and then argue with you about it."

"That sounds efficient."

"And I will stop you before she has to."

Less efficient.

I hugged Dream Haven a little closer. Selene looked at the pillow, then at me.

"No cultivation."

"I heard you."

"Sleeping is allowed."

I looked up. There were moments in life when a person was reminded that kindness still existed.

"Professor."

"Don’t make me regret saying it."

I lay down immediately. Dream Haven settled beneath my head.

Selene closed her eyes. "After you leave."

I opened mine. Cruelty had returned. I sat up.

She picked up the clipboard and walked to the door.

"Professor. Am I done?"

"Yes."

Excellent. I stood and tucked Dream Haven beneath one arm. Selene’s hand was already on the door when she looked back.

"Lord Vortex."

I paused.

"Congratulations."

Then she left, and I stared at the closed door for a moment. That had been suspiciously kind.

I looked down at Dream Haven. "We should leave before she corrects herself."

[She cannot hear you.]

’Preventive measure.’

***

Roland was waiting in the corridor. That should have warned me.

He was leaning against the wall with both hands in his pockets and the expression people wore when something profitable had happened to them personally.

"You look healthy."

"I was hoping for worse."

"So it’s official?"

"No. Selene examined me for twenty minutes because she enjoys my company."

Roland smiled. I didn’t like that.

"D-Grey?"

"Unfortunately."

His smile widened. "Thank you."

I stopped. "For what?"

"Nothing. Congratulations." He started walking.

I followed, because suspicion creates energy where none previously existed.

"What did you do?"

"Nothing."

"That’s my word."

"I don’t think you own it."

"I use it more."

He made it three more steps before he laughed, and I stopped again.

"How much?"

That made him turn around. Interesting.

"How did you know there was money?"

"There wasn’t, until you looked guilty."

"I don’t look guilty."

"You look rich."

"I always look rich."

That was true. Annoyingly.

Roland sighed and reached into his coat, and a folded sheet appeared between two of his fingers. I took it from him. There were names on it, with dates beside them. Elizabeth’s name was first, then James, Sophie and Daphne. Mine was at the bottom. Most of the dates had been crossed out. One was circled.

Yesterday.

I looked at him. "You bet on me being last."

"I believed in you."

"To fail."

"To be consistent."

"How much?"

"That’s not important."

"Roland."

"A respectable amount." He started walking again. "You’re focusing on the wrong part."

"What’s the right part?"

"You finally reached D-Grey."

"You made money from my suffering."

"You were asleep through most of your suffering."

That was also true.

There were more names on the paper than I had expected. Cedric. Marren. Three people from Brightvale. Someone from Greywall whose handwriting looked familiar; Nadia, probably. Penelope’s name wasn’t there, which was good. Lena’s wasn’t either, which was better. Mira had entered with a date three weeks from now, which suggested she had either misunderstood how betting worked or expected me to stay D-Black out of spite.

I folded the paper. "Who started this?"

"Interesting question. The important thing is that gambling is against academy rules."

"So you started it."

"I said no such thing."

"You just confessed."

"That isn’t how confessions work."

"You’re the expert."

We reached the stairs just as a few Sanctuary students were coming up. The first one saw me, looked at Roland, and grinned. Then the second. Then the third.

I stopped. Roland kept going.

"How many people knew?"

He raised one hand without turning around. "Congratulations, Alash."

I considered throwing Dream Haven at him. I didn’t. SSS-rank artifacts deserved better.

***

By lunch, the whole residence knew. By the end of lunch, somebody had drawn a grey circle around the black numeral V on the common-room board. Cedric rubbed it out. Someone put it back. Cedric rubbed it out again. The third time, whoever was responsible waited until Cedric had sat down. I respected the commitment.

Penelope found me on the sofa, with Dream Haven expanded just enough to support my head and most of one shoulder.

"Congratulations."

"Thank you."

"Roland owes me twelve silver."

I opened my eyes. "You bet too?"

"No."

"Then why does he owe you twelve silver?"

"He borrowed it."

"For the betting pool?"

"Apparently."

I stared at her. Penelope sat in the chair opposite and opened a notebook.

"You funded my humiliation."

"I funded Roland."

"That sounds worse."

"It usually is."

I pulled Dream Haven a little higher. "Did you know about the pool?"

"Yes."

"And you said nothing."

"You didn’t ask."

I looked at her. She looked back. There were moments when I understood why she and the System got along.

"Why didn’t you bet?"

"You would have complained either way."

Fair.

"Who did you think would be last?"

"You."

I pushed myself up on one elbow. She kept looking at her notebook.

"Why?"

"You nap between cultivation sessions."

"Recovery is important."

"You also nap before them."

"Preventative recovery."

"And after."

"Post-recovery."

"And during theory."

"That’s a different problem."

One corner of her mouth moved, and I sank back down.

D-Grey. Everyone kept saying it. Congratulations, well done, finally. Roland had apparently made enough money to be unbearable for at least a week. I should have felt better, and I did, which was the irritating part. I was proud of it, quietly, in a way I had no intention of discussing. D-Black to D-Grey had taken months of work: slow cycles, rest days, Selene saying no, the System also saying no, and me asking both of them again in case either had changed its mind. Neither had. And now I was D-Grey. One step, and a real one.

Penelope looked up. "What?"

I realized I had been staring at the wall. "Nothing."

"You’ve been looking at that spot for almost a minute."

"It’s a good wall."

"You’ve seen it before."

"I appreciate consistency."

She waited. I had learned to dislike that from Theoran, and apparently it was spreading.

"I’m going to sleep."

"It’s the middle of the afternoon."

"Exactly. Excellent sleeping conditions."

She went back to her notebook. I closed my eyes, and for once nobody stopped me.

***

I made it all the way to my room before the System ruined the celebration.

It didn’t do it immediately; that would have been rude. It waited until I had closed the door, changed my clothes, expanded Dream Haven across the top half of the bed, moved it slightly to the left, decided slightly to the right had been better, fixed that, and lain down.

I had earned this. People celebrated milestones in different ways. Apparently some of them even threw parties, which sounded like turning an achievement into more work.

’Status.’

The familiar display opened.

Name: Alash Vortex

Age: 15

Core Rank: D-Grey

Potential: SSS

The rest followed: stats, attributes, skills. Healing, Barrier, Gravity, Aegis. I barely looked at any of it. My eyes went back to one line.

Core Rank: D-Grey.

I smiled, very slightly.

’Better?’

[Yes.]

Good.

I looked further down. The Main Quest was where it always was. Reach SS+. Establish the required bonds. The second part had changed over the past year. The first had not.

Below it sat the countdown. I had seen it hundreds of times, and usually I avoided reading the exact numbers. There was no benefit in knowing precisely how many years, months, days and inconvenient hours the world had left. That sort of precision ruined afternoons.

But today I looked.

The first number was three.

I stopped smiling.

Three years. Then the months, the days and the hours, the smaller numbers still moving, because apparently the end of the world respected accounting. When I was ten, the number had started much higher. The years had passed slowly whenever I looked at them and very quickly whenever I didn’t, and at some point five had become four.

Now there was a three.

I looked back at my core rank, and then at the countdown.

’Enough?’

[No.]

The answer came immediately. I waited. Nothing followed it. No joke, no remark about sleeping. Just no.

I closed the status, and the room came back: quiet, curtains drawn, Dream Haven under my head. Perfect conditions. I closed my eyes.

D-Grey. D-White. C-Black. C-Grey. C-White. B-Black. B-Grey. B-White. A-Black. A-Grey. A-White. S-Black. S-Grey. S-White. SS.

I opened my eyes. That had been a mistake.

I rolled onto my side. Maybe counting ranks worked like counting sheep, if you disliked yourself. I tried again and got as far as B-White before I stopped. There were too many. I already knew there were too many. Knowing something and lying in bed with it were different experiences.

D-Black to D-Grey had taken months, and D was supposed to be the easier part. Not easy; nothing involving Selene was easy. But easier. Higher ranks compressed more mana into the same core. Channels had to adapt. The body had to keep up. Thresholds grew harder. Every instructor who talked about advancement said the same thing in one form or another: progress slowed. Eventually.

Eventually had become an unpleasant word.

’How long?’

The System didn’t answer.

’You know what I’m asking.’

[Yes.]

’If I keep going like this.’

A pause. Not long. Just enough.

[Too long.]

I stared at the ceiling. ’Be specific.’

[No.]

’That isn’t specific.’

[It is sufficiently specific.]

’That isn’t how specific works.’

[You will not reach SS within the remaining time at your current rate of advancement.]

There it was. Clean, simple, unhelpful.

I pulled Dream Haven over my face. The dark underneath it was warmer, and usually that helped. It didn’t.

I hadn’t expected D-Grey to change the countdown. I wasn’t stupid enough for that. Probably. But I had expected it to change something. I had thought reaching the next step might make the climb look shorter, and instead it had done the opposite. Now I knew exactly how long one step could take.

I lowered the pillow.

’All five of us made D-Grey.’

[Yes.]

’That’s good.’

[Yes.]

’We’re ahead of normal first-years.’

[Considerably.]

’My potential is SSS.’

[Yes.]

’So...’

[No.]

I frowned. ’I didn’t ask anything.’

[You were going to.]

’You don’t know that.’

[You have been attempting the same argument for months.]

There was the System I knew. Normally I would have had an answer for it. Nothing useful arrived.

After a moment, it spoke again.

[Reaching D-Grey was not meaningless, Host.]

’I know.’

[You sound as though you do not.]

’I know it matters.’

And it did. I was stronger than I had been yesterday. My core was healthier, my channels had adapted, my mana was denser. Tomorrow, once Selene allowed it, I would start working toward D-White, and after that C-Black, and then the next one, and the next. There was a path. The problem was that paths took time.

A thin line of afternoon light showed through the middle of the curtains.

’I was going to celebrate.’

[You are lying in bed.]

’Exactly.’

[Then continue.]

’I can’t sleep.’

The silence that followed lasted long enough to become suspicious.

’Don’t.’

[I said nothing.]

’You’re thinking something.’

[...]

’You are.’

[This is unusual.]

’What is?’

[Something preventing you from sleeping.]

I considered being offended. Unfortunately, it was accurate.

’Maybe I’m not tired.’

[You complained about being awake six minutes ago.]

’Maybe I’ve changed.’

[In six minutes.]

’Growth can be sudden.’

[Your advancement history disagrees.]

I pulled Dream Haven back over my face, and the System went quiet. This time I appreciated it.

For a while I listened to nothing in particular. No cultivation hall, no Selene, no Roland making money out of my life, no Penelope turning pages. Just my own breathing and the faint sounds of Sanctuary through the wall. Someone laughed in the corridor. A door shut. Cedric told somebody not to run, and somebody ran anyway. Normal things. Good things.

Sanctuary was fine. I was D-Grey. The world was still protected, today at least.

I should have slept. Instead the ranks came back, one after another, and somewhere behind them the countdown kept moving.

Across two lives, sleep had won almost every argument I’d ever had with it. Ceremonies, lectures, things people insisted were important. It always won eventually.

I closed my eyes.

The ranks stayed there.