As always, Adil was right. The saints did their best to make Alex’s life miserable. Even though his strength increased at a rapid rate and he completed the combat challenges for the next semester within the first month, he kind of tried to maintain the reputation of an easygoing and friendly weirdo.

In order to do that he continued to have friendly spars with almost anyone who challenged him and for the most part it worked, but only with the regular students like him and some saint candidates. They had long forgotten the two guys who Alex killed and, truth to be said, everyone knew those were accidents that happened while Alex was actually being tortured.

The young saints didn’t care though. Beating Alex now and then under the pretext of sparring was not enough, especially because they strictly abode by the rules and didn’t use any mind tricks. Alex was not completely clear why, but his guess was that they had some special inside law and strict punishment for breaking it. Be as it may, under the orders of the saints, at least a couple regular students began to harass Alex using similar tactics the second dead guy used.

He got ‘blanked out’ while simply walking, during friendly spars with others and sometimes during the lectures while answering a teacher’s question. It all could be considered harmless pranking, but Jamil claimed they were set on making Alex’s life unbearable until he quit the academy on his own or in the best case scenario – lost his mind. The mind techniques those guys used were provided by one of the saints, Sharif, and, according to Jamil, he has been Malik’s best friend.

Alex found the whole situation mostly annoying and theoretically could live with it, but as the days went by the harassers became more and more skilled. He considered asking an advice from Adil, but the old man would clearly demand a price and Alex had his hands full already.

Since he was not very close to any of the teachers, the only other option was to turn to Nabia. In fact, Jamil also suggested that after being unable to help himself, but Alex was really reluctant to do so. In the end, after a struggle that lasted for a couple of months, he gave in – it was either him staying in the Qi pond permanently or learning how to deal with those pricks.

“No!” Was her immediate answer. In fact, she didn’t even listen to what Alex had to say and refused him half way.

“My lady! Princess! Please help the poor boy out! I would like to ask ...” Alex exaggeratedly begged and Nabia, who already turned her back to walk away, but after hearing him suddenly jerked around and took a swing at Alex’s face.

“What did you call me?” She hissed, annoyed her punch missed by a hair’s width.

Alex took a couple of steps back creating some distance between them in case he said something wrong again.

“I have always been polite to you!” He complained helplessly shrugging, “Never pestered like the others did and even avoided you to not get on your nerves, but you behave like a conceited princess or even the queen … I don’t know why I called you that and I’m sorry. In the end it was my bad for thinking you could actually help. Have a nice day! Please don’t kick me in the back.”

‘F*ck this.’ Alex thought while walking away, ‘How stupid I actually am? I barely am able to keep my calm around her! What was I thinking asking for help!’

The sweet scent of lilies always made him dizzy and dreamy, and he kept loosing concentration when she was around. During some spars she was spectating he got knocked out just because he took a too deep breath during the fight! And during the last two years he was always sitting on the top floors of the library just to avoid her! All this effort, but in the end he tried to approach her on his own only to experience a complete fiasco. A real nemesis!

“Fine! But I’ll kick your ass every day for a month!” Nabia suddenly said.

Alex was already dozen or so steps away, but could clearly hear annoyance in her voice. He slowly turned around and looked at her.

“But I didn’t even ask you …” He wanted to explain, but got interrupted again.

“Everyone knows there are some people who keep using mind techniques during your spars while mixing with the other spectators.” She said proudly raising her chin, “And you want my help in order to deal with them. Not everyone is as stupid as you …”

“There it is again.” This time Alex interrupted her and she immediately realized what he meant.

To not make the situation awkward or confrontational again, Alex patiently continued, “What would you say if we approached the problem like two independent business parties? We can make an agreement while still respecting each other, don’t you think? And I don’t intend to pretend to be of a similar social …”

“Fine!” She impatiently interrupted, “But I’ll …”

“Please, don’t say ‘kick you ass’.” Alex smiled back, “We can spar and you can try to win.”

“Do you really think you can go against me?” Nabia snorted.

“Honestly? With how I currently am, I don’t stand a chance.” Alex agreed, “But besides the skill issue there is another problem.”

“What?” She impatiently asked.

This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author's work.

“If I land a hit, where am I actually allowed to hit you?” Alex seriously said, “Do you see what I mean?”

Indeed, this was a problem every male student faced during these years. That was also the reason why the few girls almost never sparred or if they did, they tried to spar between themselves. And apparently this limitation irritated Nabia since she could not practice to fight against serious opponents.

“What do you want to suggest?” She asked in a low voice blushing all over.

“Swords.” Alex said only one word, but the girl’s eyes immediately lit up.

Even though she was moody, she was not stupid and guessed his meaning. Obviously they wouldn’t fight with real swords, but even while using wooden practice swords they would wear light protection gear thus eliminating the awkwardness of Alex attacking her.

Up until now the whole academy was focusing on hand to hand techniques, but sparring with weapons was not actually forbidden, except everyone had to use wooden ones. Most of the youths refused to spar with wooden sticks since it ‘diminished their style’ and ‘looked stupid’ thus the techniques were mostly trained solo while holding a real sword.

After a short discussion they agreed that Nabia will share all the information she knew about the mind techniques, except the techniques itself in exchange for ‘beating up’ Alex for three months. She refused to call the process any other way and in the end Alex gave in. Before parting he did ask her why all the hate towards him, but got only an arrogant snort in return and left in a slight despair with a thought ‘was I also like that in my previous life?’.

Nabia turned out to be merciless. Alex was not sure if he accidentally killed her puppy or sneezed on her lunch, but she did, in fact, began to beat him up on a daily basis. Even though the leather prevented breaking of bones and open injuries, the wooden swords that the girl used continuously broke leaving painful marks all over Alex’s body.

For the first half month the whole situation became the hottest topic in the academy and the most popular entertainment. This attention made Nabia especially annoyed and, of course, Alex was the one to suffer.

First of all, besides the Bond’s technique, he didn’t really know any other fighting styles. And the second – the girl obviously had practiced sword for years leaving Alex no other choice, but to act as a target dummy. Luckily he had the Qi pond that kept healing him up every night over and over.

But it was not all bad. Even if Nabia was stronger and didn’t directly teach Alex, he was not born for the first time and quickly began to absorb her exquisite style. He actually did practice hard and at the end of the first month they were almost evenly matched.

In her fury Nabia disappeared for few days and the next time she came out her residence, she was already a Qi warrior. Alex, of course, found it out only on the training grounds and the trashing he experienced during the first days began anew.

She was not the first student to become a Qi warrior, but definitely the youngest. Alex had no clue how she managed to condense her Qi in few days as the process usually took several months, but either she was preparing for a long time or had a special technique, he became the punching bag once again.

Since he had experienced how it was to be a Qi warrior, or in that world – a Qi master, once, Alex knew the process how to become one and after taking a break for almost ten days that he spent mostly soaking in the Qi pond, came out not much weaker than her while cursing his own idiocy for focusing too much on the soul particles while neglecting the growth of his physical body.

Alex’s guess was that because of some masochistic tendencies or unresolved ‘mommy issues’, he soon began to enjoy their morning practice. He even picked up several sword techniques that were available in the library to bring more variety to the sparring and with time Nabia seemed to soften up a little as well.

It was not like they were becoming close, or he could consider her a girlfriend material. Exactly the opposite – a thought of that happening made him wish to flee as far as possible and never return.

Even Adil once asked, “You do know she’s not the girl for you, right?”

It was obvious he knew her origins, but it didn’t matter much since Alex was not interested anyway. Their relationship was more that of a convenience while both slowly learned to coexist with each other. She had someone to spar with, while he worked as a punching bag in order to get information. The part of them both becoming stronger was a nice bonus that was actually never discussed.

“Contrary to the common misconception, trikuta has very little to do with the mind techniques.” When the three months were over, Nabia honored her part of the deal.

In a late evening they sat undisturbed at her residence on the Southern peak. It was the first time either of them visited the other, even though they were neighbors for years. For different reasons neither of them was willing to have a casual chat and she went directly to the point.

“The tricks that were played on you was the actual use of techniques that can be done by any talented person.” She proudly said obviously implying she was one of those, “And the only realistic way to protect yourself is to create your own soul brand.”

“Mhm.” Alex nodded and patiently waited for a further explanation, but the girl just sat there with a satisfied smile on her face.

After a minute Alex said, “And?”

“What ‘and’? That is it.” She shrugged.

“You got to be kidding me!” Alex barely suppressed the urge to kick her in the face, “Even you can’t be this evil! To beat someone up for nothing …”

“What do you mean, evil?! I never said my knowledge was something unique and special!” She actually got upset. Obviously she played him, but there was nothing he could do.

Alex took a deep breath, got up and slightly bowed.

“Thank you for sharing your knowledge. Have a nice life!” He said and turned to leave.

But before he could take a step, she said, “There is, of course, a theory …”

“Why the hell are you doing this to me?! What have I ever done to you?” Alex finally couldn’t stand it and exploded, “There are worlds in which we could be considered to be close friends, but you’re acting like a god damn sadist!”

“Don’t you dare …” She immediately got angry as well, but Alex interrupted.

“Or what? You know better than I that lately we are evenly matched – you can’t beat me up like before! You’re gonna do what? Ask your father’s help or something?”

But the next moment his vision turned black.