After finishing his morning meditation, Sam got up to wash his face again. “Today is going to be hard,” he confided in the man in the mirror, who was consciously trying to force a smile upon his face. The man in question was, obviously, if unfortunately Sam. Unfortunately for who, though? Because he couldn’t keep attributing the misfortune to the blameless Web. In fact, he could scarcely think of anything more damaging to his psyche and self-confidence than to keep actively reinforcing that line of thought. Unfortunately for him then. For the hardship he had, has, and will have to endure on a daily basis until reaching his ultimate goal, whatever that will turn out to be.

Sam didn’t even know what he was most afraid of in the coming day. Well, that’s not strictly true. He was well aware that most of his worries stemmed from the imminent workout that he will have to endure, that much was obvious. But the actual way in which anxiety had contorted his fears was much more nefarious. Because he was also worried that he wasn’t worried enough about the latter aspects of the day. That, when he’ll return to his lessons with Dan, he’ll find himself in trouble where yesterday there were none.

“Then again…” He slapped himself on the cheeks before stepping back from the mirror. “It’s really just the exercise that I’m worried about. Everything else is irrational enough for me to be able to disregard it without much effort… At least as it is now, before I’ve had the chance to obsessively fixate on it for no discernible reason.” Such a possibility, even with his new body, was nowhere close to zero as he would’ve wished it to be.

“Fuck! Enough with the self-therapy bullshit!” he muttered as he reentered the room and started getting dressed, still not cognizant of the fuck that his talking aloud was also doing its part in feeding his morning psychological frenzy. “You’re just butthurt because you’re still sore from yesterday. It’s all physical. Nothing more to see here, folks. Nope. Just shut up and get to cultivating.” And while he did shut up promptly, cultivating was slower to come, as he had a harder time with the first stage of gathering than usual.

Midway through the second cycle, he slapped himself on the forehead, this time actually putting some force behind the act. “Idiot,” he muttered. He had gone back to the old way of doing the first stage. As though yesterday didn’t happen and he hadn’t spent most of dinner gloating to Felix that he was great at seeking. Steeling his mind (he had already lost the cycle), he turned it outwards, guided by the same instinct that allowed him to follow Dan’s guidance so easily yesterday. When his timer signaled the session over and brought him back to his senses, it also signaled the death throes of Sam’s most prominent (if very irrational) worry of the morning. He was just as good at his newly learned gathering techniques today as he was last night when he put them into independent practice for the first time.

Allowing himself a smile that held more pride than he was used to, he grabbed his things and set out to meet with Sarah. The fact that even just going down the stairs made his sore body react negatively was enough to erase the satisfaction from his face and the happiness from his mind. Although, the fact that it wasn’t that bad—not as bad as it was yesterday, and certainly not as bad as some days from his previous life—was enough to settle his mood on, at the very least, cautiously optimistic.

Sarah was already waiting for him outside. It seemed as though every weekday they were alternating between who was the one to wait for the other. Sam hoped that was unintentional and not a conscious decision by Sarah in order to appear less concerned with Sam. He only held a small hope, though, as he was pretty much always there at the same time.

“Good morning,” he greeted Sarah.

“Good morning.” She smiled at him and started walking towards the gym. “How are you feeling?”

“Sure you don’t want to further limit that question’s parameters?”

“Sam.”

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding. I’m feeling fine. Physically, a little sore, but hopefully, nothing that will prevent you from abusing me today as well.”

“Abusing you? Is that what I’ve been doing in the last two weeks?”

“Well, not during the last week, no. That’s the whole point of why we’re changing the workouts’ difficulty, after all.”

“OK, so when you’re having a hard time, it means I’m abusing you. But after you get used to it, when it stops being hard, it also stops counting as abuse?”

“Pretty much. The only correction I’d make is to say that I’m always having a hard time, and it’s just a question of whether it’s very hard or just regular hard. But don’t worry, I’m talking about abuse in the most Montaignest of ways. As in it being a very positive event, necessary for me becoming who I want to be as an adult.”

“Is it just me or are you more prone to name dropping in the morning?”

“It’s just you. As a wannabe Heideggerian I am always trying to insert dead philosophers into my conversations, no matter the time of day.”

“As long as you’re not trying to insert any modern-day politicians. I think Felix had more than his fill of that yesterday.”

“Eh… It’s not as fun to joke about politicians when they no longer have the power to ruin your life and make your world an apocalyptic—or even worse, totalitarian—shithole. Plus, I don’t know anything about any modern day politicians.”

“What about Farris?”

“Huh. I suppose he does count as a politician. But in that case, shouldn’t I also count Esther and any other Ruler I’ve heard about as one?

Sarah shrugged. “Up to you. Most people differentiate between military persons and politicians.”

“Well, there’s definitely a debate to be had there. But why are we hearkening back to yesterday’s discussion when Felix isn’t here to complain about it?”

“Because we’re nice people?”

“Nuh huh. No way. I’m not going to let you put me in the same group as you are when under that specification. I care about you way too much to let you disparage yourself like that.”

She smiled. “I could say the same thing about what you just said.”

“You could. But then I’d have to call you out as a dirty liar… Which might actually bring you down a notch—if we’re taking a deontological position—and make the argument a moot one.”

“Oh god,” Felix said with a groan, as he and Yvessa joined them. “He’s already droning about philosophy?”

Sam clapped him on his shoulder. “That was a one and done. Just wanted to get it all out of my system before we met up.”

“How nice of you…”

“It really is.”

Yvessa gestured at the building. “Let’s head in? If we really are trying to stop wasting so much time in pointless conversation.” Sam gave her a thumb ups from behind Felix’s back and in they went.

“So, no complaining today, then, Sam?” Felix asked.

“No, sir.”

“I guess yesterday wasn’t that hard after all?”

“You were there, asshole; you saw me coming apart at the seams, didn’t you? Not to mention that Sarah had to help me up the fucking stairs again. You know how humiliating that would have been for a regular, self-respecting person to be seen like that twice in two weeks?”

“Of course I don’t. I’m so far removed from that happening to me that even the theoretical scenario is impossible for someone as amazing as me to imagine.”

“God, I hope you get your legs broken before we finish our studies. I’ll be so nice and caring to you that you’ll want to vomit.”

“Are you trying to imply something about Sarah?”

“I wish I was. She wouldn’t princess carry me, you know?”

“Of course not. We call it royal carry nowadays.”

“Ugh… how far will PC culture go? Now we can’t disparage princesses anymore? Is that why you didn’t carry me up the stairs?” he asked Sarah.

She relented to him a half-amused chuckle. “You know very well that it’s not. Plus, don’t be so down on yourself. You were doing much better yesterday than compared to two weeks ago. You barely needed my support.”

Felix clapped him on the shoulder. “Way to go, Sam… Now, if that’s not personal progress, I don’t know what is.”

“How about not needing any help climbing the stairs after a workout at all?” Yvessa suggested.

“She’s got a point. I take my sarcastic comment back.”

Sam would’ve liked to make his own sarcastic comment instead, but remembering his nascent promise to Yvessa, he bit it down so nothing would delay them from starting their warm-up. Their warm-up once again. It seemed that the slight variation between the pre-workout morning routine and the evening routine was not enough to prevent Sarah from enrolling him in the full version of both. Which was really unfair, because today’s warm-up was way harder than yesterday’s. Although that might’ve been just his subjectivity making the comparison; not taking into account how his fatigued body might impact his judgment.

Thankfully, the workout itself, despite also increasing in difficulty, was easier on Sam’s body than yesterday’s exertion. Or, it could’ve been, once again, just his own prejudices talking. He always had the hardest time with cardio training, after all. Sitting up from his last repetition of the set, he looked to find Felix resting next to him, having finished the very same number of identical motions (although, the number of his sets and, much more importantly, the weight for each one, was way beyond Sam’s current capabilities).

Felix smirked at him—his friendly-jovial smirk, not his friendly-sarcastic one. “So,” he said, “how does our fair prince fare against this new hardship under the light of day?”

Sam returned his own smirk. “Took you long to come up with that?”

“All of the last set. The exhilaration I felt putting ‘fair’ and ‘fare’ together in the same sentence almost made me throw up the barbell.”

“And what a worthwhile trade that would’ve been. Strike that. I’d say it would be no trade at all if the weights managed to fly far enough to hit your legs.”

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

“I think you’re better off waiting until you’re strong enough to royal carry me in order to fully capitalize on such a ludicrous occurrence. Didn’t answer my question though…”

“Sarah put you on some sort of Sam watch duty?”

Felix nodded with a grunt as he laid back down on the bench. “Of a sort. She thought that you’d be more honest if the question came from either me or Yvessa, who ‘lost’ the coin flip. Still, you’re looking less ragged than yesterday. Would I be correct to say today’s easier?”

Sam nodded before realizing that Felix couldn’t see him. “Yeah, that’s a fair assessment. I was just thinking about how I always had an easier time with lifting weights when compared to running. You get breaks in between. You can do it in a controlled environment. But most importantly, the increase in difficulty feels more gradual.”

“Yeah,” Felix said before taking a drink from his bottle. “I can see how that makes sense. Alright, c’mon now, chop-chop, you’ve got your next sets to get to, no?”

Sam gave him a middle finger but still got up to go fetch some of the heavier than a week ago, but still rarely used dumbbells. More than half an hour later, with the weights portion of the workout behind him, Sam was reconsidering his position on today’s relative ease. If I knew how much pain I was going to be feeling right now, it would’ve been way harder to get up in the morning. He crashed down next to Felix and Yvessa. Thankfully, Sarah allowed him a longer break before the last stretch of his routine in the form of waiting on the two to finish their own weightlifting routine. Sarah, in turn, was off doing her own longer routine, one that ensured they only had to wait on her for only five minutes on average, after taking into account her short showers and Felix’s long ones.

“Cone to think of it,” Sam said. “I never asked you why you guys never work out as hard as Sarah.”

Felix shrugged. “We don’t need to… For our age and level, we’re already performing in the top percentile in all categories.”

“All categories?”

“For academy cadets. Obviously, if we’re going to go up against specialized athletes, we won’t necessarily be at the top.”

“And,” Yvessa said, “if it’s swimming, Felix’s will also be way below at the bottom.”

“Swimming, really?” Sam asked.

“Yeah, so what? I don’t like swimming,” Felix said. “I have also never ridden a horse or tried pole vaulting. I don’t need to do any of those things as a solider, right?”

“You don’t need to know how to swim?”

“I know how to swim, and that’s probably not even necessary for most front-worlds. There’s a reason the entirety Terran Republic Navy is solely under the jurisdiction of Home Command.”

“God, I how love when people try to explain to me what they see as common knowledge by saying the reason for that is common knowledge.”

Felix laughed. “My bad. You got what I’m saying, though.”

“That’s because I already knew about Sea Watch. So you’re saying the reason why Sarah is working out harder than you is because she’s a year older and a level higher?”

“Nope. The reason is that she’s a fitness junkie.”

“All of you are fitness junkies. You’re working out at least twelve times a week. You’re probably spending more than an entire day’s worth of time every week doing physical exercise in some fashion.”

“Sure. But we don’t enjoy it as much as Sarah does. At least, I don’t. I’ll never speak for Yvessa, of course.”

She rolled her eyes at him. “Way too late. Plus, I enjoy physical exercise for exercise’s sake even less than you do. Once I can, I’ll just be skipping it completely.”

“You can do that?” Sam asked, eyes twinkling.

“Rulers can do that,” Felix said. “For regular high levels, the ability to no longer need to work out, and still maintain top combat shape, is much less assured. A lot of complex patterns are required in order to make that a reality.”

“That’s my hopes dashed then.”

Yvessa chuckled. “You were hoping that it was a simple level 3 pattern and the only reason Sarah skipped it was because she loves working out?”

“Hmm… no. But that would’ve been a good dream to have, for the five seconds of its lifetime. Still, if we’re already dreaming, then why not wish for a way out in half a year, when I can finally imprint, instead of in two-and-a-half years when I’ll be level 3?”

“Man…” Felix said, “if you actually managed to hit level 3 in two-and-a-half years, that’d gotta be some kind of record.”

“It’s not,” Sam and Yvessa said at the same time. “The first Taken always had the Harots they killed to take energy from,” Yvessa explained.

“Right…” Felix nodded before giving Sam a thumbs up. “Good for you, learning stuff that isn’t common knowledge.”

“I can’t accept that compliment, I’m afraid,” Sam said. “I only learned that stuff during an anxious spiral. Wanted to see how those that came before me matched up to me.”

“Well, I’m willing to bet none of them had to work out as hard as you after only two weeks of having their new bodies.”

“They were dropped into a war…”

“Eh… I know from personal experience and public military reports that plenty of soldiers, even very skilled ones, don’t exercise as much as they should. Plus, stop being such a sourpuss. You managed the new workouts just fine, right?”

“Not yet,” Yvessa said as she stood up. “C’mon, Sam, let’s go. There’s still abdomen and stenches to do before you can pat yourself on the back.” Sam sighed and followed her.

Some time later, with his own workout done and Felix’s and Yvessa’s on the last leg of theirs, he left them to go grab a shower. Hopefully, one that will somehow manage to do away with the pain his body was feeling. I’m taking it all back, he inwardly moaned as he stepped under the hot water. Today was just as hard as yesterday. Fucking bullshit. Can’t believe I let myself think that today wasn’t going to be as hard as I feared. Always with the same fucking conceit. Ugh… and of course, even if I managed everything today, it just pushes the ball of worry to tomorrow. And it’ll be like that all the way to the end of the week. If we’re optimistic. If not, we might as well just keep it rolling all the way to next week; nursing the anxiety until it’ll be time for me to go up a physical notch again.

Then again… this shower makes the whole bloody workout almost feel worth it. He reclined against the wall, legs begging him to let them rest. Almost. He sighed. A regular timed shower later, and he could finally let his legs have their vaunted respite as he sat down on a bench outside of the gym building. Back to the grind, he thought as he took out his phone and donned his headphones. He was making headway, even with the hectic schedule of last week. To be fair, it was more the schedule’s existence that prevented him from dedicating as much time to his playlist duty as before, rather than its so-called hecticness. As Sam was reluctant to make use of his now fully sorted leisure time for such a “low cost activity.” Preferring to keep it for times such as these, when he didn’t have much time to embark on something that could be categorized as “better to do.”

Some time later, he looked up as Yvessa set next to him. “Have you passed a thousand already?” she asked.

“Yep, last Friday. But progress has been slowing down.”

“Look on the bright side. You also have these two-and-a-half years to make up your playlist. Plenty of time to finish the job.”

“Well, one never finishes working on their playlist. But I’m hoping that I’ll be able to finish restoring it way before that mark. Why only two-and-a-half years, though? We don’t have internet during Military Training?”

“Whenever we’re not at the front, we’re going to be training for deployment there.”

“So?”

She stared at him for a couple of seconds before shrugging. “They’ll take our phones for the entire first two months of training, except for an hour on the weekend. And even afterwards, for at least a couple of months, our access to electronic devices will be greatly curtailed.”

“Damn… I knew there was a reason I kept repressing the thought of what happens after the academy. That might actually prove to be the hardest challenge I’m going to have to face.”

“You’ll make it through.”

“Maybe I will, but what about you? If we do end up there at the same time, that’ll mean that I’m going to use you and Felix as entertainment substitutes.”

“As opposed to what you’re doing now? Wasn’t it exactly two weeks ago when you had me accompany you to your dorm for that very reason?”

“It sure was. Now think if that was every free moment of your day…”

“I shudder at the thought.”

“What’s that?” Felix asked as he sat down to join them as well—good thing they made the benches here larger than Sam was used to. “Did he go back to making jokes about the two of us as a couple?”

Sam guffawed. “What a preposterous claim! I stopped making those kinds of jibes ages ago.”

“About a week, but OK.”

“Almost half of my life.”

“Sam was just telling me about the dread fate that awaits the two of us during Military Training,” Yvessa said. “How we’ll be the sole source of entertainment available to him when phones won’t be allowed.”

“What? Can’t you read books?” Felix asked Sam.

“Well she said that all electronic devices will be under curfew. And I’m way too opinionated on the subject to allow myself to crawl back to physical books.”

“What about all the textbooks?”

“That’s different.”

“How?”

“In the same way that I have no problem spending three hours staring at the PC, reading some wish-fulfillment webnovel with a protagonist who thinks way too much of himself, all in one session, and for five days of the week. But I have to force myself to spend an hour reading the few measly articles required for my university courses in the following week. An hour that, by the way, should be taking much longer, but I’m not strong enough to force myself to read properly.”

“You seem to be doing fine with the textbooks so far,” Yvessa remarked.

“Yeah… Let’s just go with the explanation least positive towards myself and say that I find the current material, on average, more interesting than reading modern critiques of Weber’s theory of leadership.”

“Ugh,” Felix groaned. “I thought you got it all out of your system already. One fucking day without name dropping, Sam. Is that too much to ask?”

“Yes… But look at it this way. By the time we start our Military Training and the name dropping doctrine really intensifies, you’ll be way more familiar with the names being dropped.”

“Oh great. It’d be like I have evolved to be immune to radiation because I had so many nuclear bombs dropped on me.”

“Sounds like a good deal to me.”

“In that analogy,” Yvessa started, “will you also become radioactive yourself? So that because of Sam, people will stay away from you?”

“It does now!” Sam nodded.

“I have got to make some new friends,” Felix murmured.

“You could also get Sam some new friends,” Yvessa said.

“Maybe so. Ah, and here comes one just now.”

“She’s already his friend. And she won’t help you because she won’t be there with us.”

“Why are all of you just staring at me?” Sarah asked from above them.

“A better question,” Sam said, “is why we just let you walk over here without getting up, as would be polite.”

“You’re still not getting up.”

“Yeah, well… I’m weary and in pain. I don’t know what these twos’ excuse is.”

“C’mon ‘weary and in pain,’” Felix said as he got up. “Let’s go grab you some food and us some quiet time.”

Felix only got half of his wish, and through no fault of Sam. Well, no direct fault of Sam. Sarah spent most of breakfast lecturing Sam on the none-magical, yet still practical, aspects of cultivating. Both Yvessa and Felix joined the conversation with their own tips and details of their personal practice as well. “So,” Sam said once he finished eating, “overall, there isn’t all that much difference between seekers and holders?”

“Not in your day-to-day gathering, no,” Yvessa said. “If you’re not trying anything new, and you’re just as good with your holding technique as someone using an equal seeking technique, your first stage will be roughly identical to them. The difference comes out when you’re trying to improve your techniques themselves; moving on to other more complex techniques and so on.”

“But aren’t I constantly training in gathering by seeking, simply by… gathering that way?”

“Sure,” Felix said, “but it’s the difference between becoming a better artist by doodling for fun and actively trying to become better by learning about shading and color composition. It’s the difference between improving in doing something due to sheer rote repetition and due to putting your foot down and consciously trying to improve.”

Yvessa nodded. “Plus, you won’t keep using the same basic technique you’re using now. Practicing it for ten years might make you a master at using it, but it will take much longer to make you level 8. And it will only provide auxiliary help when you’re trying to advance to other, more complex techniques.”

“Well I don’t think advancing to any other technique is in the cards for me anytime soon,” Sam said.

“Not until you hit level 1,” Sarah agreed. “Dan will probably introduce some small changes, derivatives, to your technique when it becomes appropriate. But it’ll still be pretty much the same seeking and excavating technique.”

“So your level has something to do with how complex a method you can use for gathering?”

“Not at all. But as long as your core is solid, using any more advanced technique will be pretty hard. So better stay with the fundamentals and use that time for something else.”

“Is that you talking, or common sense?”

“Both. But if you don’t trust me, ask Dan.”

“I trust you,” he assured her. And he did. The fact that he asked Dan for his own take on the subject, twenty minutes later, had nothing to do with his confidence in Sarah and all to do with his anxiety-prone personality seeking to find multiple sources of confirmation and approval for every future action. Dan agreed with Sarah’s words, both that it was common sense to wait until your core becomes fragmented before moving on to any other gathering technique, and also that that was the plan for Sam.

“Besides,” Dan said, “you still have plenty to improve in with the fundamental techniques. Don’t think that just because you’re natural at seeking that your current application of it isn’t anything more than abysmal. We still have a long way to go before the day in which, even were you level 1, we could advance you to other techniques. Especially since I want to finish our lessons’ focus on gathering in another two or three weeks, then going down to practicing gathering together only on two days of the week.”

“Won’t that lower the chances of me making level 1 by the year’s end?”

“Indeed. But I already took that into consideration making your schedule. As long as you stick to cultivating during your ‘free time’ in the same vigor as in our time together, you should be more than fine. In any case, we’ll be checking your progress at regular intervals and will adjust accordingly, if necessary.”

Sam nodded sullenly. Yep, no one else to blame if you end up fucking up but yourself.