The sun hadn’t yet risen. There was only the soft gray light of pre-dawn touching the ground. And it was cold, bitterly cold.

Liam shivered a little as he made his way through the small outcropping of trees that they had rested their wagons against for the night. He couldn’t understand why the man wanted to meet so early.

The pain in his back and his legs had faded a little over the last two days. Jerem and the rest of his wagon mates had made quite the tumult when he had entered their wagon late at night looking the way he did.

They had dragged him personally to one of the caravan’s doctors, banging against his door until he finally dragged himself out of sleep. The man had answered grumbling, but after Jerem’s and the others continued the verbal assault, finally agreed to take Liam in.

“What the hell happened to you?” The doctor had asked him while inspecting him in the patient room in his wagon.

“Got into a little scuffle.”

The man had raised an eyebrow. “A little scuffle, eh? Either some wild beast pounced over you, or you have found yourself a woman that is a little too much to handle.”

Liam had grit his teeth as the doctor applied an alcohol solution over his wounds. Afterward, the man had wanted to give Liam a few more pills, but after Liam’s continued insistence that the pain was fine and manageable, the doctor hadn’t pushed further. At the time Liam had really thought that, but his perception changed when the after-effects of the soldier pill wore off.

For over a whole day, he hadn’t been able to move properly without his back erupting in pain. He had managed though, it wasn’t the first time Liam had suffered the aftereffects of a little scuffle.

His forearms were mostly fine. Although he had gotten quite a few gashes there, they hadn’t been particularly deep. His leg and back were still hurting him, but Liam still shuffled his way through the forest.

What was bugging him the most though, was the fact that he hadn’t had a chance to try out his newest skill yet. From what he glimpsed of its message and text, it seemed interesting to say the least.

[Gravity Field] - Shape the gravitational layer in your immediate surroundings. Affects a circular area of effect, with diminished effects upon greater distance. Strength of gravitational field and distance will increase as this skill levels.]

Liam wasn’t sure what that gravitational field would look like, but if the effectiveness of the new skills on the cat was any indicator, then this could become quite a strong skill.

When he arrived at the little clearing in the forest, Marten of course was already waiting for him. The man stood in the middle of the clearing, staring off into nowhere. His gaze fell upon Liam as soon as he stepped into the clearing.

“You’re behind it aren’t you?” Marten greeted him at their session.

Liam was taken aback by the unusual greeting. “Behind what?”

“You’re the mysterious cultivator they are talking about, right?” A sly smile played over his lips. “The one Bilby is looking for?”

Liam clasped a hand to the back of his neck. “I might be.”

“That’s funny,” he snorted. “Serves that self-centered asshole right.”

“Did he say why he was looking for me?” Liam asked, surprised.

“No, he didn’t give any details. But whatever you did is perfectly fine by me. Any sort of reason that gets him riled up is a good reason,” he held up a hand to stall Liam. “You don’t need to tell me, I don’t want to be involved. I’m just saying I love it.”

Liam chuckled. “Well, good then.”

He hadn’t wanted to tell Marten the whole story behind it in the first place. Even though his mild dislike of Bilby had grown to a rather strong dislike of the man, he still didn’t want to snitch on him. Robbing and burning his dangerous drugs was one thing, but you simply didn’t snitch on someone. Well at least not without even more provocation.

Liam glanced around the clearing and then turned his eyes towards Marten.

“Where do we start?” He asked, enthusiastic. “Will we throw fireballs? Will you show me how to use mana shields or punch through trees?”

“Slow down a little,” Marten said. “This is not quite where we are at yet.”

Liam squinted his eyes. “You said you would train me in cultivation.”

“I said I would train you alright, but there is a fine line between helping a young man because he desperately needs some help, and unveiling all the hard-earned secrets of cultivation I have gathered over the years. I don’t know you enough for that and I’m not sure I ever will.”

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Oh,” Liam’s mood dampened a little. “So what will you teach me then?”

“See that’s the good part. I will train you in the one thing that will be most useful in your career as a cultivator.”

He paused for a moment, building anticipation.

“I will teach you how to survive.”

Liam wanted to scoff at first. If there was one thing he had always been competent in, it was surviving. He couldn’t count how many friends he had lost over the years to the various dangers of the streets, while he always pulled through. Sometimes it was grit, sometimes smarts, and sometimes luck.

But then he thought back to his encounter with the noble. To his escape attempt from the Seekers. And to the Nightshade Crawler, as Liam had learned later was the name of the cat he had fought.

“When do we start?”

“Today.”

A smile played over his lips.

As it turned out, a big part of Marten’s training involved physical exercise. Hard physical exercise.

The next two hours were the hardest of Liam’s life. They consisted mostly of various bodyweight exercises. Liam had done push-ups until his arms had almost fallen off. Marten had counted them out, but after the third hundredth repetition, Liam's gasping for air had sounded over that.

There had also been squats and crunches and various other forms of movement meticulously designed to strain Liam’s body to the limit. But somewhere within those first hundred push-ups, Liam's mind had clicked itself off, leaving him to run on autopilot.

Which had made the last part of their training even more difficult.

The man had also taken him through a form of exercise very similar to the ones he had done a few days ago. Only instead of swinging an oversized sword, Liam made a series of punches and kicks in the air.

It had looked deceptively simple when Marten had demonstrated it, but Liam had trouble just remembering all of the parts. Every few movements the man would interrupt him.

“That’s wrong.”

“More weight on the back foot.”

“Keep your balance.”

“Punch like you mean it!”

“Start over.”

His legs were strained from the exercises before and his arms felt heavy. He was so soaked in sweat that he felt like he carried an extra five kilograms with him, and more than once his vision swam a little in front of his eyes.

The process of interruption repeated itself so many times that Liam was about to call it quits due to frustration a lot of times. If Marten hadn’t demonstrated it with incredible ease and grace, he would’ve believed the series of movements was utterly impossible.

“This is the very first Kata my teacher showed me back in the day,” he said at some point. “It is supposed to be the entrance into the deeper teaching of combat. Made to make you feel how movements are supposed to feel like. Real movements. This kata will show you how to throw a punch and land a kick. Two things that will save your life far more times in the real world than having a flashy fireball skill.”

There was something reassuring about the man’s voice. Something proved by Liam’s own experience of seeing the man fight. He hadn’t used any flashy techniques or had overly relied on his skills like Bilby and the rest of the cultivators, but still, he had been the most effective of them.

And so he continued. For the better part of an hour Liam fought to keep his body standing and his mind conscious, until finally, Marten called a stop to the practice.

“That’s enough for today.”

Having waited for these words for an eternity, Liam slumped back against one of the trees immediately and started gasping for air.

“That was pathetic,” Marten shook his head in amusement.

Liam couldn’t deny it. To defend his honor though, he brought forth a series of coughs with a mean intonation.

“Don’t worry, I was the same back when I first did it,” Marten thought for a second. “Well not as pathetic. But close.”

“Wow, that's strangely not encouraging to hear at all,” Liam said, although he was too exhausted to put any energy into his irony.

Marten chuckled. “You will get there.”

Of course, I will get there, but when? Liam thought.

“By the way,” Marten said. “You really shouldn’t use your skills today.”

“Why?”

“Because of a thing called mana signature. Whenever a cultivator uses their abilities, a small bit of their mana flows out into the ambient mana around them, that’s how other cultivators and even some beasts in the wild can find you. Usually, that’s a subtle thing and you can only notice it if you practice paying attention to it. But yours, yours sticks out like a flare light in the darkness.”

Liam thought for a second. “Is that how you found me in the forest?”

“Yes. You didn’t make it hard to find you,” Marten chuckled. “ But don’t worry, the mana sensing of the other cultivators is… let's say a little underdeveloped so you shouldn’t worry about them having noticed you before. Now that Bilby is actively looking out though he might be more meticulous.”

He was a little grateful that he hadn’t found the time to practice his new skill now.

“But how will I practice my skills then? I need to level them.” There was a troubled look on Liam’s face.

“Always so impatient,” an amused smile played over Marten’s lips. “I will show you a technique to mask your signature and make it harder to recognize, but we won’t have time for that today. We can start on that tomorrow if you want after we complete the physical exercise of course.”

In fact, during their training, the faint gray of early morning had slowly drawn back to reveal an orange-touched sky. The first sun rays were already breaking out over the treetops, and soon the rest of the caravan would be awake.

Liam shuddered thinking that the same thing was waiting for him the next day. But he would be ready for it. He needed to.

After Marten had left Liam stayed seated for a while and waited for some strength to return to his legs. When it finally did, he got up and walked back towards the caravan.

He couldn’t practice his skills, but he still had another thing on his agenda before the caravan set out for the day. A thing he didn’t want to put off any longer.