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Chapter 278 - Jurassic Valley (XXXV)
🕑 Added 2025-05-30 00:00:05 +0000 UTCHer mouth tasted like iron.
Ayu rubbed her fist over it and spat the blood onto the dirt, never taking her eyes off the beastman in front of her.
She was barefoot—each slow step letting her toes feel the warmth of the ground, the sound beneath it, the subtle hum of motion hiding inside the stillness.
She gripped her kukris tight, wrists loose, blades angled low. The two circled each other, assessing, measuring, waiting.
Then—
The earth cracked beneath her heel as she launched forward. Dust exploded behind her.
She reappeared just in front of him, chest low, a slicing blur at his thigh. He shifted back, narrowly avoiding the edge.
Ayu twisted mid-movement—her skin caught the kiss of wind as a counter-kick skimmed past her ribs.
She planted hard, pivoted, and drove her second blade toward his side.
Clang!
The strike was deflected. He followed through—his wrist flicking fast, aiming to catch her forearm.
But her hand was already gone, retracted before the danger ever touched her skin.
She ducked under the next strike and shot up, blade arcing toward his shoulder. He leaned back, but not far enough—her kukri grazed him. A thin line of blood bloomed across fur and skin.
He didn’t flinch.
Ayu bent at the waist—his elbow cracked through the space where her jaw had been.
She answered with a rising knee.
It landed, but he managed to mitigate the strike with a slight shift.
The beastman exhaled through his nose and spun.
She leaned, ducked, her feet sliding across the packed dirt.
Another trade.
She slashed high—he blocked.
Spun low—he jumped.
Ayu followed through, twisting, blade sweeping toward his ankle. He leapt again, light for his size, and landed behind her.
She spun to meet him.
Their blades clashed—short, sharp bursts. Each strike faster than the last, until the sounds blurred together.
She scored a cut along his cheek.
He slammed a fist into her ribs.
Both staggered back.
Her lungs burned, but she didn’t stop.
Ayu lunged—aggressive, relentless, letting momentum drive her next strike. He caught it, deflected, stepped inside her range and drove his shoulder into her gut.
Her body was already shifting to evade, but not in time—the impact sent her flying.
She landed hard, rolled twice, dirt catching in her breath.
She cursed, hands clawing the ground as she twisted—rotating mid-air and landing on her feet.
But—he was already there.
Another flurry. Dozens of strikes in half a second.
The motion came too fast for her body to fully evade.
She blocked some. Parried others. Dropped and rolled beneath the last as it sliced through the space where her throat had been.
She came up spinning, blade carving a sharp arc—
But he was no longer there.
He stepped to her blind side, elbow rising.
Her body was already twisting back, but it still slammed into her shoulder and knocked her sideways.
She grit her teeth, dropped to a knee, and slashed upward in a desperate cut meant to break the rhythm.
He caught her wrist.
Tight.
Just for a moment—enough.
She wrenched free, backed off, panting now, sweat streaking her temple.
He didn’t chase.
He waited.
Let her come.
She did.
Fast.
Angled low, she feinted toward his knee, then followed with a spinning slash aimed at his ribs.
He blocked both effortlessly.
And then—
A punch slammed into her side. Her body couldn’t keep up.
Air rushed from her lungs as she staggered.
He stepped in, let her move, and countered again. His palm hit her back. She fell forward and hit the ground.
Ayu rolled, scrambled up again, blades shaking in her grip.
The beastman was there waiting again.
Another clash. Another flurry.
She couldn't match him anymore.
His technique, his rhythm, his footwork—all much better than hers.
But still—she pushed until the last moment.
She threw a diagonal slash, reckless and desperate, trying to reset the flow.
He turned, avoided it clean, and stopped a fraction of an inch from her face—his knuckle hovering just over her nose.
Stillness.
He nodded once and stepped back.
Ayu stayed where she was, breathing hard, blades trembling slightly. Her muscles burned, her ribs ached, and her pride stung.
It was her twelfth loss in a row.
She looked at the beastman standing across from her. Broad-chested, calm, not a single break in his breathing. His striped fur was matted in places, but his stance hadn’t shifted—not once.
She turned her gaze and saw her master, Makoh, leaning against a tree in the distance. He didn’t look at her, didn’t speak… he didn’t have to.
Ayu took a deep breath.
Her hands adjusted on the hilts. Her arms still trembled. Her chest still heaved.
She raised her blades. Then… they started again.
And she lost.
And lost.
And lost.
Her knee hit the dirt. Her body bent forward, arms low, kukris nearly slipping from her fingers.
She was bruised, weak, sweating—caked in dust and blood.
Her arms shook. Her legs wobbled. Every breath came raw and uneven.
And yet—
She planted one hand on the ground.
Gritted her teeth.
And stood.
Her muscles screamed. Her bones ached. But she cursed her own body, cursed its failure, and forced herself upright.
She lifted her head—ready to go again.
But the elite beastman warrior wasn’t there.
A calm, familiar voice spoke.
“Follow me.”
Her master was already walking.
Ayu’s gaze was dizzy. Her legs heavy. But she pressed her spine straight and walked after him.
They walked for a long time.
The pain dulled. The cuts faded. Her body was quickly healing itself.
But the exhaustion stayed. Wrapped around her like a second skin. She ignored it.
She just kept moving.
She let herself feel again. Let her body open to the world.
Her bare feet read the ground—the cracks in the stone, the weight of each grain of dirt, the cool threads of grass against her toes.
She felt the wind brush each pore of her skin, drift through every strand of sweat-drenched hair.
She felt the wind.
And followed it.
Her nose picked apart every scent—iron from her own blood, salt from her sweat, damp leaves, fresh soil, the breath of nearby trees.
And yet—
She couldn’t pick up on him.
Her master left no scent. No sound. No trace.
Only her eyes told her he was still there.
To the rest of her senses… he simply wasn’t.
They walked for hours until finally, they stopped.
A hill. Small, but in these plains—rare. The view stretched wide in all directions, far beyond the horizon. Endless sky. Endless wind. Endless land. And at the top of that hill—
He sat down, legs crossed.
Ayu stepped forward and sat beside him. She crossed her legs, let her hands rest on her knees, and closed her eyes.
She wasn’t in pain. Not anymore. Just tired. The kind of tired that clung to her bones, slow and heavy. Her body told her to lie down. To rest. To sleep.
But she didn’t.
She breathed in through her nose, out through her mouth. No force. Just slow. Again. Again. Until her breathing settled into a rhythm that matched the quiet air around them.
Her heart slowed next. She felt it, not as a beat in her chest but as a soft pulse through her whole frame. Her shoulders eased. Her neck stopped holding tension.
Then she went inward.
She paid attention to each muscle—how it sat, how it tensed, how it softened with her breathing. Her arms hung calm now, though faint pressure lingered near the elbows. Her shoulders pulled slightly forward—she eased them back. Her legs, folded tight, still carried the echo of motion. Her thighs were full, warm with effort. Her calves, tight but settled. Her back stayed upright. She adjusted it slightly, finding where balance returned.
Then she moved deeper.
She followed the shape of her bones. She sensed each segment of her spine stacked with purpose. She felt how her chest held its shape through curved lengths that rose and fell with her breath. Her hips were strong, heavy, holding her still. Down through the legs, the thick weight-bearers sat secure. Joints slotted right. Ankles grounded.
Her arms matched. Long bones beneath skin, steady, firm. Wrists aligned. Fingers flexed just enough to rest, not grip. Every joint sat in its place. Nothing pressed out of line. Nothing dragged against her breath.
She moved deeper still.
She felt her lungs stretching open, full and steady. The air spread evenly, cool at first, then warm. Her heartbeat sounded soft and deep. Strong. It pulsed through her, reaching each edge in time. Her stomach sat quiet, not empty, not full. Inside her, the rest of it moved—fluid shifting, systems working, all on their own.
She saw how every part was linked.
One flow fed another. One pull eased the next.
All of it made sense. All of it was exactly where it needed to be. Such perfection in the inner body… such a quiet, beautiful harmony. It amazed her.
Ayu took a deeper breath and studied how it all shifted with the motion of air. Muscles adjusting. Bones settling. Organs giving space.
Then she went way deeper.
She focused on her body nodes and the smaller subnodes branching from them—the entire system she had trained, refined, and shaped to reach the Second Body State. She traced their current, the flow between them. The rhythm they shared with her natural body.
It wasn’t separate.
The system enhanced what was already there—resilience, stability, control. Not overpowering, not forcing. Just... aligning.
Balance. That word again.
Balance and flow.
Her master’s favorite.
She remembered the first day he brought her to sit in silence beneath the canopy, when she had still burned with anger from her losses.
He had crouched beside her, calm as ever, and said—
“Still river runs deepest.”
She had frowned then. No idea where he was going.
But he had simply sat down, eyes closed, and kept speaking.
“Storms pass. Winds change. Fire burns fast. But the river... the river is always there. Moving. Quiet. Powerful.”
More strange words.
“Your body is not a weapon,” he said. “It is a path.”
She hadn’t understood then.
She didn’t really understand now either, but... she was starting to. Maybe. Kind of.
“Control comes from knowing,” he had told her. “But mastery comes from trust.”
“Let go of fighting the wave. Be the wave.”
And… that was it. Silence.
It had been the same for the last week or two. Killing Xok’al after waking up, facing elite beastman warriors in dozens of matches where she lost and lost, and then meditating somewhere for hours, and finally—hunt and sleep.
Each session lasted two days instead of one… and yes, she only ate now once every two days… nearly a whole sabre tiger at that.
And here she found herself again. Yet… she couldn’t deny she was improving. A lot.
The path towards the Third Body State, which involved nothing less than directly integrating micro nodes in every cell of her body and linking each to a subnode, was miles away and seemed plainly impossible to reach but… the balance… that weird concept of her master… didn’t seem that weird anymore.
It was interesting. How you find so many things when you just… sit down and ‘feel’. Tiny things she used to ignore before, things that seemed useless to ponder and worry about and yet… every little thing… existed for a reason. And that reason gave birth to the flow, and the flow… to the balance.
Her master was really getting into her head, it seemed.
But… he was a good master. Perhaps she acknowledged him at the start just for the sake of gaining power and position, and searching for her friends, but as days went on, she felt different about him. That dedication, that state of mind, and that selfless help…
Makoh was a good person and a fantastic master.
Now she… wasn’t exactly the best student.
But she would be… she had to be.
Comments
Silver Beard
Confess I'm more interested in the underground facility; but I gave it a quick skim and I know I'll come back and read it again another day.
