Leo sat with that for a long moment. The scale of what Newmont had described pressed down on him. Every powerful cultivator in the country, vying for immortality. And Leo felt as though he was the only thing standing in the way.

  "Is it a bad thing if I win? Won't that piss off the most powerful cultivators on Earth?"

  Newmont's mouth twitched.

  "Ultimately, Earth has time," he said. "The high-tier cultivators can afford to wait decades. Centuries. If they lose now, they'll at least feel like they accomplished something by starting the conversation."

  The pragmatism of it settled into Leo's chest like cold water. He wasn't saving the world. He was buying time. For people like Newmont, who needed the extra years to catch up.

  He filed that away and said nothing.

  Newmont read the silence correctly. He straightened in his chair, and his tone shifted.

  "But the reason I called you here today is to discuss more than politics. We need to talk about the fight itself. Specifically, adding one more person to the need-to-know list."

  Leo's attention sharpened.

  "Right now, only myself, you, Williams, Vivian, and Matt know about the operation. Vivian and Matt will handle spiritual qi transmission during the fight."

  Leo nodded. He knew the plan.

  "However, there is a strong chance that Mateo's grey-out ability has been upgraded since your last encounter. To be safe, we would need to engrave both the spiritual transmission array and the counter-formation directly onto your La Ferrari Eclipse."

  Leo went quiet.

  "There is only one formation master I trust who is skilled enough to accomplish what we need," Newmont said carefully. "However, he is old. And old cultivators have their own ambitions."

  The weight of the earlier conversation pressed back in. Every Nascent Soul's dream of Deity Transformation.

  "Who is it?" Leo asked.

  Newmont watched him.

  "How would you feel about meeting Lord Enzo Ferrari?"

  Leo blinked. The La Ferrari Eclipse. The weapon that had, in many ways, started his journey to immortality.

  "I... yeah. Absolutely." He realized he was sitting up straighter. "When?"

  ---

  Lord Enzo Ferrari arrived a few days later. He came without an entourage. Just an old man in a dark wool coat walking through the entrance of the training facility with a leather case under one arm. Campus security almost turned him away until Coach Williams came running.

  Leo met him in the same basement room. Lord Ferrari settled into the chair across from him and set the leather case on the table. He was smaller than Leo expected. Thin, with sharp features weathered by centuries of cultivation.

  He looked at Leo for a long time before speaking.

  "So. You are the boy who flies my swords."

  His voice carried a thick Italian accent.

  "Yes, Lord Ferrari. The Eclipse has served me well in the past."

  "Served you well." Ferrari smiled. "Good. That is what it was designed to do. You know, when I first created the Eclipse line, people told me I was wasting my talent. Why would a respected formation master design swords for Foundation Establishment cultivators? Where is the prestige in that?"

  He waved a hand dismissively.

  "I wanted everyday Foundation Establishment cultivators to fight with Gold Core power. That was the vision. A high-tier sword for all, sold at retail stores, available to anyone willing to walk through the door."

  A flicker of old frustration crossed his face. "Unfortunately, the cost of T5 spiritual qi made the price higher than I would have liked. Only the wealthy could afford one. But even so. Thousands of cultivators who would have been outmatched in the Catacombs flew with the power of a Gold Core thanks to the Eclipse."

  He tapped the table once.

  "That is something worth building."

  Ferrari opened the leather case and took out a set of formation engraving tools.

  "I will examine your Moonrider, learn the counter formation, and engrave you a new Eclipse. But first, I have questions for you."

  Leo nodded.

  "Have you ever considered learning formations? Joining the commercial crafting side?"

  Leo shrugged. "I don't have enough time. I have to focus on what I do best. All roads lead to longevity, so I picked the one I'm good at."

  Ferrari leaned forward. His eyes fixed on Leo.

  "You will soon reach the age of maturity. And you will advance into Foundation Establishment."

  "That's the plan."

  "Do you understand what that means? Truly?"

  Leo shook his head.

  "A Qi Refiner can simply focus on learning," Ferrari said. "Absorbing techniques, studying the work of others, refining spiritual qi to increase their cultivation. It is a stage of life devoted to intake."

  He held up a finger.

  "But once you enter Foundation Establishment, you will need to learn your own dao and establish a firm foundation. This is the meaning of the realm. The foundation on which everything else is built."

  His voice dropped. "If you build your foundation on sand, you will find it washed away when the rain and wind come."

  "I've been trying to learn and follow the Heavenly Dao," Leo said. "The Heart of Flesh technique."

  Ferrari gave Leo a grandfatherly smile.

  "Indeed. And that is precisely why I wanted to come and speak to you myself." He settled back. "Tell me, Leo. What has been the hardest part of learning about the Heavenly Dao?"

  Leo thought about it. He thought about the scenes he'd seen in the Catacombs, at the Western Seat.

  "I just feel so small," he said. "And powerless. The world and the people in it have a mind of their own. I can feel it moving. But I can't change it. I can't shape it. I'm just... watching."

  Ferrari nodded slowly.

  "That is true. The hardest part of changing the world is making a lasting impact. It is easy to give a man a fish. Very hard to teach a man to fish."

  He folded his hands on the table. "You can fight. You can win duels. You can even win this Saturday. But when you leave the field, what remains? The memory fades. The crowd moves on. The next prodigy arrives."

  Leo said nothing.

  "But there is one way to make a lasting impact. Even after you leave. Even after you are gone." Ferrari tapped the leather case with one finger. "Formations. Crafting. The things we build outlive us."

  He picked up one of the engraving tools and turned it slowly in his fingers.

  "I was a young man in Maranello when I first understood this. I could fight. My master said I had the immortal potential for Deity Transformation if I dedicated myself to pure cultivation." A dry laugh. "I chose to make swords instead. My family thought I was throwing away my potential. My master refused to speak to me for eleven years."

  He set the tool down.

  "But I had watched cultivators die. Men and women who had refined their bodies and their qi to extraordinary levels. And they died because their weapons failed them. Because the formations engraved on their flying swords were sloppy, outdated, or simply insufficient for modern combat."

  Ferrari's eyes drifted somewhere distant.

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  "I built my first flying sword in a workshop outside Modena. The formation arrays were crude, the flight stabilization would make your teeth rattle. But a young cultivator bought it, and he flew it into some small battle, and he came home alive. He told me that the sword's emergency evasion formation had saved him from an ambush."

  He looked at Leo.

  "That was many years ago. I have built countless swords since then. Every single one carries formation work that I refined and improved on my journey toward immortality. This is my dao."

  Ferrari placed both palms flat on the table.

  "I am old, Leo. I have lived long enough to see the difference between a man who fights and a man who builds. The fighter's impact ends when he stops fighting. The builder's impact compounds. Every sword I forge carries my understanding forward. Every formation I improve gets inherited by the next generation of masters."

  The room was quiet except for the hum of the privacy formation.

  "After this Saturday is over," Ferrari said. "After the national championship, after the media circus, after all of it settles down. There will be an opportunity for you to spend real time with formations. To learn properly. From people who have dedicated their lives to this craft."

  He fixed Leo with his dark eyes.

  "I hope you will take that opportunity. You have the divine sense for it. You have exceptional perception. And you have something rarer than both. The desire to make things better for people other than yourself."

  Ferrari began laying out his engraving tools in a precise row.

  "I would very much like you to begin changing the world alongside me and my friends. We could use someone whose fire is still fresh."

  He picked up the first tool and gestured for Leo to bring out both of his lifebound weapons.

  "Now. Let's see what we can do about this sword of yours."

  Leo placed both weapons on the table. Moonrider first, then the lightsaber that needed to be converted back to its original Eclipse configuration.

  Ferrari reached for the Moonrider. He turned it slowly, examining the blade's edge, the spiritual conductivity channels, the formation arrays etched along the flat.

  Then he stopped.

  His eyebrows rose. He tilted the sword, catching the basement light at a different angle, and leaned closer. His lips moved silently, tracing the formation logic.

  "This is a very interesting matter," Ferrari murmured. "The counter formation. Whoever engraved this has a very unique and foreign opinion on heavenly patterns."

  He looked up at Leo.

  "Who engraved this?"

  Leo hesitated. The truth was complicated.

  "I'm sorry, Lord Ferrari. I don't have a good explanation for how I got the formation."

  Ferrari didn't push.

  "Then I will eagerly await the day your formation studies catch up," he said with a warm chuckle. "So that we may discuss this work properly."

  He set the Moonrider down with care and picked up the lightsaber.

  This examination was quicker. Ferrari turned the weapon over twice, tested the spiritual conductivity with a pulse of qi, and nodded to himself.

  "I will convert this back into an Eclipse. With modifications." He laid the lightsaber flat and began arranging his engraving tools beside it. "I will restore the defensive formation suite. On top of that, I will add spiritual qi transmission capability and the counter formations you will need for Saturday."

  He picked up a fine-tipped engraving stylus and tapped it once against the table.

  "However. To make space for all of that, something must go. The Eclipse will lose its offensive formations entirely. And the flight formations will be downgraded. You will have a sword that can protect you and receive support transmissions, but it will lack the aerial combat capability of a standard Eclipse."

  Leo nodded. "I'm prepared for that. Coach Williams has been training me to fight on the ground."

  "Smart man, your coach." Ferrari began sketching preliminary formation lines on a sheet of talisman paper. "There will still be movement formations. Enough to keep you quick on your feet. You won't have the vertical freedom of a Flyer, but you should be able to maneuver well enough on the ground."

  He set the stylus down and looked at Leo.

  "One last thing. A piece of advice from an old man who has watched a great many duels."

  Leo waited.

  "There is a reason why duels between cultivators are called dao discussions. The cultivator who wins is rarely the one with the stronger qi, the faster sword, or the higher realm."

  Ferrari's dark eyes held steady. "The one who wins is the one who can prove their dao. Who can step onto that field and show the world what they believe in so completely that their opponent's conviction wavers."

  "I hope to see you prove your dao on Saturday, Leo."

  He handed the Moonrider back to Leo and motioned toward the door.

  "Now go. I have work to do on your Eclipse."

  ---

  The doors of the yale training complex opened at four o'clock on the day of the Ivy League Conference Championship, and Leo walked out into the spring air with his team.

  The path to the parking lot was three hundred yards. Every inch of it was packed.

  Students crushed against the rope barriers on both sides, three and four deep. Faculty watched from the steps of nearby buildings. Alumni stood in clusters with drinks in hand, pretending they weren't as excited as the undergrads screaming next to them.

  "BULL-DOG AR-MY! BULL-DOG AR-MY! BULL-DOG AR-MY!"

  The chant hit Leo in the chest. Banners stretched between the oak trees. "CONFERENCE CHAMPS 2028." "FEAR THE PACK." "HARVARD BLEEDS CRIMSON." A projection talisman hung from a lamp post, cycling through season highlights.

  Flyer 7 jerseys were everywhere. On students, on professors, on a toddler perched on her father's shoulders, on an old woman in a wheelchair who raised a shaky fist and yelled louder than people half her age. Other numbers were mixed in. Harrison's 1, DeShawn's 22, Darnell's 30. But the sevens dominated.

  Grills lined the lawns flanking the walkway. Burgers, pulled pork, cornbread. Coolers sat open on every flat surface. Red cups in almost every hand.

  A student near the barrier leaned over and held out an open beer.

  "For the captain! Pre-game fuel!"

  Leo reached for it.

  A hand came down hard on his wrist.

  "Absolutely not," Harry said.

  "It's one beer, Harry."

  "I promised Reyes I'd keep an eye on you." Harry steered Leo's hand back to his side.

  Leo sighed. The student shrugged and drank the beer himself.

  They kept walking. Hands reached over the ropes, slapping Leo's shoulders, grabbing at his arm. Someone shook his hand before he could pull away. A girl who couldn't have been older than fourteen held up a poster that read "LEO CHEN IS MY SPIRIT ANIMAL" in glitter paint.

  The team's flying boat waited at the end of the path. Sixty feet, deep Yale blue, gold trim, the Bulldog crest on the mainsail. Spirit formations hummed along the keel. The boat would carry them to Cambridge, to Harvard's stadium.

  Leo climbed the gangplank. Below, the crowd surged to the edge of the platform.

  "BEAT HARVARD! BEAT HARVARD! BEAT HARVARD!"

  A young woman with a press lanyard and a Yale Daily News jacket appeared at his elbow. Notebook in one hand, recording talisman in the other.

  "Leo, quick word for the fans before you depart?"

  Leo looked out over the railing. The crowd stretched the full length of the walkway. Thousands of faces. Every major network had picked Harvard to win this game. Mateo Thandril, Foundation Establishment, divine pressure, the whole package. The analysts had spent the week explaining why Yale's season ended here.

  The Bulldog Army had answered by getting louder. Students who had never watched Flying Aces were painting their faces and learning about Third Person Perspective. The campus bell tower had been rigged to play the fight song at dawn. Every dismissal from the talking heads had only fed the fire.

  Leo turned to the reporter.

  "We wouldn't be here without everyone's support. The fact that all of you showed up, that you're part of this, it means everything." He paused. The crowd noise dipped as the people closest to the platform strained to hear. "This championship run isn't about me. Every person in the Bulldog Army is as much a part of this team as the twelve of us on this boat. We've got hundreds of thousands of people on this team. That's something divine pressure can't break."

  The crowd erupted. Students jumped, hugged strangers, spilled drinks they didn't care about. A formation flare burst into a blue and white bulldog that howled over the crowd before dissolving into sparks.

  Harry appeared beside him at the railing.

  "Good speech, Captain."

  "I meant it."

  "I know. That's why it worked."

  The boat's formations flared. The hull lifted. The gangplank retracted. Below, the crowd surged to the platform's edge, still cheering, voices chasing the vessel as it rose above the trees and turned northeast toward Cambridge.

  Leo stood at the stern and watched Yale shrink beneath him. The walkway was still packed. The grills were still smoking. The people were still cheering.

  He turned toward the bow, where Harvard waited.

  ---

  The whole world was watching.

  The hype had built for weeks. News boats from every major network hovered along Leo's flight path, cameras locked on the Yale vessel. Smaller press craft fell in behind them, jockeying for a good angle.

  The Thousand Talents Program had stalled completely. Congressional debate, once fierce, had gone silent. Even the bill's sponsors had thrown up their hands. They would wait until Saturday, they said. They would see how the wind blew.

  At Exeter, the students who couldn't get tickets had taken matters into their own hands. A massive watch party had swallowed the central field whole. Projection talismans the size of billboards floated above the grass, broadcasting pre-game coverage to thousands of teenagers sprawled across blankets and folding chairs.

  Throughout the country and the world, similar scenes played out. Bars in Boston. Cultivation academies in Shanghai. Military outposts in the Catacombs.

  In New York, ESPN had tracked down Cortland and Archer, the two former teammates Leo had defeated earlier in the season. They sat side by side on a studio couch, grinning, talking about what an honor it had been to share the field with him. What had been humiliating defeats were now proof that they had tested themselves against greatness.

  Deep below Harvard Stadium, Vivian and Matt had been buried in full camouflage combat suits for hours. Oxygen tanks fed steady air through their rebreathers. Life support formations blinked green in the darkness around them.

  Vivian's glasses reflected the faint glow of the spiritual qi transmission machine sitting between them, its formation arrays dormant, waiting. Matt ran his fingers along the housing one more time. They exchanged a glance. Leo was counting on their Spiritual Qi transmission to power his counter formation. They were ready.

  Above them, on his uncle's flying boat, Tom stood at the center of a crowd. Section leaders and student coordinators packed the deck around him. Tom had his phone in one hand, Leo's message pulled up on the screen. He read it out again, slower this time, making sure everyone had the words memorized. The chant Leo wanted them to learn.

  He pocketed the phone and started the briefing over from the top. The Bulldog Army would be ready for Leo's signal.

  In the visiting team locker room beneath Harvard Stadium, Coach Williams spread his scouting reports across a folding table while Coach Mei calibrated a set of formation projection talismans along the far wall. Dr. Reyes moved between equipment stations, testing the emergency medical arrays with methodical precision.

  Security guards lined the walls at five-foot intervals, their flying swords already drawn, their divine sense sweeping the room in overlapping waves. Every corner, every locker, every bag examined and re-examined.

  Williams glanced at the guards, then back at his scouting reports.

  He'd coached three championship teams. He'd never coached under armed surveillance.