The capital of Cifad;

  The Ba Martial Arts Hall stood like a relic that refused to fade away with passing time. Countless warriors and officials had walked out from its gates, carrying its discipline into the bones of the country, generation after generation.

  Stone lions guarded the entrance, their edges worn smooth by decades of hands seeking blessing before stepping inside. The wooden beams above the courtyard were dark with age and incense smoke, carved with the names of masters long buried but not forgotten. Outside, the city had grown into silent bit by bit, not entirely but noticeably.

  Inside, time still breathed through wood and calloused fists.

  Denzai Ba sat cross-legged in the head of the great hall.

  No cushion beneath him. No ornament around him.

  His frame was broad and heavy — not softened by age, but dense, like something carved rather than born. His breathing was slow and controlled, each inhale deliberates, each exhale measured.

  Across from him, Diwa Saw stood rigid.

  As a season fighter he had encountered many situations. As a teacher he had shaped reckless boys into disciplined fighters.

  Today, his world views crumbles, hands would not stop trembling until now. His mind just barely hands on by sheer will.

  The chaos from the morning still burned behind his eyes. The madness had erupted inside the hall itself — a place filled with capable fighters — and yet they had still suffered losses.

  “We lost eight apprentices,” Diwa said, his tongue briefly wetting his dry lips as if the words themselves had drained what little moisture remained.

  The hall absorbed the words.

  “It happened in a flash. Before we understood what was wrong, the damage was already done.”

  Denzai did not open his eyes.

  “And the one who first lost control?”

  Diwa swallowed.

  “Taken by TCF, three of them.”

  The initials felt foreign in this hall.

  “And the others?”

  “We dismissed most of them. Temporarily. Sent them home.”

  Failure sat heavy in his throat.

  A draft slipped through the open lattice windows, stirring the prayer ribbons tied to the rafters. They whispered overhead.

  “The boy was smiling this morning,” Diwa said quietly. “Helping the younger ones stretch. It's just....”

  His jaw tightened as the memory resurfaced. The broken bodies and blood soak floor, the madness driven eyes.

  “I don’t know what went wrong — or why this is happening.” His voice lowered, roughened by something close to disbelief. “It spread through them like a line of falling dominoes. Most of the members were shaken to the core.”

  He drew a slow breath, steadying himself. “We managed to contain it within minutes. If it had lasted any longer…”

  He didn’t finish.

  He didn’t need to.

  He forced himself to continue.

  “It took five senior fighters to bring them down. They didn’t seem to feel pain or recognize any of us.”

  A pause.

  “How does normal boys become something like that?”

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  That was when Denzai opened his eyes. Diwa tried to search an answer from those eyes.

  His gaze was not fierce. Not blazing.

  It was still — like deep water without ripples.

  “Strength without will,” Denzai said slowly, “is just another kind of death.”

  The words settled into the hall like dust after a strike.

  Diwa frowned faintly. He understood the language, but not the weight behind it. Strength was something they trained for. Honed. Measured. What did it mean for it to become death?

  He resisted the urge to ask. Some lessons, in this hall, were not given through explanation.

  Instead, he straightened instinctively, as though the air itself had shifted.

  “The government has made an offer,” he said, choosing each word with care while watching Denzai’s face for the smallest reaction.

  This time, Denzai opened his eyes fully.

  The stillness in them sharpened — not with surprise, but with focus.

  “They can provide information. Protection. Supplies.”

  “In exchange?” Denzai cut in.

  Diwa hesitated,

  “We would have to operate under their command structure,” Diwa said at last, the sentence dragging against his throat as if it did not want to be spoken aloud.

  The sentence scraped on its way out.

  Silence settled across the hall like dust.

  Somewhere beyond the gates, a car horn sounded. Distant. Irrelevant.

  Denzai unfolded his legs and rose in one smooth motion. The floorboards creaked beneath his weight.

  “For more than two hundred years,” he said calmly, “we have stood without political entanglement.”

  He took a step forward.

  “Through war. Through famine. Through regime changes.”

  Another step.

  “We trained fine sons for this country — not to place them under greedy hands.”

  His voice did not rise.

  “We bow to none.”

  His arm moved.

  A single backhand through empty air.

  The strike detonated inside the hall — a compressed thunderclap. Wooden placards trembled. Fine dust drifted from the rafters.

  Diwa flinched before he could stop himself.

  Denzai lowered his hand.

  “What they offer is not protection,” he said quietly. “It is a leash.”

  His gaze shifted toward the entrance — toward the modern skyline beyond the gates.

  “A crisis,” he murmured, “is the perfect time for some noisy guys.”

  His jaw tightened.

  “Clever old foxes.”

  = = = = =

  Elsewhere, at the edge of the capital where unfinished buildings leaned into one another like tired men, Juan Corven lay on a mattress that had long ago surrendered the right to be called one.

  The springs pressed faint patterns into his back, but he didn’t bother adjusting. Discomfort had become background noise this past week — like the distant hum of traffic or the drip of water from the cracked ceiling above him.

  Blood had dried along his sleeve in dark, stiff patches, the fabric pulled tight where it had soaked through to the thin shirt clinging against his skin. When he shifted, the scent of iron rose in the stale air—sharp, metallic, impossible to ignore. Not all of it was his.

  A week ago, he was just a small-time gang member. Small territory. Predictable rivals. Minor bribes paid on time. He was not ambitious, not reckless. In his own way, he had followed rules.

  Then something changed.

  Now his crew was dead.

  His hideout burned. Everything he had earned through for just survival was gone.

  And government units — real ones, not local patrol jokes — had hunted him like a terrorist.

  Dead or alive.

  He still didn’t know why.

  The memory came back in fragments — boots in puddles, gunfire in tight corridors, someone screaming his name. He had run. That part he remembered clearly.

  Juan turned his head slightly toward the broken window. The glass had shattered long ago, replaced by warped plywood that didn’t quite seal the frame. Through the narrow gap, sound leaked in.

  A cough from three buildings away.

  The scrape of a chair on concrete.

  Two men arguing softly over money in the alley across the street.

  He could make out fragments of their words.

  Not clearly enough to follow the conversation — but clearly enough to know distance no longer meant silence.

  He closed his eyes and focused.

  Thirty meters, maybe more.

  That wasn’t normal.

  During the chase, he had vaulted a boundary wall he used to avoid because it was too high. He remembered the brief moment in midair — the certainty that he wouldn’t make it — and then the shock of landing steady on the other side.

  He should have broken something.

  He didn’t.

  His body had felt… responsive. Like it had been waiting for permission.

  Now, lying still, he flexed his fingers slowly. The movement felt clean. Efficient. No wasted motion.

  Outside, an engine rolled down the main road. Drones fly passed the alley not too far. Not fast. Not urgent.

  Just slow enough to notice.

  Juan held his breath without thinking. The sound lingered longer than necessary, then faded gradually into the distance. Only then did he allow air back into his lungs.

  He didn’t tell himself it was paranoia. Paranoia kept people alive. He had learned that long before whatever this was began.

  Maybe they weren’t chasing him because he was weak, expendable, collateral. Maybe there were many factors involved in it. Messy thoughts shuffle through his unrest mind.

  The thought sat heavy in his chest; he just can’t understand.

  He rolled onto his side, staring at the wall where old paint peeled in thin curls. The world beyond this room was tearing itself apart, bit by bit — riots in the center districts, gangs clashing with containment units, whispers of beasts in the outer regions.

  None of it concerned him. He just wanted to live.

  That was all.

  If his hearing had sharpened, he would use it.

  If his muscles answered faster than before, he would not question the favor.

  If something inside him had changed—

  Then he would adapt to it the way he had adapted to poverty, to gang rules, to the unspoken laws of the streets.

  Because he did not need justification. He just wants to feel the tomorrow sun.