A soft wind blew across the chilly mountains. It was still quite dark, when Ryan woke up to start his cultivation routine. He had been instructed to wake up and run around his grandparents’ farm, in order to temper his body. All that work wasn’t even anywhere near enough to reach the first level of the mortal realm of cultivation.

Finally, he had been instructed to sit under a waterfall while naked. The effect? He had almost been frozen to death. The cold water would splash around his body, while he was sitting trying to maintain a sort-of calm demeanor.

As usual, he had been sitting under that ice-cold waterfall, when he realized something. His father had once told him that while studying, he had to learn to ignore all unnecessary distractions. He started to focus on a single point, his heartbeat. He stopped paying attention to everything else going around him, which mostly consisted of the sound of water splashing on his body. At first, it was easier said than done, but as time went on, he had become adept.

He kept focusing on his heartbeat, until it was the only thing he could hear. For a while, it seemed as if he was no longer himself. His heartbeat slowed down, and his hearing improved. It was at this point that he started to see a vision. In this vision, there was a man wearing an ancient bronze armor. This armor had a drawing of a true dragon on one end, while having a drawing of a phoenix on the other.

The man was middle aged, with white flowing hair. His arms were bare, and they looked rough. He turned to look at Ryan and then said slowly, “I am going to demonstrate this martial technique once, so pay attention wisely. This is called the Dancing Dragon Fist. It was created when a great sage saw a dragon flying in the sky, avoiding falling rocks. From his perspective, it seemed that the dragon was dancing in a profound manner, and from that he was enlightened.”

He paused for a moment, before he started demonstrating it. He started with a casual punch, which followed by another, then another. For normal people, it would seem like the middle-aged man was simply throwing around casual punches. However, Ryan noticed something different. It was the man’s movements. There was something about them that he couldn’t wrap his head around.

The man went on, “This fist technique is made up of three fists. The first is called the Dragon subduing fist, the second is the Divine blazing fist and the last is the Divine iron fist. All you need to do is gather momentum.” He demonstrated some more punches, and at the end, the vision vanished.

When Ryan came to, he was still sitting under the waterfall, but the sun was up. It was now in the middle of the morning, and he was late for breakfast. He scrambled to get away from the waterfall, falling multiple times in the process.

Before he left, he looked back towards the waterfall. It seemed like he was forgetting something. The feeling was the same as the feeling a person gets when they had a vivid dream early in the morning, but they don’t remember what the dream was about.

He got to the cliff where he had set his clothes and wore them, before running off towards the farm. When he arrived, he was sweating profusely, and his grandparents were about to leave the farm, with his grandmother standing by the old pick up truck.

“Morning grandma, grandpa. Sorry I’m late, things got out of hand”, he tried to explain.

“Oh hello Ryan. Where have you been? We looked for you everywhere!” yelled Marjory, his grandmother.

“I was up by the waterfall, beneath Cloud’s peak. Is breakfast ready?”

“Michael, Michael, Ryan is here! What is taking so long?” asked Marjory.

Ryan’s grandfather, who seemed to be tinkering with something in the garage, dropped a spanner, before heading out in a hurry.

“Oh kiddo, took you long enough. Don’t tell me you’ve been practicing your... eh… whatever it is that you said you’re practicing…” said Michael.

“Cultivation. It’s called cultivation, grandpa!”

“Oh dear, seems they grow up so fast. One day you’re changing their diapers and the next they’re coming up with weird names for drugs”, whispered Michael, to himself of course.

“What did you say grandpa?” asked Ryan, with a blank stare.

“Oh nothing, I was just saying kids nowadays grow up too fast. Anyway, we’re heading out to town. Want to come along?”

“Michael! He hasn’t had breakfast yet!” Marjory yelled.

“Maybe he’s not hungry. You never know with kids these days”, he came up with an excuse.

As if to disprove his grandfather’s point, Ryan’s stomach growled loudly. Everyone looked at him, before he coughed awkwardly.

“I better get some breakfast then. I will go into town myself later on. Can I borrow your truck?” asked Ryan.

“Only if George is coming with you”, replied Michael.

“Fine grandpa, I’m not a kid who needs babysitting you know”, said Ryan grumpily.

Marjory and Michael looked at each other, and then proceeded to laugh uproariously at Ryan, who walked off in a grumpy manner. The two old lovebirds left and Ryan watched the old truck leave with occasional bursts of smoke being left behind.

He sighed and went into the house. Inside the kitchen, was a young woman, who appeared to be five years older than Ryan. She was wearing a blue apron, with designs of red roses all over. She had black hair, tied with a silver hairpin.

“Good morning Aunt June”, greeted Ryan.

“Morning Ryan, where have you been? You missed breakfast”, she retorted.

“I was busy with something. Where is Uncle George?” he asked.

“He should be in the field. He was saying that there was something running around the farm, but he doesn’t know what it was or what it looked like. It’s leaving behind some humanoid footprints. Any idea what that’s about?” asked Aunt June.

“I don’t know”, replied Ryan, as he sat down at the table. June took some toasted bread and neatly put it on the table.

*************************

Now, in the hustle and bustle of Megapolis, everyone was minding their own business, carrying out their day-to-day work. At a research facility, built by PI Robotics, something was brewing.

“We’re sorry, Dr. Paige. We can no longer continue funding your research. The company does not have any more funds to keep providing with research that cannot be monetized”, said a neatly dressed man, wearing a gray suit with a gray tie.

The doctor Paige that he was speaking to was looking dejectedly at the papers he had just been handed. The papers stipulated that he was to leave all the technology he had been making at the facility, and to hand over the papers, blueprints and the likes to his manager.

He sighed before speaking, “Look, I have said it before. Just give me a few more days…no just a few hours! I will perfect it. You’re never going to find someone who can even fathom this technology. The only people who could do something like this are only Michael Avariz and I. However, Michael is retired and no longer interested in this research. Just let me continue, even on my own funds. Please…”

“We get it, Dr. Paige, but even if we’re to fund your technology, how does uploading someone’s brain into a robot help our customers?” asked the neatly dressed man.

Dr. Paige looked downwards, and avoided the neatly dressed man’s gaze. He looked at the papers in his hand, before sighing.

“I’m sorry. If we had come up with a way to sell this technology with our weapons, I’m sure we would have even expended much more effort to make sure your research bears fruit. However, the upper echelon just don’t see it. You’re free to leave now”, said the neatly dressed man. However, Dr. Paige kept sitting down. The man continued, “Do I have to call security?”

“No, it’s fine”, he replied before throwing the papers towards the neatly dressed man and turned to leave. After he had left the office, he turned back to say something to the neatly dressed man when he heard him speaking on his phone.

“It’s been taken care of. So what do we do with the technology? It’s too dangerous in the wrong hands!” he said as he waited for a reply. After he had been replied to, he said, “Okay, I get it. But won’t that be suspicious? We don’t know what Lopez will do with this technology! I wouldn’t trust the mafia to save mankind with technology. Hahahaha.” He gave a loud laugh that undulated through the air.

Dr. Paige now understood what was going on. All that technology that was being sold on the black market, these people were selling it! He was infuriated. He had dedicated his life to making technology to improve the lives of human kind. However, the upper echelon didn’t even care! All they wanted was to make money off it.

He walked towards the workshop and when he arrived, he started packing his things slowly. The younger engineers were bustling about, with excited expressions. He turned to look at what they were excited about. It turned out that one of the engineers had finished an android robot that had very advanced Artificial Intelligence software.

The robot was called PI RIN 8420, but the younger ones called it Pirin. It was more advanced than anything they had created before. It had weapons built in, which could be remotely activated and deactivated. Besides the weapons, it also had jet packs and software that could interface with any other device.

Pirin was a military grade, hacking robot with multiple weapons, to say the least. It was difficult to imagine how this could help humanity. Dr. Paige sighed when he thought about this. Suddenly, he had an idea. As he thought of this idea, he smiled brightly.

***************

In the afternoon, Ryan went to town with his Uncle George. They took the longer way round, since they had heard that huge rocks had blocked the shorter road, since it passes through the mountainous area. When they arrived at the town, it was quite lively. There were people all over, dressed in summer clothes. According to one, there was a festival that was going to happen that night.

Everyone was busy preparing for the festival. They were going to light a big fire at the outskirts of the town, and share stories about what had happened that year.

“Seems quite lively. Should we join too?” asked Ryan.

“Let’s just get what we came here for. Besides, you’re the one who dragged us here. What are we looking for?” asked Uncle George.

Ryan got out of the car and walked towards one of the cars that sold boats. Uncle George focused on parking the car, and soon followed.

Two men, dressed shabbily, were waiting in an alleyway behind the shop that sold boats. They were beating the old man who owned the shop. The poor old man was bleeding, and he had bruises all over.

Ryan went in and saw the backdoor open, with muffled grunts coming out. He rushed through the backdoor and saw a girl with blond hair, tied and neatly placed in the corner of the back office. When he undid the blindfold and the cloth tying her mouth, she shouted, “Help my grandfather. Please, go and help him!”

Ryan instinctively ran outside through the other door, to find himself outside, in the alleyway. ‘Uh-oh, I didn’t think this through! I should have called Uncle George before rushing to help. I’m really dead this time’, he thought to himself.

As he turned to leave, one of the men called out to him, “Don’t run now. Wait and let us talk about it. What do you say?”

“There’s nothing to talk about! HELP!!!!!!!” shouted Ryan.

Before he got to the door, he was grabbed and thrown down. They started beating the living daylights out of him. Just before he turned unconscious, the tattoo that was at the back of his right hand glowed faintly.

Now, what happened afterwards is subject to a matter of perspective. From the shabby men’s perspective, Ryan turned into a ferocious man-eating monster with glowing eyes. From Ryan’s perspective, actually, he didn’t remember anything at all.

Here is what really happened, as he lost consciousness, the matrix passed some celestial ki through him. What woke up wasn’t actually Ryan, but a wisp of Rogarth’s blue soul. It was controlling Ryan’s body.

One of the men, who was short and stout, wearing a wooly hat, tried to punch him in the nose. It was too slow, and the result was an easy dodge. Ryan punched him in the stomach, and the man fell unconscious.

The other man tried to run, but Ryan appeared in front of him, somehow. He took out a knife and stabbed at Ryan. A palm from Ryan hit the hand holding the knife, and the knife flew off. The man was hit in the chest and he coughed up a mouthful of blood, before losing consciousness.

Ryan, rather, Rogarth’s soul wisp, opened his mouth and spoke, “This is going to be difficult. What I was expecting is much better than this! At this rate, he might never master the fist technique! Talk about low courage!”

He sighed.