Part 4: Training for No One
Corrected Summary:
Riven moves in the shadows of a city he doesn't recognize, drawn to quiet places and forgotten spaces. He doesn't train to become stronger — he just wants to understand this body. It doesn't feel superhuman. But it doesn't feel entirely normal either. And that… unsettles him.
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Riven never stayed in one place more than two nights.
Not because someone was chasing him. He just didn't like being watched — not by people, not by the city.
Especially not by his own reflection.
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He drifted.
Under bridges. Along rooftops. Through rusted-out warehouse lots where the streetlights didn't reach.
At night, when the noise thinned out and everything slowed down, he moved.
Push-ups.
Stretches.
Jogging short laps between loading docks.
Climbing abandoned stairwells just to see how long it took to get winded.
It wasn't training.
It was testing.
Trying to feel something that made sense.
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This body wasn't faster.
Wasn't stronger.
Wasn't healing faster.
Not really.
The cuts stayed.
The bruises bloomed purple and yellow.
He still limped after tripping down a staircase once.
But there was something off about the way his muscles responded. Something in the way fatigue sat in his chest — like it landed, but didn't settle.
Like his body was tuned for improvement, even if it hadn't happened yet.
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He would walk until his legs burned. Then he'd stop.
Only to realize… the burn faded faster than expected.
He didn't call it strange.
He didn't call it anything.
He just moved. Then listened to what his body told him.
And what it told him… didn't match what he remembered from before.
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One night, he slipped while vaulting a fence and scraped his shoulder against a nail.
It bled.
It stung.
It bruised.
No miracle. No healing factor.
The pain was real, and it lasted.
He sat behind a storage container with a stolen paper towel pressed to the cut. It soaked through.
And all he could think was:
> Still human.
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That should've calmed him.
But it didn't.
Because even with the bruises, even with the normal wounds, his body never felt like it was struggling.
It felt like it was watching.
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Not improving.
Just waiting.
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