The echo rolled through stone halls and training rooms, reaching even the farthest corners of Dark Haven Fortress.
Solar, Sacral, and Root reacted in the same breath. Space twisted, gravity bent, water‑dark Essence spread like a curtain as all three clones layered their powers over the greenhouse, sealing sound and pressure away from the rest of the fortress. The second heartbeat slammed into their combined barrier and finally dulled.
They exhaled together.
Sacral Clone rubbed his chest and muttered, "This Heart Core opening is really terrifying. I don't even want to imagine what the upper cores will be like. When we opened Root, Sacral, and Solar, it was never this loud."
Solar and Root both nodded. Root spoke, eyes fixed on Ankit's still form.
"The heart is the centre of the body. Its core will be just as important and just as strong. It's also the bridge that ties the lower cores to the upper ones. If this much pressure comes just from lighting the bridge, what about when the sky it connects to opens?"
Solar and Sacral could only agree.
The disturbance had already drawn attention. Footsteps rushed down the corridor as Kamal, Neelam, and Sanya arrived at the greenhouse entrance, faces tight with worry.
"What happened?" Kamal asked. "Just now, we all heard a heartbeat… like a drum."
Solar Clone stepped forward before they could push past the safety line. He had only recently returned from East India with a haul of new metals, and had been deep in forging a powerful blade when the shockwave interrupted him; his forge was still cooling on its own.
"It's Ankit," Solar said. "He's opening his Heart Core. The sound came from his heartbeat resonating with the new core. We've sealed everything; it won't shake the fortress again."
Neelam's shoulders loosened a little. Sanya peered past them, eyes shining at the sight of Ankit sitting in the middle of a softly glowing storm.
"Is it dangerous?" she asked.
"Not to you," Solar replied. "Because all of you practiced the Mortal Foundation Scripture, your bodies and minds can handle this kind of pressure. And you were far from the greenhouse when it hit, so the impact was weak by the time it reached you."
He glanced at Root Clone.
"And Rudra was with Root at the time, so he didn't catch the full sound at all. Everyone's safe."
Kamal nodded slowly, reassured. The family stayed a while, watching from a distance as Ankit's chest rose and fell, each silent beat now hidden inside the clones' layered barriers, before returning to their own training.
Inside the greenhouse, the air remained heavy and bright, swirling around Ankit as the nascent Heart Core continued to form with every thunderous, world‑shaking thump.
****
Half a month later, Ankit's Heart Core finally took shape.
9 august, 2019
Deep in the greenhouse, the pressure that had shaken the fortress slowly faded.
Inside his chest, an air‑bright sphere now hovered above the physical heart, pulsing gently in time with his breath. The core existed, but it was still clear and colourless—formed, yet not awakened.
Ankit opened his eyes.
He rose to his feet and quietly checked his state. Only the structure of the Heart Core was complete.
Its nature—air—had not yet ignited. Here, air and wind parted ways like root and branch: air formed the silent, boundless foundation, an elemental Essence of breath, pressure, and circulation that mirrored the heart's ceaseless rhythm—steady, pervasive, sustaining life force through every vessel and lung without the chaos of motion.
Wind, its fiercer child, arose only when air surged into directed gales and tempests, ideal for offense and speed but too volatile for the Heart Core's role as the body's central pump and resonator.
The Heart aligned with air because it governed circulation and harmony across all cores, demanding an Essence that flowed evenly, adapted subtly, and amplified resonance without overwhelming the fragile balance of blood and breath—like a calm sea carrying ships, not a storm capsizing them.
To truly step into Stage 3, he would need to flood it with a massive amount of air‑type Essence Flow, the raw, ambient currents of pure air Essence drawn from heaven and earth to awaken and attune the core's nature, igniting its loop of inhale-exhale that synced with his heartbeat.
Wind Essence would not serve; its turbulent motion resisted stable filling and risked fracturing the core's fresh shell or sparking premature surges that could backlash through pathways, demanding instead the gentler, denser air flow to build capacity layer by layer.
For now, he was at half a step in Stage 3.
His thoughts turned toward his family. The clones had already informed them that he had woken up, so when he left the greenhouse and entered the living area, Sanya bounced over immediately, eyes bright.
She launched into her story at once—how she had suddenly heard a huge heartbeat days ago, how the walls seemed to tremble, how she'd thought the fortress itself was alive for a moment. Her hands waved as she spoke, re‑enacting the shock and excitement.
Kamal and Neelam stood nearby, listening and smiling, saying little. They had been frightened when that sound first rolled through the fortress, but after Solar and Sacral explained what was happening, pride had taken over.
Now that Ankit was in front of them again, healthy and calm, worry had nowhere to land.
They all moved to the dining area and ate lunch together, food laid out by the puppets as usual.
After the meal, Ankit put his chopsticks down and looked at each of them.
"I'm going out for cultivation," he said. "I won't be back for some time."
Kamal and Neelam exchanged a glance. They didn't try to keep him. At this point, they understood that their son's path was walking far ahead of them; clinging would only slow him down. They simply nodded. Neelam told him to be careful. Kamal told him to remember to come back home sometimes.
Ankit smiled, then vanished.
One moment he stood by the table, the next the space he occupied folded and snapped back. He reappeared on a mountain peak above Dark Haven fortress, cold wind whipping at his clothes.
He had used Short Step Fold, compressing a spatial path and crossing more than 15 kilometres in a single blink.
The power of the space element.