Kel stopped asking questions halfway back to Durnfield.
Not because he had stopped wondering what Dyrain had felt beneath the desert, but because Dyrain clearly wasn't going to answer until he understood it himself. That alone bothered Kel. During the past month, Dyrain always seemed to know more than he was willing to say. Seeing him genuinely uncertain was different.
Luno walked beside Kel with one hand resting near the insect jar at his side. The insects had settled somewhat since the pulse beneath the Badlands, but they weren't behaving normally. Every few minutes one would begin moving quickly inside the jar before stopping again, as if reacting to something Luno couldn't quite hear.
Spark had gone quiet too.
That might have bothered Luno more than anything.
By the time they reached the orphanage, Dyrain had already made his decision.
"Harven needs to know what happened."
Kel looked at him.
"And us?"
"You eat."
Kel waited.
"And?"
"You rest."
Kel narrowed his eyes suspiciously.
"That's it?"
"For today."
Kel looked toward Luno.
Luno shrugged.
"I wouldn't question it."
"I wasn't going to."
"You were absolutely going to."
Kel ignored him.
Dyrain left them there and headed toward the guard district.
For once, neither boy followed.
They were too tired.
---
The next morning, Dyrain was waiting behind the orphanage before sunrise.
Kel stared at him from across the training yard.
"I knew yesterday was too good to be true."
Luno yawned beside him.
"You slept almost ten hours."
"I deserved twelve."
Dyrain crouched and drew a large circle into the sand.
Unlike some of his previous training formations, there were no symbols around its edge. No resonance iron. No marked stones. No hidden trick that Kel could see.
Just a circle.
Kel looked at it.
"What happens if we step outside?"
"Nothing."
"That somehow makes me more nervous."
Dyrain stood.
"The trial showed me that both of you have improved enough to move forward."
Kel immediately straightened.
"Finally."
"You're still terrible."
Kel's shoulders dropped.
"There it is."
Luno smiled.
Dyrain stepped inside the circle.
"You know how to strengthen your bodies with Internal Qi. You know how to distribute it without wasting everything in one place. You've started learning how to react instead of guessing."
His eyes moved between them.
"But none of that means you know how to fight properly."
Kel frowned.
"I've been fighting my whole life."
"Yes."
Dyrain nodded.
"Poorly."
Luno covered his mouth.
Kel looked at him.
"Don't laugh."
"I didn't."
"You definitely did."
Dyrain ignored them.
"What you've learned so far gives you tools. Today you begin learning how to put those tools together."
Kel stepped closer.
"What are you teaching us?"
Dyrain planted his feet shoulder-width apart and raised his hands.
"Qi Boxing."
Kel's expression changed immediately.
"Now we're talking."
Luno glanced toward him.
"You don't even know what it is."
"It has boxing in the name."
"That was enough?"
"Yes."
Dyrain sighed.
"Get inside the circle."
They entered.
Kel raised his fists immediately.
Dyrain lowered them with one hand.
"Not yet."
Kel stared.
"You said boxing."
"I did."
"So why aren't we punching?"
"Because a punch is the last part of a strike."
Kel frowned.
Dyrain stepped backward and settled into a stance. His knees bent slightly, his shoulders relaxed, and his weight seemed evenly distributed through both legs.
Nothing about the position looked impressive.
That was usually when Dyrain was most dangerous.
"Stand."
Kel copied him.
Luno followed.
Dyrain walked around them slowly.
Kel's stance was too stiff almost immediately. His shoulders tightened, his knees bent more than necessary, and his hands clenched before he had any reason to use them.
Dyrain tapped his ankle with one foot.
"Relax."
"I am relaxed."
"No, you're preparing to fight the ground."
Kel looked down.
"I don't trust the ground anymore."
Luno laughed.
Dyrain moved behind him and pushed lightly against his shoulder.
Kel's entire body rocked forward.
"Too much tension in the wrong places."
He moved to Luno.
Luno looked more relaxed, but when Dyrain pressed against his chest, he shifted backward almost as easily.
"Too little structure."
Luno regained his footing.
"So he's too stiff and I'm too loose."
"Yes."
Kel smiled.
"For once we're both wrong equally."
Dyrain stepped between them.
"Your stance is where every strike begins. If your balance is wrong, your punch is wrong. If your breathing is wrong, your Qi follows it. If your body fights itself, you waste strength before touching your opponent."
He tapped his lower abdomen.
"Breathe from here."
Kel inhaled.
His chest rose.
Dyrain shook his head.
"Again."
Kel tried.
Wrong again.
Luno's first attempt wasn't much better.
For nearly an hour, they did nothing except breathe.
Kel eventually became annoyed.
"I thought this was Qi Boxing."
"It is."
"We haven't boxed."
"You aren't ready."
"I know how to breathe."
Dyrain looked at him.
"Apparently not."
Luno turned his head away to hide a smile.
Kel glared at him.
Dyrain demonstrated again. His breath entered slowly, his abdomen expanding without raising his shoulders. When he exhaled, the movement traveled naturally through his body.
There was no burst of power.
No dramatic Qi.
But Kel could feel the difference.
Dyrain's Internal Qi moved with his breathing.
Not because he forced it to.
Because the rhythm matched.
Kel tried again.
This time he stopped thinking about pushing Qi anywhere.
He inhaled slowly.
The warmth inside his body moved with him.
When he exhaled, some of the tension in his shoulders disappeared.
Dyrain nodded.
"Better."
Kel smiled.
"That's all I needed."
"Do it a hundred more times."
Kel's smile vanished.
---
That became their training.
Not for one morning.
For days.
Dyrain made them stand until their legs hurt, then corrected their posture whenever fatigue changed it. He made them breathe until they could keep their rhythm while tired. He pushed their shoulders, hips, backs, and legs without warning, forcing them to maintain balance without locking their entire bodies.
At first Kel hated it.
There was no speed.
No heavy strikes.
Nothing that felt like real fighting.
But slowly he began noticing the difference.
When his feet were placed correctly, he didn't need as much Internal Qi to remain stable. When his shoulders were relaxed, his arms moved faster. When he stopped clenching his fists too early, the heat inside his body didn't gather uselessly in his forearms.
Luno noticed different things.
Balance wasn't just something he felt through his feet anymore. His awareness of the small lives around the training yard gave him a strange sense of space. He knew when insects moved near him even without looking, and that made him increasingly aware of where everything else was too.
Dyrain noticed.
He didn't explain it.
He simply adjusted the drills.
---
On the eighth morning, Dyrain finally raised a fist.
Kel almost looked relieved.
"Finally."
Dyrain ignored him.
"A punch does not begin here."
He held up his hand.
"It begins here."
His foot pressed into the sand.
Then his hip turned.
His waist followed.
His shoulder rotated.
Only then did the fist move.
The strike wasn't fast enough to disappear.
Kel saw every part of it.
That somehow made it more impressive.
Dyrain stopped his fist in open air.
A sharp crack came from the movement alone.
Kel's eyebrows rose.
Dyrain lowered his hand.
"Your body is a chain. Feet. Legs. Hips. Core. Shoulder. Arm. Fist."
He looked at Kel.
"If one link moves at the wrong time, you lose power."
Then at Luno.
"If your intent changes halfway through the strike, your Qi follows the hesitation."
Luno nodded slowly.
Dyrain returned to stance.
"Internal Qi strengthens the chain. It does not replace it."
That sentence stayed with Kel.
Dyrain threw the punch again.
This time Kel focused on the Qi.
It moved through Dyrain's body in sequence.
Not all at once.
A controlled wave of reinforcement passed from his legs upward as the strike traveled forward. By the time it reached his fist, the rest of his body had already done its part.
Kel had been doing the opposite.
He usually gathered Qi in his fist first and expected the rest of his body to catch up.
Dyrain looked at him.
"You see it?"
Kel nodded.
"I think so."
"Show me."
Kel took his stance.
He breathed.
Then punched.
His foot pushed too hard.
His hip turned late.
Too much Internal Qi rushed into his arm.
His fist snapped forward with plenty of strength but almost pulled him off balance.
Dyrain caught him by the shoulder before he stumbled.
Kel frowned.
"That felt strong."
"It was."
Dyrain released him.
"It was also bad."
Kel looked offended.
"How can it be strong and bad?"
"Because strength doesn't automatically make something good."
Luno smiled.
"That explains a lot about you."
Kel looked at him.
"Your turn."
Luno stepped forward.
His first punch was cleaner.
His breathing stayed steady, and his body moved in better order than Kel's had.
But his strike lacked commitment.
The motion ended before his Qi fully entered it.
Dyrain caught Luno's fist easily.
"You decided you were finished before the strike was."
Luno frowned.
"What does that mean?"
"You moved correctly."
Dyrain tapped Luno's chest.
"But part of you was already thinking about what came next."
Luno considered that.
Dyrain stepped away.
"Thinking is useful. Hesitation isn't."
Kel smiled.
"Finally, something he's worse at."
Luno ignored him.
---
For the next week, they punched.
Hundreds of times.
Then thousands.
No targets at first.
Just motion.
Dyrain corrected their feet, hips, breathing, shoulders, elbows, wrists, and Qi timing.
Kel's biggest problem was still power.
Whenever something felt wrong, he tried fixing it by adding more Internal Qi.
Dyrain punished that habit immediately.
Every time Kel overloaded a punch, Dyrain slapped his arm aside or tapped whichever part of his body Kel had left underprotected.
Eventually Kel stopped trying to make each punch powerful.
He started trying to make each punch complete.
That changed everything.
His Internal Qi stopped surging violently into his fist.
Instead, it moved through him.
Feet.
Legs.
Core.
Shoulder.
Arm.
Fist.
The warmth remained.
Actually, it felt stronger.
But it no longer fought the movement.
It traveled with it.
Dyrain watched closely.
Kel hadn't produced flame.
There was no External Qi around his fist.
Nothing left his body.
But the heat inside him responded naturally every time his Internal Qi traveled through the chain.
Dyrain didn't comment on that.
Not yet.
Luno's progress looked different.
His punches became quieter.
There was less wasted motion in them, and his balance recovered almost immediately after every strike. The insects around the training yard increasingly gathered near him during practice, though Luno rarely asked them to.
They seemed interested.
Spark certainly was.
"He punches weird."
Luno continued his drill.
"Kel?"
"Dyrain."
Luno nearly missed his timing.
"You probably shouldn't say that where he can hear you."
Dyrain's voice came from behind him.
"I can hear him."
Luno froze.
Spark went completely silent.
Kel burst out laughing.
Luno slowly turned.
"You can hear Spark?"
Dyrain stared at his hat for a second.
"Sometimes."
Spark whispered.
"I don't like that."
Luno tried not to smile.
Dyrain pointed toward the training circle.
"Again."
---
By the third week, Dyrain added movement.
Kel had assumed stepping would be simple.
He was wrong.
"A fighting step isn't walking," Dyrain explained. "Walking lets your balance move freely from one foot to the other. Fighting requires you to remain ready between those movements."
He demonstrated.
One step forward.
One backward.
Then to the side.
His feet barely crossed.
His stance never disappeared.
Even while moving, his body remained capable of attacking or defending immediately.
"Your feet create the position. Your body creates the force."
Kel tried.
His first step was too large.
Dyrain pushed his chest.
Kel almost fell.
Luno laughed.
Then Luno stepped too lightly and left his weight behind.
Dyrain hooked his ankle and nearly dropped him too.
Kel laughed louder.
"Still equal."
Dyrain made them repeat the footwork until neither found it funny anymore.
Once the stepping improved, punches were added.
Then defense.
Then changing directions while striking.
Kel gradually learned that moving faster didn't always require putting more Qi into his legs. Sometimes a shorter step was faster because there was less distance to recover from.
Luno learned that his habit of watching everything could become useful if he stopped letting every piece of information delay his decision.
The two began moving differently.
Kel's style was direct.
Compact.
His body naturally wanted to close distance and strike.
Luno preferred angles, repositioning, and creating openings.
Dyrain encouraged both.
Qi Boxing wasn't supposed to make them identical.
The foundation was the same.
What they built on it would belong to them.
---
By the fourth week, the simple drills had become combinations.
Step.
Strike.
Guard.
Turn.
Breathe.
Reset.
Again.
Kel's punches carried a dull impact through the training pads now. His Internal Qi no longer gathered only in his fists. It supported his entire body through the motion.
Luno became harder to catch out of position. His awareness shifted naturally around him, and the insects had become part of that awareness without becoming the center of it.
One afternoon, Dyrain stood between them holding a thick practice pad.
"Kel."
Kel stepped forward.
He settled his breathing.
No tension in the shoulders.
No early reinforcement.
He stepped.
Hip.
Core.
Shoulder.
Fist.
The strike landed.
THUD.
Dyrain's arm moved backward several inches.
Kel stared at the pad.
That felt different.
Not heavier.
Cleaner.
The force hadn't come from one part of his body.
Everything had arrived together.
Dyrain nodded.
"There."
Kel smiled.
"I felt it."
"Remember it."
Luno went next.
His strike wasn't as heavy, but it landed with almost no warning. His body remained relaxed until the moment of contact, when Internal Qi reinforced the chain just enough.
Dyrain nodded again.
"Good."
Kel looked between them.
"So that's Qi Boxing?"
"No."
Kel's smile faded.
"What do you mean, no?"
"That's the foundation."
Kel stared.
"We've been doing this for a month."
"Yes."
"And we're at the beginning?"
"Yes."
Luno laughed.
Kel looked exhausted by the answer alone.
Dyrain lowered the training pad.
"A foundation should take time. Otherwise everything built on it falls apart."
Kel couldn't argue with that.
He still wanted to.
---
That evening, they sat outside the orphanage after training.
Kel's knuckles were sore.
Luno's legs ached.
Neither cared much.
Kel slowly opened and closed his hand.
Internal Qi followed the movement naturally.
Not enough to create heat anyone else could see, but he could feel it.
The difference between the Kel who had first met Dyrain and the Kel sitting there now wasn't some new technique.
He simply understood his own body better.
Luno watched a tiny beetle crawl across his finger before it disappeared back toward the sand.
"They're getting louder."
Kel glanced toward him.
"The insects?"
"Yeah."
"Is that good?"
Luno thought for a moment.
"I think so."
Spark shifted underneath his hat.
"We're getting better."
Luno smiled.
Kel noticed.
"Spark?"
"Yeah."
"What'd he say?"
"He said we're getting better."
Kel leaned backward on his hands.
"He's right."
Luno looked at him.
"You admitting that?"
"Don't make it weird."
They sat quietly for a while.
Then footsteps approached.
Dyrain came around the side of the orphanage.
Kel immediately became suspicious.
"If you say training starts again right now, I'm moving."
"Where?"
Kel thought.
"I don't know yet."
Dyrain stopped in front of them.
His expression was more serious than usual.
That erased Kel's joke.
"You talked to Harven?"
Dyrain nodded.
"And?"
"He's had reports."
Luno sat straighter.
"What kind?"
"Small ones."
Dyrain folded his arms.
"Animals behaving strangely. Travelers reporting vibrations beneath the southern roads. Two guard posts felt something move underground. Nothing strong enough to damage buildings."
Kel glanced toward Luno.
"The same thing we felt?"
"Maybe."
Dyrain's answer was careful.
That meant he still didn't know.
Kel stood.
"So what are we doing?"
"For now? Nothing."
Kel frowned.
Dyrain continued before he could argue.
"Harven has people checking the reports. Running blindly into the Badlands because something moved beneath your feet would be stupid."
Kel sighed.
"You always find a way to make doing nothing sound insulting."
"Because sometimes doing nothing is the intelligent choice."
Luno stood beside Kel.
"And our training?"
Dyrain looked at both of them.
"Continues."
Kel nodded slowly.
"With Qi Boxing?"
"Yes."
That got his attention.
Dyrain turned toward the darkening desert.
"You've learned the foundation. Next, you learn how to make it yours."
Kel looked at his hands.
The heat inside them stirred softly.
Luno felt several insects moving beneath the nearby sand.
Neither boy knew what their fighting styles would become.
But for the first time, they had something solid to build from.
Far beyond Durnfield, the last light disappeared behind the Badlands.
The desert stayed quiet.
For now.