Days became weeks.
Weeks became months.
Four months passed in the cavern of the Beast King's domain, and Iris never relented.
Over the course of the last four months, time had blurred into repetition, agony, and persistence.
Every night, she would return from hunting to the cavern floor, sinking once more into meditation, forcing Ki into the space beside her Astral Heart until it threatened to burst, then guiding it through her veins.
The pressure built, rotation after rotation, until her blood vessels felt like molten rivers inside her flesh.
At times she screamed.
At times she could not even move, writhing as blood spilled freely from her nose, ears, and even the corners of her eyes.
Each time she failed, she consumed algae to heal her broken body.
Each time the pressure threatened to drown her, she sank deeper into the stillness of water, learning to let pain flow through her rather than resist it.
