The next day, Jax quit school. His mother was distraught, but he was resolute.
He spun a story about the intense bullying—which wasn't a lie—and a desire to study for his GED on his own. He promised her he had a plan.
For the first time in either of his lives, he did. He had one year until The Eclipse. 365 days to transform his body from a vessel of lard and self-pity into a weapon.
His life became a grueling, monotonous cycle.
He woke up before sunrise, running along the banks of the Han River until his lungs felt like they were full of broken glass.
He used the meager savings he scrounged up to get a membership at a dingy, back-alley gym run by a gruff ex-marine. There, he lifted rusted iron, his muscles screaming in protest.
He devoured information. He spent hours in public libraries, not on seed encyclopedias—he knew that lore already—but on kinesiology, nutrition, and combat sports.
He watched thousands of hours of boxing and MMA tutorials online, practicing his footwork and shadowboxing in his small room until his body moved with a fluidity he'd never known.
The fat melted away, replaced by the hard lines of compact, efficient muscle.
His jawline sharpened, the puffiness in his face receded, revealing the handsome features he'd inherited from his father, tempered by the gentle intensity of his mother's dark eyes.
He was forging a new body, and in the process, a new identity.
His mother watched the transformation with a mixture of pride and worry.
He was becoming strong, focused, but also distant. The haunted look in his eyes, the look of a man who had seen the end of the world, never truly faded.
He did his best to reassure her, helping around the house, earning money through odd part-time jobs, and always, always telling her he loved her.
Every day was a gift.
He was preparing for war, armed with nothing but future knowledge and a body he was beating into submission.
The system window remained a silent, constant companion, its five empty slots a taunting reminder of his bizarre predicament.
He had a gun with no bullets. But he would make his body the bullet.