The River Within
The front door of the Harris household opened with a familiar click.
Cole stepped inside, the scent of home—a mix of old wood, his mother's cooking, and the faint, clean smell of laundry—washing over him. He dropped his heavy pack by the door with a weary thud.
"I'm home," he called out.
Instantly, a flurry of activity erupted from the living room. Leo was the first to greet him, his eyes wide with a mix of curiosity and brotherly concern. "You're back! Did you fight anything? Did you see a rare monster?"
Laura followed, wiping her hands on an apron. She didn't ask questions. She just looked him over with a practiced, clinical eye, checking for injuries, signs of exhaustion, or the subtle tells of a traumatic experience. Cole held her gaze calmly, projecting an air of someone who was tired from an academic trip, not a life-or-death battle.
"The workshop was great," he said, preempting the questions. He offered them a tired but satisfied smile. "Learned a lot about geological mana signatures. It was mostly just hiking and taking readings. Pretty boring for you, Leo."
"Boring is good," Laura said, her shoulders relaxing slightly. She had spotted the faint, fading scratches on his hands but likely attributed them to scrambling over rocks. "Welcome home, honey. Go get cleaned up. Dinner will be ready soon."
He passed Mia in the hallway. She gave him a quick, appraising look. "You look like you learned more than just geology," she said quietly, a knowing glint in her eyes.
"I learned that I'm not built for hiking," he replied with a wry grin.
The lie held. His family accepted his story without any further questions. He was once again Cole Harris, the studious, unremarkable son. The normalcy of it all was a comforting blanket after the sharp-edged reality of the Cinderfall Ranges.
But that night, long after the house had fallen silent, the real work began.
His bedroom, once just a place for sleep and study, became his sanctuary. His laboratory. He locked the door, something the original Cole rarely did, and soundproofed the edges with a simple dampening rune he bought with his leftover funds. It wouldn't stop a determined listener, but it would muffle any grunts of pain or sudden exhalations.
He sat cross-legged on the floor, his terminal open in front of him. On the screen, the high-resolution scans of the ancient tablets glowed softly.
[River Flows].
It wasn't a skill one could simply learn by reading. It was a philosophy of mana, a complete re-imagining of how energy should move through the body.
Modern human mana techniques were aggressive. They focused on forcefully channeling mana from the core to a specific point—a fist for punching, a blade for cutting. It was like a controlled explosion. Efficient for combat, but wasteful and damaging over time.
[River Flows] was the opposite.
The diagrams on the tablets depicted the human body not as a weapon, but as a self-contained ecosystem. The mana core was the heartspring, the source. The mana channels were the rivers and streams. The technique taught the user to create a continuous, gentle, and cyclical current. The mana wasn't meant to be shot out; it was meant to flow. It would start at the core, circulate through every limb, every organ, nourishing and strengthening them, before returning to the core, purified and slightly amplified.
The diagrams were incredibly complex, showing pathways within the body that modern science had never mapped. It required the user to simultaneously control dozens of tiny, separate streams of mana and weave them together into a single, harmonious current.
It was, in a word, beautiful. And to a Mid-F Ranker, it seemed utterly impossible.
Cole took a deep breath and began his first attempt.
He closed his eyes and drew upon his meager mana reserves. He separated a tiny thread of energy, just as he had done to open the tomb door. He tried to guide it along the first pathway shown in the diagrams—a complex route that spiraled around the spine.
He failed instantly. The thread of mana, without a forceful command, simply dissipated.
He tried again. This time, he managed to push the thread a few inches along the path before it hit a blockage. A sharp, stinging pain, like a dozen angry wasps, erupted in his back. He gasped, his concentration shattering, and the mana thread dissolved.
He spent the next hour in a state of agonizing trial and error. Every attempt ended in failure and pain. His mana channels, narrow and rigid from disuse and improper technique, resisted the new current at every turn. It was like trying to force a river through a series of clogged, rusted pipes. The pressure would build, find no release, and burst in a small, painful flare of energy.
By the end of the night, his body ached with a deep, internal soreness, and he had accomplished nothing. His mana core was completely drained.
This was the grind.
He did not despair. He was a project manager. He had anticipated setbacks. The next day, he went about his routine, and that night, he was back on the floor, patiently tracing the pathways again.
For two weeks, he made almost no progress. Every night was a new lesson in pain and failure. He learned to endure the stinging blockages, to better control the delicate threads of mana. He was mapping his own interior, learning the unique landscape of his own soul.
The breakthrough came on the fifteenth night.
He was deep in his meditative state, sweat dripping from his brow. He had successfully navigated the first major circuit around his spine and was now guiding the current down his left leg. He felt the familiar, painful resistance in his knee. In the past, he had always tried to force his way through.
This time, he did something different. He didn't push.
He let the current of mana pool against the blockage, not as a battering ram, but as a gentle, persistent tide. He made the mana flow, letting it gently nudge and coax the blockage. He felt a subtle shift. A tiny release of pressure.
The blockage dissolved.
A warm, soothing current of mana washed down his leg, as clean and refreshing as cool water. The pain vanished, replaced by a feeling of profound relief and clarity. He guided the now-unimpeded stream through the rest of the circuit—up his right side, through his arms, and finally, back to its source.
The moment the current returned to his mana core, something clicked.
The circuit was complete.
A gentle, golden warmth spread from his center, suffusing his entire body. It was a feeling of deep, bone-deep vitality. The dozens of tiny, internal aches from his nightly struggles simply melted away. He could feel his mana channels, once tight and restricted, now felt open and pliable.
He opened his eyes, his breath catching in his throat. He checked his mana core. Before, after draining it completely, it would take him five to six hours of rest to recover fully.
He focused, and felt the energy within him replenishing at a rate that was, without exaggeration, twice as fast as before.
The river was flowing.
A slow, triumphant grin spread across Cole's face. This was it. This was the foundation. He had a long, arduous road ahead of him. He still needed to perfect the flow, to make it as natural as breathing.
But the path was now clear.
His two-year plan had a new, vital component. His daily routine was set.
Physical conditioning in the morning, to forge the vessel.
School during the day, to understand the world.
And every night, in the silence of his room, he would nurture the river within, preparing for the day it would become a flood.