The muster whistle snapped the morning clean.
Cohort 3 formed on the chalk-marked yard. Dust motes drifted in angled light. Leather straps creaked as buckles were tested. The air held the neutral bite of stone and clean sweat.
Qin Ye stepped to the gear desk first. He laid down the Grip Wrap Voucher.
The clerk measured wrist, forearm, palm span. No chatter. A wrapped pair—Inner Gate legal—came out of a drawer. The clerk logged the serial on a slate, stamped the line, and slid the wraps across.
Texture, not ceremony. Compliance, not flourish.
He bound the wraps tight. No give. No color.
⸻
The roster went up with two brass tacks. Paper smoothed. Names set.
At the tack's head, light caught.
[Daily Sign-In available.]
[Location: Cohort Board Pin.]
[Sign-In? Yes / No]
Yes.
[Ding! Sign-In successful!]
[Reward: Coordination Thread (Lv.1, 20 breaths — sync micro-timing with external cadence) + Queue Alarm (1 use — notify clerk on illegal line interference).]
A thin thread settled behind his eyes, tuned to someone else's rhythm. A quiet bell for queues hung at the edge of his attention.
He glanced once at the board. Yue Hong stood three names down. Noted. Nothing said.
⸻
Drill 1: Weighted Steps Track.
Legal ankle weights clinked onto boots. A marshal paced the line, whistle on cord. Wall vents opened with a click; crosswinds breathed in pulses.
Three whistles, staggered, set the cadence—front row, second, third. Feet moved or they lied.
Qin Ye triggered the Coordination Thread.
Breath fell into the whistles' grid. Silent Step bled sound; Quiet Pivot turned gusts into nothing. Spacing held to the finger-width. Where weight tried to push, geometry replied.
A disciple two lanes over stumbled on a crosswind and recovered with heat in his cheeks. Qin Ye's line never broke.
[Ding! Micro-Goal: "Hold the Line."]
[Reward: +150,000 Spirit Stones; Formation Sense +3% (situational).]
The marshal's chalk made a small tick by Lane Three. Unremarked, but recorded.
The thread eased out of his head like a taut string unplucked.
⸻
Friction.
Yue Hong drifted a half-step into Qin Ye's lane. Legal tolerance. A brush of sleeve meant to hook a reaction.
Qin Ye didn't give him one.
A minimal Quiet Pivot removed the vector. As Yue pressed, a soft Blade Nudge—forearm to forearm, non-damaging—reset the lane by an inch. Marshal's gaze touched them, then moved on. No shout. No foul.
One calm glance from Qin Ye returned to the lane ahead. Yue Hong's eyes cooled. Probe logged nowhere.
⸻
Drill 2: Clause Practical.
A rules instructor threw scenarios at rotating stations.
"Boundary mark faded!"
"Seal ribbon loose on training tool!"
"Partner swap paperwork incomplete!"
At the boundary lane, the chalk line was a rumor.
Qin Ye raised a hand. "Clause 4.3 mandates clear demarcation. Request public refresh."
The instructor nodded once. An attendant came at a jog, chalked the line bright under every eye, and wrote the parity note on a hanging slate. The world became clear by procedure.
[Ding! Micro-Goal: "Refresh the Mark."]
[Reward: +1 Examiner Impression (situational); Logistics Memory +1 page.]
The rules instructor's mouth pressed into something like approval. He barked the next scenario without looking away.
⸻
Drill 3: Duo Balance Run.
Pairs were tethered with a slack line. The corridor carried wind like a narrow river.
Qin Ye's partner was young. Hands tight. Eyes wide. The first crosswind hit, and panic entered his ankles.
No orders. No noise.
Qin Ye set two fingers to the sleeve seam—pressure, angle. His own hip drew a tiny curve. The tether accepted the new line; the boy's feet found it.
They crossed without wobble. The marshal wrote silent leadership in neat chalk. The boy swallowed and nodded once, gratitude kept small and private.
⸻
Queue Interference.
A minor disciple eased forward for the last mini-drill, voice pitched for favor. "He-line priority."
Qin Ye triggered the Queue Alarm.
A clerk arrived with a ledger and a stamp. He asked nothing. He read the line, wrote a line, and stamped a warning slip that cracked like a small whip. The queue settled one place back to true.
[Ding! Micro-Goal: "Protect the Queue."]
[Reward: +100,000 Spirit Stones; Clerk Favor +1.]
The clerk's eyes met Qin Ye's for half a heartbeat—professional, grateful—and then moved on.
⸻
The board changed at day's end. Wax cooled in neat circles. Meridian Strain Assessment — tomorrow. Cohort blocks listed. Yue Hong's unit scheduled adjacent to Qin Ye's.
Friction calendared.
Lanterns lifted the evening. Qin Ye walked under their soft fire to the Study Pavilion and set his Access Token down on the desk. The attendant nodded, slid a register forward; stamp fell, permission made.
Shelves breathed paper and ink. He found the inner-archive manual, turned a page with diagrams dense as cities, and spent his Copy Permit Lv.2 on a single sheet: meridian strain thresholds mapped against breath-cadence overlays. No essay. Lines and curves. A logic of safe and not.
The permit stamped invisibly; the diagram settled into his memory like an instrument tuning.
[Ding! Main Quest updated — Inner Gate Trial: 8 days.]
Lantern light blurred against paper walls. He traced the curve's spine with one finger, breath in fours and fours and twos, until the shape lived under his skin.
Then he let the room go quiet around it.