Quantum Cultivation by Jace Kang (simple e reader TXT) 📕

With a nod, he followed and sat across from her. Having him there was really helpful, actually, since he helped anchor her meditation.

He wasn’t as bad as she first thought. So much of her opinion of the Purebreds had been formed by years of indoctrination; they weren’t pitiful or stupid at all, and, annoying as he could be with his enthusiasm, Kentaro being there motivated Aya to get better.

A few hours later, after sunset, they ate some food Siena had bought and Aya took a minute of real time to jack into EtherCloud and secure their path to Ginkakuji.

Though it wasn’t particularly late, very few people were out. The murders had the populace on edge, and the government was recommending that everyone stay indoors.

Their group avoided the Peacekeepers, sometimes taking back roads or ducking behind the corners of buildings.  Aya had remotely hacked every camera between the park and the temple to keep security algorithms from detecting Ryusuke, and Siena wore a hat to cover her pointed ears.

After just a couple of days of Cultivation, Aya’s endurance had improved. She would’ve been winded walking from her room to the kitchen before. Now, even during the brisk walk from the Kujo Ward, through Central, then along the Kamo River to Ginkakuji, she only had to clear her lungs every fifteen minutes. It was a significant improvement from having to do so every ten minutes when doing nothing. Ai reported that her lung efficiency had improved by sixty percent.

Considering how low it’d started, that wasn’t necessarily good. Still, it meant she could stay jacked into the EtherCloud for sixteen minutes instead of ten before having to jack out and cough up mucous.

Halfway there, on the main road running along the Kamo River, Siena gestured them into the shadows of a building.

“What is it?” Kentaro asked.

“Shhhh.” Holding her necklace in one hand, Siena scowled and pointed somewhere across the river.

“What is it?” he whispered, squinting.

Aya tried to see as well, but all she could make out were six large, dark bipedal shapes. Shocktroopers in uniform, perhaps?

“What are they?” Ryusuke asked.

The awe in his voice prompted her to jack in and hack into a nearby camera, behind the looping code she’d inserted to conceal their own passage. With its lowlight functions, the camera provided a clear shot of three turquoise-skinned humanoids with sharp features. Tusks protruded from their lower jaws, but they were otherwise quite handsome, meaning they belonged to the Tivari nobility. They wore black uniforms and appeared to be unarmed.

They must be part of the peace delegation, but trusted only so much, since the camera picked up tracking beams from both Peacekeeper and MoD drones.

Aya jacked out. Her brain was acclimating more quickly to the shift in time. She pointed to the sky, indicating the drones, then held up a hand to tell them to wait.  After the Tivari passed, she nodded.

“What were they?” Kentaro asked.

“Members of the Tivari peace delegation,” Aya said.

Ryusuke peered off in the direction they’d disappeared. “The news said they were in San Francisco. What are they doing in Kyoto?”

“Nothing good,” Siena scoffed. Reaching into her interdimensional space, she drew a sleek gun and started to go after them.

“Wait.” Aya grabbed the Elestrae’s arm. “MoD and Peacekeeper drones are monitoring them.”

“Can you hack them?” Siena asked.

So much hatred! Perhaps twenty thousand years of war could do that. Aya shook her head. “It would be difficult, and we don’t have much time left.”

They continued in awkward silence while Aya considered the Tivari. History books claimed they’d once controlled a secret source of istrium, which had fueled the rapid expansion of their galactic empire for millennia. They’d lost that source a thousand years ago, leading to their decline. Siena had said something about their failed attempt to retake an istrium source a week ago.

She shook the thoughts out of her head when they arrived at the old temple. The clock in her head showed it was 22:47, just thirteen minutes before the attacks the previous nights.

“Remember the strategy,” Ryusuke said. “Ken-kun will engage the Tofu-Kozo. If it looks like he’ll be harmed, Siena will intervene. In the very unlikely event she can’t beat it, I’ll take over. By no means should Aya fight.”

Aya was fine with that. Even if she’d programmed several of the martial routines into her neural pathways, she still lacked the strength and stamina to perform them.

With only an easily hacked security camera system guarding the grounds, they strolled right through the main gates.

The Silver Pavilion’s grounds were almost exactly the same as the Kinkakuji Gold Pavilion, where Koji Johnson had been murdered the night before: a two-story temple overlooking a pond and Zen sand garden. While Kinkakuji’s roof and walls were plated with gold leaf, the Silver Pavilion’s were plain wood. History recorded that the warlord who’d commissioned its construction had run out of funds to cover it in silver.

Now, the area was utterly quiet. While the others went deeper into the compound, Aya paused to enjoy the moon reflecting in the pond. It was quite beautiful, really, compared to her regular existence in the confines of her room, or even in the virtual world of the EtherCloud.

The air shimmered in front of her.

A little Tofu-Kozo appeared and bowed. “Would you like some tofu?”

She’d been right about the location, wrong about him attacking only males.

“Help!” she yelled.

The Tofu-Kozo’s smile transformed into a snarl of sharp teeth, and it lunged at her with a flurry of punches.

All attacks she knew.  She’d either fought against them when sparring with Ryusuke, or recorded them from earlier fights she’d had Ai analyze.

The Chen Taiji motions came automatically, her Wave Hands Like Clouds technique brushing aside the first barrage. Still, she lost ground.

“Ai, create a combat solution for