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

his staff, farther away from the blue pill. The constant need to contort kept him from rooting and Watershaping.

Siena popped up, grunted a word, and pointed. Fire darted from her fingertip and struck one of the shocktroopers. The flames fizzled around the armor, and didn’t stop him from claiming the ground between them. An assassin broke off his attack on Ryu to focus on the Elestrae.

“Their armor is made from durastrium,” Aya’s voice said. “It’s used in spacecraft and can protect against energy!”

In the corner of his eye, a string of bolts zipped past him and struck another shocktrooper. The energy plinked into his armor with no noticeable effect, but it did provide a hole in the incoming fire for Ryu to root. He lashed out with a Water Whip, severing one’s minigun. Its rotating barrels skipped across the floor.

His loss created another open space in the incoming spray of bolts, in which Ryu leaped, rooted, and whipped out again. Though the shocktroopers moved impossibly fast for their bulk, the latest Water Whip lopped off one’s outstretched arm, even through the armor.

More energy pulses struck shocktroopers, doing little more than slow them a step, and Ryu turned to see Keiko shooting. Near her, Ken was running towards the nearest assassin.

He had little time to worry about the boy when the shocktrooper whose gun Ryu had broken off closed in and ignited his energy blade. Ryu bobbed under his slash and landed a Splashing Hand into the man’s chest.

Though the technique had shattered shocktrooper armor and wounded the wearer the week before, this blow sent the man flying back six feet, while only denting the breastplate. A Xingyi Fire Fist in the same spot would probably penetrate it. Ryu started to pursue, but the first assassin jumped in between them and sent a round kick towards Ryu’s ribs.

It came fast, but not so quickly that Ryu couldn’t deflect it with a sweep of his arm and then lock up the leg. He went to sweep the other leg out, but the assassin leaped over Ryu’s attack and countered with a round kick to Ryu’s temple.

Leaning his head back out of range, Ryu yanked the man’s leg back and sent him tumbling to the floor. The assassin recovered quickly, rolling to his feet. For a split second, his back was exposed, and Ryu went to close the distance.

He pulled up short when a shocktrooper shot into the space where Ryu would’ve stepped. Another shocktrooper surged in on his flank with a heavy punch. Using Chen Taiji’s Cloud Hands, he redirected the attack, then stepped in with a Crashing Wave.  His shoulder-butt slammed into the shocktrooper, sending the man sprawling. The armor dented, but absorbed the damage from the blow.

Before Ryu could Watershape another whip, another shocktrooper engaged with a flying kick. Ryu spun out of the way, and the behemoth made cracks in the floor where he landed. But Ryu’s new position exposed him to the assassin’s punch, and it took all of his speed to avoid taking a hit to the side of his head.

Three shocktroopers closed in, attacking in coordination. Unlike the first time he’d fought their kind, they seemed to be one step ahead. He managed to land a single attack on each of them, damaging their armor; but they all evaded his follow-up Fire Fists. Soon, their counterstrikes were landing, each blow of their metal-encased fists weakening his Iron Body.

At last though, he had room to form a Water Whip. On his command, it lashed out and cut through another shocktrooper’s minigun.

Though, why weren’t they using their light blades?

A shocktrooper clambered in, but in his excitement to take advantage of Ryu’s pause, he left himself open. Ryu landed Butterfly Palms into the brute’s chest, damaging the armor and knocking the shocktrooper back.

As the space opened between them, a shot came in. Before Ryu could react, it struck him in the left arm. Pain seared there, and as he was currently unable to root to the floor and redirect the energy, it took all his concentration to keep from losing consciousness. They’d baited him by sacrificing the one shocktrooper.

With the effect of the blast stunning him, they closed in around him.

As assassin leaped in and landed a kick to Ryu’s chest, hitting with much more force than the size of the man suggested. It sent Ryu careening back into a wall, and his vision faded at the edges.

The last he saw, the shocktroopers were turning to envelope Siena, and the assassin had shredded Kentaro’s clothes as he pressed the boy back. Whether he’d cut flesh or not…

Chapter 36:

The Hacker

W ith Aya locked out of the Ministry of Defense network forever, she couldn’t hack the shocktroopers’ armor. If only she hadn’t wasted Slash’s code on crashing that gunship!  In the Peacekeeper’s EtherSpace, there were no internal force fields or other security measures for her to manipulate inside the lab. With nothing but the ability to keep the sprinkler system running, she felt utterly useless.

Ryu was losing consciousness as the assassin fired stun bolt after stun bolt into him. All eight shocktroopers had turned from him and had now fanned out to take on Siena, Kentaro, and Keiko.

Keiko! As much as Aya despised her sister, she didn’t want her hurt. Just what was she thinking, engaging against the Ministry of Defense?

All Aya could do from here was analyze what was happening.

Maybe find weaknesses in the prototype power armor.

“Ai, create a simulation of Ryu’s current fight with the shocktroopers.”

The nine-tailed fox appeared and bowed. Around Aya, her surroundings became the lab, where Ryu fought against the hulking brutes.

Why had they chosen to engage hand-to-hand instead of pinning him down with fire? And