The rest of the training went smoothly.

  Li Qinghua had them practice different stretches, then made them carry ceramic jugs of water across the courtyard. Heavy things. Glazed clay that bit into your palms and numbed your fingers. Daniel's arms burned after the third trip, shoulders aching, forearms cramping. But he kept going.

  Henry spilled half his jug on himself trying to balance on a wooden pole. Water soaking through his shirt, dripping onto the stones below. He wobbled, arms pinwheeling like a cartoon character, and nearly fell before catching himself at the last second.

  Daniel laughed. It felt strange. Good, but strange.

  The exercises were never quite the same. Even when they returned to something familiar, she'd add a twist. Narrower pole, heavier jug, longer hold. Balance drills where you had to stand on one leg until your whole body shook. Breathing exercises that made your head feel light and floaty. Something that looked like slow-motion walking but made his thighs scream like he was climbing stairs with weights strapped to his ankles.

  Li Qinghua watched everything. Correcting posture with taps of her walking stick. Saying little but missing nothing. Her eyes sharp despite her age.

  Before long the day was over. The sun had dipped behind the buildings, leaving the courtyard in cool shadow. They gathered their things and headed home.

  Daniel often wondered if Li Qinghua was really a master. He'd asked her before and she kept insisting she wasn't. But an ordinary person wouldn't know all these things, right? The techniques, the theory, the history. The way she corrected their stances like she'd done it a thousand times before. She knew too much to be just some old lady who ran a herb shop.

  But every time he tried to pry deeper, she'd shoo him away like a cat batting at an annoying hand.

  "Stop calling me master," she'd say. "I'm not."

  "But if you aren't, then how do you..."

  "Shut up."

  And that was the end of it.

  Daniel spent the next day in his apartment.

  Instant ramen for breakfast. The cheap kind, twenty cents a packet, sodium content high enough to preserve a corpse. He'd bought a case of them last week. Living the dream.

  It was a break day. No boxing, no sessions with Li Qinghua, no work at Mr. Zhao's. A good time to reflect, if he said so himself. Process everything. Let it settle.

  He sat on his futon, back against the wall, and closed his eyes. Cycled through the Basic Sensing Exercise. Back to where it all started.

  The light gathered in his dantian as always. Familiar now. Like coming home to a room, you knew by heart.

  But today he wanted to feel more.

  He'd known there were twelve meridians from his research. Li Qinghua had confirmed it in her lessons. Twelve paths. Six in the arms, six in the legs. Yang and Yin paired together like two sides of a coin.

  If he couldn't feel them, they should be blocked. And if he wanted to make progress with his six moves, he should start there. Find the blockages. Figure out how to open them.

  He breathed deeper. In and out. Let Zhan Zhuang calm his qi into a more stable form.

  Emotions can affect meridians. That was his theory. Though Li Qinghua said it might not be the whole thing, there must be some merit to that thought or she'd just say no, right? She wasn't the type to just humor him.

  So. Assuming emotions do something. What emotion should he have to help unlock his meridians? If that was even possible.

  Rage? Sadness? Those were options. Strong feelings that shook you out of your normal state. But the one that came to mind most often was simpler.

  Li Qinghua had mentioned Zhang Sanfeng and Bodhidharma. They'd both meditated for years. Sitting in silence. Maybe that was the key.

  The world was a distraction.

  To empty your mind of all thoughts. To have no thoughts at all.

  He paused, thinking about it clearly, before seeing the pencil on the floor. The blank page of the notebook where he had been scribbling at the night before.

  Once you define it, you limit what it could become.

  Emotions aren't the whole picture. Perhaps it's both? Being present and absent at the same time.

  He paused.

  Then he decided, for the first time in a long time, to just think about nothing at all.

  Nothing.

  Blank as a clean slate.

  Not a thing.

  He let the qi circulate freely, like air flowing through an open window. No direction. No intention. Just movement.

  Then something happened.

  No meridians were unlocked. But there was a strange wispy feeling. Like a gas moving throughout his body. Spreading.

  There was a pause. A moment of stillness. Like the world holding its breath.

  Then, as if someone had snapped their fingers.

  He could feel more.

  Not just the hand meridian he'd been using for Tiger Claw. Others too. Paths throughout his body that had been vague, uncertain, were now... visible? No, that wasn't the right word. More accessible. Like doors that had been locked were now just closed.

  Before, he could only sense meridians if qi was traveling through them. Like fumbling with a flashlight in a dark room, only seeing whatever the beam happened to land on.

  But now it was like someone had turned on all the lights at once. The rooms had always been there. He just couldn't see them until now.

  His dantian lit up all twelve meridians at the same time.

  What was this?

  Daniel's eyes snapped open. He stood, moved into a basic stance, trying to hold onto the feeling. It was slippery. Hard to grasp. Like trying to remember a dream as it faded.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  He tried to remember the Meridian Chart he'd copied from the museum. The lesson that Li Qinghua had taught him. Closed his eyes again. Cleared his thoughts.

  Focus.

  He tried to circulate qi through a leg meridian. The Stomach meridian, Foot Yangming. The one Li Qinghua had mentioned ran down the front of the leg.

  The qi flowed.

  Not perfectly. Not smoothly. But it moved.

  He could feel the points. Just like in his arm. Places where the qi naturally pooled before continuing.

  This was new.

  He tried the other leg. Same result. The path was there. Accessible. Waiting.

  What about the other hand meridians? The Yin ones that ran on the inner arm?

  The qi responded. Slower than the Yang meridian. Less familiar. But it moved.

  Daniel opened his eyes, staring at his hands. Turning them over. Watching like he expected to see something glowing under the skin.

  Nothing visible. But he could feel it. The qi was there.

  He grabbed his notebook. Started to organize his thoughts into one cohesive idea. His handwriting messy, rushed, trying to capture everything before the sensation faded.

  He tapped his pencil against the page. Flipped to a fresh sheet. Started writing.

  Arms:

  Large Intestine (Hand Yangming) - Open

  Lung (Hand Taiyin) - Open

  Pericardium (Hand Jueyin) - Open

  Heart (Hand Shaoyin) - Blocked

  Small Intestine (Hand Taiyang) - Blocked

  Triple Burner (Hand Shaoyang) - Blocked

  Legs:

  Stomach (Foot Yangming) - Partial

  Spleen (Foot Taiyin) - Partial

  Kidney (Foot Shaoyin) - Partial

  Bladder (Foot Taiyang) - Blocked

  Gallbladder (Foot Shaoyang) - Blocked

  Liver (Foot Jueyin) - Blocked

  Six open or partial. Six completely blocked. He was exactly halfway.

  Daniel stared at the list. Something about that felt significant. Like finding out you were at the midpoint of a journey you didn't know you were on. Halfway to what? Full mastery? Real power? He didn't know. But halfway felt important.

  He compared it to the moves he wanted to master.

  Out of the six, the closest he was to mastering was the Ghost Step. The movements were there. And he had activated it twice during his first fight with Li Mei. But he hadn't been able to activate it at will. It came and went like a sneeze you couldn't force.

  This meant it was probably connected to a meridian that was only partially open. Made sense. Partial opening meant partial access. And given that names have meaning and ghosts thrived on being unpredictable and unseen, it was most likely connected to one of the Foot Yin Meridians. Spleen or Kidney. Something subtle. Something that moved without being noticed.

  "Hmm," he mumbled to himself.

  This was a pretty interesting puzzle. Putting all the techniques into something understandable.

  Then that meant Pressure Points was most likely a Yin meridian too. Sensing and precision rather than raw power. As for Tui Shou and the mythical Ladder Cloud Step, he couldn't really tell based on their names what meridians those might use.

  Maybe those were more advanced skills that used multiple meridians at once. Like combo attacks that required specific inputs.

  His landline rang.

  The sound cut through his concentration. Harsh. Electronic.

  He picked up.

  Henry's voice: "Dude, you gotta see this. Forum's going crazy. Get to the library."

  Across the city on the previous night, Li Mei stood in her father's office.

  Her clothes were still damp from the museum sprinklers. The fabric clinging to her skin. Cold and uncomfortable, but she didn't shift or fidget. Discipline. Control. She'd come directly here after the operation. No time to change. No excuse to delay.

  The office was dim.

  Li Wentao sat behind his desk.

  He didn't look up from the report she'd written. Just read. Expression revealing nothing. His face could have been carved from stone.

  The silence stretched.

  Water dripped from her jacket onto the hardwood floor. Each drop loud in the quiet. A small puddle forming at her feet. She stood still. Let it happen. No point drawing attention to it.

  Finally, he set the report down.

  "Three scrolls," he said. "And few artifacts on the third floor."

  Li Mei said nothing. Waited.

  "Valuable acquisitions." Li Wentao leaned back in his chair. The leather creaked softly. "But not the objective."

  "The provenance records were..."

  "In the back office. Which you never reached." His voice was level. Professional. The voice of a man who never needed to raise it to be heard.

  "You secured the artifacts but failed to determine where they came from. Who owned them before the museum."

  Li Mei's jaw tightened. Just slightly. Not enough for most people to notice. But her father wasn't most people. "Yes, sir."

  Li Wentao drummed his fingers on the desk. Once. Twice.

  "And a sword against an unarmed opponent shouldn't require police intervention."

  There it was. The correction underneath the assessment. The real message.

  "No, sir."

  Pause.

  Then he slid a folder across the desk. "Your next assignment."

  Li Mei picked up the folder. Didn't open it.

  "Complete the full objective this time," Li Wentao said.

  "Yes, sir."

  Li Mei's apartment was on the second floor of the Golden Phoenix Restaurant. The smell of Shaoxing wine and cooking oil drifted up through the floorboards. Constant. Inescapable.

  Small space. Efficient. A bed with military corners. A desk with nothing on it but a lamp. Training equipment in the corner. A wooden dummy, its arms worn smooth from years of practice. Everything in its place. Nothing extra. Nothing personal.

  She pulled off her wet jacket. Hung it in the bathroom over the tub. Changed into dry clothes. Toweled her hair until it stopped dripping.

  Sat on the edge of her bed.

  The folder lay unopened on her desk. Professional work. Important work. The next step in the operation.

  But her mind kept circling back.

  The Asian Art Museum. Water everywhere. And that idiot throwing whatever he could grab.

  Did he really think she would just let them go after witnessing them in the middle of a crime? After seeing their faces? After he'd recognized her?

  And yet.

  She had adapted perfectly. Moving through the patterns she'd drilled for years. Every response correct. Every counter precise.

  But he'd made her work for it. Why hadn't she told her father she suspected he was Hidden Dragon? They moved the same, didn't they? Those reflexes were far from normal. Perhaps it was the slight uncertainty that it wasn't true? Or something else?

  Li Mei stared at the wall. The paint was beige. A water spot chipped in one corner. She'd been staring at it more often lately. As if it held some kind of answer.

  Either way, her father was right. It shouldn't have taken that long. She had training. Years of forms practiced until techniques became second nature. Movements drilled until they bypassed conscious thought entirely.

  But when he'd started to pretend he was some harmless lost teenager. That ridiculous act. Museum caretakers? Night shift maintenance?

  For just a second, under her mask where no one could see, she had smiled.

  Not the polite smile for organizational dinners. Not the cold smile during an operation.

  A real one.

  Play a trick on me? Then I'll play one back on you.

  Li Mei stood. Walked to the window. Looked out at Chinatown stretching below. The streets narrow and crowded. Neon signs starting to glow in the dusk. Red and gold and green. Colors bleeding into the evening air. People moving through the streets like blood through veins. The city alive. The city uncaring.

  When was the last time she smiled like that?

  A memory surfaced. Unneeded. Unwanted.

  Pool party. She'd been six, maybe seven.

  Some associate's house in the suburbs. Big backyard with manicured grass. Blue pool sparkling in the California sun. Other kids everywhere. Jumping, splashing, screaming. The chaos of it. The beautiful noise of children being children.

  Li Mei at the pool's edge. Standing there in her swimsuit. Watching. Her father nearby, talking to other men in suits. Business, always business, even at a party.

  One of the kids splashed her. Water hitting her face, her chest. Cold and sudden.

  She'd looked at her father. Unsure. Waiting for instruction. Was she supposed to be upset? Was she supposed to retaliate? What was the correct response?

  The smallest nod. Almost unnoticeable to anyone else.

  Permission.

  She'd jumped in. The water swallowing her whole. And suddenly she was just a kid. Chasing the other children through the water. Dove under and everything went quiet. Muffled and peaceful. A world where no one was watching. No one was assessing. No one was measuring her against expectations.

  She came up laughing. Water streaming down her face. Sun in her eyes. The other kids laughing too. All of them the same. All of them just playing.

  No forms to perfect. No techniques to drill. No assessments or corrections or disappointed silences.

  Just water and sun and noise.

  Li Mei pressed her palm against the window glass. Cold. Solid. The city lights reflecting in her eyes like distant stars.

  Forget it. She wasn't a kid anymore. She hadn't been a kid for a long time.

  She walked to her training corner. The jian leaned against the wall, sheathed in plain black lacquer. She picked it up. Drew the blade.

  Perfect balance. Perfect edge. The metal catching the last of the light from the window.

  Draw, strike, sheath. Draw, strike, sheath.

  The same movements she'd done ten thousand times. The sword an extension of her arm. Her arm an extension of her will. Muscle memory so deep it bypassed thought entirely.

  Years of the same patterns. Years of practice. Years of getting better, sharper, faster.

  Years of being exactly what she was supposed to be.

  She sheathed the sword. Set it back against the wall.

  Below her window, teenagers passed by on the sidewalk. Three of them. Laughing at something, crowding around a magazine. One shoved another, playful, and they all cracked up. Their voices drifting up through the evening air.

  She watched until they disappeared around the corner.