Elias Vance stood in the heart of the Barren Wastes, a vast, desolate plain of cracked, reddish earth that stretched to the jagged, dark mountains on the horizon. The air was still, dry, and utterly devoid of anything resembling life or curious onlookers. This was his laboratory, his proving ground, his sandbox of destruction.
The first thing he did was establish the boundaries. He extended his divine sense, not merely as a passive scan, but as an active, computational field. It surged outward, mapping every rise and fall in the cracked terrain, every distant rock formation, every microscopic dust motes suspended in the air. He wove intricate, invisible threads of Qi into the very ground, forming a massive, silent perimeter that covered several square kilometers. This wasn't a defensive formation, nor was it a trapping array. It was a monitoring grid, designed to precisely track every energy fluctuation, every sonic ripple, every structural impact within its confines. Think of it as a vast, high-resolution sensor array, feeding real-time data directly into his Multithreaded Thought Engine. He needed to quantify the chaos he was about to unleash.
"Alright," Elias murmured to the empty air, stretching his neck. The movements were fluid, effortless, each muscle responding with perfect obedience. His body hummed with the controlled power of his tokamak core, a constant, low-frequency vibration that resonated through his Qi-fiber lattice reinforcement. He felt like a coiled spring, ready to release unimaginable force.
He decided to begin with the basics: physical combat form. No flashy Qi techniques, no external energy blasts. Just pure, unadulterated physical prowess, refined by weeks of internal reconstruction and mental simulation.
He started with simple movements. A step. A turn. A feint. Each movement, though outwardly minimal, held immense power. With a casual shift of his weight, a subtle adjustment of his stance, the ground beneath his feet buckled. A faint, concussive thump echoed across the barren landscape, and ripples of compressed air, invisible to the naked eye, radiated outward.
"Oops," Elias muttered, looking down at the freshly formed, shallow crater beneath his left foot. "Still need to fine-tune the pressure control." Even his casual movements were causing minor shockwaves. His body, having undergone the tendon coil project and the cyclonic core formation, was now a kinetic energy weapon on its own. Every muscle twitch, every bone shift, every coil of his revitalized tendons stored and released power with terrifying efficiency.
He began to walk, then jog, then run. Each stride was silent, but the absence of sound was misleading. Beneath the surface, his Inertial Override Step subtly canceled his momentum, allowing for impossible changes in direction without slowing. He moved like a glitch in reality, appearing somewhere new without the usual inertia of stopping and starting. A sonic pop, faint but distinct, accompanied each sudden shift, like distant firecrackers. "Still haven't fixed that," he noted, referring to the unintended side-effect. "Stealth is clearly not my strong suit yet."
He decided to integrate his movements. He initiated a Vector Glide Technique, not just running, but sliding across the cracked earth, frictionless. His feet barely touched the ground, propelled by self-generated force vectors that allowed him to move with impossible grace over uneven terrain. He wasn't restricted to horizontal surfaces; with a thought, he could glide up the jagged face of a nearby rock formation, stick to it like a limpet, and then effortlessly launch himself sideways, leaving faint, glowing light trails like a meteor skating across the landscape.
He practiced his punching. A simple jab, outwardly unassuming, generated an explosive burst of force. His fist, imbued with the spiraling power of his cellular micro-cores and the instant recoil of his tendon coils, delivered a strike that split the air. A deep, resonant crack echoed across the wastes, as if the very atmosphere itself was tearing. He saw the invisible compression wave ripple outwards on his Refined Battle Codex Overlay, analyzing its destructive potential.
"Hmm. Not enough penetration," he mused, despite the fact that a casual punch from him could now effortlessly pulverize solid rock. He wasn't aiming for destruction, but perfection.
He began combining his techniques:
A rapid Inertial Override Step to close the distance.
A Vector Glide to seamlessly transition to a vertical wall.
A pivot, drawing on his Electromagnetic Rail Dash to launch himself like a cannonball.
Then, a precise punch, Qi-infused and kinetically amplified, aimed at a distant, unmoving boulder.
The boulder, easily the size of a small house, didn't just crack. It disintegrated. Not into large fragments, but into fine dust and pebbles that scattered across the plain as if hit by an invisible explosion. A plume of pulverized rock hung in the air for several seconds before dissipating.
"Slightly overshot the power dampening," Elias noted, adjusting the internal Qi valves in his arm. "Still, the impact velocity was within acceptable parameters. Need more control over dispersion."
He moved like a blur, a dark silhouette against the desolate landscape. He practiced sudden stops, impossible turns, and mid-air reorientations. His body was a symphony of controlled power. He could feel his tokamak core effortlessly keeping up, providing an endless supply of refined Qi to fuel his every movement. Each complex maneuver, each lightning-fast pivot, was instantly analyzed by his Battle Archive VR Engine, feeding back data for further optimization. His AI Combat Pattern Generator silently ran thousands of simulations, suggesting micro-adjustments, predicting weaknesses, and refining his internal combat algorithms.
The barren zone, once pristine in its desolation, was beginning to show signs of his presence. Shallow craters marked his footwork, lines of pulverized dust indicated his glides, and the occasional, perfectly disintegrated boulder bore testament to his "casual" punches.
"This is why I don't shake hands," he muttered, flexing a fist. His Molecular Rift Edge technique was for his internal blade, but even a regular punch held the power of localized demolition.
He shifted his focus to defensive maneuvers. He created a powerful gust of wind wash over him, then subtly engaged his Qi-Fiber Lattice Reinforcement. The wind, instead of pressing against him, felt like a gentle, invigorating massage as its kinetic energy was harmlessly dispersed through his internal spiritual framework. "Yes, excellent," he nodded. "Turns out getting punched might actually feel like a rather aggressive pat on the back."
He threw powerful Qi blasts at himself, letting his Phase Shift Shield shimmer into existence. The invisible shield rippled like a liquid mirror, effortlessly absorbing and canceling out the phantom energy. He practiced adjusting its frequency mid-imaginary-attack, preparing for diverse elemental assaults.
Hours passed. The sun began its slow descent, painting the sky in fiery oranges and purples. Elias continued his rigorous self-training, his movements becoming even more precise, his control over his vast power growing with every calculated step and devastating punch. He was learning to wield his own body as a weapon with a finesse that few in this cultivation world could ever dream of. His physical attack could now crack and shatter space.
His first objective: complete mastery over his physical form and movement techniques, without relying on external Qi blasts. He was almost there. The ground beneath him, however, was starting to look like a warzone.
"Time for phase two," Elias declared, a dangerous glint in his eyes. "The flashy bits." He looked at the setting sun, then at the scarred landscape. "And maybe I should move further away from those mountains. Just in case."