Matheo still hadn’t fully recovered from the shock: it was the small details that left him stunned. How did Lockless know exactly where he was? Why, when he had run to the river and felt the pillar of fire surrounding him, had he stepped back into the yard as if nothing had happened — and yet, without losing a single second of the morning?

“You thought I was joking,” Said Lockless, unsurprised, watching the boy touch the wristwatch. “The barrier that surrounds my house responds to any trace of Black Light in the area. I can locate you whenever I wish. By manipulating heat, I can open a short rift between where you are and here. It’s exhausting — and brief — but it works.”

Matheo swallowed hard. The sensation of being tracked, of not having a meter of privacy, tightened his throat. At the same time, a strange relief warmed his chest: he was safe, for now.

Lockless didn’t waste time before beginning the day’s practice.
“Let’s begin,” he said. “You know the rules: fetch food and water before eight; train in the afternoon; and at the end of the day, one hundred of each exercise. In addition, we fight until one of us can no longer rise.”

Matheo nodded. The routine already rang in his ears; its harshness carried something oddly comforting. He brewed quick coffee and went straight to the stacked logs: it was time to do something he could finally control — fire.

Focusing, he recalled what Lockless had shown him: heat is not just flame: it is pressure, impulse, detail. He breathed deep, felt the faint current of Black Light beneath his skin, and tried to summon it. A bluish spark leapt from his fingertip. It was fragile, but unlike anything he had ever felt. He dropped the sparks onto dry leaves and branches. The fire blossomed, alive, intense, and clean. Unable to hide his happiness at success, he roasted two fish with trembling hands — one for himself, one for Lockless.

The first part of the day passed, and then came the time for exercises. The number sounded almost insulting to his already tired mind: one hundred sit-ups, one hundred push-ups, one hundred squats. Matheo didn’t even know how to count them. He grabbed a stick and scratched in the dirt the words — PUSH-UPS, SIT-UPS, SQUATS — and next to each, three columns of marks. Each time he finished a set, he returned to draw another line. The simple method brought order to a body wracked with chaos and pain.

At first, the movements were clumsy. Push-ups shook his shoulders. Sit-ups felt like they were tearing out his ribs. Squats burned his calves as if he were walking on hot stones. Each mark in the dirt demanded a cost of sweat and blood: palms already cut open, soles blistered raw, mouth dry. The sun had climbed to its midpoint when he realized he had only completed half. A wave of despair struck his mind; his body screamed as if this limit was all it had left.

Lockless appeared beside him, as silent as ever.
“Still not enough,” he said, serious. “Get up.”

Matheo dragged himself to his feet. He could barely feel his legs. The old man led him to a cleared circle in the grass — the sparring ground. Before starting, Lockless regarded the boy with clinical calm.
“What’s the plan?” He asked.

Matheo explained, voice sluggish, the simple tactic he had devised during his forest hunt: concentrate as much heat as possible in his fists and heels, sprint with speed, and unleash everything in a single blow. It had to work — it worked for Lockless, during the demonstration the other day. All he needed was to better balance the explosion in his heels with the power in his back and core. If he could land it, he could break the old man’s guard.

Lockless smiled faintly.

“There are many things you don’t know yet.”

He gave the signal, and Matheo started. Ignoring the pain in his body, he charged at full speed, muscles snapping like taut cords, fists clenched. He felt a pale warmth spread across his skin. He gathered it into his fist as if pressing water into a glass. He lunged.

Lockless almost couldn’t hide his surprise. Just by observing, Matheo had nearly mimicked the concentration points of Black Light in his body well enough to create that burst of speed.

But it ended before it began.

There was a minimal, almost imperceptible movement: Lockless didn’t need much. He bent slightly, shifted his body as if closing a door against the wind, and Matheo’s strike passed harmlessly to the side. When the boy rolled and tried to recover, the old man’s heavy palm found his stomach. A dry, perfect blow that blasted the breath from Matheo’s lungs as if someone had ripped it open with pliers. Air spilled out in a warm froth; tunnel vision closed the edges of his sight. He collapsed on his back, hearing only the distant thrum of his own pulse.

Matheo lay there, gasping, while Lockless’s voice cut through the haze:
“You need foundation. Foot placement. Center of gravity. It’s no use channeling energy if your body isn’t a base. Heat can propel, but without technique, it’s wasted.”

The old man helped him up and, for nearly half an hour, taught him how to set his feet and hips, align shoulders, and place his weight at the right moment. He showed him how to rotate the hips through a punch to transfer force, how to withdraw to guard against counterattacks, and how to use heat to amplify his strikes without losing balance.

When Matheo tried again, Lockless wasn’t gentle. Instead of an easy dodge, he let the boy’s fist graze him — and then, with the precision of someone who knew the human body like a map, delivered a strike to Matheo’s stomach that hurled him backward. He landed dizzy, powerless, and heard the final instruction drift to him:

“This is Nóxium. This style will make you invincible. Welcome to your future, Matheo. And”     his voice turned colder “if you fail to finish your training today, tomorrow you’ll be forbidden to enter the forest to hunt. We’ll spend the whole day without food or water.”

Lying on the ground, throat parched, the metallic taste of his own blood on his tongue, Matheo had only two thoughts, short and cruel. Pain consumed every fiber of his body… and stronger than the pain was a single, almost ridiculous thought:

I’m starving.