Talent Has a Price

The day before round two, Lu slept ten hours. The youth-team chat mocked him. The king of dawn was afraid to wake up. Without stolen talent, how long could he last? Lu woke at nine to Su's report: deep sleep target met, inflammation down eighteen percent, low-impact training permitted. Beneath it she had written: Rest is not surrender. It is taking tomorrow back from injury. His opponent was Shen Chi, nicknamed the Protractor. His fists were light and his wrestling ordinary, but he controlled range to the centimeter. Across seventeen qualifying bouts, nobody had forced him to the fence. His first training time was secret. Luo had even rented a closed gym so Shen's name would not appear in access records. “They're defending against you,” Su said.