Chương 151: Give Me Time

Harbach put his hand on Leo's shoulder.

"Give me two years. Maybe three. And we'll turn you into a flyer who can turn this technique into a ring."

"I don't have two years." Harbach settled into his chair. The ceiling dust stopped falling, but a fine layer of it covered his desk, his shoulders, the holographic projector. He didn't seem to notice. Leo continued.

"I'm carrying over thirty million in debt at seven percent interest. Every month I wait, that number grows. My rookie contract covers living expenses and not much else. I need sponsorships, and sponsorships go to players who make noise in their first year." Harbach listened without interrupting. When Leo finished, the coach exhaled slowly through his nose.

"I hear you. And I'm not going to pretend the money doesn't matter. It does. This is a business. Everyone in this building is here to make some money." He brushed a flake of ceiling tile off the holographic projector.

"So let me give you the full picture, because I think you're operating on assumptions that worked in the CFL and won't work here." Leo straightened. Harbach pulled up a roster overlay on the holographic display. Names, ages, years of service. Leo scanned the numbers. He knew the starters were old. Everyone did. But the broadcasts never showed ages, and the league's media guides listed 'years of service' instead. Seeing it raw on one sheet was different.

He counted fourteen three-digit ages before he got to the fifth team.

"In the CFL, you were playing against college kids," Harbach said.

"Every single starter on this roster chose this career before you were born."

"But I'm not like everyone else! I'm fresh out of the CFL, I have a national fanbase already, I've been on the cover of the Post twice. I'm nineteen and I can sell tickets. I'm the biggest marketing opportunity this league has seen in years." Harbach pointed at him.

"Exactly. And that's why we have to be careful with you." Leo blinked.

"You think I'm the only one who sees your marketing value? Goodell sees it. Every network executive sees it. Every sponsor with a body refining product line sees it." Harbach leaned forward.

"The Commissioner has been calling me personally. You know what he tells me? He tells me not to let you play until you're ready. He tells me that if Leo Chen debuts and looks like a lost kid getting outflown by retirees on national television, the narrative dies. The golden rookie becomes the golden flop. And once the audience decides you're a joke, no amount of talent brings that story back." The words landed heavier than Leo expected.

"In fact," Harbach continued, "there's serious talk right now about delaying your contract. Pushing your official rookie year back. Two years, maybe three. Let you develop behind closed doors, train with the team, build your skills where nobody can see the growing pains. Then when you debut, the story writes itself."

"That happens?"

"All the time. The gap between rookies and starters in this league is measured in decades. Most teams delay the debut, let the kid cook." Harbach shrugged.

"It's the safe play. And Goodell likes safe plays." He was supposed to reject this immediately. He was supposed to feel insulted, dig in, insist he was ready. But what Harbach said made sense. Three years of development. No public pressure. No risk of embarrassing himself on national television. His body refining would be complete by then. He'd have years of practice reps against NFL-caliber flyers, years to build the game sense that Vince and Harbach kept telling him he lacked. His debt would be worse.

But if the delayed debut was spectacular enough, the sponsorships would come in a flood. But then Leo thought about the warning Zhang Wei gave him. Foundation. Establishment. It is not about establishing the foundation of your cultivation. It is about establishing your foundation in the world. Leo had momentum now. Everyone he knew had already bought season tickets to the Giants. If he stopped, all of that would come crashing to a halt.

"What would it take?" Leo said.

"If I wanted to compete for a spot this year."

"Good," Harbach nodded.

"Hold onto that fire." He stood and walked to the window. The practice fields stretched out below, empty in the March cold.

"You'll feel different about it come OTAs (organized team activities). When you line up across from veterans who've been doing this since before you were born and you realize what fifteen years of reps actually looks like in real time. The difference between this league and a bunch of college kids is going to hit you like a wall." He turned back.

"But fire is good. Fire wins games. So let me tell you how this works." Harbach sat back down and pulled up a tactical overlay.

"First things first. If you want to use that formation of yours in a real game, you need to be in striking range of the enemy flyer's sword. That means wing." Leo nodded. It made sense. There were five flyer positions in the NFL. The Striker led the offensive charge, the tip of the spear, responsible for drawing attention and creating openings. The Center covered the entire pitch and orchestrated transitions between offense and defense, the quarterback of the air.

The Linebacker sat back and read the field, shutting down ambushes before they developed and making sure nobody got picked off. And the two Wings followed the Striker into combat, building numbers advantages and setting up kills through coordinated pressure. Wing put him close enough to touch enemy swords. Wing rewarded the reaction speed and divine sense that were his two best attributes. Harbach pulled up a new display. A calendar.

"The NFL works differently from other cultivation sports. I submit my final starting lineup before the regular season begins. Once those names are locked in, they're locked in. If you're on the list, you play. If you're not, you sit on the bench until someone gets injured." He paused.

"And in a league with cultivation-grade medicine, injuries that keep a player out for more than a few days are rare." Leo understood. If he didn't make the starting lineup, he was done for the year.

"So here's the path. OTAs start in late May. Three weeks of practice and scheme work. You learn the playbook, you fly with the team, you get your first taste of NFL speed." Harbach continued.

"Training camp starts in July. That's where the real work happens. Full-contact practices, live scrimmages, daily evaluations. Then preseason games in August." He pointed at the flowchart.

"Right now, I've got eight wings on the preseason roster. Eight players competing for two starting spots. Every week during preseason, I cut two. Eight becomes six. Six becomes four. Four becomes two." Eight wings. Two survivors. Leo felt the door closing in on his future.

"I won't make an exception for you," Harbach said.

"Every single one of those wings has worked years for this opportunity. Some of them have been waiting a decade for a shot at a starting spot. They deserve a fair competition, and that's what they'll get."

"I wouldn't ask you to make an exception," Leo said.

"I want to earn it." Harbach walked back to the desk and sat down heavily.

"Now here's the part you need to hear carefully." Harbach's tone shifted.

"If you want a shot at preseason, you have to agree to something first. The league is going to be watching you. Goodell, the networks, the owners. The moment you step onto a preseason field, the NFL starts building a storyline around you. They start the narrative the second the cameras see your face." Leo nodded.

"If you perform well, the story is the golden rookie who lived up to the hype. Sponsorships, features, the whole machine turns in your direction." Harbach paused.

"If you perform poorly, the league will pivot. And the easiest pivot, the cleanest pivot, the one that protects your long-term value and the league's investment in your brand, is an injury." Leo's stomach dropped.

"What kind of injury?" he asked.

"How bad are we talking?" Harbach shook his head.

"Not a real one. Fake. Mutual agreement. If you show up at preseason looking overmatched, and the next day the league announces Qi Deviation. Timeline for return: to be determined." Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions. Leo was quiet for a moment. Qi Deviation wasn't an injury. It meant your dao heart failed, that you lacked the resolve to sustain your own cultivation. Nobody came back from that stigma.

"You'd develop behind closed doors," Harbach continued.

"When the league decides the narrative is ready, you come back."

"Except now everyone in the country thinks I couldn't handle the pressure."

"Yes." Harbach didn't look away.

"That's the risk. I'm not going to sugarcoat it." Leo stared at the flowchart on the holographic display. Eight wings. Cuts every week. Two survivors. And underneath all of it, a trap door that the league could open at any moment if he stumbled.

"Let me make sure I have this right," Leo said slowly.

"I compete for a wing spot. If I earn it, I play. If I don't, everyone thinks I washed out and nobody hears from me again until the league says so."

"Final four," Harbach corrected.

"You earn a second-string spot and I have enough to take back to Goodell. I tell him the kid can play, and he won't pressure you to declare Qi Deviation." He leaned back.

"You don't have to answer right now. You have until the preseason."

"And the Struggle formation?" Harbach shook his head.

"This stays in this room. You don't mention it to teammates, coaches, anyone. The second word gets out, every team in the league starts working on a counter. I want the first time anyone sees this technique to be on national television." Somewhere above them, a sword was still climbing, the battered T2 practice blade that thought it had outgrown the world.

"I want to give it a real shot," Leo said.

"OTAs, camp, all of it. But I know my limits. If I get to preseason and I'm not there yet, I'm not going to pretend I am." Harbach studied him for a long moment. Then he nodded.

"That's a harder thing to say than 'I'll never quit.' Most rookies don't know the difference." He stood and extended his hand across the dusty desk. Leo shook it. The coach held the grip for a beat.

"Two things before you leave. First, stay off social media. All of it. No posts, no stories, don't even read the news. I've seen it destroy too many rookies. The distraction, the ego inflation, the parasocial pressure. It's poison, especially for someone carrying the kind of attention you already have."

"I've never had social media," Leo said.

"I'm not interested." Harbach blinked.

"Really?"

"Really."

"That's actually refreshing. Second thing. You have five months before preseason. The only thing that can close the gap between you and a fifteen-year veteran is film. Not training. Not sparring. Film." He walked to a cabinet behind his desk and pulled out a data drive.

"I'm going to load this with every elite wing in the league over the last ten years. Their tendencies, their positioning habits, their formation preferences, their mistakes. How they move off the ball, how they set up ambushes, how they recover when a play breaks down." He set the drive on the desk between them.

"You watch all of it. Every night. You don't skim, you don't skip ahead, you don't watch at double speed. You sit there and you study these players the way a formation master studies inscriptions. By the time OTAs start, I want you to know how every starting wing in this league moves before they move." Leo picked up the drive. It was heavier than it looked.

"This is your real weapon right now," Harbach said.

"Your reaction speed is off the charts, but fast reactions to the wrong read are worthless." Leo stood and walked toward the door. He was going to start watching today.

"Leo." He turned.

"Leo." The coach was looking at the hole in the ceiling. A thin beam of late afternoon sunlight came through it, cutting a bright line across the dusty desk.

"I want you on my roster this season. Go make it easy for me." Leo nodded once and left the office. In two months, OTAs would start. In four, camp. In five, preseason. Eight wings would enter and two would survive. And somewhere between now and then, he'd have to decide if he was really willing to let the league control his future.

Leo stepped out of Harbach's office and made it halfway down the corridor before he stopped. Ananya Sharma, Columbia's starting wing, was waiting for him. He had faced her, and his old Exeter teammate Archer, two years ago. But then he realized something was wrong. Ananya dressed like a college athlete in team sweats with her hair tied back. This woman wore a cropped jacket over a low-cut top with gold hoops and polished nails. This wasn't Ananya. This was her great-grandmother. Nikita Sharma.

One hundred and three years old. Eleven-time Pro Bowl selection. Three-time Super Bowl champion. The best active wing in professional football. If the Giants had two Nikita Sharmas on the roster, he wouldn't have bothered asking Harbach for a shot. He'd have taken the three-year delay without a second thought. They looked exactly the same. The Eternal Youth protocol. A body refining procedure that froze a cultivator's appearance at whatever age they received it.

Niki Sharma had been twenty-something for longer than most people had been alive. She pushed off the wall and walked toward him. Stopped close. Close enough that he could smell her perfume, and close enough to make the low cut of her top impossible to miss.

"You must be Leo." She offered her hand. Leo took it, and she held on a beat longer than necessary. Her eyes traveled down his body and back up. She finished the inspection, nodded once, and smiled. Leo's skin crawled.

"Niki," she said.

"I play wing."

"I know who you are," he said.

"Your record speaks for itself. It's an honor to be on the same roster." He needed to leave. He manufactured an exit.

"If you'll excuse me, I have some film to review and I want to get started before..."

"You're taller in person." She stepped forward and put her hand flat on his chest. Leo went rigid. The touch was warm and soft, and he began to appreciate it. Then his brain caught up. This woman had been eligible for a senior discount since before the Catacombs War. She had great-grandchildren. She might even be older than Arthur. He wanted to step back. He almost did. But Harbach's words were still ringing in his ears. Eight wings. Two spots. Five short months until preseason.

And the woman with her hand on his chest was the best wing on their team.

"I watched your tape against Mateo," she said. Her thumb traced a small, slow circle against his shirt.

"I think you'd make a great wing, Leo."

"That means a lot coming from you."

"It should." She finally lifted her hand off his chest. Then she leaned forward and tugged the collar of her V-neck straight with two fingers. His gaze followed her gesture down before he could stop it. He snapped his eyes back up and found her smiling at him, bright and knowing.

"Here's the thing," she said.

"That data drive Harbach gave you. It's ten years of wing footage. Tendencies, formations, adjustments. But without someone who's actually flown against those wings?" She shook her head slowly.

"You'll spend a hundred hours on your own and still be guessing." Leo's jaw tightened. She was right. He was a rookie. He needed someone who could tell him what he was actually looking at and what to anticipate. He needed her. She leaned closer. He could feel the warmth of her breath.

"One hour with me would be worth more than a hundred by yourself." Leo wanted to say no. He could walk away, study the film alone, grind through five months of guesswork and hope that was enough to beat veterans who had been playing the game for years.

"I've got a great setup at my place," she said.

"Big screen, holographic projector. I'll cook. You like Indian food?" She reached up and touched his cheek.

"We'll eat. Go through some film. And I'll show you things that aren't on any scouting report." His resistance was crumbling. Niki was the difference between making the roster and spending three years on the bench waiting for his turn. Leo was someone who always took the shortcut. He always found a faster way, and now the faster way was right here in front of him. He opened his mouth. He was trying to find a reason to refuse. But he couldn't think of one.

"You OLD HAG." Vince Deluca rounded the corner carrying a legal pad. Niki's hand dropped from Leo's cheek.

"I'm introducing myself to our new teammate, Vince."

"Yeah, I can see how you're introducing yourself." He tucked the legal pad into his pocket.

"Every year, chief. Every single year. New kid shows up and this old hag is lurking outside Harbach's office like a vulture circling a gas station."

"That metaphor was already stale twenty years ago and it hasn't aged any better than you have."

"Oh, she's feisty today. You hear that, pal? The old hag's feisty." Vince looked at Leo.

"Let me tell you something about this woman. This old hag mentored Rodrigo so hard the kid requested a trade to San Francisco. The man moved across the entire country. He is currently three thousand miles away from this woman and by all accounts living his best life."

"He was traded for salary cap reasons, you disgusting little man."

"The man couldn't make eye contact with women for six months, Niki. Six months. He flinched when female reporters talked to him. He ordered all of his coffee through an app so he wouldn't have to interact with baristas."

"I am going to rip your spine out through your mouth."

"See, this is what she does." Vince gestured at Niki like a tour guide.

"Step one is the face-touching. Step two is the threats. Step three is the kid needs therapy."

"Vince." The flirtatious twenty-something vanished.

"If you call me old hag one more time, I will make what happened to Rodrigo look like a spa retreat."

"You hear that, chief? You hear how she just confirmed the Rodrigo thing while threatening me? She doesn't even realize she did it. That's how deep in it she is." Niki blinked. Her jaw tightened. Then the mask slid back on. She turned to Leo and smiled sweetly.

"So. Are you coming or not?" The corridor went quiet. Vince stared at Leo. Niki stared at Leo. Leo stood between a predator and his captain, who silently begged him to make the right choice. But he had a data drive full of footage he couldn't decode alone, and the best person to teach him what it meant stood three feet away, waiting for an answer and looking like her great-granddaughter Ananya. Ananya.

"Sure," Leo said. The word tasted sour.

"Does Tuesday work?" Vince closed his eyes. Niki's smile broke wide open. She straightened her jacket, adjusted her top one final time, and stepped back.

"Tuesday. 7pm. Bring the data drive." She walked past Vince without looking at him. Her perfume trailed behind her. Vince watched her go. Then he turned to Leo with a heavy, grieving expression.

"Kid." He put his hand on Leo's shoulder, and the grip was different from every other time Vince had touched him. There was no warmth in it.

"I thought you were smarter than this, pal." Leo said nothing. He pulled out his phone and scrolled to a name he hadn't contacted since he was in high school. He started typing. Vince frowned.

"Who are you texting?" Leo looked up. He was grinning.

"Archer Pemberton. He's teammates with Niki's great-granddaughter at Columbia. Ananya Sharma." Vince stared at him. His frown deepened.

"You're bringing her great-granddaughter," Vince said.

"To her apartment. On a date."

"As my date, yes." Vince's mouth opened. Closed. Then he started laughing so hard he had to put his hand against the wall. His shoulders shook. He tried to speak twice and couldn't.

"Twenty years," he finally managed, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand.

"Twenty years I have been trying to get under that woman's skin and you just solved it in thirty seconds standing in a hallway." He straightened up, still wheezing.

"Pal, I wish I could be there Tuesday."