Chương 90: Chapter 79: First Bone

The western fifth line began where the timber road stopped pretending to be a road. Beyond the fourth marker, carts still traveled through often enough to flatten two tracks into the earth, but grass grew between them and branches occasionally reached low enough that the forestry workers carried hooked poles to clear the way. By midday, Blackwood's wall was several hours behind them. Simon checked the map again.

"Camp Seven before sunset." Daren glanced toward the sky.

"If the rain stays away." Cole looked upward.

"You shouldn't have said that." One of the two guards added to their team laughed. His name was Renn. Nineteen years old. Selected the previous spring. Village-born. No martial family Joe knew of. The other addition, Osric, had served nearly six years and treated everything beyond Blackwood's wall with the suspicion of a man who had survived long enough to justify it. Renn still looked excited. Joe wondered how long that lasted.

The first half of the route was uneventful. That did not mean easy. The ground rose and fell beneath thick roots, streams crossed the trail without bridges, and several older boundary markers had shifted enough that Simon made the forestry workers verify them against the map. Joe enjoyed the movement. His body still seemed to be settling after Muscle Great Completion.

A month earlier, carrying the medical pack for hours through uneven ground would have required occasional conscious adjustment to keep his strength hidden and his joints comfortable. Now the control came naturally. His usable limit had crept upward again. He had tested seven hundred and fifty kilograms before leaving. Clean. No joint warning. No lingering strain. He suspected seven hundred and sixty or seventy might also be safe. There was no reason to find out before Bone. The method waited inside his memory.

Complete enough that the panel recognized it. Untested.

They reached the first damaged marker during the afternoon. Not broken. Clawed. Four long grooves cut through the wood almost deeply enough to expose the opposite side. Renn crouched beside it.

"Bear?" Osric immediately said, "Don't guess." Renn looked up.

"It looks like—""Looking like something and knowing something are different." Joe liked Osric more after that. Simon inspected the ground. Rain from several days earlier had ruined most tracks. Daren pointed toward the forest.

"Whatever did it went west." Simon nodded.

"Our route goes north." Renn stood.

"We aren't checking?"

"No." The young guard frowned.

"What if it's dangerous?" Simon looked at him.

"Then I especially don't want to follow it." Cole smiled. Renn seemed dissatisfied. Joe understood. At nineteen, danger seen from behind Blackwood's wall probably still looked like an opportunity to prove something. If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. The guard would cure that. Or the forest would.

Camp Seven was empty. That concerned Osric immediately.

"They knew we were coming." Simon approached the central shelter. The camp normally housed eight to twelve forestry workers. Axes remained beneath the awning. Split timber had been stacked beside the road. A cooking pot still sat blackened over the fire pit. Nobody answered when Simon called. Joe crouched beside the ashes. Cold. At least a day. Daren searched the first hut.

"Bedrolls gone." The second was the same. Most personal belongings had been taken. That made the situation better. Probably. One forestry worker found a message scratched onto a thin writing board inside the supply shed. Simon read it.

"Relocated east. Animal activity. Two days ago." Cole exhaled. Renn looked disappointed. Osric looked relieved. Joe examined the edge of the camp. Several trees carried damage higher than a man's shoulders. Not claws this time. Bark rubbed away. Branches snapped. Something large had moved through repeatedly. The workers had noticed and left. Correct response. Simon asked, "We continue the survey?" Osric said, "Markers north are still inside route." Daren looked toward the fading light.

"Do them tomorrow." Simon nodded. They would sleep in the abandoned camp. Renn looked toward the damaged trees.

"Whatever it was could come back."

"Yes," Simon said. That answer finally removed some of his excitement.

They took watches in pairs. Joe shared the second with Osric. The forest after midnight was not quiet. That had taken him years to appreciate. Insects. Leaves. Distant calls. Branches moving under animals small to identify. Water somewhere beyond the ridge. The absence of human noise made every natural sound feel larger. Osric sat beside the low fire.

"You don't seem nervous."

"I am attentive."

"Different thing."

"Yes." Osric looked into the dark.

"My first forest night, I couldn't sleep for two days afterward."

"What happened?"

"Nothing." Joe waited. Osric smiled slightly.

"That was the problem. Every sound became the thing that was going to kill me." He nodded toward Renn sleeping nearby.

"He'll learn." Joe remembered the twenty recruits.

"How many from your selection year are still guards?" Osric thought.

"Fourteen, maybe fifteen."

"Dead?"

"Two. One crippled. Others left." Five or six gone in six years. And that was one group. The arithmetic continued. A branch broke somewhere far west. Not close. Something answered with a deep call that Joe did not recognize. Osric immediately fed another piece of wood into the fire. Neither suggested investigating. Joe approved.

Morning brought rain. Cole blamed Daren. Daren threatened to leave him at the camp. They completed the northern markers by noon. At the final post, Joe found tracks larger than the greyhorn's. Not fresh. The depression had partially collapsed from rain. Four broad toes. Deep enough to show considerable weight. Simon saw him studying it.

"Know it?"

"No." That answer satisfied Simon more than a guess would have. They marked the location and returned. No battle. No missing guards. No dramatic rescue. Just a damaged marker, an abandoned camp and evidence that something large enough to frighten experienced forestry workers had begun moving near an official route. The report would go upward. A larger patrol might investigate. Perhaps hunters. Perhaps nobody until more evidence appeared. This, Joe realized, was how most danger probably entered the guard system.

Not as catastrophe. As a note. A track. A camp temporarily abandoned. Then somebody decided whether the note justified more men.

Garrick read Simon's report personally. His attention paused on the damaged marker and the unidentified track.

"You didn't pursue?" Simon looked almost offended.

"No."

"Good." That surprised him. It did not surprise Joe. Garrick might abuse authority. That did not make him suicidal or incompetent. A senior officer who casually encouraged guards to chase unknown beasts would not remain senior for long. Garrick signed the report.

"Your team may be sent back with a larger group if forestry requests investigation." Simon nodded. Outside, Cole muttered, "I preferred him when everything he did was easy to hate."

Joe waited two days. He ate heavily. Rested. Prepared medicine. Then locked his room and began Bone Tempering. The first attempt lasted less than a minute. Blood Energy approached the outer structure of his lower leg. Joe stopped. Not pain. Resistance. Different from Muscle. Muscle accepted Blood Energy throughout living tissue with a kind of flexibility. Bone felt stubborn. Dense. Slow. He reset. Second attempt. The circulation reached farther. Every Hard Work Pays Off returned understanding immediately.

Not an answer. Experience. Pressure too concentrated. Approach too direct. Joe adjusted. Again. One Effort Equals a Hundred turned each valid attempt into an absurd amount of practical familiarity, but only when the attempt itself was correct enough to count. Incorrect approaches still taught him what failure felt like. Perfect Health repaired minor stress. Perfect Body kept surrounding tissues from adapting badly. No Regression preserved every genuine gain.

For the first time, all of his talents felt as though they were working on one problem together.

Bone I took weeks. Even with his talents. He refused to rush it. First the major load-bearing structures. Then adjoining regions. Long rests whenever integration lagged. Medicine adjusted according to response. Food increased again. Edwin complained about his appetite. Simon complained because Joe now ate more than both of them combined. Joe ignored both. The change became visible only in what his body tolerated. His stance grew heavier without becoming slower. Landing from a jump produced less internal vibration.

Heavy loads stopped sending the same warning through knees and spine. By the final week, Joe knew the first complete Bone pass was near. Then one night, the last resistant region settled. He circulated Blood Energy again. The entire skeletal system answered coherently. Not finished. Not remotely. But tempered once. Joe stood slowly. Nothing dramatic happened. So, he went to the warehouse.

Eight hundred kilograms rose easily. Joe lowered it. Added weight. Eight-fifty. Clean. Nine hundred. His muscles finally felt useful again rather than restrained. Nine-fifty required effort. He stopped there. Not because he had reached his maximum. Because the first Bone tempering was new, and testing a newly strengthened frame to failure would be stupid. Joe rested both hands on the loading frame. Before Bone, his muscles had possessed strength his skeleton could not safely transmit.

Now the frame had begun catching up. That was the real breakthrough. Not new power appearing from nowhere. Existing power becoming usable. He opened the panel. Static Foundation — Lv5 — Perfection Dynamic Foundation — Lv5 — Perfection Muscle Tempering — Lv5 — Perfection Bone Tempering — Lv2 — Minor Joe paused. Then understood. The first coherent pass had carried Bone Tempering through the panel's Minor threshold. That was separate from what he privately called Bone I. Good. The distinction remained consistent.

He closed the panel. Nine hundred and fifty kilograms. Controlled. With room left. Joe thought of Garrick. Late Bone. For months, Garrick had existed in Joe's mind as a boundary. Someone stronger. Someone whose position and experience made direct resistance expensive. That boundary had finally changed. Joe had completed the first full tempering of his skeleton. In terms of Bone progression alone, he had moved slightly beyond an ordinary Late Bone practitioner.

That did not mean he was stronger than Garrick in every way. Garrick had years of combat experience, trained techniques, and a body Joe knew almost nothing about. Realm labels were useful comparisons, not guarantees of victory. Still, for the first time, Joe had crossed a line that had once seemed distant. And unlike Garrick, Joe did not intend to stop after one pass. Bone II came next. Then another. All the way to nine.