The smooth circulation lasted maybe twelve steps before everything went wrong.
Qi twisted sharply near Dhiraj’s ribs.
Pain spread through the left-side meridians fast enough to make him catch himself against the wall before he lost balance completely.
The metal surface felt colder than before.
Or maybe his hand was shaking.
“…circulation disruption detected,” ASTRA said.
Dhiraj breathed out slowly through clenched teeth.
“Yeah.
Got that part.”
The hidden chamber remained dim and strangely quiet around him.
Pale blue light leaked from damaged lines running across the walls and floor, not bright enough to fully illuminate the room.
Dust kept drifting through the air every time the structure vibrated.
Somewhere deeper underground, one of the old reactor systems groaned again like overloaded metal trying not to tear itself apart.
His side still hurt.
Not unbearable.
Just annoying enough to keep pulling at his attention.
Dhiraj waited until the backlash faded before straightening again.
Interesting.
The circulation stayed relatively stable while seated.
Walking ruined it almost immediately.
He rolled one shoulder carefully.
Bad idea.
The movement sent another sharp pulse through his ribs.
Movement changed everything.
Breathing rhythm changed.
Muscles tightened automatically.
Heartbeat fluctuations interfered with the flow.
Even posture mattered more than he expected.
When his weight shifted unevenly across his legs, the circulation pathways distorted slightly afterward.
Cultivating while moving behaved completely differently from cultivation during meditation.
That part bothered him more than the pain.
Most stories Shen remembered hearing about cultivators focused almost entirely on meditation.
Secluded caves.
Closed-door cultivation.
Months spent sitting still while gathering qi.
Which was fine, probably.
Until somebody tried fighting.
Combat would never happen inside perfect stillness.
Fear alone would disrupt breathing patterns.
Adrenaline would tighten muscles.
Movement would destabilize circulation constantly.
Real cultivation should account for that.
Or maybe powerful cultivators just forced their meridians to obey through sheer qi reserves.
Dhiraj looked down at his hand for a second.
He definitely did not have that option.
Meaning refinement mattered more.
The engineering side of his brain had already started sorting the problem into categories before he consciously noticed it.
Static stability and dynamic stability were different systems entirely.
He started walking again.
Slowly this time.
The hidden chamber stretched farther than he first realized.
Metallic support pillars rose toward the darkness overhead while damaged formation arrays flickered weakly between sections of the floor.
Some symbols still pulsed with faint blue light.
Others looked burned out completely.
One step.
Two.
Three—
The circulation destabilized again the moment his breathing shifted naturally during movement.
Dhiraj stopped.
Not angry yet.
Mostly curious.
“…instability source?” he asked.
ASTRA flickered once beside him before stabilizing again.
“…host movement alters synchronized respiratory rhythm beyond current circulation tolerance thresholds.”
“Makes sense.”
The circulation patterns he had developed so far depended heavily on controlled breathing and stable posture.
Walking disrupted both automatically.
He probably should have realized that sooner.
Dhiraj leaned against one of the old reactor pillars while thinking.
The metal smelled faintly burnt up close.
The Infinite Reactor Scripture fragments surfaced in his thoughts again.
Several damaged diagrams showed overlapping circulation pathways layered across one another.
Earlier he assumed they represented different techniques entirely.
Now he wasn’t sure.
Layered circulation.
The phrase appeared naturally in his head and refused to leave afterward.
Not one rigid route.
Multiple adaptive layers compensating for instability during movement.
Dhiraj crouched near the damaged cultivation platform again.
The blue symbols beneath the metallic surface pulsed unevenly while fractured circulation diagrams shifted slowly across the ancient structure.
This time he focused on smaller details.
Some routes remained fixed regardless of posture.
Others changed.
Standing posture.
Meditation posture.
Combat stance.
Movement altered circulation intentionally.
Not randomly.
Adaptive refinement again.
The Ascendancy cultivators apparently did not just cultivate power.
They optimized it continuously.
That sounded exhausting, honestly.
Dhiraj stood again and rubbed at the side of his neck absentmindedly.
“Let’s try something.”
“…awaiting action.”
The weak qi inside his body stirred through the refined pathways from earlier attempts.
This time, instead of maintaining one continuous circulation route, Dhiraj tried mentally separating the flow into layers.
Primary circulation focused on maintaining core stability through the damaged chest meridian.
Secondary flow adjusted dynamically based on breathing fluctuations and movement.
At least that was the theory.
The actual result was immediate disaster.
Pain shot through his lower meridians hard enough to blur his vision for a second.
Dhiraj nearly lost balance again and had to brace himself against the wall before falling.
“…warning,” ASTRA stated.
“…host attempting dual-path circulation without sufficient control.”
“No kidding.”
He stayed there for a few seconds waiting for the pain to settle.
One of the overhead crystal fixtures buzzed weakly before dimming again.
Somewhere nearby, water dripped steadily into a shallow puddle.
Most people probably would have stopped after that.
Reasonable decision.
Dhiraj tried again anyway.
Hours passed inside the chamber without him noticing immediately.
The reactor systems buried throughout the ruins continued cycling between weak activation and partial collapse while occasional tremors rolled through the underground structure.
Dust fell from the ceiling every few minutes.
Once, a cracked piece of metal somewhere in the distance collapsed loudly enough to make him instinctively reach for a weapon he did not have.
Far above, cultivators were probably still fighting over treasures they barely understood.
Down here, Dhiraj kept refining circulation pathways one mistake at a time.
No miraculous enlightenment appeared.
No sudden mastery.
Mostly failure.
Observation.
Adjustment.
Then more failure.
Again.
Again.
Again.
At some point his legs started hurting from constant movement drills.
His throat felt dry too.
He found himself thinking about water more than cultivation for nearly ten minutes before forcing his attention back to the circulation patterns.
The first breakthrough happened accidentally.
During one attempt, Dhiraj shifted his breathing rhythm too quickly while stepping sideways around a collapsed section of flooring.
Normally that would have destabilized everything immediately.
This time part of the circulation adapted on its own before collapsing afterward.
Not fully.
Just enough.
Dhiraj stopped moving at once.
There.
The secondary flow layer compensated briefly for movement disruption.
Interesting.
Actually—very interesting.
He repeated the motion again.
Then again.
Eventually patterns began emerging.
The qi did not require perfectly rigid circulation all the time.
It required balanced adaptability.
Primary flow stabilized the core pathways.
Secondary adjustments compensated for environmental and physical disruptions.
Layered circulation.
Not a finished technique yet.
Barely even a proper theory.
Still, the foundation existed now.
ASTRA observed silently while he continued experimenting with movement patterns across the chamber floor.
“…host circulation adaptation rate exceeds projected parameters.”
Dhiraj wiped sweat from his forehead using his sleeve.
The fabric already smelled terrible.
“That good or bad?”
“…current assessment remains uncertain.”
“Helpful as always.”
ASTRA did not respond.
His cultivation remained weak despite the improvements.
The qi inside his body still resembled a thin stream compared to the overwhelming pressure he had sensed from real cultivators earlier.
But now the flow no longer collapsed every single time he moved.
That mattered.
Dhiraj walked slowly across the chamber again.
The circulation destabilized after several steps— then partially recovered.
Better.
He adjusted his breathing rhythm slightly.
The flow smoothed further.
Another few steps.
Still stable.
A small smile almost appeared before another instability spike ruined the secondary flow completely.
Pain flashed through his side again.
Dhiraj stopped immediately.
“…right.
Still terrible.”
His own voice echoed faintly through the chamber.
The reactor systems dimmed gradually while he continued testing movement patterns.
Several crystal structures mounted overhead flickered weakly before shutting down entirely, leaving sections of the chamber darker than before.
Energy reserves dropping again.
ASTRA’s projection became unstable afterward.
Sections of her outline dissolved intermittently into streams of blue symbols before reforming.
“…reactor network degradation continuing,” she said.
Dhiraj frowned slightly.
“How long until everything down here finally dies?”
Silence.
Then:
“…insufficient remaining infrastructure data.”
Not reassuring.
Another tremor rolled through the chamber.
Stronger this time.
Dust scattered from the ceiling while damaged formation arrays across the far wall sparked violently for several seconds.
One nearby pillar emitted a sharp cracking noise that made Dhiraj instinctively step away from it.
Interesting.
His body reacted faster now.
The qi stabilized automatically through the refined pathways before complete collapse could occur.
Tiny improvement.
Still improvement.
Then ASTRA froze.
The projection flickered sharply.
Blue symbols spread rapidly across her translucent form before stabilizing again.
Dhiraj straightened immediately.
“What happened?”
No response came for several seconds.
The reactor hum deepened faintly around them.
Somewhere below the chamber, metal groaned again beneath the mountain.
Then ASTRA finally spoke.
“…abnormal resonance detected.”
Dhiraj’s expression tightened.
“From the cultivators?”
“…negative.”
The projection slowly turned toward the deeper darkness beneath the chamber.
Toward the mountain itself.
“…resonance source located beneath current reactor sector.”
The weak qi inside Dhiraj’s meridians reacted immediately.
A distant pulse echoed through the underground complex.
Cold.
Old.
Not hostile exactly.
That somehow made it worse.
And somewhere far below Graystone Mountain, something answered the reactor systems.