That night, Aris sat on his wooden bed back against the wall and took out the worn book he had been keeping in his chest. He opened the book, but the words were still a mystery to him. "Zona, can you decipher these words into a language I understand?" he asked inwardly.
[Deciphering possible. Estimated time: two hours.]
"Twohours?" he muttered, frowning. Then he asked the real question: "Is that for the whole book or just parts?"
[The whole book.] Zona answered back.
"Icanwaitifthat'sthecase," Aris thought.
The minutes dragged on. Around him, the usual hum of the barracks played out—soft talk, tired laughter. Some squires grouped together on benches, others sprawled on their beds. Dylan's crowd was clustered near the far wall, as loud as ever. Aris stayed quiet, unnoticed, like always.
Two hours passed.
[Deciphering complete.]
He glanced around, "I can't let them see what I'm doing," Aris thought, quickly covering himself with his blanket and pretending to be asleep. Then he whispered, "Zona, upload the translated text into my memory."
[Understood. Beginning memory transfer…]
He didn't know what would happen—if it would hurt if it would change him somehow. But he stayed still, hidden beneath the blanket, breathing slowly, waiting.
In the beginning, there was nothing; No pain, no noise, just the sound of his own breath under the blanket.
Then the transfer hit like a sudden rush of cold water poured straight into his skull. It was not painful, but overwhelming. Images, words, symbols—flooding in all at once. He clenched his jaw, instinctively gripping the edge of his blanket.
Breathing patterns. Muscle control. Diagrams of postures. Internal energy flow. The information came in layers, each set snapping into place like puzzle pieces. He was absorbing all of them like a sponge. It was like remembering something he'd never learned.
His heart pounded harder. His fingers twitched as his body tried to react to new instincts it didn't fully understand. He felt pressure behind his eyes, not pain, just density like his brain was being stretched to fit more inside.
[Transfer 43%… 67%… 89%…]
The words weren't unfamiliar anymore. He could read them now. Not because he understood the language, but because Zona had rewired his comprehension—translated it directly into how his mind processed information.
He could recall each breathing sequence perfectly. Each diagram. Every instruction. It wasn't just stored in his memory now rather it was his now.
[Transfer complete.]
The pressure eased, and Aris lay still, drenched in sweat from the sheer intensity of Zona's memory transfer. The dormitory was quiet now. Most of the squires were asleep, lost in their usual routine.
But Aris couldn't sleep. His heart was still racing. Excitement buzzed under his skin. For someone who came from a technological world, the idea of growing stronger through breathing felt like a fantasy. Back in his previous life, strength came from machines, biotech, or genetic modification.
There were things locked behind government vaults and buried in classified labs. Even the most enhanced people he'd known or read about faced insane risks and irreversible side effects to gain enough strength to be known as world-strongest.
But this? This book laid out a method that didn't rely on injections or surgeries—just discipline, posture, and breath.
What if it was telling the truth? What if mastering it could enable someone to shatter a boulder with a punch? But could it really be possible?
Perhaps the author was exaggerating to sell more copies of the book. On the other hand, books like this should be rare, so the author might not need to resort to such tactics. Aris found himself conflicted by this realization.
"Zona," he asked quietly, "how likely is this to be true?"
[Without sufficient data, I can't provide an accurate answer.]
"Data…" Aris murmured, eyes narrowing. "Then let's get some."
Without hesitation, he sat in the darkness and crossed his legs in a meditative posture. The blanket draped over his shoulders like a cloak, hiding him from view. In the dim silence of the dormitory, he straightened his spine and inhaled slowly, matching the diagram he now remembered perfectly.
Deep breath in. Hold. Out through the nose. Again.
And again.
The world narrowed to just breath, just control and to just the possibility of the impossible. He repeated the cycle, locking into the exact sequence from the diagrams.
After two minutes, a subtle warmth began to appear beneath his navel. It wasn't external—it was internal, "maybe it is from the cellular levels." Aris thought. Then he felt energetic due to an Increase in oxygen saturation. He focused harder, deepening the intake, allowing the air to flow deliberately.
Then Zona spoke.
[Vital activity increasing. Microcellular stimulation is underway. Blood oxygenation up 12%. Mitochondrial response triggering elevated ATP production.]
Aris's eyes narrowed slightly, recognizing the implications instantly. "Enhanced metabolic activity… oxygen-induced mitochondrial activation. This isn't mystical. It's controlled bio-enhancement through precise breathwork." Aris hypothesized.
His pulse remained steady as the warmth spread further. The AI wasn't exaggerating—his cells were responding to the technique. Breathing was oxygenating his blood more efficiently, increasing energy output at the cellular level.
[Skeletal muscle fibers showing early adaptation markers. Neural signaling improving in coordination with controlled breathing. If sustained: improved muscle efficiency, stamina, and recovery rate.]
Aris absorbed the data quickly, piecing it together like a lab report in his mind. "If these effects compound, and if the technique scales with physical output, it could simulate the results of months of training in weeks."
He understood now why people especially the knights in this world grew strong through breathing alone—it was a precise system of physiological conditioning, wrapped in mystical language but grounded in results.
He continued the exercise for nearly an hour.
When he finished, he didn't feel a sudden surge of power. No glowing aura and no fancy transformation.
But he felt calibrated. Like a machine after fine-tuning.
His soreness had dulled, and his mind was clearer. His body, though still weak, responded faster when he moved his fingers.
Aris smirked under his blanket. "This world has its own science; they just don't know it yet. Or maybe… maybe they do, and I'm the one who's been at the bottom of the well."
He had assumed he was bringing knowledge into a primitive world. But now he wasn't so sure. The breathing technique—disguised as mysticism—had shown physiological results he'd never seen in his old world, not even in classified bio-enhancement programs.
Maybe they were more advanced than they realized. Or maybe they just expressed it differently.
He could only lean on his scientific mindset to explain what was happening. But he was still at the starting line and this was only the first step in mastering the technique.
Aris then lay on the bed, staring up at the wooden beams above him, trying to settle into sleep. But sleep refused to come. His body was too energized, too alive from the technique he had just practiced.
The breaths he'd taken, the subtle activation of his cells, still buzzed within him. The quiet thrum of energy made him feel more awake than ever.
He turned over, trying to get comfortable, but every time he closed his eyes, the sensations from his body kept him alert. It wasn't the usual feeling of soreness from physical exertion but it was a new feeling and he liked it.
"It's the breathing technique," he thought, his mind racing despite his desire for rest. "But I can't expect any immediate results. It's the first time I've done it, so there won't be a sudden spike in strength. And I still need to eat well for it to have an effect—better food, better results."
The theory made sense. A body that was nourished would perform better with a technique that required internal energy manipulation.
He would need to keep his body in top shape if the technique was to yield the kind of power he was hoping for.
But there was one thing Aris hadn't considered.
The key to success with this technique wasn't just physical. It wasn't even just about perfecting the breathwork or understanding the diagrams.
No, the real limitation was something far more fundamental—a thing Aris didn't know, a missing piece to the puzzle it was knightly potential.
Knightlypotential is a concept that has existed for thousands of years in this world, it refers to an innate ability to become something more. It was that intangible, natural capacity that separated knights from ordinary men. It wasn't something that could be easily cultivated or replicated, and without it, even the most disciplined practitioner could never hope to reach the heights of true strength.
Without knightlypotential, Aris's breathing exercises would have been just simple mundane breathing exercises. His body would improve slightly, sure, but it would be nothing compared to what a true knight—someone born with that potential—could achieve.
His attempts would have only gone as far as the limits of his body's natural capacity, as he lacked the crucial spark that allowed others to transform their bodies into powerful weapons.
Yet, here Aris was, performing the technique flawlessly in just a few hours. His muscles were responding faster than any normal body could, and his mind felt sharper, clearer, and more awake.
Although Aris had the knightly potential but it was not that high. What should have been a slow, gradual process had accelerated beyond all reason.
If Fred had known what Aris had just accomplished and how fast he'd done it, he wouldn't have left so casually after handing him the breathing technique.
He would've turned back around, pulled Aris out of the squire's fortress, and placed him directly under the young master's private unit. Maybe even made him a captain-in-training.
But Fred didn't know because he had assumed Aris might succeed in a week, maybe five days if the boy was exceptionally gifted. That was a generous estimate, even for someone with knightly potential.
So he'd walked away without a second thought, confident that Aris was just beginning the climb.
But, Aris had skipped the first ten steps in a single night. However the truth was that Aris didn't know why he was succeeding where others would have failed.
What he didn't realize was that his success wasn't just a matter of talent—though he certainly had that in abundance—but also due to the subtle influence of Zona. The AI had reprogrammed his mind to believe the technique was something he had practiced for years, not hours. It had re-engineered his neural pathways, speeding up his adaptation, making his mind think that the technique was already his second nature.
He hadn't just learned the technique. Zona had essentially forced his brain to accept it, bypassing the natural limitations of his physical body's initial lack of knightly potential.
Aris wasn't aware of this, though. To him, it felt like pure raw talent.
Zona had rewritten his experience of the technique, feeding him a false sense of countless repetitions, which made the process far easier than it should have been. In a world where such mastery typically took years of dedicated effort, Aris had achieved it in mere hours.
A thought nagged at him "What would've happened if I didn't have Zona?" Without it, he would've needed days just to understand the basics of the language or maybe weeks. And the breathing technique? It might've taken a month before he saw even the faintest result.
Zona hadn't just translated words for him, It had rewired his learning curve, simulating hours of practice in his brain like muscle memory. Without it, he might've given up before anything even started and he was grateful to have it with him.
He finally turned onto his side, forcing his mind to go motionless. Twenty minutes later, sleep found him and it was the best sleep he'd had in both of his lifetimes.