Isaac smiled,
"Abbie, I'd be glad to have you and I'm sure Johan will give you a warm welcome too. In fact, I'd like to arrange a meeting for the team members at my house in 3 days. This is the location," Isaac wrote an address on the napkin in front of him, "The potential 4th member will also be attending. If they decide to join, we can begin looking for our first job as a team."
"Of course I'll come – I look forward to meeting everyone!"
After getting Abbie's confirmation, Isaac decided it was time to leave. Everything team-related was done for now, and he had 3 days before he needed to think about it again.
As for why he arranged the meeting to be in 3 days... his locker expired today. He still had 2 reward points in it, so he needed to withdraw them before the end of the day and spend the next 2 days cultivating them. Quickly using up his resources was the best way to stop people from stealing them – after all, nobody could steal his cultivation.
Following this line of thought, Isaac left the residential district and headed towards the sect lockers. After a 20-minute walk, he reached the locker unit. He opened his locker and took the 2 reward points in it, then he found the person in charge and handed over his locker key, giving up control of the locker.
Isaac went straight from his locker (well, it wasn't his anymore) to the market. He exchanged the reward points for 2 small, milky Basic Qi Pills, then pocketed them and headed home. When he was at home, Isaac dug up the box under his floorboards and stored his pills in it.
Then he quickly visited Johan's house to inform him of the meeting in 3 days. Johan wasn't pleased about Isaac recruiting all the members by himself, but there was nothing he could really do. He just had a short argument with Isaac before agreeing to come to the meeting.
Then Isaac went back home.
He didn't want to cultivate today. It was just past midday, so he wouldn't have enough time to absorb all of a pill's Qi if he started to cultivate now. It would be better if he spent more time practicing with his Snowshoe Anima today and started cultivation tomorrow.
As such, Isaac ate his lunch and then went to the training grounds. He spent the rest of the day using his Snowshoe Anima to practice being able to turn quicker – hopefully it would make him more agile and elusive in combat.
Practice was difficult, but Isaac got through it. He had fallen several times and was covered in bruises when he went home that evening, but progress always came at a cost – and Isaac'd made an awful lot of progress. He hadn't become a master in one day or anything like that, but his rate of improvement was impressive: if the average person's learning speed was like a horse-drawn carriage, Isaac learnt at the speed of a steam train.
He arrived home at about 8 pm, ate dinner, then spent an hour training sword stances. After that, he bathed and went to bed.
*************************
Isaac woke up before 7 the next morning. He got changed, but he didn't eat breakfast. Instead, he dug up the box beneath his floorboards and took out a Basic Qi Pill. Then he buried the box again and walked back over to his bed.
He lay on his back on the mattress, staring at the featureless ceiling. His eyes slowly closed and he entered a calm, relaxed state. He raised his right hand to his lips and popped a small, marble-sized pill into his mouth, then swallowed it without chewing. The pill travelled down Isaac's throat and into his stomach, where he felt it begin to emit Qi.
Isaac used his will to harness several strands of Qi and draw them into his stomach meridian point, where he spent a few seconds refining the Qi. Then he guided the strands through his system of Qi Veins and brought them to his core.
One by one, he merged the strands of Qi with his Qi Core. When he'd merged all of them, he moved his will back to his stomach and pulled more strands into his stomach meridian.
Isaac repeated this process for over an hour – he'd sunk into a state of complete serenity. He was only focused on his inner-self; the outside world was unimportant and nothing could disturb him...
*knock*
… What was that?
*bang* *Knock* *Knock*
What was going on?
*Bang* *Bang* *Bang* *Bang*
Isaac's peaceful meditation was interrupted by the commotion outside. His eyes flickered open and he got up immediately. It wasn't uncommon for cultivators to be ambushed during cultivation, so Isaac immediately focused on his surroundings. He saw his door shudder as another loud *bang* was produced. Isaac sighed inwardly in relief,
'Good. They haven't got in yet.'
Isaac was trying to train himself to break out of meditation at the slightest sound, but that was a trick which took several years of cultivation experience to learn. Isaac had been cultivating for less than 2 months so he wasn't there yet, but he still managed to wake up quickly for a beginner.
He got to his feet just as his door shook again. It looked like it was on verge of breaking, so Isaac prepared to fight. He ran over and stood next to the doorframe, ready to attack the first person who entered.
*Bang* The door shuddered and the boards holding it in place groaned.
*BANG* It shook violently.
*Craaaaack* *CRASH* *THUD*
There were terrible creaking and cracking sounds as the planks holding the door together broke. The door was sent flying and there was a resounding thud as it landed on the floor.
A large cloud of dust was kicked up, nearly causing Isaac to cough and reveal his position. As the dust began to settle, somebody stepped through the entrance. Isaac sprang into action. He used his left hand and chopped the side of the person's neck – the person fell to the ground like a sack of potatoes.
There came cries of surprise from outside,
"Jakob!"
"You bastard!"
Isaac identified the voices of 2 more people just outside. They'd seen him attack Jakob from behind, so they rushed at him.
Isaac turned to face his assailants – a short, portly woman with freckles and a woman who was unremarkable in every aspect other than her long, flowing raven-black hair. The two of them were holding a miniature battering ram.
Isaac didn't know where they'd got it, but he didn't have time to care. The pair rushed at him with the battering ram, and he couldn't dodge left or right since he was standing in the doorway.
Just as he was about to be hit, Isaac grabbed the top of the door frame and pulled himself upwards. He also lifted his legs up and tucked them in to his chest, completely avoiding the battering ram. As the battering ram sailed below him, Isaac slightly lowered himself and extended both legs. He kicked out to both sides – his left foot connected with the short woman's face and the sole of his right boot struck the black-haired woman's chest.
The short woman was knocked over, while the black-haired woman was pushed back a few steps. Isaac let go of the door frame and dropped back to the ground. Then he rushed at the short woman, who was sitting on the ground and holding her bleeding, broken nose.
She tried to get to her feet as soon as she saw Isaac heading towards her, but Isaac was no slowpoke. He took less than a second to close the 2-metre gap between them, then he unleashed a roundhouse kick as she was still trying to get up. The kick connected with the side of her head and she was sent crashing back to the ground. She wouldn't be getting up any time soon.
Meanwhile, Isaac quickly span around and faced the black-haired girl. She was glaring at him as a ball of ice gathered between her palms. The moment Isaac turned, she launched the fist-sized ball.
The projectile seemed powerful, but it wasn't too fast. Even though Isaac was quite close to the girl, he still had time to summon his spirit sword before the ice ball hit him. The ice ball collided with the flat edge of Isaac's blade.
The impact pushed him back a step and the hand holding the sword shook violently. However, he didn't drop the blade. He hastily advanced towards the woman before she could summon another ice projectile, then he swung his sword directly at her head.
The woman ducked and avoided the blade. Then, she felt something on the back of her head. 'Wait a minute... that's not right! His sword missed me, so what's on my head?' Those were her last thoughts before Isaac grabbed her hair with his left hand and held her head in place for a powerful knee strike. His knee collided with her forehead, instantly knocking her out.