The door slid open.
The sound of wood on wood was like a gunshot in the morning silence. I stepped onto the porch. The air was minus ten degrees, maybe colder. It hit my face and immediately tried to freeze the moisture in my nostrils.
I didn't flinch.
Inhale.
I drew the freezing air in, but I didn't let it hit my lungs raw. I used the back of my throat to warm it, pushing the pressure down into my gut. My diaphragm expanded. My ribs, still held together by bandages and stubbornness, didn't scream. They groaned, but they held.
"You're actually out," Tanjiro said.
He was standing in the snow, fifteen feet away. He had an axe in his hand and a pile of un-split logs at his feet. He wasn't wearing a coat. Just his thin kimono and the hanafuda earrings that jingled slightly when he moved.
"I told you I was done lying down," I said.
My legs felt like lead, but the "rhythm" was working. I wasn't shivering. My body was generating its own internal furnace. It was a mechanical heat, fueled by the way I was forcing my blood to circulate.
"If you're out here, you're working," Tanjiro said. He kicked a smaller axe toward me. It skidded across the packed ice and stopped at my feet. "We're low on kindling. Split the cedar. If you can't hit the center, go back inside."
I looked at the axe. Then I looked at Kū-on, tucked into my belt.
I left the sword. I couldn't swing it yet. The torque required for a full draw would rip my side open. But an axe? An axe was vertical. An axe was about gravity.
I stepped off the porch.
My boots sank four inches into the powder. My balance wavered. I adjusted my breath.
Exhale.
The weight shifted. I felt my center of gravity drop into my hips. I picked up the axe.
It was light. Too light. It felt like a toy compared to the heavy steel of a katana, but my grip was still weak. My fingers felt stiff, the tendons resisting the clench.
I walked to the chopping block. A thick stump of oak, stained with years of sap and blood from slipped blades.
I placed a cedar log on the center.
"Don't use your arms," Tanjiro called out. He was already back to work, his own axe rising and falling in a perfect, tireless arc. Whack. Split. Whack. Split. "If you use your arms, the vibration will shatter your ribs. Use the air. Drop the weight."
I stood over the log.
I raised the axe. My left side flared with a sharp, warning heat. I ignored it.
Inhale.
I filled my lungs to seventy percent. I held it. I felt the internal pressure stabilize my spine.
Exhale.
I let the axe fall. I didn't swing. I just let gravity take the tool.
Thuck.
The blade buried itself two inches into the cedar. It didn't split. It just stuck there, mocking me.
"Again," Tanjiro said, without looking back.
I yanked the axe out. That was a mistake. The pulling motion engaged my lats. The pain was immediate—a white-hot bolt that made my knees shake. I bit my lip until I tasted copper.
Focus.
I reset. I looked at the grain of the wood. I looked at the center.
Inhale.
This time, I didn't just hold the air. I pushed it. I imagined the pressure in my gut was a piston.
Exhale.
I dropped the axe again. Right as the steel hit the wood, I pushed a sharp burst of air out of my lungs.
CRACK.
The cedar split clean. The two halves fell into the snow.
I stood there, panting. Not because I was tired, but because the rush of blood was overwhelming. My heart was hammering, but it wasn't the erratic beat of a dying man. It was the steady rhythm of a machine coming back online.
"Good," Tanjiro said. "Now do the rest of the pile."
There were at least forty logs.
I worked for two hours.
The sun climbed higher, reflecting off the snow with a blinding, crystalline glare. My eyes burned. My hands were raw, the friction of the wooden handle peeling away the soft skin of my palms. I didn't care.
With every swing, I felt the "rhythm" getting deeper. It wasn't just about breathing anymore. It was about timing. The moment the axe hit the wood had to be the exact moment the breath left my body. Any deviation, and the shock of the impact would travel up the handle and rattle my broken bones.
Inhale. Lift. Exhale. Drop. Crack.
By the thirtieth log, I was in a trance. The cold didn't exist. The pain in my side was a dull hum, like a distant engine. I was sweating, the steam rising from my shoulders in the freezing air.
I looked at my hands. They were covered in blisters, some of them already popped and bleeding. The red stained the light wood of the axe handle.
I looked at Tanjiro. He was finished with his pile. He was watching me.
"You're not a charcoal burner," he said. It wasn't a question.
"No," I said.
"You're a killer."
I didn't answer. I picked up the next log.
"The way you look at the wood," Tanjiro said, stepping closer. "You aren't seeing fuel. You're seeing necks. You're looking for the point of least resistance so you can destroy it."
"Does it matter?" I asked, my voice dry.
"On this mountain, yes. If you bring that violence here, you bring the things that follow it."
I stopped. I leaned on the axe. "The things in the snow don't need an invitation, Tanjiro. They're already here. They've been here for a long time. You're just lucky they haven't smelled you yet."
Tanjiro went quiet. He looked at the treeline. The forest was thick, dark, and silent.
"My father said the same thing," he whispered. "He said the mountain has its own breath. And sometimes, that breath is hungry."
He turned back to me. "Your sword. Can you use it?"
"Not yet," I admitted.
"Then keep splitting wood. When the wood feels like nothing, the sword will feel like a feather. But if you try to draw that steel before your lungs are ready, you'll never breathe again."
He picked up a basket of coal and started heading back toward the hut.
I watched him go. He was just a kid. A kid with hanafuda earrings and a soot-stained face. But he knew more about the mechanics of survival than half the generals I had served under.
I looked at the last ten logs.
I didn't feel like a soldier anymore. I felt like a student.
I raised the axe.
Inhale.
I didn't think about the war. I didn't think about the blood I had spilled or the blood I was going to spill.
Exhale.
CRACK.
The log shattered.
I stayed out there until the sun started to dip behind the peaks. The purple shadows returned, stretching across the snow like reaching fingers. The temperature plummeted.
I walked back to the porch. My legs were trembling, but they held. I picked up Kū-on.
I sat on the edge of the wood, looking out at the dark forest.
I did the rhythm.
In. Hold. Out.
My ribs felt solid. Not healed, but braced. The internal pressure was doing the job that the bandages couldn't.
I looked at the treeline one last time before sliding the door shut.
Something was out there. I could feel it. A shift in the air, a scent of rot that shouldn't exist in the clean mountain cold.
I wasn't ready to fight it. Not tonight.
But I was closer.
I lay down on the futon. I didn't close my eyes immediately. I kept the rhythm going, even in the dark.
I was adapting.
And soon, the mountain would have to adapt to me.