24 The Danger.

Craftsman family younger generation came to Neo's mansion. They became his subordinates, and they will be trained and educated for the future. A few designs were given to them to start slowly take control of the market. The paper became very popular and some eyes turned on craftsman family.

(I need to protect them, as they are my people.)

He ordered some guards and thought about how to solve other problems. The society of this city is really hard to change. Even if they become stronger, it will be useless if some strong power attacks them with numbers.

(It's city and there should be military. I could actually use them as temporary protection. Craftsman family will 'invent' the stronger weapon and will work on a stronger one. The weapon that could give an advantage against beasts and other races. Sell them crossbows and incite them with a description of ballista and other siege weapons.)

The villa of craftsmen was attacked the same day. The Neo men could defend themselves without the casualties. Neo was mercenary in his previous life. He had the necessary knowledge about military training and command methods.

A stronger and better-organized group of people could defend against bigger force without problems. As long there are no martial artists involved, the chance of breaking through their defense was low.

(It's only beginning. I plan to create a military trained army of martial artists.)

The training and nurturing such army needed time and resources.

Craftsman family made a deal with a military few days later. It wasn't hard to actually protect the one family from danger. The military was connected to the underworld and one word was enough to prevent all small fries from attacking the target. The real problem was other families and their greed.

The small force was deployed to their villa and started stationing there.

(Ok. The problem of money is temporarily solved. I need to create the tunnels under the city. It will safety measure and good cover for future operation outside the city.)

There were many important factors and conditions while creating tunnels. Before digging the tunnel, one needed to do an investigation of groundwater, fault zones and many other things. It was important to calculate stand-point of the tunnel and plan necessary stabilizers.

(I will need to necessary preparations before this operation. This tunnel will be a necessity for future plans.)

One of the servants came with great news. The needles were done and Neo will be finally able to open his meridians. The opening meridians were an important ceremony for the martial artist. It determined entire future potential of the martial artist. At least, he thought so before discovering ancient medicine and creating new ways of opening them. It's still had some sentimental value to him. It symbolized the end of old ways and limitless future in martial arts.

(Hah! New opportunities and traveling around the world.)

The room was prepared, and he sat cross-legged, he ordered people to keep watch over the doors to not let anyone bother him. Opening meridians required extremely high focus and calm surroundings. Any interruption could make the process a few times harder.

The first step was inserting the needles into the opening and making small holes. The body of Neo had more meridians than normal human, so he needed to find openings to rest of the meridians. It was normally twelve meridians but he had fifteen. The necessary procedure was to use pulse to find the opening.

Time passed and after many attempts, he could finally find these meridians. First additional meridian was connected to the heart and Neo felt that there is something inside his heart. It was impossible to check it for now. His spiritual energy was too weak to enter his heart. The two of other meridians were connected to his eyes.

(It's probably related somehow to this weird eye power. I hope it won't cause any problems.)

The piercing the opening of the meridians was extremely risky. One mistake could cripple your meridian and restoring it was too hard. There was even risk that some organs would stop working after crippling your meridian.

Neo ordered twenty needless, he wasn't sure about the number of meridians for the first time. It was time, he pierced first opening. Second and third, the first five were always easy.

Fourth...fifth... The problem started from sixth. The pain started to affect your precision. It was hard but Neo went through worse situations than this.

Sixth...seventh...he started to sweat like a waterfall.

(Only...eight more!)

Eighth...ninth...tenth...eleventh. He coughed blood, his mind could endure this pain but the body wasn't so strong.

(HAHAHA! FATE WANT ME TO STOP WITH ONLY PAIN LIKE THIS! IN YOUR DREAM!)

He pierced opening of twelfth. This was an important moment because it was all meridians of normal human was opened and the pain was at the limit that human could endure.

(GRHHH! IT'S NOT ENOUGH! I WILL OPEN THESE THREE TO!)

Thirteenth, the pain became inhumane. He almost lost consciousness. The strong will to surpass the fate and previous life experiences pushed him further. Boy gritted his teeth and continued to endure while his entire body was trembling.

Fourteen and last one. There is only one way to finish this process open the meridians before losing consciousness.

The next step required circulating breathing technique to let the inner energy enter the meridians and open entrances. His breath was unstable, but he focused his entire mind on breathing technique.

One cycle...two cycles...twenty cycles... First Meridian opened and inner energy entered his body. The pain became less intense. He couldn't feed relieved yet. There were fourteen meridians to open.

Fifty cycles...a hundred cycles... The meridians started opening one after another until the thirteenth.

Two hundred cycles...a thousand cycles... He lost count of time, the only important thing was to open the three last meridians.

Five thousand cycles... The thirteenth meridian opened, his heart started pounding like crazy. All his veins started bulging. The body was being filled by very hot and strong energy. It started to fuse with inner energy. The eyes started to glow like two stars on the sky.

BOOM. Two last meridians opened with a small explosion. It was a great relief because all the pain went away.

(Finally...)

He collapsed on the floor and lost consciousness. The process was complete and his body deserves the rest. Martial artists on Earth never heard of opening all of twelve meridians, but he opened fifteen. It was an inhumane accomplishment and his potential is heaven-defying.