Selene gave them two days off after the deep zone. Rest, recover, readjust to civilization. Ren spent the first day sleeping twelve hours, eating three real meals, and washing corruption-zone mud out of gear he never wanted to see again. The second day he cultivated in his apartment, testing his new Sprout channels in clean air — feeling the difference between fighting for his life in a corrupted forest and sitting cross-legged on his bed in a quiet room.

On the third day, training resumed.

Walking into Room 3-C that morning, Ren made a decision. The Sprout breakthrough had happened in front of the entire group. They had all felt his energy shift when he walked back to camp that night. Selene had confirmed it out loud. There was no version of reality where he could pretend it hadn’t happened.

So he wasn’t going to pretend.

— • —

Selene opened the session with energy circulation drills on the formation grid. Standard format — stand on the node, cycle energy, maintain output. They had done it a hundred times.

Ren stepped onto the grid and opened his channels at Sprout level.

The difference was instant. His energy flowed through the formation with a density and speed that lit the measurement nodes up brighter than anyone except Selene. The ambient energy in the room shifted as his output filled the space. Cassian, standing on the next node over, actually stepped sideways.

"Whoa."

Lyra looked up from her station. Iris’s hands stilled on her link. Yuelan turned and stared. Kaelen’s jaw stayed level, but his eyes tracked the readings.

Selene watched from the side, recording data. Her stylus moved fast.

— • —

Combat drills came next. Formation dummies, timed strikes, scored accuracy. Same exercises they had been running for weeks.

Ren hit the first dummy at about sixty percent power. It flew off the grid and cracked against the far wall.

He stared at his fist, then at the broken dummy. He hadn’t hit it hard. Sixty percent at Germination would have knocked it back a meter and scored a solid hit. Sixty percent at Sprout had launched it across the room.

Cassian started laughing. "Dude."

"I’ll hold back," Ren said.

"Hold back? Bro, you just killed a training dummy. Those are rated for Seedling impacts."

Selene glanced at the broken dummy, then at Ren. "Use the reinforced ones from the back wall. Stage 4 rating."

He switched. They held. Barely.

— • —

The rest of the morning was the strangest training session Ren had experienced since joining the special class. Energy exercises that had required careful management at Germination were effortless at Sprout. Combat forms he had needed to calibrate precisely could now be performed at their actual speed without worrying about the mask slipping. He wasn’t calculating how much to show. He wasn’t spending energy pretending to be weaker.

He was just training. The relief hit so fast he caught himself smiling during a strike drill.

’This is what it’s supposed to feel like,’ he thought. ’Training without the weight.’

Kaia pulsed warmly. She liked this version better too.

— • —

During the break, they gathered around him.

Yuelan spoke first. "Your strike speed is at least thirty percent above what you showed during our spar. Rematch. Soon." She wasn’t upset. She was excited.

Iris stood with her arms crossed. "The gap between your assessment performance and your actual ability was bigger than I calculated." A beat. "I underestimated you."

Lyra didn’t say anything analytical. She just stood close and smiled — the warm, real one that said I’m glad you stopped hiding without needing words.

Kaelen watched from his desk. When Ren glanced over, Kaelen gave a small nod. Not friendly. Acknowledgment. Now I see what I’m actually up against.

Cassian dropped into the seat beside Ren and punched him on the shoulder.

"About time you stopped pretending."

"You knew?"

"Bro. Everyone knew. We just didn’t know how much." He grinned. "Turns out it was a lot."

"Sorry."

"Don’t be. You had your reasons." He pointed at the broken dummy still lying against the far wall. "But this is way better than watching you pretend to be average."

— • —

After the session, Ren stood in the courtyard outside the annex. Afternoon sun, ward-glow on the walls, Cassian’s voice carrying through the window making some joke about the dummy he had destroyed. Normal sounds. Normal day. Except that for the first time in two months, he wasn’t carrying the weight of pretending to be something he wasn’t.

He still had secrets. The System, his dual-law foundation, Kaia’s true nature — those were buried deep and staying there. But the raw power was out. The speed, the strength, the combat ability. Nobody had panicked. Nobody had reported him. His friends were still his friends, except now they knew what he could actually do.

Not complete freedom. But the closest thing he’d felt since waking up in this world.

Kaia pulsed. Warm. Settled. Content.

’Yeah,’ Ren thought. ’This is better.’

Tomorrow he’d push harder. Show more. Stop treating every drill like a hiding exercise and start treating it like actual training — the kind that made you stronger instead of the kind that made you careful.

The mask wasn’t gone. But it was thinner. And getting thinner every day.

---------------------------------------------------

Thank you so much for reading "Bloodline Plant Lord."

I truly appreciate everyone who has taken the time to start this story and follow Ren’s journey. This is only the beginning, and there is still a much bigger world, deeper mysteries, stronger enemies, and many powerful bloodline plants waiting to be revealed.

If you enjoyed this Chapter, please consider adding the story to your library, leaving a comment, and supporting it with Power Stones. Every comment, vote, and bit of support really helps the story grow, reach more readers, and motivates me to keep improving with each Chapter.

I would also love to hear your thoughts about the story so far — what you liked, what made you curious, and what you want to see more of in future Chapters.

Thank you again for your support.

See you in the next Chapter — Ren’s journey has only just begun.