After Lucy departed, Andrew sat at the small table, his brow furrowed in concentration. The cultivation diagrams remained spread before him, but his thoughts had drifted elsewhere.
"Mother, why was my teacher so... distracted?" he asked, looking up at Eva. "She kept staring at me, then looking away. Her explanations were good, but sometimes she wouldn't hear my questions."
Eva settled into the chair Lucy had vacated, carefully considering her response. She exchanged a meaningful glance with Amara, who hovered near the kitchen doorway.
"Well, Andrew," Eva began gently, "you're a rather unique child. Male cultivators are extremely rare in our world."
"How rare?" Andrew asked, his sharp mind immediately seeking quantification.
"Perhaps one in thousands has any aptitude at all," Eva explained. "And you've shown remarkable potential already. Lucy likely wasn't prepared to teach someone like you."
Amara snorted from the doorway, her eyes dancing with mischief. "That's putting it mildly." She bounced into the room with her characteristic energy, ignoring Eva's warning look.
"What Eva's trying to delicately say," Amara continued, dropping into a chair beside them, "is that girl was probably calculating how many children she'd have with you in the future."
"Amara!" Eva hissed in an angry tone.
Andrew's face scrunched in confusion. "Children? But I'm just a child myself."
"Not forever," Amara said with a wink. "In ten years or so, you'll be quite the catch. Lucy's just planning ahead."
Eva placed a protective hand on Andrew's shoulder. "That's enough, Amara. He doesn't need to understand all the social complications yet."
Andrew frowned, processing this new information with the same methodical approach he applied to cultivation diagrams. "So... Lucy was distracted because I'm a boy who can cultivate?"
"Yes, exactly," Eva confirmed, shooting Amara a silencing glare. "Nothing for you to worry about right now. Let's focus on what you learned today."
Across the district, Lucy stumbled into her family's modest apartment, still in a daze. Her three younger siblings swarmed around her, bombarding her with questions about her first tutoring session, but she barely registered their voices.
She made her way to the small bedroom she shared with her sisters and sat heavily on the edge of her bed. The reality of her situation was slowly sinking in.
A male cultivator. Not just any male cultivator—a child she could guide, influence, and connect with from the beginning.
In a world where female cultivators outnumbered males by tens of thousands to one, such connections were invaluable. The most powerful women in the Matriarchy often rose to prominence through their associations with the rare male practitioners. Children born of such unions frequently possessed superior aptitudes.
Lucy pressed her palms against her face, trying to steady her breathing. She was only twelve—still focused on completing her bone forging. Romance and marriage were distant concerns. Yet suddenly, the future seemed to unfold before her with dizzying new possibilities.
"I need to be careful," she whispered to herself. "Strategic."
If she became indispensable to Andrew's cultivation journey—if she became someone he trusted implicitly—the connection could elevate not just her, but her entire family. Her siblings could attend better schools. They could move from this cramped apartment to more spacious quarters.
But first, she needed to master herself. The wide-eyed awe she'd displayed today wouldn't serve her well. She needed to be professional, focused—the best tutor possible.
Lucy lay back on her bed, staring at the ceiling, her mind still racing with possibilities that had been unimaginable just hours before.
Weeks melded into months as Andrew's cultivation journey continued. The small apartment that had once been his entire world now felt like merely the starting point of a much greater adventure. With Eva's blessing, he practiced his techniques openly in the small room for studying, no longer hiding his abilities.
Lucy arrived three times a week, carrying new scrolls or cultivation manuals tucked under her arm. Her initial nervousness had gradually transformed into professional composure. The awkward silences and flustered explanations of their first meetings were replaced by structured lessons and thoughtful discussions.
"The meridian pathways connect here," she explained one afternoon, tracing invisible lines across a diagram. "Most practitioners struggle with this intersection, but I think your energy flow might actually benefit from its complexity."
Andrew nodded, absorbing her words with characteristic intensity. "Because my cultivation base started forming so early?"
"Exactly." Lucy couldn't help the small smile of pride. Teaching Andrew was unlike instructing any other child. He grasped concepts with remarkable speed, often connecting ideas across different texts she'd provided before she explicitly pointed out the relationships.
After each session, Lucy permitted herself five minutes—no more—to indulge in future fantasies. One day, when he's older, she would think, visualizing a grown Andrew, powerful and distinguished, choosing her as his cultivation partner and more. These daydreams she kept strictly private, locked away until her walk home.
By the third month, their dynamic had settled into comfortable familiarity. Lucy no longer sat stiffly at the edge of her chair but relaxed into their lessons. Andrew, initially formal and cautious with his tutor, began asking questions that extended beyond cultivation.
"Why does the Matriarchy govern this way?" he asked one day, looking up from a history text. "Wouldn't it be more efficient if—"
"Careful," Lucy interrupted with a gentle warning. "Some questions are best discussed with your mother."
But over time, even these boundaries softened. Lucy found herself explaining the basics of their society's structure, the necessity of the Matriarchy's formation after the Great Decline, and how cultivation had become primarily a female pursuit through generations of necessity and adaptation.
"The world wasn't always like this," she told him, her voice dropping to a near-whisper despite being alone in the apartment with him. "Before the Decline, cultivation was practiced equally among men and women."
Andrew knew that buy still asked. "Really? What changed?"
"War. Disease. Environmental collapse. The old texts say that men were more severely affected by some pathogen that spread during the chaos. Those who survived often couldn't cultivate anymore." She shrugged. "That's why you're so special."
Eva noticed the growing ease between them. After one particularly productive session, she pulled Lucy aside while Andrew practiced in the room.
"You've been good for him," Eva said quietly. "He's thriving under your guidance."
Lucy flushed with pleasure. "He makes it easy. His mind is... extraordinary."
"Yes," Eva agreed, her expression thoughtful. "But I'm equally grateful for how you've normalized his experience. He's no longer afraid of being different."
Later that evening, watching Andrew demonstrate a new cultivation stance with confident, precise movements, Lucy felt a swell of genuine affection that transcended her private fantasies. Whether or not her daydreams ever materialized, she realized she had already gained something precious—a connection with a truly remarkable child whose growth she was privileged to witness and nurture.
Lucy's study desk overflowed with scrolls and texts, more than she'd ever accumulated for her own cultivation training. Each time before meeting Andrew, she immersed herself in research, preparing answers for questions he hadn't yet thought to ask.
"I should know more about the Southern Continent's energy circulation patterns," she muttered to herself, making notes in the margins of an ancient text. "He'll probably ask about that next time."
Her roommate peered over her shoulder, eyebrows raised. "You're putting in more work for this tutoring position than for Mistress Zhang's final assessment. What's with this kid?"
Lucy merely shrugged, careful to keep her expression neutral. "Just a promising student. I want to do a good job."
At the academy, whispers followed her through the corridors. Fellow students noted her sudden intensity, the extra hours in the archives, the way she declined social invitations to "prepare lesson plans."
"Lucy's really working hard for this tutoring position," one girl remarked during bone-strengthening exercises. "She's terrified of losing that stipend."
Another nodded. "My mother says the Matriarchy pays well for outreach tutors. Smart move on her part—securing income for her family while still training."
If only they knew. Lucy bit her tongue, focusing on channeling energy through her body rather than responding. Let them think she was desperate to keep a modest tutoring position. Better that than revealing she spent her afternoons guiding a male cultivator with extraordinary potential.
The Great Houses would dispatch their daughters immediately if word spread. Families with cultivation histories stretching back fifteen generations wouldn't allow some nobody from the outer district to form a connection with such a rare treasure. They would overwhelm Eva's household with gifts and offers, separate Andrew from his mother if necessary, place him under their "protection" until he reached marrying age.
And Lucy? They would ensure she never approached him again.
"Your energy is dispersing before reaching your ankles," the instructor criticized, breaking Lucy's train of thought. "Focus, student Lu. Whatever's distracting you isn't worth failing your advancement test."
Lucy nodded apologetically, refocusing her attention. But the truth was, Andrew's education had become worth everything to her. Not just for future possibilities, but for the genuine joy of watching his understanding unfold.
During their next session, Andrew unexpectedly asked, "Why do you work so hard for me?"
Lucy froze mid-explanation of a particularly complex circulation pattern. "What do you mean?"
"These diagrams." He gestured to the meticulously hand-drawn charts she'd created. "They're not from standard texts. You made these yourself, didn't you? Customized for my specific questions."
His perceptiveness both alarmed and pleased her. "Yes," she admitted. "I want to give you the best guidance possible."
"But why?" he pressed, dark eyes studying her with that unnerving adult comprehension. "The other day, you mentioned you stayed up all night researching heart meridian variations just because I asked one question."
Lucy carefully organized her thoughts before responding. "Because potential like yours deserves proper nurturing. Because knowledge shouldn't be hoarded by the privileged few."
What she didn't say: Because someday, the Great Houses will discover you, and I'll lose this opportunity. Because I'm laying foundations now that will withstand their interference later.
Instead, she smiled and pulled out another scroll. "Now, about those Southern Continent techniques you were curious about..."
As weeks stretched into months, Lucy walked an increasingly precarious line. At the academy, she maintained the façade of an ordinary, if ambitious, student. With Andrew, she poured everything she had into building a foundation no future teacher could easily replace—embedding herself in his cultivation journey so thoroughly that even the daughters of Great Houses would struggle to displace her.
It was a dangerous game, but watching Andrew master techniques that students years older struggled with made every risk worthwhile.