Late to the party but rather late than never.
Nice story,novella really.
The blackmail through the predicament of a friend made for an interesting clock.
Also the foreshadowing of the dream being a dream was a nice touch as it made the reveal feel less jenky to me.
The fact that there was a reveal also worked for me. The gradual decent into ever more intense training and modification is hot but also has the risk to break the suspense of disbelieve. By suddenly revealing the dream aspect, whist having forshadowed it in ways, the level of escallation is reset and at the same time believability (after a fashion) is restored.
All in all I liked it a lot. Lot of themes explored in an interesting way.
The middle bit with the bothers/cousins wasn't really my thing but thats personal prefrence and nothing to do with the quality.
Thank you for creating and sharing this it was great fun