Chapter 359. Try to Hit the Target, Not Your Instructor
Something shifted visibly across Kaela’s face as William spoke. The defensive rigidity that had defined her posture—the coiled tension of someone constantly braced for impact—suddenly melted.
It wasn’t just that she relaxed; it was as if a physical weight had been lifted from her shoulders, allowing her to finally breathe without pain. And then, for the first time since Prince Alden’s gilded carriage had rolled through the academy gates like a plague of false propriety, something genuinely human broke through her armor.
A smile. Small, fragile, but entirely unguarded.
"That’s the first time I’ve actually smiled like this since he showed up," she admitted quietly.
Her voice lacked its usual razor-edged sarcasm; instead, it carried a raw honesty that seemed to surprise even her.
"I noticed," William said gently.
His gaze remained steady, offering her the quiet acknowledgment she had been starving for.
Kaela let out a soft, rueful laugh, running a shaking hand through her damp, disheveled hair. "You know, I’ve always felt strange holding a sword properly."
"It always felt wrong. Like wearing someone else’s clothes—heavy, stiff armor that never quite fit right no matter how many times I adjusted the straps."
"I never told anyone that, though. I kept it buried..."
"I figured it just meant I wasn’t trying hard enough..."
"I thought if I just bled enough during drills, if I just practiced those godforsaken forms until my wrists screamed, eventually it would feel natural... Like it does for everyone else."
"It was never going to feel natural," William said, his voice cutting through her self-doubt like a blade of truth. "Because it was never actually yours."
A shuddering breath escaped her.
"That’s oddly validating to hear," Kaela said, and there was a genuine thread of relief woven through her words. "I spent years assuming that discomfort was some kind of personal failure."
"A fundamental flaw in my wiring."
"Turns out it was just... what? A bad matching between weapon and person?"
"Exactly that," William said. "Some people are built to dance with a blade, to maintain that elegant distance."
"But you? You’re built for something considerably more direct... Something more primal."
Kaela fell silent, turning the revelation over in her mind as if she were examining a new weapon. Her expression was uncharacteristically thoughtful, her eyes distant as she reconnected the dots of her own life.
"Do you know what’s strange? I think some part of me always knew this."
"Deep down, in that place where I don’t let anyone else look." Her fingers unconsciously curled into fists, the scarred knuckles whitening. "Every time I watched you demonstrate a punch, even during drills that had absolutely nothing to do with unarmed combat, something in me lit up."
"It was like a spark catching fire. A feeling of... recognition."
"But I never let myself take that feeling seriously. It seemed too simple."
"Too easy an answer for someone who was supposedly so complicated she needed seventeen failed instructors before finding someone who could actually see her."
"Sometimes the answer really is simple, Kaela," William said, stepping closer, his presence warm and grounding. "It’s just that most people are too busy looking for complexity to notice the truth standing right in front of them."
"They see what they expect to see..."
"They see a student who needs correcting, not a warrior who needs understanding."
Kaela studied him then, her dark eyes searching his face with something warm and genuinely appreciative. The intensity of their conversation had stripped away the usual barriers of instructor and student, leaving something far more profound between them.
"You’re better at this than you give yourself credit for," she said softly. "The teaching, I mean."
"Not just the technique, not the forms or the strikes. But the parts where you actually see people."
"The parts where you see what’s underneath."
"I’ve had a lot of practice," William replied.
His words carried an odd weight, a hint of something ancient and weary beneath the surface. "Decades of it. In one life or another."
Kaela smiled again, a real one this time, though it was tinged with the memory of all her past frustrations.
"Well, I’m glad all that practice eventually led you here," she said, her voice steady and full of newfound purpose. "To me, specifically."
"To someone who spent years breaking down doors and punching things just because nobody else ever bothered to ask what actually made sense for me."
William glanced around the small, sun-bleached training yard, the dust motes dancing in the air between them like tiny sparks. An idea was already crystallizing in his mind, something sharp and practical.
"Let’s test the theory properly, Kaela... Right now. If you’re up for it."
Kaela’s entire demeanor shifted instantly. The vulnerability that had surfaced moments ago retreated, replaced by a predator’s alertness.
Her eyes lit up with immediate, genuine enthusiasm, the kind that promised trouble and excitement in equal measure.
"You want to start now?" she asked, already rolling her shoulders, feeling the familiar ache of readiness. "No warm-up? No lecture on proper footwork?"
"No time like the present," William said, already rolling up his sleeves, exposing forearms corded with muscle and old scars. "We’re not training you to be a duelist today."
"We’re training you to be a weapon... Basic stance first."
"Feet shoulder width apart, weight balanced evenly between them."
"Don’t think about where you’re going; think about where you are."
Kaela positioned herself eagerly, her movements quick and impatient. William quickly discovered that while her instinct for violence was flawless, her coordination for structured, formal technique was a different story entirely.
She moved like a storm contained in a powerful but chaotic human frame.
"Bring your guard up," he instructed, his voice shifting into that commanding instructor register. "Hands protecting your face."
"Keep those elbows tucked in close to your ribs... Tighten everything... Make yourself a fortress."
Kaela raised her hands, but the moment she tried to obey, her body rebelled. Her elbows immediately flared outward at an angle that left her ribs and liver completely exposed—a fatal mistake in any real confrontation.
William stepped in, his movements economical as he gently but firmly corrected the position of her arms. But the moment he stepped back to give her space, her elbows drifted right back out again, as if pulled by some invisible, unconscious habit.
Her body simply refused to accept the restriction.
"Your elbows continue to flare, Kaela," William said, his patience unshakable despite the obvious frustration building in her stance. "You’re opening yourself up."
"You’re inviting someone to gut you."
"I’m trying, William!"
"I swear, it feels like my bones are fighting me," she snapped, frustration flickering in her eyes.
She could feel the tightness in her chest, the desperate urge to stop pretending to hold a pose and actually do something.
"I believe you... But trying isn’t enough."
"You have to command it... Try again."
She gritted her teeth, adjusting her stance with visible effort. She held the position tight, controlled, and disciplined for exactly three seconds.
Then, the dam broke. The coiled energy inside her became too much to contain, the restraint feeling like a cage.
Unable to resist the primal urge to connect with something solid, she abandoned the careful stance entirely. She launched into a wild, looping haymaker toward the padded target William held up.
It wasn’t a technique; it was an explosion.
Her fist connected at an awkward, punishing angle. Because she hadn’t braced her core, her own momentum betrayed her.
Instead of the target absorbing the blow, the force carried her forward like a runaway carriage. She stumbled past the target, off balance and flailing, and crashed directly into William’s chest with the force of a battering ram.
’OOF!’
Both of them staggered backward, the impact sending a jolt through their frames. For a terrifying second, they nearly toppled over entirely, a tangle of limbs and surprised breathing.
"Okay," Kaela panted, breaking away to catch her balance, a breathless, genuine laugh escaping her lips despite the near disaster. "Okay, yeah!"
"That could have gone considerably better..."
William steadied himself, rubbing his sternum where she’d collided with him. A rare, genuine grin broke across his face.
"It would have been considerably better if you had learned how to stop your own momentum before using me as a crash pad." He shook his head, the amusement evident in his eyes. "Let’s try that again."
"And this time, Kaela? Try to hit the target, not your instructor."