Chapter 4: Life 4, Age 16, Martial Disciple 1
For the next several days, I practiced the Earth Heart Mantra alone in my tiny house. In reality, I didn’t do much more than sit there and wait. Meals were delivered by servants, but they never stuck around to chat. It was a somewhat miserable existence. I tried my best to cultivate, but it seemed like with zero affinity making any progress was going to be more difficult than I had expected.
Fortunately, on the fifth day, things changed. Everyone was brought to the large dirt square behind the houses, the imperiously named ‘Martial Arts Training Yard’.
As we gathered, I noticed one thing that was a little strange. A few children were missing from the group, including the red-robed prick who beat me to death a few days ago. Putting that together with the look of superiority he gave me the last time we met, I could guess that the elites had been separated out for special training. Good news for me it seemed.
An older man with a more military bearing stood in the middle of the yard and began giving orders.
“Alright, quiet! Space out and circle around,” he shouted. “For the next three months, you will all be undergoing extensive martial arts training. Every hour of every day you will either be exercising, cultivating, or recovering. After three months, many of you will no longer be members of my clan. If you want any hope of remaining one, you will push yourself to do your best at every moment. If you do not want to be one, you will still push to do your best at every moment, because if you don’t, the moment you leave this place you will learn what it’s like to live as a commoner. Basic martial skills are a necessity."
“This training won’t just be hard. It will be deadly. If you relax for even a moment, you might find out that it was your last. Now, time for a little demonstration,” he said, with an evil glint in his eye, “do we have any volunteers?”
Everyone froze. No one wanted to be the first to offer themselves up for a beating. After waiting a few beats, I decided to make a move. Was it stupid? Sure. Did I care? Not really. What was the worst that could happen?
I stepped forward.
“I volunteer.”