Bright and early in the morning, 4 figures were gathered at the nadir of Jin Hennessy’s mountain. They were Dam Son, Sugar Bun, Xuan Li and of course Jin Hennessy. Behind them was a long flight of stairs comprised of 70,000 steps leading to the peak of the mountain. Each student stood beside 3 large empty containers which measured 1 ½ metre in length and a diameter of 3 feet. These items were essential to their imminent training.
“Okay, you damn brats! Wipe that sleep out of your eyes and get ready to increase your stamina!” Jin Hennessy shouted through a folded Noun Script he had placed near his mouth. “Today’s training will be mountain climbing. You see those stairs behind you?” He gestured to the endless flight of stairs that seemed to have disappeared beyond the fog above.
“We see it, Master Jin.” Dam Son and the others felt slightly threatened as they stared up at the mountain peak, it was extremely high. They could already tell what their master had in store for them.
Sugar Bun touched the large wooden container sitting beside him and asked, “Are we going to carry these barrels all the way to the top of that mountain, Master Jin?”
“Your damn right you will!” Jin Hennessy increased the bass in his voice. “You 3 brats will carry those jugs to the very peak of my mountain without spilling a single drop of its contents.”
Glancing inside his container, Xuan Li expressed, “But master the jug is empty.”
“Not for long. Hurry up and pick up the damn jugs!”
“Yes sir!”
Dam Son along with the others picked up their respective jugs, resting them against their heads and backs respectively.
“Very good, now keep steady.” Saying this, Jin Hennessy unravelled the Noun Script that he had folded in his hand. He hovered over the 3 jugs while activating its contents. Water began pouring out, filling up the jugs to their utmost limit.
“Ah, it's heavy.” Sugar Bun complained about the weight of his jug.
This pissed off Jin Hennessy some more. “Stop your whining runt! You haven’t even begun the training yet. Now that I’ve filled up the jugs with water, I want all 3 of you to start climbing!”
“Already?” Xuan Li was a bit miffed. “I need to adjust my bodyweight first.”
“Adjust what? Get your ass over there before I kick it over there!”
“Yes, master!” Xuan Li followed by Dam Son and Sugar Bun slowly made their way over to the very first step of the long flight of stairs.
Jin Hennessy sat on a floating sheet of paper, observing his students’ progress. A long piece of bamboo was in his right hand while a large bottle of wine was entangled around his left arm. He couldn’t go a minute without sipping on something intoxicating. As for the stick he had in his grasp, he would use it to punish his pupils whenever they messed up their climb.
“Alright you brats! Move it! Move it! I don’t have all day to waste. Start climbing. Remember the rules. If either of you spills a single drop of that water while climbing then all of you will start all over from the bottom.”
“What?” The students were shocked to hear this additional rule. “But that is so unfair.” Xuan Li complained, “Why should all of us regress for one person’s failure?”
“Shut up smart brat! I’m the one who makes the rules around here. If you don’t like it then you can have a taste of my big toe again.” Jin Hennessy taunted Xuan Li with his very dangerous appendage.
“No esteemed master! I will comply with your rules.” Xuan Li gave face to his peers. “What are you all waiting for? Let’s do this climb together.”
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“Yes, that’s what I like to see. And remember, the training won’t be complete until all of you make it to the very top without spilling a single drop.” Jin Hennessy’s method of training was mainly focused on increasing the stamina of his pupils. Additionally, he wanted them to learn the essence of teamwork. If Dam Son and the others didn’t cooperate properly with each other then they would never make it to the top.
5 minutes into the climb, Sugar Bun and Xuan Li found the training to be not so difficult. They were only at the 25th step while Dam Son was at the 30th step.
Unlike his peers, the mountain climbing training didn’t pose so much as a challenge to Dam Son due to his Dark-Human Avatar which naturally possessed unreasonable stamina. He was easily carrying the jug on his head while dragging behind him his sapphire suitcase. The only thing he struggled with was keeping a steady balance so that the water in the jug didn’t spill over.
On reaching the 56th step, Sugar Bun accidentally tripped over a small piece of rock which caused him to lose his balance. “Woah!”
“Careful!” Xuan Li did his best to prevent Sugar Bun from tumbling over, but in doing so, he unintentionally spilt a handful of water from his jug. “No! We have to start all over again.”
“Damn right you have to!” Jin Hennessy was right on point to act. The moment his pupils messed up he slapped them both to the nadir of the mountain.
“Guys, what happened back there?” Hearing a loud echo coming from behind him, Dam Son glanced below to witness his classmates tumbling at the foot of the mountain. “Did they spill water so soon?” As soon as this question came to mind, Dam Son perceived a fierce swinging bamboo heading his way and tried to dodge it.
“Damn brat! Stay still so I can hit you!” Jin Hennessy also slapped Dam Son off the stairs. He re-joined his classmates at the bottom of the mountain.
“Damn it! This is going to be harder than I initially thought.” Dam Son commented.
“I agree.” Xuan Li responded.
“The blame is on me. I messed up.” Sugar Bun admitted. “I didn’t see that tiny piece of rock.”
“Don’t beat yourself up, Sugar Bun. Mistakes are bound to happen.” Said, Dam Son. “Now what do you guys think about the climb?”
Xuan Li was the first to respond, “I’m not going to lie. It is going to be very difficult for me. Reaching the 50th step I realized something; my stamina and strength are extremely lacking.”
“So is mine.” Sugar Bun joined in. “I never really thought about how weak my physical attributes were since I relied too much on the power of scripts.”
“Me neither.” Xuan Li agreed. “But it seems like nothing fazes you so far, eh Dark-Human?” Saying this, Xuan Li gave his eyes to Dam Son’s sapphire suitcase. “How can you carry that thing along with the jug? Your natural stamina and strength are insane.”
“Is it really?” Him being a newborn and all, Dam Son never really thought about how far his physical attributes superseded others.
“Why don’t you just leave that suitcase behind Dam Son?” Sugar Bun asked curiously. Before Dam Son could form a reply, Jin Hennessy came along and scared the crap out of them.
“What the hell do you brats thick you’re doing down here? This isn’t some picnic! It’s a goddamn training! Get your lazy asses up a climb that mountain!”
Jin Hennessy activated another set of Noun Scripts to equip his pupils with a brand new set of jugs filled with water due to the others being shattered. “Pick them up and start climbing!”
“Yes, Master Jin!”
Jin Hennessy forced them to act faster by spanking their legs with his lanky bamboo stick.
The trio donned their jugs and restarted their training. This time around, they spilt water constantly, especially whenever they made it to the 100th step. So far, they have restarted their climb from the bottom of the mountain 62 times. With this many failures, they were feeling less and less encouraged to set foot on the 70,000th step.
“Come on you guys. We can do this.” Dam Son tried to cheer up his classmates whose stamina was at a waning end. “I know we can do this if we work together.”
“What do you propose Dark-human?” Xuan Li was all ears.
Briefly looking up at the many stairs they had to conquer, Dam Son’s strategy was to share their body weight. “Here is what I propose. Since I’m obviously the strongest among us, I will aid you guys from behind.”
“Obviously the strongest?” Somehow Xuan Li felt insulted when he heard these words come out of Dam Son’s mouth, however, he didn’t make mention of it after seeing how fiercely Jin Hennessy was staring at them.
“You damn brats! Why are you wasting my time? You begged me to take you as my disciples now go ahead and do as I say! My stock of wine is almost over and the day is starting to fade. Hurry it up or I will banish your weak asses!”
“Yes. Master Jin!”
The others decided to go with Dam Son’s strategy. As they set foot on the 100th step, Dam Son stayed a step behind Xuan Li and Sugar Bun who were both climbing on the same step. They rested the avoirdupois of their jugs against Dam Son’s jug. Being linked together in a triangle, moreover, standing one step behind, Dam Son felt most of the cumbersome pressure.
“I can handle this much for now.” Dam Son aided his classmates from the rear. The speed of their climb was drastically diminished, however, by sharing the load, they managed to surpass the 1,000th step without spilling a drop of water.