Joe paused, glancing at the Acokzau as they played with their new staff weapons but then nodded and let it go. Right. They need it more than me. I’m fine… so far. But... maybe?
“Hey, Zilnek. May I see my spear shaft and ring again?”
Joe reached his hand out, taking both. He popped the ring on then pulled out the spearhead. He took the spearhead and added it back onto the before focusing on the prompt that had popped up when he put the ring on, “Spear.”
Joe stood and felt the constant and now familiar vibration on his hands instantly disappear and an amazing stillness and comfort washed over his arms and hands, even as they relaxed and fell into their natural grasp that almost twenty years of training had embedded into his skin and muscle. Ooohhh… this is so nice!
Joe smiled brightly and took a step from the wall, whipping the spear out in front of him and dancing smoothly into his forms, the spear flickering around his entire body like a silvery veil. He performed one of the flashier kata’s and came to the final flourish before holding his stance for the final moment as he was trained. When he finally allowed himself to stand, his grin erupted into a full belly laugh.
“Hahaha! I’ve missed this!” Joe roared deeply but still quietly as not to bother the rest in the cavern of the first floor. He looked around the room before he saw a goblin he wanted to take on and a small piece of detritus on the floor.
With practiced ease, his spearhead stabbed into the floor but did not touch the floor, skimming just above it to slide under the old and rotten block of wood before he flicked it upwards and back to himself. The wood block came up into the air before him and Joe felt so released that he chose not to grab and throw it as he’d planned and instead did a full round house kick, whipping his leg around in a rapid fully extended sweep at about head level.
The bottom of his foot led the way and the block of wood slapped against the ball of his foot, perfectly, before cannoning off towards the goblin he’d chosen. His aim wasn’t perfect, the wood missing the torso of the goblin, going low and to the right before smacking hard against its upper thigh. That works!
Joe grinned ferally, harnessing his pounding excitement to his murderous intent. The goblin rushed at him and for the first time in a long time, he felt that he had enough control to use his spear with several one handed moves as he’d been trained. The moves were specialized mainly to give that extra range of attack, but were still mightily important and without them, he found himself greatly restrained.
His leap forward and spread eagle side stance allowed him to gain another foot or two of distance on his spear strike and he was able to dart the spear forward like it’d been shot from a gun before grasping the butt of the spear to keep it in his control, whipping it back.
His strike had been poorly done, and the goblin stumbled in shock, its fall saving its life as the spear scoured across its scalp instead of in its chest. That was horrible… still stiff… hand’s holding too tight, wrists too firm… need to loosen up!
Joe stepped back and pulled the spear into his control, flourishing it in front of him in a one handed spin to keep the goblin back before he flipped the vertical spin in front of him into a horizontal spin that used his waist as the center of the spin, flipping it around his waist with one hand to catch it on the other and swapping out his grip to his left hand. His first strike had been with his right hand, and the rapid switch and swirl of the spear dizzied his goblin and he now struck from the opposite side with a thrust that transformed into an upward slice, scouring across the chest. He didn’t press forward more, as doing so would likely over extend him. The upward slice was enough to snap the goblins head back and Joe then finished with another horizontal spin slapping the spear into the goblin’s opposite side stunning it before he pulled it back rapidly, even as the spear struck its side, before punching it forward straight into the goblin’s chest.
Joe stood back up as the goblin slid off his spear and disappeared into a sparkle of mana dust simultaneously. The deep sigh that left him was one of relief and satisfaction. Man! It’s been so long! It’s so nice to have my skills back! I never knew it was affecting me this much! It’s just…
Joe smiled and turned back to his three apprentices, unscrewing the spear shaft as he walked back, “Can you give me a second, Zilnek?”
Zilnek took a moment to respond, before nodding eagerly, “Yes, Master Joe.”
Joe was too happy to be annoyed by being called master and nodded. Let me do some testing. He turned from the others, although he did notice Zilnek, Garnedell, and Kilniara, were staring at Joe in eye widened shock. Joe smiled to see their awe while struggling to hide it.
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Garnedell came forward, shock and excited surprise on his face, “Master! Master!”
“I’m still Joe, Garnedell.”
“Yes… I know… but… Master!”
Kilniara said nothing, but seemed frozen in shock with a subtle smile on her face while Zilnek had open adoration carved into his.
Zilnek seemed to have had enough time to think and spoke quickly, “Why did you hide from us?”
Kilniara turned to her brother and slapped him on the shoulder hard enough to make Zilnek wince and stare at Kilniara in anger. Interesting? Quick reaction there… seems it really is only for speaking. But he reacts fast enough, so, I don’t have to worry too much if he’s in a fight?
Joe shook his head but said nothing as he considered his options but then felt his eyebrow rise when Kilniara quickly spoke after her pretty hard punch to her brother’s shoulder, “Idiot! If he killed everything in one hit, how would we practice?”
Zilnek took a minute to think about it, but joined Garnedell a few minutes after him as they both quickly nodded their heads in understanding and Joe stifled his snort but was a bit too embarrassed to explain that he’d forgotten he could use the rings.
“Let’s go ahead and rest. We’ll fight after this, and I’ll show you some of the kata’s you can use with a staff. Many of the one’s you will learn for the staff also work for spears as well, so make sure you learn them carefully. Now, let’s rest and relax.”
Joe turned to put the spearhead away in his bag before pulling out his sword and grimaced when he felt the telltale vibration on his hand as he picked it up. He settled it on the shield carefully and then slipped the ring off his finger then back on as he muttered ‘sword’ under his breath.
He glanced up at the others to see if they noticed but they’d quickly began an excited second by second replay of his fight and he choked back a laughter as he watched all three boisterously discuss his fight.
He turned around to sit, and reached a hand down to push his shield out of the way. When he touched the shield, he felt the vibration and instinctually grasped it hard before it shot out of his grasp. He grimaced as he felt his hand holding the shield. Well… this can’t be right? Do I have to use two rings? There’s got to be a… ooh… right. He released the shield carefully and then slipped the ring off his hand before slipping it back on his hand and muttering once again, “Sword and shield.”
He reached out a cautious hand once again and touched the shield and sword, both resting calmly against his touch and he finally felt like he could rest, satisfaction at having figured it out. He had the ring on his left hand to not bother his sword hand, and let it drop into his lap as he put his right arm behind his head and leaned back against it to rest.
The other three continued their excited conversation and Joe let the conversation wash over him, even as his body ticked the time away, the normal time for his rest ingrained into him just as much as his katas were.
“Alright… let’s get going. Zilnek? Here is the ring and staff back. Are you all ready?”
All three responded quickly, Zilnek a bit slowly although his grabbing of the ring and staff was instant.
After they were all ready, he stood up and stretched before turning to the other three, “Alright! Stand at ready. This is ready stance, for Korean marti… ok… right… that doesn’t matter, but you stand like this. It’s simply a preparation for listening or even letting someone else know you are preparing to fight. Horse stance is the Chin…” Joe sighed and shook his head. There really was no point to explain the backgrounds as nobody would ever be able to understand. He would definitely take the time to write it down so the knowledge wouldn’t be lost, but it wasn’t important right now, and quickly centered himself back into teaching.
He went through several basic ready stances for different types of fighting, explaining how some of them trained endurance and strength, while others gave excellent balance and low center of gravity. Still others were wild and designed to throw off opponents for their strange and unusual stances. He soon found himself meandering and quickly brought himself to heel. Man… teaching is harder than I thought! Need to focus… right… a basic ‘standing at attention’ stance and… hmm… well… staff work. First basic staff form, I guess. I’ll choose the easiest one.
Joe showed both to them, showing standing at attention first so they could do so while he taught the first staff form. He then did it another couple times, having them join in after the third repetition. He then took some time to watch them for another couple repetitions before leaving them to their practice.
The next several hours, Joe slipped through the goblins easily enough but was still frustrated, finding his normal combat speed still inhibited by quite a bit. It didn’t feel so bad, but it was quite a bit less smooth than what he was normally capable of. He would fight a couple goblins, then head back to watch the offer guidance to all three once again. He was surprised to find that he was able to offer decent advice and didn’t seem to lose out on how many goblins he was able to defeat.
Lunch came, and they ate quickly and excitedly, all three pushing him to train them some more and Joe spent some more of the afternoon training them. But only about an hour after lunch, all collapsed on the floor in exhaustion and Joe left them to their rest while he began rampaging through the goblin population with ease.
After giving them about a fifteen minute break, he went back and asked what they wished to do, and all three excitedly asked to fight. Joe made the two Acokzau swap back out to their half-staves and took back his spear. He also grabbed a ring back and reset it for shield and spear but then had Garnedell off to the side paired with one of the siblings while he was with the other. They would swap out every twenty or so minutes so that he could still train the two Acokzau and sometimes he would slip over to help Garnedell as well, although he had had more time under Joe’s tutelage.
The spent the afternoon doing so and they wrapped things up late in the evening, all four excited by exhausted, with Zilnek even buzzing a bit as he’d been able to reach level seven that day, late in the afternoon. Seems about right… he must still be getting some experience from my kills even if he’s resting.
They left the dungeon in high spirits with Zilnek crowing loudly as they left, “Today was an awesome day!”
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