Fan Zhong awoke to the smiling face of his brother hunched over his bend roll casually spinning that accursed stick he always had.
“Rise and greet the morning young hero! Today we take another step up the mountain of martial arts!” Saying this with a wide grin, Fan Cheng’s arm blurred as quickly he struck Fan Zhong three times with the punishment stick.
With a groan of pain, Fan Zhon gathered himself and rose despite the tiredness of his bones. Like this, he started his third morning of voluntary training with his brother. As they started the two-hour morning run to warm up their muscles Fan Zhong could not help but notice how the air seemed to twist and bend as if in agony as dark clouds broiled overhead heralded by a large burst of lightning. Accompanying the dreary sight was a monotonous drizzling of rain not so heavy as to be a downpour but not so light as to be pleasant and refreshing, if one had to describe this rain it was as if the heavens themselves were crying in sadness.
Indeed many thought this to be the case as over the past two days of training since his Third-Grade recognition ceremony news had been spreading like wildfire. It seemed that the ‘Heavenly Emperor’ of the ‘Xing Empire’ had been slain during a duel with someone. Supposedly he was a great hero who had kept the peace of the empire through martial strength and loyalty, fighting many fierce battles for hundreds of years and becoming known as “Heavenly Emperor Xing Hai The Flashing Void Sword”. In Fan Zhong’s mind, this simply sounded like a pompous title an emperor had given himself to feel self-important
In actuality, the most shocking thing about this news to him was that the valley itself was part of the Xing Empire. Apparently the region of mortal kingdoms, which the valley was one of the smaller, ruled over by the baroness was simply a small part of the Xing Empire. Previously, Baroness Lu Yi who ruled over the entire Twisted Territories Lesser Region had been the overlord of the entire world in his eyes. A lesser territory was already so large he balked at calling it a ‘lesser’ anything. However, now he came to find out that this empire that ruled over them controlled 43 ‘Greater regions’ that themselves were made up of 300 lesser regions each, this scope truly boggled his mind. If this were true he supposed it was correct to call the Twisted Territories a lesser region, the entire empire contained over 10,000 of such regions after all!
Perhaps the ruler of such a large territory was truly powerful enough to make the heavens weep? To Fan Zhong however, it was all too distant and far away. For him, all the mourning period for the emperor meant was a week-long period of wearing black robes. That and apparently rain, this gloomy endless rain. Sighing, he lifted his foot out of a particularly deep puddle that had run over the mouth of his shoe soaking his foot, Fan Zhong lowered his gaze to the ground and increased his speed hoping to complete the run as soon as possible.
After finishing the run and arriving in the training clearing they next did squats until he could barely stand, the bone-chilling wind accenting the wonderful flavor of cold the rain had sunk into his bone. With no break this was followed by push-ups with Fan Cheng sitting on top of his back, the punishment stick falling as fast as the rain when he took so much as a breath of reprieve. The day continued with no end in sight moving on to stance practice, something Fan Zhong was incredibly irritated with.
“Wise brother, sage of all men, truly with your wisdom you can see I have mastered the “Void gate” opening stance. You said it yourself that at my age your stance might not be so well done! Why must we still dirty the path already tread with our shoes?” The mocking jovial tone in Fan Zhong's voice betrayed his utter contempt for continuing what he deemed an exercise in futility; he needed to get stronger and practice the clan palm techniques!
It was not as if they had not practiced other techniques in their routine; however, he truly felt the time spent on a technique he had already mastered was wasteful. Up until now, he had only slowly moved through the striking techniques in the air, not even at full speed. If they cut out the stance training could they not use this time to finish this step faster and move on to something more substantial like striking dummies? He felt this would allow him to improve his strength much faster.
“ Hmm I see, truly I could not see Mt. Tai. Forgive me Vaunted Heavenly Immortal with your complete understanding of the Dao, how could I lecture you? With this, I suppose my instruction must stop since it is so inadequate!” With a solemn expression, that seemed far too serious for his mocking tone, Fan Chen bowed and started to walk away
“Elder brother, esteemed master, truly you jest! This humble junior seeks guidance and begs apology for his insolence.” Begrudgingly Fan Zhong bowed a few times, relenting to his brother’s teasing.
“ Ahh truly brother your progress is fast but do you truly think your technique is the greatest among heaven and earth, what level of attainment in the Void Gate Stance would you say you have? Expert? Master? Grandmaster maybe? You must continue to improve techniques you have already learned so they grow. We have practiced the new techniques you wish to learn for the past two days but we must still allocate time for growing your foundation. I will not relent on this. No disciple of mine, brother or not, will rush to new heights while allowing the ground to fall out beneath him!” Fan Cheng clasped his hands behind his back and delivered his reproach sternly with a strict expression, this time he was not teasing. He truly meant his words and would not relent no matter how much Fan Zhong complained!
“Ahh, brother, since you are such a sage, provide some advice to this junior, you mentioned attainment levels? Do you mean the martial arts realm? I apologize but my knowledge seems to be lacking in this area. Please instruct!” Knowing he had kicked an iron plate and seeking to humble himself while gaining knowledge, Fan Zhong quickly changed the conversation topic to the first question he could pry into his mind from his brother's words.
At Fan Zhong’s words his elder brother smiled, it was truly a sign of maturity that he had been able to admit his fault and ask for help rather than be embarrassed and try to hide it. For truly what man knew all things, dominated all directions and trades? None, a truly intelligent man understood this point in Fan Cheng's estimation, and thus they would truly excel when they and they alone best understood the areas they lacked in and could admit them.
With a nod of approval Fan Cheng motioned for his brother to join him in a meditation hut and pulled up a table to the center of the room once they entered and they both sat at either side. As the thunder and lightning outside boomed and accompanied the endless patter of the rain ceaselessly banging against the waterproofing talismans Fan Cheng began a lecture on technique attainment by the light of the torches illuminating the corners of the room.
Soon Fan Zhong started to understand how technique attainment affected his martial arts. Essentially while practicing techniques one would become more and more familiar with them eventually the techniques themselves would become as natural as breathing. Even further forth if one understood a technique to a greater extent they could start to take and modify parts of it to suit them specifically allowing a greater effect to be displayed when using the technique.
Finally once one truly understood the foundations of a technique and everything about it they would essentially remake the technique in total. Doing this required using the same principles as the original but adding to it and modifying aspects. This would bring forth a new technique in its own right completely customized and adapted for the user.
At this last step usually, the martial artists would add an epithet to the technique name to denote their personal version. The name would generally give some idea to future generations on how their changes had changed the effects of the technique. For example the technique “7 shifting steps” might become the “7 Shifting lightning steps of Ying” as the master who changed it added an elemental energy of lightning into the technique's usage and was surnamed Ying.
When evaluating how strong a technique should be, martial artists over the years had come up with many denotations and ranks to ascribe to them. Firstly came the Unfamiliar Realm of Attainment, generally, this describes someone who may have witnessed a technique or been instructed in it but was attempting it for the first few times. Techniques at this level generally fail to even display the intended effects failing 50% of the time on average while requiring around 200-300% of the energy costs of normal and upon success usually only displaying 50% the strength of that was intended.
Next comes the Familiar Realm of Attainment, generally this describes someone who is familiar enough with a technique to execute the technique at will successfully under normal circumstances. Techniques at this level generally display the intended strength and energy usage of the technique on average. This is the level of technique many would consider the stage one has “learned” a technique and the most common level of attainment for techniques.
Surpassing the familiar realm comes the Expert Realm of Attainment, generally, this describes a martial artist who is incredibly used to the technique and has used it for a very long time able to execute the technique with a simple thought. At this point, the martial artist has started to refine the excess movements/energy use usually displayed by those in the Familiar Realm increasing the strength displayed by 10% while lowering energy cost by the same amount. Usually, this level of attainment is gained after intensive periods of training from a few months up to a few years depending on the complexity of the technique.
Following that came the Master Realm of Attainment, generally this describes martial artists who can use the technique as easy as breathing the movements of it barely distinguishable from their natural movements, flowing the technique into them seamlessly. Master Realm attainment allows techniques to display 50% more strength than normal while using 20% less energy. Bringing a technique to this level generally requires years of intense training, sometimes even decades.
After this came the Grandmaster Realm of Attainment, generally this is recognized when a technique is so natural to the martial artists that they had completely integrated the technique as a part of their natural set of movements. Usually, this makes their techniques indistinguishable from the rest of their movements by untrained eyes. Another sign of attainment at this level was signs that the martial artist had begun modifying the technique to suit their body and combat style, beginning to form a unique version of the technique. By reaching this level techniques are able to display 100% more strength than normal while costing 30% less energy. To reach such a level of mastery can easily take decades of dedicated training and some try their entire lives to reach this level with a single technique and fail.
Finally, the technique would come to the Supreme Grandmaster Realm of Attainment recognized by the technique being distinguishable as a fully unique version of the original. Usually, at this point, the technique is given its epithet allowing the martial artist to claim the variant as theirs and theirs alone. Upon understanding a technique to this level the martial artist would be able to display 200% of the strength of the original, plus any additional benefits they added such as elemental effects, etc, while only using 50% of the energy originally required to use the technique. To create a personal technique is the goal of many martial arts masters and could be said to be the second pinnacle of martial arts behind ascending to a higher martial arts realm.
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Although this is the case many spend hundreds of years hoping to reach the Supreme Grandmaster Realm of Attainment with a single technique and die having never come close. In the legends, it is said that immortals can continue to contemplate techniques using them to understand the very laws of the Eternal Dao and how they govern the world and in turn use that understanding to turn a simple sword strike into a profound god-slaying technique.
A famous legend of this phenomenon was still passed down to this day. It stated that during an era where humans were no more than food and playthings for primordial gods and devils alike a true immortal monk had risen to defend humanity. One day after being gravely injured fighting these evil beings he found a mountain peak overlooking a valley that contained such beauty he claimed he could see the entire Dao modeled in that place.
With such a place of enlightenment, he sat down and meditated while observing and contemplating the valley for 1,000,000 years. Every day he would practice a simple straight punch and contemplate how it related to the Dao. During this time he disappeared from the world and humanity fell to its lowest point having lost its greatest champion.
However in the end after emerging from seclusion his simple punch was said to be able to destroy the heavens themselves. Afterward, he went on to slay demons and gods alike in retribution for the 1,000,000 years of suffering inflicted upon humanity in his absence. The heavens themselves had run red with the bled of divinity under the might of his simple straight punch.
When he ascended to become a buddha he elevated humanity and cemented their place among the heavens as the most powerful race. Some said that he still lived in the heavens above, watching over all of mankind and keeping his fist ready to strike down the primordial gods and devils if they sought to suppress humanity to squalor once again.
After hearing this Fan Zhong felt he had a good grasp of the subject however after thinking about what he had just been told an obvious question was raised to his mind.
“Honored brother if these are the levels of technique attainment then what realm is my Void Gate stance at? I have not practiced it for many years yet from your description it does not sound as if my stance should be within the unfamiliar or familiar realms, how is that possible?” the confusion in Fan Zhong’s tone was genuine; he had no idea how he could have expert or even master attainment with a technique he had only practiced for a week.
“ Ahh, brother and now you see why father worried for you during the recognition ceremony. Surely mother spoke of the Dao Enlightenment you had while fighting your opponent to defend Wang Qiang? At the end of our first week of training, you had already miraculously gained expert-level attainment in the void gate stance, I personally had many slight enlightenments to achieve this due to the technique being compatible with your mindset. During that fateful duel where you slew that hateful assailant, you gained much directly perceiving the Dao during a life and death struggle pushing your attainment to master level. With this you gained almost a decade's worth of technique attainment in a mere week, this kind of progress makes the clan warriors not know whether to laugh or cry. Many think father has spent some rare immortal treasure on you to forcefully provoke such states of enlightenment. This caused a lot of grumbling behind the scenes and he thus was fiercely protective of you during the ceremony. He was worried someone who held a grudge against him would target you as a proxy. Personally, I think it is because the technique suits you. It requires the complete emptying of the mind, something I find you talented in little brother! However it seems your sudden spurts of heavenly connection have run out and you're still at the initial stages of Master Realm Attainment, it will take diligent work to keep perfecting this technique.” Fan Cheng patiently explained with a broad grin on his face as he beamed with pride for his little brother.
“Bu…bu… but brother I was under the impression my results were due to your teaching. Do you mean to say that I truly have a talent for this? Surely you jest? When we were younger my aptitude was tested numerous times and I truly had no talent, father said it was so. Now I am a genius that defies the heavens?” Fan Zhong’s bewilderment could not stop growing, it was something he couldn’t possibly understand. Surely this was all due to his genius brother secretly helping him. Perhaps he had put secret immortal pills in his food?
“Hmph defy this, come it’s time to start working on those palm techniques you wanted to get to. Since you're so ‘heaven-defying’ today we will see how you defy your brother's sagely palms of tutelage!” Fan Cheng pronounced smiling far too widely for someone about to administer what sounded like a profound beating, with that he stood up and walked into the dreary training clearing atop the cliff. Fan Zhong followed him trying his best to keep his spirits high, he had asked for this after all hadn’t he?
Taking his stance across from Fan Cheng he listened as his brother instructed. As with previous days, they started by reviewing the techniques that made up the ‘Nine Palms Subdue the Nine Heavens’ Style. Firstly were the three origin palms, these were delivered with the dominant hand that was held cocked back near the back leg in the Void Gate stance. These started with the ‘All Things Birth from the Origin’ a simple advancing palm strike with the cocked arm that rotated the whole body into the strike aimed at pushing the force into the opponent's dantian. At higher levels, this strike would carry palm force to shut off enemy qi flow and do lingering internal damage, however, without Qi the blow would still disrupt the enemy's breathing and do significant damage.
Next came the “Ascending origin” palms were strikes that started with a lowering of the upper body while dipping forward before striking upward with a palm in a crescent motion rising from the ground to the opponent. These strikes were designed to deliver the most palm force and internal damage when utilized with qi and would rattle the intervals even with purely physical force. Finally were the “Heavenly Origin” palms, these attacks were the opposite of the ascending strikes where one arched the arm up high and brought the palm in a downward crescent to strike the top of the head or shoulders. Normally these attacks would disrupt the opponent's control over one of their arms or be used as a stunning strike to set up follow-up hits when striking the head.
In the defensive arsenal of the style came the three shifting palms. These techniques were delivered from the void gate stance by switching the position of the back and forward leg through rotation causing one to shift backward or forward as they resumed the Void Gate Stance. While the shifting footwork occurred the martial artists would use the rotational force to strike with crescent-arced palm strikes from the sides. Usually, this was used to parry strikes that could not be received or push aside an opponent for positioning reasons. Differing among the three palms were if they were executed at the waist level, curving in from above and to the side or below and to the side. These three different height levels separated the shifting palms into 'Heaven Shifting Palm' for strikes that curved inward from above, mortal shifting palm for strikes that curved in at waist level from the sides, and finally earth shifting palm for strikes that curved upward from the ground and into the side.
Finally, the three receiving palms came, these strikes although called palm techniques were actually techniques that struck with the legs. All of the receiving palm techniques involved the martial artist striking the sides of an incoming blow from an opponent with a palm strike from each side as if they were executing a shifting palm from both hands without the footwork. These side strikes need to be aimed at the weak points of the opponent's blow to disrupt its power. After this is done the palms push towards each other grabbing the opponent's limb or weapon and dragging them into the martial artist, hence the name receiving palm. From here the three palms were differentiated by what the following actions were. If the martial artist rose and struck with his knee into the oncoming ‘received’ opponent then it was a mortal receiving palm. For receiving palms that answered with high kicks to the shoulder, head, or chest it was considered a 'Heaven Receiving Palm'. Finally, if the answer was a low sweeping kick or short kick to the stomach or groin it was known as an 'Earth Receiving Palm'.
“Good, now that we have reviewed the basics of the clan style we will start with the most basic striking exercise in the training manual meant for two people. This is called the ‘shifting palms obscure the origin’ drill. Simply we will take stance two paces outside of striking measure then we will take turns approaching to deliver an origin palm strike. The defender will then attempt to use a shifting palm strike to parry and access the flanking side of the attacker and deliver a countering origin palm strike. Of course, the attack is allowed to feint and use shifting palm strikes of their own to regain the advantage if they can. Now would you like to start attacking or defending brother? Don’t worry, elder brother will move at only 10% speed making this easy for a heaven-defying genius like you!” Fan Cheng explained the exercise while beaming with energy, seeming eager to start.
Fan Zhong very much doubted that even at 10% speed his brother's Master level realm speed would be anything but unreadable to his eyes however he simply sighed and chose to begin by attacking. As they took stance Fan Zhong felt the familiar calmness of the Void gate stance and took a step forward with his back leg stepping wide with his other leg to complete the pace and bring him into measure and back into stance.
He had stepped wide and to the outside of his brother’s center line hoping to use the angled approach to catch him off guard which seemed to be working. As he approached Fan Cheng indeed seemed to move with speed he could at least see. However, his movements were masterful and Fan Zhong could tell that although the wide angle had given him a superior angle of attack, outside of his opponent's center line it had taken precious time, time his experienced brother would not let go. By the moment he had entered measure and began executing his strike his brother had already adjusted in such a way that his palm was halfway into a parry before Fan Zhong had moved. In a blurring of pain that sent the world spinning, he felt his blow move off course as if a mountain had detoured it and force akin to an explosion, centered of course on his right side, sent him in a summersault before he landed painfully.
“Ahh, an ingenious angle of attack brother, however, it is obvious that you lack practice in the motion and thus you gave me ample time to respond and set myself on your new path. Now assume your stance! Remember a journey of 10,000 li is walked one step at a time, congratulations on taking the first step.” With these words, Fan Cheng clasped him on the shoulder and pulled him to his feet before pacing away and assuming the void gate stance.
Feeling the pain in his body after a single exchange, Fan Zhong hoped in his heart that the rest of the steps in this journey would not be near as painful as the first. By the time Fan Cheng was through with him for the day he clearly understood. Not only would they be just as painful, but most likely the blood and tears shed on this journey would only increase with each step!
Like this Fan Zhong’s life continued. Wake and exercise until his bones felt like cracking then drill techniques. Finally, the day would end with the same partner exercise with Fan Cheng. Wake up, get soaked, work out, get beaten, and sleep. Repeat, repeat, repeat. As the week dragged on he thought that the rain would never end and he would simply die from the physical exhaustion. What grated on him, even more, was his brother never even sweated the entire time.
Of course, Fan Zhong knew his brother’s vastly superior Martial Arts Realm meant his physical stamina was leagues beyond anything he could hope to imagine however it did little to allay his heart. This combined with the fact that it simply would not stop raining caused Fan Zhong’s mood to sour by the end of the first week of training.
He started to reconsider doing volunteer training, what was he even doing here? Why was the training so much more difficult? Were his elder brother and father trying to scare him off? Or were they simply testing his resolve and making sure he was serious about this?
Every time he thought of this however he would close his eyes and see the terrified face of Wang Qiang, the stoic face of his clan members as they bought his escape with their lives. Resolve firmed in him once again and it brought him through this first week of training even. Thankfully the rain finally stopped when the weekend came, and blissfully Fan Cheng told him he would be free to rest until the start of the new week!
Truly this impressed Fan Cheng a lot, by order of his father Fan Zhong was to be trained with the same harsh training style he had endured while studying under him. The difference was that Fan Cheng had years of physical conditioning and training to bulk up and prepare for such a grueling routine, Fan Zhong simply had not been through the necessary preparations. Although this may have been supplemented by him being older than when Fan Cheng went through it, he had been 12 at the time, he still had thought to go easier at least, to begin with.
He understood their father’s reasoning, they had to be sure this was not an idle fancy of Fan Zhong’s but truly something he wanted, however, his fondness for his siblings made putting on the stern front of an instructor difficult. Truly he had thought Fan Zhong would have quit and given up with this single week being equal to ten times the difficulty of the previous week he had spent training him. With his expectations met Fan Cheng reported the good news to his father. The entire weekend Fan Zhong only woke to eat his meals, enjoying a truly restful sleep throughout the rest of it.