AN: I'm sorry, I lied.
But not to worry! I was also lying in all of the other ANs, so you don't have to believe anything I say. After all, I'm always lying, even when I tell you I'm lying. Especially when I tell you I'm lying. What can I say? My lord Satan taught me well.
(And if that doesn't make sense, that's because you still have your logic on. Honestly, people keep forgetting to turn it off...)
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-Walking next to The shadow, contemplating manslaughter(I swear it's not normal for me!)-
On the walk back, I tripped. It was a pebble so small that it could be mistaken for a rat pellet, but I still managed to fall on my back.
I stared up into the darkness for a long moment, too mentally exhausted to get up.
So, I turned off my brain. I placed my hands behind my head, curled my abs until I was supported entirely on my hands, then shoved off the ground and enjoyed contorting my body into a spring-loaded landing, from which I cork-screw-double-flipped followed by back flips to a cartwheel which segwayed into a jumping-front flip, from which I bent my knees, then slowly rose with my arms extended to either side.
Sadly, I just slipped again. I looked around for my chalk to mark up my fifty-eighth...oh right, I'm in a pit. Oh well, no worries! That just means I need to find myself a board. As my father always said..."If you fail once, you can be forgiven. Fail twice, and you wear it upon your back until you never fail again."
He'd always had a strange way of telling us to do our best.
I groaned and got to my feet, thankful that in my line of work not too many people saw me sli-
...I rotated my neck slowly, degree by degree.
I turned my head, and saw the shadow. He was standing completely still, with his hat pulled low, hiding his expression. He was shaking faintly, and before I knew it I was growling softly. My hands were clenched in fists, and I felt as if my entire body was at war.
Half of me really wanted to kill him...the other half was on the fence. The half after that was confused at how it existed, and the other third just sorta drooled in the corner. Weirdo...the final fifth was so lost it had somehow gotten out and gained independence. I'd better crush it before any sort of revolution or revolt can take place. I'll have to secure the three halves support, then lobby a new law which will let me take action against-
-and I'm just gonna stop now. After my brief internal...something, I found the shadow staring at me with a questioning look. This is what I get for turning off my brain, my body's started to revolt. I'll have to bring it under stiff rein. Luckily, I have another whole stocked in the attic, hidden behind a boo-
-Dammit!
I turned on my heel and started walking back to the building that was...a chapel? A house? Dormitories? I guess the last one works. After a few minutes of walking, The shadow and I arrived at a small open area, which was covered in heavy sheets. I pushed it aside, to find a blinding light within. I stumbled out into the middle of it, then slipped and fell. I let my eyes adjust before getting back up. Lilea wasn't very fast at adapting, as is seen by her falling over everywhere she goes.
But Lilea won't give up! She is used to having it hard, and thus she has developed a fool-proof way of dealing with it...it is the secretive, very confidential, working a 100% of the time, ten percent of the time, the well-known yet hardly ever used...
"Fake it till' you make it."
What? Lilea is looking at me with a weird expression. Did I say something strange?
Oh Dark One...I'm getting a headache from talking about myself in the third person...Rotting spikes, but I wish the shadow would get on with the chaining training. Hmmm...poor use of profanity there, though I would enjoy chaining the shadow to a wall of rotting spikes. Ahh...
-Enough fantasies! It's training montage time.
The first thing we did was running. I fell down no less than seven times over the course of two hours, though I'm proud to say I never wavered or slowed.
Next he tested my arm strength, first by making me lift weights. I had no problem up until the one-hundred sixties, which seemed to impress the shadow. I weigh one-twenty, so I have to wonder what's so amazing about it. I managed to slip, even while sitting down, and nearly took his head off with a sixty-pounder, which was mostly an accident...I can't say I didn't slightly adjust my trajectory while falling, though I hit my head for momentary memory loss, which let me lie convincingly. I probably won't have any permanent damage...maybe...I have a slight concussion...
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After testing raw strength, he checked my endurance. I made it to the hundred-twenty-sixth push-up before I slipped, somehow kicking out with my legs and tripping the shadow. That was a little less accidental, but I didn't really think about it...too much...not for more than a minute or two...
Next we worked on flexibility, and although I didn't find something I couldn't do, I may have sorta kicked him in the head...on accident, of course. I was aiming for his kidney.
After that, he told me to lie down and rest. I stayed completely still for several minutes, but started getting restless. However, through a grand amount of willpower, I managed to stay still!
-until I slipped. How, I honestly have no idea. Dark One's sake, I wasn't even moving! But all of a sudden I was in the air, and hit my head. Still no permanent damage, but...Head my good feels not.
After that, we ate dinner with the ghouls. They were all very polite, though every single one tried to convert me. As if I didn't already worship the Dark One, I guess they must think I'm a heathen. Dinner was a funny bird that couldn't fly. Of course, it can't fly now that it's dead. Well actually, if you threw it hard enough...but would you have to rig up some sort of wings...? If it couldn't fly when it was alive, then maybe-
-I stopped that train of thought, then settled on the firm belief all the head injuries were getting to me. That, or I was a badly written character in a stupid fiction written by a finicky, indecisive, and in other words impulsive maniac who should get a life and stop being such a faggot.
I made sure to hit my head extra hard on the table, so I would forget all of those thoughts. The others looked at me weird, but at least I didn't try to suddenly convert them to a religion that was solely based on a tree. Imagine that...!
Thump, thump, thump.
"U-um, Ms, I don't think you should hit your head on the table like that..."
Thump, thump, thump,
"I really think you should stop...the master is talking with the agent in the other room, but they'll hear if you get any louder..."
THUMP, THUMP, THUMP.
The poor novice tried to pat me on the shoulder, but I hit him in the gut and he bent over like a curtain. "Heeeeeeeh, please stop! Your making a dent in the table with your forehead! Please stop!"
THUMP, THUMP, THUMP!
After one, final slam, I managed to knock myself out. When I woke up, I was lying in bed with a bandage on my head. When I went to breakfast, the novices said I must've broken already...apparently it was a regular occurence for people who came down here to suddenly start hurting themself, or other people, or both, or to just start hitting stuff.
In the morning, the shadow ran me through an intense exercise, followed by flexibilty and balance training. Walking along a tight rope didn't really work out for me, since I seemed to slip off the second I stepped on, so he just told me to jump from one pole to another pole placed some distance apart. After breakfast, we would work on jump training, sprint training, sneaking training, and dexterity training by doing stuff like juggling.
After dinner, he taught me how to use various weapons, not pushing any single one, telling me I'll develop a preference soon enough. After that, we work on poisons and anatomy. Like various ways to insert poison into someones anatomy. Fun!
Sixteen months, everything continued like that. Then, everything changed...
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AN: When the fire nation attacked.
Don't kill me please! It's late and this is the only way I can lure wild Zeny's out! I promise I'll get to the general soon enough, but...well, we should already have met him by now. I just got...sidetracked...
I feel like I'm forgetting something...meh, probably not important.