Adam didn't like this, he didn't like this at all.
He couldn't see from his left eye, and the right one made out a blurred out figure in front of him. Adam could taste the metallic scent of blood in his mouth and his limbs expressed a fiery resistance to any change in the status quo of his body, instead laying on the wooden panelling, defeated.
'Why did he walk through those imposing gates?'
'Why did you walk in there, Adam?'
'Adam' was whispering in his mind like always, seconding his every decision, then questioning it later. He felt like an old friend. A very old friend that was privy to everything about him.
Nevertheless, he wasn't being any help right now. There was a man in front of them dressed in a changpao, the robes were coloured black with golden decorum running along the edges.
The man looked down at him, the same look with which he looked at Adam when he first arrived in the Dojo. This made Adam look back at when he had entered through the gates only moments prior.
The first amongst the things he noticed were the sheer number of people inside, there were many, easily numbering in the hundreds. They all stood atop the wooden panelling in a perfect formation and practiced a series of strikes. Their movements synonymous with each other and bordering on perfection.
They were all dressed in white and sported a myriad variety of colourful belts. The people near the back had white, yellow and green belts whereas the people near the front had brown and black belts. Facing the huge cohort of people was a group of about a dozen people demonstrating the same series of movements. These people were wearing the same black belts as the people near the front except these ones had differing numbers of gold stripes at the end of their black belts.
Then, after Adam walked in, was the moment when he met the man in the black changpao. His face was extremely wrinkled and had a long white beard reminiscent of a Daoist scholar. His eyes held a cruel glint within them as he watched the karate practitioners.
He had turned towards Adam and saw him approaching, then the old man in the back robes approached Adam
"Why are you here?" He asked in broken English.
Without even waiting for an answer the old man proceeded to strike forward with an open palm. Then, Adam went into automatic combat mode and retreated backwards using shadow footwork.
The old mans eyes became slightly raised when he saw Adams footwork, then he proceed to land a palm on Adams chest at a speed multiple times faster than before. The speed was fivefold the speed demonstrated by the vigilante when swinging his sword yesterday.
The strike had held power which an old man shouldn't wield and sent Adam flying backwards through the air, that was the beginning of the trashing that Adam got when he walked through those door.
Now was near the end, he was already beat up to the point that his will to fight had been broken.
"Damn, just stop."
Adam could only force these words through his wheezing throat, they sounded pitiful.
If only Adam were a bit less beat up, he would find that the rest of the Karate practitioners had surrounded the man in the black changpao and Adam, a hostile glint within their eyes being unilaterally directed towards the old man in the black changpao.
Then, an old practitioner with a tough face and oriental features stepped forward, the black belt holding his white karate-gi held six golden stripes at the end.
"Mr. Li, what do you think you are doing in our Dojo?" This old practitioner spoke in practiced English, near fluent, in contrast to the broken English of Mr. Li.
The old practitioner held a challenging expression, he feet slid into a formidable stance which seemed like an iron fortress.
Mr. Li turned around to look at the old practitioner, then he slowly approached him.
"You, you have the face to stop me?" Mr. Li showed an incredulous expression as he stared down the old practitioner.
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Then, the old practitioner made a move. He stepped forwards and punched out with a clenched fist, a rigid stance was evident in this form. It wouldn't have been wrong to say that this strike was like an iron fist, hard and brittle.
Adam could see that the level of this fight was many levels above that of the one between him and the vigilante. If the vigilante had to fight against the unarmed practitioner, Adam had no doubt in his mind that he would lose miserably.
Then, Mr. Li stepped backwards, much faster than when he had been beating up Adam. This caused the practitioner's fist to lose all strength as it struck the air. This didn't mean much however since the old practitioner now had the momentum and stepped forward again with the other leg, the same strike, the same iron mentality.
Mr. Li stepped forwards this time, less than half a metre between their faces. The practitioners strike had missed him completely, the speed and bravery demonstrated by Mr. Li in advancing towards an attack left the practitioner in shock.
Mr. Li extended his right arm around the practitioners extended fist and pulled it towards his right, the practitioner attempted to lift his back leg and knee Mr. Li in the stomach but Mr. Li was faster and he kneed the man in his stomach instead. Were it any normal person they would have doubled over and relieved their breakfast on the floor, however, this man simply clenched his teeth.
However, it didn't matter since Mr. Li formed his left hand into knuckles and crushed the practitioners neck, knocking him unconscious.
Mr. Li then let go of the practitioners right hand and let him topple to the floor, the whites of his eyes could be seen and a trail of blood was dripping from his open mouth.
A shocking silence pervaded the entirety of the hall, all the practitioners held their breath. Only to be broken by Mr. Li.
"What gall, to dare prevent me from educating my disciple."
'Disciple?!'
'What is a disciple?'
The practitioners all had shocked expression, then they turned to look at Adam with the same spiteful look they had given Mr. Li in the beginning.
"Now, come with me, disciple." Mr. Li kept speaking in broken English and grabbed Adam by his earlobe, dragging him away to the entrance. He didn't have the strength to call out for help from the rest of the practitioners, however, by the look of it they probably wouldn't help him anyways, telling from the look in their eyes.
Adam, being dragged across the ground, found it extremely hard to stay conscious, especially since he considered the fact that his brand new suit must be near ruined by now.
Slowly, his eyes narrowed into mere slits, the last thing he could see was the back of Mr. Li's head.
---
Mr. Li walked through the streets holding onto his unconscious disciple, he hadn't taken a disciple in before. The only experience he had in teaching disciples was what he saw from his own master.
He was a nasty old man, always cuffed him on the ear whenever he made the slightest mistake in his footwork. He reminisced about the old days back on the mountaintop in Manchuria. His master was a decrepit old man near the end of his longevity at almost one hundred and forty years old, his home was a humble cottage on a mountaintop surrounded by bamboo stalks embedded into a thick layer of snow.
It was a great place to practice his own way. As a young child he was extremely frail and sickly, by the age of three he was orphaned and by the age of six he had stolen for the first time.
He remembered the first time he looked for his master, he was beat up by the dominant gang of street ruffians in the street, most would have given up, however, he was different, we wanted strength.
He scaled the mountain in which the renown martial artist was rumoured to live for the majority of a day, he started climbing on the morning of the day after he was beat up and arrived at the top at sunset, his chest heaving up and down from the utter exhaustion he had felt.
Then, he saw his old master sitting cross legged atop a boulder in the middle of a frozen pond. He had hurried forth and kowtowed repeatedly, begging for the old master to accept him as a disciple.
After three hours, the old man had opened his eyes and beckoned him to come close. He yet again rushed over, only to fall into the pond as the ice cracked and sent him crashing into the icy cold waters. After a profuse struggle, he made it back ashore, shivering and freezing from the strong gale atop the mountaintop.
Looking back, he saw that the old master was still beckoning him forth, as if nothing had happened, he could swear that if he died from freezing then he would simply be left as a frozen corpse under his pond. At the thought of this, a bubbling anger emerged from his throat and he prepared himself to cross through the thin ice yet again.
It took him many times, in the beginning every single time he stepped on the ice he would fall through, however, as time passed and as the number of near death experiences increased, he learnt to shift his weight from foot to foot. He started developing a footwork with which to cross the icy pond without breaking the ice cover.
He still distinctly remembered the smile the decrepit old man gave him when he crossed through that icy pond and stood before him, and then his acceptance of a new disciple.
Mr. Li remembered this most fond memory, it all came down to developing his own style of footwork. The entire basis of any martial doctrine was based from its footwork, it was the most vital component since it was the foundation that allowed one to exercise power over the opponent with ones own techniques.
This was the reason why he was so shocked when he saw the young man in black dodge his first strike with such beautiful footwork, it seemed to be such an imperceptible movement which would easily be missed in even the most intense combat scenarios.
What he found even more shocking was that he didn't seem to know any techniques, he was a blank slate with which to learn martial arts, he was a bit old but his marvellous movements more than made up for that. He decided then and there, this young man will inherit his style, whether he liked it or not.
...
Adam couldn't sense anything, it seemed as if he existed, yet couldn't perceive anything at all, just like that time when he got the [Awareness] feat and was rendered blind beyond every sense for an unknown amount of time.
'...'
'Hey, Adam?'
'Adam' started talking to him again, it was weird that he didn't notice until now that 'Adam' sounded like a seven year old version of him, although his voice had a certain something to it that gave it another notch of eeriness.
'What?'
'You forgot to level up.'
Level Up
New feat available at level three
Health and Mana modifiers
Health - 3 & 1, +4 Health
Mana - 4 & 4, +8 Mana
...
Well, he forgot to level up...
What else was there to it.
Perhaps if he had not fallen unconscious, he would have forgotten to level up until god knows when.
'Thanks Adam.'
'...'
Adam somehow felt that he wasn't all that amused. Well, at least he didn't miss out on anything he could have used earlier in the day, or did he?
Adam was still within this groggy yet not so groggy form of unconsciousness, and ordinary person wouldn't be able to maintain awareness within an unconscious state but for some reason Adam could, he theorised that it was so because of 'Adam' being inside his head, thus allowing him to maintain a separate consciousness awake within the body.
While Adam was in the middle of theorising and 'conversing' with 'Adam' he suddenly felt a head-splitting headache in his head.
It figuratively sent Adam reeling on his knees, everything around him was blurry, then, he could see.
There was a wooden roof above him, built in an A-frame fashion. He tried to turn his head but was only met by a searing flare of resistance from his neck. The pain felt surreal to him, it felt distant and far-away.
His body was asleep, Adam could feel the thousands of needles digging into his skin, the dull pain was pulsating, permeating itself throughout Adams skin.
Slowly, the numbness went away and it was instead replaced by a terrible ache, every single one of his limbs was sore.
Adam barely managed to turn his head and look at his surroundings.
Around him were wooden pillars and fences, they were coloured white, outside, he could see occasional patches of greenery on the face of a stone cliff.
He was in some sort of gazebo.
"You are awake."
Adam turned further and saw the cross legged figure of Mr. Li.
This man who called him his disciple, what did he have in store for him? Adam couldn't even bother thinking by this point, 'Adam' had also gone quiet. What was the point in resisting anyways?
Adam got one more careful look at Mr. Li before he fainted again.
Slightly fat face riddled with wrinkles, protruding brows with furrowed and slanted eyes, a long beard of white starting from the sideburns and ending at the chin, carefully combed so as to hang down like silk strands. White hair on the top of the head, combed backwards in a neat fashion. A black changpao with golden rims in decorative floral patterns, his attire almost seemingly made for sitting cross legged.
What did the figure of this man, silhouetted against the setting sun, plot for him?
These were Adams last thoughts before he succumbed to the pain being borne by his body.