They made their way through the market, towards the training grounds. The market wafted with powerful scents of incense, cooked meats, and fragrant spices. Lamb had to fight down the urge as they passed several foods stalls selling fried wraps, kebabs, and juicy exotic fruits.

Epona gave him a running commentary detailing the various stalls and patrons. Several of the vendors were animal-human hybrids, goat-headed creatures with human bodies. There were several of what they assumed were aliens, manning a few stalls— Epona wasn’t sure as she hadn’t gotten a chance to ask.

The supposed aliens were large fat slug like creatures, with thick hides for skin, stubby arms, tentacle mouths, and no visible eyes. They were surprisingly mobile and were constantly eating, even as they conducted business. There were also lots of monkeys everywhere, monkeys of all shapes and sizes.

They walked past a jewelry stand operated by a large snake. It didn’t have any customers, whether due to the fact that most people didn’t have money to spend on jewelry.. or whether due to the fact that the vendor was a large serpent.. nobody knew.

The training grounds was an empty field filled with gravel and sand. The sand field transitioned into a large forested area filled with trees. The training ground was huge, the size of 2 football stadiums. Several players were practicing in the field, they were swinging swords and throwing elemental blasts, they made sure to give each other lots of space.

Several guards were spread out along the border of the grounds, keeping an eye on everyone. Lamb nodded to a familiar looking guard as they found a good spot on the sands, the guard gave no response.

“I’m gonna keep practicing filling my sais with poison and throwing them.” Epona announced as she found a large tree and practiced imbuing her blade with red magical essence and throwing it against the tree. She practised 10 paces away from the three, and struggled to hit centre or make the sai stick. Lamb left her to her own devices, he trusted her to improve her abilities on her own. Before he could help her figure out what she could do, he had to figure out what he could do.

‘What is qi? And how does it work in Alyzia?’

Lamb took a deep breath and loosened his limbs, shaking them off.

He squatted down in horse stance, knees bent, back straight as if sitting on an invisible bench. The heart is in the basics.

Long Fist Wushu Academy was the only real kung fu school Lamb could find in his city. He only trained there for a year before he was forced to leave, but Lamb kept detailed notes of everything he learned there, and still practiced the skills he learned daily. And he was gonna make the most of those skills today.

The horse stance is an important foundational stance in many northern and southern kung fu styles: Southern Hung family style, Northern Bajiquan, Northern Long Fist, and Northern 7 Star Praying Mantis just to name a few.

Horse stance builds core strength, mental and physical endurance. At it’s highest level, practising horse stance can help practitioners transcend human boundaries of focus and endurance. Shaolin monks train themselves to hold horse stance for upwards of an hour. According to legends, some masters could even hold the stance for hours without breaking posture. Most students could only maintain proper horse stance for 30 secs. Horse stance is one part physical endurance— fighting through the pain, and equal parts mental endurance.

After holding the horse stance long enough, there comes a point where the practitioner experiences an outer-body experience, they’re no longer holding their body in horse stance, they just simply exist in horse stance. In the olden days, traditional hung gar schools made students practice nothing but horse stance for the first 6 months to a year. Students had to prove they could hold proper stance for at least half an hour, before they can even learn to throw a single punch. It resulted in beginners developing incredible core and leg strength before their real training began.

Lamb took several deep breath, settling in horse stance. He mediated by repeating a mantra: What is chi?

Chi/Ki/Qi was an important part of the Long Fist school’s curriculum. The philosophy of chi in Chinese martial arts was discussed at great length in class. The school had several mantas which students recited during stance practice. In class, Lamb had to recite mantras on repeat whilst holding horse stance until his legs collapsed; they made him practice stances until his legs turned to jelly. There was a particular mantra which pertained to qi, so Lamb decided to revisit that training; Lamb recited the mantra on repeat, whilst holding horse stance in the Persian training ground.

Despite several months passing since leaving his Long Fist school, he still had all their mantras memorized. He still maintained his daily stance training and often fell back to the familiar mantras when his legs felt like collapsing.

Lamb kept his eyes open, but lost focus of his surroundings. He focused on his stance, and his brain’s autopilot took over as he began reciting:

“What is chi?

Chi is your inner strength, body centre of gravity

Located below the naval in the centre of the body

The lower the point of chi to the surface, gains more power and greater balance

All mankind possess chi, but few practice to develop it.”

He pondered the words as he held horse stance and recited the mantra again and again on repeat. Reciting kung fu mantras was his fallback; whenever he was going on a long jog, or competing in a sparing match, if he started to get too tired and run out of steam, he’ll start reciting a mantra, easing the tension from his muscles and restoring energy as he fell back on the familiar words.

He held the stance for 20 minutes (his limit) before finally losing his structure and collapsing on his knees. After taking a few minutes to catch his breath, he went over his familiar warm up routine: several sets of painful push-ups on his knuckles, fingers and wrists, followed by dynamic and full body stretches. Now, it was time to get to business.

‘The heart is in the basics.’ If Lamb was gonna learn to use his qi, he was gonna have to start with the basics. He got into a gung bo walking stance, right foot forward, and began throwing straight punches, chambering the opposite hand by his waist. “What is chi? Chi is your inner strength, body centre of gravity,” he recited to himself. He tried to feel within his core, for his inner strength, “Located below the naval in the centre of the body”, he drew power from the centre of his body and tried focusing it into his fists with each punch.

He practiced for an hour without stop, his body in a trance. He added trapping backfists, and basic front, turning and side kicks as well, mixing in kicks and linking them to his punches.

After an hour, he switched to qi gong, which was the literal art of training one’s chi. He started practising tai chi, the most qi gong oriented martial art he practised (it’s literally in the name). He started with the 108 Yang step, then the 56 step Chen form.

Then he went into freeform taiji mode: he started doing the 56 step traditional form, but instead of following the traditional set movements— he just moved and flowed, his body moved on its own.. his techniques switched between Yang family style, Chen family style, and whatever. He didn’t care what the next proper technique was, he just did what felt natural. He just focused on his qi, and he moved.

He didn’t feel any different and couldn’t tell whether any progress had been made, he didn’t even know whether he was training properly. He turned and watched the people around him use wind and fire magic. He watched Epona light her sai up with red aura, and stab it into a tree. With magic, it was easy to tangibly see if you were doing it right, and if you were improving or not. A person using fire magic, could see a ball of fire forming in his hand, and after some training, they could notice their own fireball becoming bigger. There were no fireballs in what Lamb was doing.

Epona jogged up to him, drenched in sweat, “Want to take a break?” She asked.

“A little longer?” Lamb asked.

“Fine,” she replied and got back to pouring magic into her prongs. She practiced various striking combinations against the trees, her sais leaving gashes in the tree from where she struck. Her magic was not only imbuing her sais with poison, it was also making them strike harder.

Lamb took inspiration from her training and found a tree of his own to square off against. He focused qi into his fist and punched the large tree, it hurt like hell. Well that didn’t do anything. If he was able to increase his strength using qi, he’d at least be able to leave a mark on it, that would be his visual indicator.

Punching the thick wood was painful as hell for his knuckles and he wasn’t leaving a single chip on the tree. He could continuously punch against the tree at light to medium strength to condition his knuckles like he did at home, but that was not the purpose of today, today he had to focus his qi and hit it as hard as he could. So he opened his fist, brought his open palm towards his core, and focused qi into his open palm and struck the tree as hard as he could, it hurt, but he did a lot of iron palm conditioning at home, so he could keep doing this for a while.

He lost track of time as he practiced hitting the tree again and again, focusing his qi and striking with the palm as hard as he could. He mixed in combinations, striking with the blade of the hand as well, doing fast multi strike combos and chain punches. Time flew by as he got into the trance of training. Epona took a break after a while, taking a rest to rehydrate and eat a banana.

Stolen story; please report.

Lamb switched to kicking. He curled his toes up and focused energy into the front ball of his feet, then spun around into a snapping turning kick, dollyo chagi, as hard as he could against the thick tree. Lamb was bare foot. When choosing his outfit in character creation, he choose not to where shoes, he was going to use chi to condition his feet and develop iron feet. Let’s just hope the Persian Empire wasn’t filled with glass, and let’s just hope he wouldn’t have to kick any cactuses or porcupines.

Lamb used the tree like a kicking bag, he kicked it as hard as he could. Turning kicks, jumping back kicks, side kicks and front kicks. He practiced sprint kicks, and combination drills: 20 turning kicks as hard as he could in under 15 seconds, switch feet, repeat.

He jumped as high as he could into jump back kick. He kicked until his soles were bleeding and his ankles were on fire. The sun was setting when Lamb finally snapped out of his training trance. His robes were soaked in sweat, he could barely move his fingers, and he hobbled like a penguin. His feet were caked in blood, even his crotch was sore for some reason. His legs felt like they’d been holding horse stance for 2 days straight.

He turned around to see if there were still people left in the training grounds. Epona was in the zone, dashing at the tree from a distance, leaping up and pouncing on it, stabbing into the trunk multiple times.

Throughout the day, she looked over to check on Lamb multiple times, he was putting everything into his training, watching him made Epona’s heart race. She was not gonna fall behind to her American friend, he was a kicker and watching him kick was like watching a bird fly. She didn’t have kicks, she had blades and poison. She told herself: she would not stop until she was as good with her kit, as Lamb was with his feet.

She put herself into her training and pushed her feats to new heights, stabbing her sais deeper into the tree than ever before. She’d been practicing with her abilities every day since she got here, but she never trained like this, she never trained like Lamb did, he trained like he had something to prove, now so did she.

They were a team, and a team was only ever as strong as it’s weakest link. He couldn’t use any magic, and didn’t have any weapons, yet still she felt like she was the weakest link.

Epona realized Lamb had finally taken a break, and caught him watching.

“Watch this,” Epona stuck out her tongue, closed one eye and aimed at a tall tree branch, she threw a blazing red sai at it and missed, “Crap.”

“You almost got it!” Lamb said, she missed but he was still really impressed by how straight it flew.

He looked down at the tree he’d been mistreating, and finally noticed something… there were gashes. His turning kicks had left a mark and some of the wood had chipped away. At his head height, where he’d been ‘jump back kicking’, there was some visible marks too. He had been kicking the tree for 6 hours, and now he finally made marks.

“Have you made any progress yet?” Epona asked. “With your pii?” She asked, miming, pretending like she was shooting an energy blast.

“I’m not sure.” He replied disappointedly.

“Something looks different now,” she said patting his arms, “I can’t tell what it is, but something about you feels different.”

“Is it because I smell?” Lamb asked, self consciously. The sun was roaring all day, and they were both sweating buckets. Epona went in sniffing his chest, he smelled like tree dirt and sand.

“No, you smell fine,” she smiled, “but something about you does feel different, I think I can feel something that’s— it’s like how magic feels.. coming from you.”

Lamb looked at his hands, concentrating… trying to feel what Epona was describing. But his body felt hot all over, he was dizzy and light headed, like the world was spinning in circles. He couldn’t feel any ‘magic’ as Epona described it, all he felt was exhaustion.

“You’ve been training all day,” Epona said, “you’ve been training for over 6 hours and you didn’t take a single break. You didn’t eat, drink, pepe or popo for 6 hours, you just kicked a tree the entire time. Could you do that back on Earth?”

***

It was only after the adrenaline of training wore off, did Lamb realize he was starving. It wasn’t just regular starvation either, there was nothing left in the tank. He’s legs were aching, he hobbled out of the training grounds like a king penguin from the arctic server, catching weird looks from other players and the robed guards.

Epona led the way back to the rest station beside their tents.

The market streets got livelier as the sun was setting.

Colourful luminescent smoke bellowed about the streets. In the middle of a large town square, two giant lizard demons were fighting as spectators cheered.

Lamb bent his knees into a wide fighting stance with arms outstretched as a large horned demon got knocked down in front of him, blowing dust and smoke everywhere. ‘Were these monsters from outside? Are they attacking the village? Where are the guards?’

“It’s ok, chill bro,” Epona said, putting a reassuring hand on his chest.

The large scaly creature, the size of a panther, got up and blushed it’s tail. It’s tail swiped Lamb’s head, he instinctively put his hands up in a triangle guard, but the tail phased right through him. The creature was just like the yellow subtitles which appeared whenever someone spoke anything other than English, it was a projection.

They declined offers to bet on the winner and moved on, the fight seemed less interesting now since they were just illusions. Besides, when it came to movies and video games, Lamb preferred people fights over monster fights anyways.

They finally made their way back to the tents, “I thought we were going to a restaurant?” Lamb asked.

“This is a rest station, they have food too.” Epona explained.

The desk was manned by a large legless monkey with extra arms to make up for the legs. He had rusty wheels where his legs should be. Lamb decided to ask what’s up with those later, right now he was too hungry to be curious.

Epona pulled out a coin from her purse and handed it to the attendant. Lamb had a purse too, it was magically affixed to his person’s, tucked underneath his robes. She relayed some requests to the monkey, the two seemed to have a good rapport and she gestured towards Lamb as well. “Come on,” she waved Lamb over, and the two of them made their way to the rest station’s dining area.

Dinning Room B was a large sparsely populated cafeteria with rows of tables and benches, and a large buffet feast at the front. Lamb was in buffet heaven. He didn’t even wait for her to find a seat and bee-lined straight towards the buffet. A large spread of Middle Eastern, South Indian, and North African dishes were arrayed in steaming hot trays. This was his element, Lamb never declined a buff invitation, he even purposely went on some bad dates because the girl suggested going to a buffet.

He grabbed two large plates, tucking one between his elbow, a trick he learned working as a server in college. He got 2 large slices of Mannakish (a cheesy Lebanese flatbread, topped with za’atar, the chef who made it also added a hint of honey to this batch), a large rack of smoked lamb cooked rare, some basmati rice, topped with an African style braised beef stew. On the second plate, he filled it with every kind curry he could find, an extra ladle of sago (his favourite), with some spicy yogurt sauce on the side, and a few extra peaces of roghni naan and toasted keema naan for good measure.

“Do you know which of these breads are spicy?” Epona asked bashfully.

“I didn’t know there was spicy naan.” Lamb inquired. He ate a lot of Indian food, there was a Punjabi place a few blocks from his house which was his favourite, but his only experience was the Indian food available in Cape Eaton, and most of those places catered to tourists, so he was by no means an expert at real authentic Indian food.

“My first day here, I got this naan bread that smelled really good, but when I bit into it, it was so spicy I thought I was dyeing.” Epona shuddered, recalling the garish memory.

“If you want to be safe, I recommend getting the butter naan or the garlic, I also recommend the goat and the sago curry.” Lamb recommended. He resisted the urge to point out that ‘naan’ just means bread, so calling it ‘naan bread’ was just saying ‘bread bread’.

“Are you sure these naan bread isn’t spicy?” She asked examining the bread cautiously, as if it were made of uranium, “not even a little spicy?”

“I promise you, nothing on your plate has spice.” Lamb replied, resisting the urge to trick her into getting the spicy yogurt sauce to watch her die. Lamb had a feeling the yogurt was gonna be hot even by Indian standards, he looked forward to suffering the pain.

“Ok, because I can’t even handle a little spicy,” she informed him has she grabbed some meat skewers and some fruit.

“Not that one,” Lamb incepted as she reached for a skewer at the end, “that one has sliced peppers.”

“Thank you, you saved me,” she bowed, “you want it?”.

Like Lamb would ever refuse more meat.

She delicately balanced the skewer on Lamb’s plate, which was already reaching critical mass. The heat from the curry was seeping into his arm and starting to hurt. Lamb wasn’t aware that the food was magically heated in the kitchen to ensure optimal temperature before being loaded onto the trays, so he wasn’t just being burnt, he was being magically burnt.

She found a nice place to sit and started dipping her bread, as Lamb very slowly made his way to the bench across from her. Lamb’s legs were still wobbly, and it took all his concentration just to keep his plates balanced, he moved in taiji pace, meticulously controlling every muscle in his body to keep his plates steady as he walked.

Epona rolled her eyes as she bit into her bread, she got up, bread still in her mouth, and carefully— steadily took a plate from Lamb’s hand, and helped him carry it to his seat.

She was usually careful each time she bit into a new food, for fear of an accidental spicy food jump-scare, but Lamb assured her it was safe. The goat curry had a rich meaty gamey aroma with just a teeny tiny hint of spice, the kind of spice even she could handle. She was proud of herself, she was eating something spicy and actually enjoying it instead of rolling in pain, praying for death. She was getting stronger.

Even the skewers she picked had a hint of hot spice, but they too were her level of spice. She realized that literally everything on today’s menu was spicy, except for the naan she got, thank god her friend was here as a guide.

Lamb was in buffet heaven and didn’t even register the spiciness of most of the foods. He ate a lot of spicy hot foods, and prided himself in constantly improving his spice tolerance. The lamb rack was fatty and fall of the bone, and smoked to perfection with just the right amount of juices. He recommended Epona try a piece, she grabbed one of his and immediately got up to grab more after the first bite.

“Do you like it?” She asked, as Lamb bit into another steamy succulent rack.

“Love it” he replied.

“Love what? What’s the meat?”

“I love the Lamb—.” He replied, “Ohh…”

Epona hid her mouth and giggled as Lamb stared at her in contempt.

“I’m putting peppers in your food.” He huffed.

“Nooo….”

He bit into his keema, and to his surprise the naan was meat filled and spicy has heck, Epona was right! He summoned the courage and dipped it into the yogurt sauce— his suspicions were correct, just as he feared, it wasn’t just hot, it was hot hot. His face burned and all his muscle fatigue and aching joints faded away, as his mouth wallowed in burning hot pain. His face became as red as a Buddhist thunder god, it took a while for his colour to slowly return to normal, by the time it did he felt reborn anew.

“If I eat that would it kill me?” Epona asked, marking the radioactive yogurt sauce.

“Instantly.”

She grabbed some leftover flatbread, summoning new found confidence, and dipped it in the yogurt. She held the newly imbued flatbread before her, eyeing it like a cobra. Lamb placed his hand on hers, shaking his head, restoring sense to her. She put the bread on Lamb’s plate, wiping sweat off her brow, and started munching on some melon instead.

‘Next time,’ she declared in challenge, locking gazes with the pasteurized the milk.

***

They got separate sleeping quarters and Lamb had a fur tent all to himself. It was surprisingly roomy inside. He missed the comfortable familiarity of his bedroom apartment, but he had a roof over his head, no rain, and a bed was a bed. Sure beats the leaky rundown orphanage he stayed in as a child.

chapter 6 end