The sliding bamboo doors which framed the courtyard were qi-proofed with the highest grade arrays. They had to be, to withstand the training Mother and Jin often did here. The courtyard itself was mostly a voidsand pit the size of a small park, with training dummies, targets, sandbags, and weaponry stacked on racks to either side.

Ruyi stood barefoot, facing Mother, on the voidsand. Voidsand was extremely energy-absorptive and heavy to boot; it even took in all light. It was a sea of nothing under her feet. Perfect for blunting Techniques.

“A fighter’s most important trait is self-awareness,” said Mother. “This is our first lesson. Who do you think you are?”

“Is this one of those times where whatever I say, I’m wrong?” said Ruyi. Her smile was a tad sardonic.

“No,” said Mother. “There is a right answer.”

“I think I’m pretty strong,” said Ruyi. She shrugged. “Stronger than most.”

“You’re right,” said Mother. “Is that who you want to compare yourself to? The common person?”

“No.”

“Good.” Mother smiled too. “In the grand scheme, you are quite strong, dear. And I’m very proud of you for getting here. But in my eyes you have not yet crossed the threshold to be considered a beginner.”

Ouch.

“You are not even Demon King. With your demonform you may be considered equivalent to some lesser Demon Kings, but this stage—Demon King, or roughly, Nascent… it is merely a measure of raw power. Raw power is not interesting. It is what you do with it that is interesting. You should think of Nascent Soul, or Demon King, as a prerequisite.” She paced as she spoke, hands behind her back, receding into a smoother, cooler voice. Ruyi imagined this was her ‘Professor’ voice—the one she used when she gave lectures to her own disciples, back when she had them.

“You should think of power levels more as stages of development. Everything under Nascent Soul is akin to adolescence; Nascent is adulthood. But some adults are much more powerful than others. Your being an adult tells me very little about how much you can actually fight—many teenagers can destroy adults in duels. Do you understand?”

***

Her daughter nodded. Since the incident she’d had gotten much less expressive, Yun noticed. She asked fewer questions, she was less quick to her reactions—she watched and noticed and listened. She seemed a little cautious all of the time.

“For now,” Yun continued, “You have a demonform, and a great store of Essence, but but no true Techniques. You are akin to an adult with an infant’s motor skills. We must first teach you how to walk.”

She’d expected Ruyi to get offended by that. She was ready to talk her into it—Yun loved the girl but she had such a hard time facing reality sometimes. But Ruyi just nodded.

“We’ll use no Techniques. No essence. No demonforming. We’ll start from the bare-bones basics. Human form, with arms, legs, and if I see you’ve mastered that we’ll move on to something more advanced.”

She waited for complaints. Maybe questions, disguised as complaints, like—“When do we get to Techniques? Or ‘how long will this take?’”

Instead Ruyi cocked a brow and said, “So? Let’s get started.”

Hmm.

Yun set up a pushing bag, hanging it off a stand—it was a lump of sand and cotton, and the skin was a special flexible metal thread so it could conduct array qi—qi which would soften the blows.

“The first Technique I’ll teach you uses no qi nor Essence. It is called a jab, and it is the simplest punch you can throw. Watch.”

Her fist darted out, her knuckles graced the metal, fled back. “Jab.” She did it again. “Notice I’m putting very little into the punch. My hips aren’t turning, my weight’s barely shifting. I’m just touching, see? Jab—jab. You try.”

Ruyi threw a punch. It was…she winced. It was a beginner’s punch, but that was okay.

“Don’t be so stiff,” she said softly. She touched Ruyi’s shoulder; Ruyi flinched, then settled and let Yun’s hand stay. “Relax. Again. That’s it—exactly, but you’re still pushing, see? It’s not a push. It’s more like a whip, a sting, fast. Whip your fist out there—yes, yes!”

Ruyi’s elbow was flaring, so she said a note and Ruyi fixed it instantly. Ruyi was leaning too far, so Yun told her and when she threw now she was perfectly balanced, in and out.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

She never made the same mistake twice.

Thirty minutes in, her jab was perfect.

It should’ve taken thirty months, not thirty minutes. It should’ve been a matter of biology. The body had to get used to certain physical pathways. The muscles had to adapt. You couldn’t just throw picture-perfect jabs in motion, hopping back, hopping forward, little pistons tapping the bag in ruler-straight lines.

“Hmm,” said Yun, struggling to keep a blank face. “Why don’t you practice another two hours? Just jabbing. I’ll go finish up my letters. We’ll see how much progress you’ve made by the time I’ve got back, okay?” She came back two hours later and found Ruyi jabbing. Still. One after another, once every three seconds, rhythmic as a clock. Each jab could’ve been taken out of a textbook. Each jab was a copy of the last. She hit the sandbag so precisely her knuckles had chiseled themselves into the steel.

Yun blinked.

She hadn’t thought Ruyi would actually do it. She was trying to be sneaky, sneak in a hidden lesson under her real one. Her daughter was passing it a little too easily.

She always thought Ruyi would pass, but she’d expected at least three tantrums… something really had changed, hadn’t it? There was a certain… distance… to her now. Whenever Yun asked about what had happened in that Stadium Rue was always so cagey. She was just as headstrong but she was so much more suspicious now, and she seldom smiled anymore, except sarcastically. It broke Yun’s heart a little.

“How am I doing?” said Ruyi. There was something droll about her expression; she knew exactly how she was doing.

“You’re ready to move on,” said Yun. “Next, we’ll learn the cross.”

***

On the cross, they spent three hours. Well, Ruyi spent three hours; she was elsewhere for most of it. They ended the day with four hours of footwork drills.

The next day, they came back and did it again. No Techniques. No demon-forming. Hours upon hours of what must’ve seemed the most mind-numbingly easy moves, done over, and over, and over.

Another day passed, and another.

The only spice Yun added was combination punching. Jab, cross, hook. “The jab and the cross articulate a motion forward,” she’d said. “Whereas the hook articulates a motion back. Jab-cross shifts your weight from the backfoot to the frontfoot, turns your hips back-to-front. Whereas the hook shifts weight front-to-back, and shifts your hips back too. The result is you end in a balanced position. When you string together a combination, you must understand the function of each Technique. You must understand how they relate to one another.”

Then she had Ruyi practice that ten thousand times.

***

After a full week of rote eight-hour-days, she confronted Ruyi at the end of their daily practice.

“Aren’t you bored?” Yun said. She was getting bored.

“Yeah,” said Ruyi, blinking. “I’m bored out of my mind.”

“Are you curious why I’m doing this?” Yun had been curious why Grandmaster Long had put her through this when she’d been young. She’d recalled complaining loudly, day after day.

So far, Ruyi hadn’t uttered a word.

“You’re not just teaching me unarmed hand-to-hand fighting,” said Ruyi slowly. “You’re teaching me what it means to refine Techniques. It’s not something fun. It takes countless hours of drilling—it’s something you need grit to get through. And I won’t be fighting much in this form, but the concepts you’re teaching me—about positioning, about timing, about stringing together intentional combinations, they apply regardless of Technique or form. They’re universal.”

Yun was staring at her. Ruyi shrugged, brushing a stray strand of hair out of her face.

“Plus, you’re my Mother. And you’re very good at fighting. And you’ve taught Sen, and you’ve given hundreds of lectures on the Dao. I figure you know what you’re doing. You wouldn’t do me wrong.”

“That’s… right,” said Yun. “Very good.” She began to smile. “A little too good. Perhaps the lesson would’ve been more impactful if you hadn’t seen it coming.”

“Eh,” said Ruyi, yawning. “Maybe you should’ve hidden it better.”

This little—! Yun gave Ruyi’s cheeks a pinch. “Oww!” laughed Ruyi.

“Is that any way to talk to your instructor?” said Yun sternly.

“Okay, okay—let go!” There was a flash of that old mischievousness in her giggle. It was gone as soon as it’d come; her expression settled to her default these days, a dry amusement.

“I’m hungry. Can you unfreeze more of the ox flank?” Another thing that’d changed—ever since she’d gotten her new form she needed three times the food to be sated.

***

Their practices continued. When she gave thirty-minute lectures on the Dao, Li Family disciples lined up for hours. Now she spent hours a day teaching just one wide-eyed little rascal. Ruyi would sit there quiet, and Yun got the feeling not a single word she said went by her. Yun could nearly hear the whirring in the girl’s head. It was a little frightening how fast she was improving.

This morning they’d got up so early the sun hadn’t even risen yet. The sky was lightening fast, melting from deep shades of purple to lighter blue. A light frost coated the sands, the leavings of light evening rains.

“It is better to be the best in the world at one Technique,” said Yun, “Than to be passable at one hundred.”

Ruyi nodded. Even just the way she sat there staring, unblinking, owl-like… she had an intensity that was almost unnerving.

“What is a Technique?” said Yun. “It is nothing mystical. A jab with no Essence is a Technique, as is your Father’s Nine Sun Rises. It is simply an efficient arrangement of energy and body—a way of moving. For you, it will mean using your demonic form to channel your Essence. We have no demon Techniques to draw from for you, but that doesn’t matter. If we understand the fundamental principles of movement, of energy, of fighting, we can derive Techniques for you, can we not?”

“Yes,” breathed Ruyi.

“First, let’s start with your weapons. What are they? Fangs and claws, for the most part. Maybe breath. Your powers are more slashing than they are concussive. Your form… I have done some reading on the Snow Lion demonform—yes, the Li archive on demonforms is quite extensive. In recorded history it has appeared four times; most recent was Nyx, Lord of Demons.”

Ruyi’s lips pursed. “She was powerful,” Yun continued, “but it was her speed which was unmatched—something between a speedster and a berserker, who used dynamism, dexterity, and raw damage to overwhelm foes. This will be our model: we’ll hone Claw Techniques, Fang Techniques, movement Techniques, and a select few special Techniques. And we’ll put them together in a style that suits you.”