11 Chapter 11

"Why are you bowing?" Korin asked Kaz with curiosity.

"Wha- or, I mean, you're a god, so I have to bow. Right?" Kaz started tripping up after only a single, simple question from Korin. Seeing this, Korin's closed eyes shone with a mischievous light.

"Why would you have to bow now though? Did somebody say you have to bow in front of me?" Korin questioned further.

"Well, no, but, you're a god, s-so I have to show you respect!" Kaz started sweating, not expecting himself to get so nervous. 'Damnit Kaz, this is just a normal conversation! Control yourself! He is obviously just messing with you!' He mentally scolded himself.

"What do you mean I am just messing with you?" Korin asked suddenly, with a small grin forming on his face.

"No, no I didn't mean- I just meant that I need to bow because I am asking you to be my teacher, and you are a god, so I need to bow!" Kaz hurriedly tried to save himself, not realizing what just happened. But, seeing his reaction, Korin just smiled even wider.

'Shit! I can't leave this bad of a first impression, otherwise, he won't take me as his student! I need to get at least as strong as King Piccolo, and if I'm right, I only have about six years to do so, and I don't think I can do it without his help! My being here has already altered the timeline, at least a little, especially after I told Bora about his future. I can't tell if it was a big enough change to make Goku weaker or not, so now I really have to be prepared. Damn it! Why did I do that? Things would have probably stayed the same if I hadn't.'

'Focus Kaz! I need to think of a way to save this. FUCK! How the hell did I manage to fuck up my entire plan with just a few sentences?' Kaz started panicking and overreacting to the situation, not realizing that Korin didn't actually care about his nervousness.

"Whoa there, calm down. I never said I wouldn't train you, and what's this about King Piccolo?" Korin asked, surprised to hear that name from the random kid in front of him.

"K-King Piccolo? I-uh, no, King Piccolo is supposed to be set free in six years, and I don't know if Goku can still defeat him, so I have to get stronger! Wait! No, Shit!" Kaz started talking fast and slipped up yet again.

'No, why did I say that? Damn it, am I really going to fuck up the future just by talking a little with one guy?' Kaz had long since lost his calm and was starting to panic from thinking that he had already destroyed all the canon events before they even started.

"Jeez kid, you're a nervous wreck. And quick to overreact at that. I guess we'll need to work on that first." Korin told him, but he mumbled that last sentence, so Kaz didn't hear it.

"I- No, I'm sorry!" Kaz didn't know what to say with all of his words and thoughts jumbling up.

"Don't worry about it, now tell me, how do you plan to get as strong as King Piccolo in just six years? Even with my training do you really think you will be able to get that strong?" Korin asked.

"Yes, I do, at least, I think so. I am already super strong without any martial arts experience, if I can learn them I will get much stronger than I am now." Kaz replied, a little less nervous now that the topic became about fighting.

'On top of that, if I can gain more experience in martial arts then I should be able to start developing those three techniques, and once I learn them wiping the floor with people that have a higher power level than me will be easy, especially if I can master the first one.' He thought, imagining himself doing the techniques, which only made him even more desperate to learn from Korin.

"Please master Korin, please take me as your student!" He asked again.

"Sure." Korin replied casually and walked off.

"R-really?" Kaz was shocked at how easy it was. Not knowing what else to do, he just followed Korin to the second level of his tower.

"Okay kid, the first thing you'll have to do is pass my test, if you can do that, then I will teach you." Korin explained as he walked over to the jar that was sitting on a pedestal in the middle of the room and picked it up with his staff.

"You should already know what this is, what, with your power to see the future and all, so I won't bother with any tricks." Korin said as he walked over to the railing with the jug.

"Wait, how do you-?" Kaz was about to ask but then he realized something and his eyes widened. Seeing this Korin chuckled a little and then spoke.

"But your not quite ready for that lesson yet, so we will do this first." He then tossed the jar over the railing. "Now bring that back to me." He said and walked back down to the first floor without saying anything else, leaving Kaz there speechless.

"Shit!" Kaz finally reacted after a few seconds and immediately ran to the railing only to see that the jug had already fallen so far that he couldn't even see it anymore. He then turned around and ran back down to the first floor and over to the holes in the floor. With a little hesitation upon seeing the height, he was able to convince himself to climb back down and start descending the tower.

"Damnit! How could I forget that he could read minds? He was being so obvious about it as well! Wait. Why did he call it the power to see the future instead of having an existential crisis over learning that he was a fictional character? Maybe something won't let him see that? Whatever, I'll ask him about it later, for now, I need to focus on getting the damn water back." He told himself as he hastily descended the tower.

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A day and a half later, Kaz was able to return to the top of the tower, having descended to the bottom and climbed back up in that time after retrieving the jar. But, Kaz had been so focused on trying to understand why he got so nervous when talking with Korin and climbing the tower without dropping the jar again that he didnt notice his increase in speed. He wasn't a Saiyan so he didnt receive zenkai, but humans are also able to adapt to a situation quickly, especially if they instantly heal the tears in their muscles the second they appear. So, while he didnt train as fast as a Saiyan, he did still train incredibly fast.

"Wow, kid, last time it took you four and a half days to climb up, but this time it only took a day and a half, your pretty talented aren't you?" Korin said surprised. He knew about Kaz's healing Ki, but he didnt know that the effects were this powerful.

"Heh, yeah." Kaz replied half heartedly. He didnt like referring to this power as his own, but he also didnt want to talk about why he has it right now, so he just went along with it.

"Alright then kid, I'll train you now." Korin said and gestured for Kaz to follow him, which he did. He led Kaz to the second floor again and put the jar back in its place.

"Really? That was all? Don't you want to look into my past and read my mind? Or at least do a test of determination or something?" Kaz asked in confusion, a little frustrated with how easy it was for him to gain a teacher.

"What? No, why would I do that? I can already tell that you are a good person, a little heroic even. And I saw your little suicide attempt, I think that was enough proof of you determination for me. Besides, if your future sight power are correct and King Piccolo really is going to return, having another warrior to help out wont be a bad thing will it?" Korin replied.

"Now, back to the lesson. For the first part of your training we will be focusing on the most important aspect of fighting. DO you know what that is?" Korin asked while turning to look at him.

"Um, dodging?"

"No!" Korin yelled and smacked Kaz on the head with his staff. "The most important aspect to a fight is your ability to react to your opponent. This includes dodging them when they attack, but is also much more then that. You should be able to react appropriately to their every action, and once you can do that, you will have mastered martial arts." Korin replied, purposefully being vague.

"What do you mean?" Kaz questioned further.

"You can spend all of your time and effort learning a fancy kick, or a grappling maneuver, but if they can only be used in one situation, then all that time and effort becomes useless outside of that situation. Moves like that are used to react to a single action your opponent takes, but to truly master martial arts you should be able to react to any action your opponent makes on the spot."

"Trying to learn and master a move to react to every possible action your opponent can make is not just impossible, but a waste of time. Because most of the time, your opponent might not even take the action you had trained to react to, and you will be left with no way to defend yourself."

"So instead of doing that, you should focus on mastering the building blocks of martial arts of which all possible movements are made of, that way you can create your own movements to react to your opponent on the spot, no matter the situation. But this is only the first step. But for now, that is all you need to know as that is all we will be focusing on. Come, let's begin." Korin finished his lecture and got into a fighting stance, gesturing for Kaz to do the same.

And with that, Kaz's next three years of training began.