Chapter 3 - Morning Exercises

It was still early morning and dawn was breaking. All the children of the orphanage, without exception, got up and quickly made their way to the playground.

They were all lined up in rows. There were a total of 20 children, among them, in the first row were Silvester and Nerun. Sylvester was the oldest of the children present and was the first in line. Nerun was curiously the youngest of the children in the front row, only 5 years old, but no one doubted that he could be in that position. Despite being only 5 years old, children older than him were not easily able to defeat him physically.

Maya stood in front of them, and although she looked lovingly at each of the children, she had a strict countenance. Every morning for the children and even for her was the same since the children entered the orphanage.

Maya was a curious case since she was one of the few people who had not left the orphanage when she grew up but had stayed behind. The reasons being on the one hand that Maikal held her in high esteem, and on the other, that she loved taking care of the children. There was a third reason, however, that was one she was not willing to let other know, at least for now.

The door to the courtyard suddenly opened and all the children became more upright if that was possible and quite nervous. Maikal was drunk and staggered towards the centre of the courtyard.

Curiously, when he arrived in front of the children, he stared at them all. As his eyes passed over each of them, they grew nervous. The person the children feared the most was undoubtedly Maikal.

"Today is one minute!" He said in his raspy voice, and suddenly Maikal disappeared as if by magic. He hadn't really disappeared, it was simply that the speed with which he moved was such that it was incredibly difficult to follow him with the human eye.

As soon as he disappeared, the children, except for Maya, scattered across the playground at speeds far faster than expected for children of their age, some running, some tumbling, and within seconds they had moved several metres from their point of origin. Such was the beginning of life for all of them every day.

One of the children, an 8-year-old who was approaching the trees in the courtyard suddenly felt a great shiver and turning around, realised that Maikal was behind him with an ugly grin on his face, as if he thought it was the funniest thing in the world and reaching out a hand, he hit the boy in the chest, who flew backwards towards the centre of the courtyard.

None of the children stopped when that happened, but kept running, some in groups, some alone, but generally each one trying to make use of the terrain, whether rocks, trees, dirt, puddles, some even climbing onto the roof of the storeroom to escape Maikal. However, no one went out of the courtyard. Everyone knew that going out was taboo and that anyone who escaped would not only be caught eventually without exception but would carry a double dose of punishment for the rest of the week. Some of the children would even pick up rocks, branches, or anything and throw them at Maikal to try to distract him and thus delay him from catching up with them.

Maikal smiled when he saw how prepared the children looked, and again disappeared. Not half a minute had passed when more than 12 of the children had been found by Maikal and attacked and thrown into the centre of the courtyard. All without exception had all been hit in the centre of the chest with adequate force so that no matter where they were they had reached the point of the central courtyard and although they felt pain, none of their bones or organs had been injured. The degree of control of Maikal's power was simply terrifying.

Sylvester was standing behind a rock, when Maikal appeared on top of it with his mouth open, showing his few teeth. Sylvester couldn't help but be frightened, but taking courage he reached out his hands and quickly lifted a chunk of the ground and swung it at Maikal. Maikal simply extended a finger and the piece of earth hit Sylvester right in the centre of the chest, throwing him into the centre of the courtyard with the rest of the children.

There were still 10 seconds left in the minute and practically all the children had been defeated. The only one left was Nerun, yet all the youngsters were disheartened. It seemed that they were again going to lose to their Father, but curiously Nerun bravely approached the centre of the courtyard and stood there looking defiantly at Maikal.

"Oh..." said Maikal suddenly.

"Interesting, today you seem to have been bitten by the mosquito of courage hehehehe."

He again moved from his spot at ultra-human speeds and appearing behind Nerun, he held out his hand. Nerun however ducked as if he had a sixth sense and rolled on the ground. He was the only one who had managed to dodge Maikal by even a single blow. No sooner had he dodged him than he scooped up dust from the ground and threw it into the air in an attempt to create a smokescreen. There was a gleam in Maikal's eye as he watched Nerun's movements but he merely blew and an almost hurricane-force wind blew the dust away and blew Nerun into the air who took advantage of passing near one of the rocks in the courtyard to extend his foot to hook onto it and avoid being beaten. He then used all his strength to fly towards one of the nearby puddles, landing face down. Maikal disappeared again. There were still five seconds left.

He appeared on top of Nerun, as he turned and spat out a large amount of dirty water that fell on Maikal's face in surprise. All the other children's mouths dropped open and Maikal himself was shocked at Nerun's ingenuousness.

With the dirty water on his face, he had to close his eyes, yet even with his eyes closed, everything seemed to be under his control. The truth was that with his level of power, defeating multiple people with his eyes closed was extremely easy for him, especially when his opponents were nothing more than children who had not even reached Qi level 10.

Nerun did not stop but started running in a certain direction, and when the other children saw him they could not help but make a funny look. They didn't quite understand what Nerun was up to. "All right, enough of the games," said Maikal and with his eyes closed he hovered behind Nerun as if he could tell exactly where he was. With his arm outstretched he was approaching inexorably, when suddenly, just before being overtaken, Nerun jerked and crawled along the ground. "Not good enough," said Maikal who continued with his arm outstretched as he finally reached his prey with one second to go and squeezed his hand.

Curiously, Maikal's sensation was that of something soft and pleasant. The sensation was somewhat unusual thinking that he had caught Nerun, and when Maikal opened his eyes he was extremely shocked, for in front of him was not Nerun but Maya, who was red in the face like a tomato, as Maikal was squeezing one of her breasts. Nerun had run in Maya's direction and before she could react he had jumped between her legs, passing right underneath her. Maikal couldn't help but smirk and a couple of strands of blood trickled out of his nose.

" PERVERT!" Maya shouted and slapped Maikal's face, sending him flying through the air. All the other kids started guffawing on the floor, some even crying from laughter.

Maikal got up as if it was the most natural thing to do, and acted as if nothing had happened. The truth was that even if he were stronger, he would never dare attack Maya, let alone after touching her chest.

Then he looked at Nerun and smiled satisfactorily, but when he noticed Maya's icy stare on both of them, he immediately stiffened and recomposed his sullen look, as if he wanted to scold Nerun for his behaviour, although it was clearly noticeable that it was only appearance and that he was fully satisfied with Nerun's great ingenuity and inventiveness.

"Today you can both go without food," said Maya angrily and ran out of the courtyard into the house.

Nerun however, was smiling saying "Hehehehehe, I made it, I didn't get caught today".

But his smile froze when he saw that Maikal had appeared in front of him and gave him a smack on the head that made him double over in pain as he held his head, complainingly asking: "Why did you hit me? Today for the first time you failed to catch us all, I deserve a reward, not you hitting me".

Maikal replied, "You shouldn't feel satisfied that you dodged me. That's your punishment because yesterday you could have escaped the attack of those idiots who mocked your sister, indeed you could have even defeated them but you didn't. If it had been someone stronger or had used some Qi skill, not only would you have suffered injuries but you could have died. To be touched means to die."

"Well, it was all part of the show, otherwise you wouldn't have been able to get his money."

Nerun replied looking him in the eyes. Maikal looked at him with angry eyes, but at Nerun's sustained stare he couldn't help but laugh. He was actually quite happy with the brat's progress.

"Very good everyone. It's getting harder and harder for me to chase you down and catch you, and today one of you finally managed to avoid being caught. So you are entitled to a reward. Today we won't do the rest of the exercises we usually do."

All the children were excited and stood back in their places. They knew that having passed Maikal's test they would get a prize.

"You are the third generation of brats from my orphanage that I train. All of your older siblings have come out of here and they have all been trained in the same things you have. To survive, to get ahead, and to never get stuck in the face of life's problems. You are all orphans, and that is not going to change any time soon. You were alone and the fate of most of you was to die. I rescued you from the sewers and the alleys and now you belong to me. I don't care what you do but you all have to follow two basic rules. Everyone must earn a copper coin a day minimum. After all, someone has to pay for my booze hehehe"

Said Maikal with his particular grimace. Strangely enough, none of the children felt humiliated by his words. This was the truth of the world they lived in.

"And secondly, everyone must do everything you can to survive. No matter how difficult the circumstances, and the trials you face, everyone must survive. There is always a way, there is always a solution because the world never closes its doors completely. This is not only a truth, it is a way of life, it is a thought that you must take into yourselves and make it your own. Never give up. Honour may be important, but to lose your life over a matter of honour is foolish. I will never understand people who die for honour. In the grave honour disappears, only the winners are the victors, and the losers are forgotten by history and treated like dogs. If you care so much about your honour, then train, become stronger and avenge your honour later. If you are strong enough, no one will dare to mock you. The truth is that nothing anyone tells you can kill you. But if in your hearts you let yourselves be humiliated, then that is when you will be dead in life. You can dance like monkeys for a few coins. A job does not cease to be dignified, because work is for a living. But if you let yourselves be trampled on, it's a different matter. When you face someone more powerful, it is not cowardly to run away. Fighting someone much more powerful without a plan or for no important reason is not bravery, it's suicide."

The children's eyes were shining. Before arriving at the orphanage in their various places of origin they were treated like slaves, even rubbish. No one gave them importance or honour. Maikal treated them roughly, but they instinctively knew that he genuinely cared for them. That all the "suffering" they went through every morning made them stronger.

They had found their own particular form of hope. No job was beneath them, and they were capable of doing almost anything except selling their own consciences to earn a living and survive.

Every morning they had to first endure being chased, to train themselves to escape. This they did, at least 10 times throughout the morning and were always beaten by Maikal when they were caught. But they were aware that in other circumstances being beaten, for example in the street, could well mean death. Apart from the chase they had to run around the courtyard many times, then they had to jump over all the rocks several times, and do push-ups, and sit-ups, among many other exercises. They trained each and every part of their little growing bodies.

"As your reward, today I will show and tell you the true meaning of being a Qi warrior". Maikal suddenly said. All the children were overjoyed. This would be the first step to significantly change the rest of their lives.