Training ( part III)

City Lord's Mansion

Within the training ground, a youth dressed in black training clothes was wielding a long curved silver sword. He stood there with his black hair draped over his shoulders, scattering loosely behind his back. His huge pair of black eyes were shining brightly as they were full of passions and roaring with ambitions. Although he was still a child, standing there, his bearing indicated that he was full of fighting intent. A faint metallic luster aura encompassed his whole body, around him were a group of wooden puppets.The wooden puppets were all marked with some red painted dots in some part of their bodies such as foreheads, throats, chests, arms and other areas.

" Ok, now all you have to do is stab each of the puppets on the red spots. You have to be really fast and don't forget to use your footwork." Said a middle-aged man who was standing outside the circling areas of the wooden puppets.

"Swish."

Without any delay, the youth moved as fast as lightning and swift as a gust of wind. He stabbed out fiercely the first puppet that was in front of him with his sword.

" clang, clang, clang."

The tip of his sword pierced forward, but instead of hitting the red dots in the puppet's forehead, it pierced where the nose was supposed to be. The same thing happened for the next two puppets. His sword roughy missed all of his targets about an inch or two inches in some cases.

The youth was surprised and startled because he was clearly aiming for the red dots on the puppet's forehead, but he missed even after trying more than four times. He was always off by an inch or so.

" My last lesson for you, beside footwork, there's one more thing that is necessary to learn or master in order to become a great swordsman. The last thing is a perfect control of your body. You have to be familiar with your body and be in control of your bodily motions. Your body has to move the way your mind commanded it to, either consciously or a subconscious command. In order to do that, you need to have the control over the movements of your muscles, bones etc. it will take time, but once you can control perfectly your body motions, you'll be able to easily hit your target. Although you want to stab the puppets in the red dots on their forehead, you actually missed every time when you tried to do so. Not only that, you have to train countless times in order to get it right and control your body movement perfectly."

" Also, the sword isn't just a piece of metal, a true swordsman considered his weapon as an extension of his own body.

You have to be able to make your body and your sword in harmony and make them act as you wish it."

" Almost every sword technique is comprised of chop, pierce, sweep, hack, cut, draw, break, twist etc. some of them are used to attack while the others to defend."

" Now, try again, but this time try to make every sword attack in harmony with your body movement.Don't forget to stay calm at all time." Said the middle-aged man with a calm expression on his face. He was really patient and took his time to explain everything perfectly to the youth.

After listening to everything, the young boy started to train again while the middle-aged man was constantly pointed out his mistake and gave him more advice in his training.

The youth and the middle-aged man within the training ground was none other than Longwei and commander Tian as most of you already knew.

......….

More than four weeks had already gone by since Longwei started to train his swordsmanship. Commander Tian has painstakingly poured all of his efforts into training Longwei. Every day, he would spend four hours of training. The improvements of Longwei was visible to naked eye. No matter how tiring it was, Longwei kept on training every single day. It was truly an exhausting task as his body and mind were both under pressure. However, he kept on going. Watching himself getting better and better every day, stimulated him Into training more.

[ your swordsmanship level has risen]

[ your swordsmanship level has risen]

[ your swordsmanship has risen to advance level]

[ Advance swordsmanship has risen to level 1]

While I was training my swordsmanship, I can hear the metallic voice of the woman rang out within my mind every time I made a huge progress. I can clearly feel my improvement, it's like I have been training for years. It was truly a magical feeling watching me getting stronger and stronger every single day.

" I think it's over for now. You don't need me anymore. You know all the basics. All you have to do now is to find your own style." Said commander Tian while looking at me with a big smile on his face. I can sense a hint of accomplishment in his voice while he was talking me.

" However before I go, let's spar a little." Said commander Tian while holding a wooden sword in his hand. At the same time, he threw me a small wooden sword as well.

As soon I caught the wooden sword in my right hand, commander Tian attacked me without wasting any time talking. I can see that he was just playing with me and didn't take it seriously because he didn't use his battle qi, not that I can fight against him while he activated his battle qi.

However, I stood there calmly while facing the fierce sword attack of commander Tian. Suddenly, my body flickered and move closer to commander Tian, causing him to miss his target.

"Slashhhhh."

As soon as commander Tian missed his target, my wooden sword slashed toward him. Commander Tian calmly used his wooden sword to block my incoming attack. The shadow of the two wooden swords agilely danced out. Even though commander Tian was way better than me, I was still able to keep up with him. His attacks came from every direction toward me. At some point, his sword was so fast that his sword attacks turned blurry and illusionary. All I can do was moving backward, sidestep, leaping, withdrawing and turning. Even though I was still in a difficult position, I still managed to dodge most of his attack.

After a while, commander Tian slowed down his attack allowing me to be able to block them with my wooden sword which gave me some time to catch my breath. The clanging sounds of the wooden swords colliding against each other can be heard like thunderclaps. My right hand was getting tired but I didn't want stop yet as I felt intoxicated and immersed at this moment. I can feel that the wooden sword is becoming one with my body.

[ Advance swordsmanship has risen to level 2]

I can feel that my swordsmanship is better with an every swing and my speed is increasing as well. My wooden sword chopped against commander Tian's wooden sword at a high speed. My right hand trembled slightly and got pushed away by commander Tian's wooden sword. I lost control of my wooden sword, and the next thing I know, I felt a stabbing pain in my chest. I retreated a few steps backward and fell down on my ass. I didn't even see it coming, as soon as started to put some pressure on commander Tian, his movement suddenly become more nimble and fast. In a flash, he just decided the outcome of this battle with a single stab.

" Hahaha, not so fast little city lord. Your progress is really big, but I can't let this fight go on anymore. I can see that your body is at its limit, but you are refusing to give up. You have been training for three hours, you need to take a break. Let's go, from now on, you can train on your own because I have nothing more to teach you." Said commander Tian while pulling me up from the ground. It was right, I was exhausted. However, the fight was like an adrenaline that makes my blood bubble to a brim. When I tried to get up, my body swayed and fell down again. There wasn't any strength left in me, commander Tian had to carry me home after the fight.