However, the following step was where it would prove challenging to He Shan since he had to synch up his breathing with his movements then. Every step, every twist and turn, every leap he took had to be synced with his breathing. This would help him control how much oxygen each muscle had, which would, in turn, help him regulate his energy and also increase the fluidity of his movements.
After he had done all this was when he would move to the final part, which was deep sensory awareness. Sensory awareness involved perfecting the first two steps to the point he could feel every single part of his body as though it was the only part in his body and have fine control over it.
The ultimate goal of all these steps was to create harmonization. Harmonization of a person with his own body and then with the environment around him, all with the goal of achieving the most natural and optimal movement.
He Shan knew without guidance, it would take him a few years before he reached that state because it also needed to be complemented with a few resources.
For now, all he was aiming for was to gain rudimentary mastery of body alignment to achieve symmetry and balance and work on shifting his weight for smooth transitions of his movements, and finally, if he had time, supplement it with breath control.
He picked up a few bamboo poles with leaves hanging on by a thread and spread them all around the area he had selected for his practice. Next to each bamboo on both sides, he placed brittle earthen bowls filled to the brim with water. His goal was to shuttle in between those bamboo poles without disturbing the water or the leaves within the time it took half a joss stick to burn.
Once everything was set, he lit up the joss stick and began the training. He had already expected the training to be hard and to put a strain on his body and his mind, but the moment he began, he realized he had grossly underestimated the difficulty of the art.
Within the first ten minutes of his exercise, he had already failed over a dozen times. Either he made the leaves fall with the wind from his movement or broke the bowl earthenware next to him, or made the water spill over.
He Shan didn't grow frustrated over the failures. With every failure, he would sit down and analyze what he did wrong, then begin again. His progress was slow, and there were times when he thought he'd figured it out, but the result would be different every time.
One moment he would reach halfway, the next, he would fail at the third or fourth bamboo, but in all these, he kept trying with the same eagerness that he had before he started.
After half an hour, he was already soaked in sweat, could barely move an inch, and his breathing was ragged,, but despite his sorry appearance, there was a mad smile on his face as he eyed the bamboo poles like they were some prey waiting to be devoured.
Zou Yi and Zou Liqin also had, at some point, begun training in their own arts. Just like He Shan, they all chose an area far from each other, and they, too, had their own resources to help them in their training, as listed in their booklet.
Zou Yi trained against some wooden puppet which, if not for the blank face with no facial features, would have been mistaken for a real person. It had on a white robe, and on that white robe were orange leaves that had numbers on them running from one through to fifteen. Two leaves were on its eyes; three were on its wrist, elbow, and shoulder on each arm; two on its chest and one on its navel; one on each knee and lastly, one on each ankle.
Zou Yi's training in the flurry wist wave art pursued speed and flexibility. His goal was to use the fist art to grab each of the leaves on that puppet in the order of the numbers from one to fifteen.
It was a tall order since the puppet had insane reflexes and was equally as skilled in its fist art, which gave Zou Yi no small amount of trouble. Zou Yi had almost been beaten unconscious a few times since he started. He could barely survive its onslaught, let alone think of grabbing any of the leaves.
As for Zou Liqin, she was training next to one of the few trees in the combat area. The tree was an urchin exploding thunder tree. As long as one made any sudden contact with it, it would release small wooden shards from its trunk like an explosion. Along with the explosion was a thundering noise that would disorient the victim, leaving them open to be struck with thousands of tiny wooden shards.
Zou Liqin looked like an urchin. She cut a sorry figure even worse than Zou Yi, whose nose and eyes couldn't even be identified. Zou Liqi had torn bloody robes with disheveled hair and wooden prickings that were so many it looked like she had goosebumps.
The technique she chose, the withering leaves palm technique, focused on force. Force that was strong enough to create a barrier around it and also causes a capillary wave when it struck something, thus resulting in a ripple-like attack that spread the attack from the point of contact outward in a circular motion.
From her sorry state, Zou Liqin made little progress in it as the art served as both a defensive and offensive measure. With it, she would be able to strike the urchin exploding thunder tree and leave unscathed.
He Shan was run ragged, Zou Yi was a human punching bag, Zou Liqin was a human porcupine, while Yu Mei was still seated in her lotus position, exuding serenity.
The three couldn't help but spit out bitterness and hate every time they passed her and compared themselves to her.
