Conqueror of All

The Agility Square

    He woke up to the sound of his father yelling at him to get out of bed. Du Keishi went downstairs and ate his delicious breakfast quickly, then headed outside.

A grand sight awaited him. In one square, a field of long bamboo stalks, with several turrets here and there. In the second square, a whole legion of workout equipment and weights, and in the final square, an array of training dummies. His mother introduced him to each.

"This is the agility square, where you run on top of the stalks of bamboo and try not to fall, while dodging the projectiles from the turrets."

"This is the strength square, where you'll be working out and pushing you strength to the limits every day."

"And finally, the battle square. You'll be fighting these dummies that have inscriptions, making them fight like real people. At first it'll just be one dummy, then two, and so on as you get better."

"Okay, now we'll get started. Choose a weapon, carefully, as that is the type of weapon you'll be training the rest of your life with."

She led him to each of the squares, and then to a weapon rack. There were swords, spears, axes, daggers, and more exotic weapons, like the butterfly knife and things like that. After looking through for some time, he found one weapon he was drawn to immediately. The long spear. In his past lives he had known many spear wielders, and they were all extremely powerful. The spear itself was a tyrannical weapon, able to abuse enemies at a long range.

When he selected, his parents exchanged looks of uneasiness, but said nothing. It was only when Du Keishi walked over to the agility square when they spoke up.

"The spear is a famed weapon. Many want to use it, but can't due to the high level of work required to master it. For your training, we will be providing you with a long spear that is inscribed to grow with you. You will start at the agility square, as speed is one of the body types your element is known for. Every other day, you will train with your spear. On the rest of the days, you will train with nothing in your hand. For six months, you will simply be training control over your body and your muscles. For the next six, you will be training movement techniques."

The first day of training was a long and hard one. Du Keishi did extremely well for his age, and his parents praised him as a genius. However, the boy wasn't satisfied. He felt that he was extremely slow and clumsy, although D Keishi was still not used to his body. The first time he stepped on the bamboo, his foot slipped and his small body landed on the cruel ground below. He lay there for a while, got back up, and began again. The pattern of falling, thinking, then retrying continued, and Du Keishi was much better his tenth attempt.

When night fell, Du Keishi would lie in bed, thinking about his training. Days flew by as he became faster and faster, now comparable to a common tiger in terms of speed. The next three months passed quickly, and he became agile, dexterous, and patient. When he ran, all one could see was a blur.

Du Keishi also cultivated the Illustrious Tempest Monarch technique, and reached the fifth level of the True Seed realm, his silver seed now visible in the air, waiting for more Qi to be pumped into it.

The first day after the sixth month, Du Keishi was handed a manual and a book. The book was titled Summary and Basic Knowledge of Learning Martial Arts, while the manual was for the martial art Falling Wind Strides, an amazing Fei technique, pushing against the boundaries of Aruq. Once he was given this, Du Keishi was left to his own devices as he struggled to learn the martial technique.

It took the boy three days to learn the martial technique to a passable degree. The first two were spent reading the book and gaining an understanding of the meridians, which were centers of power in which Qi flowed through, the different stances and movements that could facilitate the flow of Qi and even add something unique. Du Keishi gained insight on how Qi worked in general, and one could now say that he was a martial genius, and that talent could not be wasted.