SPLASH

Kenja lost his balance and fell into the water.

A snippy, old spirit gave him the evil eye. With bushy hair formed in the outline of a ‘W’, she had the appearance of a grumpy old woman with three afro horns. Her nasal voice betrayed a hint of contempt, “How many times was that, little boy?”

143 times. He fell into the water 143 times. She kept count.

A sword flew out of the water with two hands tightly gripping its hilt. It dropped the boy onto a swaying platform made of ice. Shivering, the boy steadied his balance before turning to the woman with a wide grin on his face.

“I’ve lost count, senior. How many volleys did I reach?”

Elder Grunty narrowed her eyes at him. “Thirteen. We’ve been at it for six hours now. Your pointless persistence in trying to beat my record is…ahem, admirable.”

Two male spirits stood afloat several pillars away from her and Kenja. Xiang Xin rolled his eyes at this petty sister of his, yet Huai Yi gave her a smirk of understanding.

While the establishment of a new record was a cause for celebration, the holder of ‘said’ record would have a more complex mixture of emotions, especially if a disciple were to continuously challenge the same trial. The repeated failure could be considered disrespectful to the trial and an insult to the record holder’s prestige, but she couldn’t say anything to stop Kenja since their leader had given his permission to keep trying.

Sakura dashed from the ice platform to a nearby Pillar of Will and carried Snail back on her blade.

He berated Sakura and Kenja, “Again?! Do you think I’m some sort of towel? Stop pulling me over here every time he falls down? A mere chill won’t kill him! And you…if you can’t do this, then stop wasting our time.”

Kenja gave Snail and Sakura an apologetic smile. Wasting time was exactly what he wanted to do.

In a low whisper, Kenja asked, “Snail, how is it outside?”

Since he held no hope towards beating a record and receiving the leading Pillar’s acknowledgment, his only way out of the Dragon’s Basin was the way they had entered which was currently surrounded by an audience awaiting his triumphant return.

Six hours should have been enough to make most of those waiting outside give up and return to their daily activities. Who would waste so much time waiting for a person with no estimated time of arrival? Since the sect was rewarded an influx of Qi on behalf of his (Sakura’s) accomplishments, everyone should be eager to cultivate within their respective caves/rooms.

Please, go be productive, brothers and sisters!

“There’s more people than before. Hard to count from here, but around five hundred of them now. What’s strange is that most of them aren’t just waiting. They took a seat in the stands and have begun meditating. It’s a shame you can’t follow their example, disciple. Instead, you’d rather bob for apples without any apples.”

Kenja was too surprised by Snail’s revelation to appreciate the witty metaphor regarding his fruitless endeavor. Why were they insistent on waiting for him to the point that they’d rather cultivate in a worse environment? Was he the only one who took cultivation seriously?

Go back to your rooms, you lazy disciples!

Snail sighed at the silent boy drenched in water. Kenja felt the water being pulled from his hair and clothes before being dumped back into the basin. The other spirits were amused that the mollusk would dry the child after every fall since a Qi Flourishing disciple could simply warm his body by circulating a small amount of Qi throughout his body.

Sakura flew Snail back to a pillar and resumed watching Kenja. He turned to face Elder Grunty, and with unfocused eyes, he stated, “Junior is ready to go again.”

“Hmph!”

A mass of water attacked him from behind, but he was able to sense and steer it with a swing of his arm. The icy platform he stood on swayed under his intense movements.

One volley.

Shortly after directing the projectile away, two other masses of water came flying at him from the left and right. He performed the same maneuver as before with both arms and drove both of them away with a ninety degree rotation. Due to the rushed movement, a toe slid off the platform causing the platform to bob more violently than before.

Two volleys.

The record for Qi Flourishing disciples was thirty-eight volleys, and after six hours, Kenja had learned four things about the ‘Flowing Water’ technique.

First, judging from the peanut gallery’s reactions, his timing and precision in the technique was above-average. This was most likely a result of his rare constitution that gave him greater influence towards external Qi, indirectly giving him a wider window of opportunity for diverting attacks away. As long as he saw it coming and was in a position to receive it, he was confident in handling anything at the Qi Flourishing stage.

Second, ‘to see it coming and receive it’ was much more difficult than he had first thought. While precision and timing was considered the foundation of this skill, one’s awareness and balance determined one’s mastery in it.

While each volley’s projectiles were semi-random in number, strength, direction and element, the difficulty in dealing with them rose successively. If he couldn’t quickly assess his surroundings to see where Elder Grunty’s attacks came from, he would be doused with water, burned to a crisp or blown off the platform by a gust of wind and thus end the trial.

Even if he could perfectly grasp the assault’s angles of attack, he would still need to plan his movements accordingly and within a short window of time. Should he swing left or right? Up or behind? Should he redirect all of them or block some with the others? Which should he block? Oh, and don’t forget about the shaky, swaying block of ice that threatened to turnover at a sneeze.

Around fall number 54, he questioned the necessity of using such a poor foothold for the trial, but Elder Grunty harrumphed at his ignorance, “The mountain does not bend to the wind. If you cannot grasp this, then just give up now.”

Apparently, minimizing one’s movement when wielding this technique was of the utmost importance. If he had to make grand sweeping gestures every time, the primary purpose of utilizing the ‘Flowing Water’ technique would be lost. Thus, the trial was held atop this makeshift platform of ice that forced the challenger to be wary of his movements, lest he slip and fall into the water.

SsSsSsSsSsSsS

Kenja swung a large ball of fire at a powerful gust of wind and intercepted the two slower projectiles made of water before curving them away.

Third, luck was an important factor in dealing with Elder Grunty’s administered challenges.

After the first three or four volleys, the pattern of attacks were random based on her whims. Because each volley’s plan of attack changed every time, Kenja couldn’t prepare himself for the subsequent tests by memorizing their patterns. Aside from each successive volley being slightly more difficult to handle than the previous one, everything was fair game. Elder Grunty sometimes increased the number or ferocity of her attacks; sometimes she tweaked their speed or angle of attack. Even their elements weren’t set in stone.

Whenever a ball of fire was summoned, Kenja was inclined to let it get closer to him because they were not only easier to see and feel, but since he was standing on a block of ice, the temperature increase was welcomed by the frigid boy. On the opposite end of the spectrum, he tried to stop the gusts of wind from approaching him because they were faster and more difficult to visualize while simultaneously blowing cold air as it swung past him.

WHOOOOSH

With a knowing smile, Kenja mentally cursed Elder Grunty’s wickedness as he did a quick three-sixty to divert four gusts of wind at the same time. Steadying himself once more, he barely managed to keep from sliding off the platform.

He preferred the patterns with only one or two powerful attacks instead of the multiple weak attacks that required footwork and quick decision-making, but ever since he had achieved his best record of nineteen volleys, the random patterns shifted more towards the numerous, low-power, high-speed variety. Now, the barrages flowed seamlessly one after the other, to the extent that he could no longer tell when one volley ended and the next began.

It was as if the Elder had noticed his preference and was purposely making things difficult for him.

And making things difficult for him was exactly what she was doing.

She had thought that his claim to have practiced for only ten minutes was just a bluff to lower their expectations so that he could put up a good show and impress them, but it took her and everyone else only seconds after administering the first volley to witness his form, or lack thereof.

He formed a giant arc with his arms and deflected that first ball of water away from him only to tumble headfirst into the pool. The irony of which caused Snail and the other spirits to chuckle.

At that point, all the wills knew that he must have been telling them the truth; otherwise, his talent in acting had truly surpassed the heavens.

Forced to repeatedly administer a test meant for veteran practitioners of her favorite technique, and to an utter novice no less, Elder Grunty was in a bitter mood. No matter how many times the little boy fell into the water, the sword pulled him back up, the snail dried him off, and the annoying ingrate would give her that irritatingly, innocent smile and ask for more.

So more she gave, frequently throwing volleys of one or two strong waves of energy. But to her surprise, those patterns that tested the disciple’s limits, the ones that were the most difficult for others such as herself, Kenja had the easiest time defeating them. The only time those attacks would end his streak occurred in the first hour, before he figured out how to maintain his balance against them. After that, they became ‘free passes’ that Elder Grunty had no desire of giving to the anomalous aberration and would only throw one in occasionally since she was under the supervision of her brothers and sisters to test impartially.

After reaching nineteen volleys, she had to take him seriously. A score of ten would have been commendable for an exceptional Qi Flourishing disciple and would have garnered forgiveness for his carefree nonchalance in making the challenge, but in six hours, Kenja had achieved nearly double that score. Such growth was both unexpected and unprecedented, even from a genius’ standpoint.

She shifted to a quantity over quality approach to undermine his primary weakness—his untrained balance, but she had to do it while maintaining a facade of fairness, so she made it as feasibly difficult on Kenja as possible without going overboard else her ‘softie’ brothers might accuse her of unfairness.

If only she could wipe that smile off his face!

“Hmph!”

With thinned eyelids, she summoned six semi-transparent bubbles and launched them from varying angles and at different times.

Kenja’s shoulders drooped at the sight of another multi-pronged attack, but because of the fourth thing he discovered, his smile didn’t waver:

This was fun!

Kenja couldn’t remember the last time he enjoyed something this much. The exhilaration was reminiscent of the first time he had fixed a broken spirit tool he had found in the garbage, or when he first decided to embark on the path of cultivation. Except this was dozens of times more fulfilling!

After three years of futile failures only to skim success with the support of a snail and a sword, his self-esteem did not come out unscathed. As a result, he was stuck masquerading as a woman, and he couldn’t perform the simplest of Immortal techniques on his own despite his cultivation stage. Frankly, it was demoralizing, even for the motivated and optimistic Kenja. But just look at him now!

Kenja swung his arms in a graceful and compact manner to intercept the balls of water and combine them into a single mass before lobbing them away. The platform swayed and bobbed on the water’s surface, but he stood firm and confident.

Finally, he was doing something Immortal-like, and he was doing it all on his own. Every swing of his arms or fall into the water refreshed that bright smile on his face. There was hope for him yet!

Kenja had, once again, lost count of which volley he was on, but it didn’t matter to him. He performed better when he stopped caring about his streak anyways. Plus his mind was too busy pondering over the reason his hundreds of awaiting admirers were set on idling until his return.

His eyes focused on the blob of water he had sent flying as it fell into the basin. Compared to the surface, there was a slight discoloration to it that wasn’t there before. It was a brighter and more vibrant blue.

…

An assault of two large fireballs attacked Kenja from the front and back. Despite the life-threatening and vicious aura emanating from the projectiles, Kenja’s smile widened at finally receiving a pattern he could handle with ease. Though, right before they reached his hands, his eyebrows shot up, and his smile flickered at a sudden realisation. He unconsciously took a step back from the center.

“Hey, pay attention, idiosciple!”

Kenja’s attention reverted back onto the incoming balls of burning death thanks to Snail’s warning. He realized that his posture and center of mass were no longer positioned to divert the attacks gracefully without slipping off the ice platform. To compensate, he lowered his arms and hands by a few a degrees, and then suddenly pushed his palms to the sky, above his head.

SsSsSsSsSsSsSsSsSsSsSsSsSsSsSsSsSsS

His response was quite late, allowing the flames to graze so close to his body that onlookers were unsure whether the challenge would be deemed over. The sizzling spheres swerved upwards and collided with each other in a blaze of glory six chi above Kenja’s head.

As if to quell their confusion, Elder Grunty’s frown darkened, and she instantly summoned the next volley while Kenja reoriented himself on the shaking platform, unwilling to give him time to correct his stance.

As they resumed their back-and-forth, Kenja was internally reprimanding himself.

How could he have forgotten about the keystones!?