Chương 38: Chapter 37 - The Master

As she fell asleep, she idly wondered who had come up with the names for the different sword forms, and why they were all nature-based. Why weren't any of them called Snake Form, Hammer Form, or Farmer Form? As she drifted off, she dreamed of a sword form that broke an opponent's heart called Lovers-Quarrel Form, and another that slowly drained the light from the sun, called Bleeding-Darkness Form.

The next morning, after helping instruct the beginner's class, Kiara made her way to the second floor for her own lesson. She lost her spar five to three, but felt good about her performance. She hadn't ended any spars with zero points since her spar against Seltzer, and felt as if she could already intuit many movements that had seemed foreign to her only last week. Spending as much time as she had trying to master her three base forms was helping her in noticeable ways.

After her spar, she stayed at the facility, continuing to practice. Handel wasn't there, so she shelved her 'get him to spar with me' idea for later and instead focused on her own practice. The room slowly emptied, and hours passed. When she felt exhausted, she removed the dueling collar, which allowed her higher Endurance stat to remove some of her exhaustion, then continued practicing.

With her improved stats, she flowed through her three base forms one by one, transitioning at the end of each one without stopping. Then, she went back through them in a different order, transitioning partway through, from one to the next. She found that moving from one to the other became almost second nature now, and the three forms began to feel like a single, more comprehensive form, instead of three separate ones.

This was her first time feeling that way, and the epiphany was so stark she actually stopped what she was doing to sit down on the ground and think about it. She envisioned how each of the three forms fit perfectly into the others, and not just because the end of one could transition into the start of the next. They fit like a network of roads, that all connected simultaneously to each other, offering a multitude of paths to move from one to the next.

"Why did you stop?" Handel's voice sounded from behind her. She whirled around from where she sat, surprised to see him there. He was leaning casually against the wall with his arms folded, a piece of parchment held loosely in one hand. She hurried to her feet, giving a respectful bow.

"Master Handel! I didn't realize you had come in."

"Oh, only about ten minutes ago," he said with a smile.

"You were in the zone, I didn't want to interrupt. Why did you stop?"

"I… think I realized something. About the sword forms I've been practicing."

"Oh?" He raised an eyebrow. She explained the epiphany she had had, as he listened intently. When she was done, he gave her a wide smile and clapped slowly.

"Very good, Shian. Very good. It takes many disciples of the sword years to discover what you have. Some never discover it at all. When I suggested you practice three forms until you mastered them, I didn't expect you to accomplish it quite so quickly." Kiara blushed slightly. That was high praise.

"I was already fairly familiar with two of the three forms."

"Have you considered which forms to add in next?" She thought about it for a moment.

"I already know Forest Form quite well, so it would feel most natural to work that one in next, I think. With the realization that I've had about how they all fit together, I'm excited to see how Forest Form interlinks with the others!" Handel nodded, then walked over to her. He extended his hand that had the paper in it, and she took it. It was the paper she had pinned to the board in the beginner's class with the different sword forms written out on it. She looked up at him.

"It's an interesting write-up," he said, "Give me a thirty second explanation of what it means." She looked at the paper for a moment, then back at him.

"Well, these are the nine most common sword forms, taught here at the academy. Three of them are offensive, three are defensive, and three are neutral. Each one focuses on certain principles and movements, and some forms are strong against others.

"For example, Fire Form prefers close quarters attack patterns, while Mountain Form leans towards powerful defensive swings. If a Fire Form user can get within the outer guard of a Mountain Form user, the Mountain Form is relatively weak, as the effectiveness of powerful swings are diminished in close quarters." Handel nodded along to her explanation.

"Is Mountain Form weak then?"

"Against Fire Form, I guess," she said with a shrug. He smiled devilishly.

"Prove it."

"Uh… huh?"

"Prove it!" he said again. He pulled out a dueling collar and strapped it around his neck, then tossed one to her. A practice sword materialized in his hand, and he took up Mountain Stance. His smile was getting bigger.

"I'll stick solely to Mountain Form, and you stick solely to Fire Form." Kiara put on the dueling collar, and felt her stats drop. All of her well laid plans to try and get him to spar with her, and all it had taken was to write up a short report on sword forms? Not that she was going to complain, this was what she had been hoping for! If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it. She launched into Fire Form, advancing quickly on his position.

As expected, his first few blocks were powerful and attempted to keep her at bay. After the third block, however, she was able to slip by his outer guard, and move in close for some strikes. She smiled to herself. This was going just how she had imagined. His next two blocks were subpar, as Mountain Form didn't lend itself well to close quarters strikes. This was why most people would switch to a new form once their outer guard was broken like that.

With the subpar blocks, she quickly found her opening, and moved to strike his leg. He moved it in the nick of time and she missed by a hair. He retaliated, and she grunted as she blocked his parry. Another opening came up a few swings later, and she swung for his head. He ducked under her swing just in time. Her smile began to fade as his parry almost caught her in the ribs. She had to roll out of her stance to avoid it, back past his outer guard.

She quickly found herself dodging powerful swings, as she had given him an opening. She was able to correct her stance and move back inside of his outer guard a few seconds later, but each time she thought she had an opening, he was able to dodge it just in time. How was he doing that? He never moved out of Mountain Form, and even overexaggerated some of the movements to make sure she knew he was sticking to it like he'd said he would.

After a minute or two of sparring, he picked it up a notch, and started catching openings in her movements. He landed a hit on her leg, two on her torso, and one on the side of her head, all within just a few seconds of each other. He pulled back away from the spar, holding up a hand to indicate they should pause.

"So, what do you think?" he asked, his smile still stuck on his face. She scratched the back of her head.

"Well… maybe I misunderstood something? Is Mountain Form strong against Fire Form?" He laughed.

"No, your intellectual understanding of the forms is correct, and your write up on them was good. What do you think it means for one form to be strong against another form though?" She thought about it for a bit. Her response two weeks ago would have been that the stronger form was simply better than the weaker form, and a fighter would have to switch forms to counter attack properly. Now though?

Her perspective had changed over the past couple of weeks as she practiced these three forms, and now even more so after sparring with Handel.

"I guess the idea is that a form's patterns and movements tend to expose an opponent's weaknesses more easily based on which form they themselves are using. It's an unbalanced interaction, where one form will tend to lead to more openings and opportunities compared to the other."

"That's right, very good! Using a form that is strong against another form will simply provide you more opportunities to punish your opponent's mistakes. Your ability to notice those mistakes and take advantage of them is dependent on your skill and your level of focus at the time.

"If I were to fight myself, hypothetically, using those same two forms, the version of me using Fire Form would beat my Mountain Form Self maybe eighty percent of the time. Or rather, that's the distribution of hits I would expect in a spar between the two forms. However, a more skilled fighter can win with a form that is considered weaker, simply because they may be able to spot more weaknesses than their opponent can, and take advantage of them more easily." Kiara nodded. That made sense.

"Let's go again," Handel offered.

"This time, I won't use my sword at all." Kiara stared at him slack-jawed for a moment. Was he serious? He was already waiting in Mountain Stance, so she supposed he was. Once she shook off her surprise, she entered Fire Stance and moved forward again. She closed the distance quickly, and with no weapon to defend himself with, she aimed straight for his chest. He fell smoothly out of Mountain Form as she arrived, and went into… Hmm. Well, that doesn't look like a form at all. She swung, and he ducked under it.

She followed with a stab, and he side stepped it. She used her footwork to re-position, then tried again. A duck, a dodge, a sidestep. A dodge, a sidestep. She realized that he knew Fire Form well enough to have a good idea of where she would attack next. And so, on her next attack, instead of a swing, she broke out of the form and executed a thrust, right for his heart. He slipped to the side and smoothly grabbed her wrist, stealing the sword from her hand.

He pulled her slightly off balance, and she found the sword at her throat in the blink of an eye. He hadn't been moving faster than her, he was simply… better? That didn't quite cover it. His defense was perfect. It was over only a few seconds after they had started, and true to his word, he hadn't even used his own sword to beat her. It was almost like he could predict her next move. Knowing Fire Form, he certainly had an idea of what movements she would attempt, but it was more than that.

Any given swing or thrust could be aimed differently, timed differently, etcetera. He wasn't just dodging the theory of where she would strike next, he was dodging the actual attacks. She hadn't stood a chance.

"How… how did you do that? What form was that?" she asked in disbelief. He smiled, returning her sword to her.

"No form. That was just me dodging your attacks."

"How?" she asked. It was over so fast, she was still reeling from the suddenness of the defeat.

"Your foot placement and how you distribute your weight tells me where you plan to move next. Your posture and shoulder movements telegraph your attacks before they happen." That… huh. That made a lot of sense, actually.

"Can you teach me?" she asked in earnest. He snorted out a laugh.

"I am teaching you. Why do you think you've been attending my classes for the past few months?"

"Well, I mean sword forms are great and all, but apparently they're useless compared to whatever you just did. Teach me that!" Smiling, he shook his head.

"They're not useless at all. It's important to master the sword forms first, so that you know proper footwork and attacking patterns. Once they are second nature to you, it's important to know how and when to transition from one to the next, so that you can optimize your chances for finding openings and mistakes in your opponent's movements. This is the foundation that you're learning right now." She pouted a bit, but inwardly was paying rapt attention.

She wanted to soak up as much knowledge as she could from the master himself. She didn't know the next time she would get to learn from him directly again.

"Once that is second nature," he continued, "and you have mastered all nine forms, you no longer have to think about your own movements anymore. Then you can focus on studying your opponents movements, and begin to see what they will do before they do it.

"New sword forms will open to your mind, variations of the nine, plus others. Ways to move, where to place yourself for the best advantage, how to corral your opponent onto unfavorable terrain, how to punish their mistakes and take advantage of their openings. It all builds on the foundation that you're studying now." Kiara heard what he was saying, but still wondered if it wouldn't hurt to start learning some of what he had just shown her. She knew better than to press for it though, after his whole spiel.

She bowed, dramatically low.

"I see. Thank you, master Handel. I will practice until I've mastered all nine forms! Then you can teach me whatever it was that you just did." Coming out of her bow, she smirked slightly to let him know she was just messing with him. He laughed again.

"Fair enough. Keep up the good work Miss Yountal!" With that, he turned and walked away, leaving her alone in the arena.