The next morning, during a break between periods of chopping at pine trees, Yipachai found himself eagerly tightening and loosening his grip on the hilt of his wooden practice sword. True to his word, Harato had given it to him bright and early, but Yipachai had yet to test it out—other than a few wild swings he had taken on his way to the copse of trees.

  The entire sword was made out of a single piece of pale-colored pine. The smith had simply cut the shape out of a large spare plank, leaving a thin circular knob as an imitation of a handguard. The blade section wasn’t as gracefully curved as the other swords Harato made, but the smith had said it shouldn’t impede Yipachai’s progress for some time. Harato had also taken a long strip of cloth and wrapped it around the handle. He’d then tied it off and left about a hand’s length of excess on either end. Yipachai could already see himself masterfully manipulating the blade so that the tassel flowed smoothly behind it. It would be as artistic as Harato had described it.

  All in all, the sword felt good in Yipachai’s hand. Longer than one of his outstretched arms, and with a good weight, it felt like he was using the real thing—or at least that’s what he imagined a real sword would feel like.

  Now, after working for what felt like a good amount of time, Yipachai’s muscles were warm and he was ready to begin his first day of sword training. He opened Moyomo’s The Art of Fencing and began devouring the first page.

  It was just a bunch of words.

  Yipachai skimmed over the pages, flipping through them rapidly. The old swordsman started with a bunch of philosophical discussion about what swords were and why they were to be used—the kinds of things that Harato had said when he had first given Yipachai the book.

  Maybe he could read those parts in the evenings, when it was dark and he couldn’t practice. But right now, he wanted to move. He skipped ahead to the first section with illustrations. It depicted a simplified Sentient form holding the sword in a guarding position.

  This shouldn’t be too hard.

  Holding the book in one hand and his practice sword in the other, Yipachai quickly glanced over the accompanying text as he tried to mimic the sketch. One foot forward, pointing straight ahead. The other a little ways back, pointed off to the side. Knees bent, hips at a slight angle. Carefully, he squatted down to set the book on the ground, then took the sword in both hands and aimed the tip at a would-be opponent.

  Before long, Yipachai’s legs burned. Standing still in such an odd stance also made him feel off-balance, and he wobbled a few times, stepping out with one foot to catch himself before resuming the stance. Once he was relatively stable, he peered down to read what the book would tell him to do next.

  Hold the stance for one hundred breaths.

  A flicker of annoyance went through him, but he obeyed and settled into the stance, breathing slowly and ignoring the heat that was building in his thighs.

  One. Two. Three…

  Yipachai made it to his tenth breath before giving up. “I’ll have used my whole break if I do this,” he grumbled to himself as he picked up the book again and continued scanning the pages.

  Next were some close-up sketches of how to grip the sword hilt. It was different than he had expected, with a more relaxed hand position than he would have had naturally. He tried holding on to his practice sword the way Moyomo instructed, but it didn’t feel stable. How was he supposed to cut things if he was holding it so lightly?

  Sighing, it occurred to Yipachai that he probably ought to get back to work. He carefully closed the book and set it down somewhere safe from spraying sap, sweat, and wood chips. Then he traded his sword for the axe he had left leaning up against a nearby log and settled into the rhythm of chopping once more.

  Sword practice gave him something to think about while he worked, but it wasn’t his only distraction. Small water mhonglun frolicked in the stream, splashing and singing joyful melodies. Yipachai occasionally watched them while he caught his breath, and wondered if they were different from the sea mhonglun and the river mhonglun, or if they just changed once they drifted downstream to larger bodies of water.

  Pingou was there, too. The gray-feathered heron often stalked along the bank, hardly disturbing the reeds and other water plants that grew there as he searched for his prey. The dark blue feathers atop his head contrasted sharply with the white of his face and his bright gold beak, so Yipachai never had a problem spotting him again.

  Every so often, Yipachai would try to reach out with his mind to ask Pingou a question. His queries usually elicited polite responses, followed by polite refusals to engage in any form of deeper conversation.

  By the time his next break came around, Yipachai’s muscles were already sore and a bit unsteady, but his excitement about the sword compelled him to continue his learning. He still had a bit of time before Harato called him for lunch. He could hear the clangs of a hammer on steel drifting to him from the smithy.

  Using his sleeve to wipe the sweat from his face, Yipachai picked up The Art of Fencing once more and turned to the section on striking. After all, what was the point in learning the sword if all he did was sit still in some stupid, unbalanced stance?

  The first strike he found was a simple, overhead slash. It looked simple enough. And it used the stance that he had learned earlier that morning. Yipachai chose a low branch of a nearby sapling, about the same thickness as a few of his fingers.

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  After setting the book down next to him, he exhaled slowly and sank into his stance, his sword pointed out at the tree’s trunk. He studied the series of sketches that followed for a few moments, then with a grunt, he extended his arms high above his head, then slammed them down as hard as he could on the tree branch as if he were attempting to chop it off with a single blow.

  Pain erupted in Yipachai’s hands as a jolt vibrated through them. He released the sword hilt, which then caused the blade to rebound and smack him in the shoulder bone. He hissed, attempting to hold back a stream of curses that would have made Elder Satsanan blush, as his eyes welled with tears, his hands still buzzing, his shoulder already swelling. He kicked at the wooden practice sword, sending it skidding along with a puff of leaf litter and dirt.

  Stupid sword. Stupid book. Stupid everything.

  Yipachai paced back and forth, shaking out his hands. Why in the ever-rolling sea would they not stop hurting? He gritted his teeth and growled, but it took a long time before the tingling pain finally subsided.

  When his temper had cooled somewhat and his hands no longer burned, Yipachai returned to pick up both the book and his sword. A long crack ran down from the tip of the blade section. He winced. Hopefully Harato wouldn’t notice.

  Rather than practicing another strike against an unyielding target, Yipachai decided to move on to some of the forms that the book described. That way, he could at least get used to the movements, and he’d be able to save his hands from another round of punishment.

  He picked the one that looked the easiest and started immediately, studying the text and half-mimicking the sketches until he was sure he had it memorized.

  Stance, step, slash, step, slash, step, sheathe.

  Once he was ready, he set the book down once more and attempted the form on his own. Stance. That part wasn’t so bad. If he didn’t sit in it for too long, he wouldn’t stumble. Step. A little wobble. Slash. That felt good. There was even a soft sound of rushing wind as he whipped the blade down. Step. Yipachai hurriedly flowed into the next step, but felt himself teetering off balance. He recovered. Slash. This time, he swung across his body at an angle. It was easy without targets. Sheathe. It took him four tries before he could slip the sword’s blade through his belt without it catching on anything.

  Had he done it? Was that what the form was supposed to feel like? A sudden awareness of himself and the movements of his body came over him, and he grew ashamed of his performance. He had stumbled on nearly every step. Even his slashes were probably awkward and rigid.

  With a sigh of both frustration and weariness, Yipachai sank down to squat on his haunches. He hated how stupid he probably looked. Some Hetanzou kid swinging a Banqilun practice sword around in the woods and pretending he was some kind of hero? It was ridiculous. This whole plan was ridiculous.

  Yipachai took a few deep breaths to settle his heart, a practice he had learned as a child in the monastery. Then, he focused on taking in his surroundings. By concentrating on each of his senses, he could relieve the anger, the anxiety that had gripped him.

  He was in the familiar copse of pine trees, with the same familiar axe and the same old smell of sap and wood chips. This was a safe place. Not far off was the stream, burbling along as it made its way to the North Sea, the sound providing a rhythmic foundation for the songs of the mhonglun that played in the clear water.

  And then there was Pingou, always audibly silent, but almost always present. Yipachai exhaled and relaxed his shoulders as he studied the heron. Every step the bird took was careful, deliberate. Smooth and controlled, though it looked effortless. As Pingou moved, his sinuous neck stretched in counterpoint, keeping his head still until it was inevitably time for it to catch up to the rest of his body. Graceful, fluid movements that cooperated with the natural momentum of his body. Far different from Yipachai’s haphazard steps, his jerking slashes that felt more like chopping wood than the dance that Harato and this Moyomo Kirahana said fencing should imitate.

  Inspired, Yipachai stood and began the form again, this time considering his whole body as he moved. He adjusted his grip so that it was in line with how the book said it should be. It felt awkward, but maybe it would help him relax.

  As he moved through the steps and slashes, he thought he could sense improvement. He went slowly, but steadily, and though he stumbled once, the whole form seemed to work better than the last time.

  “Use your hips,” Harato said, causing Yipachai to jump. He hadn’t seen the smith approach. “Your arms don’t do the work. They just follow the energy the rest of your body creates.”

  Yipachai nodded once and tried the cross-body slash again. This time, he started with a twist of his hips rather than a chopping motion. Surprisingly, despite the slow movement, Yipachai could feel that the strike had more power behind it than before.

  “I thought you said you couldn’t teach me,” Yipachai said.

  Harato shrugged. “I can’t. But I’ve been around enough swordsmen to know a thing or two. And besides, a smith who doesn’t know the basics of using the tools he creates would be a foolish one indeed.”

  The Banqilun paused, considering Yipachai and stroking his beard before continuing. “And one of the basics I know is that you should always listen to your master and do exactly as he says. I believe you should still be on stances, shouldn’t you?”

  Yipachai gave him a sheepish grin, then it was his turn to shrug. Harato had caught him, but he still wasn’t convinced he needed to go through all the stances and single strike exercises before moving on to forms.

  Harato lowered his eyebrows, a small smile hidden in the corner of his mouth. The look said he knew exactly what Yipachai was thinking. “Lunch is ready when you are,” he said, then strode off back toward the house, leaving Yipachai alone in the copse of trees.

  Over the next several days, Yipachai continued to study and practice in between bouts of chopping wood, gathering iron sand from the beach, washing it out in the stream, and tending the burn pits where Harato made charcoal. When the smith wasn’t around, he would secretly flip ahead and work on forms. The Banqilun man caught him once or twice, and when he did, Yipachai would blush and return back to the basics.

  He was getting better, though. Yipachai could sense it. His movements became more sure, and his balance improved. Doing chores for Harato also helped him get stronger and build up his endurance.

  Pingou also became Yipachai’s regular companion and informal tutor. The heron often accompanied him during his chores—though he swore he only happened to be hunting wherever Yipachai was. And so Yipachai was able to study the bird’s movements and let them inspire his own. He began to understand the philosophy that the swordsman Moyomo described in The Art of Fencing.

  It truly could be like dancing, or wielding a paintbrush. And more and more, Yipachai found himself eager to find paint to create art with—the blood of the wicked, just as Moyomo said. He dreamt of finding bandits and pirates and bringing them to justice, dead or alive. He could see how his forms countered their simple, untrained, hacking slashes with smooth, artistic cuts.

  Maybe he wasn’t ready to take on someone like Mangsut, but Yipachai imagined he could take on some other low-lifes if he needed to.

  He just never thought he’d face them again so soon.