Years Later and School

Ki. Otherwise known as Inner Energy or Breath or Life Force.

It's one of the four components that makes up a person and has a direct effect on the body. As in, the more Ki you have, the stronger your body will become. The more you revolve your Ki throughout your body, the more it is strengthened in terms of resilience as well, not just physical strength.

A person is made up of four things. Sim, Gi, Che and Hon. These mean, respectively, Mind, Breath, Body and Soul.

A person's Mind. Schemes, plans, tactics for battle - they all come from the mind and they're all implemented by the mind ordering the body what to do. Without an equally strong mind, a strong body is useless as it will have no direction or control.

A person's Breath or Life Force which is essentially Ki. Their vigor, their energy--the very fact they're alive. All of this comes from Life Force. Without sufficient Breath, the body, nor the mind will be able to sustain themselves.

A person's Body. Their speed, strength, durability--their innate physical prowess. The muscles, the bones, the tendons and the ligaments--the physical components of a person. They are what is used to interact with the physical world. Without the necessary strength of Body, a Martial Artist will never be able to make the full use or his Mind, Breath (Ki) or Soul.

A person's Soul. Their desires, aspirations and their desire to fulfill them. Without this, a person would be a husk with no desire to do anything.

A Martial Artist is someone who wishes to bring these things into balance but also to take them beyond the human limit.

They do this through Techniques and special Breathing Methods taught by certain Martial Arts Schools. The technique I use is the Black Heaven & Earth Technique taught by the--you guessed it--Black Heaven & Earth School. The nature of this school's martial arts revolves around using the circulation of Ki within the body to enhance the practitioner's body's performance and result in techniques with great force. This force is both internal (from Ki) and external (from the practitioner's body). The resulting force that comes from it is why it is seen as one of the better Techniques.

The start of any good Martial Artists 'career' should be when they're properly of age to start practicing. Like I am currently.

I'm 6-years-old. Up until this point, I did a few stretches and a bit of practice every morning and every night before I slept but other than that, I lived a relatively peaceful life. Why did I do this? So I didn't cripple myself, of course.

My Ki Center, the place where my Ki gathers and where I control the circulation of my Ki from, wasn't ready to start until this point. If I forced my practice, I could end up breaking my Ki Center which wouldn't mean I wouldn't be able to train, it would just mean I'd have to spend a lot of time fixing it. Plus, you can only break your Ki Center once and repair it. Break it a second time and you're crippled forever.

...That was a hard reincarnation to live through.

Training is done in steps. Right now, I was coming to the end of the first step:

Air Herding. Why is it called that? Because you're gathering the Ki in the air and pulling it into your body, like you're herding cattle where they're supposed to go. That place being my Ki Center.

Once you were reaching your Ki Center's limit, like I was right now, you moved onto the next step.

Power Distribution. This is when you evenly spread the gathered Ki throughout your entire body. Why do you do this? To strengthen the entire body by a little but mainly to make sure that there isn't a single place in your body that you can't summon Ki to. It serves as Control training, to be able to pull Ki anywhere in your body, anytime you want.

After distributing the Ki throughout my body, circulating it through the muscles, bones, organs, flesh and tendons, I brought it back to my Ki Center where it settled down and merged with the Ki there.

Letting out a steamy breath of air, I opened my eyes before standing up on my bed and looking at the calendar hanging over it.

The year 2000...It's odd to be back in the 21st century. The last time I was alive, it was the 1800s.

It was September. Which meant I had to go to school...again. I'd been to many different kinds of educational institutes over the years. Some when I got too big for my boots and people began to think I was a genius. Then I sometimes got suspected of being a demon's child when I got WAY too big for my boots...being burned at the stake hurts. A lot.

So this time, I played it a bit cooler. I knew what was coming, so I couldn't be idle and hang about in school throughout my years when I could be training instead. So I showed enough to get a pass as a Gifted kid.

I had plans to glide through school and graduate as soon as I could.

I'd be lying if I said it was only to train, however. I did want to help around the house with bills and that as well. What? I'm a filial son. I thought we'd covered that already.

I figured putting some of my future knowledge to use would've been possible if I were born a decade earlier...but I could still invest in stocks. Or I could just start robbing people. Either one works. What mom doesn't know can't hurt her, right?

"Leo, sweetie, are you up yet? We need to get going if I'm going to take you to school!" mom gave a shout and I looked over my shoulder before jumping off the bed and beginning to get dressed.

"Yes, mom. Just give me a second," I shouted back before dressing myself as quickly as possible before I went to the bathroom where I washed my face and brushed my teeth.

My mom, a lovely woman, was used to my mature behavior by this point and didn't bat an eyelid at it. She had taken me to the doctor a few times because of my relatively odd behavior but when it turned out I was more than fine, she got over it and continued to unconditionally love me. I took after my mother in appearance...or would it be better to say she took after me? Seeing as I look exactly the same as I did every reincarnation before now.

She has olive tone skin, a mix between a tan and light brown skin, with thick black hair that easily reached her shoulder blades and immersive green eyes that flickered between gentleness and love whenever she looked at me.

Or Lola, that little piece of shit. Lola being mom's pet cat who she'd had for a few years before she gave birth to me.

Mom loves her, Lola seems to put up with mom yada yada. But instead of being okay with me, the little fur ball hates my guts. If it weren't for my harder-than-average skin, I'd no doubt be covered in claw-shaped scars. Little bastard scratches me even when she walks passed me and I'm just sitting down.

--Ahem. Anyway, my mom's a pretty woman. Single, as well. Turns out my good-for-nothing dad ran out on us as soon as he knew she was pregnant. She didn't tell me this directly per se, but she did rant and rave about it when I was a baby. I simply listened and understood unlike most babies.

Looking at my own handsome little face in the mirror, I gave a pearly white smile to myself before getting down off of the stool I used whenever I had to use the sink--I hate being a kid--and I went to put my shoes on.

I was about to tackle the earlier 2000s educational system. It was gonna be a total blast.

...It's really gonna suck ass, isn't it?