The Two Monitors
After Zheng-Fu started to practice for a short while, he heard footsteps in his direction. A group of boys saw him and approached him, then one of them said…
“Yo!”
“That’s Zheng-Fu, the bookworm! What is he doing around here?” One of the boys said loudly and looked down at Zheng-Fu at the same time…
“Isn’t he doing his silly thing studying?”
“Hey! Everybody! Follow me! Looks like we’re getting to do something fun today.”
“Hahaha!”
The group of people that approached Zheng-Fu was a group of children around his age. These were the children who liked to pick on him regularly. They started teasing him harshly ever since he started the classes with Master Huang. The head of the gang was the son of one of the great elders in the clan. This was why they were not afraid of anyone and always treated Zheng-Fu badly…
“What’s up, you big Zhuàngyuán trash!” One of the children in the group greeted Zheng-Fu. He tried to get into Zheng-Fu’s face to provoke him…
“Hahaha!”
“The big Zhuàngyuán!”
Zheng-Fu did not react to that. He kept still fixating his eyes on the martial arts manual that he brought with him. This instead provoked the boy who tried to get on Zheng-Fu’s nerves. The boy said,…
“Hey! Didn’t you hear me, you trash!”
Zheng-Fu remained silent still. He did not even look up to see those children. He thought that it was not necessary to respond to them at all. The fact that Zheng-Fu successfully reached the fifth level of the Qi Gathering stage made him confident enough to not fret. He knew that his energy level was not lower than the gang’s leader at all…
“Acting so touch, eh trash? Fine! We’re going to use you as our sandbag today!” The leader of the gang prepared to lay his fists on Zheng-Fu, but then he stopped due to a loud intervention…
“Stop!”
The boy halted his fist and turned to look for the origin of the voice, which came from behind the trees. As he turned to look, he saw two shadows walking out of the forest and stopped in front of his gang members…
As soon as the two shadows reached the group, one of them said fiercely, “What do you think you’re doing? Did you forget the clan’s rules?”
“The Monitors?!”
Everyone in the gang looked at the two shadows shockingly and frightenedly because they were the Monitors who were assigned to keep an eye on the clan’s property. However, one of the gang members was not afraid of the Monitors and that was because he was the gang’s leader and the son of one of the clan’s great elders…
That boy gave an ignorant look to the Monitors and then said, “Why do I have to care to know or not know the rules? You’re just the Monitors, don’t butt in! It’s not good to intrude!” The boy said while making a snobbish face…
“You arrogant boy! Don’t you think that we wouldn’t dare to punish you because you’re the son of the clan’s great elder! Even your father gives us respect. What makes you think that you could defy us like this?” One of the Monitors scolded the boy angrily…
“My father? Respecting you, monitors!? You’re delusional! Great! I’m going to tell my father that you brought him down to your level.” The gang’s leader said, bulging his eyes to insult the Monitors…
Boom!
All of a sudden, there was a strong force projected causing a loud explosive sound. It created a huge hole in front of the gang, a hole that was large enough to fit all of the gangsters in it. The incident made the boys falter instantaneously…
“What the heck do you think you’re doing? Did you want to kill us? I’ll tell my father that you two harassed me.” The gang’s leader shouted angrily…
“Hah! That was just a warning. If you continue to disrespect us, your head will be the thing that explodes, not the ground in front of you.”
“Let’s go, boss!”
The rest of the gang members who stood behind the gang’s leader almost fainted from the incident. Dong-Chu, the gang’s leader, noticed how scared his boys were. So, he tried to make a point with the Monitors, saying “I’ll not forget about this. It’s not over yet. I’ll tell my father to get rid of you!” They all left after Dong-Chu finished threatening…
After the gang left, the two Monitors turned to Zheng-Fu, who stood behind them in a completely calm manner. They felt sort of amazed to see that kind of reaction from him. If it was a normal kid, the reaction would be dramatic, but Zheng-Fu was not like that…
When Zheng-Fu saw the Monitors looking at him, he rushed to cup his hands and said, “Thank you, Elders, for helping me.” He bowed to both elders to pay respect…
“Don’t mention it. You can rest assured that no one would harm you as long as you are in the area that we protect.” One of the Monitors proudly told Zheng-Fu…
“Thank you, Elder!”
“Anyway, what have you been up to? You’ve been coming here for months and acted strangely with your movements.” The Monitor on the left-hand side asked Zheng-Fu with curiosity…
“Well…”
Zheng-Fu did not know how to respond to that question. He could not tell the Monitors that he had been practicing Qinggong because the Qinggong skill that he practiced did not exist in the clan…
The Monitor could see the reluctance in Zheng-Fu’s gesture and understood that he might not want to answer the question, so he said, “It’s alright if you don’t want to answer the question. We won’t force you.” He said and gave Zheng-Fu a friendly smile…
“The reason why I’ve been coming here is to practice martial arts, sir. I was born weak. That is why I get picked on all the time, so I decided to come here to practice because it doesn’t seem like anyone would often come here.” Zheng-Fu answered the question with an innocent facial expression…
“I see. You look kind of smaller than your age. That’s why you did all those silly-looking movements. How about you let us teach you?”
“Thank you, sir, for accepting me as your student.”
“It’s my pleasure. So, what fighting technique are you practicing now?”
Zheng-Fu hurried to bring out the three fighting skills manuals from his cloth bag and then said, “There you go, sir. They are the “Sword of Willow Leaves”, the “Sword of Wind”, and the “Belt Sword” skills, sir!”
“What did you just say? The “Sword of Willow Leaves”, the “Sword of Wind”, and the “Belt Sword” skills!? Are you practicing these sword skills?” The Monitors had the same reaction that Zheng-Fu’s father and the Tower elder did when they first saw that he chose these manuals…
“Yes, sir. I’m practicing all three of them, sir.” Zheng-Fu said while feeling confused by the startled looks on the Monitors’ faces…
“These are not easy skills. At least they are not easy enough for you to practice by yourself. These are the skills that are close to the ones in the intermediate levels. Although they belong to the beginner levels, they are the higher skills of all beginner levels.”
“I understand that, sir, but I think that these three skills are exactly the right ones for me.”
“Well, all right. Let’s just say that you’re very lucky because both of us have been practicing these three sword skills for a while now. Even though we don’t know much about them, we can still give you some advice.”
“Thank you very much, Elders!”
Zheng-Fu did not know how to explain his situation, so he brought up the fact that he had been trying to achieve these particular sword skills. And it turned out that he did the right thing to bring it up because the Monitors just happened to have the experience of practicing them too…
“What would you prefer me to call you, sir!?”
“Hahaha! Just look at how you speak… You really know how to say things, kid! My name is Tong-Tieng. I’m the elder who monitors all affairs around the clan’s estate.”
“Whoa whoa whoa! Hope you don’t exclude me, brother Tong-Tieng.”
All of a sudden, there was another voice rang up. It was similar to Tong-Tieng’s. They were almost the same voices. People tended to be unable to differentiate between the two…
“Ha! Tong-Lang! I thought you didn’t want to be involved because you kept silent. So, you couldn’t stand being left out…hahaha.”
“Hello, boy, I’m Tong-Lang, who is loved by everyone, especially girls.” Tong-Lang greeted Zheng-Fu with a smile…
“Please accept my respect to you, Elder Tong-Tieng, Elder Tong-Lang.” Zheng-Fu cupped his fists and paid respect to both elders humbly…
Tong-Tieng adored Zheng-Fu’s manner, which was something that made him smile satisfyingly, and then said, “You are Elder Kong-Shi’s son, aren’t you?”
“Yes, Elder Tong-Tieng.”
“I know it! You both look alike! It’s too bad your body is too small though, but never mind. So, which level are you in?” It was Tong-Lang’s turn to ask…
“The fifth level of the Qi Gathering stage, sir!”
“The fifth level of the Qi Gathering stage!”
“Whoa! Not bad at all! Not bad at all! Your level is not bad at all, even though you look too small for the level.” Tong-Lang said and laughed at the same time…
“Did you say that you are practicing the “Sword of Willow Leaves”, the “Sword of Wind”, and the “Belt sword” skills?”
“Yes, sir!”
“And how far along are you with all the skills?” Tong-Tieng did not really need to hear the answer when he asked Zheng-Fu the question. He believed that Zheng-Fu probably understood only half of one part or just one part of those skills. He thought that was already too advanced for the boy…
“I have managed to break through four parts of the “Sword of Willow Leaves” skill. For the rest of the skills, I haven’t started yet.” Zheng-Fu explained with ease about his situation with the sword skills that he had been practicing…
“Four parts!”
Did you understand up to four parts of that sword skill already? Within just a few months?!” Tong-Lang switched from smiling to being bedazzled after hearing that from Zheng-Fu…
“Yes, sir!”
Zheng-Fu confirmed with a naïve look on his face. If he told the two elders the truth, they were not going to believe him that he just picked up the manual of the “Sword of Willow Leaves” skill yesterday. And the reason why he could reach the fourth part of the skill was that there was a similarity between the skill and the “Willow-leaf Body” skill from the previous world…