Chapter 19- Burning Wild

The Thunderous Palm flowed out, the left hand striking for the face, the right sweeping for the ribs. Iron Breaking fists smashed the palms away and continued towards Tian’s face. Slaps turned to deflections, wrapping around the incoming fists and diverting their strength. Then both sides withdrew and reset.

As the hands moved, so did the feet. Hong stomped forward, seemingly ready to plant herself and trade blows- before exploding forward with the brilliant footwork of a born boxer. Tian let himself slide around, retreating as she advanced, pressing to the side when she thrust, but never letting her get a clean angle.

His fingertips thrust for her eyes, a sharp spear extending from his sleeve. Hong shifted her head, slipping the thrust and answering with a heinous kick to Tian’s thigh. Tian got his shin up to block it, and felt like he broke his leg. The impact was brutal, like kicking an iron pole. He tried to ride the momentum backwards and counter with a return palm thrust, but Hong danced back, staying just out of his range.

Tian felt his leg stiffening. He could heal it easily enough, but this was a battle of skill. No vital energy. He frowned. Iron Breaking art. It wasn’t just a boxing technique.

“You have refined your body,” Hong said, not even slightly out of breath.

Tian jolted, then half smiled. “Funny. I was going to say the same to you.”

“I’ll stop going easy then.”

Hong Liren advanced, moving with tiny steps left and right but always closing. Her upper body swayed, but each step was firm. She led with a jabbing left, a second left, then the right came in with a brutal hook that sounded like a saber ripping through the air.

Tian blocked the jabs, but the hook caught him on the button and dropped him. As he fell, he lashed out with a foot and caught the side of Hong’s knee. He wasn’t sure if his foot or her knee took more damage.

His hands slapped the ground, breaking his fall. He caught his foot around Hong’s ankle and yanked forward. Her stance broke for a second, but it was long enough for Tian to roll back to his feet. Hong’s foot scraped his cheek as he straightened up. She was on him now, fists flying, elbows smashing in, knees striking up and over. It was like trying to fight someone with eight arms. Every part of her was an iron club.

Tian retaliated, hands flashing, his own elbows and knees trying to capitalize on gaps. It was a losing trade. His skill with Thunderous Palm simply wasn’t as polished as Hong’s grasp of Iron Breaking Art. He grunted. Losing was habit forming. He didn’t intend to lose. He fell back towards the cubbies on the wall.

Hong advanced with steady ferocity. Her face was a mask of focus, cold screening the blaze in her eyes. Every step was an attack- if not directly, then in positioning. Constantly moving to strike without permitting retaliation. Tian recognized the style, if not the technique. It was the hard external arts his brothers favored.

Brother Bo told him when he first got Thunderous Palm- not many on the Southern Border practice palm arts, though it was popular amongst those who mingled in murky waters. He had always wondered about that. Surely being able to liquify someone’s internal organs with a single slap more than made up for its short range and high skill requirements.

His brothers were a lot of things, but ‘bad at boxing’ wasn’t one of them. Hong was demonstrating exactly why hard arts were favored. Fierce, direct, powerful. No need for any complicated methods. Just kill.

Well. He had always relied on complicated methods. It was all a weak boy could do. So let it be complicated.

Tian leapt up and backward to land crouched on a high cubby, then immediately pushed off to deliver a crushing shin to Hong’s head. She blocked, staggering, but immediately shifted to grab his leg. Tian borrowed the force of her block to spin in place, driving his other heel into Hong’s temple.

She slipped it. The kick came out of her blind spot, lightning fast, and she still managed to lean her head back and dodge. Then her hand came up and wrapped around his ankle like an iron hoop. Tian knew what she was going to try next- the ground slam. He started contracting his body, ready to grapple with her, but the slam didn’t come.

Since he was already near to the wall, Hong just lunged straight forward. A perfect spear thrust, with a terribly imperfect spear. Tian cracked his back and skull against the stone wall of the cave, blacking out for a moment.

“I yield.”

Tian didn’t try to get up. The ceiling was spinning. He closed his eyes and circulated The Advent of Spring. Something twisted in him. He rolled to his side and threw up.

Concussion, damn it all to hell. Keep cycling Advent of Spring. It will fix you up soon enough, but you can forget going anywhere today.

Grandpa Jun sounded grim. Tian didn’t say anything else. He just lay still and cycled his art. He could hear Hong stomp off, and what might have been a muffled scream of frustration. He wasn’t really paying attention. Tian grabbed the cursed dagger and breathed, letting his art heal him.

Some time later, he felt a cool cloth wiping his face, and something removed the smell of sick from near him. Hong must be cleaning up. A few moments later, a cool cloth was gently pressed to his forehead.

She didn’t say anything. He didn’t either. He wasn’t sure how he felt. Not good physically, but there was something painful in him emotionally, and he couldn’t quite get his hands around what it was. Among other things, he definitely didn’t like losing. But it was something more than that.

“Fists and feet have no eyes. It’s normal to be hurt while sparring.” Hong Liren’s voice was soft. “Because accidents are in the hands of fate, but negligence and fuck ups are in the hands of humans. And since we are human, we can’t be negligent and we really can’t be fuck-ups. That’s what Sister Sia told me. Then Sister Bai dragged her off by her ear, scolding the whole way, but she didn’t disagree.”

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“Sounds like something Brother Meng would say.”

“He was the brother you lost recently, right?”

“Among… too many others.”

“Sister Sia died a month ago.”

“I am sorry. She sounds like a good sister.”

“She was. She really, really was.”

Tian didn’t say anything else. What was there to say?”

“I’m sorry.” Her voice was quiet.

Tian felt something loosen within him. A knot he hadn’t even realized was tightening.

“I was stupid, and frustrated, and I’d already lost to you twice, once in front of an elder, and, and, I’m on the Disciplinary Squad.”

Tian wasn’t sure what that had to do with anything.

“You know you have an incredibly readable face, right?” Hong asked.

“I do?”