HBWnovel Chapter 426: part 2
Chapter 426: part 2
I soak my body in magic and skill effects, letting them permeate into every cell of my body, even feeling a certain warmth, as if something was being activated inside the body, instead of just shrouding myself in magic. My body didn’t feel quite lighter and felt more rarified? As if it became diluted, and filled with mana, magic, and effects from skills, quite a strange feeling? Did I rest for too long?It still feels off somehow. Like I still had room to go further, but also already went too far. A weird sense of mismatch. Closely paying attention to my condition, I slowly start moving.
As I focus on the flow of qi I had grasped the previous night, I sync my breathing with the flow of magic, spells, and skill effects, merging them into one. For a moment, I felt as though my body was swelling from within, which startled me, but there was no self-destructive backlash. Let’s go.
「Phew, here I come~?」
Calling out, I exhale and step forward, concentrating the power coiling around and within me. My consciousness is rapidly accelerating, going faster and faster, sinking me into a time-dilated slow-motion world so deep it felt like I was reaching into the abyss.
As I dash forward, trying to tear through the heavy, sticky blue world, I felt a subtle reduction in resistance. The usual sluggish sensation as if my body turned into a clay doll that comes with slowed time wasn’t there, my movements were smooth, though they felt awkward and out of sync. Yeah, because I keep crashing.
「Gyaaahhh! Hesitating for a moment whether I should dodge, stop, or roll, and doing all three at once is a really greedy move, but what actually just happened?! I thought I had a pretty good idea of what is going on, but turns out, I don’t? What was that?」
「You were, too fast. A speed, that you have never, used before. A moment of confusion, and you went flying…」
「Only the body moved. The footwork fell behind. A gap between the awareness and control.」
(Bounce-Bounce)
According to Wisdom-san’s analysis, my consciousness was lagging behind my movements. In other words, my body was moving way more than I was intending.
After mentally replaying the mistake, I calculate corrections, and adjust the control and movement to align again, then dash forward once more. Thought Acceleration deepened even further creating an even greater time slow effect. And yet, instead of feeling heavier and slower, my body moved lighter and sharper. This means my speed and precision increased drastically, but my physical senses hadn’t caught up, creating a disconnect and throwing off my control.
Even after recalibration, I nearly crashed again and tried to stop with a staggered step, only to have my foot swept out from under me and go tumbling.
「Ahhh, so I can’t stop. I don’t have the physical capacity to kill that velocity and actually stop, and if I try to forcefully do that anyway without proper control, the recoil will wreck my body~? So you are tripping me on purpose to prevent damage from sudden stops?」
(Nod-Nod, Nod Nod, Jiggle-Jiggle)
Yeah, they were worried about me. By making me tumble and roll, they were diffusing the self-destructive feedback that would come from the recoil. Yeah, they are smiling from ear to ear, but they had no malice. No malice, but they are definitely enjoying this! I also happen to have a certain hunch about what I may or may not have done to cause this.
They say the third time’s the charm, but I’ve always been a charmer, so there was no difference. So I went rolling for the third time. My mind and body still weren’t in sync. It wasn’t just that my speed increased, my body itself was now generating greater speed. All I could do is to keep testing, accumulating data, turning it into experience, and refining my control. If it were just a simple SpE stat increase, I could calculate and adjust numerically, but since my body was creating the force that converted into speed, I had no choice but to let Wisdom-san gradually learn how much strength and speed I was producing.
Again and again, step in, kick off, swing the staff, twist, extend, try to halt, then tumble. Yeah, unless I convert that linear motion into rotational motion and then refine it into spiral motion, stopping becomes dangerous. I roll and tumble, but little by little, I’m getting the hang of it, and next time, I’ll roll with more elegance!
Still, no self-inflicted damage from my body falling apart. It seems that not only my strength and speed went up, but my endurance too. My body is changing. Thanks to the alchemical effect of the 『Orb of Life』namely『Body Refinement through Alchemy and Arts of Bedchamber』 my body was being rebuilt. That’s probably why I’d been forced to rest, either because the process needed uninterrupted downtime or because that period itself was dangerous. One way or another, it all was done on purpose. You could’ve just told me instead of going Bunny?
But in combat I can’t quite grasp my own movements. I probably should be starting with some gymnastics, but since there is a clear influence 『Arts of Bedchamber』 Tai Chi or something might be closer?
I shift my awareness and slowly start refining it, kneading the movements of my muscles together with the flow of the power I’ve gathered, working it into my body. It’s what you’d call Kung Fu training, well, I’ve only read about it in books or seen it in movies, so I can’t actually do Kung Fu or Snake Fist, but I can bring out snakes? To avoid discrimination, I’ll also need to develop and train something like Tentacle Fist, I guess.
Taikyokuken or Tai Chi is widely known as a health exercise, but its training progresses from forms, to push-hands, to sparring. The initial forms are performed slowly, with gentle, flowing movements, and through them one acquires proper posture, body mechanics, and a variety of combat techniques, which is why they’ve been adopted as a health practice. However, real combat movements are anything but slow, they are sharp, swift, and powerful. In essence, it can be said to be the culmination of a comprehensive martial art incorporating Taikyoku[1] philosophy, and among qigong methods[2], Taikyokuken is the one most widely integrated.
After working through the 24-form Taikyokuken, then the 48-form and the 18-method training, I adjust things through various combinations of Taikyokuken forms. But Armored Pres-san, Dancing Girl-san, and even Slime-san seem to have taken a liking to it, and it’s turned into a full Tai Chi lesson for everyone. From the Golden Rooster Stance (Do Li Bu) to the Empty Stance (Xu Bu), then to the Cat Stance (Ding Bu), and from the Bow Stance (Gong Bu) to the Drop Stance (Pu Bu), tracing the stepping forms while creating a flow of movement through advancing steps, retreating steps, and hooked steps. While refining it, I step precisely, gradually increasing speed. Martial arts and dance are born from footwork.
Then as I was combining the ten unarmed techniques with Pao Quan, Chuan Zhang, Fen Zhang, Tiao Zhang, while creating a flow through the entire body, even the girls in tight spats seem to have joined in on Taikyokuken. It looks like we might enjoy a healthy old age, but to reach that healthy old age, we first have to survive the present. The ultimate collaboration between Taikyokuken and those curvy spats girls before my eyes is so powerful it might give one a heart attack if you stare too hard!
From Push Palms (Tui Zhang) to Warding Palms (Lan Zhang), then from Sweeping Palms (Lou Zhang) into a Thrust Punch (Chong Quan), the girls all have various body control skills, so they actually look pretty authentic. Well, even if they’ve never done it before, they’ve probably seen it on TV or in movies? I’ve also issued them tonfa, so it should come in handy, and all those calories they’ve taken in will surely get burned off. This full-body exercise uses every bit of muscular strength, and even though it appears gentle, it demands far more exertion than it looks. The girls trace the forms as sweat flies. Dripping with sweat… this is getting dangerous?
[TL Notes: No, this isn’t the wrong novel, we are also doing Chinese Martial arts now. [1] Taiji (supreme ultimate), is believed to be a cosmological state of the universe and its affairs on all levels, including the mutually reinforcing, codependent interactions between the two opposing forces of yin and yang, as well as that among the Three Treasures, the four cardinal directions, and the Five Elements, which together ultimately bring about the myriad of things from the Eight directions, each with their own nature. This will come up later so I gave a full quote to avoid confusion about where all those fists and attack names come from. So basically, Taikyokuken or Tai Chi Chuan (cn) can also be understood as SUPREME ULTIMATE FIST. Fist as in unarmed martial technique. [2] Qigong, simply put, a spirit cultivation method. An ancient Chinese practice that cultivates qi (energy) through gentle movement, breathing, and meditation, which at times equated with breathing exercises/techniques. ]
(there will be more in a couple of hours)