• Solo • Taelis II

[Doran]

Ymiden 31, Arc 720

“Are you ready, professor?” Taelis wanted to know, raised a pale eyebrow questioningly and smiled very lightly at the Mortalborn that stood opposite of him, in a relaxed stance. The blue-skinned, white-haired and white-eyed Eidisi, Doran’s training partner was dressed in comfortable clothes that would not restrict his movements, just like the Mortalborn. Furthermore, both of the men were barefoot. Your kicks tended to be less damaging when you didn’t have any shoes on, and neither of them wanted to cause the other one serious harm. This was a training session rather than a real fight, after all.

“I am”, Doran confirmed and inclined his head fractionally. They had just warmed up as well as performed various kinds of stretches – warming up and stretching was a necessity when you planned on executing moved that were, perhaps, slightly acrobatic in nature, even when you were quite an experienced fighter. This time, they would go through a few exercises that were aimed at improving your balance, your stability and your flexibility together before they would spar and finally head to the Academy where both of them took part in a new research project, pertaining to the analysis of certain chemicals.

(The Mortalborn had recently decided to get a Diploma in Chemistry in addition to his Licentiate in Alchemy, as such was required for him to move beyond his current position, and Taelis was working on a degree in chemistry as well – it would be his first degree.)

Rather than kicking one of the training dummies that were lined up against one of the walls of the room that they had decided on for their practice session, they moved to the matted area in the center, and began to execute a series of air kicks, trying to mirror each other and trying to move in relative harmony. Practicing without a target forced you to focus on your technique as well as your balance more (maintaining his balance when he kicked was the one aspect of that relatively recently invented unarmed combat style that the Mortalborn still considered to be something of a challenge; he had been a swordsman for the better part of his exceptionally long life, and comparatively high kicks had simply never been necessary).

After approximately fifteen bits, they moved on to another part of the room that had some sort of foamy material on the floor. The Mortalborn’s eyebrows rose fractionally for a moment as he set a foot on it and noticed that his feet sank in slightly which was a most curious sensation. He had requested that particular room with a certain thought in mind though. The foamy material would cause further instability – and he did not only want to learn to maintain his balance on firm ground, but on various different kinds of surfaces.

He executed another kick, noticeably lower, with Taelis standing next to him rather than opposite of him this time, a look of calm as well as utter concentration on his face, and he moved more slowly than he had moved before. Practicing on this new kind of surface required him to pay more attention to how he distributed his weight and how exactly he positioned his body. His first couple of attempts were met with mixed success, which was something that did not discourage him and that he was not embarrassed about either, of course.

He enjoyed familiarizing himself with new things, with all the new combat styles that the mortals around him had invented over the course of the decades and centuries. He enjoyed constantly learning and expanding his knowledge; and besides, improvement was only a matter of time, and he had literally all the time in the world. That gave him an advantage over them.

[Doran]

Better balance could help reduce the risk of falls during advanced kicks and spins as well as generate improved kicking and punching power, and possibly, reduce the potential of injuries. For that reason, the two men decided to go through another round of exercises that involved standing on one leg while moving the other leg sideways across the body. After that round – and a short break – they finally decided to begin to spar in earnest.

Doran and Taelis were relatively evenly matched when it came to matters of balance and acrobatics (Unlike Taelis, Doran would never attempt to do a headstand or a somersault though - he saw no need to engage in such questionable activities. He simply wished to incorporate certain aspects of acrobatics into his Menochoros practice – and ultimately also into his armed combat - in order to enhance it as such would render his moves more effective). When it came to their general combat skill and strength, the Mortalborn surpassed the Eidisi by far though.

Taelis didn’t mind the fact that Doran was better than him. Instead, he saw the Mortalborn’s superior combat skills as an opportunity. He would never be able to improve if he sparred with people that were worse than he was. In order to get better at Menochoros, he needed a challenge. For that reason, he simply advanced when the Mortalborn gave him a sign to do so, began to circle him for a few moments and finally executed a kick, aimed relatively low.

The Mortalborn immediately moved out of the way of the attack and followed up with an open palm strike and then a kick of his own before he let Taelis attack once more, holding back slightly in order to give him the opportunity to try out a few moves of his own.

While Taelis was a more traditional practitioner of Menochoros and stuck closely to the teaching of Lida’via, one of the instructors at the Fitness Centre, Doran tried to modify some of the moves slightly to suit his needs. Some schools of unarmed combat frowned on that. One of the five tenets of Menochoros was adaptability though. Practitioners of Menochoros were encouraged to adapt their fighting style and do what worked best for them.

[Doran]

When they finally stopped, a thin layer of sweat had started to bead on the Mortalborn’s forehead, as some aspects of their training session had been somewhat intense. He found physical exertion and that light exhaustion quite pleasant though. It constituted a welcome change and helped balance out all the mental work that he had to conduct at the Academy. Unlike some of his colleagues, he was not content with spending the entire trial brooding over books. He wished to hone both his mind and his body.

“Have you already decided if you want to take part in one of Lida’via’s advanced Menochoros classes, professor?” Taelis wanted to know a little later, when they were sitting on a bench at the back of the training room, relaxing. The Eidisi was a little more tired than the Mortalborn was, and he wiped the sweat from his face with a towel. During their last training, a couple of trials earlier, Doran had talked about that a bit.

“I probably will”, Doran replied in a calm and measured tone of voice. “But only after I’ve defended my thesis.” He had already finished said thesis a couple of trials earlier, but there were still a few things that needed to be done before he had finished the entire Licentiate. He already possessed a decent understanding of Menochoros (the matter of maintaining balance under more challenging circumstances aside) – his being a swordsman had helped him advance faster than most because he was already intricately familiar with certain aspects of combat.

Lida’via had been practicing for arcs though. There were still a lot of things that he could learn from her; besides, he was beginning to see the Sev’ryn woman as something of a friend. There had been a time when he had distanced himself from mortalkind – they had seemed so different – but he felt more connected to them and to the world of Idalos nowadays, due to certain unexpected, but overwhelmingly pleasant events.

They continued to talk for a while, reflecting on their training, as always, before they headed to the changing rooms in order to change into their normal clothes. Finally, they made their way through the streets of Viden that were covered with an unpleasant mixture of mud and slush rather than snow due to an unusual heatwave, to the Institute of Sciences in order to work on their project.

The Mortalborn was already familiar with a lot of aspects of chemistry – he had been working as a chemist for decades, he just hadn’t sought a degree yet as such had not been necessary until now. Science was not stagnant though. It was constantly evolving, and people constantly discovered new things and figured out better (or different) research methods, and thus the learning process had not ended yet and probably never would, at least not in the foreseeable future. There was always more knowledge to be gained.

[Pig Boy]

Doran

Experience: 10 no magic xp

Knowledge:

Acrobatics x5
Unarmed Combat (Menochoros) x1

Renown: 0 Doran is a fixture at the fitness center now. Nobody would raise an eyebrow to see him there sparring.

Skill Usage: Appropriate to level. As a novice in acrobatics, however, he might be liable to lose his balance from time to time when he gets hit. Falling is part of the learning process when it comes to acrobatics, but otherwise the skill play was good.

Loot/Losses: none

Injuries/Conditions: none

Consequences: none

Comments: The writing flowed very well from one scene to the next. It was a bit grindy, but I found Doran's exploration of martial arts pretty interesting in itself. I found myself wondering if the foamy material in the fitness center was alchemically enhanced.

I thought it was cool how Doran reflected on his different style of Menochoros, and how it was focused more on adaptability rather than faithful imitation of another person's style. Something I'm sure Syroa would approve of (although it's not quite enough here for advancement... perhaps just another small feather in Doran's cap).

I look forward to seeing how Doran improves in martial arts. I wonder if he'll become a master in time, and how that will look? Fun stuff.

Enjoy the rewards! Great writing as always.

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