Romance of Dragons and Snakes

Chapter 12: Finding strength through passion

“What? This is what happens when one uses Hidden Power to control the heat and step into the realm where the foot holds the power. Back during the time of Cheng Tinghua, Shang Yunxiang, Fu Jianqiu, Li Cunyi, and Xue Dian, they were all capable of this. Not only that, but their martial arts had transcended to grow past their limits. When I show you Taichi, you will understand what it means for the spirit to become instinct.”

Seeing how shocked Wang Chao was, she spoke, “Come, go inside and shower, I’ll have someone bring you a new set of clothes.”

“How could I dare bother sis with something like this…” Wang Chao muttered.

Tang Zichen waved her hand as if giving an order, “No more talk. Over this week, you will stay here to learn in the already short amount of time we have left.”

Knowing that sis Chen had always meant her word, he didn’t speak any more and went to go shower.

Tang Zichen’s entire villa was expansive; the bathroom on the third floor had already been larger than his entire house. The inside was completely white with some purple and gold decorative designs. Right in the middle of this rich bathroom was an eighty meter squared swimming pool.

Wang Chao began to bathe himself while also taking a look around the bathroom. The absolute wealth of Tang Zichen had positively astounded him to the point of silence.

Although he was curious of his sis’ identity and history, Wang Chao knew better than to ask. This wasn’t something he himself could ask; he would have to practice martial arts and wait for now.

After washing himself, a female servant had left some underwear and outerwear clothes on the cupboard outside for Wang Chao to try on. As he rifled through it, he noticed the style was quite nice, maybe it was a brand name?

But Wang Chao didn’t know which brand it was, or even if it was a brand name since he had never bought one before. Putting on the white sports clothes before looking at the mirror, he noticed that the golden lines on it had matched him quite nicely.

Returning to the lounge, Wang Chao saw Tang Zichen patiently sitting on the sofa. When she saw him, she nodded her head for Wang Chao to sit down as well before turning on the plasma screen television on the wall.

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The screen flickered to life before revealing a still image. Then, the image cleared up to show a strong and robust black muscular man punching at a sandbag.

This black man was a figure known to practically everybody. Even Wang Chao knew who he was, it was the “Boxing champion”, Mike Tyson.

The recording on the screen was in black and white, indicating that it was an old film, but it was still very clear.

The Mike Tyson in this recording was still very young, but he continued to punch at the sandbag with heavy blows and an equally strong perseverance. The sweat on his forehead continued to flow down, but despite all of the sweat, his eyes maintained a sharp glare as he continued to pound at the sandbag.

After watching for a moment, Wang Chao realized that Mike Tyson’s right hand was even more furious than the other one. With each blow, the sandbag was constantly knocked high up into the air, and on his naked right arm, the tattoo of a person could be seen.

That was when Wang Chao realized the tattoo was of the founder of a republic. It was the tattoo of Chairman Mao.

“Pi!” Tang Zichen turned off the television and turned to Wang Chao, “To practice martial arts requires one to be hardworking and to be enthusiastic about it. The most important thing is to have passion. If a scholar is passionate, then his writing will be poetic and forthcoming and will be able to write out amazing poems or songs. Martial arts is like this as well. If one is passionate, then they will be able to have an amazing way of technique. Tyson had found something from the chairman’s past that allowed him to feel passionate and from that passion, he found strength. This is the profound secret of the Xingyi style. Martial arts require passion to be mixed in it, and from that you will be entranced! Otherwise, no matter how much you practice, you will never reach such a high level of mastery. At the very most, you will be nothing more than a machine. This is the mysterious yet true way of life.”

Wang Chao began to think to himself, “Finding strength through passion…”

“You might not understand now, but the road ahead is long and hard. You’ll find it as you travel on it.” Tang Zichen spoke. “Let’s go eat some food, then I’ll teach you the secrets to the fighting style of Bagua.”

“En, let me tell my family first that I found a part time job over the winter break.” Wang Chao suddenly thought about his family. Hurriedly calling back home, he spun a detailed lie for his family to hear, and after an extraneous amount of time, he had finally convinced both his father and mother. Putting down the telephone, Wang Chao realized that his lips were suddenly dry so he gulped down the tea that was right next to him noisily.

Tang Zichen laughed as she waited for him to finish. The both of them then walked towards the dining hall where a variety of luxurious dishes were already set on the table; all of which composed of some stir fry, fish soup, and some light vegetables.

Wang Chao’s fingers moved about from both hands as he began to grab at the dishes and pile the food onto his own plate happily.

At this, Tang Zichen smiled, showing an affectionate manner that an elder sister would give towards her younger brother.

Resting after the meal, Tang Zichen brought Wang Chao to a giant exercise room.

When Wang Chao entered the room, he was shocked. The entire inside seemed as if it was an exact replica of the ancient dojos for martial arts

The interior of the exercise room was comprised of white and black stones that were arranged in the way of the Yin and Yang symbol of the Supreme Ultimate while the outside had the eight trigrams.

Within the exercise room, there was a meter deep stone trough where a couple of black steel balls could be seen.

Aside from this, the left side of the room had a row of weapons ranging from longspear, broadsword, jian and staff modeled weapons and their variations. On the right side was several sandbags.

The sandbags were hoisted high into the air so that even jumping wouldn’t be enough to reach for it. Right underneath the sandbag was a single vat that was filled with water.

When he saw this, Wang Chao realized that this was for practice. One had to stand on top of the vat of water and strike at the sandbag from below.

“My time in China isn’t long, and my visits are even less frequent so this dojo is quite simple and crude. I hope that you will be able to properly learn my teachings so that one day when I die, my knowledge will be passed down. Anything else would be a terrible loss.” Tang Zichen seemed as if she was speaking to herself more than Wang Chao.

Wang Chao closed his mouth so that he wouldn’t speak another word. He could tell that the identity of his sis Chen was far too mysterious. He was also sure that the world she lived in was filled with malice and danger around every corner.

“When I am finished learning, I will definitely find a way into your world and come help you.” Wang Chao silently vowed as he clenched his fist.

“Come, stand at the center of the Supreme Ultimate diagram of the Eight Trigrams. I shall teach you the Bagua style of fighting and movement.”

With that, Tang Zichen began to use her hands to describe the different stances. The eight stances had slowly transformed into sixty four ways of fighting, movement, and even the ways of jabbing, whipping, and chopping had been slowly explained to Wang Chao.

Wang Chao had originally learned the fighting form of the Lifting Yin Palm and had a grasp on the basics. So it hadn’t taken much effort, and with Tang Zichen molding Wang Chao’s hands into the proper positions, it had taken only two days to completely learn it all.

Over the course of the next five days, Wang Chao had spent all of his time in the dojo practicing. In the day time, he had practiced the forms to increase his health and strength, and at night, he would practice the way of fighting. After some time of exercise, Tang Zichen had allowed him to rest, but even then, Tang Zichen had used the golden needles to prick every single joint within his body which allowed for him to rest soundly. While he had slept for only 2 hours a day, this method had allowed all of his fatigue to be taken away/

“When humans enter deep sleep, they only require a few minutes to be relieved of their fatigue.” Tang Zichen had answered when Wang Chao had asked.

So, for five days straight, Wang Chao would practice within the middle of the Supreme Ultimate diagram, and after those five days, he was standing on top of the water vats and used the ways of Bagua Zhang to strike the sandbag above.

Every single time he had used force, the sandbag would swing wildly before coming back in place. Furthermore, the sandbags were arranged in a way so that the numerous sandbags would be sent flying back to hit the person in the center. This way, Wang Chao was forced to dodge, but at the same time, he had to be weary of the vat of water below him; but this proved to be a difficult challenge.

For the next few days, Wang Chao counted keep track of how many times he had been dunked into the vat of water or had been struck black and blue from the sandbags. At some points, he had nearly broken his bones.

But each time he was hit, Tang Zichen would use her Hidden Power to knead the bruised spots, allowing Wang Chao to feel completely refreshed the next day.

Day and night for ten days, Wang Chao persevered with his teeth gritted tightly and put his all into his work. “If it weren’t for sis Chen who was at my side everyday to treat my wounds, then I would have used up all of my nine lives already! If a master is not by one’s side, then nine out of ten the disciple would have died! How in the world did sis Chen manage to train herself?”

And so he would move about on the jar for the 10 days while constantly hitting the sandbags. He didn’t know how many times he fell, but Wang Chao had at last been able move around and change his center of gravity. But the sandbags had still managed to knock him down or force him to misstep a couple of times.

But Tang Zichen had never once let Wang Chao stop. Wang Chao had never once questioned her either since he believed that she was doing what was best for him. Another three days within the ten days they had, Wang Chao couldn’t help but ask when he was resting, “Sis Chen, what are those steel balls doing in the trough there?”

Tang Zichen followed where Wang Chao pointed and said, “Those aren’t steel balls, go and take a look.”

Wang Chao hurriedly walked over and tried to lift up the heavy steel balls. But that was when it clicked. No matter how much strength he used, it was like trying to have a dragonfly push back the stone tower–the most he could do was to push them around with difficulty and not lift it.

Wang Chao was surprised at this strange sight. When he had spun the steel balls, he could sense that there was a resonating sound coming from within.

“This ball is made of an inch thick layer of lead while the insides is filled with mercury! This is much heavier than a steel ball, so just how could you lift one?” Tang Zichen laughed. “The scholars had believed lead and mercury to be medicine, so I took their concept and used them for practicing martial arts.”