Chapter 5

Hitomi concentrated deeply as she got into a horse stance and put her hands in front of her as if holding an imaginary ball. She reached within herself and drew from her inner qi. As she felt the power begin to well up, she directed it towards her hands. When her hands started to feel warm with energy, she slowly rotated them back and forth until a ball of qi formed. After holding the power for a few moments, she gradually let it dissipate again.

“Wow, that was amazing,” Eunbi said clapping her hands along with Chaeyeon and Wonyoung. “Are you back to where you were before?”

“Yeah, my qi level seems to be about where I had been before the attack,” Hitomi said in an amazed voice, not quite believing what she was saying.

“Hii-chan, you worked really hard in pushing your mind and body to their limits. To master the Formless style as fast as you have shows how much you’ve dedicated yourself to improving. It took me years to learn it.” Chaeyeon shook her head with disbelief, thinking of all the years of training she had put herself through.

“No, no, no. I wouldn’t call myself a master of it yet. Especially, not when you and Eunbi Unnie are here.” Hitomi knew that she had barely scratched the surface of the Formless style having watched both Chaeyeon and Eunbi perform it.

“I think what matters is that you’ve recovered. You’ve come a long way from when we teamed up together in the exams,” Wonyoung said with encouragement. She still remembered when she and Hitomi were still examinees. The normally quiet Hitomi had cried with frustration more than once at being unable to exert her previous qi powers.

“Thanks,” Hitomi said to the taller younger girl. She remembered the exams with fondness even though it had been hard. While each of them had competed against each other for one of the limited spots in the school, there had been no hard feelings between them. “I still can’t train my qi in the Forty-Eight Schools way, but thanks to everyone here at the school, I’ve found another path forward. I hope I can help you as much as you’ve helped me.”

Eunbi dreaded what was coming next as Hitomi shifted the conversation back to qi training. Each of the Japanese girls were taking a group of them and training them in qi arts. Hitomi was teaching the basics, while Nako taught meditative techniques, and Sakura taught more advanced qi arts. “You know, maybe, we can help Hitomi get better at the Formless style since both me and Chaeyeon here. Maybe, we can practice qi arts another time?”

She is so cute, Chaeyeon thought as she watched their leader squirm and try to get out of qi training. “Eunbi Unnie, Hitomi really wants to repay you for all the hard work you’ve been doing as leader. We all felt bad about breaking the rules during the festival and having you take the punishment with us.”

Hitomi caught Chaeyeon’s wink towards her, catching on to the older girl’s intentions. She turned to their oldest member and pouted cutely, pushing her cheeks out even more than normal. “Yes, Eunbi Unnie, I really really want to help you and repay you for being our dearest leader.”

“Unnie, please let Hitomi help!” Wonyoung exclaimed in an exaggerated manner while hugging Eunbi tightly.

“I-I see. I guess it can’t be helped then,” Eunbi said as anyone would say when attacked by Hitomi’s cheeks and Wonyoung’s cutesy pleas.

“First, let’s see where you’re at with your qi level. Can you show me the same move that I just did?” Hitomi asked in as serious a voice as she could. Their leader was like a baby when it came to the qi arts and it made all the members happy at seeing how earnest Eunbi was when she performed them.

Eunbi sighed as she got into the same horse stance with her hands out as Hitomi had done earlier. Nako had said qi arts were a lot like the divine skills that Eunbi used, but there was no way that could be true. Eunbi’s ‘orange’ summoning skill was illusionary and drawn from her mind and psychic energies which she had worked hard in honing. Qi art practitioners drew from the qi that exists in all things including themselves and directed it as they visualized. For her, trying to grasp the flow of qi, was like trying to grasp water from a flowing river.

Wonyoung held her laughter in as she watched beads of sweat start to form on their leader’s brow. Eunbi’s eyes were closed as she rotated her hands fiercely in an exaggerated fashion in trying to form something from thin air. “How can she be so cute?” she whispered to her other members.

Chaeyeon had the hardest time holding in her laughter and had to slap Hitomi on the back to expel the pent-up amusement. “She’s like a baby.”

Hitomi nodded in agreement with the other two girls as they all watched Eunbi continue to try and massage something to exist. Back in the Forty-Eight schools, children had the most trouble in understanding the concept of controlling qi and its flow. It was common for children to simply mimic what they saw the teachers did as Eunbi was doing now. “Eunbi Unnie, you can do it. Try to visualize what you want to do with the qi after you’ve drawn it.”

Eunbi could feel the qi slowly gather around her hands as she pushed against it hard. Before she knew, it, she felt a small spark of energy form between her hands. As suddenly as it came, it disappeared. “Did I do it?” she asked meekly as she opened her eyes. She found herself under a mass of bodies as the other girls mobbed her.

“Yes, you did it!” Chaeyeon cheered loudly as tears of joy mingled with her tears of laughter.

Wonyoung thought she might die from overdose as she felt her heart burst with love at Eunbi’s timid question. Eunbi had sounded like a child asking a parent for affirmation. “You did great, Unnie.”

“I knew you could do it, Unnie,” Hitomi said proudly.

Yujin, along with Minju and Yena, sat with their legs crossed facing Nako. The Japanese girl spoke quietly so as to not disturb them as she recited meditative verses designed help the girls concentrate and cultivate their qi. Yujin thought it must have been painful for Nako to teach them these techniques while being unable to use them herself. However, when she peeked at the older girl’s face, she only saw patience and adoration. This made Yujin feel guilty that she was wasting Nako’s time since she was having a lot of trouble focusing and concentrating.

She peeked at Yena’s face and saw the girl’s pouting lips twitching. Yena was also having a difficult time with the techniques it seemed. Both Yena and Yujin were energetic girls who preferred cultivation through physical exertion, so it wasn’t a surprise to her to see the older girl struggling.

Yujin then quickly glanced over at Minju. Her roommate, as usual, took the training seriously and tried her hardest. Yujin could sense the other girl’s qi levels and noticed that it had gone up again. Minju who had been one of the lowest ranked members was also easily one of the most improved members. The beautiful girl was also one of the reasons why Yujin was having so much trouble meditating. She closed her eyes and once again tried to follow along with Nako’s instructions. However, her thoughts continued to impede her.

When they had first entered the school, everything was seemingly perfect. Yujin had managed to get accepted into the school with some of her best friends during the exams and they were all getting along great. Then, Minju had her birthday and started spending more time with the older girls. Wonyoung started spending her free time with her dormmates. It seemed everyone was always too busy for her or that she was too young to do more adult things. She wished that she could become an adult already. It was then that Yujin felt a sudden stab of pain somewhere inside of her.

Nako was startled by the shout of pain that came from Yujin’s direction. She saw the girl holding her hands up above her head with qi power flowing out of her all the while screaming incoherently. Yena and Minju were both immediately at the girl’s side trying to help. “Her internal energy is unstable. We have to help her stabilize.”

“On it,” Yena said as she grabbed one of Yujin’s outstretched hands while Nako grabbed the other. The two of them exerted their own qi to control Yujin’s wildly fluctuating internal energies.

With her meridian points damaged, Nako could only exert some of her qi to help Yujin get her internal energy circulation back under control. She could only hope that it was enough.

Minju grabbed a hold of Yujin’s head and placed her fingers by the girl’s temples. She started muttering some incantations to calm Yujin’s psychotic state.

As quickly as it started, Yujin felt the pain go away. She opened her eyes and found the other three girls around her with looks of concern in their eyes. “What’s going on? Why are you all around me?”

“Qi Deviation,” Nako said. “You lost control during qi cultivation and as a result your mind and internal power became unstable. It’s dangerous to try and practice qi arts when your mind isn’t there.”

“I’m sorry, everyone,” Yujin apologized meekly. “It’s true. I was thinking about a lot of unnecessary things.”

“I think we should stop for the day,” Yena said, taking charge as the oldest member present. She had only held Yujin’s hands for an instant, but while their qi was connected, they had shared one heart and one mind. The overwhelming feeling she had gotten from Yujin was one of loneliness.

“Yeah, let’s stop,” Nako said, agreeing readily, having also felt Yujin’s emotional state.

“We’re still new to learning qi arts this way. We can take our time,” Minju put in. She had been connected psychically with Yujin and had felt the other girl’s low morale. It shocked her since Yujin was always a bundle of energy and joy.

“But we still have the whole day left for training. What are we going to do?” Yujin asked, puzzled, as the normally hard-working girls were saying they wanted to stop.

“We can play some sports,” Yena suggested. She gave a look to Nako and Minju who both nodded ever so slightly, getting the message.

“I think there’s a ball in the room? We can play some two on two?” Nako added.

“Maybe, three on one?” Yena asked. “I was a champion ball player when I was younger you know.”

“Wow, really?” Minju asked excitedly.

“Minju, I don’t think you can believe everything Yena Unnie says.” Nako rolled her eyes at Minju.

Yujin felt everything was moving too fast for her as she watched the other three girls banter with each other. All of a sudden we’re going to ditch training and play sports? She instinctively put up her hand when one of the girls asked how they would pick teams. “Let’s pick captains.”

“Wait, even with just four people, I think I’m going to get picked last,” Minju whined. Everyone knew she didn’t like it when they picked teams.

“Okay, we can draw straws to see who gets Minju,” Nako offered mischievously.

“That sounds like punishment. Why is it we draw straws to see who gets me!?” Minju complained loudly.

“Minju, have you ever even played two on two?” Yujin asked, getting into the mood and joining Nako in teasing Minju.

“What are you guys doing to our Minju.” Yena put her arms around the younger girl and gave her a hug.

“Unnie,” Minju knew that Yena would stick up for her.

“Okay, then Yena Unnie will get Minju and I get Yujin.”

“Wait, maybe we should draw straws.”

“Unnie!”

“I’ll go get the ball,” Yujin volunteered and ran off back to the dorm.

Yuri was a little nervous as she stood in the middle of the field while Sakura, Chaewon, and Hyewon watched from the side with their hands covering their ears. She started to make a series of complex gestures with her hands. Then, she breathed in deeply and let out a loud roar that seemed to go on forever. The earth around them rumbled from the sheer force of her roar. When she found herself nearly out of breath, she let go of her hold on her qi.

“I like how you vary the pitch levels. Usually, you use it at a low pitch which is designed to damage the inner energy of your opponent. But sometimes you use it at a higher pitch to damage the physical world. Are you also using a divine skill to amplify the sound somehow? I’ve never seen anyone do that. If you let your qi gather lower before you use your roar, you might find it more effective.” Sakura said after watching Yuri perform her technique.

Yuri blinked at the long, detailed analysis. “How are you able to do that? The inner workings of the ‘Puppy Roar’ technique is a secret my old school kept guarded closely.”

Sakura shook her head at Yuri’s misunderstanding. “I’m sure I don’t know how your school performs it exactly. But I can see how your qi is circulating in your body and I can see you doing some complex actions with your hands that do not appear to be affecting your qi, so I figured they must be a divine skill.”

“Yes, I can control and form invisible fields that direct and amplify my ability,” Yuri admitted. Even though she had been living with Sakura in the same room for months now, she still found herself surprised by the woman’s hidden talents.

“That’s so amazing. As expected of one of our top martial artists,” Sakura gushed while applauding.

“Thanks,” She said blankly. Before they first entered the school, Yuri had found herself unable to even look at Sakura in the eyes. She was that breathtakingly beautiful. She had just gotten used to it, but now she again found herself dumbfounded by the woman’s gaze full of love. Fortunately, her hyung, was there to save her again.

Hyewon stepped in between Sakura’s adoring gaze and Yuri, unable to tolerate her Kkura’s attention being on someone else for too long. “Should I go next or do you want to Chaewon?”

“I can go,” Chaewon replied as she made her way to the center of the field. She felt a little self-conscious to be under Sakura’s watchful gaze. Although, Sakura asked everyone in the school to consider her to be just like everyone else, there were times where it was difficult for Chaewon to do so, like right now. Sakura’s years of experience being a head disciple of a school showed through when she mentored any of them in the qi arts.

Sakura, a martial arts maniac, squealed internally as she watched Chaewon prepare. Though she still maintained to others that Minju was ranked first in her opinion, Chaewon was quickly beginning to creep up there. The more Sakura watched the girl practice and perform martial arts, the more she became impressed.

In Chaewon, Sakura saw the perfect blend of everything one needed in order to be a top-level martial artist. The younger girl was strong, fast, and intelligent. Her qi levels were high. She could perform divine skills well. The most important point was that her physical martial arts were even more amazing than Chaeyeon or Eunbi’s. Though all three girls were now practitioners of the Formless style, they performed them differently. Chaeyeon took a soft approach where she was relied on speed and reacted to attacks in general. Eunbi took a hard approach where she was the aggressor and relied on strength. Chaewon had the ability to mix both. In Sakura’s opinion, Chaewon could overtake both in a few years.

Chaewon gathered her qi while closing her eyes. She felt her inner power building up and when it reached its apex, she opened her eyes again, stared straight through Sakura, and exploded her qi towards the woman through her eyes.

Sakura flinched even as she had prepared herself to receive the ‘Death Glare’ from Chaewon. She shivered as she felt goosebumps appear on arms. “Somehow you’re able to use a move that mixes both psychic and inner qi energy similar to Yuri’s roar. High level martial artists can sense ‘killing intent’ and this move seems to be designed to overwhelm that sense and create fear. But probably that’s not all. Is there a reason it needs to be done with the eyes? Can you see something you can’t normally see?”

It was Chaewon’s turn to shiver at Sakura’s creepy insight into her move. “Yeah, but that’s really all I can say about it.”

“Shouldn’t Eunbi Unnie be able to use it too since she came from your school?” Sakura asked since she could not recall their eldest member being able to do the same thing.

“The art requires more control over qi than Unnie has right now. And not every skill from our school is passed down to everyone.”

Sakura nodded. Many schools played favorites just as her old school had done. The secret arts that Sakura had learned had only been available to her as the head disciple. With the Forty-Eight Schools in ruin, she had made the decision to make all of her branch’s secret arts available to the other branches in order to preserve what was remaining. It had been her hope that if more Forty-Eight members knew the secret arts, there would not be a repeat of another massacre and the schools would be able to rebuild even better than before.

“I guess I’m next,” Hyewon said, switching places with Chaewon in the middle of the field.

Sakura had seen Hyewon use her ability before, but unlike other qi arts, she found herself unable to immediately grasp how it worked. She watched as the girl get into her usual horse stance. In a moment the girl would punch the floor and each time, Sakura had not been able to see clearly what was happening. This time, however, Sakura was focused on watching the qi circulation within Hyewon.

Sakura watched as air around Hyewon seemed to stir as if affected by the girl. Then, with a cry, Hyewon let out a scream and punched the ground. In that instant, Sakura was able to see the change inside of Hyewon and she felt her horror grow, finally understanding what the girl was doing. Not knowing what else to do, Sakura ran to stop her friend before she could complete the move.

Before Hyewon could finish powering herself up, she found herself in Sakura’s embrace. To her surprise, she saw tears in the woman’s eyes. “Kkura, what’s wrong?”

“You’re what’s wrong, you idiot,” Sakura said, all the while sniffling.

Chaewon and Yuri came over, concerned, as soon as they saw Sakura had stopped Hyewon. “What happened?” Chaewon asked.

“This stupid girl. She’s hacking at her own life away in order to power herself up.” Sakura felt Hyewon’s hands wiping her tears away. She looked at Hyewon angrily, but the girl didn’t balk at her accusation.

“I’m too far behind everyone. I need to do something to in order to catch up,” Hywon said matter-of-factly.

“Anything but that,” Yuri said aghast, though secretly impressed with the lengths in which Hyewon would go.

“I understand where she’s coming from,” Chaewon said to Sakura and Yuri’s surprised faces. “Wouldn’t you have done the same if you could Kkura Unnie? For many people that tried to get in to this school, it was a life or death situation. I’m pretty sure Eunbi Unnie also thought it was her last chance to go to a school where she could be recognized.”

“She’s right. I always dreamt of becoming a great martial artist, but my dreams were greater than my skills. I did think of it as life or death so using a skill that ate at my life expectancy wasn’t something I was worried about. Coming to this school has made me feel happier and more alive than I’ve ever felt before.” Hyewon smiled at Sakura even though the other girl was making such a scarily angry face.

Sakura sighed and let the anger flow out of her. “That explains all the food that you eat and all the slacking off that you do. Your skill probably saps all of your energy and you need to eat a lot to replenish it.”

“That and I like food and sleeping,” Hyewon admitted.

“Well, no more of that. We’re going to train you the right way. Your qi art is only hurting you right now because you don’t have the necessary qi level to sustain it. If you become stronger, you’ll be able to use your skill and it won’t chip away at your life energy.” Sakura said while staring directly into Hyewon’s eyes.

Author’s Note:

With twelve girls, I find myself having trouble write about all the interactions that I want to write about. This chapter gave me a chance to do some of that.

Let me know what you thought!