Goju-ryu

Smack!

Smack!

Majima Goro took off his shirt, revealing broad, solid back muscles.

Each time he settled into a stance, he took a deep breath.

Two assistants then swung wooden sticks, pounding his back and sides.

Or they viciously kicked his thighs and shins.

The skin all over his body quickly turned red in places and purple in others.

Yet Majima Goro did not move an inch.

After exhaling with a shout, he continued into the next posture.

The muscles across his whole body were like forged iron, as though he could not feel the damage at all.

Fang Cheng stood to one side and watched.

After watching instructional discs and studying related knowledge over the past few days, he knew that Majima Goro was practicing the Sanchin Kata of Goju-ryu Karate.

In Xia Country Traditional Martial Arts, this was called the Iron Body Skill; in other Eastern Island fighting styles, it was also known as the Hard Body Technique.

Sanchin Kata was one of Goju-ryu's "hard forms."

It required the muscles throughout the body to remain under maximum tension, using the Breathing Technique to regulate strength and train the Basic Skills of attacking and blocking.

The most important part—the part most suited to actual combat—was pain-resistance training.

By using breathing to tighten the muscles, one had a sparring Companion continuously strike the body's vulnerable areas.

In the end, this made the muscles firm, the stances stable, and improved one's endurance against powerful blows.

The principle behind this training method was what the saying meant by, "Before you learn to hit people, learn how to take a hit."

You punch me, and I feel no pain.

I punch you, and it could kill you.

When Fang Cheng had watched the discs at home, he had not felt much.

But now that he could see it all so clearly from up close, he could not help developing some interest in these traditional training methods.

Although his Constitution already far surpassed that of an ordinary person, if he could make his body even tougher and more durable, then the more the better.

As Fang Cheng gained a slight insight, Majima Goro clenched his teeth and endured in silence.

It was not that his mind had gone numb or that he felt no pain.

He was simply addicted to the fleeting sense of dissociation that came from tormenting his flesh.

Before coming to Xia Country, he had been full of hope.

Yet over the past six months, everyone he had encountered had either been a fraud or useless trash.

Every single one of them had been so unable to take a beating!

He could only vent his pent-up emotions through this form of self-harm, suppressing the terrifying monster lurking in his heart.

Majima Goro's eyes brimmed with disappointment and fury.

He suddenly exhaled and barked in a low voice:

"Enough."

He then withdrew his stance, stepped onto the ring, and raised a hand to point at Fang Cheng.

"You, get up here!"

With just a simple sentence and gesture, Fang Cheng understood what he meant without needing a translation.

He immediately picked up the red square kicking pad and followed him onto the ring.

He had barely taken up position and raised the pad when he looked up to see Majima Goro's stepping side kick already sweeping toward him.

Smack!

Fang Cheng reacted swiftly, raising the pad with both hands before his chest in time to block the sudden kick.

Because Majima Goro had launched it in haste, the force transmitted through his foot was not too great. Fang Cheng only took half a step back before neutralizing the impact.

Fang Cheng was currently little more than a beginner "human target."

The coach had already told Majima Goro that he was a newcomer.

Therefore, the first lesson mainly involved practicing fixed target positions.

That was, the Sparring Partner stood in suitable positions and presented targets in different ways to guide the Employer's kicks and strikes.

Fixed kick-pad training was a required Karate exercise. It helped establish proper basic movements and develop a sense of distance.

For intermediate- and high-level fighters, it could continually reinforce technical movements until they became ingrained bodily instincts.

After catching the roundhouse kick, Fang Cheng swiftly adjusted his stance and steadied his lower body.

Majima Goro's next attack came without pause, his heel spinning toward him.

In the blink of an eye, he circled Fang Cheng, repeatedly raising his legs and unleashing several rapid kicks with a series of slaps.

A gust of wind brushed against Fang Cheng's face and lifted his hair. The assault was exceptionally fierce.

Under normal circumstances, the sparring partner should have guided the client through the training, merely maintaining a good rhythm.

But Majima Goro was obviously not normal!

Right now, he was blindly pressing the attack, seeming to want to kick the "target" flying and vent the resentment in his heart.

Bang!

It was another jumping spinning hook kick.

The sheer weight and force of the kick made Fang Cheng stagger back several steps.

Fang Cheng took a slight breath and looked at Majima Goro, whose eyes gleamed with fierce light. His own gaze had turned grave as well.

Watching him exchange blows with others before had not allowed him to truly feel it for himself.

Only now, after stepping into the ring himself, did he genuinely experience the other man's beastlike brute force.

Every time he took an attack, it felt as though a rampaging bear had charged straight at him.

Measured by the Panel's attribute standards—

Majima Goro's Strength was definitely above 15 points, perhaps even close to 20.

Clearly higher than Fang Cheng's Strength value of 12.

However.

Fang Cheng did not feel the slightest urge to retreat.

His eyes shone brightly, as though blazing fighting spirit had ignited within them.

Even if he was only serving as a beginner sparring partner—

It did not mean he simply had to put on protective gear, hold up the pads, and act as a human punching bag.

A sparring partner also had another extremely important role: feeding moves.

They had to gauge their opponent's habitual moves, movement patterns, attack power, and speed, allowing the client to execute combinations more smoothly and bring out their techniques.

Therefore, an outstanding sparring partner needed keen observation and the judgment to seize the timing of transitions between offense and defense.

This was what people often called "rhythm."

Fang Cheng still remembered something the boxing coach had said while teaching the Elite Students:

"The deciding factor when experts clash is who disrupts the other's rhythm first and makes the other follow their own rhythm."

At that thought, Fang Cheng's gaze settled.

Since the beast refused to learn, then he would tame it and make it answer his call.

Majima Goro's stamina was exceptionally abundant. He continued raising and planting his feet without pause.

His two legs alternated, lashing Fang Cheng like whips.

It was as though he did not see Fang Cheng as a living person at all, but merely as a breathing humanoid target.

Front kicks, roundhouse kicks, front thrust kicks, side snap kicks, knife-edge kicks...

All kinds of techniques came crashing in from every angle like a raging storm.

Fang Cheng gripped the kick pads tightly in both hands, continuously adjusting his footwork and the pads' positions.

While blocking the attacks, he tried to sense the path of every strike and where his opponent exerted force.

In the past, doing this would have been extremely difficult.

But after his Spirit Attribute broke through 20 points, it became much easier.

Whenever anyone threw a punch, kicked, or launched an attack, there would always be signs.

Breathing, heartbeat, changes in the eyes, shifting footsteps, swaying shoulders...

The difference between experts and rookies was merely that experts moved more cleanly and decisively, and knew how to conceal their intentions.

But force could not appear out of nowhere.

It ultimately had to be transmitted through the body to deliver an effective strike.

Fang Cheng fed moves while observing.

He caught the fleeting openings that leaked from Majima Goro's body.

Gradually, he completely figured out his opponent's attack patterns and vaguely grasped a certain feeling.

Whoosh!

Majima Goro suddenly raised his leg and drove up his knee, then lashed out with a knife-edge kick straight at Fang Cheng's face.

Fang Cheng's pupils suddenly contracted. In that instant, the world before his eyes seemed to slow by one hundredth of a second.

He saw it with absolute clarity.

Majima Goro's pupils Flashed Slightly, and the muscles in his Facial Features Twitched.

He saw it.

The kick sliced through the air, tracing a Crescent-like Arc as ripples of displaced wind spread outward.

He saw it.

Power traveled from the sole of the foot to the Knees, then, through the twist of the waist and hips, accelerated back into the calf, the instep, the big toe...

Smack!

The blade-like foot struck squarely against the target—one that had been placed in advance along the attack's path.