Three spies were escorted to the rear camp. The sandy ground in the open space still bore the marks of the shockwave that had exploded moments ago. Several children crouched by the pit, poking at the loosened clods along its edge with sticks and muttering, "Brother Chen stomped once, and the bad guys jumped right out."
Chen Wuya stood where he was, unmoving. A little dust clung to his coarse cloth shirt, and his sleeves were rolled to his elbows, revealing arms with sharply defined sinews. He lowered his head and watched his palm as Misaligned Force slowly circulated through his meridians, like a stream winding around stones—unhurried and composed.
Old Wu Tou hobbled over with his cane and stopped beside him. His voice was low. "The men are tied up, but people's hearts are still unsettled."
Chen Wuya nodded and swept his gaze across the crowd. The women who had been cooking huddled beneath the eaves with their children. The men chopping wood gripped their axe handles until their knuckles turned white. Several elderly people stood together, whispering. No matter how low they kept their voices, a few words still slipped out: "The Northern Desert army... How are people like us supposed to stop them?"
He stepped forward and walked to the center of the open ground, lightly nudging with his toe the pile of firewood that had been knocked over.
"Those three from earlier were dressed just like us, and they spoke like refugees." His voice was not loud, yet everyone fell silent. "But they forgot one thing—a person truly fleeing for his life wouldn't count where the wells were, how many sentries there were, or who slept in which room."
Someone looked up at him.
"No matter how convincingly they pretended, they had never gone three days hungry on nothing but wild-vegetable soup. They didn't know how it felt to hear hoofbeats in the middle of the night and be so frightened you wet your pants." He paused. "Are we afraid? Yes. But precisely because we're afraid, we understand all the more clearly—what it is we have to protect."
A middle-aged man stepped out of the crowd, still clutching a shoulder pole. "Brother Chen, you're right. But can farmers carrying hoes really beat horsemen carrying blades?"
Chen Wuya smiled, and a dimple flashed briefly in his left cheek.
"Do you rely on brute strength to farm?" he asked.
The man was taken aback. "Of course I do."
"Wrong." Chen Wuya shook his head. "You rely on the seasons. Sow in spring, tend the crops in summer, harvest in autumn. Strength is used last. Fighting is the same—you don't need to compete over whose arms are thicker. You need to know when to dodge, when to crash into someone, and when to borrow his force to strike him with it."
He beckoned over a sturdy young man nearby. "Come here. Stand straight."
The young man had no idea what was going on, but he stood in front of him. Chen Wuya reached out and pushed his shoulder. The young man instinctively puffed out his chest to resist, his face flushing red from the effort.
"Don't brace against me," Chen Wuya said. "When I push, you retreat."
He pushed again. This time, the young man relaxed his body and retreated a step with the motion, but his footing slipped, and he nearly fell.
"See?" Chen Wuya patted his shoulder. "The harder you try to withstand it, the easier it is to fall. When he uses force, don't meet it head-on. Just slide back with it, and his force becomes your momentum. This is called Reversing Heaven and Earth—it isn't a technique. It's a principle."
Someone in the crowd muttered, "It still sounds pretty mystical."
Chen Wuya was not annoyed. He turned and pointed toward an old padded jacket swaying on a clothesline in the wind.
"When the wind comes, it doesn't fight it. It sways a couple of times, and the wind passes." He said, "People are the same. When an enemy chops down with a blade, if you raise a hoe to block it, the hoe will definitely break. But if you slip to the side and let him strike empty air, then, in the instant his blade lodges in the ground, close in and drive an elbow into his ribs. I guarantee he'll be in so much pain he'll drop to his knees."
The eyes of several young men lit up.
"Then... what about force?" the old woman from earlier asked again. "You said the force starts at the heels. I tried it. My knees did get warm, but can this really protect me?"
"Of course." Chen Wuya crouched, scooped up a handful of soil, and flung it into the air. Dust motes scattered in the sunlight before the wind carried them away.
"Isn't soil light? One kick sends it flying." He pointed toward two villagers tamping earth to repair the wall in the distance. "But they pound it solid layer by layer. Even a thousand-pound stone crashing down won't break it. Right now, we're this soil—each of us looks ordinary on our own, but together, we're a wall!"
He rose and looked around at everyone. "I'm not teaching you to leap over eaves and walls, nor am I forcing you to practice some true qi and meridians. I'm only teaching you three things: know how to dodge, know how to crash, and know how to borrow force."
"First, the Shifting Step—don't walk in a straight line from beginning to end. Turn a corner, take a diagonal step, and make it impossible for someone to judge where your foot will land. Second, the Body Shocking Technique—keep the soles of your feet against the ground, sink your breathing, and draw force up from the earth. One shock can steady your body. Third, the Counter Push Hand—when your opponent charges, don't meet him head-on. Just turn aside and guide him, transforming his forward momentum into the force that throws him down."
He demonstrated on the spot. He pulled over a villager and had him push forward with both hands. The moment the man exerted himself, Chen Wuya turned aside and guided him, pressing his palm against the man's wrist and sending it forward. The man staggered several steps before plopping down on the ground.
Laughter rang out.
"Again!" someone shouted.
Three or four people came forward in succession to try the move, and he easily guided every one of them to the ground. One youth learned quickly and, copying the movements, actually tripped his companion, drawing a chorus of cheers.
Chen Wuya clapped his hands. "Remember, you're not trying to become martial arts experts. You're trying to stay alive. As long as you learn these few moves, if ten Northern Desert soldiers charge in, we'll form groups of ten. One person trips each soldier, and the other nine follow up with a crash. We can still make sure they don't crawl back out!"
The crowd gradually grew excited.
Several men gathered together to practice the movements. The women also began teaching the children how to distinguish footsteps. An old man sat on a doorstep, nodding as he listened and muttering, "Makes sense... It really makes sense."
Old Wu Tou had remained silent all this time. Now he came forward with his cane and asked in a low voice, "This system of yours doesn't even mention the meridians. Can it really work?"
Chen Wuya smiled. "Orthodox martial arts talk about guiding the breath and circulating it through the meridians, but for rootless people like us, how would we understand any of that? As long as a person can breathe, move, and feel pain, he can understand this—when it hurts, dodge; when you're tired, rest; when someone pushes you, go with the momentum. That is the truest form of skill."
The old man fell silent for a moment. Then he suddenly raised his hand and brought his cane down hard against the ground.
"Thirty years ago, I escorted caravans for a living. I once met an elder whose fists followed no set moves and whose feet took no fixed stance, yet the moment he attacked, seven or eight bandits were all sprawled on the ground." He looked at Chen Wuya. "He once said, 'Martial skill isn't in the manuals. It's in the way you stay alive.' What you taught today follows the same path."
Chen Wuya did not answer. He merely looked toward the crowd.
The children had already begun playing a game called "Find the Shadow." They paired off, one hiding while the other searched. One little girl deliberately tiptoed as she walked, and another immediately shouted, "That's not right! People truly fleeing for their lives walk in a panic. They wouldn't be this light!"
The adults burst out laughing.
Chen Wuya walked over and crouched in front of her. "Do you still remember the three 'herbalists,' 'blacksmiths,' and 'carters' from yesterday?"
The girl nodded.
"From now on, we'll treat everyone who enters the camp as if they're playing 'Find the Shadow.'" He said, "Watch whether their eyes wander, listen for stammering when they speak, and feel whether there's unfamiliar mud on the soles of their shoes. Whoever has a guilty conscience, we'll recognize at a glance."
The girl nodded earnestly. "Then I'll be the first to check them!"
Not far away, several young men had already organized themselves on their own and divided into groups to practice the Shifting Step. One attacked while three worked together to dodge, trip, and drive in their elbows. Their movements were still clumsy, but they already had a pattern to them.
A frail youth was drenched in sweat from training, yet he still refused to stop. Chen Wuya walked over and asked him, "Are you tired?"
"Tired." The boy panted. "But I don't want to be dragged around by others anymore. The last time the Northern Desert soldiers burned the village, my mother was dragged into the fire... I didn't have the ability to save her."
Chen Wuya patted his shoulder. "Every move you practice now is you striking back for the self you were that day."
The boy clenched his teeth and nodded, then resumed his stance.
The sun climbed higher. Shadows crisscrossed the open ground, and shouts rose one after another. Whenever someone fell, his companions immediately pulled him back up. Whenever someone used the wrong movement, someone nearby corrected him: "Don't brace against him! Go with his force!"
Old Wu Tou sat on a stone block, squinting as he watched everything. The cane in his hand tapped lightly against the ground, as if he were silently memorizing the rhythm.
Chen Wuya took the water skin someone handed him and drank a mouthful. After wiping his mouth, he walked toward the young men who were practicing.
"Again," he said. "This time, add speed."
The man took a deep breath and suddenly charged.
Chen Wuya advanced instead of retreating—turning aside, closing against the arm, guiding it—
The man could not stop his momentum. His whole body pitched forward, his palm barely catching him against the ground as the veins in his forehead throbbed wildly.
"You... didn't use any force just now?" he asked between breaths.
"I didn't use force," Chen Wuya said. "Your own momentum flung you out."
The man froze, then suddenly grinned. "I get it! It's like a downhill cart—the farther it rolls, the faster it goes. Then you kick the brake, and the cart flips over by itself!"
Before his voice had even faded, Chen Wuya's brows shifted slightly.
He lowered his head and looked at the man's palm braced against the ground. A bit of dark-brown mud clung to it, marked with strange lines that looked like some kind of imprint.
The pattern resembled a scroll of opened pages, with a corner missing from the middle.
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