I began to open my eyes at last. I looked outside to see that the sun was setting. Bloody hell, I must have been asleep for longer than I thought. I climbed out of my bed and decided to find Shifu while I could as I still felt as though I needed to talk to him about my offense strategy.
The way I see it. The longer we sit here, the stronger Fennu and his clan is going to be. If we were to attack and bring him down, the best time to act would have been right now.
I quickly found Shifu to be in the Hall of heroes, meditating. I wasn't one to interrupt but I felt like I needed to speak with him at once and slithered closer. As I did, I heard him chant over and over again.
"Inner peace... Inner peace".
"Master Shifu".
"Yes? What is it python"? He asked, sounding a little annoyed that I had interrupted him. Even so, I felt like what I had to say was more urgent.
"I've been thinking lately. The recent attack from Fennu has seemed to have crippled both the Jade palace and the Valley of peace".
"And now, you think that to attack Fennu is the best strategy we have"? Shifu caught on at once.
"Indeed".
Shifu sighed, his ears fell as he did.
"I'm sorry Mike. But I must say that it is a foolish move. As far as we know, Fennu could be anywhere between here and the Galadriel gates".
"Or a few miles away from town. Even so, it's worth finding out, surely".
"Must I remind you python, that your condition would serve as a barrier between yourself and victory"?
"Master, plea"-
"It is out of the question".
I sighed, frustrated, but even so I bowed respectfully and left Shifu to continue meditating. As I did, I couldn't help but think over and over again about how close Fennu possibly could be, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it. If anything, there way a good chance that he was at that old building, the one he kept me prisoner at, just a mile away. But no matter what I thought, I still had the matter of these stitches keeping my cuts together. I just hope it wouldn't take too long until they were healing. Besides, I've noticed that my skin had been getting a little harder throughout the day. Must be that molting trick that snakes do. Thankfully, according to Viper, molting helps to heal wounds and injuries as well as to allow snakes to grow slightly bigger. I don't know if it would be enough to heal the cuts entirely but it had to do at least repair some of the tissue underneath.
I couldn't help but slither back to the barracks. The training hall was under repair right now and it wouldn't be done until a couple of days time so there was nothing anyone could do about it.
The last few hours of the day passed. My skin had become that much tougher and... well, I got rid of it. Simple as that. I don't feel comfortable describing the experience as it was... unusual. At least to me I mean, how would you feel if you had to shed your skin? Even so, I checked my cuts that I had been so anxious about lately. They seemed smaller, but not exactly fully healed. But even so, I was able to move about freely. I could no longer feel any pain, not as much as before anyway. Only problem was, what am I meant to do with my... old skin? The thing just seemed to lie there on top of my bed. I guess, if I had no further use for it, the bin would seem like a good enough home for it so I did just that with the one outside of my room. Once I had, Crane entered, he seemed to be covered in spit.
"That ape has no manners". He muttered to himself.
"Hey Crane". I greeted grabbing his attention and cheering him up slightly.
"Oh hey Mike. Didn't see you there".
"I take it that our prisoner wasn't all to chatty"? I asked.
"On the contrary, he wouldn't stop talking. That's the problem".
"How so"?
"He was roaring in my face about how he was going to single handedly rip us to pieces and yelling for us all to die a horrible death". He groaned, referring to old Red mask who had tried to kill me earlier today.
"Ah. So nothing positive".
"I'm afraid not. In the end, I had to use the shoulder pinch on him just to shut him up. The royal guard should be coming to take him to Chorgom at any time now".
"That's a shame".
"Mmm. Well, if you'll excuse me, I need to wash the spit out of my feathers. It's going to take all night to get them cleaned".
With that, Crane grabbed a towel from his room and took of to wash himself off. I on the other hand, just wanter to get some sleep while I still could. Today had been an interesting day and the majority of it had left me tired, even after taking a small rest a few hours ago. I climbed up onto my bed and fell asleep, waiting to see what surprises were in for next morning.
...
NEXT MORNING
The morning bell went and everybody had greeted Shifu. Everybody except myself who arrived a few seconds later. My cuts had become a stinging nuisance once again and I couldn't properly move around, at least not as quick as I usually would. Either I've slept on them funny or there's some other reason behind it.
I headed into the kitchen where everybody followed.
"You okay there buddy? You seem a little slow today"? Monkey asked.
"Yeah, just a little sore from that beating I received yesterday".
"That reminds me". Tigress spoke before slapping me round the back of the head. Not too hard but enough to hurt.
"Ow. And that was for"...
"Disobeying my orders and attacking that gorilla".
"... Fair enough. But still, everything worked out".
"I'll say. Both gorillas are in Chorgom and the training hall's pretty much wrecked so I guess we get to relax for the next day or two". Mantis spoke as he sat on his back with both his arms behind his head.
"We can't afford to slack off. I don't think I need to remind you of last time that happened".
"Last time"?
"You weren't there Mike but, in short, Po became in charge of our training for a week and we ended up getting our butts handed to us by the croc bandits". Crane filled me in. I was a little taken by surprise upon hearing that the crocs, possibly the worst bandits in China, had beaten them.
"Damn. That must have sucked".
"Hey, I made a great teacher. Just ask Monkey, he didn't seem to argue when it came to the pie eating contest"! Po defended himself. I just sniggered at the thought of Po holding a pie eating contest as training. It did seem like something he would do.
"Seems like your cuts have healed Mike". Viper pointed out as she looked at the smaller cuts. My stitches seemed to have come clean off with my old skin. I hadn't noticed that.
"Guess molting will do that for you. However, the pain remains". I replied with a groan, feeling the cuts sting as though they were fresh.
"Don't worry. It shouldn't take too long for the stinging to disappear altogether. Plus there's no need to reapply any stitching".
"Thank goodness for that". I guess that's some good news at least.
"Come on, we need to train". Tigress spoke up, eager to do kung fu.
"Where exactly are we meant to train"? Po pointed out. "The training hall's like, totally demolished".
"The courtyard isn't".
"Awww, what's the point of the training hall being wrecked if we're just going to train anyway"? Po whined getting most of us to laugh at his laziness.
"Oh come on Po, it could be worse". Crane tried to cheer Po up.
"You guys go on ahead. There's something I need to check on first".
"You sure Mike"?
"Yeah, I'm sure".
I watched as everybody left the barracks and headed towards the training hall courtyard. The second I couldn't see them, I left the barracks myself and headed down into town, with one building set in mind.