Greetings all, and welcome to chapter two of Fist of the Sky!
Creativity: Because apparently, we're just complete suckers for punishment when it comes to project loads.
Author: Hey, it's not that bad. Yet… Could get worse if this actually ends up taking off the way Limit Breaker has…
Anyway, I obviously have a decent chunk of this whole thing plotted out already, so it would be remiss of me to not at least get a few more chapters out there before I go dark for a little while. Oh, and that's just an eventuality. I've got a ton of projects, plus college and the inevitability of a job in the future, so that's just what's going to happen. BUT, that won't stop me! It'll only delay me.
Creativity: Can't help but feel we're making the AN's shorter than the norm.
Author: Yeah, I'm experimenting a bit with this one. But enough about that, you all are here for the next chapter! So, here it is: chapter 2 of Fist of the Sky!
"Ferah, it's time to get going!"
"Aw, can't I just train? I won't go into the forest this time!"
"No, you need to be there for measurements! Otherwise, you could get new clothes that are to tight at the stomach, too long at the sleeves and don't come up to your knees."
"Awww…"
Charra stood at the foot of the pathway that led through the mountains to a nearby village as she waited for a six year old girl dressed in slightly too small clothes, consisting of a blue undershirt, light grey sleeveless gi and pants of the same color. Wrapped around her right bicep was a strip of green cloth, tied in a neat knot. Charra could see the resigned expression underneath the head of spiky black hair, further indicated by the flicking and twitching of the girl's brown tail.
"Don't look so down. We can stop by Lara's for some sweet rocks on the way home." Charra idly mentioned, smiling a bit when she saw the girl's disposition change on a dime.
"Okay! Let's go!" She said with a wide smile. Charra's own smile grew. Aside from training and food, the best way to cheer Ferah up was to indulge her sweet tooth. Though, that could apply to her love of food as well, now that Charra thought about it. It was certainly safer to appeal to the sweet tooth, since that was just a treat instead of a whole meal. When Charra had first seen how much food Ferah could eat in one sitting, she almost had a heart attack on the spot. Luckily she'd managed to find the right amount of food so that Ferah could get her fill, and they wouldn't need to worry about having a perpetually empty pantry and possibly hunting the local deer, fish and other animal populations to extinction.
As the girl and her caretaker strolled down the forest path, Charra reminisced a bit on the previous few years with Ferah. She'd known that Ferah wasn't an ordinary child, given the fact that she'd been in a metal pod when she crashed here as well as the monkey tail, but those had only been a sign of things to come. As Ferah had gotten old enough to crawl, and eventually walk, Charra realized that Ferah's strength was well beyond that of what would be considered 'normal' for your average Etherian. A few examples of this were her being able to drag Charra's chest of books and scrolls out from under the bed when she was only two years old. It took a lot of effort, but she had eventually gotten it all the way out from under the bed. Plus, there was the time she flipped over one of the dining table chairs during a tantrum, that'd been disconcerting.
Perhaps the moment that had cemented their relationship was when Ferah was three years old and was actively watching her surrogate mother training outside. Charra had been downright religious about keeping Ferah within arm's reach when going outside, since her cabin was built relatively close to some cliffs. She'd considered trying to move into the village for some time, but had a feeling it would be better to raise Ferah away from all that. So, she'd constructed a playpen of sorts outside so that she could do her daily training without having to leave Ferah unattended. However, on the first day she'd decided to let Ferah explore around the training ground, the little one had instead watched Charra intently as she went through a few katas. After a few minutes, Charra paused after performing a roundhouse kick and was floored to see Ferah had started mimicking her motions, performing the basic katas that Charra used to warm up with remarkable results, considering Ferah's age.
After a few minutes of watching Ferah performing the motions with a feeling of immense pride, as well as a watery feeling in her eyes, Charra decided to begin training Ferah in the same fighting style that her master had taught her: the Sora no Ken, or Fist of the Sky.
As time had gone on, Charra had seen Ferah's curiosity and excitement at learning become a true passion for fighting. She loved learning new techniques in the style, and she loved even more the opportunity to test them. Charra loved it too. She loved the time spent instructing her pupil, no, her daughter in the fighting style she grew up learning and loving the learning of. She wondered if her own master had felt like this when he started training her.
That wasn't to say that there weren't bumps in the road. Namely, there was the issue of control. Ferah's incredible strength could quite easily lead to her hurting someone, accidentally or otherwise. So, much of the training Charra put Ferah through was to control her strength so that she didn't accidentally break someone's bones, or worse. After she'd accidentally sent Charra flying with too strong a punch one time when she was four, Ferah had really taken the importance of those lessons to heart. She hadn't seriously hurt Charra, just bruised and winded her, but it had still been such scary enough that she'd had a brief period of a few days where she didn't want to practice martial arts anymore, fearing her own strength. However, she'd gotten over it with some assurance and encouragement from Charra, and when they did start training to control strength, Ferah had thrown herself into the challenge with newfound gusto.
Charra's thoughts were interrupted when they breached the treeline and found themselves looking down at the village from the foot of the mountain.
"Now, you're going to behave yourself this time?" Charra asked.
"Yes, ma." Ferah replied in a happy tone.
"You aren't going to run off again and get your tail caught in a fence again?" Charra continued. She saw Ferah's tail droop a bit as she lowered her head in embarrassment.
"Yes, ma…" She muttered. Charra grinned.
"Well then… race ya there!" She exclaimed before taking off at a run! Ferah yelped in surprise before booking it after Charra.
"No fair, you got a head start!" Ferah cried as she ran as fast as her six year old legs could carry her. It didn't matter how strong she was for her age, she wouldn't be winning any footraces against Charra, regardless of whether Charra had a head start or not.
"Well you better pick up the pace then!" Charra called back with a laugh. The two ran the whole rest of the way before finally coming to a screeching halt just outside the village. Ferah was glaring at Charra, trying her best to be intimidating, but all it was serving to do was make Charra want to laugh.
"You cheated." Ferah complained. Charra smiled and bent down to eyelevel with the six year old.
"Would an extra sweet rock make you feel better?" Charra offered in a leading tone. Like clockwork, Ferah was smiling again. Charra affectionately ruffled Ferah's hair, causing the six year old to start trying to bat the offending hand away and the two began making their way over to the local tailor. Ferah was in need of some new clothes, since she'd undergone another growth spurt recently. That was another strange thing. Ferah didn't really have a consistent pattern of growth. Every once and a while, she'd suddenly shoot up a few inches seemingly overnight. On the one hand, it meant that she didn't need new clothes as often as other children would. On the other, it quickly became a necessity to get new clothes as soon as Ferah mentioned feeling growing pains.
Soon enough, they reached the tailor's shop, run be a lovely old woman named Kalli, who knew exactly what they were there for when she saw Charra and Ferah walk through the door.
Kalli was probably the most elderly of the residents of the village, having been here for thirty years out of her total seventy five. She'd come here after her previous home had become a casualty in the war between the Horde and Rebellion. While she held no ill will towards the Rebellion, after all, they weren't kidnapping children or trampling over the land like tyrants, Kalli had absolutely no interest in the war, something Charra could sympathize with.
She was a little on the shorter side, with gray hair being tied up in a bun and thick, round glasses covering blue eyes. She always wore an old red robe and dark green sash, with and orange tunic and floor-length skirt underneath.
"The little weed shoot up a few inches again?" Kalli asked in a welcoming tone as she walked over to a full-length mirror and pulling a stool up for Ferah.
"How'd you guess?" Charra replied in a friendly tone. At Kalli's gesture, Ferah hurried over to the stool and hopped atop it. Kalli hobbled over and adjust Ferah's arms before she began taking measurements with the measuring tape she always wore around her neck.
"Do you want any change in color, deary?" Kalli asked as she jotted down the measurements on a small sheet of paper.
"No. I like these ones." Ferah replied politely as Kalli went and grabbed a familiar ensemble. After bringing over the larger copies of Ferah's current clothes and putting them in the change room, Ferah hurried inside and started getting changed. While they waited, Kalli and Charra idly chatted.
"She's been good for you, you know?" Kalli stated. Charra made a 'hm' noise, which Kalli took as an invitation to continue
"I was always worried about you a bit for those first few years when you showed up. You went into the mountains and stayed there for months before you started coming down every once and a while for supplies. You always looked a bit angry, at least for those first few years." Kalli told her. Charra frowned a bit. Kalli wasn't exactly wrong. It had been… tough back then.
"Then you stopped being angry and just looked tired all the time. You got better, but I could still see that same sadness and exhaustion." Kalli continued. Once again, not wrong though Charra.
"Then one day you showed up in town with a sling across your front and a baby inside it, claiming you'd found it in the middle of the woods! And after that, seeing you come here with her, always with a smile on your face… Well, it's heartwarming to this little old lady." Kalli concluded with a smile on her face. Once again, Charra couldn't help but agree. There'd rarely been a moment she hadn't been happy with Ferah around. Training her, teaching her, just having her around brought her joy.
"I'd maybe stay out of town for the next few days. Jars says he saw a Horde heading east. It looks like they'll pass us by, but I'd err on the side of caution if I were you." Karri suggested in an undertone. Charra immediately frowned as she felt her heartbeat speed up a few beats at the mention of that. She had no doubt that if the Horde caught wind of Ferah, or even just that someone matching her own description, the Horde would come gunning for them. And she was not going to let them within 100 feet of Ferah while she still drew breath.
"I think it's a little long."
Charra was snapped out of her thoughts by a familiar voice drawing her gaze down. She had to agree, that the sleeves for both the shirt and pants did look a tad too long, but that was nothing that Kalli couldn't fix in jiffy.
"Alright dear, just hope up on the stool and I'll handle the rest." Kalli ordered Ferah, who did just that. As Kalli resumed her work, Charra started thinking about the news of a Horde contingent moving through the area. If this had been about ten years ago, she'd have probably marched out that door at the mention of the Horde and gone to fight them all singlehandedly. And that wouldn't have ended well, even if she did come out of it victorious.
However, this wasn't ten years ago. Those ten years spent training in the mountains, studying and learning everything she could from the writings of her master and the masters before him, and over those years, had finally come to the conclusion that going after the Horde wasn't going to get her what she wanted. Of course, that left her with the question of what she did want. At least until six years ago, when she found Ferah in the woods.
"Alright, that'll about do it. You two run along and I'll have everything ready for you when you get back." Kalli told them in a chipper tone before she carried the clothes back behind her counter and got to work.
"Sweet rocks?" Ferah immediately asked hopefully. Charra smiled.
"Well, what else would we do?" She asked in a teasing tone as they left the shop and made their way down the street to Lara's Sweet Shop. It was no surprise that the majority of the village's children were lingering around the shop, looking in at the many delectable treats on display.
As they entered the shop, the owner, obviously named Lara, smiled welcomingly at them. Lara was in her early forties and had grown up in the village before leaving to do a bit of traveling. She had lightly tanned skin, light brown hair, hazel eyes and almost always had a smile on her face.
Lara had come back to the village only a couple months after Charra had arrived and had immediately set about opening a sweet shop. When asked about the sudden drive to open the shop, she explained that over the course of her travels, she'd learned how to make simple candies like the sweet rocks, which were mixtures of sugar and syrup blended together in boiling water and left to crystalize on sticks.
"Well, isn't this a welcome surprise! Let me guess, you're here for…" Lara started before pausing to invite Ferah to finish the sentence.
"Sweet rocks!" Ferah answered with massive smile plastered across her face. Lara smiled back as Ferah hurried up to the glass display and looked at the candy in question with wide eyes and an eager grin.
"We'll get three today." Charra told Lara as she withdrew the requisite amount of coins from a pouch she kept in her gi and deposited them on the counter. Lara already had the pieces of candy ready and handed them to Charra and quickly counted up the coins before depositing them in her register with a smile.
"Well, you two have a wonderful day!" Lara bade them farewell as they stepped out of the shop. Charra immediately handed one of the candies to Ferah, who eagerly took it and began to attack it with gusto.
"And what do you say?" Charra asked in a leading tone.
"Thanks, ma." Ferah immediately said in a chipper voice. After finding a bench to sit down on they simply sat in silence, enjoying the candy and simply watching the day go by in the town. It was nice to have a day like this; hiking out of the mountains, coming to the town and simply taking in the different surroundings while enjoying some candy.
"Ma, can I have the last one?"
Charra looked down at Ferah, who was pointing at the last sweet rock.
"Let's save that for when we get home. Remember the last time you ate too much candy to quickly?" Charra asked, her voice dropping to a performatively ominous tone. Ferah's eyes widened with fear.
"No, I don't want that to happen again!" She yelped in terror. Charra smiled and ruffled Ferah's hair.
"I didn't think so. Let's get going. Kalli's probably done with your new clothes now." Charra told Ferah, and the two of them made their way back to Kalli's shop to pick up the clothes. After they stepped inside, Kalli turned around from where she'd been working at her counter and put her hands on her hips.
"I know I didn't exactly give you a definitive time, but you sure kept an old lady waiting." Kalli groused, though Charra could tell it was all for fun. She'd known Kalli long enough to know she wasn't really that impatient.
"These should last until the little miss finds another growing potion." Joked as she handed them a bag with Ferah's new clothes in it.
"Thanks for handling this on such short notice." Charra told Kalli gratefully as she handed over the usual fee.
"Oh, it wasn't that bad. Well, have a safe trip back home! Oh, and enjoy the moons tonight!" Kalli bade them farewell as they were just about to step out the door. Charra felt her heart jump for a moment but gave no sign of her surprise.
"We will. Have a good day!" She called back before they started departed. She knew she'd been forgetting something important earlier that day. Tonight was the night of three moons, an event that came about thrice a year. It was so named because the same three of Etheria's eleven moons would come into near perfect alignment in the night skies. While not as impressive as the very occasional night of seven moons or the mythical night of eleven, it was still an event that many across Etheria commemorated with their own small traditions. In a way, Charra supposed they similarly commemorated it, though it wasn't through anything particularly fun. Instead, Ferah had to wear a blindfold for the whole night and Charra covered all the windows until morning.
The reason for this was an incident that happened when Ferah was two years old. Charra wanted to show her the three moons, so she took her to a special location she'd found higher up in the mountains. She was glad she'd picked a place far from home, since when Ferah looked upon the three moons, she suddenly went limp as she looked at them. And then, things got weird.
Ferah's heart began to beat harder and harder and she started to… change. Before Charra had time to process it, Ferah had transformed from a two year old child into a towering, monstrous ape! Ferah had then gone on a short-lived rampage through the mountains, smashing trees and rocks and causing the local wildlife to flee in terror! Luckily, the transformation didn't last very long. Once the moons had separated enough (a few hours after alignment) the transformation wore off and Charra found an unconscious Ferah lying in the middle of a giant footprint. It didn't take a genius to figure out what had triggered the transformation. Ferah had been outside for a few nights and seen different combinations of moons in the sky. However, it was those three specific moons in that alignment that had triggered the transformation.
From that point on, Charra had been strict on keeping Ferah from being exposed to the night of three moons at all costs. It was obvious that she wasn't in control of herself when the transformation occurred, and Charra had no idea if Ferah would ever be able to control herself in the event she ever transformed again. Ferah wasn't sure why Charra had her blindfold herself three times a year, but she didn't question it. By now, it was just part of how things were to her.
The walk home was uneventful, but Charra did have a sense of urgency now that she remembered what tonight was. When they got home, the time was approximately four in the afternoon. So, it was time to start on Ferah's basic education. The six year old braced against learning basic math, reading and writing, complaining that training was more fun, but Charra wouldn't be swayed. These were important skills for everyone to learn, regardless of what path in life they wanted to take. After having her practice her letters and writing some simple sentences for an hour, Charra got to work on dinner while letting Ferah enjoy the sweet rock she'd been promised. As the time passed with relative silence, Charra began wondering how she could possibly increase Ferah's motivation to put more effort into her academic studies. Well, there was one obvious solution, and that was to tie her love of fighting to learning. Somehow…
She supposed she could try showing her the notes and scrolls about the Sora no Ken she kept in the chest but doing so would just prove a temptation for Ferah to break into the chest and start learning as much as she could, and while Charra found that enthusiasm endearing, she knew that Ferah wasn't ready for that level yet. Though she was approaching it quickly. Charra gave Ferah three, maybe four more years before she was ready for what set the Sora no Ken fighting style apart from others.
"Ma, does something smell funny to you?"
Charra resisted the urge to employ a few choice curses as she realized that dinner was beginning to burn. Luckily, Ferah's warning proved to be enough for her to save it, and after setting the stew on the cold side of the stovetop, she grabbed a pair of bowls and cut up many slices of bread before buttering them and doling out the stew for the two of them.
Charra was the first to finish her meal, though that wasn't very surprising. Ferah regularly ate at least thrice what Charra did, even if she did eat pretty fast. Where all that food went, Charra couldn't begin to guess, but Ferah never seemed to gain any weight from it. Of course, when you knew that she could also turn into a giant, rampaging monkey under the light of three moons in a specific alignment, you stopped questioning the other strange thing about her. While Ferah finished eating, Charra set about covering the windows with spare sheets and making sure they were secured before finding Ferah's blindfold. It was an old black strip of cloth that still had a few of Ferah's black hairs sticking to it from years of use.
After Ferah finished off the contents of her bowl, and implicitly the contents of the entire pot as well as the bread, she saw what Charra had been up to and immediately grabbed the blindfold and tied it around her eyes. She'd become quite used to having the blindfold after all these years and could navigate her way through the cabin without difficulty.
As the sun continued to set, the two of them sat on Charra's bed as she told Ferah stories that her master had told her when she was Ferah's age. She was in the middle of one of her favorites that her master used to tell her; How his master before him had defeated a beast of the Whispering Woods with his bare hands.
"… And so, the Great Master Akar rose to his feet as the monster shrieked at him. He glared at the beast with no fear in his eyes, for he knew that the beast did not fear him, and that would be its downfall. It charged him, every step shaking the ground beneath him. As the creature prepared to devour him in one bite, he leapt over its jaws and unleashed his might with the Thunderstrike kick!" Charra exclaimed. Even though she couldn't see them, she knew that Ferah's eyes were filled with wonder and excitement.
"With that definitive strike, the beast was defeated, and the travelers saved from its rampage! They tried to offer rewards to Master Akar, but he merely refused and continued on his way. All he needed was to know that the people were saved." Charra concluded, smiling at how enraptured Ferah had been with the story.
"I hope I can be as strong as Master Akar was!" Ferah exclaimed as she and Charra went to the sink to brush their teeth before bed.
"I said the same thing when I was your age." Charra replied with a smile. Ferah looked up at her, regardless of the blindfold.
"Are you?" She asked. Charra paused.
"I wouldn't say I'm quite there yet. After all, Master Akar was much older than I am when he defeated the beast of the Whispering Woods." Charra answered, doing her performative ominous voice when referring to the monster. Ferah giggled a bit at Charra's antics, drawing another smile from the woman.
"But, I also remember something my master used to tell me all the time. 'you cannot be strong like me. You can only be strong like you'." Charra concluded. Ferah didn't quite understand what it meant, but it sounded important, so she repeated it a few times in her head to remember it.
"What was your master like?" She suddenly asked. Charra paused. She hadn't brought her master up with Ferah very often, and she'd never asked further about him before.
"He was… Amazing. He was so strong, strict but kind… He wasn't above the occasional practical joke. I remember this one time when one of the students pranked another by filling his room with spiders. The master responded by releasing a few snakes into the first student's room while he was asleep. We could hear him scream from across the dojo… But he still cared for all of us, regardless of the trouble we caused… I really miss him." She said after a few moments of silence.
"Alright, that's enough talking! It's late, and we have extra training to do tomorrow to make up for today!" Charra announced, getting a 'yippee!' from Ferah, who immediately hurried to her own little bed and crawled under the covers. Charra walked over to her and gave her a quick kiss on the head, then went around putting out the lantern and candles before climbing into her own bed. It wasn't until hearing Ferah's own light snores before she nodded off herself. After all, tomorrow was going to be a busy day.
And we're done! Not quite as far as I thought we'd get, but I think having a whole chapter of just Charra and Ferah is better for the pacing and getting people invested in their relationship.
Creativity: Yeah, but people are gonna start wondering when the plot is going to start.
Author: Ah, they'll be fine.
So, not much left to say here. Thank you for reading, please review, and we'll see you next time!