"Honoka, are you feeling well?" Asked Honoka's friend Sakura, concern in her eyes, "it's been awhile since you came to play in the recess. Are you sick?"

"I-I a-am worried t-too H-honoka-chan. W-w-what happened?" Her other friend Hinata also came at her side, fidgeting a little in nervousness.

Truth be told the training regime was simply too harsh for her even with her sunsengnim reassurances. The runs were too long for her due to her size and age, not counting her one-yin type body to complicate matters, and the strength training was too hard for her due to lack of muscle tone at her age. Yet, she didn't dared to stop even a single day, as that would break the agreement with her sunsengnim and she wasn't sure what would happen afterwards.

"I'm fine", she tried, but both her friends just stared at her before she relented. "Alright, I'm tired because I'm training during the day."

Sakura looked thoughtful, but Hinata knew something didn't add up with what her friend said. "A-aren't you j-just e-exercisi-i-ing after s-sc-school?"

Honoka tried to stay silent, but the eager look from her friends melted her resolve. "I'm actually training at three different hours of the day. Early at morning, after school and before going to sleep."

Sakura looked rather interested in that. "You're training really seriously Honoka! Did you start training martial arts too like us?"

"Hue?"

That was news to Honoka. She knew that Hinata was learning her family own style of martial arts since she was little, even if she wasn't particularly good at it according to her friend. Sakura however never had showed an interest in martial arts before, she liked to practice various sports and was taking an interest in the track and field club before the kidnapping attempt. Did something also change to her usually excitable friend, pondered Honoka as she looked at her.

"Since when are you training martial arts Sakura-chan?" Honoka finally asked after regaining her bearings.

"Ah. A few days ago mostly", she looked rather embarrassed for some reason, "I'm trying to mimic some movements I saw on some old tapes I have on my house, while my father helps me with physical exercise."

Honoka nodded, and her two friends returned to her, expectant of what Honoka had to say.

"... uh, I can't talk about it", she finally settle down with her stomach turning inside her, "I promised."

"I u-understand H-honoka c-chan", allowed Hinata since her situation was similar herself. While her family training itself wasn't a secret, what exactly went into it was and she knew how being pressured to talk is uncomfortable.

Sakura was disappointed, but didn't comment further on it.

It still made Honoka feel bad about hiding things from her two best friends, but the deal with her sunsengnim was a deal after all, but since now they all knew what she did on her free time…

"Do you girls want to train with me too? It's a bit lonely running sometimes, even if my mother accompanies me during the mornings and evenings."

Sakura was ecstatic. "Sure! We can meet at your house since it's closer to school! I will talk with my parents to let me come in. What about you Hinata?"

Hinata was more reticent about that before shyly nodding. "I t-think I c-can a-ask f-f-father t-to allow m-me to come. I-If it's o-only p-ph-physical e-exercise he s-shouldn't have a p-problem with i-it."

"Then that's settled!" Almost yelled Sakura, "this is going to be sooo cool! We're going to get awesome together!"

Honoka couldn't help but smile at the exuberance of her friend. In her opinion, she was the one that changed the least from the experience, which gave her both a much needed sense of normalcy and relief at the same time a pang of jealousy creep on her mind. Fortunately the last part was easy for the girl to squash and ignore.

"You're right! We three together can do anything!" Honoka finally said with a smile that wasn't nearly as strained as the others she gave those days, "isn't that right Hinata-chan?"

She hesitated for a moment, before smiling and nodding. "Y-yes, t-that's right."

The three of them raised their hands, and in a quick motion did a high five. An act that the three of them haven't done in a long time in their own opinion.

~~O~~

"You have been busy", said Kanten Wu from where he was smoking on the grass under a tree that surmised the inner garden, where his sort of apprentice sat down herself to catch her breath after another long day of training. "With your friends no less." He said the last point with a hint of accusation on his tone.

"You didn't told me not to train with them, just that I couldn't talk about anyone else you were training me, and I haven't."

He grunted in response, accepting the point. "To be honest I thought you would spend more time with them instead of looking up for me here".

"Well… I wanted to know more about my sunsengnim. Other than you being an english teacher and being really strong, I don't know much about you."

"That's because most of everything isn't your business", he snapped at her making the young girl wince at his tone, making him sigh. "Sorry, but most of my past is a sore point to me. I won't say that everything was an awful mess, but the good points became all painful to remember and bittersweet at best of times."

Honoka made an 'oh' shape with her mouth before she straightened up. "Can't you tell me a bit of yourself them? Things like hobbies, likes and dislikes, stuff like that?"

"That sounds… reasonable" he allowed, "but I don't really know much about you either. Why don't you go first?"

"Oh, alright. Well, my hobbies include karaoke and board games like othello, go and shougi. What I like is my oniichan, some sweets like cake and dogs. I don't like math and centipede, those creep me out". Left unsaid however was how much she HATED kidnappers, but the sheer burning hate show in her eyes would make that blatantly obvious to anyone who knows the young girl. "What about you sunsengnim?"

"Hmm, I never had much in the way of hobbies when I was a kid, and most of what I like to do is not for children ears", he said with a smirk, "I like smoking in certain special occasions, food so spicy you can use it as a weapon and the short of expensive whiskey you drink on some high class bars. What I dislike are creepy, greedy old man and their flunkies who are either cowards to speak up or so set in tradition that when they see injustice going in front of them they prefer to remain silent instead of helping."

The last bit came as a surprise to Chun-Woo Han, but while it told a great deal it was also harmless enough for now and would probably sate the curiosity of his sort of apprentice if she knew what was good for her.

Honoka for her part just remained silent, wanting to know more but knowing when the topic is too sensitive for the time being.

~~O~~

Honoka was helping one of her classmates to bring some things from the storage room to her class, when she bumped into something and spilled everything on her hands.

"Sorry", came the automatic reply on the girl's lip as she bend down and started to grab clean up the mess she made on the floor, before she saw a long pair of legs kneeling in front of her. Looking up, she saw that it was a beautiful woman with a slender hourglass figure, large breasts and wide hips along with very long smooth brown hair and thin eyes with long eyelashes.

As she wondered what someone who looks like a model is doing in her school the mysterious woman starts to help Honoka in taking her things. "Sorry miss, you don't need to bother."

The woman just chuckles and continued helping Honoka, "it's nothing dear. It was my fault you dropped everything after all."

After they finished their task, the mysterious woman stared intently to Honoka for a few moments, making the girl a little uncomfortable. "I need to go", she finally said.

The woman nodded with a smile. "My name is I Shiho, I'm substituting your school nurse for a while. If you need anything, please drop to my office at any time."

Nodding, Honoka turned and went back to her class, already getting late by now.

Shiho keep staring at the back of the retreating girl for a few moments before she looked thoughtful. "So this is the girl who Chun-Woo Han went out of his way to help? I better take a good look at her in the future."