The next day, Mushu woke Ping up far too early. He was usually a morning person, and he often enjoyed relaxing in their garden and watching the sun rise. Unfortunately he had spent most the night collecting rice.

By the time he staggered out of his tent and towards the camp though, he was feeling more awake.

"Looks like someone slept in this morning." One of the men shouted, a grin on his lips.

Ping frowned, but didn't reply. He simply stood beside them, the rice he had eaten churning uncomfortably in his stomach.

"Ready to kick the other kid's butt?" Mushu asked quietly in his ear, but the young man ignored him.

"Hey, Ping? Are ya hungry?" Ling shouted as he strolled over to Ping.

"Yeah, cause I owe you a knuckle sandwich!" Growled the short man, Yao (if Ping was remembering correctly).

Ping took a deep breath, trying to work up his courage to say something. He wouldn't kick anyone's butt, but perhaps he could talk his way out of this. Yao grabbed his collar, and he tried to pull back, mind racing for the words that would keep him from harm.

"Soldiers!" Their commanding officer, Li Shang, came striding towards them.

Everyone fell into orderly lines, and Ping was released.

"You will assemble swiftly and silently every morning. Anyone who acts otherwise will answer to me."

Ping tried to not gape as Li slid his shirt off and picked up a quiver full of arrows and a bow.

"Ooh, tough guy." Yao remarked, unwisely.

"Yao. Thank you for volunteering. Retrieve the arrow." Li shot an arrow up high tot the top of a post in response to the sarcastic comment. Ping felt a grin twitch at his lips at the man's cheerful tone.

"I'll get that arrow, pretty boy, and I'll do it with my shirt on."

Ping wondered at the 'tough guy' act. It wasn't something he understood; they were, after all, here to train. If they didn't have something to learn from Li then they would have been with the General instead.

"One moment! You seem to be missing something." Li lead Chi-Fu over to Yao. Stopping, he pulled two weights out of the box the scribe was barely managing to hold. "This represents discipline and this represents strength. You need both to reach the arrow."

As the men chuckled at Yao, who had stumbled with the weights, Ping stared at Li. Did he need both weights or both discipline and strength? There was something odd about the way the man had phrased that, but as he watched Yao slide back down the post, he realised it didn't matter. Ping was fairly certain he would be unable to do so much as pick the weights up.

He was, of course, right. He watched the men, one by one, as they tried and failed to reach the arrow and once his turn came around, he couldn't even get off the ground with the weights attached to his wrists. Blushing furiously, he crept back to his place in line, shame burning in his gut as he watched Li let out an exasperated growl into his hands.

The next thing Li did was breathing exercises.

"You can't do any kind of physical activity without first training your body to endure it." Li informed them, his skin a glorious colour in the midday sun. "We need to work out your limits and extend them."

"Breathing? Come on, pretty boy, we all know how to do that." Yao rolled his eyes impatiently.

"Do you? Push up position then, and hold it until I say otherwise." He glared at the short man until his instructions were obeyed, then the young captain continued on. "The muscles that control your breathing are in the part of your body that is vital for everything from posture to how you move. They need to be strong."

Li glanced down at Yao, who was dripping with sweat as he struggled to stay in position.

"Here you can see, Yao does not know how to control his breathing. His skin is getting that tint because he is holding his breath." Yao's arms gave out, and he collapsed into the grass, eyes glaring up at Li. "Everyone sit."

Ping dropped to the ground, legs crossed and back straight as he had been taught.

"I want everyone to breathe in, count to ten and then exhale slowly. Then I want you to do this ten times."

Ping obeyed, feeling a calmness wash over him that he hadn't felt since before leaving home.

"Now, I want you to do the same breathing while in a push up position. You can have your elbows on the ground if you need to, but don't let anything between them and your feet touch the floor."

Ping pushed himself into position, though he needed to rest on his elbows. For a fair few moments, the position was ok.

"Ping, you are on the grass. Body up. Jian, body up. Lei… what is that? Look at those around you and copy them."

Ping's hips had sagged, so he tightened his buttocks and tried to hold his position.

"Don't forget your breathing."

And so the afternoon continued. It was far more difficult that Ping had anticipated and by the time it came to getting dinner, he just wanted to go back to bed.

"You did good, kid." Mushu whispered.

"I did terrible." Ping muttered. And he had. By the end, his breathing had been more gasping and his arms and legs let as though the bones had been turned to liquid. He had stumbled and fallen into their captain. He wasn't going to forget that glare any time soon.

"It was the first day. And he has set some of those exercises for every day. You can only get better."

Ping didn't reply, he just stood behind Chien-Po and waited for his food.

"Eyes up, Ping. You need to stop staring at your feet." Mushu's voice had a harsh tone in it, but it made Ping's shoulders sag and he slowly raised his eyes to stare at Chien-Po's back. He was disappointing his guardian.

Sitting down, Ping stuck by Chien-Po. He may not like the man's friends, but he seemed to give off a calming vibe, plus he was big enough to hide behind.

As he quietly plucked a pea out of his bowl, he wondered what his family would be doing. They would have noticed he had gone. He had crept into his parents' bedroom in the middle of the night, taken the conscription notice, and then dressed in his father's armour and left.

Honestly though, it wasn't well planned. The armour was too big for him, and though he had tied it tightly, it dug in uncomfortably in several places. Hopefully, the training would help him fill out enough to wear it better.

The young man wondered if his sister was angry with him. He hadn't told anyone what he had been planning to do, and they had always told each other everything. He hoped she would talk to him when he returned… if he returned… no, when he returned. When. He was going to go back home and show them all he could amount to something.

When… but not any time soon. Looking around, Ping realised he wasn't the only one gazing morosely at his dinner. He probably wasn't the only one out of shape either; while most of the men just seemed tired, there were a few rubbing sore muscles and struggling to gather enough energy to get about.

He had noticed that he was one of the youngest men there though; while most of the men there were younger, there were a couple of older men who had simply never served in the army before and so needed to be in a training camp first… Ping decided to take comfort from this, as his body was young and could surely recover from blows quicker than others. Ping would have been happier as a scribe in life, but now that he was here he would have to do the best he could to make everyone, including Captain Li see him.

Eventually, Ping staggered back to his tent. He was exhausted and made no move to strip down until his guardian dragon commanded him to. He just had to get through this training. Maybe at the end of it, he wouldn't feel so pathetic all the time. Maybe he wouldn't be useless and unworthy of notice… he just had to get there.