Living Life As A Game: Through And Through 15 Trouble's Brewing

Elizabeth and Jane kept up their brutal training for three hours total, before Jane had to move on with her duties. She promised Elizabeth that everyday day they could spar for at least two hours, and maybe on slow days, they might up the time allotted. Elizabeth on the other hand was a bit saddened to see her most valuable source of "points" be restricted down to just two or so hours a day.

She had improved by a comical degree, and that was all in part due to her not needing to use up nearly as much Inner Strength. Since she would just be blocked or redirected with each attempted move, her Inner Strength wasn't put on a continuous burn. Naturally, this meant her Stats increased at a much slower pace during these three hours, but the improvement to her Muay Thai skill was well worth the time offered up and it wasn't like there was not a sizable increase to her Stats through this training as well.

Elizabeth's eyes shined with glee at the thought that her Muay Thai skill had reached Level 8. Yet, no matter how she examined the outcome to her sparring with Jane, there didn't seem to be any improvements whatsoever. It just seemed like every time, she would be thrown harder and harder…

She lamented the fact that the numbers would temporarily stop increasing so quickly, and slouched over to the training area out of the sparring ring. Elizabeth recovered all the Inner Strength she exhausted during these three hours and moved to focus on resistance training, to balance out the increase to her Strength stat from the training she did before sparring with Jane.

She didn't have to exhaust all her Inner Strength from full capacity to match her Strength Stat, as her sparring with Jane increased her Defense the most out all her Stats; probably due to the fact that she kept being beaten… It was only forty-five minutes later that Elizabeth checked to see if she was keeping time correctly and her Stats had matched with what she planned — they did.

[Strength: 12.05 → 13.4

Endurance: 13.5 → 15.12

Speed: 21.85 → 22.21

Defense: 12.05 → 13.4]

Elizabeth stood up from the floor and walked over to the punching bags once more… More punishment was dealt in exchange for an increase to her Strength stat, and said punishment would return every other hour as she trained her Strength and Defense in intervals of one hour each.

Only now, when she was back to facing a static sandbag, did the difference between her Muay Thai skill start to manifest with visible proof. The poor sandbag stood no chance now that true fury descended back onto it with a more practiced flair. Its poor cylindrical shape was now constantly bent as Elizabeth turned into a bag-beating demon lost in a demonic rage.

When the hour long Strength training interval ended, some of the bystanders could swear they heard joyous cries come from the sandbag as its torture came to an end. Alas, when the next hour came, even heavier sobs of pleading mercy could come forth. The sandbag would not see its torture for the day end until 9:00 PM at night, as Elizabeth literally had nothing better to do.

…

Outside of the dojo, at atop one of the buildings a mile away from the dojo, three men and one woman stood standing, directing their line of sight directly towards Atid's Dojo. Even though none of the people in this group had their eyes squinting, their unfocused sight seemed to highlight Elizabeth in particular, as her image reflected on the surface of each of their irises.

The mysterious group could literally see her from a mile away and through the dojo windows. Given that she didn't just stand still the whole time she was in the dojo it was a miracle none of them lost her for all the moments she would move to a point which obstructed their view. However, when she was "clearly" visible some of the group members would talk to each other; a sign that they wouldn't need as much focus when she was viewable.

At one of those more casual points in their tracking, one man, decked out in a black suit with a hat, said "Boss are you sure you got the right girl? I mean look at her… She barely even has any power."

Another man, presumably this "boss," said "Very sure… Her primal qi, since first sighting, doubled..." The boss' odd pattern of speech reflected a heavy asian accent, but no one seemed to mind.

Yet another man, this time hat-less yet still suited up, said "But boss… her cultivation is barely even enough to put beginners in the Mortal Stage down. Why are we targeting such a weakling?"

The boss grew visibly angry when being questioned so much. His tone took a darker tone as he said "Stupid! New girl joined Atid! What you think will happen, come time?! Fast grower, fast learner… You want give her time, grow?"

The suited man with a hat suddenly interjected, asking "But boss, won't she be protected now that she's weak? I mean you said so yourself, she's super talented and a quick learner. Wouldn't Atid have some sort of preventative measures to safeguard his dojo's new treasure?"

The boss smirked, thinking the rest of the guys in his group were a bunch of idiots. He said "Hehehe… Master sent scout here, every day. He tell me, she came only yesterday. Last night, I follow her, she have no protection. My guess, she still new face, no reputation, no enemy to look for."

Everyone physically shook as the term "master" came out of the boss' mouth. They became silent and returned to watching Elizabeth as she trained. All of them becoming an additional point serious, slightly nervous at the thought of failing this mission and facing the master's wrath. Even the previous quiet woman who withdrew from participating in the men's conversation frowned. Her violet eyes pulsing out with an even more vibrant purple glow, before returning to normal.

…

Back in the dojo, after the sun had set and the dojo members were starting to pick up and store away the equipment used for the day, Elizabeth was just finishing her final round of sandbag torture. She hesitantly stopped and chose to help her peers in the dojo with putting the equipment away as her personality favored being social, if and only if, it made her less likely to enter conflict in the future.

Sure, no one asked her to help and she was technically doing this out of her own free will. But, if one considered that literally everyone else was helping out without being prompted, and she was the only one reaping the benefits of everyone else's efforts. The chances of her being pushed into a conflict for not acting out a common sense unspoken rule of courtesy practically escalated to 100%. To her previously game-oriented mind, whenever a distraction would pop up and require her to participate in a group-like setting — say before she (he at the time) had started homeschool — conflicts created by "acting out" would just take up her time and would thus be avoided entirely, if possible.

She just put on the most unbelievably bothered face in her arsenal of expression and hoped no one would bother her as she did her part to tidy up the dojo at the end of the day. Fortunately, god answered her prayers and no one came to bother her.

After another awkward "goodbye" to Atid and Jane, Elizabeth stormed off back to her house awaiting a much needed sleep. She didn't see Sun when she left, but did recalled that around an hour earlier he had left to go do some personal shopping.

Elizabeth took off at max speed down the shadowy silent roads of the night, but she had to curse her bad luck as it started raining around ten minutes into her run. The rain became an annoyance but it didn't stop her journey to get home, as she would be taking a shower the moment her doors were closed anyways. Though she did have to slow down a bit to enhance her control and not fall at 20 miles per hour.

Twenty minutes into her run, as she entered a small neighbor, a barricade of shadows seemed to spawn off in the distance. Elizabeth approached the shadows thinking she was imagining their existence, until she came about a hundred feet away and the shadows began to close in on her as well.

For a moment Elizabeth confused the group of shadows to be a random group of gangsters, that wanted to ruin her evening. She became strangely fearful and excited to meet some people to beat up outside of the dojo. Fearful at the thought of losing and getting hurt, yet excited to see what she could do with her current two days of Muay Thai training.

Alas, as she slowed down her pace to meet with the shadows in more controlled state, she became utterly disappointed to find they were just a group of wealthy individuals; probably coming from some sort of important meeting. She guessed as much, since not only were all four characters dressed in suits and dresses, none of them had so much as a sign of being fighters; no scars, bruises, or even wounds…

Elizabeth sighed at her chance encounter, lamenting it couldn't be different, before returning to sprinting form.

Chapter end