"Man, who knew holding one position for so long would give you such stiff shoulders?" Grace wondered aloud, stretching her arms. Reddie looked glumly over his shoulder at her. "Grace, you were standing on your elbows! How do you get stiff SHOULDERS?" he asked, bewildered. The girl only shrugged. "I guess because with Renya, when we stand unnaturally, everything comes down into what we're standing on." she replied. "I don't know how, but my shoulders are stiff, and that's that." She cocked her head to her left quickly, and a loud crack sounded out. Everyone turned towards her with wide eyes.
"Excuse me?"
Grace looked up from where she was sitting at the foot of a tree next to Reddie, to see the the girl in blue. "What is it, kid?" she asked. "Um...could you please...teach me how to fight like that?" the girl in blue, Ula, asked. "It's only simple when you're a Renya, like me. A measly human will never do it." Grace said, closing her eyes, trying to ignore Ula.
"Don't mind her." Reddie said, getting up. "Let's go somewhere else, where we won't get picked on." Once he and Ula had walked a few meters away, a rock flew into the back of his head. He turned around surprisedly, and gave Grace an irritated look. "Want another one in your eye?" she snapped.
Reddie turned on his heels, and walked off with Ula.
"Listen, whatever she says to you, ignore it. Ignore her in general." Reddie advised Ula. "Grace is cruel, and she doesn't care about what she does to other people. She has no sympathy, so you may as well just not bother her." Ula gave him a confused look. "Then why do you hang around her?" she asked. Reddie was silent...he hadn't...he didn't...yeah, he didn't know.
"Whatever, I need to introduce you to someone." Ula said, grabbing his hand, and leading him away. "Uh, OK...who?" Reddie asked. Ula stopped dragging him, and pulled him in front of her. "Earthen, this is Reddie. Reddie, Earthen."
    A boy with dark green eyes, blonde hair, and a long, green scarf looked up at Reddie with a kind smile. He got up from where he was labelling a drawing in a book, and held out his hand. "Nice to meet you then, Reddie." he said, shaking Reddie's hand. "Just joined, did you?"
"Yeah. Decided I wanted to meet some more people instead of being stuck around with that freak." Reddie replied. "What freak?" Earthen asked.
"That girl who defeated Luna earlier today."
"Seriously? Luna's been beaten? Not even I could beat her!"
"You in the top classes?"
"Yeah, I'm an advanced. Ula's a mid."
"Cool. Could Kouh beat her?"
"Oh sure! No one could ever beat Kouh. As a graduation thing, students get to spar with him. That's the only time you can see him go full-on. Even on a student! Crazy, right?"
Earthen, Reddie and Ula continued to talk, until the bell for the next class went off. "Right, see you guys later. Grace is the only one who knows what my classes are, so I gotta follow her. Bye!"
"See ya, bro!" Ula shouted after him as she walked off with Earthen.
<><><>
"Remember, you gotta hit them in the solar plexus. Think about fighting someone your own size and height. In the middle, your elbow only slightly bent."
Reddie tried to keep his arm up in the correct position for the basic Kung Fu chi block. It was hard holding his arm in the right place, trying to keep his shoulders down, and his fingers curled in far enough with the thumb over the top. His teacher, Master Kiroe, was a slim young lady with sleek black hair usually pulled into a bun at the base of her neck. She was quite young to be so experienced in such a dangerous sport, and didn't look dangerous at all.
    She had already demonstrated the basic punch on a student.
    They were on the floor taking breathing exercises.
If anyone messed with her, they'd be dead within seconds. Reddie wasn't scared of her, of course not...he was just scared of what she was capable of.
Walking out of the room, he did the bow with one hand clasped over a fist, and left. He strode over to his spot of stuff, and took his water bottle. Man, was this stuff tiring. Even the first few blocks and kicks looked hard! Let alone, forms.
    "Hey!"
Reddie stopped what he was doing, and put down his water bottle. At another door, where the elite students trained with the headmaster, Luna was standing. Elite students were allowed to wear whatever they wanted, while lower students had to wear the traditional uniform for the strategy of self-defence or attack they were learning.
Luna's dress...Reddie didn't like it. Some perverted boy would, but hell he didn't. It was ridiculously short, coming to just the very top of Luna's thighs. Her breasts were...rather huge, he had to admit, and she wasn't scared to show them off. Usually, around the waist of this dark purple thing Luna called a dress, was usually a belt with a golden buckle. This time, it was removed, and replaced with a black Karate belt.
I wonder how Grace is doing... Reddie thought.
"You! You're that girl's friend, aren't you?" Luna demanded, her high pitched voice ringing in his ear. It wasn't screechy, just high pitched.
"I'm not technically speaking her friend..." Reddie began before being interrupted. "Be sure to tell her she's going down! She may have beaten me for today, but her place won't stand for long! I'm going to defeat that girl you call Grace! Be sure to warn her for me!" With that, the former Queen of all Fighting Techniques marched back into her training room, slamming the door behind her.
"Man, do I hate girls who think they're so popular." Reddie sighed, as he wiped his forehead. Reluctantly, he stumbled back into his own training room, to continue with that chi block...