Kelty effortlessly evaded the right hook, countering with a straight right, throwing Hitryel out of the ring. Hitryel fell on the wooden floor, wrapping his hands around his stomach as he gritted his teeth in pain and anger.
In frustration and disappointment. At himself!
"And the winner by ringout," said Marlev—the boy acting as the referee—from the side. "Kelty Orin! That makes it 1199 to 0 between Kelty and Hitryel, in Kelty's favor."
Hitryel got off the ground, taking off his right glove, throwing it against the wall. "Smoke it!" he blurted out loud from the frustration boiling in his mind. "Why is it always this way! I've been training every single day to beat her ever since our first match years ago, but the result never changes!"
"Marlev," Emerton said calmly. "Get that glove."
The black-haired teenager hurried to pick up Hitryel's thrown glove off the floor.
"Maybe you don't train 'enough,'" Kelty said with a light snort. "Have you ever thought about that?"
"You don't know anything about how hard I train!" Hitryel shouted at the dark-skinned girl. "What do you even know about hard work or discipline? You don't even show up to the morning drills!"
"I was just copying you," Kelty said with a sly smirk. "And maybe I should also try running away after a defeat like you to hide my face, then I think I'll finally understand a word or two about hard work and discipline. Is that right?"
Hitryel gritted his teeth in frustration, that boiling frustration, his face turning red. "I'll get you tomorrow!"
Kelty shook her head with an unimpressed smile. "You can only try."
Marlev handed the glove he picked off the floor to Emerton. "Have you been training Kelty in secret, Master?" the boy asked. "Hitryel is the strongest fighter in all of Arestos, second only to Kelty. Hitryel losing so easily and consistently to Kelty just does not make much sense to me."
"Facts are stranger than fiction, sometimes, dear student," Emerton said, accepting the glove. "Kelty might be my dear daughter, but as soon as she steps inside of this dojo, she becomes my student first and daughter second."
"You're the man I call my teacher," Hitryel said to the tan-skinned bald man. "If you can't explain it then who can?"
Emerton looked sideways in thought as he approached Hitryel with the glove in his hand. "Maybe it's your age," he speculated. "She is almost 3 years older than you, after all."
"I can put high-ranked graduated fighters into submissions!" Hitryel said loudly. "Yet I can't even put Kelty within my reach!"
"If only you tried harder," Kelty said, turning with her tongue out.
Hitryel glared at her with gritted teeth. "You smoking arrogant little—"
Emerton placed a hand on Hitryel's shoulder, kneeling to meet his eye level.
Hitryel turned away. "'Respect your opponents,'" he repeated the Higher Teaching. "I remember, Master Emerton. I won't do it ever again."
"What about everything that helps you fight your opponent?" Emerton asked calmly, presenting the glove Hitryel had thrown away. "This is no mere object, Hitryel. It is as much a part of you as your own fist or foot. A warrior's weapon."
Hitryel accepted his glove off Emerton's hand…slamming it down right after. "If that's the case then this is a weak weapon!" he shouted, still frustrated. "I don't have any need for this! I want to soar through the Eight Skies and defeat the strongest of fighters! I can't be losing like this!"
"Maybe weakness exists only due to strength," Emerton said thoughtfully, "just as there cannot be any shadow without some light. Maybe losing is not a boulder in the path to strength, but also a part of it." Emerton turned to his other students. "Sit down, dear students," he said with his hands inside the cuffs. "Time for your Higher Teachings. Let's start right there, actually. Time. Time is the most precious resource there is…"
"You never make any sense, baldster!" With that, Hitryel ran off to the entrance of the dojo.
Kelty laughed. "It's just like yesterday, Master."
Emerton sighed. "That boy needs to learn patience," he said softly. "He does not understand that kids his age aren't supposed to be able to wrestle adult bears."
"Outta my smoking way, idiots!" Hitryel said, pushing through the two students of some foreign school.
They both jumped out of Hitryel's way to avoid getting thrown away by him.
###
Hitryel breathed out, sitting on the edge of a cliff, overlooking the sunset. "I killed another day," he repeated just like every evening. "I'm stronger."
This was his usual place of training. The students in the dojo were too amateur to spar with and the space in the dojo was too limiting. This open clearing on the top of the mountain on which Arestos was situated upon was the perfect place for Hitryel to train.
He could run around the open area to his heart's content, could lift weights way heavier than what Emerton allowed inside the dojo, and could do his favorite thing: wrestling with wild bears.
But it all seemed meaningless whenever he found himself looking up from the wooden floor of the dojo at Kelty. Almost every day. He definitely trained way more than her, so how was she still stronger? She definitely had some other source of power, since Hitryel had never seen Kelty train in his life.
'Can I even defeat her?' Hitryel asked himself genuinely.
He glanced over his shoulder as he heard footsteps, expecting an 8-foot bear coming to challenge him. But it couldn't have been farther from the truth, since he found Emerton walking up to him. The bald man was the calmest person Hitryel knew, even more so than Kelty. They both seemed to be best at smiling, even more so than fighting or teaching. Always cheerful. Always annoying.
"A wise man does not shake hands with death, Young Hitryel," Emerton said, smiling.
"I'm a fighter, not a thinker," Hitryel said without any enthusiasm. He wasn't frustrated anymore. That required energy. He felt drained.
"Fighters are supposed to be the highest of thinkers there are."
Tired still, but Hitryel couldn't stay silent when Emerton was talking stupid. "Thinking is not important for fighting."
"Then, what is?"
"Preparation and instincts. I have them both."
"Sounds to me like an animal's idea of fighting."
"They ARE natural fighters. So I think I'm fine being an animal."
"Unlike us, they don't have much choice. So I think 'survivalists' would be a better word for them."
"No, it won't. It's too big."
"For you it might be. But that's because you focus too much on the development of body, spending so much of the most precious resource on the second most important thing you hold."
"I'm not an idiot. I'm mindful enough to know my opponent's next move."
"But that's what we call 'instincts' and you said it doesn't take mind."
Hitryel sighed. "What's your point, Master Emerton?"
Emerton let out a chuckle. "I wasn't expecting you to ask me one of the most difficult questions known to humankind," he said in that cheerful way of his. "But I think if we spend our entire time trying to figure out the point of life, there would not even be a life to live after acquiring that knowledge."
"There you go again," Hitryel said, exhaling harshly. "I can barely follow you when you speak normally, but when you speak like this, I don't get a single thing you want to say."
"Is that why you hate Higher Teachings so much? You rarely join in one of my philosophy classes."
"I can't use philosophy in a fight. Philosophy cannot hurt my opponent."
"Have you ever tried it?"
Hitryel sighed deeply.
Emerton laughed.
"How can I defeat Kelty, Master Emerton?" Hitryel asked genuinely, still looking at the sunset. "Please try to be direct with the answer this time, or at least as direct as you can possibly be."
"Well…"
Hitryel sighed again, shaking his head. "Things are never 'well' when you start with 'well'…"
"Why do you want to defeat her?"
"To become the strongest fighter in all of Arestos."
"And why do you want to become the strongest fighter in all of Arestos?"
"To get one step closer to my dream."
"And why do you want to get one step closer to your dream—?"
"Huh?" Hitryel glanced over his shoulder, annoyed. "Are you trying to make fun of me, baldster? If I don't get closer to my dream, how in the smoke will I ever achieve it?"
"Well…" Emerton said calmly. "Why do you want to achieve your dream?"
"What is that even supposed to mean?" Hitryel shouted in annoyance.
"I mean," Emerton said simply, "even without achieving your dream, you can still fill up your stomach, cover your back, and not get drenched by the rain. So, why? What is your dream going to give you that you don't currently have?"
"Just that," Hitryel said without a moment's gap. "Itself."
Emerton raised an eyebrow, bemused. "Keep going."
Hitryel raised a palm toward the setting sun. "For our whole lives," he said, softer than usual, "we kill every single day that comes our way. But there will come a day that'll kill us instead. Isn't that why you said time is the most precious resource of all? Because it's limited?"
Emerton's smile widened. "That's right," he said with a nod. "Limitless is invaluable. Limited is precious."
Hitryel trapped the sinking sun inside his fist. "Before that day comes," he said with resolution, "I want to find what MY limit is. But I refuse to believe I've reached it this soon. My dream wouldn't be worth running after if the path to it was this short and effortless."
Emerton laughed wholeheartedly, eyes closing. "Well," he said as he chuckled. "It seems I was worrying about your mental development for nothing."
"As I said, Master," Hitryel said, releasing the sun, putting his hands by his side. "I'm not an idiot. I don't need to focus on thinking."
"I never said to solely focus on your mental development," Emerton said calmly, "just like I never called you an idiot, dear student. Let us not live in an 'either-or' reality, and try to live a fulfilled life by mastering the many different facets it offers us."
"You're just saying words at this point," Hitryel said, shaking his head. "That's why I love fighting. I have a clear thing to focus on, not some vague concept."
"You want a single thing to focus on for the rest of your life?"
"You'll say that doesn't exist, I know. So how about I just focus on what I like the most?"
"That is what we must do, dear student," Emerton said with a nod. "Within bounds of reason, of course. However, there does exist one such thing that can be focused solely on and be never punished for it."
Hitryel glanced over his shoulder, curious. "What is it?"
Emerton smiled, doing an outward curved motion with the index finger of both hands, forming an invisible circle in the air. "Balance."
"Balance?" Hitryel said, eyebrows furrowing. "I thought you'd say the Three Vows. Or you're philosophy of…water…?"
"The Three Vows is a concept that I cannot discuss with you as of now. Same goes for that other philosophy passed onto me by my own teachers."
"See!" Hitryel hissed "You really do think I'm an idiot! The Vows aren't even that complicated. They're short and simple—as if made just for me."
"You misunderstood me, dear student," Emerton said with a chuckle. "I'm only holding back our discussion on the Three Vows simply because I'M an idiot." Then he laughed.
Hitryel's eyes widened as he kept his eyes on the laughing man. "You…?" he asked. "An idiot…?"
"It has almost been four decades since I've known about the Three Vows," Emerton said, snorting softly. "But still, my mind is not yet ready to fully open up and listen to what they are trying to say."
"Really?" Hitryel said, amused. "I understood them from the moment you told them to us. Never bow. Never kneel. Never surrender. I think even an idiot can understand what they mean."
Emerton laughed loudly. "My mere existence contradicts your conclusion, dear student."
Hitryel was confused about everything that Emerton was talking about. Why did the man suddenly wander to here? He'd usually just lock up the dojo before sunset and head home. He came here today…just to talk to Hitryel? What was Emerton even trying to say?
"Oy, Master," Hitryel said thoughtfully. "Are you here just to distract me from my training? You should've come earlier if that's what you wanted to do. I'm done for the day."
"But someone else is not," Emerton replied. "Greatness always has a story. If someone is somewhere, they may know something that you don't."
Hitryel sighed, looking away. "There it is again…"
"Ahead of you will stand opponents that you will not know much about," Emerton said calmly. "And you MUST know your opponent in order to conquer them. Your opponents might not even have the ability to draw breath. But the one who will fight all of them, is always going to be the same—you. And you are given an entire life to know about yourself, Young Hitryel."
Hitryel slowly turned around, looking at his Master staring off into the sunset.
"Opponents will always attack in a fight. We must know how to counter."
Hitryel's eyes widened as he let those words sink in his mind.
Emerton met Hitryel's eyes with a cheerful smile. "So the only opponent you need to conquer in life is the one you can know the most about!" he said with rasied brows. "Every other opponent is merely helping you in achieving that, regardless of the outcome that they bring along."
Hitryel lips curved up on their own, eyes brightening. "So," he asked softly, suddenly hopeful, "are you saying that I haven't lost to Kelty yet?"
"That's up to you, dear student," Emerton said, then laughed. "If losing 1199 times is not a loss then what is?"
Hitryel set his jaw, turning away. "Idiot balster!"
Emerton wiped the tear in his eye, taking out something from his pocket. "Here, Hitryel," he handed the thing. "This is what I actually came here for."
Hitryel stood, turning to his teacher, accepting the keys he just handed. "What's this?"
"The keys of the dojo gates."
Hitryel's eyes widened in disbelief. "You're handing the dojo to me—?"
Emerton gently chopped at his head. "I forgot to lock the dojo. Can you do it for me?"
"Huh?" Hitryel said, annoyed. "You came from the dojo without locking it, just to give me the keys to lock it?"
Emerton nodded with a smile. "What can I say, I'm an idiot." He laughed again.
Hitryel's brows furrowed as he tried to get a read on his teacher. Emerton was a strange man. Hitryel never knew if what Emerton said was what he meant. How could he? Emerton's words were mostly cryptic and never direct.
But before he'd explode on his own teacher, he decided to run back to the dojo to complete the errand.
"You better treat me later with some meat for this!" Hitryel said, glancing over his shoulder.
"Sure," Emerton said with a smile. Then he turned toward the lowering sun once again. "Neither bright, nor dark. If not the natural representation of balance, what is even a sunset?"
###
Hitryel stopped before the entrance when he heard thrashing sounds coming from inside of the dojo, surprised to find the gates wide open.
After stepping inside, Hitryel was shocked to find Kelty still hitting the bags. Students weren't supposed to train this late; otherwise they'd be unable to recover for the training of the following day.
But to someone like Kelty—who hardly trained—maybe this wasn't so bad.
Kelty turned to Hitryel after she noticed him standing before the entrance. She smiled. "What is the Loser of Arestos doing here?"
"Loser?" Hitryel said, clenching his jaw. "You know what, I was going to defeat you tomorrow, but smoke it! Let's have a match right now!"
Kelty walked toward the ring with a smile. "I'm always ready," she said, her eyes resolute. "Just try me."
Hitryel stomped after the silver-haired girl. "Back at you!"