Tao Training — The Violence Within
The dojo smelled of old wood, sweat, and the faint traces of Tao left behind by generations of students who had trained within its walls. Sunlight streamed through the tall windows, stretching across the polished floorboards while a small plant grew between a circle of stones near the center of the room, its thin green leaves swaying whenever the wind slipped through the open windows.
Akira stood opposite Ito, rolling his shoulders as he looked around the spacious room. His ribs still ached whenever he moved too quickly, but after spending several days recovering from his injuries, he was more than ready to begin training. He had already wasted enough time lying in a hospital bed, and every day he spent recovering was another day someone else could be getting stronger.
Ito stood with his hands tucked into the pockets of his uniform, his red hair tied neatly behind his head while sunlight reflected off the armor covering his shoulders. He watched Akira stretch for another moment before his expression grew more serious.
"Before we start, there's something I need to tell you about your Tao."
Akira stopped stretching and looked at him.
"What about it?"
Ito removed one hand from his pocket and gestured for Akira to approach. Akira walked forward without hesitation, stopping a few feet away as the older man examined him with his uncovered eye.
"Your Tao is incredibly violent."
Akira blinked. "Okay?"
Ito stared at him for, apparently waiting for a more meaningful reaction, but Akira merely scratched his cheek and glanced down at his hands.
"Is that supposed to be a bad thing? I mean, if my Tao is strong, isn't that what-"
"No." The answer came so quickly that Akira looked back up.
Ito sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose, as though he had already begun regretting how much work this student was going to require.
"Listen carefully, Akira. Tao isn't simply a source of power that you can force into your body and throw at whatever stands in front of you. You need to understand it, control it, and make it respond to your intentions. If you want to become a proper Taoist, you can't just rely on having a large amount of energy."
Akira steps forward, his Tao moving even more violently. "Why not? I just want strength; I don't need to become a proper Taoist."
Ito moved closer to Akira, his voice becoming stern. "I'm your employer. It doesn't matter what you want. Also," he paused for a few seconds, "If Tao flows smoothly through a person's body, it will explode within them and kill the person."
Akira lowered his head before taking a few steps back.
He raised his hand, allowing a faint red glow to gather around his fingers. Unlike the unstable pressure Akira had occasionally felt during his recovery, Ito's Tao moved smoothly, spreading across his hand in a thin layer before settling against his skin.
"Look at this. My Tao is moving exactly where I want it to go. There's no unnecessary movement, no wasted energy, and no pressure escaping beyond what I intend to release. I can increase the output, decrease it, or stop it completely without losing control."
The golden light disappeared as Ito closed his hand.
"Now, your Tao..." He paused, looking directly into Akira's eyes. "It's like trying to hold back a raging river with your bare hands."
Akira glanced at his own palms, turning them over as though he expected to find something unusual written across his skin.
For a moment, Ito said nothing. He simply stared at the boy standing in front of him, whose expression suggested that he genuinely couldn't understand why someone would consider overwhelming power a disadvantage.
Eventually, Ito exhaled and folded his arms.
He stepped forward, placing two fingers against Akira's chest.
"Your Tao doesn't settle down on its own. Even when you're standing perfectly still, it continues to fluctuate beneath the surface, surging whenever your body reacts to something. If you try to force it into a technique while it's behaving like this, you'll waste energy, damage your own body, or lose control at the worst possible moment."
Akira looked down at Ito's fingers before returning his gaze to the older man.
"So, I just need to make it calmer?"
"Exactly. Before you can master your Tao, you need to learn how to calm it down. You don't necessarily have to make it completely still, but you need to bring it under control. Right now, it's far too unstable for you to use efficiently."
Akira shrugged.
"Fine. How do I do that?"
Ito withdrew his hand and took a few steps backward, his expression turning thoughtful as he considered how to explain something that most students learned through years of practice.
"Your Tao isn't behaving this way for no reason. Most Taoists gradually learn to recognize the relationship between their emotions, their thoughts, and the way their Tao moves. Anger might cause one person's Tao to become sharper, while fear might cause another person's energy to scatter. The exact response depends on the individual."
He pointed toward Akira.
"But your Tao is constantly flaring up, even when you aren't consciously trying to use it. Something in your own mind is causing that reaction. You might not even notice when it happens because you've probably been doing it for a long time."
Akira glanced down at his hands again, flexing his fingers as though he could catch his Tao in the act.
"So, my mind is making my Tao go crazy?"
Ito's faint smile returned, but it soon faded as he stepped closer again.
"Listen, Akira. I can teach you how to use Tao. I can show you how to shape it, direct it, and turn it into techniques that can tear through practically anything in front of you. But I can't reach inside your head and tell you why your own power reacts the way it does."
He tapped his temple with one finger.
"You need to figure out what causes your Tao to flare up and learn how to stop it from happening unconsciously."
Akira stared at him.
"...How?"
Ito tapped Akira's his head. "You figure it out."
Akira threw his hands up in frustration, his shoulders rising as he looked toward the ceiling.
"Man, you're making this way more complicated than it needs to be!"
"Then stop making it complicated."
"How am I supposed to do that?!"
"Figure it out."
Akira's mouth opened, but no words came out.
Ito simply smiled.
For several seconds, the two stared at each other while sunlight continued creeping across the floor between them. Somewhere outside, the distant sound of metal striking metal rang out from another training area, followed by a shouted command and the hurried footsteps of soldiers crossing the courtyard.
Eventually, Akira let out a long sigh and dropped his shoulders.
"...Fine. So what am I supposed to do? Just sit here and think about myself all day?"
"No. You're going to go about your life."
Akira blinked.
"Huh?"
"You're going to eat, sleep, train, talk to people, and do whatever else you normally do. I don't want you forcing yourself to think about your Tao every second of the day. If your mind is triggering these reactions subconsciously, then I want to see how your Tao behaves when you're not actively trying to control it."
Ito turned toward the dojo doors, looking out across the courtyard where several soldiers were practicing their techniques beneath the afternoon sun.
"I'll monitor your Tao for a while. If I can observe when it flares up and what causes those changes, I might be able to help you understand the pattern. But figuring out why it happens in the first place is still your responsibility."
Akira tilted his head.
"So, you're just going to watch me?"
"Pretty much."
"That sounds creepy."
"Then try not to do anything embarrassing."
"That's not how it works!"
Ito chuckled and turned back toward him.
"Relax. I'm not going to follow you around every waking moment. I have other responsibilities, you know."
"Could've fooled me."
"Keep talking, and I'll give you enough training to make you forget how."
Akira immediately closed his mouth.
Ito nodded approvingly.
"See? You're learning already."
"That wasn't learning. That was self-preservation."
"Whatever helps you sleep at night."
Ito walked past Akira, heading toward a small cabinet beside the wall where several training tools and folded pieces of cloth had been neatly arranged. He opened one of the drawers and began searching through it, moving aside a few wooden tags before finding what he wanted.
When he returned, he held a small rectangular talisman between two fingers. Its pale surface was covered in fine black markings, with a narrow red line running through the center.
Akira leaned forward to inspect it.
"What's that?"
"A talisman."
"Yeah, I can see that. What does it do?"
"Hopefully, it'll save me from having to guess what's going on with you."
Ito held the talisman up to the light, examining the markings before giving a satisfied nod. He then stepped behind Akira and gestured toward his uniform.
"Lift your shirt."
Akira froze.
"...What?"
"Your shirt, Akira. Lift it."
Akira slowly turned his head to look over his shoulder.
"Could've just said you wanted to see my abs."
Ito stared at him.
"I can change my mind about training you, you know."
"Right, right. I'm doing it."
Akira grabbed the bottom of his shirt and lifted it, exposing his back. The movement pulled slightly at his still-healing ribs, and he winced before steadying himself. Ito waited until he had raised the fabric high enough, then positioned the talisman against the center of Akira's back.
"Hold still."
Before Akira could ask another question, Ito pressed the talisman firmly against his skin.
A brief warmth spread across Akira's back.
The black markings shimmered, and the red line running through the center flashed once before the entire talisman settled against his skin. Its edges seemed to soften, adhering to him without a strap or a drop of adhesive.
Akira twisted around as far as he could, trying to see what had happened.
"Whoa. Did you just stick that to me?"
"Something like that."
"Can I take it off?"
"No."
Akira's head snapped toward him.
"Why not?!"
"Because then it won't do its job."
Ito stepped back and raised his hand. A faint golden glow gathered around his fingertips, and for an instant, the markings on the talisman responded with a subtle flicker of red light.
Akira felt nothing unusual, but Ito's eye narrowed as he watched the glow fade.
"There. I can monitor the changes in your Tao through this talisman. Whenever your Tao flares up, the markings will respond, allowing me to observe the intensity and frequency of those fluctuations."
Akira lowered his shirt and rubbed his back.
"So, you're putting a tracking device on me?"
"It's not a tracking device."
"Then what do you call something that lets you keep an eye on me without being around?"
"A monitoring talisman."
"That's just a fancy name for a tracking device!"
Ito ignored him and examined the talisman once more, seemingly satisfied that it had settled into place correctly.
"It won't tell me every thought that passes through your head, so don't get any strange ideas. All it does is help me monitor your Tao. If something unusual happens, I'll know."
Akira crossed his arms.
"And if I don't want you monitoring me?"
"Then you can spend the next few months struggling to control your Tao without my help."
Akira considered that for a moment.
"...The talisman stays."
"Excellent decision."
"Still creepy, though."
"You're welcome."
Ito returned to the center of the dojo, where he picked up his discarded training cloth and draped it over one shoulder.
"Now, go about your life as usual. Don't deliberately provoke your Tao, and don't spend every waking moment trying to suppress it. Pay attention to yourself. When you feel your Tao change, think about what you were doing and what was going through your mind beforehand."
Akira nodded slowly, finally beginning to understand what Ito wanted from him.
"So, I just need to figure out what sets it off."
"More or less."
"And once I figure that out, I'll be able to control it?"
"Understanding the cause is the first step. You'll still need to practice controlling your response, but at least you'll know what you're dealing with."
Akira glanced down at his hands, flexing his fingers as a faint flicker of blue light appeared between them before fading away. He didn't see anything wrong with having violent Tao. If anything, he still thought it sounded pretty useful.
But if mastering his power meant understanding why it reacted the way it did, then he would figure that out too.
After all, he had never planned on stopping at being strong.
He intended to become King.
And if his own mind was going to stand in the way of that dream, then he would have to understand it just as thoroughly as he intended to understand his enemies.
"All right," Akira said, turning toward the dojo doors. "I'll figure it out."
Behind him, Ito watched the boy walk away, his expression unreadable. After a moment, he lifted his hand and glanced at the faint golden glow gathering around his fingertips.
The talisman had already begun responding to Akira's distant Tao, its red markings pulsing so subtly that an ordinary person would never have noticed.
Ito's expression grew thoughtful.
"Let's see what you're hiding from yourself, Akira."