Days bled into weeks. Li Jin's training settled into an immutable, monastic rhythm. Mornings were for the scrolls of the dead, absorbing their mistakes. Afternoons were for facing the Grand Master on the wind-scoured peak. Evenings were for meditation—not to escape, but to observe.
The Tiger was always there. Its voice had grown more subtle. It no longer tried to overwhelm him with rage. It tempted him with frustration.
Look at yourself, the voice would whisper during his repeated failures against the Grand Master. You're pathetic. The old man is toying with you. He's tiring you out to keep you weak. Accept my strength, just a little. You could surprise him. Show him you're not a plaything.
Li Jin learned to let the whispers slide past. Frustration was a wave. He let it wash over him and recede. The rock. He remembered the rock.
But the physical training was different. The Grand Master taught him no new, secret techniques. He forced him to repeat the fundamentals. The same stances, the same strikes, the same parries, thousands of times over.
"Your body is an instrument," the old man told him. "Right now, it only knows how to play one song: the Tiger's. A song of fury and brute force. You must teach it another. A song of yielding, of flow."
The sparring with the wooden swords continued. Li Jin didn't improve in strength, but in sensitivity. He began to feel the air currents stirred by his master's movements. He learned to read the minute shifts in his posture, the transfer of his weight. He was no longer fighting an opponent, but a constantly moving puzzle.
One day, as he launched an attack, the Grand Master didn't evade. He did something unexpected. He placed the blade of his own wooden sword against Li Jin's. He didn't block the strike. He met it.
For a split second, their blades were joined. Li Jin felt, through the wood, his master's intent. It wasn't a force opposing his own, but an energy that absorbed and guided it. In an almost imperceptible circular motion, the Grand Master redirected the entire force of Li Jin's attack, sending him stumbling to the side.
"Did you feel it?" the old man asked. "The water. It did not break the wave. It joined with it to guide it elsewhere."
That feeling was a revelation. True mastery was not in the power of the strike, but in the connection. In listening.
He spent the next days trying to replicate that sensation. He no longer sought to hit, but to touch, to feel. He turned the sparring into a silent dialogue, their wooden swords the voices.
He was so absorbed in his training that he almost forgot the outside world. But the world had not forgotten him.
One evening, Master Chen sought him out. His usually calm face was troubled. "The council of masters has been convened. There was an incident."
"What kind of incident?" Li Jin asked.
"Xiao Lie," Master Chen replied. "Since your... confrontation, he has changed. He's become obsessive. He spends his days training to the point of collapse. He has challenged and defeated every disciple in his class, sometimes with excessive brutality. He says he must prepare himself. Prepare to face you."
Li Jin felt a pang in his chest. He hadn't meant to break Xiao Lie. He had simply reacted. But the beast within him had left a scar, not just on his rival's body, but on his spirit.
"Today," Master Chen continued, "he challenged an older disciple. A fifth-year student. And he won. But he didn't stop. He kept striking while his opponent was on the ground, unconscious. He broke his arm. It took three instructors to pull him off. He was screaming your name."
Li Jin's blood ran cold. The echo of his fury had created another monster.
"The council is debating his fate," Master Chen concluded. "His father is an influential general in the capital. Expelling him could have political consequences. But to let him remain... his hatred has become a dangerous obsession."
Li Jin did not sleep that night. The Tiger was unusually quiet. It didn't need to speak. Li Jin's own guilt spoke for it. He was the cause of this. His loss of control had poisoned someone else.
The next morning, he made a decision. He walked to the council hall, uninvited. The masters were seated in a circle, the Grand Master at their head. Xiao Lie knelt in the center, his face bruised and defiant, vibrating with contained rage.
When Li Jin entered, a dead silence fell.
"What are you doing here, disciple?" one of the masters asked, his voice stern.
Li Jin bowed deeply. "Masters. I have come to speak on Xiao Lie's behalf."
Xiao Lie himself stared at him with hateful disbelief. "I don't need a demon's pity."
Li Jin ignored him and addressed the council. "What has happened to Xiao Lie is my fault. It was my strength that injured him. It was my loss of control that planted this seed of hatred in his heart. To punish him would be to punish the effect, not the cause."
"And what do you suggest?" the Grand Master asked, his face unreadable.
Li Jin took a deep breath. This was the hardest thing he had ever had to do. He walked over to Xiao Lie and knelt beside him. He pressed his forehead to the floor.
"I apologize," he said, his voice clear and free of pride. "I did not control my strength. I hurt you, and I humiliated you. I let a beast act in my place. I have no excuse. I ask for your forgiveness."
The silence in the hall was absolute. No one had expected this. Least of all Xiao Lie. He stared at Li Jin, kneeling before him in a posture of utter submission. His arrogance, his hatred... it all suddenly felt hollow in the face of this total act of humility. The anger that had consumed him for weeks flickered.
"Get up," he said finally, his voice hoarse.
Li Jin did not move. "Not until I have your answer."
Xiao Lie was silent for a long moment, at war with himself. His hatred fought against his warrior's honor. To reject an apology offered in this manner would be an act of profound dishonor.
"I..." he swallowed. "Get up. The matter is finished."
Li Jin rose slowly. He met Xiao Lie's gaze. The hatred hadn't vanished, but it was no longer the only thing in his eyes. There was now confusion. Turmoil. And the barest flicker of respect.
Li Jin bowed to the council again. "I am prepared to accept any punishment for my actions."
The Grand Master looked at him for a long time. "Your training is your punishment. And your redemption. Return to it." He turned to Xiao Lie. "As for you, you will spend a month in solitary meditation to reflect on the difference between determination and cruelty. The matter is closed."
Li Jin left the hall, his heart lighter than it had been in months. He had faced an opponent more terrifying than the Tiger: his own consequences.
When he returned to the training peak, the Grand Master was waiting.
"That was reckless," the old man said. "And brave. You used the way of water on his spirit. You did not fight his rage. You flowed around it with humility."
He handed him the wooden sword. "But do not think the problem is solved. You have calmed a river. The ocean of hatred in the hearts of men is vast."
They resumed their training. But something had shifted. Li Jin felt different. Lighter. By apologizing, by accepting responsibility, he had taken away one of the Tiger's primary weapons: guilt.
That day, for the first time, he managed to do what the Grand Master had shown him.
As the old man's sword swept toward him, Li Jin didn't block. He didn't retreat. He moved forward, his blade meeting his master's. He didn't push. He felt. He listened to the wood, to the energy of the attack. And he turned.
With a fluidity he didn't know he possessed, he pivoted his body, using his master's own force to create a spiral. Their two swords spun together as if they were linked. The Grand Master's attack was completely deflected, his momentum carrying him a step further than intended.
For a split second, the Grand Master's side was exposed.
Li Jin could have struck. It was a perfect opening. The Tiger's instinct screamed in his mind. Strike! Win!
But Li Jin arrested his motion. The wooden sword stopped an inch from the old man's robes. Winning was not the point.
The Grand Master turned slowly. He looked at the sword, frozen in mid-air. Then he looked up at Li Jin.
For the first time, he smiled. A genuine smile that lit up his wrinkled face.
"Good," he said simply. "Now, the lesson can truly begin."