Chapter 9: The Building of the Foundation (1)

“Su Jie, help me buy a phone in town . Mine is broken . ”

On the eighth day, Coach Gu Yang informed the students of the cla.s.s to relax for the day . For the past seven days, they had practiced ‘till they could no longer put out . Finally, it was time for them to rest .

As for Josh . He was a peculiar existence within the cla.s.s . Adding on to the work they did, he wasted no time strengthening himself . He did push-ups, squats, barbells, anything one could think of, he did . He would have done it again too had it not been for his broken phone . He did plan to go to town but instead had a better idea . He asked Su Jie to head into town so he could continue practicing .

“No problem,” Su Jie said while chewing his food .

The school was five to six kilometers away from town . There were no buses, let alone a subway . If a student wanted to go to town, they’d need to borrow one of the neighboring farmers’ motorcycles, or walk on foot .

After finis.h.i.+ng his meal, Su Jie decided to practice the movements of hoeing and digging .

He had recently come up with a few ideas on attack and defense .

The hoe would be raised in an attempt to block incoming attacks . It was a form of defense . When it’s smashed down, it would be an attack . When others attack with their fists, Su Jie would raise the hose, blocking the attack directly, then smash down .

The movement was simple . It looked like an ordinary person fighting and swinging his arms randomly, but after careful examination, the movements contained a hidden power .

Coach Gu Yang had explained in detail the skills and training points of the move . When raising the hand, it would spiral upwards like a heavenly monkey . When descending, he would move as fast as thunder, like an eagle pouncing on a rabbit .

These things were extremely useful in combat .

However, Gu Yang only focused on practicing how to dig faster . He didn’t mention a word of fighting .

Fortunately, Su Jie was good at learning/ He searched for information on the internet and watched some videos of some martial moves . In doing so, he gained some insights .

It was a simple raising of the hands and lowering of the hands . Hoe and dig…

He truly hoped a true expert would explain this technique to him . If he were to ask Coach Gu Yang, he would say nothing . He only taught training methods, not how to fight . It’s like teaching you how to make money, not how to spend it .

After finis.h.i.+ng up, Su Jie left school and heading into town, not caring of the piercing gazes of others . There were martial arts schools all around and people running on the streets . Some practiced their fighting skill while some somersaulted in the air .

The sights he saw on the way to town was interesting, but boy did it take long .

When he arrived, he saw the streets bustling . There where shops erected and people crowded on both ends of the spectrum . There were even high-end hotels set up, the most common place foreigners would reside in to match their quality of living back in their home .

Su Jie walked into one of the shops and quickly bought a phone . He went in, and he went out . The time spent in the shop was short as time was of the essence . He had two months to practice and hone his skills, two months .

“…I’m thirsty . I’ll go buy a bottle of water first . ”

Cursed the sun . It felt like death rained upon them .

Su Jie went to a roadside stall and bought a bottle of water for three yuan . The sizzling, hot sun dawned on everyone . Water was running out fast .

“This? This is ten yuan?”

At this time, a foreigner had come to buy water . Seeing it was a foreigner, the owner raised the price to ten yuan . Su Jie turned around and was about to say something, but he held his tongue . He knew the people here were only trying to make ends meet . Driving up the prices for the foreigners seemed fitting . Su Jie wanted to say something, but he did not . He’d get in trouble .

The foreigner was a middle-aged man in his forties . He carried a huge travel bag on him . He was alone and looked parched; his lips were dry and crusty too, pointing at something with his finger as if telling them he was not familiar with Chinese .

The shop owner made a gesture of ten yuan . The foreigner didn’t bargain . He just bought the water and left .

Su Jie quickly followed behind and pulled out seven yuan . “Hey, uncle, the shop owner miscalculated . It should be three yuan per bottle,” He said in fluent English . “He told me to return the excess money to you . ”

“Interesting, interesting . ” The middle-aged foreigner turned around and stared at Su Jie . He spoke in Chinese Mandarin with almost the same fluency as that of a native speaker . “Lad, it’s not that the shop owner gave it to you, but you gave it to me willingly . And you speak good English . ”

Hearing the foreigner’s words, Su Jie blushed but recovered soon after . “I didn’t think that you could speak Chinese so well, Uncle . We Chinese are very good people . The shop owner just wanted to make a living even though it wasn’t through honest means . Don’t think that we’re all like this though . My name is Su Jie . ”