A Tale of Brass
11th of September 2006 A.D.
Maybe it's the power deadening pain, maybe you are just weird, but there is something cathartic about ultimately managing to push even those limits to the edge and past them, joints contorted until they pop, muscles straining until phantom aches slowly creep though them like frost over glass on a chill winter's night. Thankfully Brother Devisimar is too polite to say so and simply runs you though the most recent batch of exercises, correcting your posture with a word here, a gesture there to prevent your chi from being impeded Alas after the strain testing comes sparring, or to be more precise being repeatedly punched and kicked in the throat and forehead, with blows landing all around the respective chakras as you struggle with the urge to just get out of the way.
Tough it out Molly. Kicks to the chest are not, as it turns out, conductive to maintaining an even breathing pattern and gasping like a beached carp isn't not conductive to rolling with the blows either .
Be as Steel, bend when you must, but always retain integrity of self.
Not for the first time you feel warmth spreading out under your skin, radiating out from the bruises, like smoke trapped in a silken back. Each time you had tried to mold it to your will, to wield it as you did your tools or wrap yourself in it as in idol-wrought armor it simply slipped between your fingers. Like trying to forge blood into chainmail.
Not blood...Even the following punch to the head does not manage to dislodge the thought. The point isn't the pain, isn't the blood. How did the old saying go:
The more you sweat the less you bleed. It feels less like a key slotting into place and more like finally being able to just breathe. the heat grows and grows until it is just on the edge of being painful yet somehow not in the least distracting. In the depths of your soul a fire roars forth and through your skin bubbles not sweat, but molten brass until you are shrouded heat to toe, turning the next blow with a faint clang.
Steel Skin Learned
"Yes!" you shout and punch the air. "Got it." Tough a moment later the euphoria is replaced by worry. Quickly glancing down you are
very happy to see that the brass coating your body is not actually molten hot and so didn't burn away your clothes. That would have been really awkward.
"You did indeed, though I was not expecting such a literal interpretation," the monk backs off a small but undeniably proud smile on his aged face.
"Steel isn't strong, flesh is stronger... especially when it's made of magic brass," you misquote Conan, giggling more from the adrenaline than the joke. "Now what?"
"Now," he bows to mark the start of another bout. "You may dodge."
***
14th of September 2006 A.D.
As undeniably
fun as it is to finally be able to get out of the way, not to mention try to hit back between school, the Great Church Bake-off (TM) and Hank being in a mood over mom and dad refusing to buy him a Razor Scooter, a thing which is
precisely as safe as it sounds, it feels like you should have a headache if you could still get those.
As you lay in bed to sleep you find no peace, haunted by formless shadows running through corridors of ice that morph into the living room at home or Harry's apartment without warning, always empty and yet filled with a horrified certainty that something had taken your loved ones away forever. In the dream you know that you could just look through the eyes of your crown and yet you are filled with dread of what you might see and with self-loathing for not looking.
This time you wake up crying.
So you wash your face, take a bath in bleach tainted water for what comfort the power within may grant and, as you had before, carry on with your day.
Alas it seems you are not as good at appearing cheery, maybe you overdid it, because Brother Devisimar asks you if you are well. You open your mouth to say that you are, knowing that you are more than good enough a liar to pull it off, especially if you cheat, but then you consider:
Do I want to lie?
The Qiao of the Meng, which he had offered to tech you is said to be of great aid to Shih in finding their mental and spiritual center and you are pretty sure, horrible nightmares count as being uncentered.
Dragon's Speed Progress: 9-1 (Nightmare) = 8/15
Do you talk about your nightmares with Brother Devisimar?
[] Yes
-[]... and ask to learn the Qiao of the Meng starting next month (Locks Action)
[] No, you are fine
[] Write in
OOC: Welp, it looks like those Nightmares really want Molly to notice them. 
