The days fell into rhythm. Run. Fall. Stand. Walk. Again and again, until my body learned to move without thought, until my feet sought balance before my mind even registered the shift in the ground.
Elder Sun never offered praise, but I began to notice the difference myself. I no longer stumbled as often. My steps, once burdened by strength alone, had grown lighter. The effort remained, but something within me had adjusted. I had adjusted.
Yet, there was still so much I did not understand.
One evening, as the sun dipped behind the mountain peaks, Elder Sun called me aside. He led me past the training fields, beyond the grove, and to a small stream that ran down the mountain's side. The water was clear, moving swiftly over smooth stones.
"Strike the water," he said.
I hesitated, glancing at him. "With my sword?"
His expression remained impassive. "With your hand."
Frowning, I knelt by the stream and thrust my palm into the current. The water splashed, displaced by the force of my strike, but it quickly reformed, flowing past my fingers as though nothing had happened.
Elder Sun watched. "Again."
I struck again. Harder. The result was the same. No matter how much strength I put into it, the water did not resist, did not break. It simply moved.
I exhaled, my frustration mounting. "What am I supposed to learn from this?"
Elder Sun knelt beside me, dipping his own hand into the stream. Unlike mine, his movements did not disturb the water. He did not fight the current; he moved with it. His fingers glided through effortlessly, the water parting and then rejoining in his wake.
"Strength is not about resistance," he said. "A boulder in the river resists and is worn down. A leaf follows the flow and is carried. Your sword should be neither. It should be as the stream—moving where it must, never stagnant, never wasted."
I stared at the water, my hands curling into fists. "But I am not the stream. My strength—"
"Is only an advantage if you know how to wield it properly," he interrupted. "You swing your sword as if you are cutting through stone. But you are not fighting stone. You are fighting men. And men move."
I fell silent, watching the water move around my fingers.
Elder Sun stood. "Tomorrow, we train here."
I looked up at him. "Here?"
He nodded. "You will practice your forms in the stream. Until you learn to move like the water, you will not move at all."
The thought of swinging my massive sword while standing in rushing water was daunting, but I knew better than to question him.
Slow. Steady. That was the path.
I placed my hand in the stream again, this time not striking, but feeling. The water swirled around my fingers, unbothered, untamed.
One day, I would move like that too.