Chapter 205: The Martial Pavilion

Yang Xiu was practically bouncing up and down as Master escorted her, Kang Lin, and Yang Ru into the Martial Pavilion. Kang Lin had been telling stories about the one at the Poison Claw Sect, and if the one Master procured could do half those things, Yang Xiu was going to be so happy.

From the outside, it was perfect. At five stories, it was taller than all the other buildings in the main area, and its blue paint and tiles matched the others perfectly. Best of all was its location—right next to the Administration Hall. It was the first pavilion any visitor to the sect would see.

As it should be as the most important one. And she was its leader!

Well, co-leader. But Yang Ru didn’t count. He didn’t really care about telling people what to do. For all practical purposes, she was in charge.

According to Kang Lin, no one in most sects got to lead a pavilion until they were at least fifty years old. That was practically ancient, more than three times the amount of time Yang Xiu had been alive. And she was already in charge!

“Of all the buildings, I spent the most time modifying the formations in this one,” Master said. “I think the three of you will like what I’ve done with the place.”

That really went without saying. Master really was the best.

“First of all, though,” he continued, “remember that the arena is the proper venue for events with a large audience. There are places for sparring inside the Martial Pavilion, but there is only space for a fairly limited number of spectators.”

“Yes, Master.”

Before leading them inside, he showed them a room accessed from the outside that was located in the back of the building.

“Remember the coin slot that Jin LiJuan used to feed the shield during the beast tide?” he said.

They all nodded.



“This slot provides the same function for all the formations in the building. For the first several weeks, I want you to have someone keep careful track of how much qi you have to supply to the slot versus what arrays are in use for how many people, etc.”

“Yes, Master.”

With the boring stuff out of the way, he finally showed them the inside the building. The entire first floor was completely open except for stairways leading up on each end, and there were four separate colored areas consisting of a square within a square that divided the space into quadrants.

He led them onto the blue area. “Kang Lin, I’m assuming you are familiar with the setup?”

“Yes, Master. This floor is for teaching, demonstrations, and public spars. Spectators stand in the outer painted area. The fighters compete inside the inner square, and the array prevents any qi or other attacks from reaching the people watching. The outer array can also be tuned to block noise and light from entering or leaving, creating privacy for the fighters inside, allowing only those in the spectator area to see or hear. It’s also standard that the array prevents any injuries greater than a bruise and reduces the pain felt to a low number, usually around twenty-five percent.”

“Excellent description,” Master said, before turning to Yang Xiu and her brother. “It’s important to remember that this shield is not all powerful. It’s currently rated for any attacks to the peak of Foundation Establishment. If a Golden Core cultivator possessing a Concept wants to spar, do not depend on the array to protect spectators.”

“Yes, Master,” the twins chorused.

“Good,” Master said. “This pavilion isn’t exactly like the one Kang Lin is used to. One of the modifications that I made is for the injury and pain arrays to be adjustable instead of just on/off. The pain can be set in five percent increments from zero to one hundred, and there are five injury damage settings from zero to one hundred in twenty five percent increments.”

Kang Lin looked impressed.

“What?” Yang Xiu said, not understanding what difference the change made.

“Our sect has arrays like that, too, but only for the elite martial artists. Grandfather said that it was too expensive to let the normal sect members use it.” Kang Lin turned to Yang Xiu. “Experts prefer not to get used to not feeling pain when they get hit.”

Yang Xiu and Yang Ru cupped their hands. “Gratitude, Master.”

He smiled briefly before showing them the controls, pointing out which glyph activated which area and how to adjust the ones that were variable. Yang Xiu paid rapt attention, knowing that she’d want to be able to use the building to its fullest capacity.

“If we turn the pain to zero and injuries to zero, we can’t hurt each other no matter what we do?” she said.

“Correct, assuming that the power of your strikes does not overwhelm the capacity of the array,” Master said. “Anything the three of you can throw at it should be fine.”

Yang Xiu naturally had to test that, so after setting the arrays and having Master assure her that she did it right, she had Yang Ru attack her with his full strength. His bull rush, though de-powered by the relatively short distance the sparring square allowed, knocked her clear to the opposite side of the array. She’d taken many, many such hits in fights with her brother and, even after Master’s assurance, had been expecting it to hurt.

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“That was so weird.” She rubbed her shoulder where Yang Ru had made contact before loosening the fabric of her robe to peek at the skin there. “That should have left a bruise, but there’s not a mark. And I didn’t feel a thing.”

“Play around with the settings,” Master said. “Each has a purpose. There is value in being able to go all out without fear of injuring each other. The other side of that, though, is what Kang Lin pointed out a little while ago. Getting used to the idea that attacks don’t hurt can cause the pain to mess you up in a real fight.”

“Yes, Master.”

The second floor held twenty one-on-one sparring rooms, basically private rooms meant for working on martial arts and techniques with either an instructor or an opponent. The arrays were the same ones used for the inner squares on the first floor, so they didn’t spend much time going over those.

The third floor was similar to the first, a large open area. Instead of squares dividing it into quadrants, though, the flooring was all one color. What set it apart were the fifty dummies in assorted colors scattered about the area. Master once again let Kang Lin handle the explanation.

“Combat dummies. You can set them to the cultivation level you want down to the minor realm.” She turned to the sect leader. “The maximum level is Golden Core minor realm one, Master?”

“Minor realm five,” he said. “No Concepts, though.”

“Impressive, Master,” Kang Lin said. “You certainly believe in giving your sect members good training tools.”



“Absolutely. Though these aren’t quite as extraordinary as what I normally provide. These were the dummies used by the Righteous Rain Sect. I just enhanced them a little.”

Kang Lin went on to explain that the dummies were tough, both in attack and defense, and could be programmed to use a variety of techniques and weapons. “I’m not sure what the relevance of the colors are, though.”

“Qi element type,” Master said. “I’ll get you a list of what color corresponds to what element, but gray is neutral, meaning no element. I thought it would be good to be able to gain experience in what it feels like to go against elements that are strong against you and ones that are weak against you.”

Kang Lin’s jaw dropped.

“Now that was what I was expecting,” Yang Xiu said. “I bet the Poison Claw Sect doesn’t have that feature.”

“Not that I’ve ever heard of!” Kang Lin said. “It is a good idea, though.”

“Don’t be too impressed, though,” Master said. “I’m not completely finished. Just like I still need to buy furniture, I want this place to have weapon racks with all the standard melee weapons available for the combat dummies. I’ll also have to tweak their programming as we go so that they have access to appropriate attack and defense techniques to truly challenge you.”

“Gratitude, Master.”

The fourth floor was the analog to the second, consisting of private rooms, each with a single combat dummy. Master pointed out a big difference from the previous floor. While the dummies in the massive room were stationary, the ones in the solo rooms were mobile.

There were only twelve of the solo rooms instead of twenty, though. Three of the rooms had been set up for a special purpose by Master. The extra space was dedicated to two larger rooms holding multiple dummies.

“Group combat training, right Master?” Yang Ru said.

“Got it in one. You can configure up to twenty enemies and go in as an individual or with a team. Should be great for working on tactics as well as techniques.”

“What about the three special rooms, Master?” Yang Xiu said.

“Ranged weapon training, featuring spatial formation to make the rooms big enough for even you to use for long range targets and configurable with either stationary targets or moving combat dummies.”

She cupped her hands. “Gratitude, Master.”

Yang Xiu was very happy. The building met or exceeded all her expectations. She was sure that, with all the resources the Martial Pavilion provided, she could take her training to new heights. “What about the fifth floor, Master?”

“Kang Lin?” he said.

“Academic areas. A place to sit down and discuss strategies and tactics. Probably a large central hall to gather everyone for lectures or speeches. That kind of thing.”

“Yep. That was what was there all right,” Master said.

Was?

“Well,” he said, “I did leave some of those areas. It’s good to have a place to relax after a workout, discuss your spar with a friend, and have some tea or whatever. Mainly, though, I added some new functionality. Follow me and check it out.”

Master was smiling widely as he welcomed them to the top floor. Whatever he did must have been something truly special. It didn’t look like much from the outside, though. Just a hallway with doors leading off of it.

“There are five special combat rooms up here,” he said. “One is for one-on-one sparring. Two are for solo fighting against combat dummies. One is for group sparring. And the final one is for single or group fighting against multiple dummies.”

On the face of it, his explanation didn’t make it sound any different than the rooms on the floors below. Yang Xiu was sure that there was some surprise, though, or he wouldn’t have been nearly that happy about showing the rooms to them.

He led them to the small sparring room first and had the two girls exchange a few punches with injuries and pain set at zero.



“The arrays work just like the ones downstairs, right?” Master said. “There’s really no difference. We should probably just skip this floor.”

Yang Xiu liked it when Master was being playful.

“Master,” she said, “what is that big panel and what do the glyphs next to it do?”

“Oh,” he said. “I totally forgot about that. Let’s see.”

Master hit a glyph, and suddenly the big panel came to life. A moving image of her and Kang Lin fighting appeared. He touched another glyph, and the images ran in reverse, reverting back to the start of the fight. Another made the images move really slow.

“I know that cultivators are good at visualizing a fight and remembering everything that happened,” Master said with a grin, “but I thought this might be of some small use.”

“It’s amazing, Master,” Yang Xiu said.

And it was. Contrary to what he had said, her memory wasn’t so good that she could remember the smallest of details, and she didn’t think any of the others had that ability, either. The option of replaying the entire fight over and over again and examine each move in detail would be a huge benefit when it came time to consolidate gains.

Yang Ru and Kang Lin likewise expressed their amazement.

Eventually, they moved onto the next room, one of the ones set up for solo battle against a single combat dummy.

“Besides the playback screen, the combat dummies on this floor are much more advanced than the ones on the lower floors. For one thing, they’re more adaptable, able to use any qi element the pavilion has available. They’re also stronger, faster, and tougher. Their big advantage, though, is that they are programmed to remember previous fights against a particular opponent, and use information gained to progress their abilities. So each time you fight one of the dummies on this floor, it’s training you, but you’re also training it, making it harder to defeat next time.”

Yang Xiu smiled widely. A tough, progressive enemy that would learn her fighting style and improve based on it, so it always gave her a challenge? Perfect. She just knew her skill with her techniques would improve very fast with the advantages her new Martial Pavilion provided.