บท 58: A Book with Diagrams

This time we wouldn't travel blind. I had a map with me, and a few other things Nick left for me. The green gloves were surely not for fighting, but it took me a while to realise why they were there. These gloves were for the Art of Medicine. More precisely, for herb harvesting. I recalled that one of Nick's books mentioned such gloves and their use. Some poisonous herbs couldn't be touched, that was where the gloves came in.

Other than the gloves, I found some clothing. There were two sets of clothes and seemed to be pretty new. One of them was pure black, and plain looking. There was a hood attached to a long robe, as well as sleek pants and boots. I tried them out, and they fit very well to my body but looked out of place. 'I shouldn't walk around in these clothes, I don't want to look suspicious', I thought. The second set of clothes was mostly grey, but there were hints of blue in a few places. The second set was surely more casual, and consisted of jacket, boots, pants and a shirt. I decided to wear it, since the clothes I had were already rags.

There was one more new thing inside the bag, except the things I've already used or seen. I thought it was the same old mask I used for my training, but that wasn't the case. There were actually two masks, and they looked similar. Still with a face of a skeleton, but there were differences. The eye sockets were different and the colour of the other mask was dark grey.

When I wore the second mask and activated the Formation, I was surprised by its effects. The mask didn't seal my vision, it actually made it a bit better. I could see a bit further away, and even the stuff closer to me became more defined. 'Wow, this mask is great!", I exclaimed to myself. "Mah... Mah", Shelly made some noises and pulled on my pants. I took the mask off while asking, "What's wrong?".

Shelly pointed at the forest, and made a few more sounds. Suddenly a bear charged at us from behind the trees. I snorted, then threw my daggers. "Swoosh, Swoosh, Swoosh...", the bear was no longer my opponent, dying quickly to my daggers. I could dispose of such creatures without issues, although larger packs could pose some difficulties. "We have our dinner, I guess. We are in no hurry either, let's stop here and roast some meat", I said while walking towards the bear's carcass.

While we enjoyed our food, I took out Rand's book. 'Let's see what this book is really about', I thought and started reading. The book was really thin and cheap with words or explanations. There were a few detailed diagrams, but the descriptions were appalling. Dina did not tell me any secrets concerning that book. She probably thought I would never get it. The first diagram displayed a Human figure making a specific pose. The pose in the diagram was quite weird. I would need to hold both hands on top of my head, while standing on one leg crouched. The description said, "Rising warrior stretching before great war". The description didn't provide much either, as if written in a secret language. Stuff like, "Hands pointing towards the sun, welcoming it wholeheartedly", made no sense to me at all.

The longer I stared at those diagrams, the more I realised something. 'Those poses... they are not so bad for training muscles in one's body...', I thought. The more I studied that first diagram, the more stuff I realised. Not only muscles, this exercise was supposed to exercise hidden muscles. Muscles that were usually dormant or not used during standard exercises. There was one more thing. This type of exercise couldn't be carried out for too long. A prolonged strain on those hidden muscles, would actually make things worse rather than better. I estimated that the maximum amount of time someone could stay under such pose would be around fifteen minutes. Of course more, when someone was as strong as Nick for example. If someone tried to actually overdo it, the results would backfire.

'I could probably last fifteen minutes without damaging my muscles. After all, my muscles are packed and a bit different to others', I thought and turned the page. The second diagram was a pose of some sort too, but of course a different one. This time, both legs were on the ground but the human figure was still crouching. Both of his hands were straightened out in front of him, and the head was tilted backwards. 'Who the hell came up with such stuff... I mean, it looks stupid as hell, but it actually seems to be working... Rand and Senty were stronger than others after all. This is enough proof for me', I thought.

I flipped the pages like that and found another three diagrams. The poses in those diagrams would surely help me train my muscles, but there were no durations or other descriptions. I could only guess the duration, and what effects those poses would have. 'Who'd write such a book without explanations? With hidden muscles, one mistake and the body can really suffer', I thought. Since Rand and his granddaughter practiced that, I wanted to at least give it a go. I chose the first pose, even though I wasn't sure about the difficulty. The book was written really poorly, so the first pose might've been the most difficult for all I knew. Not even a minute passed, when my body began to feel weird. I stopped immediately and checked the book again. 'I'm sure this is not fake, but it doesn't seem right to me...', I thought.

"Anyway, I'll worry about that later. Let's go, Shelly. There's nothing here to sit around for", I said. With the map in hand, I decided to head north. Mostly because the northern direction seemed most interesting. We came from the south, which meant there was no point going there. 'There is a small village not far away, and it's called Grassroot Village. I should watch out for any merchants or hunters around these parts. After burning that village, I surely don't need any suspicions to pile up', I thought.

We avoided the marked trails drawn on the map, and only travelled through the forest. The forest wasn't that dangerous to me anymore. Hunting was easy, there were plenty of herbs growing around and no one disturbed us. Like that, a few days went by. We encountered no issues at that stage, which was reassuring. These past few days, I tried to figure something out about those diagrams. I didn't get much from that, and even thought that my body wasn't compatible with that book. 'Maybe it's not for everyone? Rand and Senty just happened to be compatible. Why would I feel weird when practicing that otherwise?', I asked myself. Since using the diagrams felt weird, I got a different idea. My knowledge of Human body wasn't that bad, hence I decided to try and modify those diagrams to suit me. 'That's not going to be easy for sure, but what the hell. I can always try', I said to myself.

During each evening, I experimented with the first diagram. Using a stick and the ground, I tried all sorts of variations and checked the effects they would have. Sometimes the effects would be beneficial, but sometimes make things worse. Moreover, just because I made one beneficial change, that didn't mean it would fit the whole diagram immediately. Everything was connected in a way, hence all beneficial changes had to work together. In a sense, flow like the water in a river.

'It's not impossible, but making sure all the changes fit will be difficult. I have loads of time. There is no rush, as long as I complete one diagram, I will be able to use it. I can work on the others later... I wonder how well this will work after I finish with it', I thought before taking a look to my right. 'Hehe, Shelly is already asleep. I should rest as well. Tomorrow's a day too', I thought.