Heart of the Warrior (Solo)

[Talya]

Timestamp: Summer 65, 515 AV

Talya needed to be alone. It was easier now, she found, to find those moments when there were no other people, although the same could not always be said of the animals. It had gotten easier to slip out of the port city; easier to leave everything behind, at least, for a little while. Now she knew more or less where she was going, where to turn, and where things led, and as the sun's light filtered down through the trees, through the empty spaces between the leaves, she found that she felt somewhat happy as she entered a large empty area, a clearing. It was ringed by a series of oak trees, she realized, and its center was set on a slight slope. It was filled with green grass, which flowed easily over a bed of dying soil. It had rained recently, she thought, she could smell it in the air, or perhaps it was nothing more than the morning's dew. A few wild flowers were scattered here and there, some were white, others a deep purple, and others still a vibrant blue. It was perhaps, eight feet all around, and she knew that it would do, so she set her bag against the trunk of a tree, and walked steadily toward the center of the clearing, until she reached the middle.

When she got there, Talya quit moving. She stood still, and took a deep breath in through her nose, and out through her mouth. Then, she wrenched her dagger from its sheath, and held it in the forward grip, in her right hand. From there, she began to slip into a starting position she didn't often employ. She let her right foot slide across the forest floor, until it was about two and a half feet in front of its kin. She kept all of her toes pointed forward. Her left foot, on the other hand, trailed behind the right, and was turned toward the left side of her body- the toes pointing to the northwest, so that it formed a forty-five degree angle or so with her other foot. She had both legs bent at the knee, but the right one far more so than the other, as she had applied most of her weight to her lead foot. Her chest was squared, and directed to the north, ahead of her, and her hands were held in a more defensive position than an offensive one. Her right arm was held at a curve above her head, her left, bent at the elbow and held a few inches in front of her chest, at a diagonal angle. It ran from her right shoulder, down to her left hip. The metal of the blade glinted in the sunlight; she felt like a crane in this position, especially as she pulled her right leg back a little, and then tilted the foot, so that it rested lightly on the toes, most of her weight then shifting to her left foot.

Talya breathed deeply again, she took air in through her nose and then out through her mouth, as slowly, she brought her right arm down, bringing it in front of her chest- in front of her left arm. Then, she jerked it out to the right side, flinging her entire arm with the motion, so that she cut the air behind her, as she shuffled a half step back with her left foot, and then slid her right foot forward again, so that its sole rested once more, against the ground. The leather creaking as it moved, and Talya slid her left hand to her left side, balling the fingers into a fist, as she set it under her armpit, in a protective pocket, meanwhile, her right arm swept back in, and cut across the line of her collarbone, stopping when it reached the area just ahead of the center of her neck. Talya breathed again as she stepped forward, the area from her waist up rotated to her left side, so that she presented less of herself to potential attackers. She smiled as she moved forward, and then guided her right hand out to the right side of her body. When it had extended as far as it would go, she moved the arm inward again, following a line like a crescent to her far shoulder, and then moving it back.

[Talya]

Talya stepped forward again. She began to move her right hand inward. When it had moved a few inches toward her right shoulder, she thrust it outward, and stabbed at the air in front of her, at a level with her shoulder. When the arm had moved as far as it could possibly go, she pulled her arm back until it slipped against the side of her body, under her armpit. She took an exaggerated step forward with her right foot, pushing it far ahead of the left. Then she slid it farther forward, until it had gone as far as it would go, and bent it largely at the knee, shifting her weight almost entirely onto it, as in the same motion, she snapped her right arm forward and stabbed at the air directly in front of her, completing her lunge as she finished extending her arm in its entirety. Light reflected off the edge of the blade, as she waved it to the right, and then to the left, and then back to the position she had ended the lunge in. Slowly, she slid her right foot back along the ground, and pulled her legs closer together. She stopped when they were about a foot apart, and pulled her blade in front of her face. She held it on a slight diagonal- as though she were blocking an attack.

From there, Talya lowered her blade to her right hip, and held it on the same diagonal line, as though blocking another attack, before moving it to her middle. She imagined hearing a clang of metal as she successfully blocked another attack, and then side-stepped to the left, to narrowly avoid yet another incoming. When this was done, she brought her right arm across her chest, over to the left side of her body. She let the metal fall against the space between her hip and her shoulder. She let herself lead with her elbow as she glided forward, and then jut it out, as though stabbing her imaginary opponent with it, as opposed to her dagger, before she snapped the arm outward, and followed up with a thrust from it. Then, she pulled it back, and held the dagger at a diagonal in front of her chest, to meet with another imaginary, attempted strike, before pushing her arm outward, this would push a blade back, and create a little space by which she could move around and manuever herself. She would glide into the opening, and stab at her opponent's chest, before guiding her blade downward, so that it would cut the area from their pectoral muscles, all the way to their belly button.

Then, Talya would straighten herself out again. She would take a deep breath in through her nose and out through her mouth, before rotating her wrist so that her fist opened to the space ahead of her, and the dagger was pointed downward, and out ahead of her. She would then move her arm up and down, guiding the dagger in the space before her, in a simple, slashing pattern. She would move her hand from left to right, cutting from her shoulder to her waist over and over again. Raising her blade when it dipped to low, and then lowering it again when it got to high. The exercise was simple- so was the strike. It was a hack and slash at the air ahead of her. A massacre of it- she could imagine it bleeding as she lifted the blade again, and then lowered it. Lifted the blade again, and then lowered it, cutting through the air up and down for the longest time, before she began to sweep it to the left and the right as well, over and over again until her hands and her wrists began to ache, and she decided that it was time to move onto something else, a new sort of exercise, or her own make and her own choosing.

[Talya]

Talya returned to the starting position she had chosen at the start of her training. She moved her left hand back to pocket within a heartbeat, just to keep it safe. From there, she lowered her right hand a little, bringing the blade down with it. She guided it over to her left shoulder, and then breathed deeply before moving it over to the right shoulder. From there, she moved it down to the left hip, in one clean sweep, and then rapidly over to the right hip, and then back to the left again, and then diagonally over to the right shoulder, as she ducked and then guided the blade over to the left shoulder, as though cutting across a person's legs before she pushed up against her scrunched limbs, and eased herself back into a standing position. She straightened out her spine, as she guided her blade back over to her right shoulder, and then across to her left hip, before moving it up to the left shoulder again, then forming a triangle in the space above and in front of her head, as she moved it over to the right shoulder one more, before suddenly, stepping forward and jabbing at the air, bringing her dagger with the punch.

Talya skipped backward. She lifted her right heel off the ground, and pressed her boot-covered toes into the soil, the grass that lined it. She pulled the majority of her weight off her foot, and transferred it into her hips, as well as the other, as she circled it around the ground, causing her body to wind as she let her arm fall out to her side. As she circled, moving her foot faster and faster, pushing it against the ground to propel her and ease her rotations, her hair swept up from her shoulders, and moved with her, as she tightened her grip on her dagger, and simply cut it through the air until she got dizzy and had to stop, and taking a moment to wait as the world righted itself, and she regained her composure. When that was done, and her heart still maintained its adrenaline fueled rush, Talya took a deep breath, and then darted forward, she slashed wildly at the air- moving her dagger from the north, to the south, then the east and the west, and all the other directions and sub directions that existed between all of that. Her dagger moved as a whir, she could almost hear the air humming as she moved, proud of herself for keeping up a decent pace despite how her arm ached.

Talya straightened herself out, and then returned to her starting position. But not the one of this training session- instead, she slipped into the one she had always favored, as she deemed it the most versatile. She had her right foot planted in front of the left, although it led by about two feet. With the way her toes pointed, they formed a ninety degree angle. From the waist up, her body had twisted toward the west- so that she presented less of a target. Her left hand had been balled into a fist, her arm bent at the elbow- she held it across her side, so that the angle ran toward her right shoulder. It was held across the middle portion of the chest, in a protective position. The dagger was still held in the forward position. She had the right arm cocked as well, and held a little over the left. She breathed deeply as she leaned into her front leg a little more, and then, as though testing her arm and its motions out, extended her right arm, and circled the dagger lazily in the air. Moving the arm in a wind mill like fashion, that would likely make it appear to any potential onlookers that she were either stretching, or trying to swim. When she was done, she returned her arm to its starting position, and thought on what to do next.

[Talya]

From there, Talya decided that she would begin to draw shapes, for the sole purpose of practicing her precision and the like. She began by guiding her blade upward, until its point was directed in the air directly above the center of her head. She then pushed the blade over to the right side of her body, so that the dagger moved in a diagonal line, before cutting the blade swiftly, directly across her chest to the opposite side of her body. From there, she followed a steep incline back to the start of her little exercise, completing the triangle. Talya then began again, moving the hand even faster now, so that it would seem as though she were really trying to hurt someone, as opposed to simply playing in the woods, with a blade perched in the center of her right hand. Faster and faster, she moved her arm with each repeat of the process, until she felt as though she were creating her own wind, (in reality, she was simply cutting through the stillness of the air), anyway, several minutes later, she decided to change things up, and move her hand in the reverse direction. She did this for a long time, before moving onto something else.

As Talya completed her next circle, she stopped for but a second as her dagger reached the highest point it ever would, before sweeping the blade down and around. She cut corners, and smoothed things out as much as she rounded things out. She was beginning to make circles with the dagger. She kept them roughly the same size at first, but as time progressed, she made them far smaller, allowing her arm to wind inward with each rotation, until her dagger did little more than quiver in the air, and then, scarcely seem to move. From there, Talya took a deep breath in through her nose and out through her mouth, before she began to wind her blade back outward, so that gradually, she created larger and larger circles with its point. When she had returned to the original size of her circles, she cut downward, to the base of her throat, and then moved her dagger across to her left shoulder, then down to her left hip, then over to the other hip, then up to the right shoulder, and then back to the start, forming rectangles. The next time, she angled downward and out a little, before following the same base line, and then moving up on a slight diagonal past the shoulder, and back to the start, forming parallelograms. She did this several times, and then moved onto another form of the exercise.

Now that she had practiced a few shapes, and begun to warm herself up, Talya decided that she would build upon the shapes- that she would make things out of them. She began by drawing infinity symbols, and then rotating the image to make quick, fluid figure eights. From there, she added another circle, to the image, so that there were three in all. The one on the top was smaller than that in the middle, which was smaller than the base. She smiled, she liked drawing snowmen she found, as she stabbed at the air in both the center circle, and the middle one- adding lumps of coal for its eyes and the buttons. She kept on drawing this image for a bit, before struggling to draw a cube several times, and then a sphere, and finally giving up on that before picking out another few shapes to "draw" with her dagger. She made a clover, and then a maple leaf, (although a very, very sloppy one). She drew carrots and cabbages, as well as a few stars. Then she drew a moon and its crater-filled surface several times over, as she drew a large circle, and then several smaller circles within it. By the time she was done with this, she had grown bored and decided it was time to move onto something else.

[Talya]

Talya took a deep breath in through her nose and out through her mouth, to help steady the shallowness of her breath and the thundering of her heart as she slipped back into her starting position. She decided that now she would try to add more movement to her dagger-wielding actions, as she had remained pretty stationary for the best several minutes. She began by raising her right hand over her head. She guided it over to the right side of her body, so that it had moved a bit past her shoulder. From there, she tucked her left hand behind her back, to keep it safe. She held it there firmly- letting the length press against the line of her kidneys. Then she took another deep breath as she jumped forward, pushing off against the ground with her feet. It propelled her higher than it might have otherwise done, as she sank a little first, letting her knees bend a little more before she took off. She didn't move very far forward thought, as she swept her dagger inward, and down toward her left hip. Then, she crashed into the earth with a gentle thud, which she assumed was largely muffled by the presence of the grass.

Talya smiled. She had liked falling through the air for a moment- the rush it made her feel. She had thought the movement of her arm fluid, she felt it natural, and she knew that the move could prove useful. Staying off the ground meant that her legs could not be swept out from under her. It meant she had a higher vantage point than her opponent, in most if not all cases, which could be advantageous in and of itself- simply by where her blade would fall and be placed. But while she was in the air, she thought, she may be more susceptible and prone to attack- as she would have no real chance to move herself around once air born, should she need to dodge a strike or two. Of course, she would have the ability to move her dagger around, as she always did, but it wouldn't be able to stretch as far, and she felt, that she would leave areas open to attack that hadn't been before. All the same, she felt it worth practicing, and jumped up again, this time, she moved a little farther forward as she guided the blade back up from her hip to the space above her shoulder- the previous starting position. Then she jumped again, and repeated the process, again and again.

When Talya had reached the end of the clearing, she turned herself around. She took a deep breath in through her nose and out through her mouth, and thought that she had gotten enough practice with her one side, and decided it was time to move onto the other. So she shifted her right arm slightly, guiding it across her body on a diagonal, over to the left side, and above her head still. It marred her vision, but such happened, even in battle, and you had to deal with it. But even so, she felt she should add more movement to each jump than she had been, if she could, to counter the loss of some of her field of vision. With this in mind, Talya jumped up again, and guided her arm down to her right hip, and then back up to her right shoulder. Then she landed. She leapt up again the instant she had, and slashed at the air wildly from left to right. She landed again, and then sprang up once more. She waved the dagger all around, cutting viciously at the air, before she fell back down to the earth, and repeated the process another two times. The second time, she landed funny, and a sharp jarring pain coursed up the length of her leg. It stemmed from her ankle.

Talya turned around, and tried to walk the other way, then winced. It hurt a lot, the pain being surprisingly great. So she decided to stop for now until she felt a little better, and sheathed her dagger. Then she gathered the rest of her things, and slowly, made her way back into the city of Zeltiva.