Arwyn pulled off the game helmet and sat up, the cheerful morning light coming through the windows in contrast to the deep night she had been experiencing in-game. Squinting, she glanced at the clock and saw that it was just after 7:00 a.m.
Sunday mornings were when Arwyn went to tae kwon do, so she busied herself with making a substantial breakfast. If she did not eat, she would feel faint after only a few minutes of running around, and if she ate late, she would have to suffer the discomfort of feeling the food sit like a stone in her stomach as her body focused powering her muscles rather than digesting the food (don't even get her started about the one time she ate at McDonald's right before class).
Arwyn enjoyed the quiet of the morning, broken only by the small sounds of her dishes and cutlery. While she was not (completely) antisocial, quiet alone time was when she relaxed and recharged her mental energies, able to act how she wanted without worrying about affecting others. Her internal dialogue was too interesting for her to ever be bored by herself. (By reading up to this chapter, you readers implicitly agree, since her internal dialogue is what's driving this entire story and she's spent 3/4 of the scenes alone. Evil pets don't count.)
Readying herself for class, Arwyn put on the traditional white tae kwon do uniform of loose pants and long-sleeved top. Fastening the jacket to her body was her red belt (it's the one below black), wrapped twice around her waist before being knotted twice in the front (this left enough length on the loose ends that she occasionally managed to whack herself in the face while kicking and jumping; not so much with the thicker-waisted). Her impractically long hair was confined to a ponytail, and she filled up her large (blue) water bottle from her pitcher of filtered water before heading out.
Tae kwon do practice took place in the gymnasium of a local elementary school, rented out on weekends for a variety of activities. Upon arrival, Arwyn took off her shoes and socks, then bowed as she entered the gym. Bowing was a very frequent and important action in tae kwon do; you bowed when entering and exiting the room, at the formal beginning and end of class, when you paired up with a partner, before you talked to someone of a higher belt level, before leaving someone's presence, when you gave or received anything, and any time the grandmaster walked by (you know, the guy with the eight stripes on his black belt who could literally beat you in a fight with both hands tied behind his back). Ancient tradition and showing respect aside, Arwyn thought constant bowing was a good way to strengthen the lower back muscles.
Class started with lining up in order by belt level, then age; Arwyn was in the back, since it was a high-belt class for red belts and up. Everyone bowed to the instructor, who then directed the warm-up. Much of tae kwon do classes consisted of improving strength, flexibility, and endurance through mundane exercises. People who peeked in during the beginning part of class expecting flashy stunts or intense fighting were usually disappointed to see red and black belts running laps, doing push-ups (or whatever you called the pathetic things Arwyn did) and sit ups, or quietly stretching (though whimpering wasn't that uncommon during partner stretching). It was not until everyone's muscles were warm and loose that the tae kwon do techniques really appeared.
Every week, the class practiced different areas. Sometimes they worked on patterns, also called forms, sets of linked kicks, punches, and blocks that were part of the standard curriculum to advance in belt level. Also common were classes focused on one or a few kicks, with the aim to improve speed, balance, power, and accuracy. Occasionally, they learned 'street fighting': simple techniques that would work well against opponents in a real fight (and would get you disqualified from a competition); as a rule, starting fights and using tae kwon do techniques to bully others would get you banned from the sport, but if someone else threw the first punch, you were allowed to dodge in a way that ended up with the other person face-down on the ground with their arm twisted behind their back.
This week's practice went into raising the height of their axe kicks (seen in Chapter 3; the foot goes up over the target and smashes straight down). Arwyn paired up with the most flexible girl in class (and bowed), then accepted a hand target (she thinks they're called hand targets because they're hand-sized; they were really foot targets most of the time) from the assistant instructor (with a bow). Flexibility was variable between individuals in class; as a general rule, the older and more muscular you were, the less flexible you were. Some of the practitioners could barely kick a target at waist height, while Arwyn and her partner started the target at face level.
Settling into a fighting stance, Arwyn focused on the target, then brought her foot up and snapped it down through the target with a yell. “Hai!” Yells were called 'ki-ups', with 'ki' meaning 'energy'. The loud cries at the moment of impact psychologically invigorated a person to strike with more energy, as well as physiologically causing the abdominal muscles to tense at the correct time. Hit at the correct angle, the hand target made a loud slapping sound a split second after Arwyn's ki-up.
After a few kicks with both legs, Arwyn took the target from her partner (with a bow) and held it for the other girl to kick. (Her ki-up sounded more like “Eh!”) Time passed with a sense of cameraderie as Arwyn and her partner grinningly held the target higher and higher until it was well over head height, technically physically impossible to hit even if you were able to do front splits. The girls circumvented this technicality by bouncing onto the balls of their feet, standing on their toes and elevating their effective height by a few inches (*sneaky*).
When an hour had passed, class ended (with bowing), and Arwyn headed home tired, sweaty, and slightly sore, but completely relaxed and glowing from her exertions. (Get your minds out of the gutter; it's an exercise high. Though if you're being warned about this, it means the author's mind is also in the gutter.) After she took a (necessary) shower and devoured lunch (like a lunch-devouring monster), “completely relaxed” became “sleepy”. Though Arwyn had been getting plenty of sleep since purchasing Fantasia, she had been conscious and thinking for over three days, six if you counted the faster time in the game; her body was rested, but her mind was weary. Arwyn went into her room and sank into her queen-sized bed for a nap. (Tsk tsk, going to bed with wet hair. This is how weird hairstyles are born).
An hour later, Arwyn wakened naturally, feeling amazingly refreshed. She had had one of those perfect naps where she woke with her mind completely focused and her body warm and relaxed, with none of the small discomforts usually associated with sleeping, like a sore neck or a dry mouth. (Even her hair was fine; one of the properties of really long hair was that gravity pulled it into the same style no matter how you abused it.) She indulged herself by lazing about like a cat (she had five full-sized pillows that she liked to shift into various configurations for lazing on) before finally getting up.
Contentedly, Arwyn turned on her computer. Technically, she did not have to work on weekends, but deadlines were deadlines no matter when you did the work, so she tended to spread her workload out to weekends if there was nothing better to do. The next few hours were spent immersed in spreadsheets and emails.
Arwyn continued working after dinner. Night had fallen, and she was about to turn off her laptop when Leah sent her an instant message:
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - How was TKD?
ArwynTheElf – Great. You should take it with me.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - I will if you take yoga with me.
This was an ongoing negotiation between the two friends as each tried to convince the other of the superiority of their chosen form of exercise. Leah contended that tae kwon do was too violent and a high-risk activity for injury, while Arwyn maintained that yoga did not even count as exercise (and wasn't violent enough).
ArwynTheElf – I'd rather... go to tae kwon do by myself.
(She had been about to write something melodramatic like, “I'd rather eat low-fat ice cream”, but then realized she didn't find yoga that distasteful.)
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - Good, because I'd rather not have somebody stomp on my foot and have to hobble around for weeks.
ArwynTheElf – That only happened once.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - What about the time you sprained your ankle and hobbled around for weeks?
ArwynTheElf – That also only happened once.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - And the time you twisted your knee?
ArwynTheElf – Okay, that one doesn't even count; it wasn't a full sprain, I wasn't hobbling, and I didn't even have to skip a TKD class.
ArwynTheElf – Anyways, are you going to list every injury that I ever had? Because been there, suffered that.
Arwyn did not actually get injured frequently in tae kwon do class, but after almost a decade of weekly and twice-weekly classes, the incidents added up.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - Actually, I wanted to check on your Fantasia progress. I trained hard last night and got to level 15.
ArwynTheElf – ...19
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - *swear word* Seriously? HOW?
(Leah actually wrote “*swear word*”; she swears infrequently, like Arwyn.)
ArwynTheElf – I got the Magic (*song reference*[i]). Oh, and sometimes hunting is more efficient in a party.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - >_> Of course I hunt in a party. Solo mages are just asking to die, and I'm not antisocial like you.
ArwynTheElf – I'm only antisocial towards stupid people.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - And everyone is stupid.
ArwynTheElf – You understand me so well ^_^
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - Well, it's the least I can do, since you're so great at helping me destroy the evidence.
(This was an ongoing joke that Leah and Arwyn played on whatever agency might be monitoring their chat history. They are both law-abiding citizens.)
ArwynTheElf – I'd patent the process, if its only use weren't so illegal.
(Still joking. Really. There is no process. *doth protest too much*[ii])
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - k, well, I'm going to go try to catch up with you in Fantasia. Bye and goodnight.
ArwynTheElf – Nightnight.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... is offline.
Arwyn took Leah's game-playing as permission to do so herself. Saving her work, she shut her laptop and prepared for sleeping. She brushed her teeth (and flossed; good dental hygiene is important to overall health) before climbing onto the recliner and putting on the game helmet (“Welcome,” it whispered seductively). Setting the alarm for work the next morning, Arwyn turned on the game.
◊◊◊
Darkness.
“Scanning. Player detected. Welcome back to Fantasia, Fey E'lan.”
A flash of light.
◊◊◊
Fey blinked into existence a short distance from Moonwood village. Almost immediately after logging on, she received a private message:
Fey felt a jolt of nervous anticipation at the prospect of seeing the angel again.
Arwyn pulled off the game helmet and sat up, the cheerful morning light coming through the windows in contrast to the deep night she had been experiencing in-game. Squinting, she glanced at the clock and saw that it was just after 7:00 a.m.
Sunday mornings were when Arwyn went to tae kwon do, so she busied herself with making a substantial breakfast. If she did not eat, she would feel faint after only a few minutes of running around, and if she ate late, she would have to suffer the discomfort of feeling the food sit like a stone in her stomach as her body focused powering her muscles rather than digesting the food (don't even get her started about the one time she ate at McDonald's right before class).
Arwyn enjoyed the quiet of the morning, broken only by the small sounds of her dishes and cutlery. While she was not (completely) antisocial, quiet alone time was when she relaxed and recharged her mental energies, able to act how she wanted without worrying about affecting others. Her internal dialogue was too interesting for her to ever be bored by herself. (By reading up to this chapter, you readers implicitly agree, since her internal dialogue is what's driving this entire story and she's spent 3/4 of the scenes alone. Evil pets don't count.)
Readying herself for class, Arwyn put on the traditional white tae kwon do uniform of loose pants and long-sleeved top. Fastening the jacket to her body was her red belt (it's the one below black), wrapped twice around her waist before being knotted twice in the front (this left enough length on the loose ends that she occasionally managed to whack herself in the face while kicking and jumping; not so much with the thicker-waisted). Her impractically long hair was confined to a ponytail, and she filled up her large (blue) water bottle from her pitcher of filtered water before heading out.
Tae kwon do practice took place in the gymnasium of a local elementary school, rented out on weekends for a variety of activities. Upon arrival, Arwyn took off her shoes and socks, then bowed as she entered the gym. Bowing was a very frequent and important action in tae kwon do; you bowed when entering and exiting the room, at the formal beginning and end of class, when you paired up with a partner, before you talked to someone of a higher belt level, before leaving someone's presence, when you gave or received anything, and any time the grandmaster walked by (you know, the guy with the eight stripes on his black belt who could literally beat you in a fight with both hands tied behind his back). Ancient tradition and showing respect aside, Arwyn thought constant bowing was a good way to strengthen the lower back muscles.
Class started with lining up in order by belt level, then age; Arwyn was in the back, since it was a high-belt class for red belts and up. Everyone bowed to the instructor, who then directed the warm-up. Much of tae kwon do classes consisted of improving strength, flexibility, and endurance through mundane exercises. People who peeked in during the beginning part of class expecting flashy stunts or intense fighting were usually disappointed to see red and black belts running laps, doing push-ups (or whatever you called the pathetic things Arwyn did) and sit ups, or quietly stretching (though whimpering wasn't that uncommon during partner stretching). It was not until everyone's muscles were warm and loose that the tae kwon do techniques really appeared.
Every week, the class practiced different areas. Sometimes they worked on patterns, also called forms, sets of linked kicks, punches, and blocks that were part of the standard curriculum to advance in belt level. Also common were classes focused on one or a few kicks, with the aim to improve speed, balance, power, and accuracy. Occasionally, they learned 'street fighting': simple techniques that would work well against opponents in a real fight (and would get you disqualified from a competition); as a rule, starting fights and using tae kwon do techniques to bully others would get you banned from the sport, but if someone else threw the first punch, you were allowed to dodge in a way that ended up with the other person face-down on the ground with their arm twisted behind their back.
This week's practice went into raising the height of their axe kicks (seen in Chapter 3; the foot goes up over the target and smashes straight down). Arwyn paired up with the most flexible girl in class (and bowed), then accepted a hand target (she thinks they're called hand targets because they're hand-sized; they were really foot targets most of the time) from the assistant instructor (with a bow). Flexibility was variable between individuals in class; as a general rule, the older and more muscular you were, the less flexible you were. Some of the practitioners could barely kick a target at waist height, while Arwyn and her partner started the target at face level.
Settling into a fighting stance, Arwyn focused on the target, then brought her foot up and snapped it down through the target with a yell. “Hai!” Yells were called 'ki-ups', with 'ki' meaning 'energy'. The loud cries at the moment of impact psychologically invigorated a person to strike with more energy, as well as physiologically causing the abdominal muscles to tense at the correct time. Hit at the correct angle, the hand target made a loud slapping sound a split second after Arwyn's ki-up.
After a few kicks with both legs, Arwyn took the target from her partner (with a bow) and held it for the other girl to kick. (Her ki-up sounded more like “Eh!”) Time passed with a sense of cameraderie as Arwyn and her partner grinningly held the target higher and higher until it was well over head height, technically physically impossible to hit even if you were able to do front splits. The girls circumvented this technicality by bouncing onto the balls of their feet, standing on their toes and elevating their effective height by a few inches (*sneaky*).
When an hour had passed, class ended (with bowing), and Arwyn headed home tired, sweaty, and slightly sore, but completely relaxed and glowing from her exertions. (Get your minds out of the gutter; it's an exercise high. Though if you're being warned about this, it means the author's mind is also in the gutter.) After she took a (necessary) shower and devoured lunch (like a lunch-devouring monster), “completely relaxed” became “sleepy”. Though Arwyn had been getting plenty of sleep since purchasing Fantasia, she had been conscious and thinking for over three days, six if you counted the faster time in the game; her body was rested, but her mind was weary. Arwyn went into her room and sank into her queen-sized bed for a nap. (Tsk tsk, going to bed with wet hair. This is how weird hairstyles are born).
An hour later, Arwyn wakened naturally, feeling amazingly refreshed. She had had one of those perfect naps where she woke with her mind completely focused and her body warm and relaxed, with none of the small discomforts usually associated with sleeping, like a sore neck or a dry mouth. (Even her hair was fine; one of the properties of really long hair was that gravity pulled it into the same style no matter how you abused it.) She indulged herself by lazing about like a cat (she had five full-sized pillows that she liked to shift into various configurations for lazing on) before finally getting up.
Contentedly, Arwyn turned on her computer. Technically, she did not have to work on weekends, but deadlines were deadlines no matter when you did the work, so she tended to spread her workload out to weekends if there was nothing better to do. The next few hours were spent immersed in spreadsheets and emails.
Arwyn continued working after dinner. Night had fallen, and she was about to turn off her laptop when Leah sent her an instant message:
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - How was TKD?
ArwynTheElf – Great. You should take it with me.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - I will if you take yoga with me.
This was an ongoing negotiation between the two friends as each tried to convince the other of the superiority of their chosen form of exercise. Leah contended that tae kwon do was too violent and a high-risk activity for injury, while Arwyn maintained that yoga did not even count as exercise (and wasn't violent enough).
ArwynTheElf – I'd rather... go to tae kwon do by myself.
(She had been about to write something melodramatic like, “I'd rather eat low-fat ice cream”, but then realized she didn't find yoga that distasteful.)
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - Good, because I'd rather not have somebody stomp on my foot and have to hobble around for weeks.
ArwynTheElf – That only happened once.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - What about the time you sprained your ankle and hobbled around for weeks?
ArwynTheElf – That also only happened once.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - And the time you twisted your knee?
ArwynTheElf – Okay, that one doesn't even count; it wasn't a full sprain, I wasn't hobbling, and I didn't even have to skip a TKD class.
ArwynTheElf – Anyways, are you going to list every injury that I ever had? Because been there, suffered that.
Arwyn did not actually get injured frequently in tae kwon do class, but after almost a decade of weekly and twice-weekly classes, the incidents added up.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - Actually, I wanted to check on your Fantasia progress. I trained hard last night and got to level 15.
ArwynTheElf – ...19
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - *swear word* Seriously? HOW?
(Leah actually wrote “*swear word*”; she swears infrequently, like Arwyn.)
ArwynTheElf – I got the Magic (*song reference*[i]). Oh, and sometimes hunting is more efficient in a party.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - >_> Of course I hunt in a party. Solo mages are just asking to die, and I'm not antisocial like you.
ArwynTheElf – I'm only antisocial towards stupid people.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - And everyone is stupid.
ArwynTheElf – You understand me so well ^_^
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - Well, it's the least I can do, since you're so great at helping me destroy the evidence.
(This was an ongoing joke that Leah and Arwyn played on whatever agency might be monitoring their chat history. They are both law-abiding citizens.)
ArwynTheElf – I'd patent the process, if its only use weren't so illegal.
(Still joking. Really. There is no process. *doth protest too much*[ii])
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... - k, well, I'm going to go try to catch up with you in Fantasia. Bye and goodnight.
ArwynTheElf – Nightnight.
Leah-IfIHadAMillionDollars... is offline.
Arwyn took Leah's game-playing as permission to do so herself. Saving her work, she shut her laptop and prepared for sleeping. She brushed her teeth (and flossed; good dental hygiene is important to overall health) before climbing onto the recliner and putting on the game helmet (“Welcome,” it whispered seductively). Setting the alarm for work the next morning, Arwyn turned on the game.
◊◊◊
Darkness.
“Scanning. Player detected. Welcome back to Fantasia, Fey E'lan.”
A flash of light.
◊◊◊
Fey blinked into existence a short distance from Moonwood village. Almost immediately after logging on, she received a private message:
Fey felt a jolt of nervous anticipation at the prospect of seeing the angel again.
