KFP The Adventures of Liu Zhang - 02 (part 1)

Kung Fu Panda - The Adventures of Liu Zhang


02. Let me see your true self (part 1)


It was an afternoon just like any other in the Jade Palace, a beautiful blue sky with few clouds, temperature pleasantly warm, a gentle breeze going around all over the mountain, and a pretty quiet environment.

Well, at least inside the palace, and in the huge staircase, but in the Training Hall, I (Liu Zhang) was training very hard. After a good stretch, I was running from one side to the other and using all my energies to complete the training circuit. I was training my endurance in combat.

"AGAIN!" Master Shifu ordered after I had completed the circuit, going and back, and for the 6th time I ran again to continue, going to the Seven Swinging Clubs of Instant Oblivion, or as I prefer to say: treadmills.

Running as fast as I could and using my arms to balance, I went from one end to the other of the treadmill and did a backflip to proceed to the next. And as I ran, also had to worry about those wooden things with thorns, which swayed attached to chains, passing very close to me, but I did my best not to be struck and got through them.

After almost stumbling, I went to the Jade Tortoise of Wisdom, or as most know: bowl. I jumped and tried to support myself on the edge that was more ahead, I wanted to try to finish faster than the previous circuit times, and would intentionally steady myself only at one edge of the bowl, without doing all the kung fu moves while balancing myself, then continue. But I hadn't the chance to try to cheat, because just before I touch the bowl, Crane made a flyby in front of me, causing me to fall into the bowl and stagger.

"Trying to cheat, Liu?!" he teased, balancing with only one leg on the bowl, then I got into fighting position.

"Oh, come on! Is it really necessary to do All these stuff so many times? I mean, this is not my goal!" I said, standing up and balancing on the edge, in front of him, ready to fight to pass and continue the training circuit.

"Your goal is to train and acquire greater stamina, Liu! And not to make the circuit as fast as you can" Master Shifu replied.

"He's right, Liu. The resistance is not due to the strength or speed you have, but how much you can stand to do something repeatedly without tiring" added Crane.

"Agh! Okay..." I agree, but still not understanding somehow. I returned my gaze to the fight.

Crane was bigger than me, and his long wings allow him to hit me more easily. He tried to hit me alternating right and left blows with the wing, which I blocked with the wrists and elbows, but he was attacking fast and it was very difficult to balance on the narrow edges of the bowl, so I ended falling in again.

I heard him giving a slight laugh to see me fall out, what got me mad. I needed to get through him as quickly as possible, but how to do this if he was the master of balancing, and had the advantage of being able to hit me while I couldn't do a single blow?

Then an idea crossed my mind. As we were moving in the bowl, I noticed that if I left a heavier side, this side would stay closer to the ground. So, instead of starting a body-to-body fight, I started to throw my body forward and back into the bowl until Crane almost touch the ground, and then, using the momentum, I braced my feet on the opposite side and jumped highly, going over him.

Passing by him, I headed immediately to the next obstacle, the Gauntlet of Wooden Warriors. 16 training dummies of wood and iron arranged in four rows with four dolls each, which I needed to go through all, knocking the three members that revolves around them. Running left to right, I should repeat the sequence of strokes in all of the first row and then do the same with the following.

When I was in the sixth wooden warrior, I stopped to think if it was really necessary to hit them all, after all I should go through them all several times during the resistance training, then why should I hit them all every time if I would end up doing it moments later?

Then, after completing the sequence of hits on the sixth wooden warrior, I jumped four and started directly with the 11th. Right after I do this something strange happened. After giving a punch to the opponent of wood and dodge the member, a member of the warrior that was behind me struck me on the head.

"Ouch...What...happened?" I looked back, nothing could have done that. I continued the sequence of blows I was doing and suddenly I was hit in the ribs. I used my hand to relieve the pain and then looked back, and again I only saw the same wooden warrior that had struck me before.

This made no sense, none of wooden warriors, which look like alligators with armor, could move by itself. The wind wasn't strong enough even to move their limbs, so it was impossible to be enough to make it hit blows like those, it meant that someone was messing with them. But who? I didn't see anyone but Master Shifu and Crane.

After looking around and face the alligator of wood, it spin it's limbs in circles and hit me in the stomach and then in the nose, making me walk back. I leaned my back into another wooden warrior, who then immediately hit me in the ear, throwing me to another enemy, which hit me a blow in the face.

That wasn't good, whatever was that, someone making the opponents of wood move or if they had their own accord, I was taking a beating, and had to act as soon as I could, before let they defeat me without letting me finish my training. I shook my head to regain my balance and concentrated to see where it would come the next blows. Soon, the opponents who were around me started attacking me simultaneously, and I found myself obliged to use all my abilities to defend myself.

Using my arms, wrists, hands, feet and legs, I defended myself from the blows. Eventually I ended up taking a few hits, they were too fast for me to defend myself, and without realizing I was walking from one side to the other, just by going through the wooden warriors that I hadn't beaten before. After some time, the warriors of wood stopped moving.

"Very well, Liu! Now that you have hit all those you had skipped, you can continue with the others remaining" it was Mantis. As it seemed, he was beating on the wooden warriors to hit me, and it all just to make me come back and do the full circuit.

"AH! C’mon! I'll go through them all again later! So what's the point?" I asked with a slight revulsion, because he had delayed and hurt me, and he could have just told me to go back and do it again.

"Your goal is to train and acquire greater stamina, Liu! And not to make the circuit as fast as you can! And if you Really want to develop a Good physical resistance, it Must be intensive, and not only repetitive" Master Shifu explained. Frankly I still not understanding that very well. Repeating that phrase made me feel like a little kid, and that wasn't cool.

"Oh no, Liu! Get down, it will hit you!" Mantis said, jumping quickly on the wooden warrior that was behind me, doing a strike on it and hitting my face with the enemie's limbs, again.

"Ouch! W-why did you do that?" I asked nervously.

"I told you to get down! Hahahaha" he joked, making me even more nervous.

"Grrrr! Darn, this time I'll..."

"Concentrate, Liu! You haven't finished training yet!" Master Shifu interrupted me.

"But...*sigh*...okay" I replied.

I obeyed my master and continued training, this time doing the sequence of blows on all the enemies of wood, then going to the Field of Fiery Death, or simply: minefield. I had to be very careful to move quickly and with precision, because in the tubes of the ground of this part of the training had sensors that were easily triggered, which make large flames get off from ground, and I knew from own experience that is isn't very nice to get burned there.

Soon after stepping on the tubes, the training would start, but about 3 seconds after you step on them, those flames off the ground with great pressure. Knowing this, I wanted to pass well through and get out of there, but halfway I was stopped.

"Hi, Liu! You wouldn't mind sparring with me, right?" it was Viper, now it was her who was on my way.

"Ah! Seriously, even here?" I inquired. Then I heard the roar of the flames that were about to leave the pipes where I was stepping and I jumped to escape. When I just left, the flames rose, already giving me a chill down your spine for fear of getting burned. But I haven't had much time of peace, I tried to run out of the minefield, but was detained by Viper.

"Trying to escape, Liu? I thought you were going to fight me...are you scared?" she teased me.

I had no choice, I had to defeat her if I wanted to continue. Before start fighting, I heard the noise of fire rising from the ground through the pipes again, I found myself obliged again to move to escape the flames, before starting the fight with my opponent.

It was a complicated situation. I couldn't stay still for long, or I was going to burn myself, but at the same time I needed to dodge the attacks from my opponent, and find a way to attack her. Viper's strikes were mostly well-aimed, she aimed mostly on my legs and on my face, what made me lose my balance. The fact that I couldn't even hit a blow on her was agonizing, I had to move myself constantly to not end up turning into a toasted black panther.

It was unfair, Viper trained in the same part of the Training Hall since coming to the Jade Palace, she knew how to make her movements with precision and she never got burned. All her training left her extremely agile, and being thin as a noodle makes her be able to pass more easily through the flames.

After some time, the fatigue began to disturb me. I had to do so many somersaults and cartwheels in a row, not to mention that Viper hit me several blows, and the flames passing very close to me were affecting my psychological, even my sweat seemed to be hot.

"Come on, Liu! Stop running away and face me!" she teased me again.

"I'm trying! Do you think it's easy to fight on this thing? Furthermore, it's against You I'm fighting..." I replied, steadying my base and getting into fighting position.

"You haven't realized yet, I suppose?" she asked me with a strange smile on her face.

"Realized...Ah! I don't believe it..." I exclaimed when realized what she was talking about. Appearing to fight was a way of intensifying the resistance training.

"Hahaha! Come on, Liu! If you don't pass, soon you will not endure comply with the 100 laps on the circuit that you have promised!" she laughed and then reminded me, trying to hit me in sequence.

"Well, you guys told me I'd have to train my stamina if I wanted to enter the tournament. You do this at least once a week, and if you can I also have to be able to do it!" I grumbled.

"That's not how things work, Liu. You only get good at something training a lot! And there's no way to compare your workout with the other Six, yet. It will take years to..."

"No, no, no! Stop! It's always the same conversation, I can't stand thinking about taking years training the same thing! I'm not even...AAAAAAAH!!!" I would vent my exhaustion and dissatisfaction with myself, but before I finished, one of the flames rose up behind me and burned my tail.

With my tail on fire and in pain, I ran into a run from one side to the other while trying to extinguish the fire with my hands, making Viper laughed loudly. I was angry with it at first, but then I saw my opportunity to get out of that tremendous heat. I ran as fast as I could to the end of the Training Hall, passing with ease by Viper, who was still laughing. So I finished the training circuit.

"Hihihihi! Ah, Liu. Never keep still while in the Field of Fiery Dea..." she told me, but then also got burned, getting from the head to the tip of the tail toasted.

"RA! Do you see what happens when you keep mocking someone...OuchOuchOuch! *sigh of relief*" I said, then putting my tail in my mouth to extinguish the fire. So I fell back on the floor.

"AGAIN!" yelled Master Shifu.

"What?! You gotta be kidding me!" I grumbled.

"Come on, Liu! Otherwise I will not fulfill my part of the agreement" he said in response.

I was wondering if all what I was doing was worth. By the time I made the deal with Master Shifu everything seemed so much easier and exciting. Well, now it wasn't time for me to whine, I had to complete a workout.

"*sigh*...Well, it can't be that bad...only more...93 times..." to whom I was trying to fool? It would be a long day after all.

Fail and not fulfill my promise was definitely not an option. I took my tail off the mouth and spit out some toasted fur, then slowly regained my breath and prepared to continue the circuit training.

On lap 17, I started to feel my legs and arms get sore, my movements were getting hard, it was almost impossible to stretch my limbs completely. On the lap 28, I started to get a little dizzy, I did every obstacle without understanding what I was doing, I just did them automatically. In the 35th round, I started to decrease my pace, but still not skipping a single step of the training circuit. In the 40th lap I got scared, my vision was blurred; my sweating was cold and I was very breathless, when I tried to run to try to increase my pace again I closed my eyes briefly, and when I opened my vision was very blurred, I couldn't even see my friends in the Training Hall.

"Liu, are you okay?" Master Shifu asked with concern.

Surely if I said I wasn't fine, he would tell me to stop training, but I hadn't completed the 100 laps on the circuit yet. I'd said I would do the 100 laps, and if I didn't fulfill my word I wouldn't be able to live with myself, and Master Shifu wouldn't comply with his part of the agreement. Breathless to answer him, I just shaked my head to say that I was fine. I lied, but I just couldn't stop now.

I shook my head to regain my consciousness and continued the circuit. It was a disaster, I was exhausted, I fell into the bowl several times to the inside and outside and also the warriors of wood were hitting me more than I was hitting them. But the real problem was when I reached the minefield where every time a flame rose from the ground, I felt like the heat was making me faint.

In the 48th lap, my vision started to get blurry again. It was hard to stand, but I had to keep running while doing the circuit training. It no longer mattered to me more if I was doing each lap faster than the last time, all that mattered now was getting to the other side and go straight to the next lap. Once the flames in the minefield extinguished, I tried to run up in the middle to go faster, a big mistake that cost me dearly.

Something long and green came towards me, I couldn't see straight, but I concluded that it was the Viper, which gave me a blow in the face to prevent me from moving forward. I was careless, as Crane and Mantis, she appeared in only a few moments during the training, to intensify it, but as I clearly had skipped one part of the circuit, she came directly in an aggressive way to stop me. But I had so little strength remain, that the blow she gave me made me tumble and roll forward, I couldn't keep standing after the attack.

I fell out of the minefield, and to try to regain my consciousness I tried to support myself on the first thing that was closer to me. Another mistake, because I began to walk backwards and leaned on a wooden warrior, the one who was in the middle of them. I knew at that moment that Mantis would attack me too, and I was right.

I looked left and saw a blurry image of something small and green coming towards me. Mantis gave me a powerful kick in the stomach that made me bend forward in pain, then started hitting the wooden warriors to hit me several simultaneous strikes. With all my pains and unbearable dizziness, every blow seemed to cause short faintings, which I quickly woke up and tried to lift my arms to try to defend myself, but I had no strength to lift them.

"Stop, Mantis! Liu can not hold on anymore, it's time to stop before she..." Master Shifu said exactly what I feared, he wanted to stop the training and stop me. I couldn't believe that he thought I was already done, so early, I hadn't even done half of the training yet.

I just had to run from one side to the other, it seemed so easy, but still, I failed. I had to forget all that pain and sickness, and find a quick way to show Master Shifu that I was still able to continue.

"N-n-n-...no! I...I haven't finished y-yet...look at me...I'm fine...j-just a little...winded...I won't...stop now!" I said breathless and in pain, running from the Gauntlet of Wooden Warriors to the Jade Tortoise of Wisdom, starting to limp with my left leg.

"Liu, stop! You have reached your limit, if you continue, the consequences can be very serious! It makes no sense to continue like this" he tried again to tell me to stop, but what he said eventually left me with even more desire to continue.

"M-my...li-li-...limit?!...No! I still haven't...finished...I will fulfil with... what I s-said!" I replied, jumping to the edge of the bowl and starting to make the movements of tai chi. But I couldn't do them, it was almost impossible to move my arms and legs, let alone making moves that required a tremendous balance and synchrony. I just tried to swing my arms in any way similar to tai chi and would go to the next obstacle.

The last obstacles were the Seven Swinging Clubs of Instant Oblivion. But in my state, I wasn't able to make all the moves and divert the masses of wood with thorns, and unconsciously I started going through the middle of the treadmills, only to reach the other side. But again I was skipping a step of the training circuit, and that meant that someone would come to stop me from moving forward.

It gave me a shiver down my spine for a moment, causing me to quickly look around to see from where my next opponent would come, and saw a mass of wood with thorns coming towards me, with the thorns pointing at my face. I gathered all the strength I had left and punched the left side of that thing, throwing it away and saving myself.

"Feel the Thunder, Cheater!" it was Po, he took a big leap from afar, coming towards me to give me a bellyful.

"PO, NO!" shouted Master Shifu, Viper, Mantis and Crane, trying to stop Po. But it was too late.

A flabby panda with his 130 Kg at a high speed isn't something easy to stop, and besides, we were talking about our flabby panda, who wasn't exactly a good listener. Po didn't even try to stop, he just hit me a powerful bellyful, throwing me with all his strength away, to the metal bowl.

I hit my head hard on it, sitting on the floor after I fell. Gradually I began to lose my senses and fainted.

When I woke up, I had no idea of how long I was unconscious. I felt someone put a small wet towel on my forehead. I strained my eyes to get open, then saw I the ceiling, realizing that I was in my bedroom. I felt that I had a stiff neck, then I looked only with the corner of my eyes to see who else was in the bedroom.

"*sigh of relief*...Thank goodness, Liu" it was my mother, Tigress. She put her hand on top of mine, to comfort me.

"...Hi, mom!...For...how long I was unconscious?" I asked, still a little dizzy.

"It's already night. When you fainted it was almost lunchtime...you haven't make a single move for more than eight hours. But that's not important right now, just rest, you had a hard day today and got really hurt" she replied. When she talked about food my stomach growled, I was very hungry.

"Phew! What a relief that you're already awake, Liu. I feared the worst, I thought you would end up passed out for some days, but as always, you proves to be stronger than we think" Master Shifu said, entering the room.

"Oh!...Hi, Grandpa...thank you..." I said. Seeing him reminded me of our agreement, and I was disappointed for not having fulfilled my part of the agreement, already reminding me of his part of the agreement.

"What is the matter, Liu? Something's wrong?" my mother asked me, calmly.

"I...I wasn't able to do that!...I said I'd do 100 laps on the training circuit, but couldn't stand it. I haven't done even half of it and had fainted..." I replied, very sad with myself.

"Oh, Liu. You don't need to be so sad about it. You're being too hard on yourself. And after all, it was just a training and...and...and I owe you an apology! I was careless and too hard on you...the training was very hard and intense, even for one of the other Furious Six...I should have stopped you before...it happens..." Master Shifu apologized.

"It's okay, Master. But...how should I not be sad? I failed...you said that I could only participate in that martial arts event of that famous samurai, if I could complete 100 laps on the circuit...and I couldn't do it" I replied, even more sad now.

"Oh! Haha...Liu, I told you that you would only be ble To Compete against the legendary samurai Tamatso Utin, if you at least Improve your endurance in combat! Doing one hundred laps per day in the Training Hall circuit was an Exaggerated estimate I gave you at that moment to tell you How you maybe could improve your stamina until the day of the event" he said.

"What?!" I asked blankly.

"Hah?! What event is this?" my mother asked, wondering what our Master had agreed with me without her permission.

"Oh, Liu and I made a deal, Tigress. She said she would love to accept the challenge of Tamatso Utin, which will happen on next week, and I said that if she could prove to me that would be physically and psychologically ready by then, I would pay the fee so she could participate" he explained.

"The famous Tamatso Utin?! Wow, What kind of event?" she asked.

"It is a tournament of sword fighting, mom! This samurai opened this event for the whole China! Any challenger who thinks is able to defeat him in a battle of swords can participate" I completed, with courage.

"Yes. And as I was saying, rest well tonight, Liu! Tomorrow you will have a day off to recover...and if I were you, I would put a bit of ice on the back of your left shoulder. It was a hard stroke..." he said.

Shortly thereafter, I tried to catch with my left hand the baggie with ice, which actually was a big bag with almost the size of my back, which had a pretty chilled water with small pieces of ice inside.

"Oh...okay!...If you say I need more...I won't disagree...hehe" I said, already thinking about how I would be able to sleep with that thing on my back freezing me.

"And tomorrow, when we finish our breakfast, we will go to the Valley to pay your inscription to the event" he continued. His answer made me extremely excited.

"Seriously?! YAAAY! Thank...Ouch!...Thank You Very Much, Master!...But wait...I haven't improved my stamina, so..." I tried to get up to celebrate, but the torticollis stopped me.

"Of course yes! You proved it to us today. Every day you improve all your skills, including your stamina. I have no doubt that you'll be more than ready to join that event!" he replied, leaving me a little embarrassed by the praise.

"Thank you, Master!" I thanked him, then he left the room.

"Liu, I'm proud of you! This is what I call been Hardcore" she said, smiling.

"Thank you, Miss. Harcore" I joked, making us laugh.

"But don't forget to ask me permission for this kind of thing next time! Of course I would agree with it anyway, but you are not old enough to make these kind of agreements with others without asking my permission first"

"But it was a deal with grandpa!" I said.

"You got my point!...Let me put some more ice in this..." she'd pick up the bag to fill with ice to put it on my back, but Po'd just entered our room.

"HUH! Oh my God! LIU! You've already woke up..." he exclaimed, excited, but his exaltation cost me a powerful hug.

"AAAH! PO, your dolt! I'm with torticollis and pains all over the body!" I yelled. He stopped squeezing me so hard, but just freed me after seeing the cold gaze of my mother.

"Oops...hehe! Sorry, Liu. But it's that I...I...*sigh*...I'm sorry for what happened today! I...I was late, and when I knew what I had to do to join your workout...I think I overdid it..." he apologized.

"Don't worry about it, Po. It was just an accident" I said.

"Yes...and since you're here, why don't you do something good to redeem yourself, huh?! Can you fill this bag with ice, please?" my mother said, still a bit serious.

"Ah...yes...I'll be right back" Po said with a slightly odd tone, as if he was sad or worried, then he grabbed the bag and left the room.

"Why is he...Oh! How could I forget? You said you wanted to have a private conversation with Po. What you wanted to talk to him?" I asked, careful not to show too much excitement, to not prevent her from answering me.

"Liu, I...I don't wanna talk about it. Today was a long and tiring day, and I also need a rest" she replied, now with a tone of disappointment.

"Oh, Mom. Please, tell me! Don't worry, I'm your daughter, you can tell me everything. I promise to keep a secret" I insisted. She was thoughtful for a moment.

"...*sigh*...Liu...I wanted to talk to him because...because I think he was really starting to believe that kiss thing was serious. I told you guys the truth, he would drown and I couldn't let him leave the water, sharing my breath with him was the only way! It was just a mission, I haven't done that because I like him......and well, Po has told me of some indirect ways that he...appreciates me...I remember very well the day he used the Mystical Mirror of Yin and Yang in himself and the wicked and perverted part of him was doing pickup lines...the time Yijiro came to the Jade Palace and Po was dying of jealousy..." she told me quietly, but something seemed to bother her more than that.

"But...if you just wanted to tell it to him, then why are you like this, mom?" I continued.

"...I...I don't know...maybe becau..." she went on, but she listened to the steps of Po coming closer and stopped talking.

"Here is the bag with ice" he said quietly when entered the room, seeming to avoid looking at my mother in the eye.

"...Thank you, Po...Good night" she thanked him, then put the ice bag behind my shoulder.

"...good night...Good night, Liu!" he said, then turned and walked slowly to his room, in front of our. My mother extinguished the fire in lamp and then gave me a goodnight kiss on my forehead.

"Good night, sweetie. Sleep well"

"Good night, mom. Ah...sorry, I know you just lay down on your comfortable bed...but I have a little problem, hehe!" I said softly.

"What's the matter?" She turned to look at me.

"I can't lay down on my bed...can you help me?" I replied, not knowing whether to laugh or not.

She helped me to lie down and pinching the ice bag on my shoulder, then she lay down again and fell asleep quickly. It was a pleasantly warm night, but I couldn't sleep very well, that ice bag was freezing all my back, but mostly one thing bothered me: why my mother was feeling so bad? It had been a long time since I hadn't seen that. And not just her, Po also was feeling lousy. What had actually happened to them? And worse, why that particular night had so many little noises of cracks of wood?

But even so, it was a pretty nice night. I could rest well and recover from my training injuries, but what do I didn't expect was to wake up the way I woke up.

"GOOD MORNING, Sweetheart! Did you sleep well? Had good dreams? Seriously? Me too! Wow, it what a good night's sleep!" my mother woke me in a happy mood that was more than unusual for her.

"Ah...good morning, mom!..." right after I finish the sentence the bell rang and it was time to introduce ourselves to Master Shifu, but what happened next was even stranger.

"Goooood Mooorning, Masteeer" Po, my mother and others have said, instead of saying seriously as we always do. But the strangest thing was after saying good morning.

"Hey! You guys have woken up too? I don't believe it! COOL! GROUP HUG!" they said animated and in sync, then all rushed at each other and gave a big hug. Master Shifu and I stared at it without having the slightest idea of what was going on.

"What...what's wrong with them?" I asked softly to myself.



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Continues