“Your foundation is solid, but your sword technique relies too much on explosive eruptions of spiritual energy. A true swordsman needs a touch of gracefulness.”

Each afternoon, Corin awaited inside the narrow bamboo lodge. He never once rose to demonstrate. Instead, reclined on a low bamboo couch, fingers roaming the length of a pitch-black wooden sword, and pointed out Jared’s flaws with a casual nod or a single tap of the wooden blade.

“Look at this old bamboo,” Corin remarked, “When the wind comes, it bows, when the wind fades, it straightens… It looks fragile, yet its strength is hidden in its bend. A sword should be the same. Steel breaks if it stays hard too long. Mix hardness with grace and you can slice, coil, deflect, maintain control of the battle.”

Jared focused on the bamboo outside the window. Gusts whipped the green trunk until it seemed certain to snap, yet each time the gale peaked, the stalk leaned, shedding most of the force before settling upright again.

Understanding struck like flint on steel. Dragonslayer Sword hummed In his grip, and the brutal sword technique had practiced for years melted into something lighter.

Sword light fluttered like shadows of bamboo leaves, one instant shooting straight up like a newborn shoot, the next skimming sideways as gently as a leaf riding the wind.

“Mm. Now we are getting somewhere,” Corin remarked, “Sword technique is not a set of fixed rules. Follow forms too closely, and you are merely ordinary. Grasp the idea behind the blade, and you become something special. Until today, you’ve only known to ‘sever‘. Remember the blade can also coil and circle.”