Tai Ma Training Post - Heritage Arc - Post Episode #15

While Zymon was away to hang out with the others, which oddly enough doesn't happen very often. Tai Ma was going about training in the woods of Peach Creek. He was meditating on his Genso Hoshutsu technique, intending to amplify its effects. As such, his mind was cleared of all unnecessary thoughts and distractions, and he focused his energy. Whiteness met his mind's eye, with a blurry shape in view. Then the scnerey was overshadowed by darkness. "Urrgh..." Tai Ma's energy began destabilizing, and the ground beneath him began to crack. His aura began glowing an eerie white, which seemed to caress a few of the trees around him. The spectrum descended into a dark red, becoming a mist, at which the trees began to shrivel, as though their very life was being sapped away before them. Tai Ma popped open his eyes, panting heavily. "Huff..hurrrghh...huff...Heh...back then, controlling this seemed easier..." As he said these words, his mind raced to images of his student, Zymon, being drained of his life force, along with the others. "No...I must not be distracted by such trivial missteps...! Again!" Tai Ma cleared his mind once more, and began to meditate.
The white blank space came to him again, this time, with a silhouette the shape of a person in view. The shadow appeared to put its hand toward him, greeting him. He didn't see any trick hiding beneath this gesture, so his mind's form gently put its hand on the shadow's hand. The shadow dissipated, and darkness came over his mind's eye again.
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A few days later, Zymon and Tai Ma were sparring as per their usual training routine, but Tai Ma's mind was elsewhere. "What was the apparition that came to me the past few days...?" Tai Ma pondered. Zymon's energy began increasing, yet Tai Ma was not paying heed to this, and this lack of attention earned him a few hits to the face. "Try to keep your head in it, Master, or you'll be left in the dust!" Tai Ma staggered a bit while Zymone jumped forward to connect with his hits, but Tai Ma grabbed Zymon's fist, twisted it, and slammed him into the ground. Tai Ma's face was curdling a bit with aggravation, while Zymon was showing a bit of fear at Tai's expression. "M-Master, is something wrong?" Zymon inquired.

Tai Ma calmed down a bit at this quesiton, realizing where he was again. "I-I'm sorry, Zymon. I did not mean to exert such force..." Tai Ma helped Zymon up. "What just happened...? For a minute, I felt...something..." Tai Ma again pondered his thoughts. "Why don't you go and practice your movement in the trees, Zymon? It should help your agility and reflexes." Tai Ma assigned to his student. His student obeyed and left his master to his thoughts.

As soon as Zymon was out of sight, Tai Ma sat down on a rock near the house. "Why...Why did I do that...?" Tai Ma asked himself. He closed his eyes, turning to meditation to discern the reason for his action. However, his mind was not clear, but rather full of voices that shouted, "You're too weak!" or "You're nothing but a failure!" and even "Why should you even bother to live?" Tai Ma was sorting through all these voices, calmly reassuring himself. "These are but feelings of doubt. Doubt in my own power." A voice replied to his reassurance, "Power? HAH! You couldn't even master a technique of your own design!" Tai Ma retorted, "Just because it is a technique I developed does not mean I can master it within an instant!" The voice replied back, starting a large verbal debate in his mind. "How can you even call it your technique if you have not even used it to its greatest effect?" "There could be consequences if I used it at its fullest capacity!" "There could be??? How would you know if you have never even tried??!" "Fine, then! GENSO HOSHUTSU!"
A white aura surrounded Tai Ma's mental form, and the source of the voice came in the form of a shadow, seeming unimpressed. "You can only visualize the capacity you have restricted yourself to using, not what you CAN use. Let me show you how it's done." The shadow got into a battle stance, and a white burst of energy exploded from its body, blotting out the mental image...

Tai Ma suddenly opened his eyes, gasping for breath. "Huff...huff..." He sensed that Zymon was still training around in the trees, which meant that he had not leaked any large power in his trance. "Hmmm..." Tai Ma thought about what the voice said, and began to meditate once more.
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This is more or less a foreshadowing to Tai Ma achieving full mastery over the Genso Hoshutsu, so it will occur a little later.