Ancient Chinese Secrets

By Rev.K.

My current player-character is a fella named John Patterson .He is an Akashic brother and started out as a sort of a cross between Fortunato from the "Wild Cards" books, and John Constantine. I've been playing him steadily for a few years now and he's evolved a bit. One of the most enduring factors in John's life is his Mentor,Morry Chang.

Morry (or "the old goat" ,as john refers to him.) is Chinese and is over 400 years old. He is incredibly wise,witty,never gives a straight answer, and if you listen to certain students, the most sadistic man alive. As I've already stated, I like the Destroyer novels and the movie too. Morry Chang is a sort of cross between Chiun (last reigning master of the glorious house of Sinanju,and adviser to Mad Harold,emperor of America.) and that fella in Sidekicks who owned the restaurant.

One of the running gags in the chronicle is that Morry has 400 years worth of experience in teaching students humility. And lots of methods. Here are some. As related by Patterson himself.

" This was the first lesson I ever learned. It's basically an Atemi strike and not magickal at all. I didn't know that of course. I was bitching about the diet, and all the exercises and the gross unfairness of life in general when Morry snaked out his hand and set my entire nervous system on fire. Air became an incredibly precious commodity and time seemed to slow to a crawl...No, check that....a drag. He stood there with his hands on his hips,naked power of his avatar showing. Somehow he had gone from 4'8" to 9 feet tall. And he said," Pain clears the mind but it steals the breath. If you would learn anything CHILD...you must learn to master both." I have no doubt that if I hadn't nodded,I would still be on that floor begging death to come find me."

Kata study:

One day the master said he would show me a Kata. He took me to the kwoon,and after warming up, performed a perfect and heartbreakingly beautiful swan Kata. he showed me the movements and bade me work on it. After a half an hour I thought had it pretty good. He came back in with a bucket of tennis balls.he told me to begin the kata and I did and then he started whipping the tennis balls at me. Hard. I was naturally upset and angry. I ended up slipping on a tennis ball and landing on my...pride.

The old goat was chuckling."You are the vainest creature on earth....Why are you doing the Kata that way? You are trying to pretty it up."

"But it's supposed to be Beautiful. It is a martial art."

"John-san, Kata is only an exercise to teach you nuts and bolts of Do. Will enemies stop in these particular spaces where you put your fist or your foot? No.Kata is to teach elements. You must learn to be flexible, The beauty of Kata comes from it's simplicity, not because it is some sort tea ceremony."

DO KATA! HAI!" (whiff,whiff,>OW!<)

Breaking Boards:

" As I found out later, Breaking objects is a simple application of the knowledge of stress points and Chi control. But I didn't know that. I guess I'd seen too much Kung-Fu as a kid and so I pestered him until he showed me how to do it. After I had done it once. I looked at him and he just looked tired. "What!",I said," I think that was pretty good considering that I've never done it before."

"You put too much stock in that parlor trick."he griped,"Problem is...Board does not hit back." And so saying he hefted a 2x4 and chased me around the kwoon until I broke it while he was swinging it at me."Now that's useful." he grinned.

(Btw, Entropy Magick helps this process along considerably.)"

Everyday Maneuvers:

"I know that my Sifu has seen many Karate Movies.He likes to give them the MST3k treatment.He can laugh his Chinese ass off at the Power Rangers all day. Now,I see why. I also know that he's seen the Karate kid Movies. I know this because I ended up working on his house for free,and working at his restaurant for free. He'd give me some repetitive task that I'd have to do all day and then he'd attack me yelling " Show me Paint fence! Show me Wax car!" I once got my nose broken because I was stumped as to how to defend myself with "Mow lawn". Morry apologized,and still swears to this day that it was an accident. Unfortunately, I believe him."

Walk without traces:

" We had trained on a Nightingale floor which is a Ninja training tool. It is a floor especially designed to creak and pop. He was trying to teach me footwork control and how to walk without trace. One day he brought out a long roll of rice paper parchment. He said" Walk across the parchment without leaving a mark."

I said " Hard.But certainly not impossible." He smiled thinly and then unrolled it. the length of the paper had been freshly inked with Kanji characters that read things like 50 laps, or 50 marine push-ups.or 1000 strikes on the makiwara board, or 4 hours on the heavy bag, you get the idea. If I mussed it, I did it.

I grimaced "Still not impossible, you're losing your touch old man."

Then he pulled out a jeweler's loupe and put it in his eye. I should have kept my mouth shut."

Concentration Exercises:

"Concentration is the key not just to Do or Magick but life," he would say. "But life does not play fair." Well, neither did he. He started me with simple exercise. but they were the equivalent of "go into the corner, and keep from thinking about a white bear." He would read long Chinese poetry to me. if I showed any sign of wandering attention or of incomprehension he kept a wooden practice sword handy to smack at me with. Once he put me in a room alone with a T.V. and told me clear my mind of all thought. he turned on the T.V. popped a tape in the V.C.R. and left. I was pretty sure he was monitoring me mentally so I cleared my mind and started my Chi-gung exercises. The tape was long sections of Playboy channel and the goddamn song from sesame street. You know the one...Mahna Mahna DOO DOO DOO DOO DOO! Mahna Mahna DOOT DOO DOO!

Hand-eye coordination:

"Hand-eye is very important, it's very key to Mind Magick and is useful for learning some forms of Time Magick. We practiced with many weapon forms. Morry is very well rounded in Kobu-jutsu. Kendo,Japanese archery, Mongol,horse-borne archery(which he swears is more useful.) Shuriken throwing, knife and tomahawk throwing. and other suchlike became my daily faire. I excelled at this. the old goat even said so once. and I was going along fine.

Until one day...

" I am thinking that you have truly mastered hand-eye coordination.your training is finished but for one last test."

" I am ready Sifu."

" You know my grandson Soo, Answers to Johnny?"

" Sure, I've sparred with him a few times." The kid was only 13 but was every bit the martial artist.

" Good, then go defeat him in Mortal combat."

I was a bit stunned as you can imagine. I went to go find Johnny Chang.

" you grandfather says that I'm to best you in mortal combat."

"is that so?" he said,cracking his knuckles." That old Man never gets anything right. I swear I told him that I was gonna use Virtua Fighter 2. Mortal Kombat is totally old news."

I still haven't beat that damn kid.

Mental flexibility:

I'll give the old goat this. His training is designed to make you mentally alert. "Your mind must be like water." is his big phrase. We had an exercise that took place in his kitchen. We would be working on the lunch or dinner rush. and he would attack me. my only warning would be "HAAAAI!" and I would have to defend myself with whatever weapon I had to hand. It made me cognizant of the fact that I am constantly surrounded by weapons. Coffee mugs,keychains, newspapers, all can be deadly in the hands of a master. Believe me I have the scars to prove it.

Another one of his favorites was firing arrows at me in the kwoon while doing kata. I was allowed to break only red feathered arrows but I was only allowed to catch the blue ones. I was not allowed to duck. Occasionally he would co-locate or Multi-locate. Stopping three arrows all at once is tough. there is also a portion of the kwoon that is called the Black Labyrinth. It has no light at all and is filled with mundane traps that constantly change, as well as other students,spiritual guardians,and the occasional mental illusion. Mind,body and spirit get tested in there.

Hired Guns:

Occasionally, a gang of guys will accost me on the street. They will say:

" We were paid by Morry Chang to teach you to control your temper." And then they'll try to beat the living shit out of me. Rocks,chains,knives ,martial arts weapons,pipes,antennas,2x4's and other implements of destruction. Morry sez that this is to teach me how to combat groups. When to run and how to focus on not hurting the other guy too much. I never kill these guys and they've never killed me. Guns have never come into it thankfully.

Really advanced exercises:

Some of the really advanced exercises aren't possible without some low level use of Magick and some high-level use of Do. There is a rock face that Morry is fond off. I have to free-climb it while doing calculus problems in my head, on another track in my head Morry is berating me for my laziness and my foolish western attitudes, also he's shooting at me from a distance. I'm lucky though, Morry's a pretty lousy shot.

The one that I hate the most is the Juggling exercise. First he'll toss me some balls,bean bags,or clubs. maybe a mix of all three. then there is a ball that I'm supposed to get up on. then he'll toss a ring which I'm supposed to catch on my free leg and spin. then he might start throwing in odd items into. the juggle. He's thrown a head of cabbage,a beef tongue,a squid(thankfully dead) a haddock, a steak(literally covered with pepper) a cleaver, a mixing bowl, and once even a bowling ball. I'm supposed to keep that up for as long as it takes him to empty a clip a me. I am allowed to duck but I'm not allowed to drop anything.

"Why are you doing this to me?"

"I do this to teach you how to concentrate and be alert."

"I concentrate fine, you old goat, you're just a fucking sadist."

" That too."(BLAM!BLAM!BLAM!)