Life Giver

Casmir returned home after his meeting with Master Bluefire, he stored his refining books and items in his room for the moment. He intended to study them for a few hours every day in between practicing the Life Body Cycle.

However at the moment Casmir had something to do.

On his way back, Casmir noticed Ling was training just outside of his homes back garden. There was a patch of forest there that lead towards Ellaris park, however Casmir noticed Ling punching and kicking the tree's here.

As someone relatively new to cultivation and training Casmir thought that there was perhaps an advantage to training here that he had not realised.

When he arrived he noticed Ling was still attacking the nearby tree's and occasionally breaking some of smaller ones.

"Hey, Ling!" he called out prompting Ling to turn his attention to Casmir.

Ling had built up a sweat as he trained but he was still very energetic, he smiled as he saw Casmir calling out to him.

"Hey Casmir, what are you doing out here?" Ling replied.

Casmir walked up to Ling explaining "I was actually wondering what you were doing, Why are you practicing out here rather than in the training hall?"

Hearing Casmir Ling understood what Casmir wanted to know.

"Ah, right. Well the training hall is great and everything but it's too pristine of an environment. When I get into the City guard properly I'll be trekking through forest's and grasslands, the terrain is very different. If I suddenly trip up on a rock because I'm used to training on a nice flat surface, I could get hurt."

Casmir nodded in understanding.

"Ohh, so training out here is better."

Ling smiled as he explained further, "There also another reason, you see these tree's here?"

He said as he tapped on a nearby tree, the tree's bark was white and it's surface was full of indentation made by Ling's strikes, some clearly older and less powerful.

It was also a very thick tree, nearly a meter in diametre yet it appeared to be shorter and less sturdy than other type's of trees.

"This is a white Popper Tree, they're really useful for training against. They all grow to a nearly identical size and density so you can easily test your strength against them by judging how deep each of your strikes reach."

Ling stepped back as he prepared to punch the tree.

"And they're really satisfying to punch." Ling said as he punched the tree.

Ling was already a Grade 2 advancement 2 cultivator however he didn't priorities cultivation because he wasn't very talented at it, he was already 26. Most cultivator's would be attempting to break in Grade 3 at his age.

Ling priorities training his body and advancing his fighting skills so that he could become a Grade 2 Warrior.

Due to his focus on his body, Ling had a very strong body. When he struck the tree his fist pierce half way through the tree, all the way to it's core, of course if this was a sturdier tree Ling wouldn't have been able to achieve such a feet.

"See? The wood of these tree's is really soft, you can train against them for a long time without hurting your hands or feet. Although they might still be a bit tough for you."

Casmir was impressed by Ling's punch.

"Wow, but won't the tree break down now?" Casmir asked.

"Nah, these tree's are really sturdy, even with four or five fist sized holes in it it'll stay up. They also grow back fairly quickly, see that tree over there?" Ling said as he pointed to another white Popper tree.

Casmir looked over to where Ling pointed, he saw a tree with many indentations and a few noticeable holes in it however a thick sap had covered the holes and deep indents.

"Once that sap fills in the hole completely, it starts to rebuild the damaged wood" Ling explained.

Casmir nodded before asking, "Can I have a go?"

Ling shrugged saying "Sure but don't think you're going to break it like papper, it's still thick wood afterall."

Casmir found a nearby undamaged tree and punch out at full force.

To Ling's surprise, Casmir's punch managed to create a few centimetre indentation. For a human with minimal body training this was very impressive.

Human's were one of the weaker species in terms of natural body strenght, at least among the beast path's. Race's that follow different systems developed their bodies in different ways, Elemental's for example were naturally incredibly weak however their bodies grew greatly with their cultivation.

"Wow, nice punch Casmir. You hit pretty hard for a human, did you feel how soft the tree was? Actually try hitting a different tree first, you probably don't even realise the difference." Ling said.

Casmir meanwhile was looking at the white Popper Tree in surprise, he had used the wooden dummy in the training hall and understand how hard wood normally was, the white Popper Tree really did feel soft in comparison.

"No that's okay, I use the wooden dummy in the training hall, this tree really does feel soft." Casmir replied.

Ling nodded and offered Casmir some spare gloves he had as he spoke.

"You should train using these tree's, you'll damage your hands and legs if you use practise targets that are too hard. These gloves with help too, to protect your skin for cuts."

"Thanks Ling. Can you teach me some more? At the moment all I've been doing is practicing the basic Qi flow exercises and doing some basic training." Casmir asked.

Ling eyes gleamed as he heard Casmir, "Yes! Haha, this'll be fun. You have no idea how boring it is out here sometimes, I'll be glad to have someone to talk to."

Ling walked over to Casmir wrapping his arm around Casmir's shoulder as he began to explain his training...

=======

While Casmir was training with Ling, Elena and Rose were talking about him behind his back.

They didn't speak poorly of him, they simple amused themselves by laughing about some of Casmir's habit's. They had spoken a few times about Casmir over the past few days, firstly as Elena's attempt to get to know Rose but later because they both enjoyed the company.

Rose was after all from a brothel, the women their tended to stick together for security and mental wellbeing, so Rose was very talkative by nature.

To Elena's surprise however, their conversations often drifted towards matters of the bedroom, Elena was quite shy about such things but everything Rose told her was new to her, curiously Elena seemed to open up about it rather quickly.

As they spoke today, suddenly Rose asked a rather s.e.n.s.i.t.i.v.e question.

"So... What's Casmir like with you? If know what I mean.." Rose said as they talked about Casmir.

Elena and Rose were both sitting in the same chair at this moment, Elena's face heated up a little as she heard Rose's question.

Rose slyly smiled as she saw this, saying "When I was with him, he was very aggressive you know..."

Rose leaned in whispering the later half of the sentence into Elena's ear.

Elena's eyes opened wide from shock as she exclaimed "He did that?!"

Rose laughed as she watched Elena's reaction "Hahaha.. you are so similar to him.. You're both so easy to tease."

"Of course he wouldn't do that, however if you want to do that with him. I can give you some tips.." Rose said as she teased Elena further.

Elena subconsciously smiled a little before turning away in protest to Rose's teasing.

"Hehe.. come on, I'm just joking." Rose said as she smiled.

The pair spoke like this as if they were in a loop, Rose would tease Elena hoping to open her up and Elena would over time react in a less constrained manner.

It wasn't long before Rose explained her plans for the evening, these plans caused Elena to feel slightly cold even though she was involved in their making.

"So, as you know, I'm going to invite Casmir to dinner later. What happens afterwards is what happens naturally, are you sure you're still okay with this?" Rose asked tactfully.

Although the pair had discussed their relationsh.i.p.s with Casmir, Elena was still understandably uncomfortable with the situation.

Elena simply nodded in responce, seeing that Rose frowned a little.

Most of the women she had met were much more open to these kinds of relationsh.i.p.s in which a man or a woman was shared by multiple people, Elena however was a much less experienced woman.

Feeling Elena's mood shift, Rose leaned over and playfully hugged her acting as if she wanted to fall asleep using Elena as a pillow.

"I'm tired.. be my pillow..." she said sleepily

Elena only responded meekly with a small smile, seeing her do so Rose thought of something else to distract and please Elena with.

"You know.. Casmir told about your weak points." Rose said in a seductive and suggestive voice.

Elena didn't believe Casmir would tell Rose about those kinds of weak points, Elena felt that something was off with what Rose had said.

Suddenly Rose wiggle her hands under Elena's armpits and began to attack Elena.

"Ahhh.. no.. no... that's not fair." Elena cried out, she now understood what Rose meant by weak points.

"Hahaha... it's too late Elena.. I'm not going to let you sulk about today while I have some fun. You need to tell me you're happy..." Rose said as she continued to attack Elena forcing her to giggle and cry out.

Elena knew what Rose was talking about and for a moment she still felt she should maintain her current attitude towards the situation.

However that all collapsed under Rose's attacks, Elena wasn't the type to mop about in sadness, she always tried to be smile and be positive about things.

"Ah.. fine.. stop it for a second.. ah ah.. okay.. " Elena cried out, causing Rose to pause for a second.

Rose didn't move her hands but asked "So you promise you wont mop about? Casmir loves you, not me, I just got lucky remember."

Elena nodded "Okay.. but I don't want any weird stuff about what you two do.."

Rose smiled happily, she knew that Elena wasn't completely accepting of Casmir and her self's relationship but talking about it was the first step towards accepting it.

"Good, now be a good girl and let me have a rest." Rose said as she rested on Elena.

At this point Rose was practically laying on top of the poor Elena, Elena didn't mind that much because Rose had deliberately acted like this whenever they were together, Rose felt that this was the best way to get Elena to open up to her.

Unfortunately for the pair, just at this moment Casmir entered the room.

As he saw the pair in laying down on a sofa together, he couldn't help but question them in an odd tone...