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She wondered when he had the time to hunt for rabbit because the rabbit on the plate was fresh. Alexandra enjoyed the roasted rabbit, wild onions and the variant of wild mushrooms that was on the plate. Wiping the meat juices from her mouth with the back of her hand, she spoke while continuing to chew her food,
“Do you know anymore stuff about the Dochani?”
Jentus looked up as he shoved another piece of the rabbit into his mouth,
“The best people to ask about your origins are your parents. All that I know about them has been told to you. Orlghar the high elder of our tribe knows the most, but I don’t know if he will give you an audience. He might make an exception after I explain to him that you are a true Dochani.”
Alexandra still did not understand how she was a Dochani, other than what was passed from her ancestors from her mother’s line. She did not know who her father was. The information that Jentus had told her already about the Dochani was overwhelming. It was hard to picture living over a thousand years and worse yet that she came from an egg, although she knew that was true already.
Knowing something did not make it any easier to grasp or understand. She wondered how long her egg lay dormant before her friend’s parents’ parents’ had come across it and if there were other eggs that were her siblings. These things would take time to get used to. After finishing what was on her plate she handed it to Jentus and he asked her if she wanted more. She was still hungry so she accepted the second plate of food.
Surprised at her hunger and appetite she finished her fourth helping and decided to have no more, even though she was still hungry. Both of them talked for a bit while they waited for the food to settle in their stomachs. Fifteen minutes went by, and Jentus was the first to get up,
“We must continue with your training. The day is not over yet and there is still a lot of time left to train. You must be patient with me because now that I know that you are Dochani the training will get more difficult.
“Of course that includes the enchanted forest that is a must for your survival. After these next six months are over you will have to keep up your training on your own. Doing this should improve your skills. You must also explore your Dochani abilities as well.
“I should probably not say that time is of the essence since you have the ability to live so long but anyone or anything can shorten that life span, so it has been said. Now let’s get to your strength training, then running in the enchanted forest, your basic combat and your meditation.”
Jentus looked very serious when he was talking to her and Alexandra knew that he would be like a drill sergeant for the rest of her hunter training.
*
Jentus explained to her about sets and reps. Sets, as he explained it, are the amount of times a unit of repetitions of an exercise is repeated. His example was if she did six push-ups, rested then did six more push-ups she would have done two sets of six reps. He told her this so that she would understand when he told her to do a certain amount of sets and reps.
He made her do ten sets of six reps in push-ups, ten sets of eight reps in crunches, ten sets of five reps in leg raises and made her climb up and down the tree twenty times. She was tired, but knew that he was not finished with her. Alexandra expected him to send her into the enchanted forest, but he moved her into the basic combat instead.
It was the longest hour that she had ever endured in her life or at least it seemed to be. Jentus sent many punches and kicks at her that would have stopped any normal person. To her there was no difference between her and anyone else on Sevle. Near the end of the hour she began to wonder if Jentus ever took a breath while he fought.
He had the courage and strength of a lion and the speed of some wild cat that her friends always had warned her about. She felt tired, but knew that Jentus would no longer let her use it as an excuse and besides even if her bruises were temporary they still hurt something fierce. When she figured out that they were done basic combat training, Jentus told her that he would be teaching her basic strikes.
Meaning that he would teach her how to punch, use her elbow, use her knee and some basic kicks. The morning exercises paled in comparison to what she had to go through this afternoon. At least she would have a good night’s sleep. Jentus began his instruction,
“You make a fist in the same manner as when you are blocking. When punching, you do not frantically flail your arms about. In striking your opponent everything you do must be planned out carefully.
“I will train you to plan your strikes spontaneously. This is so that your opponent will be set off balance. It makes a difference in your stance, but that will be covered after three months when you are used to the basics of combat.
“Now let’s start the basic punches. For now we will focus on the straight punch, the right cross, the left cross and the uppercut. The straight punch is the easiest to learn, so we will start with that.
“For the straight punch you will have to extend your arm forward in a straight line putting weight on your front leg. This will allow for more power to be transferred to your punch, just leaning on your back leg will reduce the power of your opponent’s strike.
“It is not good to hit with the whole fist because of the nature of the punch. You do this with other punches, but with this one you hit with only the first two knuckles. These two knuckles will cause more damage than the usual four because you have the same power focused onto a smaller area. The straight punch is usually thrown as a jab to throw off your opponent.
“Some others believe a jab is to be thrown into the air about the face. This is wrong, and a clumsy way of fighting. From my experience every punch should count, including your jab.
“In a fight everything counts and that jab that makes contact with your opponent instead of hanging out in the wind for him to grab a hold of could off balance him. Now, try to hit me with a straight punch. Remember to maintain your blocking.”
At first the straight punch felt very awkward to Alexandra. It was definitely different than blocking. Every once in a while Jentus would correct the positioning of her legs and the execution of her straight punch. She lost count after she passed the several dozen punches mark for each closed fist and even more blocks.
Jentus continued to hit her very hard and in turn she tried to hit him as hard as she could, but the harder she tried the worse she became. He kept telling her that she should not force the punches, but let them flow and they would come. An hour of straight punches being exchanged back and forth from Alexandra and Jentus started the lesson on punching. Jentus called a halt and continued with his instructions,
“Now, for the right cross and the left cross. The right cross is executed with the right hand hitting the left side of your opponent’s body or head and the left cross is executed with the left hand hitting the right side of your opponent’s body or head. It is a powerful punch that is usually used against your opponent’s ribs or jaw.
“It adds to the effectiveness of the straight punch, as it allows adequate time for it to be executed providing the cross is landed with the utmost accuracy. To perform this punch the arm is slightly bent at the elbow and the power of the upper body is transferred to the fist as it hits your opponent.
“Transferring the power of the upper body to the fist is not an easy task and takes unending patience to learn. I have not quite mastered it yet. Power is transferred to the fist by twisting the upper body back and then forward to deliver a powerful punch.
“Done properly even the smallest and weakest fighter can fell the biggest and strongest of fighters. Now, let’s try out the right and left cross. Remember to continue to throw your straight punches and block my punches. A lot of times blocking can decide the fate of the battle.”
Alexandra tried to transfer power to her crosses, but always took too long and got hit far more times than she wanted to. She attempted to throw a right cross without transferring the upper body’s power to it and it just glanced off of Jentus’ jaw with no apparent effect. Considering the way she struck Jentus and the fact that he was taking more time than usual to respond to her attack, Alexandra threw a left cross followed by a straight punch.
Catching him on the jaw with the cross and on the tip of his nose with the straight punch, Jentus went crashing to the ground. Afraid of what she had done to him she stood still where she was. After a few minutes he shook the dizziness out of his head and slowly stood up. Alexandra was relieved that he was okay. Moments later he spoke while rubbing his chin,
“Obviously you are better at the cross then I ever was, a fact that my jaw knows all too well. You will do well as a hunter and your size is sure to give many a false sense of confidence. The uppercut is more devastating than even the cross, but harder to execute and that is why I have saved it for the last in these basic punches.
“For an uppercut the elbow is bent at a ninety-degree angle. The fist is shot up towards the sky to hit your opponent below the chin or into their solar plexus. It is a very devastating punch if thrown properly. Now, let’s see you try it. Remember to block, use the straight punch or cross once in a while.”
Alexandra found that she got hit more often than when she had tried to execute the cross. The uppercut was giving her trouble, so she focused more on the straight punch, blocked and kept waiting for openings in Jentus’ defense. He made it a point to block all of her crosses. They were indeed blocked, but Alexandra could see the tension in his arms that he was having a hard time blocking her crosses. Many punches were exchanged from both Alexandra and Jentus, many were blocked and some got through.
She found that an uppercut well placed in timing and positioning was very hard to block. One such punch managed to get below her guard and plunged itself into her solar plexus leaving her almost breathless as it lifted her, momentarily, into the air. This was followed by another uppercut into her face while she was still bent over and recovering.
It too, lifted her from the ground. Dazed and in some pain, Jentus followed up with a right cross then a left cross sending her spinning to the left. Putting her back leg back to slow her descent to the ground and attempting to block as Jentus kept sending wave after wave of punches. He varied each punch so that she could not figure out a pattern, but she did. Hours went by and Alexandra knew that they would only have the sun for a few more hours.