Limits

I looked at Shelly and it was still asleep. I thought 'That's odd. Shelly would be up by now and hungry but it didn't wake up since yesterday'. With those thought in my mind, I walked over to where Shelly was sleeping and called out "Shelly, wake up" but I hear no response. 'This is not normal, Shelley would usually wake up when I called its name. Something must have happened' I thought.

I then patted Shellys head and called out again "Shelly, are you alright?". Again, I saw no response. This got me worried, 'Why isn't Shelly waking up?' I thought and proceeded to examine it in more details. I checked the temperature and it seemed to be the usual temperature that Shelly had. I lifted Shelly's eye lids and noticed that both eyes are in the state of rest but no abnormality there either.

I picked Shelly up and noticed that it weighs about twice as much as it used to. Although it got only a bit bigger, its weight doubled since I picked it up last time at the river. I didn't know what to think of it and went to find Nick, 'Maybe Nick will have a clue as to what is happening to Shelly' I thought.

At Nick's house, I noticed that Nick is as usual sitting in his chair, resting. I said "Nick, I think something is happening to Shelly. Can you check it for me as you have much more experience than I do in the Art of Medicine". Nick opened his eyes and said "I already saw the state your turtle was in. You don't have to worry about its health, rather did you give it something lately?"

I was confused at first by Nick's response but then I remembered that indeed, I gave something to Shelly. I said to Nick "Now that I think about it, yes. When I created the two vials of Vital Liquid and you left, Shelly came over begging for it. I gave both vials to Shelly and it drank both then happily returned to sleep. I don't think that the medicine could harm Shelly though".

To my answer, Nick responded "It didn't harm it. Vital Liquid that you gave to your turtle will actually help it develop better. Turtles by nature are steady and live their lives as if in slow motion. Due to that, turtles can live longer. It's not that they can't move faster than usually, it's just they prefer not to. As for your turtle, the medicine you gave it works a bit differently on it. Instead of healing your turtle which I assume had no injuries, it helps it develop further".

I was stunned by this and asked "Then what is Shelly going to develop?" to which Nick smiled and said "It depends on the turtle. For example, Vital Liquid may be converted to a longer life for the turtle. It wouldn't gain many years but a bit of time here and there and that is how those turtles are able to live twice if not three times as long as humans. It all depends on your turtle's nature, character and what it requires the most".

Nick then continued "Don't worry about your turtle and focus on your training, it will wake up in a day or two. It may even take a week. As I said, it depends on the turtle and what it is trying to improve". I heaved a sigh of relief and said to Nick "Then, if I give it more medicine, will it improve constantly?" to which Nick said "No. It would be the same for you as well. If you abuse the medicine then the effect it would have on you later would be reduced or even non existent. That is why it is important not to abuse medicine and take it moderately". I nodded my head and left Nick's house.

Back at my house, I noticed that Shelly was still asleep. I decided to leave it alone and focus on my training. Nick already said that I didn't have to worry and Shelly would wake up eventually. I practised with the puppets as usual. Due to my diligence, I was now able to control 2 puppets, each with one hand.

To control 3 puppets at once was a breakthrough point as I would have to use a combination of fingers in either one of my hands or both of my hands at the same time to control the 3rd puppet independently. It was also much harder to control the two puppets separately because each puppet had to do different movements and with that came different control patterns.

I had to learn how to divide my mind and focus on how to operate two things at the same time while doing different actions. Nick told me an exercise for that as well. He said to draw a circle with one hand and a square with the other at the same time. It may seem simple but doing it for longer than a minute requires a lot of concentration. I practised with that everyday and also changed shapes in order not to learn one repetitive process but to learn how to divide my attention and essentially mind.

This way I learned to use my both hands as if two different people used them. One puppet could make attacking movements while the other puppet could make defending movements. It didn't limit me to such combinations only, both could attack and defend as well and in different ways at that. Of course that was only an exercise to learn how to control the situation, I had to maneuver the puppets in such way that they could attack and defend at the same time.

Nick told me that experts in fighting can imagine a strong opponent standing in front of them and fight as if they were fighting for real. Nick said this skill was called Shade Enemy and people needed very high attainments in skill and mind to develop this skill. He even said that there is supposedly even a higher skill to that, a next step so called.

But Nick also mentioned that it was a legend and no one ever saw people with this skill. After a few hours of training with puppets and improving my concentration as well as dividing my mind, I started to train a bit in the Art of Stealth. I tried to use the shadow just like Nick to stay less visible and move only between the shadows.

To some extend, I could hide my presence just like Nick does but I couldn't disappear into thin air even in shadows the same way that Nick does. I didn't discourage myself because Nick had many years to develop his skills, while I trained less than a year under Nick. I trained well into the late afternoon after all that training, I decided to make one more batch of Cloud Haze Poison. I needed to create couple of vials.

My initial plan was to make 3 of them but because I was doing the poison myself and the effects may be a bit weaker, I wanted to make as many as I could. I still had to make some antidote which I had ingredients for but instead I was focused on the poison itself, besides Nick already gave me the antidote.

I knew Nick told me to wait because I can't get the proper weight of stuff by hand without tools. He said he will give them to me on the next occasion but he didn't yet and I wanted to try nevertheless. I still had four more batches to make and therefore doing one more and trying one more time will not make my plans invalid, even if I fail this one. With the pot ready including all the ingredients as well as other tools, I started to make the Cloud Haze Poison.