The courtyard had been abandoned so thoroughly that even the idea of abandonment felt old.
Chen Mu found it by accident the first time, months ago, while delivering a stack of broken practice swords to storage. It lay beyond the outer ring of active training grounds, tucked between a collapsed equipment shed and a line of weathered stone walls that no one bothered to repair anymore. Weeds pushed up through cracks in the flagstones. One corner of the wall leaned inward, as if listening.
No lamps were lit there at night.
That was why he chose it.
He arrived after the second watch, when even the most diligent disciples had returned to their rooms and the sect settled into its familiar, careful sleep. The air was cool, carrying the faint scent of pine resin and old stone. Somewhere far off, a night insect clicked with patient insistence.
Chen Mu stood at the edge of the courtyard and listened.
Nothing.
He stepped inside.
The staff lay across his palms, heavier than he remembered from storage racks and casual handling. It was plain—unvarnished wood, straight but not perfectly so, worn smooth in places where hands had passed over it without ceremony. No inscriptions. No balance markings. No subtle reinforcement of qi like the swords he had trained with for years.
Just length. Weight. Presence.
"It's just a stick," Chen Mu muttered.
The staff did not object.
He set it upright and exhaled, rolling his shoulders as if preparing for sword forms. The habit asserted itself immediately—spine straightening, feet planting, breath settling into the deep, familiar rhythm of gathering and holding.
He stopped.
That was wrong.
He remembered the manuscript's irritating insistence.
Do not plant the foot.
Let it arrive, bear weight, and leave.
Chen Mu frowned and deliberately loosened his stance. The effect was immediate and unpleasant. His balance felt vague, unresolved, like standing on ground that might shift if asked to justify itself.
"This already feels inefficient," he said quietly.
He picked up the staff properly, hands spaced as the manuscript suggested—farther apart than sword grip, but not symmetrically. One hand closer to the end, the other nearer the center. The asymmetry bothered him.
He tried the first movement described in the text.
It did not go well.
The instruction had been vague to the point of insult:
"Let the staff fall forward.
Follow it."
Chen Mu attempted to "let" the staff fall, which in practice meant that he lost control of it almost immediately. The wood dipped forward faster than he expected, momentum pulling his arms ahead of his feet. He stumbled, catching himself at the last moment, the end of the staff thumping awkwardly against the stone.
The sound echoed.
He froze, heart jumping unnecessarily, then relaxed when no response came.
"Good start," he muttered.
He reset.
This time, he tried to guide the fall—subtly redirecting it, controlling the descent. The staff resisted in a way swords never did. A sword responded to intent immediately; the staff responded to mass.
It dipped anyway, dragging his grip with it.
Chen Mu adjusted too late, stepping forward sharply to keep from losing it entirely. His heel slipped on a patch of dust. He windmilled one arm instinctively—forgetting that the other was holding a long piece of wood—and clipped his own shoulder with the staff's midpoint.
Pain flared, sharp and immediate.
"—ah."
He hissed through his teeth and rubbed the spot, already feeling the bruise forming. Not serious. Just humiliating.
He stood there for a moment, breathing, irritation tightening behind his eyes.
No despair followed. No doubt about whether this was worth doing.
Just annoyance.
He tried again.
Over and over, he attempted the opening sequence as he understood it: allowing the staff to move first, stepping where it led, not where he wanted to go. Each attempt ended similarly—with awkward stumbles, clumsy corrections, and a growing collection of minor grievances lodged throughout his body.
The staff caught his ribs once when he misjudged the arc. Another time, it slid through his hands faster than expected, skin scraping painfully before he managed to clamp down.
His breathing suffered.
The manuscript's breathing instructions hovered at the edge of his awareness, unhelpful as ever.
Do not deepen the breath.
Change its weight.
Chen Mu tried to apply that while moving.
He failed.
When he focused on his breath, his footing collapsed. When he focused on his footing, his breath reverted to sword cultivation habits—controlled, gathered, held. The result was tension everywhere and coherence nowhere.
At one point, after nearly losing his grip again, he slammed the staff's end against the ground in frustration.
"Explain yourself," he said quietly, absurdly, to the empty courtyard.
The staff remained wooden.
He paced, staff resting across his shoulders, and tried to think—not about how to make the movements work, but about why they weren't.
The manuscript had never once instructed him to control the staff.
It spoke of following. Of arriving late. Of letting weight resolve itself.
Chen Mu stopped pacing.
"Fine," he said. "Late, then."
He returned to the starting position and loosened his grip deliberately. Not enough to drop the staff, but enough that he could feel its weight shift independently of his hands.
He inhaled—not deeply, not shallowly, just… without deciding how.
Then he let the staff fall forward again.
This time, he did not try to guide it.
He stepped because he had to.
The difference was subtle, but undeniable.
The staff dipped, and instead of dragging him forward into imbalance, it pulled him into motion. His foot landed without thought. His weight transferred without instruction. The movement was still ugly, still imprecise, but—
It did not fight him.
Encouraged despite himself, Chen Mu continued.
The next sequence involved a turning motion, the staff arcing across the body while the practitioner shifted weight from front foot to back.
He tried to do it "correctly."
It failed immediately.
His shoulders tightened. His grip locked. The staff slowed, momentum dying mid-arc, leaving him twisted awkwardly, balance broken. He recovered with an irritated exhale and reset.
Again.
Same result.
Again.
Worse.
He stopped, breathing hard now—not from exertion, but from accumulated irritation.
"Every sword manual would have told me where my feet should be," he said. "What angle my wrists should be at. What this is for."
The courtyard offered no answer.
He tried once more, but this time, he did not aim for precision.
He let the staff begin the arc and simply allowed his body to turn with it. Not sharply. Not decisively. Just… following.
The movement was sloppy.
But it completed.
Chen Mu blinked.
He tried again.
Still sloppy. Still inelegant.
But smoother.
The staff's weight carried through the arc instead of stalling halfway. His feet adjusted without conscious correction. His breath hitched less.
He felt ridiculous.
He also felt—annoyingly—slightly less wrong.
Minutes passed like this. Then more.
The courtyard remained silent save for the soft scrape of wood against stone and Chen Mu's uneven breathing. Sweat gathered at his collar. His palms stung where the staff rubbed.
He made mistakes constantly.
He stepped too late. Too early. He overcommitted and nearly fell backward once, catching himself only by jamming the staff into the ground and wrenching his wrist painfully in the process.
He swore under his breath, shaking out his hand.
The staff was not punishing him.
It was indifferent.
That, he realized, was part of the frustration. A sword rewarded correct intent with immediate feedback—clean lines, sharp responses, a sense of alignment. The staff offered no such affirmation. It simply continued being a length of wood moving through space.
If he forced it, it resisted.
If he hesitated, it outran him.
Only when he allowed its momentum to exist—neither restraining nor abandoning it—did the movement begin to cohere.
The realization came slowly, grudgingly, like a concession he did not want to make.
Chen Mu paused, leaning on the staff, chest rising and falling.
His body ached in small, unimportant ways. A bruise throbbed on his shoulder. His wrist felt tender. There was a faint scrape along his forearm where the wood had bitten skin.
Nothing serious.
Nothing worth reporting.
He straightened and took his stance again—loose, unresolved, unsatisfying.
He let the staff move.
He followed.
The motion was still crude, but it no longer collapsed.
Chen Mu exhaled, irritation intact but redirected now, sharpened into something usable.
"Fine," he said quietly to the night. "I won't force it."
The staff dipped forward, and this time, he went with it—not ahead, not behind, but alongside, discovering that for the first time that night, the movement did not fight him quite so hard.