[Winter; Martial Arts] of Unwittered Staff, Silent Punch, and Bewildered Sword
Title: of Unwittered Staff, Silent Punch, and Bewildered Sword
Author: secretlyexol
Rating: R
Fandom: EXO
Pairing(s)/Focus: Tao/Sehun, Tao/Kris,
Length: 4,300
Summary: What Zitao got is his perseverance.
Warnings: n/a
Notes: I’m really challenging myself through this fic. This is not the kind of fic I usually make but, yeah, here I am, writing something about sport. I guess, this can’t really be called as a sport fic, but at least I’ve tried my best. I can only hope you guys can enjoy this fic. (Actually I don’t know what I write either so, yeah,.. LOL). Thank you for the mod who has been waiting for me and be patience with me when I’m late. I don’t know what I’m going to do with you. I love you. Well, now let’s enjoy the music! ;)
Winter is coming and World Wushu Championship 2015 is right around the corner.
All of the people who takes wushu seriously have been waiting for this big competition and Zitao is no exception.
Zitao is counted as a newcomer considering he is just debuted as a profesional wushu practitioner in the beginning of 2014.
In the same year, Zitao has to withdraw in any competition for the rest of 2014 due to an injury caused by over-exerting himself in a practice session. So this competition becomes his first world class wushu championship he has ever entered.
He has been very anxious about this world championship thing, but Luhan and Yixing, his senior from the same dojo, has also been there to calm him just so he didn’t repeat the same mistakes like he did last year.
Zitao is the descendant of Huang Li Yi. A legendary wushu practicioner.
Needless to say, his family, too, is full of wushu profesional atlet and practicioner.
His father really put some burden in his shoes. That was one of the reason why he over-exerted himself last year. And it’s kinda the same this year. But he really needs to say thanks to Yixing and Luhan for always been there and remind him to take a break and get some rest.
Zitao exhales and slings his bag to his shoulder. He is ready to go to the national gym where his master will announce the atlet that’s going to represent China in World Wushu Championship this year.
*****
“This year is going to be a little bit difficult for us. But I believe, the names I mention in the next minutes will be able to bring the best out of him and brings gold medal for the emperor.” Mr. Li, Zitao’s coach (or some of the students still call him master, including Zitao) gives some encouragement to his students before he mentions the names.
There is none of them dare to speak. Or, maybe they simply can’t. Too nervous to even talk. That’s how hard they trained to gain this posisition in national team, and how bad they want it.
Even Zitao closes his eyes and squeezes Yixing’s hand tightly. Yixing looks at his junior and smiles knowingly.
“For Sanda class, Zhang Yixing.” He announces first.
“Yes!” Yixing throws a punch in the air with his free hand and bows to his master. “Thank you master.”
Mr. Li nods a little as an acknowledgement and continues, “Next, Taolu Jianshu and Qiangshu event, Xi Luhan.”
“Yeah!!!” Luhan yells.
And Mr Li continues mentioning the name for each category until,
“And last, Taolu Changquan in barehanded category, daoshu and gunshu in weaponery Taolu event, .....”
This is his specialty. He really want Mr.Li to picks him up.
“...will be presented by.........”
Zitao gulps.
“...Huang Zitao.” Mr. Li announced it calmly. “And lastly, Zitao, Yixing, and Luhan will be in the fighting round.
At first Zitao can’t believe what his ears hear. But as he stands here in the strategic meeting room, he has no choice but to believe, right? He’s in. He’s in the team for a world class competition.
Zitao is not the one that are happy with being chosen. All of the chosen athletes too, express their feeling and causing a commotion in the strategic meeting room.
“Okay guys! Listen up!” Mr. Li comes with so many papers in one of his hand.
And suddenly, all the commotion in that room goes down.
Mr. Li and his charisma really is something, Zitao thinks.
“Like I said before, the tension will be pretty high this year. The reason is......”
He shifts a little, spreads the paper sheets he brought which apparently contain some of his important data, on the desk in front of him, and projects a presentation to the wall in front of them.
“These three countries, are going to be our biggest competitor this year.”
He pauses a while and then continues,
“Do you ever curious why it is so rare for other country to win a wushu championship? One of the main reason is because wushu is more like a country/local sport. So many practicioner believes, and even proves, that foreign people won’t be as good as us. That is, what we hold all of these past years and still continue to believe so.” He explaines.
“But apparently, the other country especially these three countries I show you, which is Canada, Japan, and Korea, start to grasp this idea as well. And so, they were trying hard to beat us, with our own strong point which also our won weak point. Our people.”
All of the chosen athletes in that room stay silent.
“Therefore, I’m gonna show you, the people you should pay attention to in this competition.” Mister Li clicks on his presentation so the slide changes.
“This is Wu Kris. He is half chinese half canadian. He grew up in Canada but his father chinese blood on him were awaken when he was just a teenager and now he is one of wushu athletes we need to be cautious with.”
Zitao looks at the presentation slides. Eyeing the canadian boy on the screen.
“Phew, he’s pretty handsome. I might want to pay attention to him in my bed.” Luhan cooes. And the other laughs at him.
“Well, I hope that’s after you kick his ass in the competition, Luhan.” Mister Li interupts Luhan’s jokes.
“Sorry master.” Luhan cringes but not feel sorry enough. He really thinks the guy is pretty handsome. Maybe he will try to flirt with the guy later.
“Next,” Mister Li clicks to the next slide. “This is Park Chanyeol. His father is a Korean, but his mother is a famous chinese female wushu athletes 10 years back.”
“All of Canadian athletes is good but pay more attention to these two.”
All the athletes nods to show that they’re understand enough.
“Next is Korean. This is Do Kyungsoo and Byun Baekhyun. Both of them are Korean by birth but Baekhyun mother is chinese and were a femali taiji practicioner back in 90s, while Kyungsoo’s mother used to be my best student. There is this rookies named Oh Sehoon among them. But I guess we can worry less about him.”
Someone whistles from around the back area because, hell yeah, this years foreign athletes has too much connection with China.
Zitao looks at Yixing who’s grinning like a mad man.
That’s how Yixing is. He always get overly excited over the possibility that they are going to face a really strong opponent, while Luhan is still busy googling on his phone to search more news about Wu Kris.
Zitao rolls his eyes. Both of his senior has their own perks, but they are a great wushu athletes so Zitao can really say nothing about their weird act sometimes.
What Zitao want to do is focus. Because it’s 3 weeks away from World Wushu Championship and he still feels that there is not enough time for him to reach perfection. Well, maybe this is him being a little bit perfectionist than ever, but that’s not his fault. He really wants to get his hands on that gold medal, so he has no other choice but to train harder than everyone else.
“Master....” one of the athlete raises his hand. “What about Japan?”
“Ahh! You’re right. From Japan, there is Kim brothers. They came from the same family. The father of Kim brothers is a korean who got married with a Japanese woman. At one first look you won’t understand why they were on the list. But the unique thing about them is, two of Kim brothers, namely Chen and Min, are originally Chinese. They were adopted. So, you know why we should be careful to them right.”
All of the athletes nods silently. And after delivering more briefs material, Mister Li tells his student to takea break for today and tomorrow because the day after tomorrow, they are going to have intensive training for 2 weeks until a week before the tournament.
*****
The tournament is here.
Zitao is so nervous because he is going to do a speech for the opening as the athletes representatives. Luhan and Yixing cheers him up and after he passes it, he felt all the blood pressure that rushes through his vein going back to relax again.
But he can only being relaxed for a second, because as the tournament begin, he is the first one in this Taolu round to perform.
And Zitao is walking to the mat with all of his courage.
*****
If there is a word that could describe the perfection of a figure that goes around dancing graciously and swings taolu staff beautifully in front of Wu Kris’s eyes, he really wants to scream the word right now. Unfortunately, there is no words could describe how mesmerizing this person is in Kris’s eyes.
“Hey, hey, Yeollie, who’s that?” Wu Kris nudges his teammate without breaking off his gaze from his new found angel.
“Huh, who?” Park Chanyeol raises his head and looks at the guy Kris meant, who’s currently dancing on Taolu number. “Ahh, him.”
“Yes, him! Do you know him? Who is he? Who is he, Yeollie! Tell me! Hurry, hurry!” Kris shakes Chanyeol’s body back and forth.
So before Kris can bombard him with more question, Chanyeol raises his hand to gesture Kris to stop talking.
“Are you stupid? His name is Huang Zitao, and he was one of the China representative that was giving a speech in the opening ceremony. Where were you, by the way?” says Chanyeol.
And Kris scratches his head.
“Sleeping?” Kris answers playfully. “I was bored then I went back to our team’s tent and took a small nap.”
“Well, then you missed how smooth he was talking in the podium with a high pitched voice that was pretty adorable now that I remember.” And Chanyeol laughs at the memory, leaving Kris feeling unsatisfied because, ‘Damn! He really wants to see the angel talks in the podium.’
“Too bad buddy, too bad.” Says Chanyeol purposely. And he ended up cringes because Kris kicked him lightly in his shin.
“I need to get him, Yeol. Im gonna get him.” Kris whispers.
“Hah! You wish buddy.” Chanyeol scoffs and Kris, once again, hit him in the head.
*****
In around the same time...
“Oyy, Sehun-ah! Can you stop drooling over a guy from the enemy side?” Do Kyungsoo smirks at his junior who’s looking at Huang Zitao with a sparks while the latter was on Taolu number.
“Ahh, hyung. Don’t say it like that. You make it sounds bad.” Sehun laughs at his senior but then his head automatically look at the male that currently is dancing on the matt.
In Sehun’s eyes, Zitao is perfection. His black hair, his tanned skin, his sharp jaw and his unique nose feature are all perfect. He can’t describe the feeling he felt on his chest when he looked at how flawless Zitao swing the staff around and slam his slender body to the ground and up again, fly in the air for a second as he turn his body in a backflip then proceed to round-off and finishes it with a butterfly kick somersault. He’s so amazed he wants to kidnap the guy and put it inside a glass house so he can look at Zitao perfection forever. Sehun smiles all the time and being all happy as he watch the chinese boy on the matt. But then, comes Baekhyun.
“I saw your gaze, baby boy. Don’t you dare!! He’s an enemy!” Baekhyun barks. Eyes sharply judging on every move Sehun makes.
“Baek-hyung. You’re finally here!!” Kyungsoo walks toward Baekhyun and then rest his butt next to Baekhyun. “Told you, Sehun-ah. He’s an enemy so don’t you dare.”
Sehun looks at both of his seniors weirdly and sighs at their words about ‘enemy’. What’s wrong with liking someone? He thought with a short face.
*****
“Lulu, jiayo!! Jiayou, Lulu! We love youuuu!!” Zitao who just finished his taolu round, comes back to bench and cheering on his senior. He excitedly screams without realizing that he is too loud.
Luhan, who is just about to go to the mat, turns his body around and hushes Zitao down.
“Shhh!! Tao-zi, you’re too loud for godsake. Don’t embarrased me!” he says blushing to their team youngest. And Zitao can only giggle cutely as an apology. He makes Luhan rolls his eyes then he proceed to the mat.
*****
Meanwhile around in the same time in Canadian and Korean benches,
“Lulu, jiayo!! Jiayou, Lulu! I love youuuu!!” Zitao screams his lung from his bench to his senior.
Kris looks at Zitao, crazily smiling and lost in his own thinking of how cute Zitao is when he is giggling apologeticly like that. He imagines if he is in a relationship with Zitao and the younger makes mistakes in his Taolu moves, would the younger giggles cutely like that?
“Ahhh...” Kris sighs dreamily against the counter infront of the bench.
While Sehun is blushing, feeling the embarassement coming into him as he looks at how Zitao shamefully cheering so loud in a Taolu round. No one is screaming in a taolu round, ever. But Zitao does. And it’s embarrasing to look at. But at the same time he looks adorably super cute too, so Sehun can’t really say anything. He just confused and embarrased with himself. How can he has a crush in a kid-like boy like Zitao? He feels trouble. But he’s smiling. Because Zitao must be a great kind of trouble.
*****
In this performance, Luhan will perform in Jianshu and Qianshu number and he was using spears and sword.
Luhan has been competing in profesional championship for around 3 years together with Yixing. He already got the moves, and the tricks, and he has talent. Moreover, he is a silent hardworker. While Yixing practice alone in the middle of the night in their dojo, Luhan will practice in the woods behind the dojo. So he’s pretty confident with himself.
He himself is also very beautiful. And his body lean feature helps him a lot in making the judges gasp in awe as he turning around, running and jumping with his sword and spear gracefully. No wonder everybody in this room can’t take their eyes off of the beautiful male.
That is, including Kim Xiumin, from Japanese team.
“Oi, Jun. Ano otoko, dare?” He asks curiously to his brother.
“Ahh, the man on the mat? His name is Luhan. He’s from the Chinese Team. Why, nii-chan? Are you interested in him? Hahaha.” Kim Jun, asks his oldest brother back with a tease.
“What? No.” Min answered, a little bit flustered. “I’m just curious because he looks like a girl.”
Jun scoffs. “Yeah right.” He laughs at his brother.
*****
After that, the Taolu round is over and all the athletes are welcomed to take a quick break before the fighting round is started.
Kris looks this at the opportunity to make a moves at Zitao. But apparently, Kris is not the only one who thinks so.
And when he approaches Zitao, this Korean guy named Sehun is already there, courting Kris’s angel first.
“Hello.” Sehun calls softly. And Zitao, who’s busy tidying up his taolu equipment, raises his body and turns his head to meet Sehun’s.
“Ah, yes?” Zitao answers hesitately with a smile. And he adds, “Hello, too, I guess?” with a bright smile in his sweaty face with sweat running down his caramel skin that looks super sexy in Sehun’s eyes. Sehun and Kris gulps as they see it, because eventhough Kris stands a little further from Sehun and Tao he can still see the glistening trace in Zitao’s beautiful skin.
“I’m Sehun, Korean. And you are, Zitao, from China right?” Sehun asks casually trying to hide his heart beat sound so Zitao can’t hear it.
“Ahh, yes, yes, I am.” Zitao chuckles playfully. He always delighted to meet a new friend. “Nice to know you, Sehun.”
“Hahaha,... nice to know you too, Tao.” Sehun says.
And for a moment they stay silence until Zitao decides to break the air,
“So, do you enjoy here in China?” he asks.
“I really enjoy it here. The food here is delicious. When we arrived yesterday, our guide brought us to this good restaurant and we really enjoy our meals.”
“Really? Ahh, I’m glad.” Zitao smiles so radiant Sehun thinks it can kill him.
And before Sehun can answers again, Kris coughs purposely to gain Zitao’s attention. And he does it. Both of them now looking at him. One of them, which is Sehun, is looking at him feeling annoyed. But when he realize this, Kris just smiles back at Sehun annoyingly, on purpose.
Zitao looks at Kris with an expectant eyes. And the cocky smiles he gave to Sehun previously fell off of his face because he suddenly feels nervous under Zitao’s expectant feline eyes. That eyes is so fierce eventhough the owner is currently smiling.
“So, um-uh, hello, I’m Kris, from the Canadian Team. I was looking at your taolu form before and it was totally beautiful. You’re very talented, and beautiful too.” And Kris stops. Did he just said beautiful? Shit. Good job Kris, now he’s going to think that I’m weird.
“Uh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to insult you, I mean your form is-“
“It’s okay, Kris. I understand. Hahaha, thank you by the way. Im flattered.” Zitao cuts Kris before he finish his sentence, blushing.
Kris’s mouth gaps open at the sight before him.
Kris’s squeals along with Sehun who’s annoyed at the fact that Kris somehow succeed in making their angel to blush and yet, feeling weirdly happy because Zitao is so cute blushing like that.
And they ended up talking for a pretty long time, until their break time is over.
Luhan and Yixing is making their way back to their bench when they see Zitao is talking casually, and sometimes blushing too, to two stranger. Looks at each other weirdly, they fasten their pace to their bench.
“Ehem, Tao-zi. It looks like you’ve made aquaintance?” Luhan starts.
“Care to introduce them to us, Taotao?” Yixing smiles calmly.
And Zitao face lits up at his seniors.
“Gege, this is Kris from Canada and this is Sehun from Korea. Kris, Sehun, this is Yixing-ge and Lu-ge. My seniors.”
And all four of them shaking hands with each other much to Zitao delight.
“Great. Now we’re all friend. How excited! And we will compete against each other right? Oh my God! Excited, excited, excited!” Zitao keeps yelling zestfully.
Leaving Luhan and Sehun feeling embarrased while Kris and Yixing smiling crazily over Zitao cuteness.
Fighting round is started.
And while become a little bit relaxed after a few light talk with his new friend, Zitao doesn’t forget the reason he’s standing here at the very moment. He wants to be the best in wushu and winning this tournament is one of the big way to do it.
After Sehun and Kris gets back to their own bench feeling happy with themselves, Tao is sitting tensely in his own seat.
In the fighting round, all the athletes stands alone. The fighters will be called into the ring and fight until one of them is unable to continue or surrender.
The first match of the preliminary is between Tao and a Belgian athlete. The Belgian guy looks calm and great, but Tao knows he can do this. He only need to be as calm as possible and remember all the practice he has been doing. And with a high kick on the enemy’s chest, he manages to knock down his enemy.
The next game is between Sehun and Chanyeol.
“Is that the new guy in Korean team? Coach said that he’s not a threat.” Says Luhan. “He doesn’t look like one either though. He looks... fragile.”
“Don’t you underestimate someone you don’t know about.” Yixing says subtly but firm.
And then, Luhan’s mouth is gapping out as he sees Sehun knocks Chanyeol down in three hit. While Yixing besides him is giggling satisfiedly.
“See, I told you. Don’t underestimate someone. Especially your enemy.”
“Oh, shut up, Xing!” Luhan throws his empty plastic cup into Yixing’s face.
Meanwhile in the ring next to it, there is Kris win against a Swedish and Suho win against a Spain athlete. And both of them win.
The next game is between Kai and Baekhyun.
Baekhyun’s body is small. Maybe that’s why Kai, who’s clearly bigger than Baekhyun, underestimate him. But Kai is dead wrong. Baekhyun is strong and Kai surrenders.
The last game in preliminary is between Kyungsoo and Chen. Both of them are great but Kyungsoo is just slightly stronger. Kyungsoo strangles Chen until the later almost fainted but then Chen surrenders.
The second round of the preliminary consist of a little struggle from Suho when he is fighting against Kris, a pretty big hit in Sehun chest as a little gift from Yixing before he then fainted and lose because Sehun shifts on his feet to Yixing’s back and knocks Yixing directly in the vital point of his nape, and a flustered Minseok who clearly has a crush with Luhan and literally crushes Luhan as well. He knocks Luhan down after the third hit. But Minseok proceed to the next round only to get beaten by Tao. Minseok is hard to beat, but not impossible. Zitao’s goal is still far up ahead after all. He can’t lose in this round.
This leaves the semifinal of the competition between Kris, Tao, Sehun and Kyungsoo.
Kyungsoo gets his victory easy though, because in the second preliminary, Baekhyun calls to withdraw and Kyungsoo automatically won. That was a strategy that has already been planned, since both athletes comes from the same country.
Even so, Kyungsoo is not an easy opponent, so Sehun thinks he may be in trouble now. And he is. Kyungsoo is strong and a little blood runs through Sehun’s lips as a result of Kyungsoo’s powerful kick. But it’s not impossible either. After a few 20 minutes of hard struggle and fight, Sehun wins.
Meanwhile Tao is a little nervous about fighting against Kris. He just knows Kris, and he’s afraid that it would be awkward when Tao’s fighting against him. Kris looks like he has a lot of pride going on his mind. And that would be very disappointing and hurt his pride a bit if he lose against Tao.
But on the other hand, Kris is worried about hurting Tao. He’s afraid if he somehow, hurting his angel in the match.
Kris fears becomes reality when Kris is doing a somersault butterfly kick and hit Tao’s jaws with his heels, causing the younger fell on the ground. And Kris needs to hold every muscles on his body to not to run over to Tao and helps him. That would be pretty weird, helping the enemy.
Kris, becomes paranoid and afraid of hurting Tao after the first time. But as the result he becomes unfocused on his own moves.
Then much to his own adventages, Zitao stands up again, and tackles Kris’s feet, causing the taller to fall on the ground and then, Zitao graciously turned his body in the air using butterfly twist and drop his body upon Kris’s stocmach under him, resulting on Kris to spurts his belly water from his mouth.
Zitao raises and stands on his ground while Kris is still curling his body on the ground feeling much to the sting on his belly.
When Kris finally stands again, the referee makes sure that he can still continue the fight and Kris mutters a little, ‘Yes’.
But then, when the fight is started again, Zitao takes a very quick step infront of Kris and punches Kris’s belly a few more time before Kris is kneeling on the ground, surrender.
Tao helps Kris to stand up, but because Kris is so big and heavy, Tao’s limping and out of balance as he propped Kris’s hand on his shoulder and support Kris’s huge body on his own.
“Im sorry Kris. Still friends right?” Tao whispers as he helps Kris walking to his country bench.
“Of course.” Kris chuckles weakly.
“Im sorry about your belly that must be pretty hard on you.” Zitao says again.
“Don’t worry. Don’t worry its okay. But if you keeps feeling uncomfortable and want to makes it up with me, what about a little lunch date next time?” Kris asks slyly.
And Zitao giggles cutely. The kind of giggles Kris’s loved from him.
After that, Tao beats Sehun in the finals and brings Chinese to win once again, in the fighting round of World Wushu Championship.
Same with at that time Kris, Tao briefly afraid that his newly build friendship with Sehun will be awkward after he beats the others and apology. But Sehun too, just like Kris, asking Tao to a dinner date. And once again, Zitao can only blushes elatedly at the proposal.
A tournament should be about win and lose. But Zitao learned something from his first world class tournament. That a tournament is where you can find a different kind of friend and competition won’t always burn the friendship down.
He learns that there is so many type of people and if he wants to be a great wushu athletes and known as a legend he has to starts making friends and connetion, and learns to understand each and everyone of them.
Zitao’s journey to became a Wushu master is not over, it was just begun. The tournament is just one of his one big steps towards his dream. And he will keep his preseverance and faithful til the end.
END
Author: secretlyexol
Rating: R
Fandom: EXO
Pairing(s)/Focus: Tao/Sehun, Tao/Kris,
Length: 4,300
Summary: What Zitao got is his perseverance.
Warnings: n/a
Notes: I’m really challenging myself through this fic. This is not the kind of fic I usually make but, yeah, here I am, writing something about sport. I guess, this can’t really be called as a sport fic, but at least I’ve tried my best. I can only hope you guys can enjoy this fic. (Actually I don’t know what I write either so, yeah,.. LOL). Thank you for the mod who has been waiting for me and be patience with me when I’m late. I don’t know what I’m going to do with you. I love you. Well, now let’s enjoy the music! ;)
Winter is coming and World Wushu Championship 2015 is right around the corner.
All of the people who takes wushu seriously have been waiting for this big competition and Zitao is no exception.
Zitao is counted as a newcomer considering he is just debuted as a profesional wushu practitioner in the beginning of 2014.
In the same year, Zitao has to withdraw in any competition for the rest of 2014 due to an injury caused by over-exerting himself in a practice session. So this competition becomes his first world class wushu championship he has ever entered.
He has been very anxious about this world championship thing, but Luhan and Yixing, his senior from the same dojo, has also been there to calm him just so he didn’t repeat the same mistakes like he did last year.
Zitao is the descendant of Huang Li Yi. A legendary wushu practicioner.
Needless to say, his family, too, is full of wushu profesional atlet and practicioner.
His father really put some burden in his shoes. That was one of the reason why he over-exerted himself last year. And it’s kinda the same this year. But he really needs to say thanks to Yixing and Luhan for always been there and remind him to take a break and get some rest.
Zitao exhales and slings his bag to his shoulder. He is ready to go to the national gym where his master will announce the atlet that’s going to represent China in World Wushu Championship this year.
*****
“This year is going to be a little bit difficult for us. But I believe, the names I mention in the next minutes will be able to bring the best out of him and brings gold medal for the emperor.” Mr. Li, Zitao’s coach (or some of the students still call him master, including Zitao) gives some encouragement to his students before he mentions the names.
There is none of them dare to speak. Or, maybe they simply can’t. Too nervous to even talk. That’s how hard they trained to gain this posisition in national team, and how bad they want it.
Even Zitao closes his eyes and squeezes Yixing’s hand tightly. Yixing looks at his junior and smiles knowingly.
“For Sanda class, Zhang Yixing.” He announces first.
“Yes!” Yixing throws a punch in the air with his free hand and bows to his master. “Thank you master.”
Mr. Li nods a little as an acknowledgement and continues, “Next, Taolu Jianshu and Qiangshu event, Xi Luhan.”
“Yeah!!!” Luhan yells.
And Mr Li continues mentioning the name for each category until,
“And last, Taolu Changquan in barehanded category, daoshu and gunshu in weaponery Taolu event, .....”
This is his specialty. He really want Mr.Li to picks him up.
“...will be presented by.........”
Zitao gulps.
“...Huang Zitao.” Mr. Li announced it calmly. “And lastly, Zitao, Yixing, and Luhan will be in the fighting round.
At first Zitao can’t believe what his ears hear. But as he stands here in the strategic meeting room, he has no choice but to believe, right? He’s in. He’s in the team for a world class competition.
Zitao is not the one that are happy with being chosen. All of the chosen athletes too, express their feeling and causing a commotion in the strategic meeting room.
“Okay guys! Listen up!” Mr. Li comes with so many papers in one of his hand.
And suddenly, all the commotion in that room goes down.
Mr. Li and his charisma really is something, Zitao thinks.
“Like I said before, the tension will be pretty high this year. The reason is......”
He shifts a little, spreads the paper sheets he brought which apparently contain some of his important data, on the desk in front of him, and projects a presentation to the wall in front of them.
“These three countries, are going to be our biggest competitor this year.”
He pauses a while and then continues,
“Do you ever curious why it is so rare for other country to win a wushu championship? One of the main reason is because wushu is more like a country/local sport. So many practicioner believes, and even proves, that foreign people won’t be as good as us. That is, what we hold all of these past years and still continue to believe so.” He explaines.
“But apparently, the other country especially these three countries I show you, which is Canada, Japan, and Korea, start to grasp this idea as well. And so, they were trying hard to beat us, with our own strong point which also our won weak point. Our people.”
All of the chosen athletes in that room stay silent.
“Therefore, I’m gonna show you, the people you should pay attention to in this competition.” Mister Li clicks on his presentation so the slide changes.
“This is Wu Kris. He is half chinese half canadian. He grew up in Canada but his father chinese blood on him were awaken when he was just a teenager and now he is one of wushu athletes we need to be cautious with.”
Zitao looks at the presentation slides. Eyeing the canadian boy on the screen.
“Phew, he’s pretty handsome. I might want to pay attention to him in my bed.” Luhan cooes. And the other laughs at him.
“Well, I hope that’s after you kick his ass in the competition, Luhan.” Mister Li interupts Luhan’s jokes.
“Sorry master.” Luhan cringes but not feel sorry enough. He really thinks the guy is pretty handsome. Maybe he will try to flirt with the guy later.
“Next,” Mister Li clicks to the next slide. “This is Park Chanyeol. His father is a Korean, but his mother is a famous chinese female wushu athletes 10 years back.”
“All of Canadian athletes is good but pay more attention to these two.”
All the athletes nods to show that they’re understand enough.
“Next is Korean. This is Do Kyungsoo and Byun Baekhyun. Both of them are Korean by birth but Baekhyun mother is chinese and were a femali taiji practicioner back in 90s, while Kyungsoo’s mother used to be my best student. There is this rookies named Oh Sehoon among them. But I guess we can worry less about him.”
Someone whistles from around the back area because, hell yeah, this years foreign athletes has too much connection with China.
Zitao looks at Yixing who’s grinning like a mad man.
That’s how Yixing is. He always get overly excited over the possibility that they are going to face a really strong opponent, while Luhan is still busy googling on his phone to search more news about Wu Kris.
Zitao rolls his eyes. Both of his senior has their own perks, but they are a great wushu athletes so Zitao can really say nothing about their weird act sometimes.
What Zitao want to do is focus. Because it’s 3 weeks away from World Wushu Championship and he still feels that there is not enough time for him to reach perfection. Well, maybe this is him being a little bit perfectionist than ever, but that’s not his fault. He really wants to get his hands on that gold medal, so he has no other choice but to train harder than everyone else.
“Master....” one of the athlete raises his hand. “What about Japan?”
“Ahh! You’re right. From Japan, there is Kim brothers. They came from the same family. The father of Kim brothers is a korean who got married with a Japanese woman. At one first look you won’t understand why they were on the list. But the unique thing about them is, two of Kim brothers, namely Chen and Min, are originally Chinese. They were adopted. So, you know why we should be careful to them right.”
All of the athletes nods silently. And after delivering more briefs material, Mister Li tells his student to takea break for today and tomorrow because the day after tomorrow, they are going to have intensive training for 2 weeks until a week before the tournament.
*****
The tournament is here.
Zitao is so nervous because he is going to do a speech for the opening as the athletes representatives. Luhan and Yixing cheers him up and after he passes it, he felt all the blood pressure that rushes through his vein going back to relax again.
But he can only being relaxed for a second, because as the tournament begin, he is the first one in this Taolu round to perform.
And Zitao is walking to the mat with all of his courage.
*****
If there is a word that could describe the perfection of a figure that goes around dancing graciously and swings taolu staff beautifully in front of Wu Kris’s eyes, he really wants to scream the word right now. Unfortunately, there is no words could describe how mesmerizing this person is in Kris’s eyes.
“Hey, hey, Yeollie, who’s that?” Wu Kris nudges his teammate without breaking off his gaze from his new found angel.
“Huh, who?” Park Chanyeol raises his head and looks at the guy Kris meant, who’s currently dancing on Taolu number. “Ahh, him.”
“Yes, him! Do you know him? Who is he? Who is he, Yeollie! Tell me! Hurry, hurry!” Kris shakes Chanyeol’s body back and forth.
So before Kris can bombard him with more question, Chanyeol raises his hand to gesture Kris to stop talking.
“Are you stupid? His name is Huang Zitao, and he was one of the China representative that was giving a speech in the opening ceremony. Where were you, by the way?” says Chanyeol.
And Kris scratches his head.
“Sleeping?” Kris answers playfully. “I was bored then I went back to our team’s tent and took a small nap.”
“Well, then you missed how smooth he was talking in the podium with a high pitched voice that was pretty adorable now that I remember.” And Chanyeol laughs at the memory, leaving Kris feeling unsatisfied because, ‘Damn! He really wants to see the angel talks in the podium.’
“Too bad buddy, too bad.” Says Chanyeol purposely. And he ended up cringes because Kris kicked him lightly in his shin.
“I need to get him, Yeol. Im gonna get him.” Kris whispers.
“Hah! You wish buddy.” Chanyeol scoffs and Kris, once again, hit him in the head.
*****
In around the same time...
“Oyy, Sehun-ah! Can you stop drooling over a guy from the enemy side?” Do Kyungsoo smirks at his junior who’s looking at Huang Zitao with a sparks while the latter was on Taolu number.
“Ahh, hyung. Don’t say it like that. You make it sounds bad.” Sehun laughs at his senior but then his head automatically look at the male that currently is dancing on the matt.
In Sehun’s eyes, Zitao is perfection. His black hair, his tanned skin, his sharp jaw and his unique nose feature are all perfect. He can’t describe the feeling he felt on his chest when he looked at how flawless Zitao swing the staff around and slam his slender body to the ground and up again, fly in the air for a second as he turn his body in a backflip then proceed to round-off and finishes it with a butterfly kick somersault. He’s so amazed he wants to kidnap the guy and put it inside a glass house so he can look at Zitao perfection forever. Sehun smiles all the time and being all happy as he watch the chinese boy on the matt. But then, comes Baekhyun.
“I saw your gaze, baby boy. Don’t you dare!! He’s an enemy!” Baekhyun barks. Eyes sharply judging on every move Sehun makes.
“Baek-hyung. You’re finally here!!” Kyungsoo walks toward Baekhyun and then rest his butt next to Baekhyun. “Told you, Sehun-ah. He’s an enemy so don’t you dare.”
Sehun looks at both of his seniors weirdly and sighs at their words about ‘enemy’. What’s wrong with liking someone? He thought with a short face.
*****
“Lulu, jiayo!! Jiayou, Lulu! We love youuuu!!” Zitao who just finished his taolu round, comes back to bench and cheering on his senior. He excitedly screams without realizing that he is too loud.
Luhan, who is just about to go to the mat, turns his body around and hushes Zitao down.
“Shhh!! Tao-zi, you’re too loud for godsake. Don’t embarrased me!” he says blushing to their team youngest. And Zitao can only giggle cutely as an apology. He makes Luhan rolls his eyes then he proceed to the mat.
*****
Meanwhile around in the same time in Canadian and Korean benches,
“Lulu, jiayo!! Jiayou, Lulu! I love youuuu!!” Zitao screams his lung from his bench to his senior.
Kris looks at Zitao, crazily smiling and lost in his own thinking of how cute Zitao is when he is giggling apologeticly like that. He imagines if he is in a relationship with Zitao and the younger makes mistakes in his Taolu moves, would the younger giggles cutely like that?
“Ahhh...” Kris sighs dreamily against the counter infront of the bench.
While Sehun is blushing, feeling the embarassement coming into him as he looks at how Zitao shamefully cheering so loud in a Taolu round. No one is screaming in a taolu round, ever. But Zitao does. And it’s embarrasing to look at. But at the same time he looks adorably super cute too, so Sehun can’t really say anything. He just confused and embarrased with himself. How can he has a crush in a kid-like boy like Zitao? He feels trouble. But he’s smiling. Because Zitao must be a great kind of trouble.
*****
In this performance, Luhan will perform in Jianshu and Qianshu number and he was using spears and sword.
Luhan has been competing in profesional championship for around 3 years together with Yixing. He already got the moves, and the tricks, and he has talent. Moreover, he is a silent hardworker. While Yixing practice alone in the middle of the night in their dojo, Luhan will practice in the woods behind the dojo. So he’s pretty confident with himself.
He himself is also very beautiful. And his body lean feature helps him a lot in making the judges gasp in awe as he turning around, running and jumping with his sword and spear gracefully. No wonder everybody in this room can’t take their eyes off of the beautiful male.
That is, including Kim Xiumin, from Japanese team.
“Oi, Jun. Ano otoko, dare?” He asks curiously to his brother.
“Ahh, the man on the mat? His name is Luhan. He’s from the Chinese Team. Why, nii-chan? Are you interested in him? Hahaha.” Kim Jun, asks his oldest brother back with a tease.
“What? No.” Min answered, a little bit flustered. “I’m just curious because he looks like a girl.”
Jun scoffs. “Yeah right.” He laughs at his brother.
*****
After that, the Taolu round is over and all the athletes are welcomed to take a quick break before the fighting round is started.
Kris looks this at the opportunity to make a moves at Zitao. But apparently, Kris is not the only one who thinks so.
And when he approaches Zitao, this Korean guy named Sehun is already there, courting Kris’s angel first.
“Hello.” Sehun calls softly. And Zitao, who’s busy tidying up his taolu equipment, raises his body and turns his head to meet Sehun’s.
“Ah, yes?” Zitao answers hesitately with a smile. And he adds, “Hello, too, I guess?” with a bright smile in his sweaty face with sweat running down his caramel skin that looks super sexy in Sehun’s eyes. Sehun and Kris gulps as they see it, because eventhough Kris stands a little further from Sehun and Tao he can still see the glistening trace in Zitao’s beautiful skin.
“I’m Sehun, Korean. And you are, Zitao, from China right?” Sehun asks casually trying to hide his heart beat sound so Zitao can’t hear it.
“Ahh, yes, yes, I am.” Zitao chuckles playfully. He always delighted to meet a new friend. “Nice to know you, Sehun.”
“Hahaha,... nice to know you too, Tao.” Sehun says.
And for a moment they stay silence until Zitao decides to break the air,
“So, do you enjoy here in China?” he asks.
“I really enjoy it here. The food here is delicious. When we arrived yesterday, our guide brought us to this good restaurant and we really enjoy our meals.”
“Really? Ahh, I’m glad.” Zitao smiles so radiant Sehun thinks it can kill him.
And before Sehun can answers again, Kris coughs purposely to gain Zitao’s attention. And he does it. Both of them now looking at him. One of them, which is Sehun, is looking at him feeling annoyed. But when he realize this, Kris just smiles back at Sehun annoyingly, on purpose.
Zitao looks at Kris with an expectant eyes. And the cocky smiles he gave to Sehun previously fell off of his face because he suddenly feels nervous under Zitao’s expectant feline eyes. That eyes is so fierce eventhough the owner is currently smiling.
“So, um-uh, hello, I’m Kris, from the Canadian Team. I was looking at your taolu form before and it was totally beautiful. You’re very talented, and beautiful too.” And Kris stops. Did he just said beautiful? Shit. Good job Kris, now he’s going to think that I’m weird.
“Uh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to insult you, I mean your form is-“
“It’s okay, Kris. I understand. Hahaha, thank you by the way. Im flattered.” Zitao cuts Kris before he finish his sentence, blushing.
Kris’s mouth gaps open at the sight before him.
Kris’s squeals along with Sehun who’s annoyed at the fact that Kris somehow succeed in making their angel to blush and yet, feeling weirdly happy because Zitao is so cute blushing like that.
And they ended up talking for a pretty long time, until their break time is over.
Luhan and Yixing is making their way back to their bench when they see Zitao is talking casually, and sometimes blushing too, to two stranger. Looks at each other weirdly, they fasten their pace to their bench.
“Ehem, Tao-zi. It looks like you’ve made aquaintance?” Luhan starts.
“Care to introduce them to us, Taotao?” Yixing smiles calmly.
And Zitao face lits up at his seniors.
“Gege, this is Kris from Canada and this is Sehun from Korea. Kris, Sehun, this is Yixing-ge and Lu-ge. My seniors.”
And all four of them shaking hands with each other much to Zitao delight.
“Great. Now we’re all friend. How excited! And we will compete against each other right? Oh my God! Excited, excited, excited!” Zitao keeps yelling zestfully.
Leaving Luhan and Sehun feeling embarrased while Kris and Yixing smiling crazily over Zitao cuteness.
Fighting round is started.
And while become a little bit relaxed after a few light talk with his new friend, Zitao doesn’t forget the reason he’s standing here at the very moment. He wants to be the best in wushu and winning this tournament is one of the big way to do it.
After Sehun and Kris gets back to their own bench feeling happy with themselves, Tao is sitting tensely in his own seat.
In the fighting round, all the athletes stands alone. The fighters will be called into the ring and fight until one of them is unable to continue or surrender.
The first match of the preliminary is between Tao and a Belgian athlete. The Belgian guy looks calm and great, but Tao knows he can do this. He only need to be as calm as possible and remember all the practice he has been doing. And with a high kick on the enemy’s chest, he manages to knock down his enemy.
The next game is between Sehun and Chanyeol.
“Is that the new guy in Korean team? Coach said that he’s not a threat.” Says Luhan. “He doesn’t look like one either though. He looks... fragile.”
“Don’t you underestimate someone you don’t know about.” Yixing says subtly but firm.
And then, Luhan’s mouth is gapping out as he sees Sehun knocks Chanyeol down in three hit. While Yixing besides him is giggling satisfiedly.
“See, I told you. Don’t underestimate someone. Especially your enemy.”
“Oh, shut up, Xing!” Luhan throws his empty plastic cup into Yixing’s face.
Meanwhile in the ring next to it, there is Kris win against a Swedish and Suho win against a Spain athlete. And both of them win.
The next game is between Kai and Baekhyun.
Baekhyun’s body is small. Maybe that’s why Kai, who’s clearly bigger than Baekhyun, underestimate him. But Kai is dead wrong. Baekhyun is strong and Kai surrenders.
The last game in preliminary is between Kyungsoo and Chen. Both of them are great but Kyungsoo is just slightly stronger. Kyungsoo strangles Chen until the later almost fainted but then Chen surrenders.
The second round of the preliminary consist of a little struggle from Suho when he is fighting against Kris, a pretty big hit in Sehun chest as a little gift from Yixing before he then fainted and lose because Sehun shifts on his feet to Yixing’s back and knocks Yixing directly in the vital point of his nape, and a flustered Minseok who clearly has a crush with Luhan and literally crushes Luhan as well. He knocks Luhan down after the third hit. But Minseok proceed to the next round only to get beaten by Tao. Minseok is hard to beat, but not impossible. Zitao’s goal is still far up ahead after all. He can’t lose in this round.
This leaves the semifinal of the competition between Kris, Tao, Sehun and Kyungsoo.
Kyungsoo gets his victory easy though, because in the second preliminary, Baekhyun calls to withdraw and Kyungsoo automatically won. That was a strategy that has already been planned, since both athletes comes from the same country.
Even so, Kyungsoo is not an easy opponent, so Sehun thinks he may be in trouble now. And he is. Kyungsoo is strong and a little blood runs through Sehun’s lips as a result of Kyungsoo’s powerful kick. But it’s not impossible either. After a few 20 minutes of hard struggle and fight, Sehun wins.
Meanwhile Tao is a little nervous about fighting against Kris. He just knows Kris, and he’s afraid that it would be awkward when Tao’s fighting against him. Kris looks like he has a lot of pride going on his mind. And that would be very disappointing and hurt his pride a bit if he lose against Tao.
But on the other hand, Kris is worried about hurting Tao. He’s afraid if he somehow, hurting his angel in the match.
Kris fears becomes reality when Kris is doing a somersault butterfly kick and hit Tao’s jaws with his heels, causing the younger fell on the ground. And Kris needs to hold every muscles on his body to not to run over to Tao and helps him. That would be pretty weird, helping the enemy.
Kris, becomes paranoid and afraid of hurting Tao after the first time. But as the result he becomes unfocused on his own moves.
Then much to his own adventages, Zitao stands up again, and tackles Kris’s feet, causing the taller to fall on the ground and then, Zitao graciously turned his body in the air using butterfly twist and drop his body upon Kris’s stocmach under him, resulting on Kris to spurts his belly water from his mouth.
Zitao raises and stands on his ground while Kris is still curling his body on the ground feeling much to the sting on his belly.
When Kris finally stands again, the referee makes sure that he can still continue the fight and Kris mutters a little, ‘Yes’.
But then, when the fight is started again, Zitao takes a very quick step infront of Kris and punches Kris’s belly a few more time before Kris is kneeling on the ground, surrender.
Tao helps Kris to stand up, but because Kris is so big and heavy, Tao’s limping and out of balance as he propped Kris’s hand on his shoulder and support Kris’s huge body on his own.
“Im sorry Kris. Still friends right?” Tao whispers as he helps Kris walking to his country bench.
“Of course.” Kris chuckles weakly.
“Im sorry about your belly that must be pretty hard on you.” Zitao says again.
“Don’t worry. Don’t worry its okay. But if you keeps feeling uncomfortable and want to makes it up with me, what about a little lunch date next time?” Kris asks slyly.
And Zitao giggles cutely. The kind of giggles Kris’s loved from him.
After that, Tao beats Sehun in the finals and brings Chinese to win once again, in the fighting round of World Wushu Championship.
Same with at that time Kris, Tao briefly afraid that his newly build friendship with Sehun will be awkward after he beats the others and apology. But Sehun too, just like Kris, asking Tao to a dinner date. And once again, Zitao can only blushes elatedly at the proposal.
A tournament should be about win and lose. But Zitao learned something from his first world class tournament. That a tournament is where you can find a different kind of friend and competition won’t always burn the friendship down.
He learns that there is so many type of people and if he wants to be a great wushu athletes and known as a legend he has to starts making friends and connetion, and learns to understand each and everyone of them.
Zitao’s journey to became a Wushu master is not over, it was just begun. The tournament is just one of his one big steps towards his dream. And he will keep his preseverance and faithful til the end.
END