"David....you scared me," Karine fussed before smiling, "What are you doing here?"

"Your uncle asked me to come visit him," David responded.

"Oh...so I guess you heard that he is going to advance to The Other with my father," Karine said.

"Yes, we discussed his advancement.....and I overheard most of your conversation with Gabriel," David said with a slight hint of jest in his voice.

Karine just stared at David for a moment. He overheard the conversation? And he seemed to be joking with her?

Seeing a slightly beleaguered Karine, David chuckled before saying, "I guess that I have some competition for your hand now."

"David....I know what your thinking...I need to...," Karine was about to explain.

"Sorry, Karine....you don't have to explain. We are both going through a lot right now. My parents were just murdered and your dad And uncle are leaving you for another planet. I am desperately trying to get further in my cultivation and you are assuming pretty much all the responsibility for the leadership transition in the Carmine Corporation," David straightforwardly spelled out the situation.

"That was my thinking, David. No one seems to understand that I just don't have any time right now," Karine said with a bit of relief in her voice.

"It also seems like in the middle of all this mess....another man has set his sights on you too," David said with a bit of jealousy in his voice.

"David, I am not interested in Gabriel," Karine said trying to lessen the tension in the conversation.

"But you haven't rejected him as a suitor either, have you?," David said

Karine was speechless. David was 100 percent right. She hadn't rejected Gabriel.

"I am not fussing or scorning you, Karine. I just want to let you know that I understand that the situation is complicated. It is complicated for me as well. I am jealous but I want you to be happy," David said.

"Thank you, David," Karine said walking up to hug him. She reached her arms around David and hugged.

David hugged back and said, "Let me know if you need anything. I won't pressure you for a date or time until all of this blows over and life settles down. Try to relax a bit."

David bent his head down and kissed Karine on her forehead.

"I need to go, Karine. I have a meeting with Mr. Lester for training. If you end up with some free time, please let me know. I really miss our dates."

"I will David. I definitely will," Karine responded before the two each went separate ways down the hall.

______________________________________

Ever since David overheard Gabriel's comments about him not being able to protect his parents, David was ready to get started on his afternoon training session. He also really didn't like Gabriel. After wrapping up his conversation with Karine, David had left the Carmine Estate with a shuttle of guards and arrived back at the Guard housing facility. Then, he just went about the rest of the day making preparation for his training tonight.

When 3:30 PM came around, David made his way to the training gym to meet with Mr. Lester and Chaz. When he arrived, Mr. Lester ushered him to a separate training room off to the side of the gym. David had asked why they needed a private training room.

Mr. Lester just commented about how he didn't want people to see what David had planned.....they might report them for mental illness.

"David, are you sure about this?" Mr. Lester asked.

"Yes, it is the fastest way to train the Body of Recovery," David responded, "I need to get stronger quickly."

"Alright, start to get loosened up. I'll go wait for Chaz outside," Mr. Lester instructed.

After about 10 minutes of waiting, David began his warm ups in anticipate of the sparing. After about 20 minutes of waiting, Chaz was lead through the door by Mr. Lester.

"Alight, someone tell me what the hell is going on? I thought we were just going to have a normal spar. Why are we in a private training room?," Chaz puzzled over why he was in a room with Mr. Lester and David.

"David, you explain to him since this is your idea," Mr. Lester said as if he had nothing to do with this training.

Laughing, David began to explain his new training plan.

"Alright Chaz. You know how you told me that you didn't want to go all out because no one could handle your physical attacks.....Well, I can't really handle your attacks either...better to say that I can't handle your attacks without getting injured."

"So you are saying you can't spar with me? Why the hell are we here for then?," Chaz said getting pissed off for being lead around for no reason.

"Nope, we are still going to spar. And you have free reign to beat the shit out of me," David responded with a grin.

"What did you say?," Chaz said in disbelief. "You want me to fuck you up?"

"Yes, I want you to go full throttle. When you mentioned the sparing the other night, I also had an epiphany. I have been practicing the Body of Recovery for some time now. I need something to help me get through the bottleneck for skill mastery. I haven't broken through to the final stage, but I am pretty good at healing myself if I sit down and focus," David said before continuing, "Based on my reading, the quickest way to advance the Body of Recovery to the final stage....is to repeatedly heal from injuries."

"Remember when I said that I had some conditions? I want to spar without any protective gear," David followed up.

"This is kinda sick. You actually want me to beat the shit out of you. You do know that I could possibly kill you, right? Mr. Lester, are you cool with this?," Chaz asked.

"Not really, but David does have a point. This exercise will allow both him and you to have quick advances in your training. I have taken his suggestion and planned a workout around it. Starting from today, you two will meet here every day at 4:00 PM and fight to around 8:00 PM. The first 30 minutes will be warm up, then the real training will start. In alternating cycles of 15 minutes fighting and 15 minutes resting, you two will spar continuously for 4 hours," Mr. Lester instructed, "If you or David can not last the 15 minutes of fighting to to injury or exhaustion, then I will call time and your 15 minutes of resting will start. The cycle will be repeated until time runs out."

Mr. Lester continued explaining to Chaz, "This method suits both you and David. For David, the physical contact with someone of your strength will cause repeated significant damage to his body. This training will give him practice on fighting people physically stronger than himself; however, David's real training will be during the resting period when he heals his injuries. For you, Chaz, the full out spar for 15 minutes will be of great benefit to your stamina. As you might know already, the Body of Strength exhausts a good bit of stored heavenly energy during combat. This training will teach you how to pace yourself and how to use your strength appropriately. With this training, both of you should see significant improvements in only a couple of weeks."

Both guys were totally psyched up after Mr. Lester's talk. They were ready to get started, so they both began to warm up with a little bit of stretches and bag work.

When it was 4:30 PM, the two began their first round of 15 minutes.

During the first round, both guys seemed to be just feeling out the situation. After the 15 minutes we're up, Mr. Lester had absolutely lost his shit at the poor level of combat. He said that they didn't deserve a rest period and made them immediately enter round two of sparring.

After the berating by Mr. Lester, both guys seemed to want to kill each other in the second round. David had actually landed a few good punches to Chaz's abdomen which caused the well built man to retaliate with a blow to David's shoulder that felt like it dislocated something. Mr. Lester had to stop the fight, reset David's dislocated shoulder and give them both the full 15 minutes to recover.

After the chaos of the second round, the two men seemed to start developing a rhythm to their fights. David would land a few punches while only taking a few partial blows from Chaz. If one was watching the two, they may think that the quicker David was bullying Chaz. However a trained eye, like Mr. Lester, could see that the few partial contact blows that Chaz was delivering were very damaging to David and hurt him in the fight.

For this first training session, the two sparred for a total of nine 15 minute rounds by the time the training session was over.

All was going as planned until it was time for the last round, Mr. Lester had said that they were to go all out and not hold anything back in the final spar of the day. The competition was brutal. When the last round was finally over, both David and Chaz could hardly walk. Chaz because he was utterly exhausted from the long sustained battle. David because he was currently laying on the ground healing a crooked leg.

"Hey man. You are absolutely crazy to think of this type of training. I have really done a number on you tonight. Can you really heal a broken bone over night? Your leg is pretty messed up," Chaz was chatting with David.

"Yep, I should be able to heal it up by tomorrow's sparing. I can already feel that I have had someone improvement in my recovery skill too. One night of fighting and I feel that I am actually healing myself slightly faster," David said.

"Well you two better take care of yourselves. Chaz, I would suggest that you try to run for 30 minutes before you leave to go to work everyday. Not just normal running. Running while exerting all your strength. You need some help getting your stamina up," Mr. Lester advised. "David, you need to try to heal yourself during actual combat. If you can talk while healing, you should be able to fight while healing. Remember that at its peak, the Body of Recovery skill will heal you at all the time on reflex....including during the middle of a battle."

David could tell the old man wanted to keep talking. He really was a great coach. But to keep from spending all night listening to the man chat, David had to bring an end to the day's training.

"Alright, Mr. Lester. I think we are all ready to go for the night," David said, "Oh.....Can someone help me get up off the floor?"