"What? A warning? What is going on, Karine?," David asked in anticipation of some bad news.

"Since my dad and uncle have left, life in and around the Carmine Family here on Earth...is changing. I am trying to adapt to these changes the best that I can to help out my family. Some odd things may happen, but don't be worried for me and please don't take offense. Try to lay low and don't cause trouble until after I work a few things out," Karine said very seriously.

"What? Tell me what is going on, Karine. I can help you," David said with worry in his voice.

"No...you don't need to help me for now. Just try to keep yourself out of trouble. I have to go, David. Take care," Karine said hurriedly before hanging up the phone.

David mind was left in a disarray by the phone call. 'Stay out of trouble and lay low' seemed to be the words of warning. It seemed to David that he could cause Karine trouble if he got involved in any sort of mess. Needing to know a bit more information, David decided that he would have to ask Mr. Lester about the situation during this evening's training session with Chaz.

Pushing the warning to the back of his head, David finished up his lunch, changed into a fresh shirt and made his way down to the gym with his training knives.

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Once in the gym, David found a group of guards standing around taking turns fighting each other with swords. For a moment, he just stood by and watched as the men fought viciously with each other. These guys absolutely didn't pull any punches when they were fighting it out with these wooden weapons. If there were actual swords involved, there would be blood and body parts everywhere in the gym. Instead, these guys just tended to beat the shit out of each other with the wooden weapons they had in their hands. Combat was so intense that even a few of the wooden swords were broken and thrown off to the side. David didn't doubt that these men would be covered in massive bruises when they were finished. The whole scene was somewhat intimidating.

After standing around watching for a while, David sat down and pulled his wooden knives out of his bag. Like a pack of sharks sensing blood in the water, the swordsman instantly noticed when David took out the wooden weapons. It only took a manner of seconds before someone walked over to talk to him.

"So you fight with knives?," a man asked as he walked up. He didn't even bother to introduce himself.

"Yes, I am just starting my training. Mr. Lester told me to come spar with you guys, so that you could show me what a weapons fight is like," David said trying to be friendly.

At David's words, the man almost looked like he was going to have an orgasm in his workout shorts...he was really excited.

"Oh....I'm Rick...Let's go spar," the guy said with a look of utter joy.

Soon, David had fought a few rounds with the guys. They were utterly ruthless. Mr. Lester was right. These guys love to pick on newbies and seemed to enjoy it even more because David was using knives instead of a sword. David had been beaten black and blue in his first three rounds.

The swordsmen were appalled by David's complete lack of skill and decided to take it out on him in an appropriate fashion. One guy even broke his sword on David's shoulder in an attack. David had to sit out a round to recover with his body skill. Actually, the only thing that the guys were impressed with about David...was that David could take such a beating and rebound so quickly. If David didn't have mastery over the Body of Recovery, he would have probably been hospitalized in the first fight.

During the breaks between rounds of sparing, David had noticed a lurker that seemed to enjoy watching the sword guys beat up David. Looking closely, David realized that the man watching was one of the group of guys that always hangs around Gabriel.

'Scouting out the competition, I guess,' David thought as he seen the guy send a few text messages while watching.

By the time 3:00 PM rolled around, David had decided to call it quits for the day. He needed to get back to the room to grab a bite to eat and change clothes before his evening sparing with Chaz....he also needed to focus for healing up the three broken fingers on his left hand. In the last two spars, it seemed as if the two guys were having a competition...on how many times they could disarm David. They didn't seem to aim for any other part of his body except his hands and forearms in order to make him drop the knives.

"Alright guys, I have to get going for the day," David said to the group of eight sword fighters that had beat the shit out of him earlier. His words were only met with a collective sigh from the men as they seemed to have thought their chance to abuse this knife wielding newbie was gone.

Realizing what the sigh was all about, David laughed, "Don't worry guys. I will be back tomorrow. Mr. Lester wants me on this schedule until the tournament."

The sword guys actually cheered, then immediately started pairing up to beat the shit out of each other some more.

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After taking care of his business in his apartment, David walked down to the private training room in the gym. When he walked through the door, Mr. Lester is already there waiting. David was glad that Mr. Lester was around. He really needed some answers about Karine's phone call earlier.

After a brief chat with Mr. Lester, David realized that most of the situation was related to the shift in control of the Carmine Corporation. Mr. Lester told David that Karine must be worried that he will do something stupid because of Gabriel's taunting and cause a commotion. William Carmine's supporters are limited on Earth now, so anything that David did could be used to exert pressure on Karine.

After Mr. Lester's explanation, David understood the situation. It was basically business strong arm tactics to suck away the remaining power of the prior administration. If David would say.....smack around Gabriel the next time he saw him...he would end up being harshly dealt with by the Carmine Family. In order to resolve any issues, Karine would have to make concessions with Vincent Carmine and more of her father's power base on Earth would be eroded. It was easy enough to understand....David had watched tons of movies.

After waiting for about 15 minutes, Chaz showed up. At the instruction of Mr. Lester, David goes through his standard training with Chaz. However instead of trading fists with Chaz, David attacked using the wooden training knives.

After fighting a few rounds with Chaz and getting beaten every time, David realized that the training knives are not really good for simulating battle. They are wonderful for using while practicing attacks on dummies, but not really good at effecting an opponent in sparing. For example, David stabbed Chaz near his lung with one attack leaving a circular bruise on his chest. Chaz followed the stab with a counterattack that left David sprawled on the floor with several injuries. If it would have been real knives, Chaz would have been breathing through a hole in his chest. Fake knifes didn't translate well in actual sparing.

When David complained about the issue, Mr. Lester had seemed unapologetic and told David, "Just dodge his counterattack next time."

Although the comment wasn't super helpful, it did make David realize that he needed to plan for his escape every time that he launched an attack with a knife. If he overextended himself in an attack, then his opponent could easily take advantage of his closeness and deliver a deadly blow.

The one main issue with knives were that they were an up close an person weapon. Any attack was basically done at arm's length. This fact meant that David had to constantly expose himself to risk when fighting an opponent head on.

By the end of the training session, the whole issue actually had a surprising outcome. David was getting really good at attacking and retreating to safety. It was like a hit and run tactic. Attack then retreat. Over and over again. Only attack when you are sure that you can land a hit safely.

David and Chaz continued training under the watchful eye of Mr. Lester until the training session was over. Once the sparing was over, Mr. Lester walked over to David.

"So what do you think about the training today? Can you keep up with the pace?," Mr. Lester asked.

"Yes.....I think that I can keep up with the pace just fine," David said, "Hopefully, I can get these knife skills sorted out by the time of the tournament."

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12 days later.

Today was David's day off before the tournament. He was trying to enjoy himself and relax. David woke up without an alarm and even cooked himself breakfast. Looking at the picture of his parents on his apartment wall...he felt hope that he may have a chance to get revenge for them. Although he was not as strong as he wished, his strength was steadily increasing. As he sat at the kitchen table in his apartment, he felt proud of himself for training so hard. With a mouth full of breakfast, David started to reflect on the recent things that had taken place.

Over the last two weeks, David's training had continued in a similar fashion with three different training sessions per day. With the repeated sparing, David's knife skills had advanced pretty steadily. He had pretty much memorized all of the vital locations on the training dummy and could hit them on command. David could also last a few minutes in a sparing round with some of the wooden sword guys before getting beaten. He even managed to defeat Chaz once by hitting him repeatedly with the wooden knifes. Everything wasn't perfect, but David could feel the improvement.

On another note, he hadn't spoken to Karine since her warning phone call two weeks ago. He had texted her several times to see how she was doing, but he never received a response. He could only hope that she was doing well and getting her issues sorted out. Thinking of the good times that they had together, David smiled as he finished up his breakfast. Maybe she would attend the tournament and he would finally get another chance to talk with her. Who knows if he will see her at the Carmine Estate for the tournament?

Speaking of the Carmine Estate, Mr. Lester had moved over to there to help watch over Karine and Sonia. David missed having the old man as a fixture in the gym. On his final day in the gym, he had given David the practice dummy and said, "Here. Take this. I don't have a place to put it in my new room." Mr. Lester still traveled over to the gym once a day for Chaz and David's sparing sessions. David had tried asking about Karine several times, but the only response he got from Mr. Lester is "She's busy."

David was only entering the tournament tomorrow for a chance to test his training and potentially when a few prizes. He felt that he had no hope of winning first place. Particularly with Gabriel participating in the competition. The man was very strong for a foundation stage cultivator and David would have a hard time beating him while only showing his publicly known strength. With the unstable situation around Karine, David knew that he needed to maintain his secretes. David also knew that Gabriel had it out for him. At least five times in the last two weeks, one of Gabriel's people had come to watch David spar with the group of wooden sword guys. One guy had even barged into the private training room when David and Chaz were sparing. He said he thought it was the bathroom and left. Mr. Lester had been pissed.

As David sat on his couch watching television, he felt excited that the tournament was going to start tomorrow.....and even more excited that he was going to finally have a chance to test out his skills.