Confucius - or Elder Li as he was more respectably known to the townspeople - sat in his study and meditated on the conundrum that was the young man that was currently in his care. Although he wasn't a true healer, who could heal any affliction and mend any wound with little more than a thought and an expenditure of life energy, he had been apprenticed to one as a youngster.

But even with his minor talent, he could tell that there was something strange about the young man in his care. He had never seen a living being with an empty Shēnghuó, and although he wasn't sensitive to any of the other power points he suspected that they were as good as empty as well. Even now that he could sense the life energy in the youth's Shēnghuó, it was only at the level of a newborn. If he closed his eyes, that is actually what his senses were telling him he was looking at!

The boy's lack of vigour, strength and intent just reinforced this impression. They were all at the level of an infant, despite his size and relative robustness. He had been scouring through his modest collection of orbs about healing, health and the human body and he was no less perplexed. He suspected he would never know the truth of this young man's condition...

"Five more minutes!" Jack grumbled back at the knock on the door as he rolled over and pulled the cover over his head.

A few seconds later, he was brought fully out of the dream he'd been having of being back home in his own bed, by the voice of the young girl that he'd started thinking of as "The Shrew". Always a serious expression on her face! He could vaguely sense that she'd told him to get up, which was only confirmed when she gestured at him to "get up and come!".

He felt vaguely embarrassed when he remembered how this stick of a girl had basically carried him back to bed, and how he had passed out clothes and all after walking probably less than a hundred yards in total.

He laboriously climbed out of bed, and followed the girl as she led him once again to the courtyard. Was this just going to be a repeat of his previous debacle?

But no, instead of leading him to the bench, she took him to one side before pulling out two reed mats, seating herself cross legged on one and indicating for him to sit on the other. As long as she wasn't going to bring him to his knees with those weights again!

Seeing the boy obediently take a seat, Jun fished out some of the diced Mìngmài that she had taken from the bowl next to his bed. She held up a piece so that he could clearly see what she was doing, and then placed it in her mouth. She handed him a similar piece and mimed for him to do the same.

Watching him follow suit she assumed a standard meditative pose, legs crossed in lotus position, hands turned on her knees and started to focus on her breathing, feeling the warmth from the fruit starting to permeate her body. She was curious to see how this savage would meditate, to best absorb the bountiful life energy contained in the Mìngmài.

To her surprise, the fool just sat there! She revised her opinion of him back down to imbecile, as she asked "Are you not going to meditate?", pointing at herself in her pose to reinforce the intent of her words. He mumbled something that felt apologetic, before attempting to mimic her pose.

"Sorry", Jack mumbled as the Shrew glared at him while showing that she expected him to be doing whatever it was she was doing. Which appeared to be preparing to meditate? At least, it resembled the stereotypes he'd seen of people meditating - he'd never meditated a day in his life! "When in Rome..." he mused, as he clumsily copied her manner of sitting.

Legs folded under him, hands resting on his knees, back straight. Now what? Seeing her close her eyes and taking long, deliberate breaths, he followed suit.

Seconds turned into minutes as he sat there, occasionally glancing at the girl seated next to him to see if he was supposed to be doing anything else.

Slowly, his senses cleared.

He could hear strange insect sounds in the distance, the shuffling of what a peek showed him was the same cat sized lizard that had startled him previously, adjusting itself in a spot of sun on the bench, his own breathing.

Strange, normally the warmth from the odd fruit cubes would dissipate fairly quickly, but somehow this time it was persisting. Not only that, he was just feeling warmer as the minutes passed - and he was sitting in the shade? Was this the effect of the mediation he was merely pretending to do? Maybe there was something to this mumbo jumbo after all?

Jack focused on the feeling of warmth seeping into and through his body.

After about ten minutes - that felt like an hour - he could feel the heat fading. No, it seemed to be shifting, gaining intensity as it fell through him in slow motion.

Suddenly springing to his feet, he brushed frantically at the front of his pants to put out the fire that he was certain must be there. "Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow!" he yelped, before realising that there was no fire. But his nether regions were hot!

He returned the glare that the Shrew had sent his way with interest, certain that this was somehow her plan all along. In return, peals of laughter bounced around the courtyard. Okay, seeing and hearing her laugh, maybe she wasn't such a Shrew after all. But still, a word of warning would have been nice?

Elder Li turned from the window where he had been watching the whole incident, even more confused than ever. It was clear that the boy did not know the first thing about meditation - he didn't even seem to know that he was supposed to meditate to guide the energy of the Mìngmài to his Shēnghuó!

Either the boy was a consummate actor, or he truly was a savage who didn't know the first thing about harnessing the energy of the world around him. Which was preposterous - all living beings knew that!

But what he truly couldn't wrap his head around was that despite the boy barely meditating, and clearly not knowing why he was doing so, his Shēnghuó was detectably fuller. Most people would take weeks, if not months, to show the same result! Where had this idiot savant come from?