M I S F I T S

iv. foe or ally

Tomi blinked, trying to make sense of the school's culture. "What club you're in?"

"Wingchun," Yuqi smirked, and sounded like she took pride being in the Wingchun Club.

Tomi knew Wingchun. One of the most graceful styles in Chinese martial arts (wushu). Focused on quick strong punches and tight defense. It was one of many styles Tomi wished she could practice. One of her favorites.

"Ji Changmin is our club leader, and he's really nice. You can try applying for our club." Yuqi smirked.

Although Yuqi seemed welcoming and was really nice to her by telling her all of this, she couldn't decide to trust her completely yet. She hasn't met anyone besides Yuqi here, everything she'd said might not be the truth. Even when it seems like it was.

Yuqi excused herself and let her be to unpack and to adjust here. After thanking Yuqi, she closed her door shut and locked it. Finally relieved she was alone.

~

Tomi didn't know what to do so she went to the school main building to check out the training halls. She had the main building's floor plan in her hands and tried her best to navigate herself. The inside of the building was breathtaking. The hallways were illuminated by natural lighting from the sun that came through the tall windows. As it was nearing sunset, she could watch the sunset from where she was walking.

She finally arrived on the floor where the training halls were. She stopped in front of a door that has a No. 1 sign hanging. She pushed open the door to reveal a hall that she hadn't expected.

The design of the hall completely changed. In contrast to the modern school building, the training hall was in shades of earthy tone with a lot of wooden interiors. There was a big Japanese sign saying "Nakamoto-ryu Kenka Karate", meaning "Nakamoto style fighting Karate".

The dojo was breathtakingly beautiful, Tomi had to stop and admire it. After she felt satisfied, she went to the next training halls.

Karate Club. Wuxing Club, the five animals style. Wingchun Club, she remembered it was Yuqi's club. Bajiquan Club, Baguazhang Club, Xin Yi Quan Club.

Her heart fell when he heard someone whining, and she found a guy on the floor curling while holding his leg in pain.

"Oh God, hi, do you need help?" Tomi quickly rushed to the guy in the middle of the training hall of Xin Yi Quan Club.

The guy didn't answer. He seemed too focused on enduring his pain. Tomi looked around for a first aid kit and found a large box. She rushed to find an ice pack, and when she found it she placed it on the guy's ankle.

He grabbed her wrist with his left arm, fully wrapped with a bandage, as a reflex to the pain. A sudden weird feeling rose inside of her. As soon as his hand made contact, she felt a sudden rush of strong energy.

She didn't like the feeling. The energy wasn't friendly, she felt it wanted to hurt people.

"It helps with the pain," Tomi tried to distract herself from the weird energy.

The guy watched and studied her face before replying, "I know." His breathing becoming more more stable. "Thank you."

When he released his grip on her, the feeling was vanished.

Though Tomi was much smaller in figure, she still managed to help the guy got off the stage and they sat on the side of the room.

"It doesn't look that bad," she said as she examined his ankle. "Do you want to compress it so the swelling stops—"

"No, no need. It's fine." He said and the corner of his lips curled up slightly. "You seem to know a lot. Experience?"

"Well, I do gymnastics. These things happen once in a while." Tomi smiled. "I sometimes go too far with practice too. You should take it easy from now on." She pointed at his ankle.

"Right." The guy blinked. "Are you new here? I've never seen you around. First year?"

Tomi caught his eyes, and she immediately looked back on his ankle. "No, second year." She corrected. "And yes I just got here."

"Welcome to NPS."

Tomi's eyes landed on the white bandage wrapping the guy's entire left hand again. Why was it wrapped? It was too early to ask him about it, they just met. Though she couldn't help but wonder if it wasn't an injury underneath that bandage.

She caught his name that was sewn into his training uniform. P. SEONGHWA.

"Tomi." She smiled at him and offered her hand.

The guy took her hand but didn't introduce himself back, "'you in a club yet?" Was all he said.

She thought people here have a weird way of introducing themselves. Or not introducing themselves. "No, I'm not. I'm still deciding." She answered.

"Deciding? What do you mean? What style do you practice?" The guy furrowed his eyebrows at her.

"I'm... I'm a freestyler." She admitted with a small voice.

"You're the scholarship winner," He pointed out. "Yuqi told everyone she met you yesterday. Not that I wanted to know, she just informed it to everyone."

Yuqi told everyone? She wondered what else Yuqi had said about her.

"Oh she did?" Tomi let out a dry chuckle. She stood up, "well, I better get going then. Nice to meet you. Take care."

After biding each other goodbyes, Tomi went to the next room.

She wished she wouldn't bump into anyone else. Not when everyone's just going to point out that she is the scholarship winner like it's a shame.

The next training hall she opened belonged to the Taekwondo Club. She also loved Taekwondo's moves, and might consider to join them. Next was Tiger Club, which she guessed was Hung Kuen, also known as Hung Ga. Then Muay Thai Club, where they had a boxing ring instead of a decorated flat surface like the rest of the training hall.

She thought she's reached the last training hall of the 10 clubs in NPS, but there was another room at the end of the hallway. The last training hall was different from the others. Though the biggest and most beautifully designed was the Nakamoto-ryu Club dojo, the rest were pretty big and were designed neatly pleasing to the eyes too. But the last training hall was much smaller and seemed old. There were few thin cracks on the wooden surface and the walls. The hall was a bit dusty, and instead of a printed wooden signage, the name of the club was simply written on a long paper with a black marker,

이 스타일 전통 무예

Which means Lee Style Traditional Martial Arts.

Tomi thought maybe this was a class, not a club. But she'd never heard of a Lee Style Traditional Martial Arts. Yuqi also said NPS only has 10 clubs. If this was a club, this would be the eleventh.

Now the question is, which club should she sign up for? And more importantly, how would she get in?

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A/N:
In case if anyone was wondering, Tomi's fighting style is similar to Lili in the game (Tekken). Lili's fighting style incorporates gymnastic moves, and is self-taught. It isn't a real martial art.

Later in the story it will be explained why Tomi fights with that style, not Kazama-ryu.

CHEERS!