“How did he manage to fall down?” Kostya asked Andrew with curiosity, but he shrugged his shoulders.

“Maybe he just lost his balance. He was standing on one foot. Probably so, because it seemed like the strike was very light. And you can’t even call it a strike.”

Sensei, shedding the scarf, asked Volodya, “Are you alive, self-killer?”

“Alive,” Volodya drawled, holding his right eye. “I don’t understand, where did I make a mistake?”

“Your mistake is that you tried to get me from what you thought was my most unprotected side, in other words, from the most vulnerable point.”

“Of course!”

“That’s why you got into trouble! If you had attacked me from the front, you would’ve had more of a chance than attacking from behind or the right side. Had you attacked from behind left, you would’ve been hurt even more.”

“But why?”

“Because you think like a human, possessing vision and hearing. How many times did I tell you, you must take into consideration your opponent’s way of thinking. Since I see and hear nothing, you could logically assume that my mind is controlling the worst protected places a lot better and stronger.”

“And how about the front?”

“In front of me, there is weaker control because the body is already prepared for attack. A human, without natural perception, is more physically ready for the fight in front of him and spiritually from behind, and that’s a lot more dangerous. It means that the more vulnerable the side of the opponent seems to be, the more it is protected and, correspondingly, the counterattack can be more unpredictable.”

“And what if I had had a gun?”

“If you had had a gun, we would have greater use for you tomorrow.”

“What do you mean?”

“Exactly what I’ve just said. We would have eaten at least soul pies.”

Volodya smiled in reply to Sensei’s black humor.

“Well, no need to, I will better bring pies to you myself…”

When Volodya took his hand away from his face, we were taken aback a little. A big bruise has swollen under his eye. The skin around his eye became dark blue and was covered with blisters, as if after a burn. Girls from our group began to bustle about and brought Volodya a towel, which they had wet in cold water. But even this compress didn’t help him. Nevertheless, it seemed that Volodya worried least of all about his eye. He stood up, shook his clothes off, and merrily joked with Sensei, while we were commanded to exercise our techniques.

After the training, almost at the very end of the additional training, we again heard something interesting.

“Sensei, is there such a technique to control the surrounding space that can be taught in a simpler form, so that it could be understood and practiced by the guys of my sub-unit?” asked Volodya.

The Teacher thought for a little while and replied, “Yes, there is such a technique, although you will need a partner for it. Best of all is to practice it sitting in the lotus pose. You should do the following: on the level of your head suspend a soft tennis ball on a rope, so that during its swinging or pushing by a partner the trajectory of its flight would coincide with the location of your head. Your objective is simply to learn to dodge it without using your common organs of control in the surrounding space, and to rely more on intuition. You should perceive the ball in its spiritual interpretation. Try to feel the object approaching the back of your head and, guided by your internal intuition, move your head before it hits you. The most important thing is to train your mind, and again we got back to our subject,” smiled Sensei. “Speaking frankly, you should bring your mind to a complete calmness so that it reminds you of the mirror-like surface of a lake. And in that full silence of your consciousness, the approaching object, in our case the ball, will be like a pebble thrown into that glassy surface, causing ripples, or like a boat, call it as you wish. But it will be cleaving your space. All the rest that is located farther, such as people standing in the circle, will be like trees or people on the shore, whatever you prefer. And you are the center of that lake. You should learn to feel any vibration on your surface, any penetration in your space. Finally you will learn to feel the approaching alien object and all that’s happening around.”

Andrew, who stood with us next to Sensei, asked, “Can we also train in this way?”

“If you have such a desire, certainly, train yourselves,” answered Sensei.

“And in this case, what kind of a perception will it be?” Volodya asked.

“Almost the same as the one during this demonstration. The most important thing is to come out with your consciousness over the boundaries of your body.”

“And how is that?” Andrew didn’t grasp the idea.

“Well, I’ll give you this simple example. Any human, when he sits down, relaxes, and tries to calm his thoughts, will start to feel that his consciousness is widening and comes far out over the boundaries of his body. Consciousness becomes three-dimensional. It covers enormous spaces. In this case, you simply limit it with a certain place. In the example that I showed you, it was the sports hall. Although, if you train hard enough, you will be able to feel what is going on at the other end of your district. Actually, it’s not that difficult.”

“In other words, the most important thing in the exercise with the ball is to achieve a complete calmness of the mind, like in the example with the lake?” Andrew asked again.

“Absolutely correct, and make an effort so that not a single thought could enter that space.”

“That’s hard.”

“Hard, but possible.”

“Stas said that the style of the ‘Old Lama’ is very ancient. Is that true?”

“Yes.”

“Does history record the names of those who mastered it?” asked Kostya.

Sensei smiled, thinking about something and answered, “You might know only Buddha. And, of course, his first followers.”

“Buddha?” said Kostya, surprised. “But I thought that he had a different kind of philosophy, the philosophy of good. Why did he need to fight?”

“Even good people may need to fight,” Sensei answered calmly. “But to master that art doesn’t always mean to attack someone. For them it was sort of a stage in spiritual development.”

Thus our additional training ended, and again we became witnesses to the valuable knowledge and abilities of Sensei. Our delight was endless. Having changed, we awaited the others near the sports hall. When the crowd came out to the street, Eugene glanced at Volodya and exclaimed with horror, “My God! Oho… What a shiner you have, beautiful.”

At these words everybody directed his attention to Volodya. His eye was completely swollen, turning into a big, black spot.

“Don’t worry,” Eugene tried to cheer him up, puffing up his chest, and declaring, “Bruises make men more attractive!”

Volodya replied with a smile, “And how about you, don’t you want to become more attractive?”

Everybody burst out in laughter.

“Of course he wants to. And I’ll be like a witness in that joke,” Stas was developing the situation. “When he was asked, ‘Did you see how one man hit another on the head?’ he replied, ‘I don’t know if I saw, but I heard a sound, as if somebody hit something empty’.”

Victor added, “And I will be a second witness. If I am asked why I didn’t come to help the victim during the fight, I will answer with a clean conscience, ‘How could I know who the victim was when they were fighting with each other so hard?!’”

Another wave of laughter rolled through our crowd.

“Come on, guys,” Eugene mimicked everyone. “Your jokes are good only for soldiers in barracks. Sensei, did you see, I hardly said a word, and they have already fabricated a case!”

Joking and poking fun at each other, the guys moved on. The weather was calm, and the sky was covered with scattered stars. Enjoying the evening cool after the intensive training, we didn’t noticed that our group was a little stretched out. Kostya and Tatyana had gone far ahead. Volodya, Eugene, and Stas dragged somewhere behind. And Victor, Andrew, Slava, Yura, and I were walking in the middle with Sensei chattering about trifles.