The next few years didn’t pass as quickly, and not just because her training was getting more difficult, but because she felt Dim Mak slowly shifting her stance towards her. She was harsher when it came to lessons, having her keep a strict following of the Qigong system of movements, breathing, and meditation to condition her further.

Dim Mak drilled every form and technique from every style she knew into her, including Tai Chi, Baguazhang, and Xingyiquan, which she explained were the three main types of Chinese martial arts under the Wudang school. But she also implemented other styles from Shaolin Wushu style like Wing Chun, which Reina greatly admired after watching the Ip Man movies. 

“It’s too much,” Reina pleaded, feeling exhausted. “I can’t keep up with all this.” 

“I don’t expect you to master everything,” Dim Mak countered. “Few people can do so with the one style or two they practice to perfect, but the idea is that you learn a little bit of everything, so you recognize when you see it, and add when you need it. The more books you read, the more imagination you’ll have.”

To illustrate her point better, she would also demonstrate moves from other disciplines like Taekwondo, Muay Thai, and Karate. Her Sifu was like a living database of knowledge when it came to martial arts, regardless of origins; she had not only mastered her preferred styles but had bothered to learn the fundamentals of many more just to be more flexible and unpredictable when fighting. 

One day she sat her down and told her the story of Ng Mui, one of the survivors of the Shaolin Temple, and considered one of the greatest martial artists to ever live.

"Back then, women had few choices outside of marriage, so she chose to become a nun to continue practicing her technique," Dim Mak narrated, remembering the story fondly.

"One day, she chanced upon a snake and a crane fighting. No matter how the snake attacked, the crane could always maintain its center and control the match. The crane used its wings to deflect all the attacks while countering with its beak at the same time."

"I can guess who won," Reina said.

"You'd be an idiot otherwise," Dim Mak remarked, and Reina leered at her. "This event became the foundation for Ng Mui's new fighting style, which she passed on to a young woman called Yim Wing Chun...I'm sure that name is familiar to you."

"Ip Man!" Reina half screamed in recognition, this being one of her all-time favorite movies.

"She was the creator of his style, yes," Dim Mak acknowledged. "And she used it to defeat the man harassing her to marry him. In time she refined it and passed it down to become the Wing Chun martial arts that you know today. So you see, Reina, we honor these women who have come before us, and who used their fists to choose their own fates. That is why I wear this crest," Dim Mak pointed toward the white big circle in the front of her robe, and suddenly her deadly beak-like technique made sense.

"We learn all we can from the long legacy behind us to pursue whatever future we desire," Dim Mak said, her tone as serious as it ever got. "Become the warrior you want to be Reina, and learn why you want to fight for."

Reina took her words to heart and set forth to absorb as much as she could from then on. However, she couldn’t hope to match decades' worth of experience in just five more years, and a lot of the styles Dim Mak showed her felt too different from each other, which made them harder to grasp. Not that that stopped her. And her callused knuckles bled over and over as living proof of her progress.

Finally, Dim Mak summoned her for a final test.

“You’ve done well this past decade in building your body and your skills,” Dim Mak, circling Reina to asses her properly. “Now it’s time to test your will. Go ahead and strike me. I don’t care how.”

They had just finished training for the day, and Reina would have thought she was kidding if she didn’t know her so well. She relaxed her right hand and shifted her feet only the tiniest amount.

“Just like that? I know you’re fast Sifu, but you should at least get in a stance or-POW!”

Reina threw a fast right toward Dim Mak’s ribs, but her fist never made it there. She stopped halfway as she felt the side of Dim Mak’s open palm pressed against her cheek.

“你的生死掌握在我的手中.” Dim Mak said in Mandarin.

“W-Wha…what does that mean?”

“Your life and death are in my hands.”

“Huh, neat,” Reina said, laughing nervously. She could feel a bead of sweat running down her temple. “What if I wanted to say ‘your life in my thighs!’”

“Why would you?”

“Cause it’d be funny.”

“That’s not remotely intimidating.”

“But it would give anyone pause,” Reina argued.

“Hmm…I suppose,” Dim Mak concurred, and removed her palm. Reina almost lost her balance when she did so, she had felt immobilized by the simple gesture. She knew what that hand could do if Dim Mak wanted. 

“Then you would say: ‘你的生死现在掌握在我的大腿之间!’”

“Then I will definitely use that one day,” Reina said, taking a heavy breath.

“You're stalling, Reina. But since you’re eager to learn, we could also say that your Shén was in my hands.”

“My “Shèn”?”

“You’re saying it wrong, that way it means liver.”

“Wait, my liver is in your hand?”

Dim Mak let out a soft growl, growing tired of the banter, and then moved again in her blink-and-you-miss-it speed so that before Reina could realize it, she had her hand grasping Reina by the throat in a deadly stiff grip.

“No, your ‘Shén’, as in your spirit is in my hand,” Dim Mak said calmly, though Reina could not breathe, she could feel the violence that could erupt at will from that hand if she wished. 

“Point taken,” Reina said, smiling despite knowing what could happen.

Dim Mak sighed. “You’re lucky my hand showed mercy.”

She released Reina, and backed up a few steps, looking down at her with a mixture of emotions. Frustration for sure, but also hesitation, which was rare for her. Reina had seen that grow more and more over the years, she was less cold with her and seemed to soften up when she wouldn't have otherwise.

“Never attack unless you mean it, and for God’s sake don't announce it,” Dim Mak said, her voice growing harsher. “Every strike has to have a purpose. Always make them direct. Is your intention to scare? To maim? To Kill!”

She punched the wooden pole they used for practice and shattered the top into a million pieces, splinters flying everywhere dummy. Her hand was like a wrecking ball in power.

“If you don’t have the Shén, then you don’t have the power to defeat anyone. Brute force alone is useless. Knowing the forms alone is useless. If you don’t have the will behind your choices, how can you expect your enemies to fall?”

Reina straightened up and bowed respectfully to her immediately, “I apologize Sifu, please let me try again, I beg you.”

Dim Mak stood there looking at her and said nothing for a while, judging her.

“You may,” she said finally, and when Reina straightened up, she felt a sharp pain in her abdomen that spread like wildfire and fell to her knees, head hitting the floor as she clutched her stomach.

“The strike I hit you with was potentially lethal,” Dim Mak said casually, while Reina couldn't even muster a scream from the shock. “I damaged your energy with mine. That’s what it means to have “The Death’s Touch.”

Reina could barely process her words, she wanted to throw up and blackout at the same time. She had never felt such pain in all her life, not in all the years of harsh training, the broken bones and bruises she had collected were nothing compared to it.

“If you can’t survive this at this level, then there’s no point in continuing.”

The words seemed to be coming from a great distance, but they didn’t matter, all that mattered was moving past the pain. Not to ignore it, but to feel and embrace it. She had to want to move more than the pain wanted her not to. 

She gritted her teeth, punched the ground, and screamed. Reina screamed like she hadn't since the day the woman in front of her killed her father with a single strike. She would not die. She would not. 

“Show me your Shén, Reina. Show me you want to live.”

“Hey, Sifu…”

Dim Mak’s eyes widened slightly as Reina looked up and made eye contact with her, it was as close to showing surprise as she would allow, but even she couldn't hide it as Reina slowly got up again. She stomped the ground defiantly, one arm still holding on to her insides, but the other she raised into a fist, ready to fight if necessary.

“If y-your intent was to kill me…then…your Shén ain’t shit!”

Dim Mak seemed taken aback at first, but then she smiled. And not in a sarcastic or superior way, but a genuine smile so warm, that Reina couldn’t but smile back at it despite the pain. 

“我很自豪,” Dim Mak said.

“What’s that mean...ah,” she finally lost her balance and fell forward, but Dim Mak rushed to catch her this time.

“It means I’m proud.”

***

“Your dim sum is excellent, my sincere compliments,” Dim Mak said the next night to a waitress, as they enjoyed some Chinese food from the best restaurant in the city. “From what province are you from?”

“Los Teques, vieja,” the waitress answered annoyed after Reina had translated for her, referring to a local municipality in Caracas.

“That seemed rude,” Dim Mak noted as she left. “You can tell she was born here.”

“Nothing wrong with that,” Reina pointed out, as she enjoyed her noodles.

“No, I suppose not,” Dim Mak said warmly. “Your people have a very defiant spirit, but it suits you. You especially embody it well.”

“Thanks, I guess, but thanks to you i have a bigger cultural heritage, and I’m grateful for that.”

Dim Mak nodded graciously as if to say that she was welcome, and Reina privately thought she shared the sentiment in her own way, if only for how much she liked arepas now. But tonight was about her culture, and celebrating a universal date in the way she had referred most during their twelve years together.

The people around them started getting excited and murmuring as the staff began to countdown from ten. Everyone serving their wine glasses, and gathering their grapes, which was a Venezuelan tradition, even if it did come from Spain first.

“Can I say it now?”

“Yes, now it is appropriate,” Dim Mak answered, raising her glass.

“Feliz Año, Sifu,” Reina said, raising hers and clinking it.

“Happy year of the snake, Reina.”

They drank their wine, and then ate the grapes as the fireworks exploded above in the sky, making their twelve wishes, which for Reina just most were just hoping her country would see a better future than it had now. Even after all this time, she couldn’t guess what Dim Mak would have wished for, except maybe that Reina was more advanced in her training.

Reina…” Dim Mak said slowly, and then paused, which was odd for her. She seemed to want to say more, but couldn’t find the words. Then suddenly she pulled out a long red envelope, with Chinese writing on a big gold seal.

“What’s this?” Reina asked, curious.

“Since you always insist on celebrating this day as well, I thought I might as well do it properly this time”

Reina noticed she seemed off, her face, usually perfectly composed, seemed unnaturally stiff, and her lips bound too tight. 

“Wait, is this…a gift?”

“In China, we give a Hong Bao to our loved ones during important dates, such as the Lunar New Year. It occurred to me I had not done so with you since we moved here and…perhaps I should have.”

Reina had no words. “Are you actually apolo-”

“Just open it.”

Reina did so and pulled three hundred dollars in cash. It was the most money she had seen Dim Mak give anyone, and then she remembered…it was also the cost of that jacket she had wanted. 

A drop fell on the envelope in her hand, the moisture spearmint like an inkblot, and it took her a second to realize it was one of her tears.

“Sifu, I…gracias.” 

Reina started to bow to show her appreciation for the gesture, but she felt Dim Mak's hand stopping her. She looked up and saw her looking down with a soft look in her eyes.

“You don’t have to bow to me for that. I didn’t give it to you as your master.”

Reina nearly knocked over the table as she suddenly embraced her, fully crying now. She should have stopped to consider Dim Mak might have seen it as an attack, but she did not fight it, and after a minute of uncertainty, she returned it. 

“Gracias,” Reina repeated with a sobbing voice.

“You are welcome, little queen.”

They stood there, and for once Dim Mak didn’t chastise Reina for crying but continued to hold her with a tenderness that reminded her of her mother. She didn’t cry, probably couldn’t allow herself that, but Reina could feel a tension in her body like she wanted to. It was enough though. It was more than enough.