Chapter 46: Championship Coach

The final week of the new book ranking. I am begging for continuous reads to keep this book alive. Please.

If he had a choice among numerous martial arts, Hua Shi'er would naturally choose Chinese martial arts first.

Although traditional martial arts had a somewhat poor reputation on the internet due to various reasons—often dismissed as a self-deceiving scam incapable of actual combat—Hua Shi'er believed such claims were absolute nonsense.

The inability of Chinese martial arts to be used in practical combat was a result of the broader environment. As is well known, following the founding of the People's Republic of China, considerations for social order and stability led to a drastic trimming of the highly offensive aspects of traditional Chinese martial arts.

This can be seen in the rules of traditional martial arts competitions, which predominantly focus on routines. This caused traditional martial arts, originally centered on combat application, to shift toward a gymnastics-like direction, thereby altering the hard-core inner essence of Chinese martial arts.

Consequently, true traditional martial arts completely changed in the hands of professional martial arts athletes, turning into flashy routines primarily for performance.

Meanwhile, whatever genuine techniques remained could only be passed down among the folk practitioners. There is a saying among the common people: "Win the fight and go to prison, lose the fight and go to the hospital." This heavily restricted the development of traditional martial arts in actual combat, because even if you learned the fighting techniques within them, you never had the opportunity to practice them in real scenarios.

For a long time, traditional martial arts lacked the soil for combat application. All inheritors could only work behind closed doors, transforming from martial arts inheritors into martial arts enthusiasts, severely lacking professional training and actual combat experience.

This was the true reason for the so-called "inability to fight" in traditional martial arts.

It was not that the arts were not strong; the environment made it so.

Hua Shi'er checked information on various combat sports on his computer and analyzed their pros and cons. He felt that if he chose traditional martial arts to practice, there would be two major problems.

One was the difficulty of acquiring genuine mastery, and the other was that traditional martial arts relied too heavily on foundations.

Traditional martial arts emphasize that force originates from the ground. During the Republic of China era, those martial arts masters spent two double-hours every day standing in stake-stances (Zhan Zhuang) when they first started learning, in order to strengthen waist and leg strength and train their center of gravity. Two double-hours meant four hours! Moreover, this had to be practiced every single day without interruption, starting with a minimum of one or two years.

Only through the persistence of water dripping through stone could it be called true skill (Kung Fu).

Just like Jet Li's line in the movie *Fearless*: "This punch represents twenty years of Kung Fu!"

How could Hua Shi'er possibly have that kind of time to build a foundation? He might enter a mission world the very next day. By then, being a half-baked practitioner would mean he was barely at the introductory level, completely useless when facing danger.

Therefore, Hua Shi'er had to steel his heart and temporarily cross traditional martial arts off his list of options. If he wanted to learn traditional martial arts in the future, it would be best to obtain it directly as a mission reward—that would be a one-step shortcut to achieving instant mastery.

Combining his own conditions, Hua Shi'er wanted to choose a combat sport that could be mastered quickly and possessed a certain degree of self-defense capability and lethality.

He understood that his advantage was having the physical strength of prime Shaquille O'Neal. In terms of strength, he surpassed ninety-nine percent of normal humans on Earth. With his strength, whatever combat sport he learned would yield twice the result with half the effort.

After careful consideration, Hua Shi'er decided to learn "boxing," which was the easiest to get started with.

Hua Shi'er was unfamiliar with this field, so he wanted to consult a professional, and Wang Li's figure immediately appeared in his mind.

Wang Li ran a fitness club, and the club included boxing programs among its offerings, so he should know something about this sport.

He immediately took out his phone and dialed Wang Li's number.

After just a few rings, the call was answered, and Wang Li's hearty laughter came from the other end:

"Good brother, what made you think of your older brother? By the way, do you have time this noon? Your sister-in-law and I want to invite you to dinner, and let your big nephew kowtow to thank you for saving his life!"

Wang Li's enthusiasm made Hua Shi'er feel embarrassed, and he quickly said:

"Stop it, Brother Wang, can we let that matter go already? If you're going to be this polite again, I won't call you anymore!"

Hearing this, Wang Li said helplessly:

"Alright, alright, brother, don't get upset. Your brother won't mention it anymore, okay?"

Only then did Hua Shi'er state the purpose of his call: "Brother Wang, I'm very interested in boxing. Do you have any good coaches you can recommend?"

Upon hearing this, Wang Li immediately took responsibility: "That's not a problem at all. You probably know my club—we specially run combat courses, including boxing. The boxing coach at my flagship store is a retired National Games boxing champion, an absolute expert. When are you coming over? I'll come pick you up myself!"

Hearing that it was a National Games champion, Hua Shi'er's eyes lit up instantly, and he quickly said: "No need to trouble you, Brother Wang. I know where your flagship store is; I'll go over myself!"

After much persuasion, he finally made Wang Li give up the idea of picking him up. He tidied up briefly and headed out toward the headquarters of Wang Li's fitness club.

When he arrived at Wang Li's club and was speaking with the front desk, Wang Li came down from upstairs to greet him and led Hua Shi'er directly into his office, where his wife, Li Dan, and their child were already waiting.

Wang Li called out to his son: "Tongtong, this is the uncle who saved you. Hurry up and kowtow to uncle!"

The little boy looked about four or five years old, and looking timidly, he was about to come forward to kowtow when Hua Shi'er stopped him:

"Don't do that. Didn't this matter pass long ago? Brother Wang, I've already spent the money you gave me. What's with the kowtowing?"

Wang Li shook his head and said, "How can that be? Brother, the immense kindness you showed our family can never be wiped away just by giving money!"

Li Dan chimed in as well: "Little brother Hua, you risked your life to save our Tongtong back then. It's only right for him to kowtow to you!"

Hua Shi'er certainly wouldn't let such a young child kowtow to him. He put on a stern face and said: "If you guys are going to be like this, I'm leaving right now and I won't come back anymore. Look, you're scaring the child!"

Seeing that his attitude was resolute, Wang Li and his wife had no choice but to drop the matter.

Hua Shi'er squatted down, pinched the child's little cheek, and smiled, "Tongtong is so cute!"

Tongtong blinked his clear, big eyes and said in a milky voice, "Thank you, Uncle, for saving Tongtong!"

Hua Shi'er found this utterly adorable and rubbed Tongtong's little head: "Tongtong is such a good boy!"

After exchanging a few words with the child, he stood up and brought up again that he wanted to learn boxing.

Wang Li had Li Dan watch the child, and he led Hua Shi'er to the combat area on the third floor of the fitness club.

Since it wasn't a holiday, there weren't many people working out. As for learning boxing, there was only one trainee practicing striking a heavy bag, while a robust-built coach stood nearby, occasionally correcting the trainee's punching form.

"Coach Chen, come over for a moment!"

Wang Li called out to the coach. Seeing that it was his boss, the other person said something to the trainee and walked over.

When he reached them, Wang Li smiled and introduced him to Hua Shi'er:

"This is our boxing coach, Chen Junshan, the National Games 81kg-class champion!"

Hua Shi'er quickly stepped forward to shake his hand: "Hello, Coach Chen!"

Chen Junshan also extended his hand to shake Hua Shi'er's: "Hello, hello."

Wang Li then introduced Hua Shi'er to Chen Junshan: "Coach Chen, this is Hua Shi'er, my brother and also my benefactor. He wants to learn boxing, so I'll have to trouble you in the future!"

Coach Chen smiled and said, "Boss, you're being too polite. You pay me a salary; what trouble is there?"

Wang Li laughed heartily: "Listen to that! That's just you giving me face. Otherwise, Coach Chen, where wouldn't you earn more than you do with me?"

Listening from the side, Hua Shi'er thought Wang Li's words were very smooth. Sure enough, Chen Junshan took it very well, smiling from ear to ear as he waved his hands repeatedly:

"What are you saying? The salary you pay is already high enough. Boss, you're being far too polite!"

Wang Li smiled and exchanged a few pleasantries, then said to Hua Shi'er: "Brother, you go ahead and start learning here. I'm treating us to lunch at noon, so you must do me the honor!"

Hua Shi'er nodded: "Alright, Brother Wang, go handle your business!"

Wang Li waved at the two of them and returned to his office.

Chen Junshan turned to Hua Shi'er and asked, "Brother, have you practiced boxing before? Do you have any foundation? Are you looking to practice boxing for fitness, or do you genuinely want to learn real skills?"

Before coming, Hua Shi'er had already figured out what he wanted to learn. Starting from basic training definitely wouldn't work, so he said directly:

"Coach, I want to learn Mike Tyson's combination punches!"