touch of nature ＊ JIYOO

8. "The Unexpected Plan"

› THE NEXT DAY:

"Minji come on! We'll be late if you don't wake up now!" Hayoung called out, running over to open the curtains to let sunlight in the room. The sleeping woman whined, covering her face with her blanket.

They had to train this morning and she was usually always up first, but she couldn't sleep properly all night from worrying about Yoohyeon. She couldn't manage to say a proper goodbye to her and this left her too sad that she was feeling moody.

"Just wake up already, come on!" Hayoung shouted one last time before Minji finally woke up and went to the bathroom to wash herself up. Once she was out, Hayoung was already dressed up and ready to leave.

"Get dressed quickly and let's go or I'll eat your strawberries." Hayoung mischievously said, giggling at the way how Minji suddenly fastened her pace and was done and ready to go in no time. Minji was always like that whenever it came to food, especially fruits.

The two women soon entered their training grounds, saluting at everyone. Since they were the ones to lead this time, they started with the stretching and introductions, since there were more new recruits.

"Good morning recruited soldiers, I'm General Jiu and this is General Ha. We'll be your supervisors for this training, so stretch properly and walk over to the fighting zone when you're done so we can test your skills." Minji saluted and greeted everyone, earning a salute of approval from the new soldiers and they all followed her orders.

Once they were done with their stretching, they all wore a different outfit with a kevlar mask and prepared themselves for a session of epee fencing. Swordsmanship was one of the most needed qualities to become an Icebreaker, so Minji had to go against eight different men and women in a fencing battle to determine their skills. No one has ever managed to defeat her for years, so she wondered if there could be someone different this time.

"Okay, next recruit!" Minji ordered and a guy stepped in. He was slightly bulkier than the others and looked like he was in good shape. He seemed good..

But her opinion on him immediately changed when he attacked her without strategizing anything and got hit with the tip of the long sword in an instant by the general.

"Your form is good, but you need to start planning ahead more than to only trust your speed. Now next!" She gave him advice and called out again, a girl entering the ring soon after.

The girl got into position to defend first, surprising Minji. "Nice thinking. Let's see how you fight." The woman was first to attack this time but was taken aback when that girl dodged with her whole body. Minji could see the smirk forming behind the visible part of the kevlar helmet of the recruit, which almost made the woman pissed. She had to show her who's the stronger one now. Minji definitely had an ick for cocky people.. depending on the person, of course. There always were a few exceptions.

The woman and girl fought for a while, the recruit constantly dodging each and every attack. How was this person so good?

Soon enough, Minji was getting more and more agitated. Their battle had been going on for solid two minutes - the longest the general has ever fought for with a recruit. She tried to hit the girl's open waist, but was shocked when it was a fake position the girl had planned beforehand. A so called perfectly strategized feint defence that caught Minji off guard. The woman stumbled on her own feet when the girl bent to the side and landed a hit on the woman, successfully touching her shoulder with the sword.

The epee fencing battle ended in a loss for Minji.

The other recruits clapped with amazement, noticing the excited aura that girl had when she managed to defeat Minji, as well as make her stumble down to the ground.