Noble Effort (For BritBrat)

Li-Mei was simply in mid stretch when she suddenly heard the door being slammed and a loud voice reverberating the whole gym. Frankly, the Oriental Rose wasn't so interested in mingling with other Friction talent at the moment, mostly keeping to herself at this point in time. After how things are going, she preffered to work out in peace. 

Of course, this was a Friction gym. This sort of thing happens here on a daily basis. Someone coming in mostly looking for a fight. Arguably it's the best place to find one, though opponents can be debatable, as she experienced when she first came here.

So she would go back into doing her own thing. Keeping herself to herself and letting someone else deal with this random person. And it would look to be the case. That is until something caught her eye. 

Rather the corner of her eye when she saw this little one performing something akin to kata. It usually isn't something that catches her attention, but she looked pretty interesting...and darn cute. A kawaii it seems. Interesting to see one here of all places.

Okay, so her curiosity is piqued and she would be drawn to leave her yoga mat and walk up towards the new person. Her amethyst gaze looking down whilst she does her kata. "Another martial artist?" She would finally say as she leans on one of the machines but outside of the mats, simply just wearing a red sports bra, shorts and trainers. "Your kata looks decent at least."

At the very least she was quite cute when she perked up just at the simplest point of being noticed, watching her mannerisms. From close up, she definitely had to be a kawaii. No doubt about it. The size difference is telling once she is more closer to the woman. The small one certainly has some charisma, mentioning that it was her mother which taught her martial arts. How nice. She could sorta relate...except for the mud wrestling in the pit part growing up.

"Your mother? That's pretty good." It is then that she introduced herself, Maelle. Sounds French, but had a Japanese mix to her. Pretty exotic. What did stuck out was her status as a aristocrat. Which AFW has almost no shortage of. "You flatter me." She smirked but straightened up off the machine. "I'm Li-Mei." She looked up and down before the next question came to her mind. "And how long have you trained?"

It was nice meeting someone new. Someone interesting, someone who wasn't of this land that they now live in. And this Maelle person seemed to be that. Despite coming off as a little snobbish when she entered, there was a certain charm to this little one. And as the Frenchwoman unpacked more about her past training and the reasoning behind it, it looked all the more impressive.

The Oriental Rose could understand where this little one was coming from. Having to defend herself was something that could help when you are getting picked on. Though her parents didn't teach the style of Kung-Fu just to defend herself against bullies. "Well, that being the reason to drive you into training more is admirable. I can respect that. And from what I've seen, you kept up with your training. Impressive."

But now it was her turn to be quizzed about her martial art history. Which was a breath of fresh air, only Natasha had ever questioned about that, let alone experienced it first hand. "That I am. Chinese martial arts, though. Not Japanese, obviously. Mainly Kung-Fu...a bit of Chinese Kickboxing...that my parents didn't teach me, but the other one they did. It was more out of tradition for my family."

While Li-Mei wouldn't go through much of bullying when she grew up, she can understand people going to martial arts for that particular reason. It's a good motivator and most cases, some end up sticking with it. Maelle proved to be one of them and while Li hasn't seen much past her kata, there was skill there. 

Maelle seemed to take the compliments nicely and didn't seem to be too egotistical about it. Which was nice at least. And apparently Maelle wants to a taster of Chinese martial arts in a form of a demonstration. She never expected her day to be where they both show off their respective styles but who was she to deny what she wants? 


"Aha, yeah. I can show you some. Most are kinda choreographed for dramatic effect." She came into the first stance, both her feet together and her hands to her side. The Oriental Rose would begin her Tao Lu, the Chinese version of kata, the Five Stance routine that she at least know off by heart. There wouldn't be any hesitation in her movements, not caring who else is watching other than Maelle. By the time she get to halfway, or resting stance, she checked Maelle if she was at least enjoying the little demonstration.

Rather than some of the more rigid stance and attacks shown in most Japanese martial arts, kung-fu remained more flowing, fluid even. And Li-Mei was smart to accentuate that point with her own form, letting Maelle’s eyes take in the trained motion that was practised lots of times. It was as she was back in her home country even and not in Tokyo. She looked back to see if the French Noblewoman was paying any attention to it and she is, much more attentive and her expression was genuine, which had Li-Mei carrying on, all before she would reach the final step before returning back to the starting point.

“Well, that took me back.” Li-Mei said as she put her palm next to her fist, bowing towards the small woman. “How did you like that?” She was curious to know what she thought of this, after seeing something more real rather than something more exaggerated.