"An hour?" Yang Yi asked loudly as Zhang Yong's request just seemed too impossible.
"Stop being a child! What's wrong with doing a plank for an hour? I can do a plank for seven to eight hours on a bad day, so what are you complaining about?"
"Uh, nothing. You're right, what's one hour of planking? I'll get to it instantly! But, uh… how do I train for it?"
"Do you know what bodyweight training is?" Zhang Yong asked as he scratched his back while laying on his bed comfortably.
"I know, but Ah Jiang told me that it's best if I that I only do bodyweight training if I know what I'm doing. I didn't have to courage to do it since I didn't have anyone I could ask."
"Yes, bodyweight training can be really bad for your body if you don't do it right, especially your joints. But since we're in prison, bodyweight training is our only option since we don't have access to a gym. Anyhow, it's a pretty good way to train your body if you do it right."
"I guess so."
"The point of bodyweight training isn't to look better, it's purely for the sake of building strength. Well, obviously it's not enough to just do a workout. The point of doing this workout is to just get you prepared for your Martial Arts training."
"Isn't working out enough?" Yang Yi asked in perplexity.
Zhang Yong shook his head and smiled, "No, no, not by a long stretch. We, Chinese, have our own training routine when it comes to practicing martial arts. Not only are you doing bodyweight training, I'm also going to have you doing some traditional exercise routines which are even harder to do. For stuff like stretching hamstrings and learning how to do the splits, I'll have to help you as well."
"Split?" Yang Yi asked in a scared voice.
"Yes, I'm going help you loosen up your muscles before you starting doing bodyweight training."
"Does it hurt?"
"Not if you do it gradually and slowly. It's only going to hurt a little."
"We're starting now?" Yang Yi took a deep breath.
"Yeah. Come, sit here. Spread your legs as wide as you possibly can," Zhang Yong said as he came down from his bed.
Yang Yi wasn't sure about doing stretching this early, but he listened anyway and got into a stretching pose as he sat on the ground. Zhang Yong, who stood in front of Yang Yi, stood on Yang Yi's shins and held onto Yang Yi's wrists.
"Get a nice slow start," Zhang Yong instructed, "That's right, as fast as you can do comfortably. Spread those legs and feel those strings loosening up and extending as you go."
"That's it. I'm hitting my limit!" Yang Yi shouted as his legs were almost pulled horizontal. However, Zhang Yong wasn't moving his legs.
Instead, he was stepping on Yang Yi's legs even harder. Yang Yi was in so much pain that he broke into a cold sweat. Zhang Yong did respond to Yang Yi's call to stop, though. He was just a few seconds late.
"Sure, we'll stop there," Zhang Yong said, "Let's increase how far you stretch bit by bit every day. Again, we want the process to be gradual."
Even though Yang Yi was going to hold on longer in his next set, the fact that they were going to have interval breaks between sets was already quite relieving to him. As it was the first time that he did a stretching exercise this intense, he didn't feel like he could endure the pain at all.
The next set was five minutes. Again, as uncomfortable as it was, Yang Yi somehow managed to finish the set. Zhang Yong said as the daily stretching routine ended, "Alright, that's it for today. I'm going to help you close your legs. Don't close them too fast."
"Okay," Yang Yi said in relief as he tried to bring his legs back to their normal position. But as soon as he let his guard down, Zhang Yong suddenly stomped on one of his legs with both of his feet.
The biggest fear of stretching was having someone coming at you when you were in the middle of working on your stiffest muscle. And as for Yang Yi, he was just that lucky.
"Ahhhh!" Yang Yi yelled like a butchered animal, his limbs then started spasming on the ground. He didn't get to a full split, but he actually got pretty close.
"Alright, we're done for today. We have now ended our stretching routine for the day," Zhang Yong dusted himself off as though nothing happened.
"You… lied…to...me…" Yang Yi cried in pain. He was in no condition to move.
"You wouldn't relax otherwise if I don't do this. Just get up when you're ready."
"I can't move!" Yang Yi said as tears began to drip out of his eyes, "I think I broke my bones. I'm not sure what it is, but you definitely broke something down there."
"Nah, it's just pain. It's always like that the first time. Come on, get up. It'll get a lot better the next time you do it."
Yang Yi tried to move his legs again as slowly as he could. He felt like he could if he tried harder, but decided to lay on his stomach for a while.
"How am I supposed to do a workout now?" Yang Yi whined in pain, "Why are you in such a hurry when it comes to stretching? Weren't you the one talking about doing it slowly and gradually?"
"It's the same whenever we do it. It's not like we have all day to do training. We're going straight into a workout once the pain is gone."
"Am I doing a split now?" Yang Yi asked as he stayed on the ground for a while.
"Split? Ha, not even close! But don't you worry. You don't need to go as far as a full split. We're only trying to reach a moderate amount of flexibility for you."
After talking a short break, Yang Yi finally got himself up off the floor.
"Come on, we have two more hours," Zhang Yong smiled kindly, "There's plenty of time. Take a short break now, I'll teach you a few sets of movements once you're ready."
"It's fine, I can hold it. How about we do something like upper body training?"
"Nah, don't rush it. You'll understand why soon," Zhang Yong shook his head.
"What are you talking about?" Yang Yi asked, then his stomach suddenly bellowed. It turned out that Yang Yi wasn't just weak in stamina. The food that the prison offered just wasn't enough for the Wushu training.
"We only do warm-ups in the mornings. After we have our lunch, we'll get to the real routines during the afternoon."
"Brother Yong, I can't keep going like this if lunch is all I'm getting! Please, is there any way I can get myself something else to eat?" Yang Yi asked desperately as he was already feeling headaches from the hunger.
"There are no vendors here since we aren't in the casual area of the prison. Sometimes the guards let prisoners sneak in small amounts of cigarettes and food from outside. If you want to want to have a really full stomach, you either have to steal food from other prisoners or find a way to trade with them. I can't help you personally and I'm not willing to anyway."
"Come on, even if it's just cup noodles…" Yang Yi said as he heard his stomach bellowing again. No wonder the Boxing King resorted to stealing food from other inmates.
"Cup noodles? I think I know someone who trades them. There's not a lot though. One box of cup noodles costs about two packets of cigarettes. You probably have enough cigarettes from the gambling match."
As Zhang Yong just informed him of a way to end his hunger, Yang Yi's eyes suddenly glistened hopefully.
"It'll have to do," Yang Yi said decisively, "Brother Yong, where can I buy food? I don't want to starve to death here!"