Eugene made a low bow. During his speech, Sensei turned to him in surprise.

“What? What?” he asked. “Which might, which power? What are you talking about?”

Eugene and Stas both rolled with laughter.

“What’s the matter? What are you laughing about?” asked Sensei, while smoking a cigarette. “And where are the other guys? Have you met them?”

Drowning in laughter, Eugene waved towards us, “They are still in a stupor over there and can’t come out.”

“What kind of stupor?” asked Sensei, not understanding and looking into the dark. “What nonsense have you told them?”

But Eugene couldn’t stop laughing, hopelessly waving his hand.

“What a clown!”

“Sensei, don’t you know Eugene?” replied Stas, dying laughing.

Looking at all that turmoil, Andrew was first to understand what was going on. Shamefully pulling his hand away from the button, he sighed with relief.

“Well, guys,” said Andrew, coming out from the darkness to them. “That was great. The joke was good, but who’s going to wash my pants now?!”

This comment provoked an even bigger storm of laughter. Sensei said with a smile, “What did this clown make up this time?”

Andrew started to tell in detail how this “guide” led us through the village, changed according to his stories into the Brocken mountain. We also joined him, enriching the story with our impressions. At the very end, our entire big company, together with Sensei, roared with uninterrupted laughter, recalling our recent feelings.

“I just came earlier today,” explained Sensei, laughing through tears. “The light in our village was cut off. Probably the cable was damaged somewhere.”

“What a story,” Tatyana uttered with her clear voice. “I don’t want to mention what we suffered from Eugene, but there was also this cat!”

Meanwhile, the small ball of our big fear sat peacefully, frightened by human laughter.

“It’s Samurai,” Stas waved his hand and explained. “Sensei’s cat. He always follows him.”

“Stas, you should have clued us in to what was going on,” Andrew said with a smile.

“How?” he shrugged his shoulders. “You dashed aside from every shadow, and if I were to start making faces, we would have had to search for you all over the village.”

The guys laughed, having imagined this picture.

“I say,” Eugene justified, “it was an ordinary joke. Like Ostap Bender said, ‘The most important is to bring confusion into the enemy’s camp… Because people most of all are afraid of the unknown.’”

“That’s right,” said Sensei. “Fear begotten by imagination sees danger even where there is no danger at all. There is one ancient eastern legend about fear. A wise man met the Plague on his way and asked, ‘Where are you going?’ It answered, ‘To a big city. I have to kill five thousand people there.’ In a few days the same wise man again met the Plague. ‘You said that you’d kill five thousand people but you’ve killed fifty thousand,’ he accused. ‘No,’ objected the Plague. ’I‘ve killed five thousand; the others died from fear.’”

Having discussed all the funny details of this journey and having dispersed the myth of our unjustified fears by humor and laughter, we switched to more serious topics. Our group was joined by three other guys: Ruslan, Yura, and Victor (senior sempai). A little later came Nikolai Andreevich (“Dumpling”), who turned out to be a psychotherapist. Meanwhile we were talking about Qigong.

“What does the word ‘Qigong’ mean?” Slava asked Sensei.

“Well, translating this word literally from Chinese, Qigong refers to work with the energy of the air, because ‘Qi’ means ‘wind, gas, breath,’ and the syllable ‘gong’ means ‘work, action, or deed.’”