To fight gravity would be to lose, Remo knew. One might just as well have tried to wrestle the sun from the heavens. If he taunted nature, he would plummet like Icarus to the hard, unforgiving ground. Instead, Remo became a force of nature unto himself.

Remo was a Master of Sinanju. The latest in a long line of heroes stretching back into the mists of prehistory. To be a Sinanju master was to be in total control of one's physical and mental abilities.

Feats that seemed extraordinary to normal mortals were second nature to the men of Sinanju. Dodging bullets, scaling sheer walls, the ability to lift many times their own weight all came easy to those in harmony with the forces of the cosmos.

But Sinanju was not just a philosophy. The name derived from the poor North Korean fishing village from which the first master had come more than five millennia ago. Remo was the pupil of the Reigning Master, the last in the original pure bloodline.

Remo had not expected to become a Sinanju master. In fact, Remo-like most people-had never even heard of the most deadly of all the martial arts.

A lifetime before, Remo had been a Newark beat cop. One night a pusher had been found beaten to death, Remo's badge clutched in a hand tight with rigor mortis.

The trial had been incredibly, suspiciously, fast. Remo lost. He was executed for a crime he had not committed. When the electric chair didn't work, Remo awoke to find his old life was over and a new one just beginning. Technically dead, but still very much alive, Remo was placed in the skillful hands of the Master of Sinanju. From that moment on, Remo had been taught how to become all that he could be.