“First I’ll give you an example, look closely at what I’m doing, from the posture of my body, to the way I breathe and how I grab the bow, everything in your body counts to make a perfect shot, It isn’t just throwing the arrow with your bow, and with more experience that you gain you’ll realize how every skill can assist you in combat, even without the bow.” Instructor Rod explain before grabbing the bow attached to his back.
When he gets in position I notice how something in him change, I don’t know if it’s relate it to his skills and how he’s activating them, but it’s not just power what you feel, it’s entirely different at how he and the other two instructor expand their power in order to make us submit to them. He gives the impression that he can achieve what he sets out to do.
I don’t want to miss anything and observe what he’s doing, I gather mana in my eyes without using my mana network because doing so would expose me like a magus.
I can see the way he selects an arrow in slow motion, grabs it from the quiver, put the arrow with the bow, his posture change a little to get a better balance, pull the arrow with the string and you can notice by the way his arms move that it’s not easy to pull that string, maybe it’s an special bow to handle all of his stats and abilities. I can see everything much better with mana in my eyes but they are starting to hurt and my head is killing me.
[New Skill Acquired.]
[Enhance Vision Lv1]
[New Skill Acquired.]
[Detailed Analysis Lv1]
The new skills take me by surprise, and I activate them and see what they can do for me. After activating the skills, the mana in my eyes flows in a more efficient way, but the pain in my head still persists, I try to nullify it with my physical pain resistance skill with my mental resistance skill and it helps a little.
[Skill Level Up.]
[Detailed Analysis Lv2]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Enhance Vision Lv2]
I continue to observe with the skills active and focus on all the movements that I need to replicate. Master Rod throw the arrow and even with the skill I’m not capable of see it until it reaches the target in the other side of the training grounds.
[Skill Level Up.]
[Detailed Analysis Lv3]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Enhance Vision Lv2]
“Try and replicate it, I would assist if I see any mistakes. The targets are at seventy six yd.”
I select a simple bow with some arrows and get in position, without wasting time I try to put the arrow with the string of the bow and pull, but I’m not able to do it, my strength is too little for the action.
“It would take a lot of effort just to get familiar with the correct way to pull the arrow, keep trying.”
“Yes…” I mumble and continue with my efforts, putting all my strength into the arrow I manage to pull but when I free it doesn’t arrive at the target. I didn’t even manage to cross all the distance.
“Your stance wasn’t good, try not to curve so much your back, the angle of the bow wasn’t right either and the arrow wasn’t pull enough, you have other errors but before getting into them, correct the ones I mention.” Instructors Rod corrects my mistakes and I’m grateful that he doesn’t teach the same way as Master Julius who for some reason enjoys hitting us with a stick for every error we make.
I try to make some adjustments and this time, when I throw the arrow it came closer to the target but still didn’t reach it.
“You need more strength, we should include in your routine some exercise with weight. Open a little bit more your feet, the way you are putting your weight doesn’t help you with the balance.”
“Understood.”
After hours and what appears to be like a thousand arrows, I’m covered in sweat, the instructors really know the way to put our bodies to their limits, if I didn’t recover with magic last night, I wouldn’t be able to continue.
[New Skill Acquired.]
[Balance Lv1]
[New Skill Acquired.]
[Bow proficiency Lv1]
After a day of hard work I obtain two new skills, I don’t know if I’m more suitable to the bow than the sword or if Master Rod is a better teacher than Master Julius.
“It’s everything for today, have some rest that tomorrow we are going to be stricter.”
We disperse and I arrive in my room where the servants have my food ready. After I ate I was thinking that today was a good day, and preparing to rest for a little while, but I see Leonore entering my room with two older women, both appear to be very tense when they see me, with their grey hair and well turned out with their clothes, nothing appear out of place with them.
“My grace, starting from today after your practice in the training grounds, you are going to start your education in noble affairs with these two ladies, please follow us to a better place.” Leonore informs me before turning around and departing with the two ladies.
I follow behind them with my tired body.
“Why do I nee to tae this lessons? (Why do I need to take this lessons?)”
“I know that you need to invest the majority of your time on the training ground but we cannot let you live without a proper education.” Leonore says it before leaving me with the two ladies in the room filled with books.
I take a seat in front a little table.
“First thing first, we need to teach you the numbers, alphabet, how to read and how to write.”
I don’t want to be wasting my time with this so I’m not going to pretend to be dumb or that I don’t know everything that I learned from my past life.
They open a book a start signaling every letter, number and read a few phrases really slow.
When it’s my time to show them if I’m paying attention to them, I repeat everything correct, except for the parts that they correct about my pronunciation but there’s little I can do about that.
[New Skill Acquired.]
[Reading Lv1]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Reading Lv2]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Reading Lv3]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Reading Lv4]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Reading Lv5]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Reading Lv6]
When they notice how well I’m learning I can see the surprise and a little skeptical look in their faces.
“This…”
“What…”
They cannot even talk of the surprise to be looking the level of learning of a small child.
“You are really gifted my grace.”
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
“What about trying to write some words, like the ones in this book.”
They give me some paper, ink and a pen. I can see the expectation reflected in their eyes and I smile at them activating my charm skill, the better course of action it’s to have this two ladies on my side.
Without second guesses I start writing and it’s a little clumsy for the size of my hands.
[New Skill Acquired.]
[Writing Lv1]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Writing Lv2]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Writing Lv3]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Writing Lv4]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Writing Lv5]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Writing Lv6]
The two teachers become exited at the opportunity to teach a genius and start incrementing the amount of knowledge we revise about writing and reading before we pass and start memorizing numbers and some basic equations like some addition or extraction.
[New Skill Acquired.]
[Mathematics Lv1]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Mathematics Lv2]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Mathematics Lv3]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Mathematics Lv4]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Mathematics Lv5]
[Skill Level Up.]
[Mathematics Lv6]
Before the day ends I gained more skills and manage to level them up really easy, this gives me the confidence to advance towards my goals.
…………….
POV Knight Rodmund:
I wake up in my room at four in the morning before the sun even shows up and I’m ready to start my routine, I get up and make the bed before dressing up and going outside.
I love the way my room looks clean and tidy, that’s one of the reasons I refuse to put any of the unnecessary items that people normally arrange in their own rooms, maybe that’s why my room resembles the one I used to have in the army before resigning my position to be under the Viscount.
I cross the house and nobody seems to be awake at this hour as always, except for the guards that need to keep their position and protect the house.
The people in the house don’t know how to appreciate the time in the morning and the best way to utilize the little time they have for the day, they forget that time waits for no one.
When I pass by the side of the guards on patrol, they give me a small salute with their head and I do the same to them.
I get out of the house and arrive to the training grounds, during the day we use them to train the kids of the family, but other than that time we are free to use them.
I go to the warehouse besides the building and retrieve my personal belongings, a special best and some handcuffs for every extremity of my body that a normal person cannot even get up the ground, but with my stats it’s not that hard, the moment I put them in my body I can feel the strength that I need to use to move and it has become easy at this point, what shows me how I need to find a smith to make new ones for me, it’s the only way to improve my training.
I get out the storehouse and commence my routine jogging at first in the open area, to eventually increase my speed and run with all my might until it becomes difficult to breathe, I activate my skills to increase them, I continue for three more hours at the same speed and even if want to continue I need to respect my routine. I stop and retrieve my personal bow with my arrows from my belongings, after practicing for an hour with the bow I hear the voices of the kids approaching and put everything in place before cleaning myself in a bathroom attach to the storehouse.
When I am in front of the trainees I can see the spirit burning in their eyes to learn new things and improve themselves, I respect it and want to help them, that’s when I see a person out of place between all of them, a little girl that appears too fragile to be standing here, she looks like a princess that needs protection from the world, she’s been taking lessons from us for a year now and I can tell she’s one of the most commit students I’ve ever seen, her resolve has never declined.
Nolan and Julius always talks how funny and cute she looks with her dresses and her little shoes getting ruined at the end of each day, by now the dresses she brings don’t look fancy anymore, all of them look like they should be in the trash rather than be in use by the daughter of a Viscount.
I know that the economic situation it’s bad but not at the point to not have money to dress a little girl. I’ve always hated to involve myself in the affairs of the house, after all it’s not in my duties, and doing so would be against the rules of the family.
Nolan has told me how some servants gossip about her and how unfortunate her life has been since she was born, always sick and with the need to consume medicine, to how she would be an amazing scholar, apparently she’s a genius in every topic her academic teachers have taught her, but that doesn’t matter when she’s destined to die in the test. Every time he or Julius bring me gossip about her or other kid, I told them to stop doing it, we should only do our work, everything outside of that it’s unnecessary.
What I can tell for sure it’s that people judge her too quickly, for the past year we have seen how much effort she puts in her training, that’s surprising for a little girl, especially for a noble one who doesn’t know anything about how hard life truly is. She may have zero talent with the sword, everyone knows that, unlike her brothers who are gifted with real talent, at least she’s talented with the bow, even if she still struggles to make it to the target with her strength, her balance, and posture are remarkable.
Dalia it’s my first student since I arrived to the house and I’m going to make sure she learn everything she can before entering the test, if I could I would ask the Viscount to give her more training hours but that would be against the rules.
“Alright, you know the drill, you need to run before we start the proper training, only that this time we have prepare something different, besides putting the weighting handcuffs in your body, we are going to throw you some rocks, you need to avoid them.” Julius tells the trainees about the changes in their training.
“Finally some fun, I’m going to love this Ha-ha!” Nolan appears excited at the idea to be able to torment his students, which only put a terrified look in the kids’ faces.
“Please show some self-control Sir Nolan, that’s not the proper look for someone in our position.” I try to give an advice to Nolan, I know how important it’s the way this trainees see us, and most important how one needs to present to the public.
He gives me an eye roll and I can only ignore it for now.
“Please put your weighting handcuffs in you and start running.” I give the instructions to the students but I see a small hand trying to grab my attention. “What is it Dalia?”
“I don have that equipme yet Maser Rod. (I don’t have that equipment yet Master Rod.)” She still doesn’t talk properly, some of the servants say that she’s cute whit those mistakes, only to start criticizing her the next moment, something not that strange in a noble house like this one.
“I know, the house hasn’t provide with some special to your size, you just need to run the way you are now.”
I know how unfair and how detrimental it is for her training to do it this way but for some reason people in charge of the purchase of the equipment always forgets about her.
I can see the disappointment in her eyes, but there’s nothing I can do if it’s not included in my duties.
“This exercise it’s going to help to either unlock or increase in level the skill danger sense, we know that some of the kids older than ten years old have already unlock it, for those under ten it’s impossible to know it until you unlock your status page.”
Dalia start running with all her might and even without the extra weight she barely keep up with the rest of the kids.
Nolan and Julius start throwing their rocks with moderate force but even if decrease it, the rocks hit hard the kids, the older ones take the pain easy but some of the younger ones fall to the floor from the pain. The thing they don’t know the more they are in the floor the more rocks are going to impact them.
I’m surprised to see the three kids that have six years old, the two boys are something else, they can avoid the rocks with little difficulty, and the girl it’s trying her best but failing in some occasions, but even when she takes a hit, she continues to run without reducing her speed.
“Start increasing the pace you are throwing and aim at the most vulnerable parts of their bodies.” I start throwing my own rocks at specific points of the body that I know would hurt more, no one can avoid them.
The more we throw the more people become accustomed to our rocks, when we notice how they are catching up to the speed we use, we increment it. Although this exercise seems painful, what exercise doesn’t, the only ones who help increasing stats or gaining skills are like.
After spending two hours with this exercise it’s time to move to the next part.
I’m once again alone with Dalia, I can see a lot of new bruises in her little body but she doesn’t appear to mind them, if she can still walk then we can still proceed with our training.
“You should know that you have it easier that the other kids because you are the only one without extra weight in your body.”
I don’t want her to become complacent with her progress.
“I know Master.” She lowers her gaze before answering me, I know a true master should try to encourage her and let her know that she’s not alone, but I’ve never been good in those kind of affairs. Maybe if her master was Nolan or Julius things will be different for her, but she choose the bow as her main weapon.
“Today I’m going to demonstrate something different, try to analyze it to gain some inspiration, you don’t need to demand too much of yourself, it’s a technique that requires a lot of time to comprehend.”
The only thing that I can do it’s inspire her with an advance technique.
I try to do my movements in the most obvious way and lowering the speed of them, I know that if I do it at my normal speed she would be unable to see something, less learn it.
Putting myself in position with my bow in hand and an arrow in the other, I pull the arrow while I change the way I breathe activating some skills and gathering the aura I unlocked, I charge the aura into the arrow and it takes all of my strength to keep it in place when it starts to glow and trying to release the energy, I contain it inside of the structure of the arrow and this one vibrates with the energy in it, letting go a sound similar to a beast ready to attack. I let the arrow out and only I can see the trajectory and how it reaches the point that I set as my target, far away into the woods.
The moment it touch the ground an explosion happens and a sound wave expand, making all of the trainees to lose their footing.
I turn to see Dalia and I can only see determination in her eyes, to grasp the knowledge and make it hers. I don’t want to bring her down to earth and tell her that it’s impossible that she manage to do what I just did before the test.
“If you continue to practice with all your heart you can do the same.”
I can only let her live in her fantasy, if she’s going to die there’s no need for me to make her life harder than it is already.
