The meal had turned out to be one of the better ones in all of their lives. Arden and Sya had actual food for the first time in years, and Vera was pleased to be eating with people who didn't look at her like she was either a living weapon or a failure. They all enjoyed each other's company, which was in some ways better than the meal itself.

  There was no liquor involved, but after a certain amount of time, they all got drunk off the atmosphere. Stories were told and laughs were shared.

  Vera looked between her two new friends with a warmth she hadn't had in a long time as they sang a song from an old show they used to watch before coming to the slums. She realized that she had never felt as happy as she did right now. It had only been a few days since meeting them as well. She didn't know if they were just that friendly or if she had lived with a void in her heart.

  ‘Probably both,’ she thought.

  Eventually, the festivities died down, and they all went to sleep. For the first time in a long time, they all felt like they had a good reason to wake up in the morning.

  *****

  It was bright and early when Arden woke up the next morning. As he gradually regained lucidity, he realized that it was not bright when he got out of bed. The rumbling of thunder above him let him know that a storm was rapidly approaching. His belief was proven a few minutes later when he heard the white noise of rain against the roof.

  He didn't mind. It gave him a reason to stay out of sight and out of trouble for the time being, he thought, temporarily forgetting that a bounty had been placed in his head.

  With a yawn, Arden migrated from his room to the open space that doubled as a living room and dining area the night before. He saw Vera holding the plank of plywood under her arms as she moved it from the center of the room to stand it against the wall.

  “Doing some redecorating?” Arden asked.

  “Something like that,” Vera responded. “If you're serious about getting stronger, you're going to need the space to grow.”

  “Need some help?”

  “I won't turn it down.”

  It didn't take long to clear the area. It was almost as if a table made out of plywood and cinder blocks didn't take much effort to relocate.

  As Arden lowered the last of the bricks to the ground alongside the others, he asked his soon-to-be mentor a question.

  “What type of training will this be?”

  “Every type,” Vera answered. “When Sya wakes up, we'll begin with some observational exercises while I teach you two the basics of being a Starborn. After that, I'll be training you one-on-one. Nothing too taxing.”

  “How will the training go?”

  “Probably as well as you'd expect. Don't worry though. You won't be beaten up,” she said, to Arden’s relief. “The first thing we need to do is improve your body. Thankfully Cirai gave us what we need to get you from malnourished to underweight. It will take a while, but if we just train for a while, we should see some results.”

  “So you won't be teaching me how to fight?” Arden asked, slightly deflated.

  “You're not at that level yet. You need to be able to take a couple hits before we begin sparring. I can't have you dying on our first session”

  “That does not fill me with confidence.”

  Vera shrugged. With her short-sleeved shirt, it showed off the muscles that Arden could only hope to obtain.

  “No one ever said training was easy. If it was, we'd already have some white-tier Starborn. Maybe even some blue-tier. If you had the belief that this would be easy, allow me to disabuse you of that notion.”

  “Perish the thought,” Arden said. “I don't know how hard it would be, but I never thought it would be easy.”

  “Good,” Vera said with her hands on her hips. “Then let's begin. Sya doesn't need to be awake for this part.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Get on your hands and knees.”

  *****

  Sya woke up feeling more refreshed than she had in a long time. Whether it was from eating real food, or having a good time last night, she didn't know. Nor did she care.

  She was rested. That was enough for her.

  With a yawn and a quick stretch, she rolled off the bed. Like her brother, she wore a faded t-shirt And matching sweatpants, as they were some of the only clothes that would be hard to grow out of. That was the main reason why Cirai got the clothes for them.

  No matter how much Arden scavenged, clothes and food were the only things that constantly eluded him. He could occasionally find furniture, and he could find books with relative ease, but clothes and real food were nonexistent in the slums.

  Thankfully, Cirai was not bound to the same limits as slum folk, as she could easily leave and reenter the slums whenever she needed. Mindful of the fact that one of the few people that she cared about was from the slums, and that he was taking care of his Blight Walker sister, and thus were very underprivileged, she felt it was only right.

  If Sya ever met Cirai, she knew that there would be a prolonged thank you in store for her. Assuming that Sya wasn’t beaten to death for being a Blight Walker.

  Ignoring the hypothetical in her head, she walked towards the living room, eager to begin training with Arden and Vera, when she stopped.

  She heard their voices in the next room, but what they were saying was strange.

  “Come on, you can go another round!” Vera said.

  Arden responded, extremely short of breath.

  “I can't! I've already done it five times! My body is giving out!”

  “Only five? You need to be able to do at least ten.”

  “Look at me! You drained me!”

  “Oh it's not that bad.”

  Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

  Sya stayed in her room with a red face, unsure of what the proper call to make would be.

  She liked Vera. She was helpful, friendly, and didn’t judge Sya for being a Blight Walker. In the week that they had met, there were no problems whatsoever. It had been just like having a sister. She also liked that Arden and her got along great as well, despite him only knowing her for roughly a day from his perspective.

  Sya had only seen Arden and Vera interact for a small amount of time, but she could tell that he was comfortable with her, something that she didn’t see much. Perhaps it was because there was barely anyone who didn't dislike him, or maybe it was because she just didn't see it. She’d stayed away from the outside world for a few years, after all.

  Sya thought that Arden and Vera were just friendly with each other, but hearing the strained noises coming from her brother alongside the energetic encouragement from Vera made her think that she needed to revise the thought.

  Arden groaned from the next room.

  “Ugh,” he growled through clenched teeth. “You’re getting on top now!?”

  “You were the one who wanted this,” Vera said in a teasing manner.

  Sya slowly retreated back to her bed in a daze, trying to put as much space between her and the couple going at it in the next room.

  ‘Good luck, Arden. You’re going to need it. I hope you survive and you learn not to do this in the open again.’

  *****

  Arden groaned, as he finished his tenth rep of ten push-ups. They were difficult on their own, but halfway through, they had gotten much more challenging thanks to Vera sitting cross legged on his back. To make him stronger, she said.

  He wondered how much of that was the truth.

  Strangely, he didn’t hate the feeling as he thought he would. He wondered why.

  Regardless, Arden collapsed on the ground with his arms splayed out in front of him. Sweat poured off his topless body. He had the thought that if he lost any more weight from water loss his bones would pierce his skin. With one cheek on the ground, he looked over his shoulder to the beautiful woman sitting on his back.

  As he waited for solidity to return to his arms and legs, he heard Vera speak to him, still on his back.

  “Good job. I didn’t think you’d be able to do it.”

  “Neither did I,” Arden said in between gasps of air.

  “But you did. You showed that what you thought was your limit was just a mental hurdle. That’s the first thing that you need to learn. As cheesy as it sounds, the power of belief is vital when it comes to training. If you believe that you can only amount to so much, then that is as far as you will go.”

  “I guess that makes sense.”

  “Good. Now to move on to the other exercises.”

  Fear gripped Arden’s heart.

  “What?” he asked weakly.

  “Oh yeah. You’ve got a lot more to do. You still have a physical limit. Right now, we need to find it.”

  Arden prayed that Sya would wake up soon so he could move on from this hellish physical training.

  *****

  An hour later, Arden was lying flat on his back staring up at the ceiling. Vera had found his limit, and it had taken much longer than he hoped it would. She on the other hand was overjoyed. With his arms and legs having given out, she let him rest as she went out to collect food for lunch after throwing on a poncho for the rain.

  As he tried to slow his pounding heart, he suddenly saw Sya standing over him, looking down at him with crossed arms and a flushed face. She looked like she had something she wanted to say to him.

  Without even lifting his head from the floor, he spoke.

  “Hey.”

  “Is that all you have to say?”

  “Uh…Good morning?”

  She looked away from him and clicked her tongue.

  “Pervert.”

  Arden chuckled, not offended at all.

  “Is this because of me not wearing a shirt? Vera told me to take it off. She didn’t want me to soak my only shirt with sweat. It's not because I want to show off my god-like physique.”

  “You don’t have a body to show off.”

  “Tell me about it. If I did, maybe I would have been able to survive my session with her.”

  “Where is Vera, anyway?”

  “Grabbing food. It's important to eat well after a work-out like that.”

  “I’ll need to have a talk with her about your ‘work-out.’”

  Arden raised an eyebrow, confused.

  “What's wrong with my training?”

  Sya sighed and knelt down next to him.

  “Arden, I’m not mad at you. Really, I’m not. If anything, I’m happy that you and Vera are so compatible.”

  “Uh…What?” Arden asked, even more confused.

  “But there is a time and place for stuff like this. Don’t do it in the open like that, especially if your sister is in the next room. It’s not healthy!”

  “I’m sorry? How is this not healthy? Look at how tired I am now. A lot of exercise went into this.”

  “Why can’t you just do normal exercises instead? What’s wrong with pushups? Whatever happened to basic calisthenics?”

  “...I think there’s a misunderstanding here. I was doing normal exercises.”

  Arden wondered what the hell Sya thought he was doing. All he’d been doing was a standard workout made difficult by pushing himself to the limit. Why did she think he was doing something inappropriate?

  A moment later, he remembered some of the words exchanged between himself and Vera, and paled. To someone listening in, it could be misconstrued as something just as taxing but much more fun.

  Arden suddenly wished that he had strength left in his arms so he could cover his face in embarrassment. Unfortunately, they were still worthless, so he could only look away from Sya.

  “I didn’t do anything like that, Sya,” he muttered. “It was just training. That’s it.”

  “You didn’t hook up with Vera?”

  “No.”

  Now Sya was the one who wanted to die from embarrassment. She could tell from the similar look on her brother’s face that it wasn't easy for him either.

  A silence was shared between them for a few minutes until feeling returned to Arden’s limbs. He wordlessly threw on his shirt and propped himself up against the wall, which made an unsettling creaking sound.

  “So how’d you sleep?” Arden asked, sterling the conversation away from hypothetical sexcapades.

  After a few minutes of conversation that began awkward but gradually became normal, Vera returned.

  “Able to move yet?” she said to Arden.

  “Somewhat. I’ve recovered a bit.”

  “Enough to eat?”

  “Definitely.”

  Vera pulled seven cans of food from her inventory. She gave one to Sya, five to Arden, and kept the last one for herself. Knowing the procedure well, Arden slipped four of his into his inventory, knowing that Sya couldn't access hers.

  “How many did you get?” Sya asked

  “Nine. That’s how you two do it right?”

  “That’s right.”

  With the amount of food Arden had in his inventory now, he had roughly five days of food, and all of it was premium, that is to say, it was food. But not just any food. Arden and Sya gasped as they pulled the top from their cans and steam rushed up to meet their faces.

  “Vera,” Arden began. “Is this meat?”

  “Ground beef, to be exact,” she confirmed. “I told you this morning that before anything, we need to improve your body. Protein will help with that.”

  Vera glanced towards Sya who was already greedily devouring the ground meat.

  “And I figured I might as well help both of you out. The condition of her body is about equal to yours.”

  Sya, having put down the plastic spoon, spoke up while wiping the side of her mouth.

  “Yeah. Eating soylent brown and never leaving the house will do that to you.”

  “Eat up, both of you.” Vera advised. “Nutrition is important not just for physical workouts but also mental ones. We’ll be getting to the latter once we’re done eating.”