After relaxing and spending time together for the evening. The lot went to bed after dinner. Thankfully, there wasn’t an unwanted intrusion this time.
Come the next morning, they were actually awoken early morning by a knock on the door and then two envelopes being pushed under the door. As Akai and Kidd slowly got up, they heard the same thing happened next door. Going one by one through the dorm.
Akai was the first out of bed so he grabbed both and tossed Kidd’s onto his bed. They were marked with their names and Akai opened his. It was a bundle of papers related to the academy. The first page would be their set schedule. When not on any special business or direction from a member of the staff heads, they would default to this. Akai and Kidd compared schedules and they were relatively lined up. Though, a few things Akai had in the morning Kidd had in the evening, but they both had the early mornings dedicated to fitness training with sigurd, then back again after lunch for physical combat training. Different classes in between and after combat training, Depending on the day, Akai would be alternating between herbalist classes, Craft classes, Enchanting classes, magic classes, and academic lectures. Weekends were free from most classes but the specialized studies were free to join.
Each day had free time between classes as well as a free period after fitness in the morning.
This schedule was not set in stone, depending on how they perform the Academy would be willing to make changes to help encourage someone into furthering a specialty they develop.
Akai and Kidd got dressed before reading ahead, reading that the mess halls serve breakfast in the mornings from sunrise to 2 hours after before they clear the tables to get prepared for lunch. Lunch is served from noon to 2 hours after, before clearing the tables for dinner, and dinner is served from evening until bed time. Akai looked out the window and realized it had been sunrise when they had been woken up. So they got ready and headed out to the mess hall first, meeting up with Lamorie who was being trailed by Langyao.
Langyao gave them a small glare but ignored them entirely. Though, she was heard muttering under her breath “The choices of food are strange..” as they were given meal choices of bread rolls, fried eggs, something made from potatoes, porridge, fried sausages, cold cuts of meat, and hard cheeses.
After breakfast, they noticed it was a total of 6 of them heading straight to Sigurd’s training field. The first fitness class starts at 7, and from the time pieces in the mess hall it was around 6 now.
Kidd, Akai, Lamorie, that girl Akai had accidentally annoyed during the trip here, Langyao, and another boy who was the tallest of the group and looked quite strong. Looking bulky despite their uniform doing its best to make them look normal.
They began idly chatting as they walked, Langyao pointedly ignoring them all. Today was the third day here and she already had a reputation spreading among the girls about being fairly rude and haughty.
Reaching the training field, they saw Sigurd himself finishing his own exercises. He was shirtless and they could see the various scars on his body from his time, and why he is the former head of the royal guard. On his side was a nasty scar that looked like he had suffered a wound he was lucky to survive. Akai had the image of a sword or large axe cleaving into him, luckily being stopped before it could sever his spine and cripple the older man.
Sigurd has a sturdy body of impressive muscles, though it was quickly covered when he stood up straight and grabbed a shirt from where it was sitting on a rack of sparring gear. He put it back on and said “Good, I didn’t have to hunt any of you down.” as he eyed over the 6 of them.
His eyes landed on the tall boy. “Your first name, your affinity, and your patron. I do not care about your last name. Noble titles mean nothing to me, even if it’s a member of the Legon Royal family.”
The tall boy said “Jeice. Soul affinity. Blessed by Niohlenth, god of death.”
“Soul, huh? Very rare, always unique, I’m eager to see how you use it.” Sigurd said before turning to Langyao. Repeating himself and receiving
“Langyao, sir, Fire affinity, Blessed by the immortal hero.” she said, speaking formally to Sigurd.
“Interesting.” He said, giving a nod. Then turning to the other girl.
“Anna, earth affinity, Blessed by Ankhou, god of war.”
Seeing as sigurd was going down the line, the trio didn’t need to wait for him to speak. They spoke when he turned to them.
“Lamorie, water affinity, Blessed by Miogh, God of strength.”
“Kidd, Lightning affinity, Blessed by Ankhou,
“Akai, Fire affinity, Blessed by The Immortal Hero.”
Sigurd stood before them and after taking a moment to acknowledge them, he split them into pairs.. Sigurd was above petty squabbles so the fast he paired Lamorie with Langyao must have been a coincidence. And there was no way to know of the embarrassing moment in the caravan where Akai mistook Anna for Lamorie just because they both had the same hair.
Langyao and Lamorie were going to spar under his supervision.
Then it would be Kidd and Jeice.
And then Akai and Anna.. Who still seemed to give him odd looks out of the corner of her eye.
“You will spar until I tell you to stop.” and Langyao only smiled, walking to an open place on the field and turning, waiting for Lamorie.. Lamorie hesitated and asked
“Why are we sparring before class begins?” to which Sigurd simply responded
“To test you”
Lamorie didn’t like the look Langyao had on her face, but reluctantly walked out. Stopping at a distance she knows Akai and Kidd normally started their spars at. Suddenly, Sigurd shouted “Begin!”
Lamorie didn’t spar much at all, so she wasn’t really prepared. But she had a few times over the years. Though, Langyao was quick, almost as quick as Kidd was. Wisps of violet fire enveloped Langyao as she launched forwards and Lamorie barely had time to bring her own power to bear and try to dodge. But when she moved to the side, Langyao adapted easily. Visibly having much more experience than Lamorie did, but the other 4 probably did as well.. It was Akai’s and Kidd’s fault she was being roped into this mess.
Lamorie brought up her arms to block a kick that was going right for her head and was knocked off her feet from the force.. She rolled to the ground and was scared that aggressive wolf was going to be on her but Langyao didn’t pursue. She waited for Lamorie to get back on her feet before rushing in again.. The hit was hard, very hard, Lamorie was going to have bruises on her arms as a result. But she thought she could take at least one hit like that head on, and she knew she could hit Langyao as hard as a runaway freight wagon… Resolving her plan, Lamorie planted her feet and reeled back a fist to strike when Langyao got in range, prepared to feel the pain of another strike.. But when Langyao moved in, Lamorie swung, she did not feel the pain she expected.. Langyao was overestimating Lamorie and tried to dodge early to the side, then move in to grapple the outstretched arm.. But Lamorie was a bit slow on her punch and threw a poorly structured haymaker instead of a proper punch like it looked like she would..
When Lamorie finally took the moment to actually take in what happened. Langyao was a good 30ft away and slumped over. Lamorie’s knuckles bruised as she ended up hitting the wolf girl right in the ribs.. She had gotten lucky and Langyao didn’t..
“That’s enough.” he said as he walked over to check on Langyao, who rolled over onto her stomach and began coughing and wheezing.. Lamorie saw blood come out from her mouth and suddenly felt guilty about actually injuring her.. As rude as Langyao had been, Lamorie didn’t want to end up actually injuring her.
Sigurd was gently patting the area she was hit and checking over the teen. Then saying “You stopped your attack at the last minute and devoted your powers to reinforcing your body. Your ribs aren’t broken but they would have been if you were any slower..” as both a bit of praise and admonishment to Langyao. He helped her to her feet and Langyao was now glaring daggers at Lamorie. Before her temper could begin building, Sigurd began walking Langyao off the field and said “Head to the infirmary. You are well enough to walk. Slow, deep breaths.”
Reluctantly, Langyao actually listened. She was holding her side and wincing with every other deep breath as she began walking away.. Lamorie had a gut feeling this was not going to end well later with her.
“As for you.” Sigurd shouted, giving Lamorie a strong disapproving glare.
“You were slow, it was pure luck you landed a hit and didn’t get taken down again. Your form was sloppy, your control was awful.”
Lamorie lowered her head and Sigurd asked. “You apprentice as a blacksmith, don’t you?”
Lamorie nodded, saying “Yes, both my parents are.”
“You move just like Grinwald does. He has immaculate control with a hammer but awful control with an empty fist.”
Lamorie felt like sulking a little, she didn’t deserve to win that spar. She sighed and Sigurd said “I will fix those problems through combat training” as he put a hand on her shoulder.. Then saying “Now, I expect you to run laps around the field. Your fitness class begins early.”
Next, Jeice and Kidd walked onto the field. Taking a measured distance and simple stances. Sigurd shouted “Begin!” and in a flash Kidd was upon Jeice. But after a moment, Kidd had to jump back as a knee almost caught his stomach in response. A white powerful aura surrounded Jeice as Kidd and Akai watched how his soul affinity worked.
The white aura around Jeice flared and seemed to flow upwards around him while he squared his stance. Then rocketed forwards with speed similar to Kidd’s own. Jeice was taller, larger, and similarly skilled to Kidd’s usual training partner.. His affinity was harnessing power from his own being to empower his body. Kidd smirked as he dodged a strike and knew how to handle this. Though, his thoughts of Jeice being similar to Akai was broken when he tried to block a follow up punch by batting away the strike and failing to make Jeice budge. Kidd turned with the hit so it didn’t rattle him but it felt like his fist was unstoppable.
This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
When Kidd backstepped to make a little distance, he saw that white aura form roughly into a ball in Jeice’s hand and when he threw it, Kidd was unable to block or dodge it. Too fast even for him and even with lightning coursing through him at almost full power. Kidd tried to block it concentrating his lightning in his hands but the ball completely ignored his power’s attempt to interfere.. Kidd was knocked backwards onto his back and Jeice rushed over. Wanting to go ahead and put an end to this duel. Kidd wasn’t sure how this soul affinity worked and was a bit scared about how the spar had been going so far. Kidd quickly kicked out, trying to trip Jeice’s leg as he approached but just like before, it felt like he was kicking immovable steel. Kidd let out a curse in pain as Jeice took a stance that looked like he was going to strike but intentionally hesitated.. Jeice wanted Sigurd to call it, which a moment later he did.
“Enough!”
Jeice took a step back and extended a hand to help Kidd get up, which he did take. Jeice said “You’re strong.” He complimented. Kidd gave a small smile of respect, definitely wanting to ask for a rematch later.. Sigurd approached and said “Kidd, you are fast and your form is good, but you expected an equal fight despite not knowing your opponent.”
Sigurd turned to Jeice and said “You relied on your rare affinity to catch Kidd off guard. You had no way of knowing he was unprepared. Too risky.”
“Both of you did good, I expect nothing less of an early awakened and the son of a champion.” He said finally, praising them as he nodded his head. “Start running.” Both Kidd and Jeice smiled and nodded. Kidd knew he awakened early but now he was curious what he meant by calling Jeice the son of a champion.. He would have to learn directly from the taller boy.
Next, Akai and Anna were standing apart from one another. She was facing him but her gaze was averted. They were waiting for Sgurd to tell them to start, but before that could happen Anna said “I’m not going to be your girlfriend, too.”
That startled Akai, causing a faint flush to appear on his face. He asked “Wh-what?” as he couldn’t think of where this was coming from. He quickly thought back to the one and only time they interacted. He sent forwards little birds of fire to get her attention, but thought she was Lamorie because he couldn’t get a good look besides the hair..
Also what the heck did she mean by too? He didn’t have a-
“Begin!” Sigurd shouted suddenly, pulling Akai’s mind away from the confusion. He didn’t know her skill level so he didn’t want to end up hurting her by overestimating her. A few motes of flame swirled around him as he saw Anna’s skin turn to a greyish color and a matte texture. Her earth affinity making her skin similar to stone. They stood for a moment, both hesitating to take offense first. But Akai ultimately stepped first, he moved forwards and threw a few testing strikes to probe her defense. Anna threw an arm to knock away Akai’s fist and tried to counter it, but she was slow in his eyes. Akai shifted to the side to dodge and continued pressing, not trying to overwhelm her at first. Though, Anna seemed to notice and got an upset and angry look on her face. Akai blocked as she went on the offense and deflected or dodged a few strikes before he noticed she was about to trick him with a feint. It looked like she was going to go for another punch but he saw her weight shift away from her rear leg as she readied a sneaky kick.
He ignored the feint and planted his feet, raising an arm and blocking the kick directly. It hurt, Anna was much stronger than she appeared and Akai slid a few inches as the kick hit his forearm and shoulder. It also felt like he was hit with a weapon and not a leg, her stone skin made her own body a weapon.. But he wasn’t going to waste this opportunity he gave himself. Pain could be ignored. He stepped in and threw a well structured punch to her stomach that she couldn’t effectively dodge while still on one leg. But Akai’s fist felt like he just punched a solid boulder. Anna did stumble backwards but damn did that hurt.. Anna seemed to not be in any pain from the hit either. She regained her footing and looked a little heated now.
The two continued for a few minutes, Akai was scared to hit harder and despite being much slower than Kidd, she was still a very skilled fighter and growing frustrated with every blocked or dodged attack she threw out.
Eventually, Sigurd said “enough!” and they stopped, Akai breathing steady but Anna was breathing harder because she was putting in too much effort at the end.
“Anna, control your temper! You are losing focus on what you’re doing and overexerting yourself.” Sigurd shouted but he was approaching Akai. He glared and said “And you, Akai, take the spar seriously. You hesitate with every strike and you hold back what I had seen you capable of against Kidd. You will not be able to seriously injure Anna here and even if you do, that is why we have a very highly trained healer in our infirmary!”
Sigurd placed a solid hand on Akai’s head which startled him and said “Apologize to Anna immediately for showing her such disrespect.” as he made Akai turn his head back towards the girl. Her stone skin was fading away and she looked.. Genuinely upset over this.. He begun to say “I’m sorry, I-” but was cut off by her shouting “Langyao was right about you!” before she began to stomp off, then starting to run, joining the others.
“There is no greater disrespect you can show another fighter than by not taking them seriously.” Sigurd said, then not so gently shoving Akai and saying “Run”. in a stern tone.
The five of them had been running until the first fitness class started, which they were made to join as well. Langyao had returned in time for the 2nd half of the class looking much better. And ever since Anna and Langyao had spoken, she gave dirty glares to both Akai and Lamorie.
Kidd and Jeice seemed to be getting along as they exercised.
Running laps, push ups, sit ups, then were made to do sword drills until their time for the class was over. All of them were left as a sweaty mess afterwards. Sigurd shouted at everyone to take 10 minutes to rest then head to their dorm buildings to clean themselves before their next class. Which nobody complained about.
Half an hour later, Akai, Kidd, and Jeice were sitting in the common room. Clean, hair still damp, and relaxing on a lush sofa before it was time to leave.
“So, what did Sigurd mean by calling you the son of a champion?” Kidd eventually asked. Jeice looked over at them and said “Right, you two aren’t from around here are you?” before continuing. “My father is the current Arena Champion for Thedifell. He became an arena fighter when he retired from adventure work.”
“Arena fighter?” Akai asked, interested. Kidd was perked up by the information as well.
“The city arena, they host tournaments a few times a year for mundane fighters. My father has been the champion for the past 3 years.”
“Mundane?” Akai asked before he could really think about it. Then he realized what he meant but it was too late to take back his question.
“I’m the only member of my family to be blessed.” Jeice deadpanned.
Akai rubbed the back of his head for a bit before asking a question that actually had a little merit to it.
“Why couldn’t Kidd block your attacks?” and Jeice shrugged. He didn’t see a real reason to deny them the information so he said, facing Kidd, “You lacked the willpower.”
This confused them both but Kidd spouted “What? What do you mean I lack willpower.”
Jeice sad “My affinity makes use of my own will, combining it with my body. If your will doesn’t match my own, you can’t stop me or slow me. I was putting a lot of myself in that spar.”
Kidd sat up and thought about it for a moment.. He wasn’t really giving it everything he had. If he was, would it have been enough?
Jeice then said in a joking tone. “At least you tried to put up a fight.” while giving Akai a look. Akai sulked back in the seat and muttered “I was scared I’d hurt her. I only ever sparred with Kidd before.”
Kidd then came to Akai’s defense and said “Yeah, your control is pretty good but if you actually tried to take her seriously, you’d be hitting almost as hard as Lamorie does when she’s serious. Anna would be lucky if her bones didn’t break, even with that defensive thing she was doing.”
“Really?” Jeice asked and Kidd nodded. “Akai pushes his speed to his limits when against me, but when he doesn’t need to strain to keep up He’s almost as strong as Lamorie. And Lamorie wasn’t putting her all into that punch that floored Langyao.”
Jeice looked over Akai with an appraising look. He didn’t look as strong as Kidd claimed but looks could be deceiving with their powers. Jeice then said “well, we can put that to the test later.”
Jeice began to get up onto his feet. He nodded to the time piece of the wall and said “About time to head to the central building for classes.”
Kidd and Akai both nodded and got up, they grabbed their uniform jackets and headed out.
A bit later, they separated into different classrooms and Akai was introduced to the wonderful world of schoolwork. His teacher wasn’t Lady Mirella, instead one of the teachers under Lady Mirella. Akai was put through a while of being tested on how well he could read, write, and do math. He was better than expected coming from a small countryside village but not on a level the teacher was seemingly happy with.
For the next hour and a half, Akai was putting pencil to paper as he and a handful of other first years were going through a workbook of different questions and problems. Akai hadn’t done this much writing at once before so his hand was cramping by the end but he signed the collection of schoolwork with his name and was finally excused from the class. He was rubbing his hand and a few of the other kids were too when they were let free. Getting a few light hearted chuckles from the others who were more accustomed to writing and schooling. Akai didn’t care about that, though.. He wanted to know why someone was buying over 40 bushels of apples in that one section. That’s too many apples for one person to buy.
Elsewhere,
Lamorie was finishing her first project working with Mr. Cragfall. She was still tired from having to exercise so much this morning but despite the strain to her aching body, working in a smithy always brought her comfort. It just felt natural for her. She was among other students also working here either due to proficiency in this line or work, their blessing catering them to this kind of work, or both like herself.. Her task was very simple, she told him she already knew how to forge so he did not make her go through a simple test to get used to the practice of forming hot metal. She pulled the well defined knife blank from the tempering oven in the back of the workshop. She set it on a rack to finish air cooling and Grinwald stepped over to look at it.
As if the metal wasn’t hot enough to sear a steak on still, Grinwald simply grabbed it without issue and began inspecting it with his bare hands, completely unbothered by the temperature of the metal. He said “Good shape, well formed, but it’s still blunt.” he said before casually saying “Ya got good talent but you got too many bad habits from your home forge.”. Lamorie was caught off guard and said “Of course it’s still blunt, I haven’t taken it to the grinding wheel yet!” as if the idea of her able to forge the blade fully sharp was ridiculous. Which it was. But Grinwald gave a cheeky smirk and said “Girl!” as he patted her back. “You’re a smith blessed by Miogh, you only have a water affinity instead of an earth affinity, sure, but you have the ability to go far beyond what any mundane smith would be able to.”
Lamorie stared at him before asking “And how would I keep the edge in a straight line if I hammer it that way while it’s still hot?”
“I’ll make sure you learn how, girl. But a grindstone is a way to smooth out the imperfections of your forging. Any half decent blessed smith wouldn’t be caught dead using a grindstone. It’s admitting their forging is shit.”
Grinwald did look over the knife again, this time just visually, and said “Prove to me you have the gumption to pursue greatness, girl, and I’ll make sure you are able to reach it.” before turning and shouting “No! What the hell are you doing!” before rushing over to a different part of the workshop. Away from the forge and to where a 2nd year student was. Next thing they knew a loud boom shook the ground and black smoke was rising from where a student was trying to cut some kind of gem to shape, but said gem was now missing. Grinwald was shouting about how unbelievably stupid it was to try and use an infernus crystal for their work. Chastising the kid as he said “You JUST got out of the infirmary and now look at you!”
Two other students let out a loud sigh and got up, and began to help walk the freshly injured kid back to the infirmary.
The infirmary where a red headed wolf girl was finally being allowed to leave. She was helped up from a bed and winced as her side still ached, but the healer that had helped her said “Now, that will be quite tender for a while, but everything is back to normal.”
Langyao got to her feet and brought her hands together in front of her and bowed deeply. “Thank you very much, Healer.” she said formally, addressing the healer with a title in her native language that the healer did not know. They said “It’s fine, it’s fine. Just be more careful about things in the future. Now go, you don’t want to miss too much of your new classes.”
Langyao held the bow for a few moments longer before standing straight and leaving. She frowned deeply when she was alone and thinking back on what happened.. How could she lose that spar? That girl was lucky, sure, lucky enough to be chosen by the god of strength.. But Langyao was chosen by the Immortal Hero. She should be the stronger fighter. She needed to be the stronger fighter. The immortal hero had told her to grow in strength and be the strongest.
She scowled indignantly at her own failure.. Langyao remembered what she was supposed to do here.. Why she was here in the first place. And what happened to send her to this academy. It was still a fresh wound in her mind.
