14
Stirring from hibernation, Vander yawned. The phantom pains of an achy body reminded him of the training from hell. From the look of darkness, he’d only been out a few hours. Pretty impressive recovery speed.
“Thought you’d died or something,” Zekiel called from just outside the boundary of the encampment. How Vander hadn’t heard the constant rap-thwap-tap slamming against the oak, he’d never know. “You’ve slept through the day. Couldn’t wake you for anything, but that’s no surprise. The Crucible’s not made for the lighthearted. People say I’m talented, but you seriously kicked ass.”
“What are you saying?” Vander sat up as hunger pangs that could give a happy torturer a run for his money lanced through his gut, warmth spreading up his spine before it slammed into the base of his neck like a spike and chisel. “Damnation! Argh!”
“About the reaction I’d expected.” Soft hands pressed him back down onto his back, and thick thighs straddled his chest as warm, tasty something or other entered his mouth. A wooden bowl and spoon hovered over his mouth, and behind them, Vanessa in her thin night outfit. He couldn’t avoid staring straight up at her two mounds, and they stared back. “Eat.” She jammed another spoonful in his mouth with far too much glee sparkling like ecstasy in her amber eyes.
No matter how many times he tried to resist, his body refused. Any buckling to throw her off only lit his cheeks and made him uncomfortably aware of her proximity, how silky smooth and soft her skin was against his. Acquiescence his only option, he scowled.
While he mechanically ate spoonful after spoonful, he dove head first into mental gymnastics to distract himself as well as he could. Every box he could check, he did. Circulation through all of his limbs, testing one property or another of the integrated skills to measure their efficiency, and theorizing a dozen and a half methods to get back at Vanessa.
But in all reality, he needed to know what the true net gains of the suffering he’d paid—hopefully for the last time. Zekiel talked as if the training Vander experienced was something common, but whether that was amongst nobility, swordsmen, or other, he couldn’t determine yet. Only the name echoed in his mind, cementing the experience of injustice and excruciating gains with a single word: Crucible.
Fuckers. He squinted towards the well endowed woman atop his chest. You too.
Gains, not women. Gains. Always and forever. With that in mind, he looked over the skill notifications he’d received.
Skill Tracking Enabled.
Default notification sound enabled: Heavenly Triumph.
You mean Demon Lord worship? If I ever hear that sound again, I… Just the thought, shudder. One wave changed the sound to that terribly sweet and evil tone to that of a cow’s moo. Moo, moo! Now that I’ve taken care of that, onward and upward as they say.
Toggled Skill Tracking List:
True Lightning Proficiency
Meditation
Braxton Breathing Technique
Magic Body
Swordsmanship
He added Braxton Sword Arts to the list and checked the last of the notifications.
Skill Tracking for Event: I swear these people are masochists
Final Report:
True Lightning Proficiency
Initial level recorded: 3
Final level recorded: 17
Congratulations on your explosive growth!
Meditation
Initial level recorded: 65
Final level recorded: 68
Slow and steady wins the race.
Braxton Breathing Technique
Initial level recorded: 23
Final level recorded: 36
Woah!
Magic Body
Initial level recorded: 15
Final level recorded: 25
You should take better care of yourself… you masochist.
Swordsmanship
Initial level recorded: 0
Final level recorded: 57
Are you trying to die, or what?
Even seeing the final results of his training wasn’t enough to ease the pain in his heart. Just thinking about swinging his sword again sent phantom pangs tingling through his fingers and up his arm to his shoulder and down his back.
Now if only that damnable man would tell me what the requirements for using the sword arts are, Vander grumbled internally. Then the timetable clicked into place. He calmed his beating heart rather than trying ineffectively to buck Vanessa off again and met her gaze. “Is he gone?”
She jammed a thumb over her shoulder and nimbly dismounted his chest. Knowing he shouldn’t didn’t change that his eyes trailed up her slim toned legs, thick thighs that could probably crush his neck, and stopped on a perfectly shaped as—hips. Respectable hips.
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Amber eyes met his pure blue and winked before she stalked away to some place that wasn’t here. For that, Vander felt appreciative. Maybe she wasn’t so bad…
Then the person he actively avoided making eye contact with reached a hand down to help him up, buzzing electrified mana through their fingertips that set Vander on overdrive. Like a battery on overdrive, he felt like he’d explode any second.
“Woops, a bit too much. Hard to control when working with fractions of a percent,” his dad muttered, grinning. “Feeling better? Seems like it if you’re playing around with that huntress.”
“I had nothing to do with that.” His reddening cheeks betrayed him.
“Sure.” Adrian turned and walked out of the camp wordlessly, and Vander followed, quickly finding stride at the man’s side. “What defines nobility?”
A test. “Not whoever’s in charge of Enari, that’s for sure.” Adrian paused mid step for but a moment and looked away, but not fast enough for Vander to miss the full faced grin. “Nobility isn’t something I quite understand. Merchants and hunters, even knights. Money to secure resources, such as food for citizens and livestock or construction material or to fashion weapons and armor. Food, simple. Everything that lives must eat. Security to ensure rules are followed and to apprehend or punish those incapable of following them.”
Adrian nodded along as Vander spoke. He seemed genuinely curious in the seemingly ambling and aimless drivel Vander spewed, not quite sure what the man wanted for an answer. Maybe just to pick his mind, but also maybe something else. With the truth revealed about who Adrian was, Vander stopped fooling himself into thinking he understood a damned thing about the man.
“I suppose the nobility are the rulers of the land, the organizers and enablers for people to live. Their rules govern the land. Their policies influence the minutiae of life but also dictate foreign and domestic diplomacy. Both simple and complex, that.” Vander nodded in satisfaction. “Nobility are leaders.”
“I agree with you. Now let me ask you this, what is someone who trains proficiency with a weapon?”
“A fighter. Wielding a sword, swordsman. Spear, spearman.”
“Simple. What of someone who trains magical proficiency?” Adrian smirked.
This time, Vander felt even less certain. “A mage?”
“Is that an answer or a question?” his dad retorted, raising a deft brow.
“A mage,” Vander repeated with confidence. “Practicing magic would make someone a mage.”
“But a noble could be both a swordsman and a mage?”
“We live as proof.” Vander gestured at the two of us. “So swords and magic or a dagger in the night, even a priestly prayer. All are tools to wield? That is what you’re saying?”
Adrian nodded. “To be a noble is to be given a label, a title demanding respect with the authority to control the lives of others. Tools like what class you choose are just that, tools, usable by anybody with the capacity to learn such things. You learned swordsmanship in but hours, and that has become another tool in your repertoire, but you’re still nobility without. Before, after, doesn’t matter.”
“I… see.” The title of successor, the son of a duke, made him nobility. “I’m following. Please continue.”
Voice firm and practiced, “A noble is more than their personal power and acts as a representative of their family. All actions taken by a noble affects the prestige their name carries. A noble is, as you say, a leader. A decision maker. Someone who holds life in their hands like clay, the lives of their people.”
The Department of Magical Handling and Abnormals came to mind. If such a hierarchy existed in his life as a Delver, then they’d been the nobility of his world. And they’d been shit at it. They made choices, sacrificed others for their own personal goals, and threw lives away carelessly for no other reason than their own amusement or entertainment.
Lives treated like clay. Even if the one sculpting the clay were the one to make a mistake, the piece would easily be discarded to start anew. Something easily shapeable until hard, and then too much pressure would shatter the final product without mercy. Regardless of a fine work or failure, even something as simple as the aesthetic of a piece of pottery, shaped and warped by its handler’s whims, determined whether the final product would be discarded or kept.
I’ll never be like them, Vander promised. They were scum, and he’d never stoop to their level. Had they made decisions with the interest of those who slaved for them at heart, year after year, instead of for their own greed and to cover their own asses, what worries would they have had? What would they have to fear when the world would unite under a leader who cherished and valued the blood, sweat, tears, and sacrifices made? Fuckers.
“I wish to be a good noble,” Vander muttered to himself more than Adrian as he stared at the ground in front of him. “I joked about Enari’s nobility, but I can’t stand them.”
A mask settled over Adrian’s face, one to hide his agreement. “You’ll be a good noble, my son. You are a Braxton, and what makes us Braxtons is not our breathing technique or sword arts. Those make us strong enough to defend our name and prestige and the authority commanded by it. We are Braxtons because of the responsibility of our name and the weight it carries, the burden of responsibility garnered through success, tried and true through generations.”
He stopped in the path and turned towards Vander. Vander followed his lead, attentive.
Adrian rested his hands on Vander’s shoulder, and they locked eyes. “We are Braxtons that carry a respectable name because of the trials and tribulations our ancestors have overcome, because of the path they've paved for us. And as such, that is our duty. To continue paving that never ending path, despite the unmistakable burden it places upon us. Each choice we make may cost a life, a dozen, even thousands, or it could lead to a golden age where our people flourish, happy and fat.”
The path of a noble, huh? Never thought I’d see the day. If I look at it like a challenge, I can see how much better than those damned DMHA bastards I can be. Resolved to take on the responsibility passed by Adrian, Vander nodded. “As I see it, a leader is nothing without the people they lead. Without people to lead, people to care for, a noble would be just another person. Like me.”
“Your time is coming, my son.” The night’s wind billowed as son and father prepared themselves, whipping the long grasslands into a fuss and tousling their hair. Neither blinked. “I’ll miss you, my son.”
“Before you go,” Vander said as Adrian dropped his arms and turned to depart for good, “the class advancement. What did you choose?”
Mirth flashed through the older Braxton’s face. “I’ve given you all the hints you need, Vander. And even if you don’t figure it out, I’m dying to see the path you choose to carve your name into history and bring honor to our family as you journey through this world.” Turning away, his final words floated through the air, echoing as he disappeared. “I love you, my son.”