Aionios muscle?

I look down at the huge sword and squat down again while Magister Mulligan's words resound in my head.

Magical muscle fibers… you just have to die from pain, Joey, no biggie, I moan internally, gripping the sword's hilt.

This time, when the pain comes, it's in smaller waves. I'm barely pulling or exerting any strength whatsoever. Still, it feels like I'm plunging half a dozen syringes into my arms and twice that into my back.

I last maybe ten seconds before releasing and falling on my butt.

"Christ," I mutter, exhausted. "They make it look much easier in video games and mangas."

I shoot a glance at Magister Mulligan, but, as per usual, he just stares back in his sphynx-like manner.

My legs tremble slightly when I get up again to grip the sword.

This must get easier at some point…

…

Ten minutes later, guess what?

It did not get any easier.

If anything, my body is now going through random spasms, and I can feel lumps below the skin on my arms. As you already know, I do have problems with anxiety. Some of those made me a bit of a hypochondriac. Feeling lumps under my skin after less than ten minutes of this exercise is frightening.

I place my hand on one just below my wrist. It's roughly half an inch in size and a quarter of an inch in height.

"What's this?" I say, showing my wrist to the [Archmage].

"Nothing out of the ordinary," the old man replies.

I don't even have the strength to argue about this disgusting thing. Thank God there's no Google to convince me that I just caught magical cancer, though.

When I squat down and grab the sword again – something that I'm becoming disgustingly familiar with and terrified of – I feel deep mental exhaustion settling in.

It's the kind of exhaustion you get after discovering your friend's mom has cancer, having a panic attack, accepting a duel that could get you exiled from the only city you know in the world, and having foolishly accepted a training that, from the looks of it, might very well kill me.

This is all I've ever feared in my life, I ponder. Entering med school and finding a miserable life on the other side of that door.

I shun the thought away, gripping the sword—I try to put some courage into my grip. I genuinely don't want to die. I don't want to half-ass this thing.

But I'm already so tired. So damn tired.

I shake my head.

Can't be fucking dying like this, I start swearing in my mind. I'll send my apologies once I'm out of this.

"Come on, son of bitch," I say out loud, starting to pull and grunting at the first blasts of pain. "COME ON, BITCH! AAAAH!"

I release a long shout as I slowly increase the force I'm putting into my legs.

If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

"FUUUUCK! MOOOVE! MOOOVE, SON OF BITCH! MOOOOOOVE!"

By mistake, I put too much strength into my legs, and the pain that shoots through my body knocks me out.

My next blink shows me the fake sky above.

"Holy Christ," I say, feeling some wetness at the corners of my eyes. "I'm really going to fucking die, aren't I?" Those last few words come out of my mouth in a whisper. "I'm going to die for real. I should have never accepted—"

"Joey Luciani," Magister Mulligan clears his voice. "You just spent forty seconds pulling up the sword. Before, you could barely grab it for ten. You’ve just made incredible progress."

I look at the long-bearded old man with a comically large wizard hat on his head.

"Listen," I say, propping myself up on my elbows, "forty seconds or ten seconds—what's the difference? Realistically, how long before I can bear the pain? And then, how long before I can fucking lift the sword?"

Magister Mulligan purses his lips and looks around, fixing his gaze on the puppet before returning to me. He seems to hesitate.

"Joey Luciani," he says, spelling out my name with a little doubt, "I have never had to deal with this."

"What? With… training? Didn't you train the two guys? The… their names end in -er?"

"Yes. Skialaer and Filaer. What I'm trying to say is that I've never met someone whose problem is willpower. Among the Vanedeni, you could find people with exceptional willpower, even by our standards. [Princess] Valarith is the best example—she wasn't a full [Hero] when she gave her life for Mauser. She wasn't supposed to win. She did it out of pure willpower."

"So what? You just underestimated how much willpower I've got to spare, and I'm going to fucking die at the hand of a puppet?" I tell him, exasperated.

"That is one possibility," he nods.

"Listen, man," I say, brushing my fingers through my hair, "I feel like my nerve endings are getting worse. Sure, I held on for forty seconds now, but it felt like I was going to die. I really don't think I can do this. This would have been fine if it was a movie, and I could have training-montaged my way out of it… but this? No way. No fucking way."

Magister Mulligan inhales deeply before adjusting the big hat on his head.

"Young Luciani, you are going to die if you give up. I don't devise a way for me to interrupt training. I did not do it with the Omnium Compendium, and I did not do it here. I can't shuttle you out of this dimension."

"Great," I say, sitting on the ground, putting my head between my knees.

Is this how I meet my end? A training montage gone fucking wrong?

The funny thing is that I thought this would genuinely be it, you know? I thought this would be like me staying at a college dorm and having fun messing around with great magic.

Fuck me.

It wasn't supposed to be like this.

It was supposed to be magical…

I swallow a lump in my throat as rivulets of tears stream down my cheeks.

"Young man," Magister Mulligan says, not calling me by my name, probably for the first time since I've met the guy. "Look up."

I sense some slight uncertainty in his words, but I do.

"This was never supposed to be easy. You were never supposed to come to this world. How that happened is still a mystery—even to me. But now, you have shown to be made from a different cut. You, Joey Luciani, have talent. I won't coddle you and tell you that we can find a way to avoid this training. You will get killed by the puppet if you can't defend yourself. And you will have to fight for twenty-three hours straight. It will be the worst thing you have ever faced in your life."

"This doesn't sound very encouraging," I say, looking up at him.

"It is not supposed to be. If you tell a Vanedeni child that they have talent but not willpower, you have forever ruined them. We push our offspring to be better than they ever thought they could be. We don't let them think themselves to the state you are currently in. Some perish, true. The rest, however, raise above everyone else. Even those who died are remembered by every brother, sister, and friend. Everyone knows they died while trying to be a true Vanedeni.

"So," Magister Mulligan continues, "listen to me, Joey Luciani. And listen very well, child. The pain you’ve just experienced is something you are going to go through regardless of what skill, class, or technique you use. There's no way around the pain. There's no dulling it in any way. The Runes make it impossible. They would bypass even a [Berserker]'s capstone skill at level 40, much less anything you could come up with."

"What am I supposed to do then?"

"Early on," Magister Mulligan launches into an explanation, "there were many far too fond of the Empathetic school of magic. The Vanedeni… we were never too flexible in some regards. It's the reason my people suffer now —when you never bend, you either always win or, at some point, you are reduced to ashes.

"I have no fondness for weakness, young Luciani. None. But I can bestow one last gift before you complete this training."

"I have no idea what you are trying to say," I tell the man, exasperated.

"You are about to be privy to one of the great secrets of my people," the man announces solemnly. "That's what it means."