Standing on the hard packed dirt that was the melee training course’s “classroom”, Kaden felt excited.

Before the lesson, the instructor had told him to skip the first year course, and show up to the second year course instead, which was right after.

He was itching to fight some stronger opponents and push himself to his limit. He had no doubt that he would be put through his paces here, because even the weakest second year was without a doubt stronger than anyone in his own year. After all, they had a head start and had already been entering dungeons for a while.

In the distance, he saw Instructor Wynter walking towards him. It was hard to miss the tall and broadly built man, especially when he was carrying what looked like a shiny new metal spear in one hand, and waving at him with the other.

The man’s large steps quickly brought him over, and after they shared a quick greeting, the instructor passed him the spear.

Kaden took it with both hands and fell forward, only barely managing to adapt to the weight of it and stay on his feet. It was far heavier than he had expected.

“What is this?” He eyed the instructor, his gaze laden with mistrust.

“Your new weapon, at least while you’re attending this course,” Instructor Wynter stated matter-of-factly.

Kaden creased his brows, feeling somewhat doubtful. Just holding the spear was already a struggle for him, it weighed more than a fully grown man. How could he possibly fight with it?

“How the hell is this supposed to help me?” He said, already getting an ominous feeling. Whatever this instructor of his had planned, it wasn’t a good thing.

“I never said it was—“ The instructor said and held a hand up to forestall Kaden’s protest. “Let me finish first. I never said that it would help you, but if you can overcome this disadvantage, both your skill and fighting instinct will improve by leaps and bounds.”

His interest peeked, Kaden asked, “How?”

“Usually, we make first years use light training weapons with blunt edges and lots of padding, to minimize damage as much as possible. As a general rule, the lighter a blunt weapon is, the less force you can put behind an attack. But, if your strength is a lot higher than your opponent’s vitality, this becomes irrelevant. At that point you could seriously hurt them even without a weapon, as their skin, bones, and muscles, aren’t hard enough to withstand the impact.”

Kaden nodded, this wasn’t anything he hadn’t heard before. “I still don’t see the point, though. Now you’ve just given me a weapon that will seriously injure anyone I hit.”

“Ahh, but that’s the key right there, isn’t it? Anyone you hit. With your strength, and trust me I’ve judged it carefully, you won’t be able to move that hunk of iron fast enough to hit anyone. Even an old cripple can get out of the way in time. And since your movements will be so slow, you can’t perform a proper strike with that spear. Even if you touch someone, you’d just be slowly pushing them. That won’t injure anyone.”

Instructor Wynter gave him a challenging look before continuing.

“To overcome this weakness, your only choice is to evolve as a fighter, and learn to predict your opponent’s attacks and plan ahead. Until then,” The instructor grinned devilishly, “well you can’t block if your movements are too slow, so you’ll have to take a few beatings. Serving as a punching bag for the second years will help you learn quicker though.” Finished, the instructor’s grin turned into full-blown laughter.

Kaden’s just watched, utterly baffled by what he was seeing. In the beginning, when he first met him, this man had seemed like such a serious person. Now he was anything but.

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His expression grew sour as he realized what this lesson was going to be like for him. And after noticing the look on his face, the instructor just laughed even harder.

Right then, Kaden was one hundred percent sure that this man knew his father very well, their actions and laughter overlapping in his head.

“This…” Kaden looked around, gulping as the second years arrived one by one. He prided himself on his determination and will, but he was starting to feel nervous now. Everyone here was ahead of him, and he did not know what level they had reached. They were all at least level five, but some had probably even reached level 10.

“Let’s not waste any more time. Class is about to begin. Oh, I almost forgot.” The instructor took a set of leather-like armor out of his storage crystal. “Here’s your protective suit, punching bag. Can’t have you getting hurt too badly in my class.” The instructor winked and walked off, leaving him.

Holding the worn-through armor in his hands, Kaden released out a dark sigh. Yeah, there was no doubt that man and his father knew each other, even that wink was the same.

Submitting to his fate, he put the armor on, piece by piece. When the last thing, a bracer, was tightened securely around his wrist, he started scanning the training grounds, innerly wishing that he could either turn invisible, or that no one would spot him. At least that way, he wouldn’t have to fight anyone.

But things had a habit of not turning out the way you hoped, and he knew the instructor had no intention of letting him off easy like that.

That thought was confirmed when Kaden saw the instructor talking to a pair of older students and pointing towards him. The man was undoubtedly trying his best to provoke them into challenging him.

And indeed, his thoughts were correct. The moment the instructor finished talking to the students, their eyes turned to his, and stalked across the dirt training field, anger in their steps.

Releasing another sigh, Kaden closed his eyes, and tried to channel some of that unwavering will he was so proud of.

“Hey! Instructor Wynter told us what you said, you think you’re better than us little firstie? Huh, do you? You’re so arrogant, just because you got moved up a year, doesn’t mean you’re worth shit.” A student with a face that shared more resemblance with a horse’s than a man’s, spat on the ground near his feet.

“Let’s just get this over with,” Kaden muttered, rolling his eyes at the student’s immature behavior. It was no use to try and explain himself, the instructor would just keep sending over students until he was forced to fight. And well, there was the whole training aspect too. The instructor wasn’t doing this for no reason, so if he needed to take a beating to get stronger, he would.

“So arrogant. Honestly, I like that. Let’s fight.” The horse-faced student grinned and hefted his weapon, a large two-handed sword.

***

Kaden winced as he dragged his body towards the dormitory. Never before had the campus seemed so big, as he moved at a snail’s pace, his body aching the entire time.

Unfortunately, the classes and all the student lodgings were placed on opposite sides of the academy’s main building, and were about as far away from each other as possible.

Technically, he had one more course left today, but he was in no mood to attend it right now. And it was just that useless skill theory class, anyway.

His body was beaten black and blue from all the sparring, which was on a whole other level in the second year class. The students weren’t only stronger; they were also far more skilled, and fights didn’t stop at the first blow. It hadn’t helped that Kaden was unwilling to give up and back down from any fights. But whether that was stupidity or bravery was hard to say, as it just meant every opponent had more time to beat on him, while he desperately tried to block their blows. He hadn’t even had time to think about attacking.

At one point, he had been close to throwing down his weapon and using his fists instead. But that would be the same as giving up, so he didn’t.

Thinking about the future, he didn’t see a way to overcome this weakness of his. Short of waiting until the second semester where they would start entering dungeons and he could increase his strength, there was nothing he could do. Despite trying for a whole lesson, with an endless supply of students to spar with, provided by the kind instructor of course, he had made no progress in predicting his opponent’s attacks.

He didn’t even know where to start, and Instructor Wynter hadn’t given him much to go on. It wouldn’t be any help to go to his father either, as that man definitely had a hand in this. Hell, for all he knew, his father had been the one to arrange it.

But at least that thought gave him some motivation and confidence. This disastrous training method couldn’t be for no reason, right? He trusted his father.

Arriving in his dorm room, he had barely set his things down when he collapsed in his bed. He could think more about all that stuff later, for now, he needed some rest.