CHAPTER 15 - ELITE TRAINING

Weapon practice was rough on Johnny. Margaret had pulled different weapons out of her wings giving Johnny different things to try. She started with swords, with two dull short swords she pulled from her wings. One for herself and one for him. Although her’s was a bit longer than his. “First, we will see how to work with a sword. You will be going defensive for the first part. Then you will go offensive next.” She said as she handed Johnny the sword.

Johnny only had experience with sword fighting in VR. He was confident he would do okay, but he needed to prove his worth. He sighed as he prepared to defend himself.

Margaret started the first session seeing how Johnny would react, she started out slowly at first to see how his reflexes were, picking up the speed when she was satisfied. She began pulling fast jabs and strikes at Johnny, who managed to parry most of the strikes but missed a good number. Soon it was impossible to block any as she was becoming a blur. With that she stopped.

“Okay, now you will go on the offensive.” She informed him. He took what experience he had from the VR game and tried to go at her with it. She managed to block everything he attacked with.

“Is this the best you can do?” She mocked Johnny raising her brow. Johnny didn’t say anything, only lowering his head. Margaret just sighed, pinching her nose. “I will see what else I can train you in. At least you are good with the blocking somewhat, it could use some improvement, but your attacks are poor.” She let out a frustrated tone with a huff in her breath.

She instructed Johnny to hand back the short sword. He handed it over as he watched her put his and her sword into her wings. She then went to test Johnny from axes, bows, lances, guns, and all sorts of other forms of combat. By the time they were done the sun was beginning to set.

Julia had come back just then. Margaret informed her Johnny lacked a lot of weapon skills but seemed to be most promising with the sword and guns. “He needs to work more on his attacks and his blocking could be better.” She informed Julia with concern.

“On the contrary, his marksmanship with guns and rifles is over my pay grade. He pretty much hit every target dead center.” She finished with an admired tone.

Julia nodded and informed Johnny he would be working on his swordsmanship with Margaret later the following morning. Tomorrow he will be working with Cleo on his physical forms.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

That evening Johnny tried to get to know the others better. The conversation went well until he tried to ask about their pasts. Sadly, no one was willing to much in depth about what they had been through. Apparently, the tone was a grim setting of just how bad things had been for the others, where they didn’t want to mention their pasts. He hoped in the near future they would open up.

Johnny went to his own tent and settled down for the night thinking what he was in for fighting in the future. He could only wonder what horrors the others must have faced.

—---------------------------------

Johnny woke up the next day, eating with the others, wondering what physically demanding tasks he'd be doing. While eating breakfast he wondered if he could have Albert assist him. “Hey Julia, can Albert accompany me in helping with the tasks?”

“No Johnny, you need to do this on your own. Who will help you if you are by yourself? You need to be capable of doing things on your own.” Replied Julia with a serious tone. Johnny just groaned while the others snickered. Johnny finished his breakfast and headed off with Cleo for his physical assessment. Qin assisted them knowing Cleo’s personality of being shy.

Cleo led him through the different tasks using gestures of what he needed to do. There were rare occasions where she did get frustrated and spoke, but barely. It was up to Qin to help with that.

He did many simple tasks such as seeing how much he could lift in weights, averaging around 350 lbs, which Johnny already knew by how much he bench pressed. To how much blunt force he could use, which surprised him with how much strength he had. By mid-morning Johnny was getting worn out. He was sweating and getting sluggish.

Julia noticed his performance falling off and called for a break. She helped Johnny by giving him some stamina potions to boost his performance while he took a quick reprisal. He continued on afterwards doing other simple tasks until lunch came around. He was relieved for a lunch break, by this point his mood was soon spoiled when he was told the tests were going to be more rigorous.

After everyone broke from lunch around the campsite. He was now having to do even harder tests that included multitasking. One challenge had him run through an obstacle course while being chased by phantom rift eaters.

By the time dinner rolled around Johnny was worn out and tired. He could barely move as his body was sweating and aching in pain all over. Julia came over to relieve him with a simple healing spell that got rid most of all his aches and pains. She even massaged him to help with his stress.

Cleo made her report to Julia after dinner. She was satisfied that Johnny was in physical form. Julia instructed Johnny that he only needed to do a minimum of at least two hours of physical training a day to keep up. She was going to have him train with Margaret on how to use a sword the rest of the time.

He was relieved of that, knowing he was in physical shape Johnny was going to be able to sleep better. Although, he dreaded tomorrow as well. Tomorrow he was going to be working on how to use a sword properly. Johnny said good night to everyone as he got a shower and went to bed immediately falling asleep as soon as he hit his cot.