“What’s wrong with your leg?” asked a student while Demund was packing his things. His arms were crossed, and he had a frown on his face—his lips were pursed. “Got into an accident?”

Demund looked up from his bag and stared directly into the student’s eyes.

“It got run over by a car. They had to amputate it,” he said with a smile.

The student’s frown grew deeper.

“Oh…okay, then.”

Without saying anything more, the student retreated to the side of the class where his other friends were waiting at. Demund heard them leave the class, and he thought he heard some snickers from the distance. It could have been his imagination.

Demund had never cared to socialize, and the mood for the special class made it harder to do so. Not that he cared that much anyway. His hands were too tied with the new material he was learning, as well as training with his friends. And most importantly—

“Demund.”

He zipped up his bag and looked up once more. Enariss had approached him with a small smile on her face. A kind smile.

“What’s up?”

“I need to attend a short meeting with one of the club supervisors. Can you head to the club without me?”

Demund nodded. “Yeah. Will I see you there?”

“Yup. It won’t take longer than thirty minutes.”

Demund got up from his seat and slung his bag over his back. After making sure his prosthetic was well-adjusted, he stretched his arms.

“See you there.”

With a wave of her hand and a dance of crimson hair, Enariss left the classroom like the wind. Demund heard her footsteps grow further away, and he brushed his hair to the side and squeezed his fists.

The new environment was just so exciting. The material was actually not as difficult as he imagined it would be and attending the MMA Club after school with his friends was just amazing. Though if he had a slight problem, it would be that the stump on his leg would sometimes get a rash due to the constant rubbing and pressure.

That was the biggest of his problems. Meaning that he was having a splendid school life.

Though he did have one complaint.

He exited the school building and reached the club building. After a hearty push on the iron doors, he entered the club. There were relatively few people as he had come straight after school had ended, so he made use of the time by changing into the school’s sportswear in the men’s locker room.

On the doorway of the room, a student moved to the side to avoid him. But he did it with excessive motion as if he was passing a delicate cake being moved across the room.

Demund sighed. This was his one complaint. People didn’t treat him like a member. Few had seen his short match with Enariss, and even then—it was logical for them to think that Enariss went easy on him. She usually destroyed her opponents. So, because the captain, who never went easy on anyone, went easy on Demund, everyone felt the need to treat him like some kind of…special patient.

That’s what he had concluded.

The members were giving him fewer stares now, but it didn’t make him feel less sheltered. He sighed again as he stretched. After a while, Rhyne entered the club.

“Early as usual,” commented Rhyne as he took out his clothes while he passed Demund. “Riley said his parents were doing something today, so he went home first.”

“The thing with his brothers, right?”

Rhyne nodded as he zipped up his bag and slid it to the side on the room where the other bags were piled up. “I’ll join you soon. I really wanted him to see my spar today…”

Demund looked at his muttering friend’s back as he entered the locker room. The friends he made before he had gotten into the accident were the only ones who treated him normally. Like normal friends. They didn’t go easy on him during their spars. They understood his determination.

Perhaps it was him who was going easy on them. It was hard to tell with this body. It exhausted itself much quicker than he wanted to, and its heaviness compared to Shaden’s body was nothing to be ignored.

Which was exactly why he was training. He knew what to aim for.

The room grew louder as the chattering of the people increased. The room soon filled up, Rhyne joined and stretched with Demund, and the leaders emerged from the back to begin the day’s first spars. Enariss was nowhere to be seen as she had stated.

For that day, five of the outer platforms were raised. There wasn’t a particular rule for the number of spars per day. Students could challenge anyone they wanted as long as they were of a higher rank, or they could plan the fight beforehand by asking.

Rhyne had challenged the person who was a rank above himself. He was currently at rank 22.

Demund watched as his friend entered the ring. Another student, a male who was slightly stockier, also entered the ring he was in. People above rank 20 had impressive abilities, and Rhyne wanted to be recognized.

His opponent apparently had the ability to enlarge his limbs to a certain extent. Or to be more specific, he could make his muscles in his limbs swell up to around 1.5x its original size.

The other contestants entered their respective rings, and the judges were set for each ring. Demund naturally kept his attention focused on his friend.

The fights began with a beep from a speaker. The students surrounding the rings cheered as the contestants rushed towards each other.

There were two ways to win a fight in the MMA Club. Push your opponent out of the ring which was surrounded by padded fences or make your opponent surrender. But before everything else, the safety of the students was the most important. Sensors and cameras on the ceiling scanned the fights, and if a student was put in critical danger, it would notify the judges on their monitors, and they would stop the fights.

There were many cases of broken bones, but the infirmary could take care of it. The school took extra-care to rank the students depending on their abilities.

Rhyne dodged the quick blows from his opponent with ease, sticking in a few punches and kicks in between. Demund put his hand on his chin in approval. His friend was always so skilled at limiting the number of wasteful movements he made.

Demund winced as his opponent’s thick fist slammed into Rhyne’s arm. It made an audible thud as Rhyne jumped back. But his opponent, taking the chance, jumped to Rhyne, doing a sweep aimed at his legs. Rhyne quickly jumped up and landed a solid kick on the student’s chest. With a grunt, the student fell backwards, his balance ruined.

Rhyne smiled and jumped up and down. He wasn’t petty enough to go for a guy on his bum.

With a grunt, the student got up and cracked his neck. He raised his hand.

“I lost,” he stated.

The small crowd clapped at the end of the match. This was natural. Rankings changed all the time, and students usually retired before things became too serious.

Rhyne raised a fist into the air and glanced at Demund. Demund clapped his hands furiously.

“Nice one!” he yelled. Rhyne smiled and turned back to shake hands with his opponent. In terms of physical ability, he was second to Enariss in the group. He was class C+, after all.

He got off of the stage and approached Demund.

“That was amazing.”

“Thanks,” Rhyne replied with a huge grin. “I was worried, but he wasn’t as fast as I expected.” He touched his arm and winced. “I think I’m going to get some anexide. I got hit pretty hard.”

Rhyne, while clutching his red arm, went to the side of the room where the emergency devices were stored. There were these small squared packs that contained diluted anexide, and rubbing it into the skin helped alleviate swelling, burns, cuts, etc. As long as it wasn’t a broken bone, the packs could take care of it.

Demund touched his leg while his friend was gone. He had to work on his lower body strength for today. It was one of the greatest weaknesses he had.

Soon, Rhyne returned, and they began their leg workouts together at the side of the room. But his expression was slightly dark and a little gloomy.

“I heard something today,” he said while he went to grab some weights. “Actually, just now. No, I keep on hearing it.”

“What is it?”

“You noticed, right? Some people are dissatisfied with you. They don’t think you belong here.”

“Really?”

Rhyne clicked his tongue. “I almost hit them. Hah…you know what they said to me? They asked me, why are you hanging out with a cripple? The nerve of those guys…”

Well…Demund had kind of expected it. The people here were pretty wealthy, and according to his tutor, the rich were always…a little unsympathetic.

Then again, all of his friends were great. It wasn’t good to generalize.

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

“I can just challenge them.”

“Yeah, you can………wait, what?”

Demund stifled a yawn as he finished his squats. “If they’re so dissatisfied, I can just show them what I’m capable of.”

“I mean, sure. Will you be alright, though?”

The spars Demund had with his friends were serious, but he knew they were avoiding his weak parts, like his prosthetic leg. They had also refrained from using their abilities. They had never stated it, but Demund knew.

Maybe…it was time to test the fruits of his training.

“It’ll be fine. Anyone you would recommend?”

“Hmm…”

Rhyne scratched his head as his eyes searched through the crowd. Students working out everywhere along with a few small spars going on at the sides of the large room. Specific martial arts were taught on the second floor; Riley and Rhyne didn’t feel the need to attend them.

“Don’t think of me as a jerk, but should I tell you who was making fun of you?”

“Well, are they good at fighting?”

Rhyne shrugged. “I haven’t seen him in the higher ranks, so he’s probably so-so.”

Demund frowned. “It won’t be fun if they’re too easy to defeat.”

“Ha. It’s gonna be your first fight, so take it easy.”

Rhyne lifted his arm and pointed towards a small group of students who were wrestling each other on a row of mats.

“It’s them.”

Just then, one of the students made eye contact with Demund. He instantly turned towards his group and the people who weren’t sparring lifted their heads to look at Demund’s direction.

“Well, shoot. They’re looking at us,” muttered Rhyne.

But the stares soon broke apart, and the group returned to doing their usual things. Rhyne let out a sigh and patted Demund’s shoulder.

“Anyways, good luck. Are you going to challenge them tomorrow?”

“Yeah. Faster is better.”

The two of them returned to lifting weights.

〄 〄 〄

“You’re awfully energetic today,” his tutor commented.

Shaden ducked as his aunt Lytha flung a kick towards his head. It made a whipping sound as it passed over him, and Shaden quickly focused the mana into his palms and threw it at her chest. With her left hand, she countered the blow, pushing against Shaden’s mana with her own.

Her mastery over her mana allowed her to overcome the gap between her mana pool and Shaden’s boundless one. By compressing the mana in her palm with expert precision and perfectly executing a pattern through it, she was able to deflect all of Shaden’s blows that would have created a hole in a tree and smashed boulders.

Whenever Shaden smashed in hands against her aunt’s, it felt like his mana burst like a balloon. Gradually, he had resisted the blows, but there was still a large gap between their levels.

He quickly sidestepped and felt a whoosh of air go past him. With his heightened senses, he jumped up, barely dodging his aunt’s right palm. He placed his hand on her extended arm, only to have it be blocked by her free hand.

Horror filled him as he felt his arm be grabbed. His vision blurred as he was flung into the air with great momentum, his arm screaming from the tension. Through his heightened senses, he instinctively covered his face with his arms as he crashed into the branches of a tree. He fell to the floor and rolled just in time as his legs hit the ground.

“I told you over and over; don’t fall for the feints,” scolded his tutor. She walked over to Shaden and lifted him by his collar with her immense strength. “Your opponent will fake a move to make you let your guard down.” She untied her hair and let the long strands fall loosely onto her shoulders. “And never get grabbed.”

She put Shaden down and pat his head. Shaden sighed.

“This is unfair,” he said. “If I could use magic, I could beat you.”

“Hmph. Then it wouldn’t be training. Stop grumbling.”

Shaden knew she was right. And thanks to her, he had gotten much better at hand-to-hand combat. But spending the past two years just being defeated by his tutor was disheartening.

“You’re getting better,” his aunt said after seeing his face. “By the time you are fifteen, you might even surpass me.”

Shaden pouted. He grunted in pain as his aunt grabbed his cheeks and pulled him to her, enveloping him in her arms.

“You’ve done far better than anything I expected,” she said. “You’re better than both your father and me when we were your age. Don’t be so discouraged.”

“…okay.”

〄 〄 〄

Lytha looked at the sleeping figure of Shaden in the dying light of the campfire. She polished her dagger with some cloth and oil, making sure the dark edge was in prime condition. She rarely used it, but it had become a habit of hers. It reminded her of the time when she and her brother were still children, locked within their castle of black with nothing else but the instructions of their father to guide them.

Shaden reminded her so much of her little brother. Minus his weakness, plus some additional good looks. He was just like the perfect heir that her father had wished for, and a part of her shuddered.

If he knew about the truth of their family, would he still be so happy?

She had hated her father once. For being so harsh on them, for being so harsh on her brother. Looking back, she also had tried to roughen up Garthan multiple times seeing how he had been so meek.

Perhaps it was jealousy. Her father had focused on Garthan excessively.

But now, she pitied her father. Now that she knew about his responsibilities, her views had shifted. She knew the importance of duty. The truth was that her father was chained to the family. Garthan had escaped it, but his son had come to take his place.

If only he knew.

She reached out and touched Shaden’s cheek. Her nephew still had much time left. And her father wouldn’t die for the next five decades or so. It was plenty of time for Shaden to discover the world and find the things he wanted to do. Then, maybe he would return to the castle to be shackled.

She was…just worried about her cute nephew. He didn’t have the meekness of a child. Maybe it was the blood. And that’s what made her shudder. Was Shaden just a tool for the family to use? Had he been influenced by some ancient magic?

But then again, he was very bright. He didn’t show signs of being under mind-control or character-manipulation.

He was already eight. On his tenth birthday, he would choose the path he wanted to take.

And if her father’s wish came true, be bonded into the family.

She understood her father’s disappointment when Garthan had refused to bind. It was a lifelong commitment, and in some ways, a lifeless one. Skotos was a depressing place. Always surrounded by mist, always filled with strangers from all over. Pilgrims, she had labeled them. Those who came in search of ancient arts for a price.

She smiled as Shaden mumbled something in his sleep. He looked so vulnerable and weak lying on the ground like that. He looked like a normal boy.

She looked up at the stars. They were shining as brightly as ever. She wanted to show this boy more of the world. Maybe if he still decided to stay on his birthday, she would take him around the continents.

It was nice to babysit and take a moment of rest from all of the other things she did.

She pulled the blanket over Shaden more tightly and threw another piece of wood into the dying fire. Winter was right around the corner. They’d have to visit the estate soon.

〄 〄 〄

“Hey.”

The boy whom Rhyne had pointed out the day before turned his head around. Demund casually waved to him and smiled.

“Want a match?”

The boy slowly lowered his bag.

“Really?” he replied, discomfort in his voice.

Demund shrugged. “I want to climb the ranks. And I heard that you were—”

“I am what?”

“A good place to begin. Rank 78, Max, right?”

Max crossed his arms and squinted his eyes. “You’re that kid who always hangs out with Rhyne, aren’t you?”

“You know him?”

“A lot of people do. So, you really want a match?”

Demund nodded. “How about it?”

The boy furrowed his eyebrows and scanned Demund’s body. His eyes rested a little longer on Demund’s prosthetic leg, and he had a hint of dissatisfaction in his expression.

“I don’t think you should. You’re underestimating me. Besides, if you really wanted to challenge me, you could have announced it later before the matches began. Why bother to ask me?”

“I thought it’d be more appropriate.”

Max snorted. “Do as you like. But I honestly think you don’t belong here.”

He slung his bag over his shoulder and walked past him. At the entrance of the locker room, he stopped and turned around.

“If you’re just going to exercise, I don’t care. But you’re stunting Rhyne’s growth. That’s what I dislike about you. This isn’t a place to waste time.”

Demund scratched his head as Max left the room.

〄 〄 〄

The crowd stood in disbelief as Demund called for a match between himself and the 78th ranking person in the club. Even Enariss, who usually kept a calm demeanor, wrinkled her eyebrows slightly. She wasn’t against the match, but she hadn’t seen Demund do anything impressive the past few days. It was too early for him to begin climbing.

She threw him a glance and their eyes met. Demund grinned and lifted his hand in an okay sign, to which she opened her mouth and closed it.

It was his choice. She’d observe.

The contestants for the day entered their rings, and the judges were set for each one. Enariss was in charge of supervising one of the higher-ranking matches, which she felt discontent of as she wouldn’t be able to focus on Demund’s match. She would try to sneak a few glances, but she expected it would end quickly.

In the crowd, Riley was holding Rhyne by the shoulders.

“You what? You recommended the fight to him?!”

Rhyne winced as Riley’s fingers dug into his skin.

“It’s only 78!”

“That’s not the point! Demund is—”

Riley paused, and Rhyne lifted his friend’s arms off of his body.

“We can trust him. I did a few spars with Demund, and he wasn’t bad at all.”

“I know. I know.”

Riley let out a large sigh and focused his sight on Demund’s ring.

〄 〄 〄

Demund stretched his arms and his still-existing leg, to which his opponent winced at slightly.

“I’m not going to go easy on you,” Max warned. “I’ll try to end this as quickly as possible, so don’t blame me if you get some bruises.”

Demund cracked his neck and jumped up and down. “I’d be sad if you went easy on me.” He rolled his hands into a fist and unrolled them, breathing in and out. Man, he suddenly felt nervous for some reason. The thrill before the unknown future was a great one.

“Please, show me what you’ve got.”

“Ha. I’d say the same thing.”

The judge barked orders, and the two fighters face each other around four meters apart. Then with a blurt of the speakers, the matches for the day began.

Demund instantly began to circulate at a high speed as Max jumped towards him with an open palm.

As expected, he thought. His opponent most likely trying to make him surrender by immobilizing him, not by beating him up. Probably.

Demund’s senses heightened, and his eyes focused on the figure that ran at him. Max was lowering his body as he accelerated, aiming to slam into Demund’s stomach, pinning him onto the ground. Against some ability users, it was a stupid move. But against normal people, it was effective.

Demund felt mana rush inside of him as he took a deep breath. It was the first time he would get so serious. Max had a bigger build than him, so this would be a little tricky.

Demund faked a punch aimed at Max’s head, who instinctively covered his face with an arm. But they were now less than a meter apart. Any moment, his body would slam into his.

Focusing mana into his left leg, he jumped.

Max passed by just below him, and with his left leg, he kicked Max’s back and did a roll in the air. He almost fell on his face but rolled just in time as his body hit the floor. The exercises he did during the break were displaying themselves.

Max, on the other hand, fell chest-first on the floor, his arms skidding on the platform. With a groan, he recovered and got up.

“How—”

He saw Demund’s cool grin and shut his mouth. Maybe there was a reason why Rhyne hung out with the disabled kid.

Max raised his fists this time. And taking a deep breath, he charged at Demund, eyes focused on him.

One two, one two. Repeating the pattern he learned in the club, he threw a fist at Demund’s shoulder—

And cried in pain as his arm was pushed to the side and something like a slab of concrete rammed into his face. His body fell back, and he clutched his face. He looked at his hand and panicked as he saw some drops of blood from his nose.

“I’m not here to play around,” growled Demund. He looked over the crowd. The people who had been observing his match looked surprised, and a low gasp was reverberating through the club.

He turned his attention back to Max. “Are you up for more?”

Max got on his feet with a groan. He raised a hand as if to surrender. Then out of nowhere, he dashed towards Demund once again, his eyes leaking out anger. He lowered his body and threw a kick aimed at Demund’s prosthetic leg.

Demund’s left sports shoe smashed into Max’s face, and doing a small leap in the air, he landed on the floor lightly on his prosthetic leg.

He looked back at Max, who was clutching his face. Then he noticed that the judge had raised his arm.

“Winner, Demund,” he stated.

Demund walked over to Max and squatted.

“Sorry if I went too overboard.”

He was answered with a groan. Had he stepped on the dude too hard?

“Hey…you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Max muttered not-so-finely. He sounded like a cow being strangled.

Maybe Demund shouldn’t have used a mana-reinforced palm strike on him. But it had been really weak.

Demund helped Max get up and patted his shoulder.

“You should go take some packs.”

“I know,” Max groaned.

Because the match was over, some of Max’s friends were making their way onto the stage. Demund got up and left the ring as Max was given a towel by one of his friends.

He joined Rhyne and Riley, who were staring at him with their mouths open.

“That was amazing!” exclaimed Rhyne.

“It was,” said Riley, his mouth still open, though smaller now. “Where did you learn to do that?”

Demund grinned.

“My dreams,” he replied.