( Author’s note: Felt Bad for the supremely boring telling and not showing in the previous chapter and hopefully this would rectify things.)

I was in my class again, it was as if everything I’ve experienced until now was a lie and nothing more than a figment of my own imaginations. It was the usual scene of history class with Professor Octavian doling out his regular lectures as he lazily talked while resting his face upon one of his hands while the other was clicking away on his powerpoint presentation.

“And so today we’re going to be learning about the poor excuse of a netflix adaptation of the Empire I had painstakingly built, the Holy Roman Empire.” I saw Octavian shooting a sharp glance at me as he said that. Well that wasn’t very nice, it’s not like I was the one who made the HRE.

Yes, yes. Karl the Great founded the Empire after he was crowned by the pope, bla bla, yadda yadda... The history of the Empire is all well and good and might be interesting to some, but as someone who had actually been an Emperor… It was all just a giant meh for me.

Into one ear and out of the other. It was then the words coming out of Octavian’s mouth stopped being words and just became white noise as I felt my head getting heavier and heavier, my body swinging ever more forwards… Well I guess I could be excused for falling asleep… Just this once on this one particular-...

As I was about to enter dreamland, I could feel a slight nudge to my side. I looked up and saw Isabella only shaking her head with a disappointed pout… ‘God, she looks so adorable when she’s angry..’

“Carlos, it isn’t good to fall asleep during class!!” She said in a whisper as she nudged me some more

“Just five more minutes, por favore??” I pleaded

“No excuses..! Wake up!...Wake up, Charlie, Wake up…”

As I felt her words land in my ear, they started to be repeated… and repeated, and repeated until it started morphing. It didn’t even sound like a girl’s voice as it soon got deeper….

“Wake up, Charlie!!” The voice was changing, but the intensity had gotten louder and soon enough at the next moment, Isabella had disappeared… not to mention my entire class… And it was then that….

“ISABELLA…!!!” I screamed out as I noticed her fading

***

“WAKE UP, CHARLIE!!” Al’s voice brought me up and at ‘em. I was breathing raggedly and heavily as I felt my heart racing as I looked around with heightened alert. I looked left and right to analyse my surroundings to see what was going on. I was still in my room in Dansville. It was still the rickety wooden ceiling and I was still holding onto a blanket made of skins and on a mattress stuffed with wool. I started to stabilise my breathing but it was then that...

“AHHHH!!” I yelped out and jumped a bit when I noticed Al was calmly sitting beside my bed, drinking tea from a cup while smiling with a raised eyebrow.

“Isabella, huh?? Seems like I woke you up from a wet dream, eh boy??” Al only chuckled as he took another sip from his cup “Though I didn’t expect to hear you shriek like a little girl…”

“Well I didn’t expect you to sneak up on me while I was sleeping!” I exclaimed as I got my breathing back in order and calmed down a bit

“I don’t know what to tell you, Charlie. If a seventy-one-year old man in a wheelchair can sneak up on you, maybe you really do need my training.” What he said was honestly pretty scathing, but I swear he put on a skill to be able to enter like that undetected.

Getting my wits about me, I looked around the room again and noticed that sunlight had yet to enter in through the ventilations and it was then did the fatigue still manage to hit me a bit. “What time is it, now??” I asked Al.

“The perfect time for you to start your training, Charlie boy…” He said nonchalantly as he continued to drink his tea and read the book on his lap

I audibly groaned as I held my head in my hands for a bit. I could also feel a rumbling growl in my stomach. “...Would I be able to trouble you or Rosie for some breakfast first, though??” I didn’t like my chances but It wouldn’t hurt to ask him anyways.

“If you were still the guest that we were indebted to, of course, but now you’re my new pupil and beloved grandson and I need to give you a little taste of what training under me is going to feel like. Besides, Rosie’s asleep and we still have a food crisis to deal with here…”

“Oh well…” I said as I finally got myself fully up as I stood beside the bed

“But tell you what. Of course you’d be hungry and you need the food to fill up your stomach, eh?” Al said as he began to smile again. I don’t think I like where this is going. “Go back to the nearby forest from where you came from and see if you can’t find some good game for us to eat, yea?”

I let out a sigh. Alright, fine… It didn’t seem that unreasonable. “Alright, just let me get my gear ready for some hunting-...”

“And I want you to be back here by the time I finish this fine cup of tea.” And there it was.

“Surely you must be joking…” I said with a slight chuckle but Al only smiled as he continued to sip his cup which I saw was now half empty.

“Tick tock, Charlie. If you could clear an entire battalion of wolf beasts, you can hunt a single deer, now off you go…” Without me even being prepared, Al only motioned his arm a bit as I was driven by a strong gust of wind outside of the building.

As I almost crashed to the ground with a slight thud, I had managed to stabilise myself as I manipulated my own winds to prevent my face from kissing the hard ground. When I got my footing back, I looked up and noticed that the moon was still in the sky for God’s sake!

Ah, whatever. I just needed to get this over with or else who knows what Al is gonna make me do next. Picking up my speed as I ran along with the wind breezing through my hair, I quickly made my way out of the village by jumping over a palisade wall and headed towards the forests. No wolves could be spotted, but given the beasts have been running rampant until just about a few days ago, I was skeptical if I’d be able to find any game at all.

Reaching the forest, I immediately made my way to climb one of the trees and started to scout around for any sign of game that I could possibly hunt and bring back. It was so damn loud with cricket noises and the like I could barely focus.

Alright, just breathe in and focus, Charles. Focus on the sounds… As I sat on the thick branch, I began to try and focus on the surrounding areas, feeling the cool winds and ignoring the loud ambience. After a few moments, I noticed a rustle in one of the nearby bushes. When I focused in on it, would you believe my luck that I was able to spot a lone deer. By the looks of it, an adult male deer of considerable size with quite the set of antlers on it.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Alright, this seems simple enough. Just lounge at the deer and then stab it where-... As my hand reached for the place I usually keep my knife, I only just remembered that I forgot to take any weapon with me and so there I was trying to hunt with my bare hands… This was less than ideal.

Whelp, I guess it’s the way of the caveman for me. I looked around and noticed there was a sharp enough rock on the ground and I immediately jumped off to take it before doing my damndest to jump back up on another branch to stalk my prey again waiting for the perfect chance to strike.

The deer became alert again as it noticed some ruffling sounds around it. I tried my best to channel any sort of ‘energy’ from within me to make the wind blow and somehow I managed to make some slight breezes around the deer so as to keep it unaware of my presence. It was only after a few moments did it get back to grazing and it was at this moment did I lounge off at full speed, rock in my hands, down at the poor morsel.

The deer struggled quite a bit as I pounced at it and held it down with the weight of my body before smashing in its head several times to finally send it to eternal rest. This primal feeling was honestly quite new to me. Hunting was always a favourite pastime for nobility during my days as Emperor but it was never anything as visceral as this, being mostly us chasing some smaller game with guns or bows. But to actually pin down an animal like this and have it squirm and struggle to its death… it was surreal.

Shaking my head after I lost my train of thought for a second there, I immediately took the dead deer up on my back before hauling it back to the village as fast I could. When I reached the house, I could already see Alfred smirking at me, teacup still at hand. Alright so I’ve made it in time…

“You’re late, Charlie.” Al said as he took a sip from the cup “Tis already my third cup of tea… But since it’s your first day, I’ll go easy on you. Drop and give me 20…”

“Wha-...” Just when I was about to say something, Alfred moved his hand and immediately I felt an intense pressure on me, as if the air around me was sucked up and a vacuum was pushing me to the ground. This man…

“After you’re done with the push-ups, I’ll have you help old Beck with skinning the deer and preparing it.” Al said as he wheeled himself back in the building

Not giving me another toss, I was still left there flat on the ground, having to commit push ups against this ungodly pressure. Did Al even need my help in defending the village?

—

[Endurance increased by…]

[Strength increased by…]

After what felt like an eternity, I managed to free myself from the pressure as I rolled over in relief that I could take a breather.

“Ah, so you’re done, eh? Not bad, honestly, but if you think that’s the extent of your training, you’re dead wrong.” Al had come out and gave me a smirk before sending me away with another villager to help prepare the deer. I found it hard to gather myself as I still felt a little drowsy from the early morning, but it was then I suddenly felt a rush of cold water assail me as I screamed.

“Honestly Charlie, you need to work on that unmanly scream. After you’re done with preparing the deer and have lunch, make 10 laps around the village before meeting me back here.”

I was honestly stunned at what I was hearing. This had to be some form of torture. I was about to complain to him but I immediately shut myself up when I noticed Al’s shit-eating grin as if he was expecting me to call it quits. I merely sucked it up before I went on to help prepare the game that I had caught personally.

And so the hours went by that after I helped prepare the meal for a few villagers and eating my portion, Al had sent Rosie over to ‘monitor’ or at the very least check up on me and make sure that I actually did what he instructed me to do. And so I did as was told and started my 10 laps around the village. In all honesty this part wasn’t quite bad and was actually pretty doable considering my affinity with the wind and the fact that my regenerative abilities come in quite handy here.

But it was then that on the 5th lap, Rosie told me to put on some cuffs that Al told me to wear. There design did not fit any mediaeval history I knew and looked Roman-ish, but it had a pretty design of some people stabbing what looked to be a depiction of a Goddess. Pretty ominous if you ask me. When I put them on, I was in for quite the surprise…

[Regenerative abilities temporarily disabled. Wind affinity suppressed.]

Fucking hell… the cuffs were basically a very effective handicap and I had to make the rest of the 5 laps like I would at the track field back at the academy. Christ above…

This time it took me quite a while to accomplish the runs while the heat of the afternoon sun was definitely of no help to me at all. Being as tired as I was from the run, I had finally finished the laps as I collapsed in front of the village head’s house, Gasping for air to catch my breath. It was only then did Rosie take the cuffs off of me and my rejuvenation abilities started up again.

“Those are ‘Blessing Removal Bracelets’... Curious little items we found when we were scouring the ruins of one of the old fortresses of the Heroic Era.” Alfred explained as he handled the bracelets in his arms carefully “We weren’t privy to its uses besides a short description of ‘disrupts the blessings of the gods’ and when put on by our party it had next to no effects besides a very subtle discomforting feeling.”

To think that there were such items in this world… If I met an opponent or a monster that had those capabilities, suffice it to say I’d be pretty fucked. The worry in my expression it appears was obvious to see as Alfred immediately spoke.

“I don’t think you need to worry all that much though… These are relics from a bygone era that we’d only kept ‘cause they looked nice and the secrets behind creating such artefacts are still long lost… However, on the off-chance that you’d come across things like these, training is necessary so that you don’t keep relying on your ‘cheats’ if you may…”

For a man of his time in this mediaeval-like world, that was a very apt way of putting it. I simply nodded before asking. “So what’s the next training in our agenda?”

“Atta boy! That’s the spirit…” Al said as he clasped his hands together “Our next one will be quite in tune with the theme of raw ability. I want you to put these bracelets back on and, without any of your fancy skills or weapons or whatnot, land a hit on me… Just one is enough…”

Rosie then presented two blunted steel training swords towards me and Al.

“So whaddya, say??” Al asked as he took one of the training swords and began to skillfully show off his skills as he spun it around in his hands and making all sorts of flexible manoeuvres you wouldn’t expect an old man to have “Oh come now, don’t tell me you’re scared to fight a paraplegic old man in a wheelchair?”

“...There is no winning for me in this situation, Al.” I sighed as I took the other training sword and adjusted myself to it

“Ah you do carry yourself like a nobleman with those moves…”

“Sort of… Anyways, are you also going to limit yourself to not use skills and the like?”

“Pfft. Are you insane? Of course I’m going to use them. I don’t have a death wish now do I?”

Typical. Without any second thought or delay, the match began as I wordlessly lounged at the old man in the wheelchair. A quick and easy strike is all I need to fulfil this absurd training. And just when I was sure I caught Al by surprise and struck out the sword towards his exposed torso, I felt the air shift around me as my sword aim completely missed the mark and I turned back up and saw a yawning Al with a cheeky grin.

“This is gonna be a long day isn’t it…” I said exasperatedly as I readjusted my stance

“Now, now, Charlie. Chin up and come at me again. This time with more energy, yea?” Al once again spun his sword around as if to mock me and with that the sparring session commenced in earnest.

Long story short, even after an hour of God forsaken trying, I did not manage to land even a single hit on the old man in a wheelchair and instead I collapsed on the ground in exhaustion…

“I see that you may need my training after all… I barely broke a sweat, Charlie. Rosie, help the boy up and make him clean himself before he comes in the house. The physical training’s over for today…”

“Godzijdank!” I breathed out tiredly

“But the academic learning starts after 7. You have a lot to learn about this world, Charlie…”

“Ah Scheiße…!” I sighed out in resignation, but not before Al rolled up his wheelchair closer to me and pulled me up.

“I heard that, Charlie. I may not fluently speak Sevaldian, but I’ve killed enough Lowerians to know when someone is cursing me out.” I merely smiled in resignation. There really is no getting past this old man.

And so began my week of hell… -training and learning in earnest. Fun.