“Ah, Shane. Good to see you again. Come sit down, sit down. You must be Hana? Grenfell’s told me all about you.”

Karato offered me a seat at the table with Grenfell who sat opposite him.

“Hi Commander Karato, what exactly did the old man tell you?”

“Which old man?”

Grenfell questioned, but no one answered him.

“Everything of course. I have to say that you didn’t waste any time. No bad intentions to you Hana, but I know two young ladies I know are going to be very disappointed in his decision. By the way, I’m not a commander anymore.”

What two ladies would those be, and if he wasn’t a commander what was he?

“Then what rank are you then?”

“I’ve officially retired out of the knights.”

I silently considered his answer. After failing to subjugate the forest dungeon, the reason for his so-called retirement was obvious. More like he got the boot.

“Ah, don’t get your knickers in a twist about it. I’m more freelancing for the palace now. If anything, I’m better off.”

I wasn’t going to go any further with that line of questioning and left it where it was. I didn’t imagine Karato would be happy with the situation.

“Why did you want to see me, I assume it wasn’t for my stellar swordplay?”

“Ha, ha, ha. No. But thanks for reminding me. Since I’ve more time now, I’d love to resume the sparring with you in the mornings.”

Now ask yourselves, why would I go and mention something I eagerly wanted to avoid? Perhaps some deeper part of me loved being beaten up an inch of my life. I didn’t want to explore that point any deeper; let’s leave it there.

“Actually, the reason I came was to tell you the king wanted to reward you for your contribution during the Blister Oak Forest monster invasion of the camp. That included healing my arm and your contributions to the morale of the people during the retreat.”

“What, really? Why would he do something like that? I just thought I was doing what came naturally and certainly there would be others far more deserving of that reward.”

“All those people you’re referring to have already been rewarded, except you.”

“I’m honoured…I guess. But if I may ask, what exactly did I contribute during the camp invasion, I merely sorted out an ogre?”

“Ha, ha, ha. Merely an ogre he says. You killed the general of those monster forces.”

“What? Not again?”

Karato slapped me hard on the back while laughing his head off.

“Yes, apparently you like finding the ogre generals for some reason. We think the only reason the camp got off that lightly was because you killed the general, causing the whole bunch of monsters under his command to panic.”

“It was pitch dark, why would they panic if most of them never saw me kill that ogre?”

“Well, we got to thinking about that. The answer we came to was that the hill you and the old man were camping on was to be their point of operations for the attack. When the monsters heard the camp’s knights approaching with no instructions from the ogre general, they started to panic. Monsters tend to behave instinctively in battle, but when things don’t go the way they planned, they easily fluster. That fortunate interruption gave our forces the short reprieve they needed to respond. Thanks to Grenfell’s advanced warning to the knights and to your keen eyes we stopped a potential massacre.”

“Who’s the old man?”

I couldn’t deny that. I’d warned the old man about the camp infiltration by that goblin scout, and he raised the alarm at the command centre.

“What’s the reward?”

“Well, the king originally thought of giving you the usual reward of gold…”

Yeah, that sounded good but why did I sense troubling words ahead.

“Instead, I offered that you get to look in the royal storage room for any item you might like in there.”

“What’s in there?”

“Mostly hand-me-downs from previous kings and dusty relics.”

Why did I feel like he dumped a bucket of icy water over me? I preferred the king’s idea. Much better. Was it possible to swap Karato’s idea in for the king’s idea? A terrible travesty had just been committed, Your Majesty.

“Come on. Don’t look like that. I expected a bit more enthusiasm.”

“Ugh. Please don’t consider me unthankful, but you’re sending me to the second-hand shop for what I could’ve bought brand new with gold.”

With my head on my arms, I rested on the table.

“Oh? I can see why you think that, but first see the royal stores before you get all dejected.”

In the end I couldn’t complain, I couldn’t reject something given for free but there was something I wanted more than anything else.

“Is there a chance I could ask King Leopold to release Hana from her slave contract?”

An uncomfortable silence settled on everyone. Did I perhaps say something wrong I wondered? Hana looked visibly astonished at my request.

“It’s not that the king wouldn’t want to help Hana, but there are strict rules around changing slave statuses, even the king can’t just change them. The labour guild is the officiator of slave contracts and any disputes regarding slave statuses can be brought to them. Even though we know Hana was wrongly enslaved, to prove that requires evidence that a crime was involved against her. From what I understand about her circumstances I doubt Hana could provide that evidence.”

Hana’s shaking head confirmed Karato’s words. If a family member or a relative could act as witness, that would help. Hana didn’t even know where her village was relative to the kingdom of Arania, how could she even start to defend her wrongful enslavement case. Since nobody could do anything to improve the situation, I decided to change the sombre mood of the conversation.

“When are we going?”

“That’s the spirit. We’ll pick you up first thing tomorrow morning and take you to the palace. After we’ve sparred a bit, we can have a look at the royal stores.”

Oh bugger, didn’t miss that bullet Mr. Neo, I thought.

Later that evening after dinner, just before I went to bed in my now less spacious room, a particular woman who couldn’t be more than fifty paces from me, stared straight at me.

“What?”

I asked Hana. Judging by her attitude I realised that I unexpectedly stepped on a landmine somewhere.

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“Who were the two women Karato referred to?”

It took me a few slow moments to figure out what she was referring to. Do you know what the worst part was? I didn’t even know who Karato was talking about. Perhaps one of them was that young cadet, Karina? Why would Hana be concerned about that?

“I’m not sure.”

Luckily she left it at that, but I could see the subject bothered her for some reason. With the lights out and Hana’s soft breathing on the other side of the room I was just starting to drift off when a familiar voice sounded in my head.

I wondered when Ara would get back to me on that. I nearly died when I accidently activated the mind download of generations worth of elves’ experience in a matter of minutes. The download almost fried my sanity, luckily Ana’s construct came to the rescue. It also meant the data download was mixed in between my memories although I felt largely unaffected. At least it seemed that way to me.

I felt like a kid the day before Christmas.

The next morning, I woke up feeling refreshed, invigorated, and ready to open my Christmas present. The first thing I did was sit up in bed to look at what new skills I learned overnight thanks to Ara.

I did an appraisal of my skills and there it was, a transfer storage. When I thought about using the skill, I discovered that I understood all its associated attributes as if I’d been studying and practicing it for weeks. Transfer storage was accidentally discovered by the elves when they unsuccessfully tried to create an interdimensional gate, the transfer storage skill behaved in a totally different way to the pocket dimension storage. Firstly, the name was misleading because it wasn’t a storage skill, well at least at the time it might look like it, but it operated like an interdimensional time gate. But just like a gate doesn’t store anything, although it looks like it to the casual observer because once an object entered the gate activation field, the storage skill transferred the item to another future time and place of the operator’s choice. I could in theory, throw a log into the transfer storage then later retrieve that log. It behaved on a principle of first-in first-out, meaning I could throw as many logs as I wanted into the storage, but when I opened it up again to retrieve the logs they would come out one at a time.

Deciding I had enough of thinking, I wanted to play around with my new toy. Activating the entry side of the transfer storage, a flat and round black hole about a football sized object hovered about an arm’s length in front of me. I only observed it for a while. It made no noise and light didn’t reflect off the object. After deciding it wouldn’t do anything else I wanted to do some tests. I wasn’t going make the same mistake of putting my finger in there like the last time I tested the pocket dimension storage. I looked around for something to be my unwilling guineapig and found my belt. With smug satisfaction I watched my belt disappear into the storage and then stupidly realised I just lost the only thing keeping my pants up.

“Oh crap!”

I quickly swapped modes to the exit mode and a belt jumped out of the round black hole and straight past me.

“What the?”

Came Hana’s surprised voice from bed opposite me. She sat straight up and stared wide eyed at the apparition hanging in the air in front of me.

“Uh, sorry. Didn’t mean to disturb you.”

I said apologetically.

The next morning the inn supplied a copper basing along with a bucket of hot water to wash ourselves before breakfast. I left the room to give Hana some privacy and then after she finished up and left the room, I washed myself. The usual inn breakfast of pulled braised meat and root vegetables sated my hunger and tasted heaps better than the Screaming Banshee’s morning fare, but a little heavier than the breakfasts I became used to. Hana didn’t seem too deturbed by my skill machinations of that morning. Secretly, it gave me a feeling of relief because in future she would constantly be around me, the last thing I needed was a panicky slave that couldn’t move more than fifty paces away from me.

The previous day we received notice that a royal carriage would arrive on time to take us to the palace. When it arrived, our escort was none other than Mr. “Walk-this-way”, the impeccably dressed royal messenger and carveyor of all palace visiting peoples. Our arrival at the palace was somewhat lacklustre compared to my last visit since we never entered the main palace that time but travelled past to the royal barracks at the back. For the first time Hana looked particularly nervous and I realised it was probably the first time she’d ever been in a royal carriage, let alone going to something like a palace.

The Royal Knight’s barracks lay a hundred meters to the north of the palace building. Its outer dimensions and façade were almost identical to the palace, and that’s where the similarities ended. Its interior appeared somewhat different as compared to the palace. The barracks contained military accommodation, lecture rooms and a large sparring hall. I realised that the military camp’s sparring ring looked like a smaller version to the barrack’s sparring ring, no doubt the former being inspired by the latter. I found myself sparring in against Karato…once again. Was I doomed to spend the rest of my life sparring that monster?

King Leopold made a surprise appearance, and not just as a spectator either. He arrived fully kitted out in his armour as if personally invited to the occasion. King Leopold and Karato greeted each other like old friends which made me wonder if I someone set me up for the sparring. The knights greeted Karato with familiarity born of many a military campaign regardless of his leaving the knights. I couldn’t relate; was I the only one who thought his propensity to pick on me the school equivalent of gym teacher bullying. Did I suffer from selective amnesia that I am still unable to recall much about that sparring session. Unfortunately, I remember that many spectating knights still cheered despite me spending more time evading than fighting. I think Karato conveniently forgot I saved that very sword arm he so vehemently used against me.

If I thought my session from hell ended with Karato’s sparring, then I was severely disappointed when His Royal Majesty eagerly replaced Karato before I could protest at the unfair play. I mean the king of the kingdom was facing me in mock battle although I couldn’t tell the difference between mock or not, because none of them held back. By the end of the match, I understood the reason why Karato and King Leopold got on so well together, they practically fought like twins. You wouldn’t think King Leopold would be as nimble as he was when he practically sat with a desk job, and yet he pirouetted around the field like a professional dancer. Really, think about it; what king you know of danced while fighting on the battlefield?

“Ah, give the man a rest, he deserves it!”

Laughed Karato. I cried in relief as Karosaki sparring season finally closed. Since I was then worth zero on a contract, the sparring focus naturally shifted to Hana. Because she wore her adventurer gear everyone assumed she was up to the task. But she never wavered, even thanking Karato for the offer. However, she did have one question for him first.

“Karato. I’ve never sparred against someone as well armoured as a knight. Would you be able to show me the best places to attack on your armour?”

I thought her chances were nil that Karato would divulge that information to her. Heck, I figured he’d give her some story to nicely tell her off.

“Sure.”

“What?”

“Do you have a problem with that Shane?”

“No. Please go ahead.”

It wasn’t my funeral. As soon as she took off her scarf in preparation for the fight there was an audible gasp from the knights. I realised they noticed her collar for the first time. I sighed to myself because there was no doubt some underlying issues regarding slaves in the military, and I really wasn’t in the mood to have to deal with them. But all the knighted fumed, and that’s when I realised, they weren’t looking at Hana, they were looking at me!

“What?”

A distant conversation with Shimmerstal’s adventurer guild master came to mind where he spoke about slaves being misused by adventurers as bait to draw out monsters. It suddenly dawned on me that every knight around that sparring ring thought the same thing as the guild master. All my survival instincts begged me to start running.

“Ha, ha, ha. You guys got it all wrong.”

Laughed Karato in a loud voice.

“She’s not his slave because he wanted to misuse her, he got conned into buying her.”

He obviously sensed the knight’s animosity towards me and attempted defuse it, but did he really have to say that? Even worse, he explained further.

“He even signed a distance restriction clause.”

The whole place erupted with laughter. I’m not sure what embarrassed me more, my fighting performance or those knights’ laughter.

“In fact, I hear she nearly beat the crap out of him.”

That got a surprised sound from the knights. Karato pointed his sword at Hana.

“I’m willing to bet that packaged inside that beautiful girl is a killer looking for revenge. Come, get rid of that frustration if you dare!”

He challenged Hana. Silence fell. And then Hana smiled. It was the first time I’d ever seen her smile like that, and it sent chills down my spine.