As they got to the stables, Bryn Asked everyone to do a circle surrounding him.
“To start today’s session, I need everyone to appraise themselves. Try and feel your status, your skills, remember that you are one and can only perform your best when comprehending what they can do, not only the number they are showing.”
After a few seconds, the first exercise as usual was stretching. Gaining flexibility would allow everyone to perform all other tasks much better.
All members were used to the movements implemented by Bryn, so most had an okay time doing them. Michele and Luca were still young, their flexibility still hadn’t degraded from their young days. What surprised Bryn was that both Gabriel and Jonas had zero troubles with the exercises.
Bryn tried to increase the difficulty of positions, but his knowledge of yoga was only so much. The students fell one after the other trying to perform the poses, but in the end, only 7 people ended the class without hiccups: Bryn, Daniel, Gabriel, Jonas, Luca, Michele, and Zara.
Since the young girl had taken a liking to Zara, Kwame asked her to participate in today’s training. She was not a fan of the group practice, it took too much effort, and she gained very little in any skill she trained with them.
During the class, Gabriel had to control Michelle a couple of times. The 8-year-old girl had a hard time controlling herself around the cat woman. During the yoga poses, the fluffiness of her fur and being reached new heights in Michelle's mind. Zara had a striped fur, caramel in nature, complemented by a white and black stripe. Her pointy ears were always alert, listening to anything and everything around them. Her tail was long, it started thin but the amount of fur at the end was larger. At the very tip, the caramel and black colors stop to allow for a completely white tail to arise.
At every movement, the sun hitting her felt to Michelle as a petting provocation. All the young kid wanted to do was play with Zara.
An opposite feeling was what she got when looking at Kaelar. The nagaman was still not part of the training camp but was looking from the sides.
He had chosen for himself a tree with a good amount of shadow next to the group. The sunlight surrounding him added to his mysterious aura. His upper torso was that of a regular man, making him look bored with his crossed arms. Looking down, little by little, Michelle and Luca both felt strange. His skin started to change color to a military green. Scales started to appear near his belly and were everything one could see at his waste. The man had no legs, instead, he was on top of a swirled tail. At every round, it got thinner and thinner, but from that position, one couldn’t see the end. He had a mosaic pattern on the top of his tail, like squares next to one another ranging from black to light green.
All the fluffiness projected by Zara was the very opposite of Kaelar standing in the shadows.
The second part of training was martial arts combined with physical training. Here, different training regiments started to appear. The caravan members were ordered to keep doing the basic movements, Kwame’s group each had their style and necessities, so Bryn was trying to reach a difficulty that would help develop them faster. The four newcomers were hard to read. From the previous group, Daniel was the strongest and had the highest skills for combat. From the way people looked at Gabriel and Jonas, they were much stronger than Daniel, so he had no idea how to train them.
Still, one problem at a time. Calm yourself down, Bryn. There is no need for their first few trainings to be perfect.
Breathing a few times, the faun asked the new members to gather around him.
“Everyone, the second part of our training camp is Martial Arts Combined with physical training. Every warrior needs to keep their techniques in check as well as his body. I do not know your status of skills, as you all can see I’m still at level one. For us to find a proper training schedule for any of you I’ll need your help. I can demonstrate to you the techniques we are currently trying to master and engrave in our minds as well as the movements we have been doing to train our bodies. But the intensity of your training I’ll leave up to you for today. Is that understood?”
I sound like a shitty professor, but that is all I can do for now.
“No problem, Bryn, I would like you to show us the movements and explain them little by little please.” Said Gabriel. Hearing their leader, none of the others said a word.
“Sure, I can do that. The first thing are the basic defenses and offensive moves…” As Bryn started to demonstrate each position, movement, and combination, he could feel from all four a hunger for knowledge he had never felt in his time with the others. Their pupils widened and constricted in a mix of focus and pleasure. With each move, Bryn explained all he remembered from taekwondo classes and the idea behind the creation of that strike.
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After demonstrating all Taekwondo moves, including a few more advanced techniques, Bryn went on to show the training regime to help develop the body. Again, most of the four were amazed by the specificity and knowledge the faun had about the body. All four could perform every single movement with ease, but Michelle was not as excited about the physical training as she was with martial arts. When asked to focus on a specific part of their body and isolate the movement on one or two muscles, both Gabriel and Jonas looked at one another shocked, and, in a glance, Gabriel's expression tensed as Jonas nodded from side to side.
“Jonas, this kid methodology… Doesn’t it remind you of our time in the army?”
“He lacks the ability and tools to create the same environment, but for the way he explained everything, I would never say he is eight years would faun just passed the ritual. The detail to which he describes every technique is even more refined than our trainers ever did…”
“It is decided. We are to train him in our ways of hunting as done for Luca and we are still doing for Michelle.”
“Gabriel, we just met the faun. There is no need for that. Also, the others might benefit from it. Why should we help these people?”
“Do you remember our part in the current state of the continents? It is our responsibility to try and find ways to mend what we broke. If you are unsatisfied with the task, do not worry. I’ll train the faun myself.”
Bryn and the others were unable to listen to their exchange, only someone more powerful than them and with the proper skills would be able to break a mind link.
After one hour of training, everyone was told to gather again. It was time to start the mobility and physical endurance training. During the past few months, Bryn realized that separating strength and endurance training was the best way to mentally lighten the burden for those less talented.
As he distributed orders, Bryn asked the four to wait a few moments before they started anything. As everyone got their assigned training, Bryn arrived at the newcomers once again.
“Everyone, I hate to impose on private information, but I would like to know if any of you have climbing and acrobatic skills. If you feel comfortable sharing, that can help us save time.”
“I do have both skills, yes.” Said Gabriel, looking around and nodding to confirm they could share their reality with the kid standing in front of them.
“I have climbing, but I do not have acrobatics. What is that?” said Michelle.
“I have both skills, but climbing is a much higher level than acrobatics.” Said Luca looking at his sister while puffing his chest.
“I also have both skills”.
“Amazing! In our caravan almost no one had any of those skills, we can save a lot of time then.”
Jonas interrupted Bryn by raising his hand and asking without waiting for Bryn to permit him.
“What do you mean by “no one had any of the skills” kid?”
“What else, everyone has both skills now. It took us about two weeks to wake everyone, but we were finally able to. They are both skills that demand courage on top of physical capabilities. Climbing makes you challenge height while acrobatics challenges the basic ways your body was designed to move. If not for that, it would have been faster, I’m sure.”
“Gabriel, who is this kid?”
Gabriel ignored Jonas’s inquiry completely and focused on the faun.
“That is incredible Bryn, congratulations to you and your group… Now knowing about our skills, what do you suggest?”
“I believe that for Michelle, I’ll assign her a person from the caravan to wake up acrobatics. As for Luca, I’ll ask someone to help him level up specifically that as well. You two will come by train with me. Is that ok with you?”
Jumping in her place, the girl almost screamed, “Can Zara train me?”. At the other side of the training grounds, Zara sneezed instantly as she shivered without apparent reason.
“Unfortunately, Zara is so talented in acrobatics, that she is not our best teacher. It would be like asking a bird how to fly, it is simply in their nature to do so. I would like you to accompany Amelia. As for Luca, I believe Daniel can be a good fit for you. Wait here one moment.”
Bryn asked Amelia and Daniel for their help and both were happy to help. With both kids taken care of, only the two monsters remained.
“Gabriel and Jonas. Let me ask you something, you both have appraised me, right?”
Both nodded affirmatively.
“Then you can see two things, one of them, I understand that vows are possible, correct?”
This time the two just waited for the faun to continue his explanation.
“I would like you both to follow me far away from the group as well as to vow never to share with anyone what I’m about to share with you.”
Jonas was the first to answer.
“I’m willing to go wherever you like. But I’m not vowing anything to you.”
“Jonas, calm down. Bryn, do you understand how vows work?”
“I don’t. Kwame explained to me that you mark on your soul a promise and must follow it or there will be repercussions.”
“You are right, but there can only be so many vows one can take, or his soul can be under too much pressure and your growth can be compromised.” Said Gabriel.
He continued “What I’m willing to do is an exchange of secrets of favors, how about that?”
If I get these two to help me level up and get stronger, I can improve by leaps and bounds during winter. It is a risk I must take. They could torture any info from me whenever they liked, it’s not like I have the power to hold my secret. Also, how crazy was Kwame to do such a relevant thing to a random kid? It makes no sense at all. I’ll have to ask him someday.
Pondering Gabriel’s words for a second, he decided to counter.
“That is ok with me… I’m willing to share with you my training camp personal objective. What I ask in return is that you help me level up during winter. Being level one is a limitation I must break to keep improving myself and everyone’s training.”
“If what you share is of relevance, that can be done. Still, you are a level-one faun… We’ll be the judges of the information you share…” Complemented Jonas.
“That is fine with me… Let's go. For the next part, we’ll go alone then.” Said Bryn.
“Let’s go.” Both said in unison.