In the afternoon we arrived at the monastery, I was a total wreck at that point. The pain in my leg had drained me both mentally and physically. It had slowly faded with time and, but I could still feel a throbbing pain and I was limping. When we saw the monastery I told Belinda to hide and wait for me while I made my way towards the gates.

The monastery was surrounded by a 10 feet stone wall, and a big wooden gate with a wicket blocked the entrance. You could see the temple stretching itself above the wall with spires and around the temple were roofs of other buildings that made up the monastery complex.

I pulled on a rope that hung outside the gate and I could hear a bell ring on the inside.

"Who goes there?"

I looked up and saw an elderly man that I immediately recognized, it was Nathan, a retired paladin of the order. He had been by our blacksmith lots of times on business for the members of the order and he often rode his wagon all the way to Kevin's harbor. He was something of a Steward I guess. And I waved to him in greeting as I took two steps back so he could see me easier.

"Hello Nathan!"

Then I remembered myself, I gave a bow to the old paladin. Hopefully he could not see me blush at my forgetfulness.

"Good day Sir Nathan"

I could hear amusement as he answered.

"Well, if it isn't our favorite blacksmith, a good day to you, Elric. Wait a moment and I will open the door."

He disappeared from atop the wall, and a moment later the door swung inwards. The kindly old paladin with a well groomed beard and short hair that was beginning to thin out stood on the other side and he motions for me to come in.

"Come in lad and welcome to the order of the dawn."

As I went inside I looked around, and the thing that captured my attention was the big training field. Sure the temple was cool with the statues of the lady and it's spires, but the paladins and knights training was something else. Lances broke against shields, and the men on foot wielded axes to maces. They fought in full plate mails that must have weighed close to a hundred pounds. Still they moved fast and did not seem encumbered at all, I realized that it must be the strength and constitution stats that made it possible.

"Elirc… ELRIC!!!!"

A hand shook me, and I came back to the here and now.

"Sorry sir Nathan, I was just..."

I was a bit embarrassed to be so captured in the martial display before me. But something about gleaming armor and charging down the field was just awe inspiring.

" I understand lad, it is a sight to behold."

The old knight got a dreamy look in his eyes for a moment. Then shook his head, probably clearing his thoughts from whatever memory had just captured him. He cleared his throat.

"So what brings you here lad?"

I took out my letter and showed it to him.

"Father told me to see Dame Erika, and ask for lessons in horse riding and fighting."

Nathan lifted a grey eyebrow and took my letter and examined it..

"Did he now? He should be more than qualified to teach you how to hold a weapon on his own?"

I started to laugh at the question, I had been thinking the same when I came to the conclusion that...

" I don't think he can ride a horse, father is not big enough. And I have never heard of any dwarven cavalry."

He got a startled look on his face, then started to grin.

"Well they have those rams they use in the mountains, but I would hardly call that cavalry. Well lad follow me I take you to her "

I followed the old knight over to the training field. I watched as the knights formed up on the other side, there were ten knights in a line. Then one of the knights in the middle looked to both sides and said something I could not hear. Almost as one they started to move slowly towards us trying to keep the line, then they picked up speed still staying in line as they lowered their lances couching it under their armpits. They were now racing down the field towards us. When they had crossed a little more than half the field they started to slow down and raised their lances again still in formation.

"They are training to keep the formation as they charge. It has the biggest impact if they are able to hit at the same time."

Nathan explained before I could even ask. As the knights slowed Nathan called Dame Erika over. She dismounted and gave the reins to one of the other knights. When she was beside us she removed her helmet, she had short auburn brown hair and looked to be around mid twenties. She was definitely a beauty and her charisma stat should be quite high. I bowed as best as I could and held my letter out to her.

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

"Hello Dame Erika, my name is Elric Silveraxe. My father Thorgrim Silveraxe sent me."

She smiled at me and her eyes twinkled as she took the letter from my hand.

"Oh, good day to you Elric, so you are Thorgrims foster son? How you have grown since last I saw you."

She opened the letter and scanned it's contents.

"So the old dwarf wants me to teach you how to ride and fight from horseback?"

I nodded to her.

"Well the riding should be no problem but how good are you with weapons?"

She eyed my bow and dagger and frowned. I could feel my cheeks becoming red.

"I should be a journeyman at swords and archery and an apprentice in axe, blunt and Spear."

Her eyebrows did rise at that and I could see that Nathan was also surprised.

"That is a lot better than most your age… but then with a tier four as your trainer I should not be surprised."

I looked at her confused.

"Tier four? What's that?"

"It's just what we call people who have gotten their fourth class. When you turn fifteen you will choose a class and will be tier one. When you turn level twenty you will get to choose a tier two class. They are stronger than tier one classes."

So father was tier four, I wonder why he did not tell me? Not that it matters.

"Anyway your letter says you will come here two days a week, starting tomorrow if I agree. Which I do, it's not every day a grandmaster promises to make you an armor for a favor."

She smiled and seemed to be happy with the aragensment.

" So what's wrong with your leg? I could not help noticing how you seemed to have a slight limp."

----

And so my equestrian training began, in the start it was slow going with the order lending me an old docile mare. But at the end of the summer both me and Tilda got our horses. Mine being a young warhorse with a hint of unicorn blood in it that the elves breed. My uncle had visited us in the summer, and when he heard about the deal between me and father he made contact with his own house's stable and secured the horse. The horse was pitch black and around 17 hands high stallion.

My training with the knights intensified when I got my own horse to every other day. I loved the feeling of riding and I could see that Belinda liked that we finally could roam a bigger area around our house. My days had settled into a routine, first training with father in the mornings for two hours then either helping out in the blacksmith or riding over to the monastery. The afternoons were more or less free, with me and Belinda often out hunting. My magical training was reading books of arcane knowledge. By the way, did you know that there are a lot of other planes out there? No? Neither did I but hell is real so no more stealing cookies.

Prince Alexander came by in late autumn with a great host of knights and soldiers. From what I could hear, he and uncle were going to speak with the dark elves. Father was not impressed but the dark elves had made contact with the garrison and wanted to discuss trade. This was a great opportunity for the kingdom if it was true, there were many resources that could only be found down in the maze.

Time passes and today is my thirteenth birthday, I was standing outside on the training field, which I and Thorgrim had made and later expanded. It was a perfect spring day. Not a cloud in sight and almost no wind, if this weather held up it would get quite warm in the sun.

"Okay Eric, first to open your character screen you need to say or think the word Status. And you need to will it forward. Just saying the word won't do it."

I nodded that I had understood him and focused.

In my mind I said the word "Status" while trying to force it to show itself. Suddenly a lot of information popped up in front of me. I was so surprised that I fell on my behind.

Personal Information

Name:

Elric Silveraxe

Age: 13 years

Length: 162 cm

Weight: 51 kg

Race:

Half-elf

(Human)

Class:

N/A

Exp:

N/A

Hit points:

10/10

Stamina:

10/10

Mana:

1/1

Attributes

Strength:

8 (-1)

Dexterity:

13 (+1)

Constitution:

10 (0)

Intelligence:

14 (+2)

Wisdom:

11(0)

Charisma:

13 (+1)

Perception:

13 (+1)

Endurance:

11 (0)

Agility:

13 (+1)

Thorgrim started to laugh, he had obviously known what would happen.

" Now you need the information boxes to become transparent, this will help you keep your awareness of your surroundings."

"And how do I do that?"

I probably sounded a bit snarky, as I rubbed my but.

"Just focus on the boxes and will it."

I did as told, lo and behold. The boxes slowly faded and became more and more transparent, the longer I focused. When I could easily see the shit grinning dwarf I stopped.

" I'm finished."

"Good, now I want you to send the information over to me. Remember that this is personal stuff, so don't go blabbering or showing it to people you don't trust."

"Like sneaky dwarfs you old goat" I was about to say when I caught myself, seeing his serious expression. He was not kidding about it.

"Yes dad, I will be careful. But how do I...oh"

Do you want to share your Personal Information with your foster father Thorgrim?

Yes or no.

I was trying to send the information when suddenly the question popped up.

"Uh… Yes, please?"

" Aha there we have it, let's see… six in intelligence and two in charisma. Yes that explains it, always thought he was a bit slow and ugly… and three in endurance, well lazy doesn't even begin to explain the lad. But what is an old humble saint of a dwarf to do…"

The old bastard was nodding while "mumbling" just high enough for me to hear, while all the time smiling. The old goat was baiting me like he always did when we were training. Well let's see how he likes this, slowly with a low voice I started to mumble the incantation for one of the two spells I knew of, when I was almost done I pointed at him. He was now looking at me smiling while waiting for the spell to finish. As the spell finished a small ball of magical energy formed and sent towards him at a high speed. As it was about to hit him, he just held up his hand and slapped the ball. It exploded and a red number was shown.

-0

He chuckled, then cleared his throat.

"Okay, enough with the bullshit. Did you see a number when your spell hit me?"

I nodded, and gave him the stink eye.

" That my boy, is the system showing how much damage you did. The same will happen if you hit something with a weapon or your fist. But you can only see the damage you do, or members in your party if you have formed one. Do you understand?"

"Yeah I do, but why did I not do any damage at all? The spell should do 1-4+2 magic damage."

He smiled and pointed at me.

"Good question, it is because I have magical defense. Both from abilities and items. If I had been an enemy you would now know this and can now either try a more powerful spell or go for physical damage like hitting me with a weapon. If you still don't do any damage you should seriously consider retreating and gather more information if possible. Hopefully you would have gathered the information before attacking."

He stopped for a second to let this sink in, then continued.

"Now let's go over your attributes."