Panting from exertion, Symon stepped forward before delivering another slash. The blade whistled through the air as it swiped downwards, the off-angle causing it to catch the wind and be pushed off slightly to the side.
This time he overcorrected, tilting the blade too far past a neutral position and causing him to end up with the original problem, just in the opposite direction. By now, almost every muscle in his body was aching from overuse. Even the ones he hadn't thought were used in sword fighting were protesting the treatment he'd given them — his hips and thighs especially. He'd thought swinging a sword was all in your arms?
Keelgrave had disabused him of this notion in his usual abrasive manner, although like always the spirit's advice regarding fighting matters was helpful despite how harshly it was dispensed. He'd been forced to assume a half-squatting posture that was allegedly important for maintaining balance. At first, it had just made things worse. He'd felt that a single push would send him stumbling over his own legs. But now, after hours of non-stop practice, he had to admit it made a difference. There was more of a physical connection between him and the ground, an awareness of where his body was in space.
His hips and thighs were killing him as he hadn't given them a single break since he'd started his training exercise, but a steady trickle of vitality ensured he never needed to do so. It still felt like he was on the verge of tearing a muscle, and he was pretty sure he actually had at one point after an especially ill-performed strike, but the vitality kept him going. He hadn't even had to use as much of the energy as he'd expected. The injuries weren't that bad, at least relative to all the others he'd healed, so it stood to reason that they didn't need as much to fix as the others.
He felt that some of the benefits from the Ledger were helping here, too. For one, he had a noticeably higher Constitution compared to when he first woke up half-buried in the desert. He was at 1.11, which didn't sound like much until he considered that 1.00 was as high as a regular human could get without the use of mana. It made sense that the strain of pushing his muscles beyond their limits wouldn't affect him as much as it used to, which would in turn mean they needed less vitality to maintain their effort. Being 11% more durable than the toughest man on Earth seemed like the kind of superpower a genie who hated his job would give, but it was still a noticeable and much-appreciated improvement.
Also, it seemed likely that the increase in levels in his Idealise ability was helping him out. The Ledger was painfully tight-lipped when it came to explaining the details of what the levels actually did, and he couldn't even ask Keelgrave considering the spirit had never encountered someone with a spell like his, but he still had some ideas.
He remembered back when he'd fought the bearcat, how the vitality he stole from the creature had been used to heal the old wounds he was still carrying from a centipede. The lacerations had healed like a normal wound would be expected to, simply sped up to an incredible degree. They'd scabbed over just like a real wound, and then that scab had fallen off to reveal fresh, pink skin that had then in turn rapidly aged to match the rest of his skin, not leaving even the tiniest of scars behind. But more and more, he'd noticed his magic behaving differently. It seemed to skip most of the normal healing process, cutting out inefficiencies as the pure vitality shaped his body directly back to the way it should have been.
This was something he was grateful for — if his magic had been stuck to simply accelerating his natural healing, he'd never have been able to regrow his fingers. He was curious about what other changes the levels had brought. For Seize, it was obvious; he drained vitality faster and from a longer range. But other than the change in the healing process, he wasn't sure of all the things that had improved with that ability. It seemed to have gotten better all around, the same wound taking less time and vitality to heal, but he wasn't sure if this was something directly from the improved level or if it was a side benefit from the way it had changed the way it healed.
The whole time he was thinking about his abilities, he'd continued his training. Continually performing the same downward slash through the air wasn't something that required much conscious thought. He was operating on autopilot, only changing things up when Keelgrave barked out another command.
"Huh? Are we done?" Symon asked, mentally projecting his thoughts toward Keelgrave.
Symon suppressed a snicker. He'd thought he was above finding stupid innuendos funny, but something about the serious and grumpy Keelgrave saying that almost made him giggle. He kept it restrained, though. He didn't want to have to explain it to Keelgrave.
His body was always quickly healed, but perhaps all the effort had made his mind a little unfocused. Either way, he pushed on.
Over the next few hours, Keelgrave worked him to the bone trying to ingrain the basics of sword fighting into his coddled modern-day Earth mind. Symon felt good about his progress, at least in a vacuum. It was easy to follow these complicated patterns and dances when he could go through them as slowly as he needed to, a spirit's voice in his mind correcting his mistakes as soon as they occurred. Even then, his actions felt robotic. Things just didn't flow naturally for him, and it felt like Keelgrave had to constantly remind him of the same mistakes he was making.
A steady flow of vitality meant he could work himself at maximum intensity nigh-indefinitely, but a few hours of hard work wasn't enough to turn Symon into a capable amateur. Not when it was something so different from anything he was used to. He felt a little bad that he hadn't unlocked a Swords Passive, even though he knew it was unreasonable. Keelgrave had explained to him the three pillars necessary for having the Ledger recognise a skill: time, effort, and understanding. Symon had effort in spades, but it wasn't enough to compensate for the near-complete lack of the other two. It would come eventually, as long as he kept at his training. Which he would.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
But first, it was time for lunch. There was no point starving his body and wasting vitality when they had plenty of spare food available. The others had been happy to relax around at camp while Symon trained, thankful for an excuse to take a day off. They'd been exploring every day for a few weeks before they'd met Symon, never sleeping in the same place more than once. All that free time meant they could cook something more involved — and it was well worth the effort.
They'd prepared another stew, which was a good start. They'd also made one for dinner last night, and it had tasted much as he'd been expecting a stew to taste. He wouldn't have thought twice about it if he'd been served it in an Earth restaurant.
Atabek was also well enough to move around after the recent round of healing, so he contributed in his own manner. The big man had taken out a wide, flat sheet of metal from his pack before coating it in flour he poured from a large leather pouch. He then added water to it, kneading the dough into thin discs before delving into yet another pouch and sprinkling a different powder over it. After that, he pressed the dough down flat with his sledgehammer-like bare hands before transferring the tray directly over the fire. He clapped his hands together to dust the flour off, the impact of each meaty palm sounding like thunder.
Stiffly, he lowered himself into a sitting position as he waited for the bread to cook, letting out a satisfied sigh as he did so. It smelled delicious even though it had barely started cooking, a strong herbal scent that he had no close comparison for.
Symon licked his lips as he stared at the bread. All that training built up an appetite. Turning away from the fire, he caught Atabek's eye. The giant of a man had a smug look on his face as if he knew exactly how good the bread smelled. Symon offered a smile and a thumbs up, the only direct communication they could have considering Symon spoke no Dumosan and the adventurer spoke no Common.
In response, Atabek squinted at Symon's raised hand. Slowly, he raised his own hand, thumb outstretched. It seemed the power of the humble thumbs-up transcended all cultural and language barriers.
Fine, he might have been trying to delay things. Despite the pain and effort required, he enjoyed the physical exercise. It was something he hadn't been able to commit so much time to until recently, so it was a novel experience for him. But the next part of his training... he wasn't sure if he would be able to handle it.
With one last forlorn look at the frying bread and sizzling stew, he trudged off to begin his lessons. The food would be done soon, hopefully, and save him from what was to come.
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"You just said the same thing twice!" Symon complained.
Symon took a deep breath before trying again. "Kuh. Kuh. Kuh."
The pair was just feeding off one another, making the experience miserable for both teacher and student. In truth, Symon wasn't doing that poorly. He'd already been speaking Common with Aslan, or more accurately he was speaking Common at Aslan, considering he was just repeating what Keelgrave told him, but that still meant he'd been having practical experience with the language. In his more recent conversations with Aslan, he'd found himself able to occasionally pick out the meaning of some words even before Keelgrave supplied the translation.
His improved Intelligence must be helping, but he also suspected that his Will was helping here. It had been his highest attribute from the moment he came to this planet, although Constitution was quickly catching up. He felt like his Will was allowing him to stay focused for longer, especially when it was something he didn't enjoy. Learning to use a sword was exciting, even if Keelgrave had him doing the same couple swings over and over for hours at a time. Learning Common, on the other hand, was something he had to force himself to do. Foreign languages had always been a weak point of his, but he was powering through. As much to spite Keelgrave as anything else.
Symon successfully endured his lessons for an hour before the food was finally ready. Symon had hoped it would have been done in half that time, but the tough jerky they used in their travel rations needed to be simmered in the stew for a considerable time in order to soften.
The stew was simple but tasty, with a light citrusy taste. He would have preferred some nice big chunks of meat, but the jerky had mostly broken down into small fibres. Not the most appetising texture, but still enjoyable. It would have been a more than acceptable meal, a strong six out of ten... but then came the flatbreads that Atabek had made.
They were delicious. A soft, still warm interior coupled with a flaky and crispy exterior. They somehow tasted buttery, despite Symon never witnessing Atabek add any of the substance. Whatever he'd sprinkled on the dough just before he moved it to the fire gave it a spicy garlic flavour. The others used their breads as both a utensil and a food, scooping up their stew and eating the two together. When Symon tried it, he almost shed tears of joy. He told himself his eyes were just watering from the spice. This sure beat not eating for days and only using vitality to keep your body going.
After lunch, Symon returned to his sword training with gusto, repeating the same downwards chop a thousand times before switching to a stab, and then a sideways slash. Eventually, it was time for more language lessons, during which he made a conscious effort to try and forget his past shortcomings and simply give his all in the moment. It was marginally effective.
As night fell, they had their leftover lunch for dinner — it was almost as good reheated as it was fresh.
Crawling ontop of his bedroll under his open faced tent, he let out a contented sigh. A life of near death experiences fighting monsters would cause you to grow incredible in some regards, but would also leave other areas distinctly lacking. He felt like he'd made good progress towards bringing these aspects up to par.
He doubted he'd ever come to enjoy learning Common, but with the benefits the Ledger had provided him, he felt it was more tolerable. At least sleep would grant him escape from the lessons.