“How goes the training Angus?” Alnoss asked as I walked in to the inn the next morning.
“Pretty well. The best part was meeting your little friend though. Has she been hiding around the inn the entire time?”
“Hehe, yep. She loves to hang out in the rafters and people watch. Most of the regulars know that I have a guardian up there, and they don’t start anything. Those few that do end up with a set of slashes across the back ended any shenanigans very quickly.”
“After seeing the size of her? Hell yeah, I can understand quitting after one slash.” I said with a chuckle. “I’m surprised she doesn’t try and curl up against the chimney in your kitchen.”
“Heh, she tried that as a kitten. The key to training them is to let ‘em know early on what is and isn’t acceptable.”
“So how did you do it? I haven’t had to train pets yet.”
“We started putting her favorite food in the rafters in the main room, along with a nice soft bed for her. Soon enough she started waiting there for it.”
“Heh, sounds like you got some practice training a mate as well.”
“What are you talking about?” She asked, head tilted.
“There’s a saying where I’m from. ‘The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.’ Pretty much if you want him to do what you want, feed him.”
“That’s. . . I like that! And it really does fit. Though it took a bit for Khaliss to fall for it.” She said, staring off into space as she reminisced about something. “Now, you should probably eat up so you can head out. We have a few people making wagers on your training.”
“Wait, really?”
“Hah, yeah we do. Don’t underestimate what bored people will bet on Angus.”
“And you gently encourage it, as I assume the House gets a small cut of the action?”
“Well, we do facilitate things.” She said with a grin, before patting me on my shoulder. “Now, get to eating, I have money to make off you!” Chuckling, I started in on my food, sausage and eggs. I finished, and headed out to make sure Djarleen was ready, and we headed to the training grounds. I had mystic vision activated, so I noticed the magical emanations from the squirrel on top of one of the buildings, but didn’t react. I wanted to see how Inkler would react to some spying.
“Angus, glad to see you have drastically improved the company you keep!” I heard Shrik taunt as I walked into the barracks training area.
“Heh, considering I usually end up with you or Khaliss, I would say I had nowhere to go but up!”
“Ah, but you wound me!” He fake cried, clutching at his heart.
“You keep some interesting company, apprentice.” Djarleen said with a smile. “I wasn’t aware that some guards received bardic training, but here stands one with a silver tongue.” Winking at Shrik, she sauntered past his gobsmacked expression, putting a little extra swing in her step.
Stepping up to him, I patted him on the shoulder and gave him a bit of advice. “You’re already caught, man. You know it, I know it, and most importantly, she knows it. The one thing I wouldn’t do is piss her off. From what I hear, there are still stories told about her training days in the alchemist guild.” He turned to stare at me, but I was already following Djarleen.
“Dragan! Codo! Podo! You three are training with Angus today!” Shrik yelled as he chased after us, and three drakelings split off and followed us with their spears. Once we got to the building, I opened a doorway but with much less skill than what Shrik did yesterday.
“Inkler.” I whispered as Shrik shut the door behind us. “Saw a squirrel taking an inordinate amount of interest in us, you might have some visitors.” From across the room, I saw two silver eyes blink a few times before a Cheshire grin formed in the darkness.
“Okay everyone, here’s how training is going to go.” I spoke louder. “I’ll start off doing some meditation while Djarleen poisons me. You three can practice your forms while I do that. I’m sure Khaliss would particularly enjoy you practicing at the edges of the light, as switching from shadow to light and back can mess with depth perception. After I get a handle on countering the poison, we will start sparring, first one on one and hopefully by the end of the day it’ll be three on one. Djarleen will have to stay close, so mind your blows if she calls a ‘clear.’ That’ll be her cue to dart in and poison me again.”
“Everyone clear?” Shrik asked, and got nods all around. “Great, then I’ll just leave with one last bit of instruction from Khaliss himself. He feels that Angus here is missing a critical sense. In order to build his danger sense, Inkler will attack randomly from the shadows. Keep going until he dodges at least ten in a row. Oh, and you will need to remove your armor Angus. We wouldn’t want Inkler to feel bad if he shreds it, would we?” He asked with a sadistic smile.
“No, it would be terrible if Inkler felt bad about anything.” I said, putting as much sarcasm into my voice as possible. As Shrik was chuckling, we saw some sparks flash near one of the lights. Walking underneath, we noticed four long slashes in the stone. A few feet away were two silver eyes, and though we couldn’t see any of his face he still managed to convey smugness.
“Did’ya get ‘em?” Shrik asked, and the eyes nodded. “Great job. I’ll just tidy this up a bit.” He muttered, raising a hand and fixing the claw marks in the stone.
“Shrik.” I spoke, voice oddly calm. “Were those inch deep gashes in the stone?”
“Yep!”
“From Inkler? And he is going to slash me like that?”
He stopped and turned to look me right in the eyes, putting his hands on my shoulders. “Only if you don’t dodge it. I highly recommend dodging Angus.” Laughing like a madman, he headed out to do whatever he had planned for the day.
“Ok, you three have fun practicing for a bit, you know what you need to work on more than I do. I’m heading over to this corner to meditate for a bit.”
I sat in the corner with my eyes closed, focusing on my breathing. I quickly managed to tone out the scratching of the footwork of the three spearmen, and it seemed like the relaxation technique that Djarleen had me run through yesterday went much quicker today. I felt a needle pierce my neck again, and this time the poison acted a lot different. Instead of congregating around the nerves, this was a much more free flowing poison. Some would settle in to the large muscle groups, but didn’t actually go into the muscles themselves. Instead, it formed a sort of sheath around the blood vessels. From there, it would drain a bit of everything passing through. Huh, that must be the stamina draining portion. It acted like a massive leech, causing you to burn through more resources for the same effect.
The rest of the poison settled in my heart, where part of it was eating at my mana supply and the rest was consuming blood. I couldn’t just swamp it with mana like the previous poison, as it was eating the mana. It also seemed to be immune to the destructive forces, or at least able to regenerate itself enough to counteract the problem. Not surprising, since this was a much higher tier poison. Well, if they were going to increase the power of the poison, I would have to increase the power of my mana. With my mind and shadow manipulation, I forced half of the mana that was in my core to concentrate, letting much less out per pulse. The poison surprised me, and actively pursued the less concentrated mana, letting me know I was on the right track.
Once I had all my mana concentrated, I went to work. I started at the stuff concentrated in my heart, ripping it to shreds. I let small bits of it flow off in the blood, concentrating on breaking up the larger concentrations first. Once that was done, I went hunting. It was a bit complicated, keeping the new concentrated mana circulating through my body as I directed it to hunt the lingering bits of poison in my blood. I felt Djarleen apply new poison every so often, and found it much easier to attack it before it could get a foothold in places. Once I thought I had a good bit of control, I stood up and looked at the three drakelings.
“So, can I assume from the names Codo and Podo, you two are closely related?”
“Twins.” They replied in unison.
“Perfect. Do you two work well together?”
“The best. We often know what the other is thinking, and can plan attack routines accordingly.”
“Great, you two practice together for a bit, Dragan here is going to battle me first.” The largest of the three nodded, and stepped into the middle of the area. We both took slightly defensive stances, and I nodded at him. Within a half a second, he exploded into action, unleashing a flurry of blows designed to test my speed with my weapon as well as my mobility. I parried where appropriate, angling my body to take the power out of his strikes where I couldn’t. Due to his reach, I didn’t even try and approach at first, content to learn his fighting style. Unfortunately, he revealed very little, settling in to wear me out with shallow jabs that barely drew blood. Death from a Thousand Cuts. It wasn’t flashy, but it was a tried and true way to take out your enemy with as little danger to yourself as possible.
Well, I couldn’t let things go any further like this, so I tried a little trickery. Charging forward, I crafted a buckler type shield to intercept his decending spear and deflect it safely away from me. His eyes widened in shock at first, before narrowing in concentration as he smiled. Looks like Khaliss gave me trainees that enjoyed a challenge.
“Clear!” Djarleen called, and we both froze while she stabbed me in the neck once again. A second later, we heard her say, “Resume.”
We immediately started battling, only this time Dragan was on the defensive. He was incredibly proficient at deflecting my strikes, though I wasn’t quite going full speed. I threw a slow attack from the right, easily blocked. Once he started moving to block it, I stepped forward and slammed my left fist into his ribs, but was disappointed to only get a grunt. Of course, he retaliated by slamming his tail into my ankles, and bringing the butt of his spear into an overhead strike that I had to commit both hands on my weapon to stop, and even then it was a close thing. Disengaging, we looked each other up and down, both having been surprised at some point in the battle. Smiling, I started to move forward once again only to feel a burning slash across my back, surprise causing me to stumble and take a vicious jab from Dragan right into my solar plexus. Just like Khaliss probably taught him, his assault didn’t end there as he stepped forward and swung his spear butt in a sweep from the right side aimed straight at my head.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
This was going to hurt quite a bit if I did nothing, and I had a feeling that he was expecting my shadow shield to reappear. Instead I flung a glob of darkness at his spear, changing it into a chain that locked it to the ground as swiftly as possible. The spear stopped short, and he quickly took mental control of it as I smacked his elbow with my hammer, not having the mental ability to fight off the poison, maintain control of the shadow, and keep attacking physically. He backed away this time, shaking his hand to get feeling back. I would have pursued, but that loss of the chain had left me with a bit of a backlash, manifesting in a spiking pain behind an eye. It left swiftly, but still was one more distraction in battle that I just couldn’t afford. Just before we resumed, I got a sensation like the hairs on the back of my neck were standing on end, and I dove to the side in a roll without thinking. Turning back, I saw silver eyes looking disappointingly between myself and the four claws that were still unsheathed. Inkler narrowed his eyes at me in annoyance, then disappeared back into the shadows.
“How? I didn’t even sense his attack until his claws unsheathed, and you were moving before that.” Podo asked from across the room.
“Ever had that feeling, that something was watching you? You feel slight tingles on the back of your neck? That’s what I felt, and I moved before I thought.” The three trainees all nodded, and Dragan beckoned me to return to the fight.
Battle resumed, and we both must have decided that the probing attacks were done as we went at it with abandon. It seemed that Dragan was holding back his speed as well, as he had no issues with my increase. We managed to battle through two more reapplications of poison before I called a break, having burned through a good bit of my energy. I was still fighting the poison, but it had taken the upper hand and I needed to meditate to get it back under control. I took the better part of an hour, wanting to have my health regenerate a bit. Once I had recovered, I stood once more.
“Alright you guys, time to test out the twins.” Dragan backed away to watch, as the twins stepped forward, leaving a decent gap between themselves. “BEGIN!” I shouted, and they immediately moved to flank me, something that I had assumed would happen. To prevent it, I had a stone hand reach up from the floor and grab at one of them. Though it didn’t manage to grab anything, it did destroy his footwork splendidly and allow me to charge in and smash his chest with a hammer blow before I was spinning and defending from a furious onslaught from his twin. I kept my momentum, and used it to circle around so that both twins were in my field of vision, using lessons learned from battlefield control to the fullest. Something told me that those two would cover each other’s openings nearly flawlessly, and that unless I wanted to be in pain I needed to keep them from attacking in tandem.
They made me work for it, but I managed to keep them apart for the majority of the fight. The issues usually arrived when Inkler decided to take a swipe or two at me, not always going for the back either. I took a large gash on the thigh as I was weapon locked with one of the twins, and the loss of mobility really put me in a bind as I kept taking jabs from the remaining twin. I actually had to make my shadow copy in order to escape from them, but I was kinda proud of how it went down. I dove to my left, the same side as the spare twin and left a shadow where I was previously. The nearer twin stabbed the clone in the chest, and I transformed the clingy shadows into solid stone and locked his weapon. Then it was simple to defend against the free weapon as the first twin took precious seconds to free his weapon.
We all took a bit to recover after that exchange. “You have quite a few surprising secrets Angus.” Dragan said. “I had no idea we could convert shadow to stone.”
“I didn’t either, but I needed to bind that weapon if I was going to get out of that predicament. It helps if you start the conversion on the shadow immediately around the shaft, as then you can expand it to whatever you need and don’t run the risk of them removing the spear from the shadow before you can catch it.” I explained while panting. “Now, I’m sorry to say this but I need a bit of a breather. I’ve almost mastered fighting this annoying poison, but it has effectively cut my regeneration in half.”
“What would you say if some of us wanted to go through this ritual?” One of the twins, Podo I think, asked.
“Let’s see how I end up, and you can see if you can pay Djarleen to do it for you. Remember, it takes two days for every five levels you have. I would also suggest talking with Khaliss for some intensive training like what we are doing, as it helps to have something to fill your time.”
I ended up taking almost half an hour, spending that time using my shadow to battle with Dragan while Codo and Podo fought. When Dragan and I took small breaks, I was busy checking out the battle between the twins. They were so in tuned with each other that they could react to the slightest muscle twitch, and most of their battle was subtle shifting of position for a minute followed by an incredibly rapid exchange of blows that usually came out in a draw.
“Ok, switch partners.” I said, and got all three people looking at me weirdly. “What, do you two.” I pointed at the twins. “Seriously think that your only opponents in life will be those who fight with the same style as your twin? Or that you will know them well enough to adjust based on the slightest twitch? Dragan now gets to fight with Codo, and my shadow will spar with Podo.”
Switching partners did a number on the poor twins, as they found themselves falling for all but the most obvious of feints. I would have felt slightly bad about things, but I was sure Khaliss would have done far worse to them if they didn’t take steps to remedy the situation. I called a break after fifteen minutes, as they had both taken some rather serious blows in the meantime. “So, what did we learn?” I asked through the glares of the twins.
“That you are just as sadistic as Khaliss.”
“Dragan hits harder than Podo.”
“Flexibility in your style is key.”
“Good points, but I want you two to listen to Dragan’s reasoning. Can you explain that?”
“I can try. Um. It’s like how we started, you do small probing attacks to figure out what your opponent is capable of. Find any habits you can exploit. Angus prefers sweeping parries, which would leave him open to a follow through from the spear butt if he didn’t have that shadow shield he can summon.”
“Right. It will also be obvious in those initial blows if there is a large skill disparity. If you are much stronger skill wise, it is fine to overpower your foe with skillful blows. If not, you will need something to bridge that gap. Ideas for those?”
“Tricks.” The twins replied in unison while Dragan thought for a bit, then shrugged.
“Tricks will work, but another thing you can do is delay.”
“Delay?” Dragan asked, confused.
“Yes. If you can’t beat your opponent, but you can delay them until help arrives, go ahead and do so.”
“Wouldn’t that be, I dunno, weak?”
“Not necessarily. Take the twins here. I can probably beat them one on one, with a bit of work. But if one is fighting defensively while waiting on his brother to arrive, I am at a severe disadvantage. First, I am needlessly expending energy in a fruitless endeavor. Sure, I might injure him a bit but my chances of a decisive blow are minimal. So his brother arrives, and now they can bring their combined might to bear. This puts us at equal skill, if not slightly in their favor, as well as fighting an enemy that is already tired and frustrated, both of which will lead to mistakes on my part.”
“Isn’t that, not very honorable?” One of the twins asked.
“So? At the end of the day, would you rather be honorable or dead? If it really bothers you, think of it like this. Honor is for duels; pragmatism is for battle. In battle all that really matters is the other guy is dead. Nobody will care if you blinded him with mud or your brother stabbed him in the back as you had him in a weapon lock. Now, are you guys ready for the best part of the day?”
“Oh god, he’s got that look that Khaliss gets.” Dragan muttered.
“Perfect! No objections, so now we get to battle. Three on one!”
“Isn’t that a little, one sided?” Codo asked.
“You’re absolutely right. Djarleen, hand me the rest of that vial of poison. I need to even the odds for these guys a bit, so I’ll be drinking it before battle.” Chugging the last third of the bottle, I quickly turned and charged at the still seated trainees. “FIGHT!” I screamed, and took great pleasure at their astonished faces as they scrambled to get into a fighting posture. Each one took a pulled blow from my scythe end, hard enough to emphasize that I hit a vital area like the neck or a kidney, but light enough that it wouldn’t interfere with the fight.
“Always be prepared! Lesson one failed!” I cackled, as I started lashing out in all directions. I did the opposite of my battle with the twins, and let them surround me. I wasn’t really at any detriment, as I could read the telegraphing blows from the eyes of the two I could see, and also spinning let me switch focus rapidly between opponents. After a half a minute where they couldn’t land a blow, I started fighting really dirty. Grabbing Podo’s spear, I jerked him into the path of Dragan’s blow, snickering at the thud of the impact.
“Know what your allies are doing at all times. Lesson two failed!” I shoved Podo, further throwing him and Dragan into disarray. Dragan was shocked that he had actually hit Podo, so I got him back into the fight with a punch to the jaw. “If you strike an ally, keep your head in the game. Lesson two point five failed!” I said, dropping to the ground and sweeping with a stone enhanced tail to both dodge the spear thrust from Codo and knock him off balance. The tail mace was rather effective, but I didn’t have the strength to hold it more than an inch off the ground.
“All parts of a monster are a weapon. Lesson three failed!” I said as I used a spinning overhand blow to help Codo head towards the ground. Smiling at the next feeling, I created a blob of taffy like shadow on my back, before spinning to grab the paw of a rather surprised Inkler and spinning him into the Podo Dragan mix. “Never be predictable, especially from ambush. Lesson four failed!” I chuckled, watching as the three tried to extricate themselves but kept getting tangled from a panicked Inkler. I circled around them and hit Dragan in the kidneys, sending him stumbling but finally breaking up the tangle.
“Never lose sight of your opponent. Lesson five failed!” I said, sliding my hand up the shaft of my weapon and using it as a weight to add force to my punches. Poor Podo was only able to partially block the first one before a flurry had him tripping over his feet in a mad scramble to get away. “Some weapons can be wielded in strange manners, completely changing their attack range and patterns. Lesson six, failed!” I said after a particularly vicious punch to Podo’s snout. I turned to see that in the meantime, Codo and Dragan had separated themselves, and taken the time to reset their stances.
“Sacrificing a comrade might be necessary. Use the most of it. Lesson seven, passed.” I said with a smile, stepping away from Podo so that he couldn’t tangle my footing. We were all breathing heavily at this point, and I thought I caught a gleam of inspiration in Dragan’s eyes before he did something completely unexpected. Tossing his spear crosswise at me, he charged in right behind it. As I dealt with the unexpected weapon, he grabbed my arm and slid around behind me, putting me into a very competent full nelson.
“He’s wide open, finish it!” Dragan shouted at Codo, who only hesitated for a fraction of a second before pulling a blow that struck right where my heart was. I noticed that even as the blow was landing, Dragan had spun and let go with his left hand, so that should the spear pierce through he wouldn’t be sacrificed as well.
“Being unexpected can lead to opportunities, if properly exploited. Lesson eight, passed.” I said chuckling before collapsing onto my butt.
“Sacrificing your weapon to bind a superior opponent, you allowed an ally the killing blow while leaving yourself an exit. Quite impressive teamwork everyone.” We all started and turned to see Khaliss had come in at some point, and we had all missed it. “But you failed to keep track of your surroundings. Lesson nine, was it? Lesson nine failed. That includes you too, Angus.”
“But when? How?” I stammered.
“Dancing shadow steps. I thought for sure one of you would notice that one of the lights is now blocked. I used the shadow from that to drop down into the room here. Which brings us to lesson ten: attacks may come from all directions, don’t limit yourself to two dimensions. Overall, I would give that battle lesson a 7 out of 10. You are all improving, but we still have a ways to go. Now, if you don’t mind, I think our time is up for the day. Thank you Angus, for the impromptu lessons.”
“Hey, thanks for loaning them to me for the day. I’m pretty sure I didn’t break them, so can I borrow your trainees again in the future?”
“If need be, probably. What about tomorrow?”
“No, tomorrow it will need to be just him.” Djarleen interrupted, and explained further when we all stared at her. “Tomorrow we start the application of Death’s Knell. It is far and away the most destructive poison crafted by alchemy. He will need to devote the entire day without distraction to countering it, and even that might not be enough.”
“Very well. See you the day after tomorrow then Angus. Djarleen.” He said, nodding at each of us before creating an opening in the wall and leading his trainees out.
“Is it really that bad?” I asked, though judging by the name it was going to be pretty horrible.
“Yes. I hope you prepare yourself, as the time between applications is triple, and we are supposed to start with your non dominant hand instead of the neck.” She said in an incredibly serious tone. “The first dose, I am supposed to just barely break the surface with the needle. That is enough to kill things, so please be careful. I can probably count on one hand the number of natural poisons that even come close, and the only ones that are more powerful are semi divine in nature.”
“Thanks Djarleen.” I said, with just as much gravity as she just gave me. “I will take this seriously, and I appreciate everything you have done so far. I won’t let you kill your apprentice.”
“You better not. Now go and get some sleep, tomorrow you descend into hell.”
“Yes ma’am!” I said with a mock salute, then headed to the inn to log out for the night. I kept murmuring to myself that I would make my own house one of these days, but it always ended up as a low priority.