“No spells. No magical strengthening. Not a lick of magic at all. Okay?” Harold firmly said while he held a medium-length longsword in his two hands.

“Gotcha!” I stood opposite of him, wielding the sword Ersham gifted me.

I dashed from the ground, before running in a circle around Harold, trying to decide the direction of my attack, while his left eye calmly tracked my movements.

“Don’t have all day, boy.”

There.

I sprung towards him, intending to attack him from the left, taking advantage of the blind spot of his covered right eye. He smiled to himself as if expecting such an attack. At the last instant, before my sword would meet his body, he suddenly turned with lightning-quick speed and parried my blow.

“Gah!”

He remained in his place, not opting to counterattack. I stepped back, rethinking my offense.

“Is that really all you can muster, boy? Fine. I’ll let you use your body strengthening.”

Tch, it frustrates me to say this, but even with body strengthening, I won’t be able to get even close to winning against him.

Mana circulated through my body, enhancing my strength and speed. With renewed power, I bolted forwards, intending to beat him in a direct clash. Lurching towards him, I launched a slash, which was met with a deflection via a twisting of his sword, a sidestep to reposition himself, and a jab from him straight to my face as if to punish my foolishness. Another slash met with a parry, redirecting my sword upwards, allowing him to punish me with an elbow to the stomach, knocking the wind out of me.

I desperately made to stab his chest, but he simply sidestepped effortlessly once more and gave me a biting slap to my face.

Welp, this is going nowhere.

I jumped into the air before bringing down my sword with full power, but my target was… nowhere to be found.

“Who the hell would let themselves get hit by that?”

A fist to my face knocked me out.

***

“Abysmal. Utterly abysmal. Worst pupil I’ve ever had.”

The old man did not spare kind words for me as I rubbed my sore face.

“While you might be a hot shot with magic, your sword skills are simply horrendous, embarrassing to the eye. You rely on body strengthening to make up for a lack of skill and technique. Being young is not an excuse for such a vomit-inducing display of so-called swordsmanship.”

I found myself hard-pressed to contradict his words though. He wasn’t wrong.

“I almost feel bad for your sword, stuck with a wielder unable to wield it to its full potential.”

Harold looked over my expression as if to probe my reaction.

“But, the foundation is there.” His one eye looked towards me with an intense fieriness. “And better yet, you have passion, boy. Spirit. The desire to win. All the skill in the world brings you nothing if you don’t have that.”

His expression grew fiercer as if to gauge my resolve.

“For the next coming weeks, if you truly intend to stay here, you will not be using any magical strengthening, nor spells in general, during our training. Rely on your own very body to fight.”

He passed me a wet rag to nurture my sore bruises.

“Martial arts, whether that be swordsmanship or not, is all about the endless pursuit of self-betterment, about learning to lower yourself to sincere humility. As a wise man once said, a highland will never be irrigated by a river,” Harold said cooly. “So… I look forward to teaching you humility, boy.”

I could see at that moment that this old man would be the harshest yet most effective teacher I’d have thus far.

***

“What, are you getting tired out?” Harold asked me as we walked deep into the woods, the two of us carrying long pikes in our hands. The crowing and squawking of the birds signified the coming dawn. It was the morning after my first spar with him.

“Just trying to focus on protecting myself from this miasma,” I said. “It takes quite a bit of concentration to prevent it from draining my energy.” I focused on keeping the mana in my reservoir protected from the black fog that hung in the forest air.

Harold’s cottage lay in a calm area closer to the mountains, in the proximity of river streams. It was yet untainted by miasma, but surrounding the cottage was deep ancient forestry with thick, mature trees and wildly sprawled vegetation, and most importantly, these areas were blanketed by miasma.

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“Hmph, you’re part demon so shouldn’t it be easier for you, boy?”

“I guess. More importantly, how are you not being affected, mister Harold?”

“Over time, my body has learned the best way to counteract miasmic mana drain. How do I describe it…” the old man said. “Ah, yes. If you think of your mana reservoir as a ball of water, my technique is to have that ball of water swirl around itself, as if to repel the miasma from creeping in by the momentum of its sheer spin.”

That… actually makes sense. I’ve been going about it wrong, then. Instead of static protection…

I imagined his words, removing the layer of protection from my mana reservoir and visualizing instead it as flowing endlessly on itself like a whirlpool. I felt my mana circulating in place within me; the sensation felt natural and effortless.

…I should go for dynamic protection. While my mana is still being drained, the leakage of mana is at a very, very minuscule rate. Almost unnoticeable. And I can also use magic while maintaining this protection because the channels of my reservoir are still open, unlike with my own technique.

“Thanks, mister Harold. I think I got it!”

“What.” He stared at me in shock. “Are you serious? Did you actually replicate my technique?”

“I think so. And it feels easy to maintain, as well.”

“Fifty years of practice… fifty years… Only for a half-demon boy to steal my technique in a matter of seconds… Haha…” He laughed at himself incredulously, still in disbelief. “Well, then. This just means I won’t show mercy on you in our trips to the forest.”

Damn it, old man. Maybe I should have pretended to not have gotten it first try.

We were venturing into the depths of the Northern Forests to hunt. This was something he said we would do every morning, something that he did by himself before my arrival. To develop a keen, aware mind while also developing one’s endurance — that was the goal.

My body was beginning to feel tired, having not used magical body enhancement even once today to reinvigorate itself.

I just realized, I never really… worked out properly. I’ve always relied on my bountiful mana to power me, convinced that magic would be my one ace. Have I blinded myself? Have I only stuck to my talents?

“A fight is often not decided by extravagant attacks and supersonic speed, but by simple endurance,” Harold said as we continued into the woods. “That is the first key — to train your body and mind to endure through endless toil. One often fights not at the peak but rather at the trough of their strength.”

We stopped as we saw in the distance, a gigantic boar, with sharp curved tusks more than capable of ripping our bodies apart.

“And it is due to this reason, that the truly strong fight weakly,” Harold said as he approached the boar, which now caught sight of us and began charging down. “Fight with only as much strength as necessary.”

He held his pike tilted, the bottom end on the ground, the blade on the top pointing towards the approaching boar. As the tip impaled the boar, the creature stopped, realizing its mistake too late.

“And only then, when the opportunity presents itself, do you crash your full strength onto your enemy.” Harold pulled out the pike from the boar before jumping to its side and unleashing a flurry of powerful yet precise stabs through the boar’s left eye, deep into its brain. The animal fell to the ground, dead. “Did you get that while you were standing there, twiddling your thumbs, boy?”

The whole time, I had been pondering his words while watching his graceful movements with intention, soaking in everything he displayed.

One year. No. In less than one year, I’ll push myself, truly push myself for the first time in my life as Luqa. I’ll learn everything I can from this man.

“Think I got most of it, old man!” I said cheerfully.

***

Right after he made me drag practically half of the boar’s body back to the cottage, we immediately moved to the second part of the day — physical exercise.

He watched me intently as I went through body exercises: push-ups, sit-ups, and other exercises that made my muscles scream in pain. After one painstaking hour of intense non-stop workouts, I still wasn’t even done.

“Good, now that you’re warmed up, hold these.”

“Hah… hah…”

As my body felt like jelly, my lungs forcing me to take in air, he handed me an over-sized metal club in each hand while setting a large cylinder in front of me. I almost dropped the clubs as he handed them to me from their sheer weight. The sight of the clubs with the cylinder made me quite nostalgic while also quite horrified at the same time.

“No way… this is…”

“Haha! You know it, boy, don’t you! This is something I learned from you demons. Do y’know how this goes?”

“I’ve h-heard a little about it.”

This was a training method from a certain group of demons, from a particularly spiritual sect of the gods’ worshipers. While I couldn't remember the specifics, the trauma of it washed over me. Visions flashed through my head, visions of a child Malachi protesting against his father, crying, desperate to find a way out.

I shuddered as I tried to compose myself; for the first time as Luqa, I felt true fear.

“Okay, using those clubs in your hands you’ll have to play a certain rhythm constantly for an extended period of time. Use the whole of your body to play and make the movements of your arms smooth, like water.”

I began playing a simple rhythm, with evenly spaced beats, alternating between left and right.

“Faster!” Harold shouted. “Hold that beat for an hour at the very least! And your movements are as fluid as your damn ice magic! Move your arms in an arc over your head before bringing the club down!”

Oh, cruel gods, why did I reincarnate myself?

***

“Good. That’s enough for today.”

I collapsed onto the ground, my arms feeling as if on fire.

This old man really just put an eight-year-old through that. But then again, I kinda asked for it.

“Time for a break.”

Yes! Yes! Yes!

“You can rest for thirty minutes, but after that, put yourself together and make our breakfast, boy,” Harold said while walking away. “And make it delicious!”

Ye— No. No. No.

“Today was an easy morning! Don’t get used to it!” he continued from the distance.

I looked absentmindedly at the sky, while slowly breathing as my heart beat rapidly in my chest. After it was all said and done, I felt great satisfaction. This was much unlike magic training with my mother, where learning spells just came naturally to me and I never really found myself exhausted trying to cast spells.

It could be the insight from my past life aiding me in relearning magic. But this training was markedly different. It required pushing my body to the limits, in a way I couldn’t remember doing, well, ever. Even as Malachi, though I had worked hard, my power flowered from talent and natural aptitude.

Yes, this life will be different. I’ll never stop pushing myself. I’ll never become complacent.

From the depths of my memories, my mother’s advice came to mind.

“…And never stop practicing your magic!” “You have the potential to be a legendary mage, Luqa. So become one!”

Right. Even with my so-called ‘talent’ with magic, no, especially with magic, I should never become complacent.

I shakily raised my right hand, conjuring and manipulating water in front of me. As the water floated in front of me, it froze into crystals of ice before melting back into water. This cycle continued, my control of the process improving by minuscule increments each time.

I have 30 minutes. I won’t waste a single one.