When hearing this, Ben remembered some of the people that frequented his gym back on earth. It seemed that their whole purpose in life was to see how much weight they could lift, as there was nothing else they ever talked about. It was always gains, diet, supplements, and other workout related stuff. How would they feel seeing a woman much stronger than them saying brute strength was nothing to be proud off?

[Depressed, I’m sure,] he concluded.

“Ok, so after the backlash all you need to do is rest?” Liza continued.

“Yes, pretty much.”

“Isn’t this bad though? Won’t it kill you in the long run?”

“Nah, I’ll be fine. Although I was injured in the past, I’m much healthier than a regular person. Everything will be ok as long as I don’t abuse it too much and take my time recovering after each instance.”

“Ok then, if you say so. Now that I’ve thanked you for saving us from that pinch and know you won’t be dying on me, let me ask you… who the hell are you?”

“Oh? I thought I’d already introduced myself. I’m Fang Chu, remember?” she said with a smile.

Liza chose to ignore her childish remark.

“You can clearly defend yourself. Why did you hire us? What are you plotting?”

“Indeed, I targeted you guys from the start. Ever since our chance meeting back in Kalafrana, I couldn’t stop thinking about you, Ben.”

“Wha– what? Me?” asked Ben in a fluster. His heart began racing and his face flushed to a light pink color. He thought he was already immune to Fang Chu’s dazzling appearance and demeanour, but this one sentence left him scrambling.

Liza was also surprised by this revelation. She looked over at Ben with an evaluating glance and pondered. [Nope, definitely not because of his looks,] she thought.

“Yes. I want to take you in as a pupil. What do you say?”

“What?” exclaimed Liza.

“Huh?” said Ben, who was caught off guard. That was not what he was expecting.

“What’s a pupil?” inquired Eliot.

A short silence followed as everyone adjusted their mindset.

“What’s a pupil?” asked Eliot again.

“Not now Eliot, I’ll explain to you later,” said Liza quietly.

“So, what do you say Ben? Will you take me as your master?”

“Huh, I… wait. You know my name is Ben?” he asked befuddled.

“Hahaha, indeed. It’s been mightily entertaining seeing everyone refer to you as Neb for the past few days.”

Liza and Ben looked at each other with wry smiles on their faces.

“Ah~, and I was doing so well too! I didn’t let it slip once, just like Liza told me to,” said a dejected Eliot as he kicked randomly at a few bushes.

“Don’t feel down Eliot, you did great!” encouraged Liza.

“So, what do you say Ben?” she asked again.

“There are a few things I need to know before I can answer that.”

“Ask away then.”

“Aren’t you a noble? Why are you searching for a pupil? Why me? What are you supposed to be teaching me? What’s in it for you?” he asked in rapid fire fashion.

“Hahaha, I’m not nobility at all. I’m not even from around here. I’m part of the Heaven Reaching Sect located on the kingdom of Zahur. What I’ll be teaching you is how to defend yourself with your fists and a variety of weapons.”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

“Wait, you’re not nobility? But people from house Esin and Melis acknowledged you as so! How would that be possible if you weren’t a true noble?” interrupted Liza.

“Oh, that? It’s because I have this,” said Fang Chu as she made a small metal shield appear on her hand. It was masterly crafted and on it was carved the crest of a noble family with minute detail.

“Oh, cool!” exclaimed Eliot.

“I bumped into an old man and his entourage when I was wandering around. Turns out he was another lecherous bastard of noble origins. He ordered his guards to capture me the moment he laid eyes on me. I was left with no other choice but to give him and his men a good trashing. I lifted this up from his person afterwards.”

“Uh, what?!”

“Then, during my stay in the capital something similar happened with that Richard fellow. Ah, being this beautiful is so troublesome sometimes,” Fang Chu sighed melodramatically before continuing.

“I also beat his guard up. He became furious that I, a peasant, was trying to fight back. Albek, who happened to be passing by, overheard the commotion and came in my defense. They began arguing with each other and things started to heat up. To avoid further complications, I flashed this crest and said I was a recently adopted daughter of that old man. They were doubtful, but the emblem is genuine so there was nothing they could say. They probably sent people to verify the information on that same day, but I wasn’t worried as I knew I’d be out of the capital when they got their confirmation back.”

Liza and Ben were both astonished. That was brazen! That was bold! To antagonize nobles whenever she went and have a firm mind and cold blood when dealing with them showed how brave Fang Chu was. Actually, maybe crazy would be a better adjective.

[Since she is from a foreign nation and is this powerful, I guess she just doesn’t care. If she’s always on the move it would be nigh impossible for anyone to take revenge on her,] thought Liza.

Fang Chu made a simple gesture and the emblem that was on her hand disappeared into thin air again. Eliot’s eyes shined brightly and he clapped his hand on his leg vigorously.

“Cool! So cool! Do it again! Make it appear and disappear again!”

“Now that you mentioned it Eliot, how are you doing that? You did it with the orb that protected us too,” said Liza.

Ben was also surprised by this, but that was not what was on his mind right now. He wanted to keep talking to Fang Chu and hear her answers, but before he knew it, the conversation got side-tracked.

[Maybe it’s not that bad. It gives me more time to process everything.]

“This?” said Fang Chu as she made the metal emblem appear and disappear repeatedly. “It’s because of this ring. It contains a spatial pocket inside where I can store my things. I noticed that only in the capital you have something similar, but they’re all rucksacks. Bags of holding they were called, if I’m not mistaken. Since I didn’t want to draw attention or suspicion, I bought this rucksack to pretend I’m taking stuff out of my bag. Of course, there’s little reason for it now with how things went in the last fight.”

“Amazing. I always wanted something like that,” said Liza.

“Hey, uhm, can we bring it back a little please?” asked Ben.

“Oh, sorry,” said Liza as she retreated a few steps to give them space.

“Then, what do you think?” asked Fang Chu with a smile.

“You didn’t finish answering my questions. Why are you searching for a pupil? Why me? What’s in it for you?”

“Oh, you’re right, I didn’t…”

Fang Chu paused for a moment. Those were things she didn’t want to share, but she knew there would be no chance of Ben accepting her proposal if she wasn’t completely honest.

“To put it bluntly, I’m searching for a pupil to show my worth. I was always considered a promising seedling and that reflected on my status within the sect. However, things changed. After I was unable to progress any further due to my injury, the upper echelons started pressuring my father. They wanted to have me married to an important figure of another sect to make an alliance,” said Fang Chu with a sigh.

Ben felt a pang on his heart. Hearing Fang Chu was being pressured into marriage irked him a lot somehow. Why did this annoy him so much? He barely knew the woman. Was this what they called loved at first sight?

[Pfft, don’t be ridiculous Ben. You just find her super attractive and that’s why your brain is messing with you with all its chemicals and stuff,] he tried reasoning with himself.

“Of course, I wanted none of that. Even though my father was shielding me, I knew he wouldn’t be able to hold back the upper echelon forever. I knew I’d to show that I was still valuable to the sect before it was too late. I was always focused on improving myself, so I already had a lot of my own thoughts about the training regimen and how to get stronger. Thus, I began teaching the younger disciples, but I soon realized that they were a bunch of lazy, ungrateful, self-righteous little bastards,” said Fang Chu with a scoff.

“I’m sorry, what? Why would you keep people like that around?” asked Liza.

“Every sect has limited resources, so we can’t accept everybody. Therefore, we always conduct an entrance exam to gauge every participant aptitude. We only take in the most talented, the best of the best. The sect would never send them away willingly, specially not after wasting resources on them.”

“But you said they were lazy, ungrateful and self-righteous.”

“Well, I might have gone overboard a little,” said Fang Chu with embarrassment. “They do train and do their own diligence. It’s just that my training regimen is a tiny little bit harsher. Just a bit. In the end, all my students gave up and asked to be assigned to a new instructor before the end of the month,” she said shaking her head.