“RISE AND SHINE SWEETHEART! YOU HAVE THREE MINUTES TO GET TO THE YARD AND GET YORU ARMOR ON!” Volgan’s chipper voice threw me out of a deep sleep, and for once I didn’t try and fight my instincts. I blew through the house, slipping silently around surprised servants before they truly registered that I was there. By the time my mind managed to fight back into control, I was in the training yard looking around for my equipment.

“Not bad kid, not bad.” Volgan chuckled as he joined me at a leisurely pace. “Your stuff is over in that chest there. I took the liberty of having it altered yesterday since I was informed of your added strength. Go ahead and get ready, there isn’t a time limit. I just wanted you to get used to getting up in a hurry.”

While I was getting ready, I took a look around at the setup. The pells were in the same configuration, though there were two extra poles on my side of the grounds. That struck me as a bit odd, but I was sure I would find out what hell they would bring as soon as I was deemed ready for it. Luckily for me, that was immediately.

Volgan smiled, “I see you eyeing those poles. That’s good. It always pays to notice what has changed on the battlefield. This time it’s just training, but in real life that could be a trap set in the night by your enemy. Now normally I wait to do this, but since you noticed it, you get to start early! Every day you will come out here and find the traps I’ve laid. I’ll start out easy, but there will be ones you miss and you will learn a lesson every time. This, I guarantee. Questions?”

“What are the poles for?”

“Come on over, and I’ll show you.” He said, letting me go ahead. I heard a bit of clattering behind me, and was a bit confused to see him hauling two shields with a massive grin on his face. Once I was in position between the poles, he gently hung them on the cross bars.

“The legion works as a unit. It is our greatest strength. Part of working together is not getting in the way of your fellows. Today, we will spend the majority of the day targeting again, but your new hurdle is to not strike the shields of your shieldmates. Every time you do, you will have to run a mile. Same as yesterday, I want constant movement between strikes I call. I hope you’re ready.”

Ten minutes in, and I was already starting to feel the difference. What really was only a pound or two of lead added to specific sections of my lorica, gladius, and scutum didn’t seem like much at first. And then fatigue started setting in. “DON’T YOU DARE FLUSH YOURSELF WITH MAGIC BOY! I SEE IT IN YOUR EYES! PUSH THROUGH IT! FIGHT LIKE A LEGIONNAIRE DAMN YOU!”

With that motivation, I kept trying to maintain my speed, but I was doomed to fail. Four stabs later, and my growing inaccuracies cost me. My shield had slipped too far to the side, knocking down the shield to my left.

“HALT!” Volgan cried, and I backed away panting, gently resting the bottom of my scutum on my greaves. He came around the sides, resetting the shield on the pole, and looking me over. “Alright, after action report time. While I’m talking, go ahead and use your magic to refresh yourself. First off, well done. As you can see, adding that little bit of weight really drains the stamina. You didn’t make it as far as I was hoping, but you easily passed the worst case scenario. That it was your shield arm that failed is telling as well. For the next week, unless the task requires finesse you are to use your left arm. We will build up strength and stamina. If you don’t like the sound of that, we can do another option. The choice is yours, change hands or blind option number two.”

I thought about it for a second. I know that both options are going to be effective, and in all honesty both are going to be just as hard. That said, I really had a loathing to using my left hand for some reason. “Let’s go with option two then.” I said, getting a surprised flinch from Volgan.

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“Really? Wow, congrats on being the first to have chosen option two! In that chest over there is a lead bracer. It is the same weight as a scutum. After I release you from here, you are to wear it. At least five minutes out of every ten, you are to hold your left arm out at chest height, keeping your forearm perfectly level. I don’t care if you are eating, walking, or balls deep in whoever you convinced to lift her skirts. You will do it, understand?”

“Yes sir!” I said, straightening my back just a bit.

“Good! Now, let’s get going on rounds two through five, shall we?” He asked, slapping me on the back with the flat of his own blade as motivation. “GO! HIGH THRUST!”

Back into the grind we went, he kept pushing me the entire time. He did let me use my magic on the next several rounds, but stopped me at the end of round four. “Right, here’s where we check to see how much you have been paying attention. I’ve been keeping track of how long you can go without your magic. Have you been keeping track of how much mana you need to use each time to recover?”

I blanched. “Um, no?”

“Well, that just makes this next bit all the more difficult! I’m not going to stop you this time. You are still fighting until you mess up, but you are allowed to use your magic. In fact, I want you to be constantly draining your mana to clear your fatigue. You are to stop when you feel you have used the same amount of mana as clearing it in one go. Understood?”

“Yes sir.” I said, dreading this. I had no idea how much mana I had used, and I had a feeling that Volgan had some way of measuring what I had used. I stepped up, and immediately had to drop into the same speed of striking as had been going the entire time. I held off for a little while, letting the fatigue build up, then started trickling mana in. I was hoping to hold myself in that groove you get after you have warmed up, and it was working.

*CRACK*

Volgan gave me a subtle reminder that my speed and accuracy were slipping as I was concentrating too much on the mana. His blade bounced off the upper rim of my shield, throwing yet another distraction and disrupting my tempo.

“Come on trainee! How are you going to survive in battle if a little love tap like that is enough to disrupt your rhythm? Low! Low! High! Your moves are getting blocky again!” The berating continued, though it always did have a point. I fixed my timing, but lost the thread of the mana. I don’t know how Volgan did it, but he managed to always do something at exactly the wrong time to smash my concentration. Eventually the inevitable happened yet again, and I overcompensated on a side thrust and hit the shield to my right, knocking it off the stand.

“Alright, that’s enough for now. Go head over and start taking off and cleaning your gear.” Volgan ordered, ushering me over. As I started wiping everything down, he continued, “I know I’m pushing you a bit boy, but you have a lot of powerful people looking at you right now. They expect results, and it just ain’t gonna happen if I pussyfoot around. I do want to commend you though. This is by far the toughest I have ever pushed anyone, and you have yet to push back. Part of that might be how you were brought up, part might be that you haven’t fully met your limits yet. We’ll see.” He sat down and sighed, looking over the yards. “I’m not used to explaining myself, but somethin’ just tells me that I should so you know. Whatever, I didn’t live this long by not listening to my instincts. So. I’ll keep pushing you, being careful to keep it to what you can handle. The biggest thing you need to work on is multitasking. The mage guild told me that it takes less mana to keep a low level spell going over a longer period than it does to cast a stronger spell. I was hoping to get you to realize it, but you didn’t realize that you needed to pay attention to everything in battle, no matter how small it seems.”

He paused to pat my back, consoling me. “It’s ok. I’m not going to hold it against you, it’s a lesson we all must learn in time. For the rest of this week, that’s all we are going to work on. Bladework while balancing magic usage and extending the amount of time you can fight. Now, go ahead and take eight laps around the area. Full speed for two, then two at half speed, two at a jog, and the final two at a walk to finish cooling down. You can start the shield training after your magic control lessons with Devon.