The gentle sound of waves hitting on the hull of the ship was the first thing Keziah noticed once out of his cabin. The calming nature of this repeatable pattern gave off a serene feeling. One could feel completely cut off from the world, from his problems, or from his worries. With nothing but a darker blue of the sea and the lighter blue of the sky, with the occasional white of the waves trying to breach the gap between the two, it was possible to forget the past and not worry about the future. Everyone onboard lived completely, and only, in the present.

Perhaps that was the biggest allure of sailing. The unspoken freedom that many mythicized. It was a life so vastly different from most, that one had to experience it for himself to truly understand the pull of the sea. Keziah had spent his fair share of time on a ship. Never as a sailor, always as a guest or passenger. It allowed him to enjoy the sea to the fullest, without having to do most of the work necessary in maintaining a ship. Even then, he honestly could care less for life on the sea.

He wondered why that might be. He didn't grow up on the coast, but his family's estate was close enough that a day of journey would bring him to the sea. He spent three years in the Tower, which was located on an island in the middle of Midarior, the inland sea. He was fairly accustomed to water being around him. Even if most of his life was spent on the road or in the forest, the feeling of the sea breeze and smell of salt never left his memory. He liked it.

That deduction would leave him with one part of the answer as to why the life of a sailor didn't suit him. The feeling of freedom. He realized after his last voyage on a different ship that he didn't need it. He felt calmer in the sea, sure, but that was mostly due to there being considerably less unknown danger. No one would make an attempt in his life while he was sleeping on cold, hard ground while he was on a ship. He didn't have to worry about some beast chasing him, or a human hunting him for revenge. He did have to worry about the crew of the ship a little bit, but he already made moves to ensure nothing dodgy would happen.

He didn't need the freedom of not having to worry about the future, or remembering the past because he had always lived entirely in the present. Even before his accidents, he tended to get the most out of life as he could. In recent years that turned out to be not much, but nevertheless, he focused only on what was in front of him. No point in being anxious about the future, or regretting what could have been. What's done is done. Keziah liked his life just the way it was. Unfortunately for him, he was involuntarily forced to, ever so slightly, worry about the future. Not his, necessarily, but the person in front of him.

"Hey, Kez!" Annette called out to him once she saw him. "Finally awake, huh?" she tried to tease him.

"I'm old, haven't you heard?" he joked back. "Old people need their sleep."

"Uh-huh." She leaned her wooden practice sword on her shoulder.

Annette has been put through somewhat of a regimen these past few days on the ship. Taking advantage of the relatively safe environment and having not much else to do, Keziah spread out whole sessions for Annie to do. Morning always started with running laps around the ship, to the initial confusion of the sailors who had since learned to just ignore the unusual guests. Then there was stretching. Flexibility was as important to a warrior as his strength. Being mostly self-taught, Keziah considered this to be the biggest flaw in most soldiers' and military-man fighting styles. They considered strength to be the most important. Then was speed, and maybe after speed, they would start to worry about not pulling a muscle on the smallest activity. Keziah had learned that it doesn't matter how strong you are if you fall on your back after losing balance from the smallest of trips.

Next in Annie's schedule came the strength training. For how much Keziah thought that some overdid it in this department, it was still crucial and necessary. Annie did what her body was currently capable of. This narrowed down to push-ups, sit-ups, and pull-ups. All used just the weight of her own body as a challenge.

It would continue to be so for a long time, as Keziah didn't envision Annette as using her physical strength to overpower her enemies. She herself showed no preference so far, so Keziah pushed her toward a fighting style that focused more on speed and precision. There were some barriers, especially in terms of physical strength, that were simply impossible for Annie to overcome, being a woman. If she were to develop her mana channels more, then that would also translate to a more powerful body. Not by a huge amount, but a strong mage was noticeably stronger physically than a white soul — a person without magic. But that also applied to everyone else. Annie had to play to her strengths, and they would soon discover what they were. Keziah was sure of that.

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"Are you alright?" asked Annette, her face turning into a worried frown. "I think I heard you screaming from the cabin?"

"I heard it too," said Scoyl, standing opposite of Annette with his own wooden sword. He was helping her — and irreversibly himself — with the last part of her daily training — swordsmanship. He was a much more experienced fighter than she was, but his focus lay mostly on daggers. With a sword, he was almost like a novice. Keziah, learning about that, thought he could kill two birds with one stone, and so the two sparred after Annie's strength training. Of course, Keziah instructed Scoyl to hold his strength as much as was necessary but to still not hold out completely. Annie had to understand how important it was to hold onto a sword after being exhausted. It was easy to block and parry strikes when you were at peak condition, but in reality, you were fighting battles while being mercilessly tired more often than not.

"It's nothing," reassured Keziah. "I just thought that I was gonna be stuck on this ship with you lot for a whole week more, and the thought honestly terrified me," Keziah tried to hide his nightmare under a joke.

"Don't worry, Ashish!" Scoyl said wholeheartedly, squeezing his hand into a fist and placing it on his heart. "I will protect you from any danger lurking in the shadows."

"Well, that's a little ironic, but thank you, I guess," he acknowledged the blonde youth's enthusiasm, which made him smile and look more revitalized. "I can sleep peacefully knowing that at least one of my students values my life. If only the other one holding onto this piece of wood would be equally ready to show her respect to her master. Man, what a day that would be. But I guess you can't be blessed with two earnest apprentices at once, huh?" Keziah said and put his hands on the back of his neck and stretched his back with a little yawn.

Annette rolled her eyes at Keziah's antics. "Yes, yes, this humble apprentice shows her gratitude to the master," she said, throwing a deep, theatrical bow.

"At least you learn fast, don't ya?" Keziah grinned at Annette who smirked back. "Well, then go back to your training. Unless you want to spar with me?"

"No!" both Annette and Scoyl shouted at the same time.

"That… won't be necessary, Ashish," said Scoyl meekly. "I think…?" he added, hoping that Keziah wouldn't take his own offer of joining the training.

Keziah looked at both of them, tired, but not tired enough for him to torment them yet. "Hm, no it won't, Scoyl. No, it won't."

Both Annette and Scoyl breathed huge sighs of relief.

"That doesn't mean you stop training. Back to sparring, you two." Keziah warned them.

"Yes!" affirmed Annette, not wanting to push her luck with complaining.

"Yes, Ashish!" Scoyl never even imagined complaining.

Keziah watched the two of them exchange blows for the next fifteen minutes. Annie was getting more and more comfortable blocking strikes that held more power than her own. Most of the sparring involved her on the defensive, as parrying, blocking, and dodging winded her up too much to go on the offensive. The stamina would come with training, so Keziah wasn't particularly worried about that. If she had learned good defensive basics first, then all it would mean is him being less worried about her. Attacking was arguably the easier of the two, and so it didn't fret Keziah too.

Scoyl on the other hand, was experienced. His attacking patterns were polished, even if they involved stabbing, as daggers were his weapon of choice. He could hold his own against most opponents as long as they weren't at least a quarter as good as Keziah. His defense, on the other hand, was something that slightly concerned Keziah. The boy was an assassin of some sort, and as such he was most probably taught to kill as fast as possible, defending not needed. That might have worked well if he was always the first one to strike, but he wouldn't always be.

It was another issue that would be resolved with time, so Keziah tried not to dwell on the dark thoughts too long. Satisfied with what he had watched so far, he grabbed an orange from one of the barrels near the wall of the cabins and started walking up the stairs to the quarterdeck. To see the captain.