Chapter 4: The Barracks.

The barracks were split into three buildings in total which were all just cubes of stone bricks. The soldiers didn’t need anything fancy for a base but this was still leagues above Kalon’s house.

He dreamed of living in a place this nice but he knew that his mother wanted to be as far away from the monsters living in the town as she possibly could so there wasn’t much chance of that happening.

The largest building was used to house the soldiers with many different rooms where they slept and kept all of their belongings within. The second-largest building was used for lecturing soldiers on strategies and issuing orders from the emperor which happened regularly.

And the smallest building consisted of two rooms. One was a large bathhouse and the other consisted of cubicles with holes in the ground which were used as toilets. It wasn’t the most hygienic way of relieving yourself but it was still better than going into the forest in the middle of the night like Kalon was accustomed to doing.

As Kalon stood at the gates for a few seconds he heard a hissing sound over his left shoulder and then turned to see a man dressed in a black military uniform and covered from head to toe with large green scales with yellow beady eyes that seemed to look deep into the soul of whoever saw them.

“Mr Talen. I didn’t notice you there.” Kalon said with a smile upon seeing the man with snake-like features standing behind him.

“Hello, Kalon…” The man hissed in a tone that was much like a whisper. His voice was barely audible but Kalon’s hearing was top notch. He lived in the woods so he had to constantly listen out for predators and chase them off when they got too close. Almost nothing could escape his ears.

“Have you seen Mater Ranwald today? I’m pretty sure he told me that he would wait by the gate for me but he isn’t here…” Kalon stroked his chin gently as he tried to remember the exact words that he had heard yesterday.

“Master Ranwald you say? Hss, I have no idea. Maybe you will find him in the lecture hall.” Mr Talen hissed once again before licking the air in front of his face.

“The lecture hall? Do you think he will be there? From what I know he hates lectures.” Kalon asked to make sure that Mr Talen was sure of himself but the only reply he got was a single nod of his head.

“Well, then I will go and check. Thank you!” Kalon shouted before excitedly running toward the lecture hall.

Although Kalon was the emperor's abandoned son, a human and had almost no combat ability that could stand up to even the weakest monster. Most of the soldiers at the Barracks loved having him around.

He would help them with basic things like math and Sylton language. Despite his young age he excelled in academics and was quick to learn new things. Which helped him when learning swordsmanship although he was still a far away from being able to fight on equal ground with even the weakest of monster races.

As he ran throughout the barracks countless soldiers waved to him along his way. His presence was appreciated by the soldiers. It was almost like they had their own human mascot.

As Kalon arrived at the lecture hall he found that the door was left slightly ajar and he heard voices coming from inside. There were two people inside and seemed to be talking about something quite secretive given their hushed tone.

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“You don't have a choice. It’s an order from the emperor.” An old sounding voice whispered as Kalon pressed his ear against the door to listen into the conversation.

The sounds of footsteps clacked over and over as someone paced the length of the room over and over again.

“I get that. But why does it have to be him? Literally, anyone is more suitable. It’s like sending him to his death and I don’t want to be the one responsible for it.” Kalon recognised Master Ranwald’s voice as he said to the older sounding man within the room. but he didn’t quite make out what they were talking about over the sounds of footsteps walking up and down the room.

The only part of the conversation he heard was "death" and "responsible". He figured that he probably shouldn’t be listening to whatever they were talking about so he took a few steps back to be out of hearing distance. He was interested to know what Master Ranwald was talking about but the last time he eavesdropped on a lecture the Knights Captain had him punished with twenty lashes from a whip.

He didn’t want anything like that to happen on such a great morning so he decided to lock away his curiosity and wait for them to come outside.

Fifteen minutes passed by as Kalon walked around in circles to keep himself distracted so the wait didn’t feel so long when suddenly the door creaked opened the rest of the way revealing a shorter looking man compared to the monstrous size of everyone else in the town, with long brown hair and muscles so defined that they were visible through his clothes as he stepped out into the light.

Unlike many of the other soldiers in the Barracks, this man looked more like Kalon than he did the other monsters. But that didn’t mean that he was any weaker than the others. In fact, it was quite the opposite. There were only a handful of monsters that took on a human form and many of them stood out as the strongest members of the Sylton empire. Master Ranwald just so happened to be one of them.

“Kalon? You’re here already. I thought I told you I would meet you by the gate?” Master Ranwald asked as he saw the young human boy standing before him.

“You did. But I was looking forward to today’s training. You said you would teach me the empires dual sword form today.” Kalon smiled brightly as he looked up at his teacher.

“I did?… Oh and I guess that I must have told you that pigs can fly too didn’t I?” Master Ranwald sighed before hitting the back of Kalon’s head for lying.

“Ouch! Okay, I’m sorry. But you did say you would teach me something special right?” Kalon asked while rubbing the back of his head.

“Did I say that?” Mater Ranwald teased him by feigning ignorance but when he saw his student pout slightly he stopped.

“That’s right. You said you wanted to learn the dual sword form right?” He asked and then put his hand on Kalon’s shoulder.

“Wait you will really teach me!?” Kalon looked up with stars in his eyes. He was so happy. The empires dual sword form was the strongest fighting style that they taught to soldiers but it was also the hardest to master. Kalon only got the idea of learning it as he saw his teacher beat an enemy much larger than himself while using two swords.

“I can’t teach you the empires dual sword form no. But I know another sword form where you also use two swords. It is pretty similar and you won’t need to become an official soldier to learn it. So if you want to I can-” Before Master Ranwald could even finish, Kalon interrupted him.

“Yes! Please teach me!” He shouted.

There was a moment of silence between them both as Mater Ranwald smiled slightly before sighing.

“In that case meet me in the training grounds. I just need to grab the manual so you can understand it a little better.” He said and then patted Kalon on the head before walking to the largest building in the barracks.

“Oh yeah! I will finally gain enough strength to break through Master Ranwalds defence. I am sick of always being thrown around by him! Maybe this might even make mom proud…” Kalon stopped mid-sentence.

“Ah… Who am I kidding? I won’t get any stronger overnight. I just need to rinse and repeat. I’m bound to get stronger eventually.” He smiled happily as he walked to the other side of the barracks.

The training ground consisted of a large open field that people could come and go as they pleased to practise on the dummies made from sticks and straw-stuffed inside burlap sacks. Or even practice against other people and then there was the coliseum where only top-ranking knights could battle with each other.

The generals even allowed the townspeople into the barracks on Fridays to watch the fights within the coliseum and many of them would even make bets which helped fund the army to make sure they were all fed.

Even though Master Ranwald was strong, he couldn’t take Kalon into the coliseum to train with the knights. So they had to do all of their training out in the open which limited what Kalon could be taught since Master Ranwald couldn’t give away anything that could cause weakness to be shown within his defence out of fear of losing his next battle in the coliseum.

As Kalon arrived at the training grounds he noticed that it was surprisingly busy for some reason. But as he got closer he realised what had gotten everyone so excited. Prince Octavian had come to visit.

“I should have known this would happen…” Kalon said to himself before walking over to the stands and sitting down while wishing that Master Ranwald would hurry up. He knew that if his brother spotted him that it wouldn’t end well. When suddenly he heard a voice call out his name from the top of the stands.

“Kalon!” A woman's voice shouted out with glee as his vision went dark and he could no longer see anything.