Slowly Novis started to open his heavy eyelids, his vision was slowly returning and all he could see was a grey murky ceiling.

"Where am I?" Novis said as he lifted himself off the ground. As he did though a shooting pain could be felt in his chest. He grabbed hold of it with one arm expecting a scar but nothing was there.

"Slow down you're still hurt," Ashley said.

"What happened to me?"

"You nearly gave me a heart attack boy, if you were out on the floor any longer I would have called an ambulance," Daiki said as he started laughing out loud. "But you did as I told, you stood your ground, how do you feel?"

Novis looked around the room and noticed he was inside the dojo on the floor, the students were outside still busy practising away. The last thing he could remember was being chucked through the…

As Novis looked at the Dojo door he could see the sliding panels had been bent out of place form where his body had hit them.

"Don't worry about that boy." Daiki said, "The amount of money you have made for the dojo, I won't go charging you for something like that."

"I wouldn't expect you to, you were the one who threw me through the thing in the first place." Novis wanted to say out loud.

As Novis tried to move, he again felt a huge pain in his chest, when he thought back to what happened he couldn't remember much apart from the fear of being struck by the sword energy.

"To be honest I'm just in a lot of pain right now."

"Novis perhaps your body is not strong enough for sword energy yet," George said.

Novis immediately turned his head and started to stare at George. After what just happened, when the two of them said they would protect him, Novis didn't want to really want to take their advice anymore.

"Look hear me out," George said with a nervous smile. "Form our world we know that the bodies strengthening condition is important to improve your sword energy power. I don't think Daiki's idea of you taking hits from the sword energy is a bad one, just right now you're too weak to even take on a hit."

"Yes, it seems like we might have focused on your conditioning and fitness too much," Arthur added.

As Novis looked at himself, he could see they were right. Novis was fitter than most kids now and he had the reflexes to go with it, but he was still only 15 and was just starting to fill out. There wasn't much muscle on his body at all.

"What are they saying to you boy," Daiki asked seeing that Novis seemed to be in the middle of a conversation. All though to the outside world, it looked Novis was just moving his head around the room and nodding constantly.

"They said I need a stronger body, strong enough to at least withstand the attack of your sword energy."

"I definitely agree with that. When I was younger my body went through all sorts of hardships, it what gave me my lovely guns today." Daiki said as he tensed his bicep. "Well it doesn't look like you're in any condition to do anything today, get some rest and I'll try to make a plan for you to follow for the next few days and next time your ready will try this again."

Novis then laid back down on the mats for an awhile and after a few minutes, he could move again. Although his body was sore at least he was able to make his way home on his own.

After a slow and painful walk home, all Novis wanted to do was lie in his bed. He was hoping he would have made some progress with Daiki but it seemed like he had just taken a step backwards and now with his body injured who knew when he would be able to train at full strength again.

As Novis laid down on his bed he looked at the pod next to him, he started to remember the feeling of the pod inside. The cushions were top-notch quality and whenever he was inside, he felt like he was sleeping on clouds. So instead of lying on the bed, he decided to climb into the pod and rest his eyes.

"Hey, Novis while you in here, feel free to rest but do you mind if me and Arthur play a few games?" George asked

Novis was beat for the day and didn't want to do anything but rest, the last thing he was thinking about was playing a few games but if Arthur and George wanted to play, he didn't see a problem with that.

The last time Novis had played with them, he had discovered the fact that the whole world was looking for this so-called virtual sword god player and had decided to let Arthur and George take a break hoping the world would forget about them.

"Yeah sure, why don't you two play a few games."

Although it had been a while since the player ID Pendragon had come online, no one had forgotten about him. The fact that the player only games online once in a while made it an even bigger event than usual.

"It's him!"

"The virtual sword god is back!"

"Quick guys start recording, can't wait to see him get out of diamond and go up to the god tier!"

"Yeah but at the rate he comes online it will be months before that."

Novis then switched control and allowed Arthur to play the game. Before Novis used to control most of the settings of the game and then only switch over control when actually in a match. But Arthur had seen Novis do everything so many times by now, he was able to do everything himself.

When Arthur logged into the game though, Novis's brother Bill and Hastam had been notified. They too were keeping an eye on him. In that instant, both of them had sent a party invite.

"Hey I know you said we wouldn't be able to meet, but I was thinking before I come to England I could play a few matches with you?" Hastam asked.

And at the same time, his brother had sent him a message.

"Thank you so much for accepting my friend request. I hate to ask this but it would be an honour if I and you could play together." Bill asked.

"What would you like me to do?" Arthur asked Novis.

Novis didn't want to upset his brother and at the same time, he felt bad for lying to Hastam last time about not being able to make it. In the end, Novis had come up with an idea.

They had accepted Hastam invite and were teleported to a blue party room.

"Hey I wasn't expecting you to accept my party invite," Hastam said.

"There I a person I would like to invite, do you mind?" Arthur asked.

"Sure, go ahead, a friend of yours is a friend fo mine."

In truth, Hastam was dead excited about who the Virtual sword god would be inviting. If it was someone he knew it would have to be a great player.

Then when Bill had entered the room, Hatsam's excitement quickly died down. Hastam knew who Bill was, or at least to the extent that everyone else knew who Bill was. In the last game, many people had seen Arthur accept Bill's invite.

This caused a wide search for the player ID Billybill, when they found Bill was only a student in middle school, their hope was quickly lost and they just assumed it was a random acceptance.

But that's when a thought hit Hastam. Wasn't the virtual sword god also a student? Maybe the fact that he had accepted the invite wasn't random after all. From the reaction in the video, it seemed like Bill didn't know who the Virtual sword god was, if the Virtual sword god was keeping his identity secret then perhaps the two knew each other in some way.

When Bill entered the room, he was completely starstruck, not only was he with his Idol, but he was also standing in front of a Pro player. He was practically in a game with two celebrities.

"I'm a huge fan of yours Hastam, I learnt a lot form your live streams," Bill said.

"Thank you, it's always nice to meet a fan, hey I know, where are you from?" Hastam asked.

"Ennnn England," Bill said nervously.

"Oh what a nice surprise, I'm actually going to England this weekend to host a game, I happen to have some free tickets, if you're in the area maybe we can meet each other?"

"That would be great!" Bill shouted.

"That's great, it's part of the Berkshire tournament."

"Wait did you say? Berkshire tournament." Bill interrupted. "That's my county, I live in that area. My brothers in that tournament too, this is amazing!"

Novis did not like where this conversation was going, not one bit.