Micah dried himself off in the changing rooms of Prisha’s bathhouse after washing up for the morning. When he dropped the towel in the basket, he stopped and stared at the scars of his left hand for a moment. He didn’t know what to think about them now. He’d thought only the large wound would leave a scar — and that it would look different, too — but there were more along his fingers and the base of his thumb. He had six noticeable ones all over his body in total. A burn mark on his shoulder, a scratch on his waist leading to his back, one near his collarbone, and these three on his hand. They all looked so peaceful and pale. Almost white. They looked as if he’d had them for ages. Despite that, they dominated his hand like an extra set of lines in his palm.

He wondered which fortune they would tell.

For now, his fortune was clear. The first week of easy work at his sister’s bathhouse was over. His bandages were gone, and it was time to do actual Chores, like scrubbing the baths, washing the towels, and sweeping the streets, and not just chores, like tidying up and running errands for his extended relatives.

Micah had tried to tell Prisha and Neil that they were being overly cautious all week, but neither of them would hear it. They couldn’t risk having his wound opening up again or getting the bandages filthy, after all. He almost sighed remembering it. He was using healing paste twenty-four seven! What did they think was going to happen?

It didn’t matter anymore. Micah looked forward to finally getting something real to do. And his parents weren’t around to be the ones who told him what that was. Neil had that honor.

“All healed up?” he asked when Micah walked out into the hall.

As an answer, Micah held up and splayed his hand.

“Scars,” Neil noted. “Nice. Chicks will dig it.”

He started walking then and Micah followed, frowning. He didn’t really have a chick he wanted to dig it yet. And anyway, how would Neil know? He’d only ever been with Prisha … right?

“Do you have a scar?” Micah asked.

“Yeah, on my shoulder,” he said. “A roof shilling fell on it while I was about your age. It left a scar despite the middle-grade healing potion we bought a few hours later. Waste of money, that.”

Micah frowned some more at that. Waste of money? He hoped not. He wanted to make them someday.

“Did it hurt?” he asked.

“Yeah, it hurt,” Neil said. “It cut right in. My father couldn’t get me to stop crying all the while he fixed me up.”

Somehow, the picture of Neil crying didn’t fit either.

A pair of his aunts passed them in the hall and Micah smiled up at them. They had to smile up at Neil, too, even though he was half their age. His family both looked up to him, and they looked up to him, Micah knew. He remembered when Prisha had told him about Neil’s father leaving and him getting the [Business Owner] Class. He was the only one in his family who had it apparently — aside from their grandma, but she was too old to get out of her rocking chair most days. The next best Class they had for managing the business was an aunt who had a high level in [Host], but she had her own job to do.

And then Neil had lost his [Student] Class, too ...

It must have been tough, taking over the bathhouse when he was still in school. But Neil had made it, and he even got the [Family Path] along the way, along with half of his relatives. Business was flourishing.

Him crying over a shilling wound while he was Micah’s age and him soldiering on through that, they seemed like two things that shouldn’t mix.

Different kinds of pains, Micah guessed.

“Scar buddies?” he said to Neil while they walked, and he smiled down at him.

They stopped at a door near the back of the building, and Neil turned to him before going inside.

“You kept on complaining that you wanted real work to do,” he said, smiling a little more. Uh oh. “So I have a treat for you.”

He opened the door to reveal an almost empty room inside. There was a water basin on the one wall and six old bathing barrels in the center of it. A small window near the top of the back lit up the space, and streams of dust danced around the edges of its light, the tiniest amount of something catching Micah’s eye.

Dust essence, he knew, though he hadn’t ever gotten a good enough look to see it. Even in places like the attic or basements that were littered with the stuff, it just looked like it was vibrating ever so slightly, like the tiniest ripples in a pond.

Micah took a step closer. He hadn’t seen these barrels before. They looked like nobody had for a long while. A thick layer of grime, dust, and cobwebs clung to them like a second skin. How long had they been back here? Or were they new? The grime was smudged in some places as if someone had moved them recently.

“You get to scrub all of these clean,” Neil said.

Micah turned on him. What? Then he looked back to the tall barrels. He wouldn’t even be able to reach the floor of those things leaning in. He’d have climb inside. And how was he supposed to move them? They looked heavy.

“Relax,” Neil said. “This is all you have to do today … probably. Stick around in case we need you for something, but otherwise you’ll have the day off to study and do alchemist stuff afterward. Just don’t burn the house down, OK?”

He winked at Micah, and his mood relaxed again.

“Oh. Then thanks, Neil,” he said and went into the room.

His brother-in-law left saying, “Have fun,” while he spun around, looking for the buckets. He found one, but there was no soap or things to scrub with, so Micah had to run back, passing Neil in the hallway, to go get them, too. He didn’t mind. Even when his extended family gave him unpleasant work, they were still pleasant about it, after all. Unlike some Chores workers or his parents who could sometimes gloat … Micah much preferred working this way.

Back in the room, he filled his bucket up at the basin, readied his scrubbing brush and tackled the first barrel.

By the time he finished with the fifth one of them, he was covered in both dirty soap water and sweat. There was water pooled at the bottom covering his feet, but he wasn’t sure how to get rid of it. He’d tried tipping one of the barrels over to pour it out in the drain, and the thing smacked against the ground before he could stop it. Nothing was bent or broken, but Micah still wouldn’t want to risk it again. Maybe someone could help him out later?

He was climbing out of his current barrel when Neil showed up again, probably to check on him. Micah could just ask him!

He started, but the man talked over him before he could. He seemed distracted somehow.

“Hey, Micah. Uhm, there’s someone here for you?”

“Huh?” Micah asked while he hoped down, question forgotten. “Who?”

“He says his name is Ryan? A classmate of yours?”

“Oh!” Micah said and tossed his brush in the tub behind him. “I’ll go greet him.”

He tried to rush past Neil, but the man just stretched an arm out and held him back.

“Nuh-uh, mister. I sat him down in the common room with some water. Finish cleaning your tubs, then you can have your break.”

“But Neeil,” Micah protested.

“Work first, then break. Them’s the rules, young man.”

“Ugh. And I thought you were cool,” Micah said and climbed back in the tub to get out his brush again.

“My heart,” Neil said behind him and chuckled. Micah imagined him clutching his chest while he walked out.

He hurried to rinse off the outside of the fifth barrel. Then he refilled his bucket, which took forever, and hurried even more to clean up the sixth. Micah had just started on scrubbing the outside when Neil came back in again, followed by Ryan.

“Hey Micah,” he said and gave a little wave.

“I told him he’d have to wait because you’re not done yet and he insisted on helping,” Neil explained,

“We have to scrub tubs?”

“Hey, uh, yeah. Bathing barrels. There’s only one left.”

“Why is there water in all of these?” Neil asked, standing next to the ones Micah had finished and peering into them one by one.

Micah tried to read his face, to see if he was content with how thorough his scrubbing had been, but all he could see was his slight puzzlement.

“Uh, I tried to pour one out by tipping it over and it almost fell down,” he explained. “They’re too heavy for me. I didn’t want to risk doing the same with the rest.”

“Oh.” Neil looked at him as if appraising him for a second time. “You’re so diligent. I forgot you don’t have [Lesser Strength].”

Micah wasn’t sure if he should blush at the compliment or blush because out of embarrassment that he didn’t have the Skill. Did [Alchemists] even get [Lesser Strength]? Maybe his warrior Path could offer it, but he’d heard they rarely did that. Yet another reason to get a combat Class.

Micah did blush either way.

“Ryan, right? Help me tip these over to pour the water down the drain,” Neil said. “Micah, you can finish cleaning the last one in the meantime.”

Micah nodded and turned back to the task at hand.

“Just help me turn it over then,” Neil said.

Ryan answered, “Sure,” and Micah glanced back to see him help Neil tilt the barrel over after he’d lifted it on his own. It looked so easy. They’d be done in no time. He doubled down on his scrubbing efforts but in the end, they were finished way before he was.

“You can just tip over that last one,” Neil told them before he left, his voice muted somewhat from outside the barrel Micah now sat in. “Do it carefully, though. They were expensive.”

Ah. At least, that answered his question.

“Will do … sir?” Ryan said, and Micah chuckled a little at the awkwardness of it. Neil joined in while he left, and a moment later Micah got water flicked at him for his cheekiness.

“Unfair,” he called up because he couldn’t see or fight back, but Ryan laughed back at him.

They made small-talk while he finished up. Ryan asked him how work was (great) and told him about how Gardener was pushing him more and more ever since he’d gotten that new Skill of his, [Lesser Endurance]. He said it might be in part because of entrance exams, and Micah had him refill his bucket in an attempt to switch topics. Then it was about the weather, and how Ryan dreaded it getting warmer. Micah offered him his condolences and wondered if he could make him some kind of cooling potion with his mist crystals. Then he was done and climbed back out, pulling himself up by Ryan’s offered hand. He was surprised by how warm it was — that being, not much warmer at all. Ryan had mentioned being able to turn [Hot Skin] up and down. Did he have it all the way down right now?

They tipped the barrel over, Ryan doing most of the heavy-lifting, and Micah smiled while he watched his handiwork.

“Done,” he said. It felt good seeing the spotless barrels after spending most of the morning cleaning them, especially since Micah knew how filthy they had been before. It was almost as good as finishing a new potion. Well … not really, but the feeling was the same. It brought a smile to Micah’s lips.

When he turned to Ryan though, the other boy was frowning at him again for some reason.

“What?”

“Are you … copying me?” he said, nodding his chin at Micah.

Micah glanced down and realized what he meant. He was wearing an undershirt and shorts just like the ones Ryan liked to wear. They even had the same color as his current clothes. No wonder he thought that. But no, he wasn’t copying him. At least, not on purpose.

“Oh, no. This is just work clothing. I spend a lot of time around water,” he explained.

“Ah.”

“On that note, what did you want to do today?” Micah asked. “We could go to the bridge where Lang and the others hang out. The water’s cold and a bunch of flowers grow near the riverbed, so I could get started on a perfume potion. As long as you don’t mind me pushing anyone in the water who might laugh at me picking flowers.”

“Ha, I’d help you,” Ryan said while he walked to the door. “But actually, I was thinking we could hang out here?”

He walked to the door and reached around it, pulling his backpack from out of the hall. When Ryan opened it, there were two wooden swords sticking out that bulged the cloth.

Oh!

“I convinced Jenkins, the equipment storage manager at my school, to let me borrow a pair,” he said. “You wanted to learn, so I thought I could show you the basics?”

Micah nodded eagerly. He remembered when Ryan had told him that he might have to spar to get the [Fighter] Class. If he got it today, that would be awesome.

“Please,” he said.

“And, uhm,” Ryan went on. He checked the doorway, as if making sure nowhere was there, and even walked up to it to poke his head out.

They were in the dusty backrooms of the building, though. Micah doubted anyone would walk in on them here.

Seemingly satisfied, Ryan reached into his bag and pulled out a thin book as well. It looked slightly worn and bent, more like a magazine than a book, but Micah saw a hint of its title and immediately knew what it was.

“I brought my copy of the Beginner’s Guide, too,” Ryan said and held it out to Micah. “Cause you said you wanted to read it?”

“Thank you,” Micah said, stepping closer to see the cover, but he didn’t touch it. He still had wet and somewhat dirty hands. He could — and would — always read it later, after all. “But I can’t take it right now.” He held up his hands and gestured helplessly at his still-wet clothes. “And I have nowhere to hide it, either.”

“Oh. Right.”

Ryan tucked the book back in.

“Where did you want to practice?” Micah asked, thinking of what was nearby. Neil had wanted him to stick around, after all, so he didn’t want to go too far. “We have a yard in the middle of the bathhouse, and there’s a backstreet, and uh, an alley, and there’s the entrance … but I think Ed would chase us off.”

“The yard sounds fine,” Ryan said. “I just want to show some basic footwork and how to hold the sword. Nothing fancy. Even your room would be enough.”

“Alright, then. It’s this way.”

He took Ryan by the arm and led him to the small yard in the middle of the bathhouse. It wasn’t much by itself. It had two small patches of grass on either side, one that had some flowers and weeds spotting it, the others tomatoes Prisha liked to grow. Micah thought one of his cousins had even gotten [Green Thumb] from those, or maybe they had helped make them grow with the Skill? He couldn’t remember.

Junk littered the corners, too, like old buckets and brooms, and gloves and empty bags of soil that probably belonged in the trash by now. There was one small bench near the flower patch. The ground looked like Micah might have to sweep it tomorrow.

...

He would probably have to sweep it tomorrow. He would have done it today if he’d known Ryan was coming.

The indoor porch that surrounded the yard was much better kept. The wood had been freshly painted for his sister’s wedding a little more than a year ago. There were chairs on the one side where guests could sit for fresh air, and people cleaned it every day.

Micah watched Ryan take it all in with a nod.

“It’s great,” he said. “Big enough for walking forms, too.”

He pulled out the two wooden swords he’d brought, tossed the bag aside and one of the swords to Micah who caught it by the hilt.

He immediately tried measuring the weight, and … something else? He felt something there at the back of his mind. Not a hunch. Definitely not a thought. Something small that was gone in a moment. He gripped the handle and moved the sword around a bit, to get a feel for it.

But really, he had no idea what he was doing.

“Nice grip,” Ryan told him walking up. “Keep it tight, though. If you let up, you might drop it. I know from personal experience how bad that can be.”

“Yeah. Me, too,” Micah mumbled.

Ryan paused.

“Alright, then,” he then said somewhat with a somewhat more energetic voice. It sounded a little different, too, like he was imitating someone. Maybe his teacher? “We’ll start out with one-handed forms and then switch to two. Why don’t you just try copying me to start out, and then I’ll go around and fix any mistakes.”

“And explain?” Micah added.

“Uhm, yeah. And explain ... ” Ryan said, and mumbled, “I totally pay attention.”

He stood next to Micah and adopted a stance that looked a lot like what Micah might think of when someone said ‘sword fighter’. His legs were kind of far apart, one further back than the other, both slightly bent at the knees, and he was standing slightly half-way sideways with his right arm forward. He held the sword away from himself, and his elbow close at about waist level.

Micah imagined Ryan facing a salamander like that and frowned. There was definitely something wrong with that. The salamanders were too small, he would be bending forward to hack at them all the time. It looked more like a stance used to fight another person. Maybe it could work against the wolves, though. Different poses for different monsters? Obviously, know that Micah thought about it. Why hadn’t he ever before?

What about different weapons? Where was Ryan’s shield?

“Micah?” Ryan asked, nudging him out of his thoughts.

“Oh,” he said and quickly tried copying him. He was slow in doing it, but when he had it he thought it was right.

“Like this?”

Ryan dropped his own stance and started circling him, pushing Micah’s shoulder when he walked past. Micah wobbled a little and had to push back to stay upright. Then Ryan just let go and he almost fell in that direction instead. He thought Ryan might berate him for that, but he just told him, “legs further apart, and go lower. No, your knees, bend your knees lower.”

“Oh.” Micah did as he was told.

“Your elbows need to be closer to your waist, too, like this.” He demonstrated, and Micah tried to adjust his stance.

“That’s good. Now hold that for a bit.”

Micah did. Eventually, he felt awkward doing it and kept on glancing at Ryan to see if he could stop. The other boy just stared at him, though, impassive. Then his arm started groaning, and trembling, and then his knees followed.

“Ryan?” Micah asked. No answer. When his wooden sword started swaying, Micah couldn’t hold it anymore and let his arm sag.

He straightened himself up and saw Ryan smiling.

“Remember that feeling. By the time we’re done, you should be feeling it all over or you didn’t do it right. You want to be unable to lift the sword anymore. That way you know you’ll build muscle.”

He glanced at Micah’s arm, and Micah wished he was wearing something a little less revealing.

“I have muscle,” he pouted and flexed in protest.

“Sure you do,” the other boy said. “Now, do that stance again.”

Micah did, and Ryan circled him once more and poked and prodded him back into shape, fixing some mistakes Micah hadn’t even realized he was making. Afterward, he had him walking around for a bit, just holding that sword up and “facing an imaginary opponent”, as he told Micah to think. He said he wanted to make sure Micah was moving right. How could you not move right?

By putting your foot too far forward, apparently, or too wide, or forgetting your stance while you did, and forgetting to bend your knees. So many little mistakes that probably didn’t even matter. Why couldn’t Micah just hack at his enemies and make things up as he moved along? Micah had thought sword-fighting would be more exciting.

He admonished himself for the thought and tried his best to memorize everything Ryan showed him. Pouting wasn’t very warrior-like after all.

After walking around, Ryan had him doing basic thrusts and slashes. Sometimes with just one hand, sometimes with both hands gripping the hilt for extra force.

Then he was supposed to block an imaginary strike from above and either punch his opponent at the same time or steady his sword with his other hand. Or ‘make the strike’ slide off his blade and cut the enemy. How was that supposed to work? Enemies had arms, too. And his blade had two edges.

“Won’t I cut myself?” Micah asked.

“Oh, right. I forgot that one’s only for backswords,” he said, flushing somewhat.

Micah narrowed his eyes at him. He did know what he was doing, right?

“Just forget about that block for now. Schools use these as standard anyway,” he nodded at the training sword in Micah’s hands. “Now repeat everything I showed you, one by one.”

Micah did. After the first few ones, he had to glance at Ryan to remind him which one came next. When he was done, Ryan suddenly told him to watch and walked a sequence of a bunch of the movements in a row.

“This is a basic form,” he told Micah. “To teach you different moves with some structure behind them. You only want to walk them sparingly, though. Whenever you train, you apparently build something called ‘muscle memory’. It means, uhm, that your body does what it remembers doing without you having to think about it? The forms are just like a manual, though, and walking them too often leads to mistakes, and being rigid, and uhm, walking them on accident during combat, I think. So doing the moves on their own is important and sparring is even more important, but there’s no point in doing that when you don’t know how yet.”

“You mean we aren’t going to spar today?”

“No?” Ryan said, looking at him. “Sorry.”

So Micah wasn’t going to get his [Fighter] Class today, after all? That sucked. Ryan must have seen his disappointment because he quickly explained himself.

“I thought I’d teach you one of the basic forms so you can train on your own when I’m not there, first. And then when you know a little more we can do some basic stuff together. And then we can spar.”

“Oh,” Micah said. So Ryan did have a plan. “Yeah, that makes sense.”

“So try walking the form now.”

Micah nodded, went into stance and promptly came up blank.

“Uhm, can you show it to me again?” he asked Ryan sheepishly.

The older boy groaned, but he did the form again. More slowly this time. Micah tried to copy him along the way. He thought he got the hang of it. It was kind of easy, all things considered. Or it would be if Ryan would stop being so picky while he walked it on his own.

“Again,” he said afterward. “Pay attention so you don’t make the same mistakes as last time..”

“Yes, sir,” Micah sighed. He walked the form. This time, Ryan pointed out other mistakes though. New ones Micah made.

“Again.”

It took them seven more tries until Ryan was happy, and then he had Micah do two more just to make sure.

Micah was sweaty and tired by the end of it all. His arms felt sore and he couldn’t hold the wooden sword upright. He let it sag to the floor and followed it down, sighed and said, “Yay,” with a little fist pump. “Victory.”

He didn’t feel like he’d won. That was just a basic form. How much more complicated could they get? Or rather, how stupid was sword-fighting?

He sat down, then lay all the way on the ground, spawled his arms out, and felt his chest heave as he breathed.

Ryan crouched down next to him and poked his upper arm, right in the scar.

“You have muscles, eh?” he asked with a smile.

“Shaddup,” Micah protested with a blush. Spending almost two years indoors studying alchemy hadn’t exactly done good things for his health. And he’d just finished recovering from the trip into the Tower, too. Yeah, those were totally good excuses. Micha would have his muscles — that he’d totally had once — back in no time.

Surprisingly, instead of teasing him some more, Ryan lay down and let out a soft sigh of his own. He folded his arms over his stomach, and Micah thought he was staring at the cloud-dotted sky. It was basically afternoon by now, and yet the sky was blue. He closed his own eyes instead and enjoyed it.

“What are you two doing?” Prisha called a while later.

Micah immediately shot up and looked around, leaning on his elbows while he tried to find her. He spotted her then, leaning against the porch’s railing and watching them. She had an amused smile on her face.

“Ryan is teaching me sword-fighting,” Micah said.

“Really?” she asked, just looked at them, and Micah realized how this must look. Like he was goofing off and a sunny day. If she had seen him a minute ago, she would have seen how sweaty and exhausted he was. This was so unfair.

“We’re taking a break,” Micah added, to defend himself. “He taught me one whole form. It took like the whole noon. Right, Ryan?”

He turned to look at the other boy. Ryan didn’t answer though, so Micah nudged him.

“Ryan?”

“Actually, I think he’s asleep,” Prisha said. “Great learning method, though. I’ll have to try that sometime.”

Micah scowled at her.

“Ryan, wake up.” He sat up until he sat on there with his legs stretched out and shook the other boy a little more thoroughly. Then leaned over and snapped his fingers over his face.

He shot up all the sudden, almost head-butting Micah’s hand, and looked around himself like he didn’t know where he was.

“You fell asleep,” Micah explained.

“Oh,” Ryan said. “Sorry. I’m just kind of exhausted from training.”

“Hey, Ryan,” Prisha greeted him.

“Uhm, hello? Mrs. Prisha,” Ryan greeted her back awkwardly.

“I heard you’re teaching Micah sword-fighting?” she asked, and Micah turned to look at her. There was a slight edge to her voice there.

“Huh? Oh, yeah. He has a combat Path, after all. I thought … well, y’know? Uhm, we’re using practice swords, too. Is that alright?”

Micah stared at his sister, the same question in his eyes, except with a little more worry. Why wouldn’t it be alright?

“No, no. It’s fine,” she said with a smile. and it eased Micah’s worries a little. “I just wish you’d have asked me first. I could have said hi and made some refreshments. We just got a new batch of strawberry jam. It’s great.”

“Oh!” Ryan almost shouted. “I totally forgot I brought my own water.”

He jogged over to his backpack and ruffled around in it. Then he pulled out two waterskins and tossed one of them across the yard to Micah.

He had to lunge from where he still sat to catch it, but then he thanked Ryan profusely and took one long gulp of the cool liquid. He kept on going until he’d downed a third of it in one go and then let the liquid spill a little to the sides to cool him off. Then he wiped his chin and let out a content sigh.

Ryan was doing much the same on the other side of the yard.

“What time is it?” Ryan asked, squinting at the sky.

“About four,” Prisha answered. “Why?”

“My parents will probably be home by now,” he said. “I wanted to share dinner with my dad before he has to go to his evening shift.”

“Oh, that’s a shame. Dodging my food again?” Prisha asked.

Ryan smiled and said, “Sorry, Mrs. Prisha.” He turned to Micah and asked, “Same time tomorrow? Uhm, I mean, if it’s alright with you?” He looked at Micah’s sister.

“Sure, if Micah gets his work done by then.”

“Fine by me, too,” Micah said. He walked Ryan out, and on the street in front of the bathhouse, Ryan told him he could just drop the beginner’s guide off in his room if Micah wanted him to.

“Yes, please,” Micah said.

When he left, Micah flexed his arm again. Nothing. Huh. He’d have to work on-

Oh!

Having an idea, Micah sped back inside and went to look for Neil. He found him in the kitchen, reading something at the table.

“Give me all the hard chores you have,” he said. “From now on.”

Neil looked up, looking somewhat surprised.

“Sure, you can sweep the yard tomorrow. Why?”

Ha! Micah knew it.

“I want [Lesser Strength]. Actually, I’ll do it now!” he called while he sped back out and to the yard.

The next day, Micah hadn’t gotten the [Fighter] Class, sadly. He was too tired to read the beginner’s guide either and he woke up with his whole body feeling sore. He was still happy, though.

Ryan only had to mention to him that alleyball built muscles for Micah to play it with him all week.