Arn woke up and groggily tried to roll out of bed, falling on the floor tangled in sheets. Arn tried to disentangle, but the sheets were firmly stuck to him. What in the Endless Hells???? Arn pried the sheets away … and noticed they were stained with blood.

Damnation, I don’t have time to wash everything and this will never come out! I couldn’t have taken two seconds to take off my clothes? Well, shredded rags now. Ugh, I guess it doesn’t matter; its not like I’ll be taking the sheets with me, but I’ll be dammed if I’m going to ruin another set of clothes. For that matter, at this point, why bathe at all when I’ve got another blood bath to look forward too. To hell with the villagers! Let them see what a legendary class really means!

Liara had ordered him to return to the training fields before dawn today, refusing to reveal whatever special torment she had in mind before the half dozen others in his age group arrived for training. Resolved, Arn peeled off the shredded rags that had been his shirt, gave the waist of his tattered pants a pull, and, satisfied that they wouldn’t immediately fall off entirely, grabbed some jerky for breakfast and headed out the door, half naked and covered in dried blood with bits of cloth stuck in random spots. For good measure, Arn roared his defiance at the world on exiting . . . and came face to face with the schoolteacher, Miss Zalina and her two young children.

Miss Zalina shrieked, and Yulia, her youngest, started to cry. “Sorry! Sorry! I’m fine. Fine. This is from training. I … uh got a legendary class. Going to be a great hero. Yep. Its just …um… a little messy and . . .”

“You should be ashamed of yourself! Scaring young children like that! Are you a boy or a beast! Go wash this…”

Realizing it was a lost cause, and didn’t really matter anyway, Arn turned his back on the family and headed to the training field. “DON’T YOU WALK AWAY FROM ME YOUNG MAN!” Arn signed and, for the sake of his ears and to prevent waking up the entire village – if his idiotic roar hadn’t already done that – he broke into a jog to quickly leave the lecture behind.

At least I’ll enjoy the look on the other teens’ faces when they see me and realize what I’m going through. Maybe I haven’t trained for years like they have, but they will see that I have the spirit and heart of a warrior!

Deep in his thoughts as he was, Arn didn’t notice his surroundings until he arrived at the training fields. Liara was already there, her eyes drilling into Arn with a scowl that could melt lead . . . as were five village children, ages 8 to 11 looking up at him with a mixture of horror, revulsion and curiosity.

“Fitting that you come looking like a vile beast today Arn. It will make it easier for the children to really get into stabbing you. After we go over the basics of how to use a shield and practice the footwork, the children will use you for target practice while you try your best to block.” Turning to the students, she continued, “in the wild, you never know what is coming, and if you end up facing a massive beast, you’ll fight as a team or you’ll die. No one dies today, but if you don’t stab Arn full of holes, you’ll run through lunch. But first, lets go over the basics. Line up!”

It occurred to Arn that the day couldn’t get any worse, but then he remembered yesterday…and actually thought about being repeatedly stabbed by the children. I’m never going to be a Titan like the legends am I? But . . . I have to make something of myself; I gained a lot of stats for one day yesterday. I can do this! I think.