This was the third day of training for Noah, thinking back on the other player's route, he gained a lot more and there were 5 days to go before he completed the hidden quest. He was eager to know what awaited him in these coming days.

As agreed with the Head Instructor, he came to the training grounds 30 minutes early and there he found him waiting. This imposing and muscular man was sitting on a bench, with a pair of training swords besides him.

When he saw Pestilence a warm smile appeared on his face and, while lifting himself and going inside a sparring circle, he said: “ You have come youngster! Good thing to see all this enthusiasm. Today I want to imprint some moves from my sword dance, it won’t take many days before you memorize every part of it. After we are done with a couple of moves, we will dedicate the remaining time to dodging. “.

Having exchanged a few greetings with the instructor and learned what was waiting for him in this private session, Noah entered the circle leaving a bit of space so Dominik could freely move.

What he got showed was a full execution of Dominik’s sword dance. It was composed of a total of 10 moves with 10 transitions. The last passage was chainable with the starting strike, allowing for a smooth cycling of it. This was what he saw the other day when he came earlier, Dominik was constantly chaining repetitions of his sword dance.

Today focus was on two moves, bringing Noah at 7 out of 10, he was nearing the end, and wondered what could be obtained from doing so. Understanding that this opportunity to train with Dominik was something kind of unique and that he could learn and obtain a lot, made Noah really eager to dedicate himself even more. Right before his turn to start the practice, Noah, following this train of thoughts decided to ask the instructor: “ Teacher, I was wondering in which aspect of my body I should invest and focus in order to grow efficiently, can you enlighten me?”.

Dominik started pondering a bit as if in a deep meditation, it wasn’t a simple matter to answer after all. He knew all too well.

“You see, we all have a Path already established for us but you don’t have to look at it as an immoveable guide, there are some rare chances were a person path can change or, with time, evolve. This said, remember when I told you about magicians learning swordsmanship, you can specialize how you want. For the time being, try to get a feeling for your path first. Use it and then we will have this discussion again”.

There was a strong feeling of trust in the eyes of Noah, who was looking at his teacher. After all, he really liked to feel like a swordsman but, at the same time, didn’t forget about his dream of controlling an army. In conclusion, after logging out, it was necessary to see what other tamers were doing, or so he thought.

After 20 minutes they were done with learning those two moves, it was a straining matter this time. Going further in the dance was physically hard because Dominik pretended to see it being done from the start every time, Noah was at a point where he could execute it in the dark, with his eyes closed.

In the remaining time, he got a level up in dodge(passive), Noah got amazed by his ability to avoid such fast blows fired by the instructor. His reflexes were improving and, with each level up of the skill, he could feel his body becoming faster. His passive was already level 7, now rabbits weren’t enough to raise its level. Only sparring with the instructor could, and this was him starting to display some real speed, comparable to the soldiers that Noah could see sparring not so far away.

It was when the duo was taking a rest of 15 minutes before the group training began that they received the visit of Markus Barbian, Divel’s city first battalion leader.

“Hey greenhorn! I see that you are working hard with the Head Instructor. How is the training going, pretty hard right?... Good, keep going!”.

He spoke with that loud voice of him while laughing and then, turning serious, asked to talk a minute with Dominik alone, Noah was more than happy to comply so he saluted and went to gather at the battalion training ground where he found Lawrence being there earlier than usual. While approaching he got saluted as usual and then went to sit beside his favorite NPC out of the bunch, Lawrence.

His character was really cheerful and solar, he could bring out a good mood with just his presence alone. Even if a bit light headed, Noah really liked to interact with him.

Having sited down, saluted his friend and acquaintances, Noah had some small chat waiting for the instructor to be there. It turned out that his friend got dumped at the promotion exams because he came late a lot of times to the city guard duty and even on the exam day. Lawrence admitted that he wasn’t permitted to take the physical tests at all, pretty like him Noah thought.

When Dominik arrived in front of his trainees, he carried with him a full bag of spears with a round head meant for training. Wearing a serious expression he announced that today they were going to familiarize with spear attacks and the objective of the day was to utilize focused blow with this weapon too.

Noah was surprised that the skill could be used with different weapons, maybe it was possible to utilize it with bare fist too. There was a high chance for that to be the case.

It went smoothly for the first half of the day, after a couple of hours of familiarizing with the spear and trying to get the movements of focused blows right with the new weapon, some results were arriving and many people were able to rightly execute the blow. Right before the lunch break, they had a run as routine and Noah logged off to rest a bit.

The training day was concluded successfully, albeit that Dominik’s expression always remained placid and serious. Noah gained 3 levels in focused blow and 2 in enduring body, training and running paid off it seemed. He checked his stamina and found it at a whooping 125 points, he wondered if his increased endurance lowered its consumption or only indicated his defense. Having these thoughts he stayed behind to have another training with Dominik.

He found the instructor waiting for him with the serious expression that he carried all day.

“here you are Pestilence, I have to talk with you. It appears that a problem that requires my presence aroused. While I promised that I would have taught you everything I could during the military training period, I don’t think that is possible anymore. Now I will pass down to you the remaining moves of my sword dance”.

Noah, feeling agitated about both losing his opportunities and losing the Instructor who he started to respect and admire, spoke right away:” Instructor, I’m really thankful that you will pass down all of your sword dance to me. But I also don’t want to part with you yet, there is still more I can learn from you! I hope that there is a way that you can keep up your promise”.

It was with a bit of remorse that he spoke those words, he even felt a tad bit greedy with his demands but he got to be daring, this was his golden ticket to gain an advantage against the other players; Dominik was the way to tread his route and enjoy a unique adventure.

“You are right, I promised to train you but this matter can’t be avoided. I have to depart, maybe the next morning, I don’t exactly know when but I must go”.

After this reply, Noah felt desperation arousing in him; Dominik was going to depart and he couldn’t avoid it; since it wasn’t possible to overcome the hurdle, he decided to go alone with it.

“Teacher, please allow a selfish request of mine! Bring me along and train me, there are some days left after all. You can even leave me behind when the teachings are over”.

The stubbornness of this young student and his vigorous flame, both impressed him. It really looked like he was seeing his past and young self, burning from desire and willing to sacrifice himself to gain something in return.

“Indeed I promised, I guess that I’m allowed to bring along an aide. But if we do so you will have to leave the military or it would figure out that you deserted the training period, I’m sorry but I don’t have enough power to change these bureaucracy matters. Everything I can do is make you join the expedition as my follower and sentencing you not worth to join the military, this would give you an easier time leaving this camp”.

While speaking he maintained a perplexed and curious look, as if to wonder what Noah would answer.

“You have until the end of this session to decide, now focus on learning the remaining figures”.