198…199…200!

And I promptly collapsed onto my chest. A week ago, two hundred pushups was nothing, even with all the weight of my surplus ki. I had regained enough control of my ki that I had regained the Second Stage and was able to use my ki internally to make myself both faster and stronger. All this had meant was that I could do more repetitions, when what I needed was to increase the strain to both my body and my spirit.

And so, I finally got around to using the secondary forge at Dolores’ smithshop. I forged myself a series of small iron rods and semicircles. Back in my apartment, I then enscribed them with the runes for both resisting movements and for applying additional force in the same direction as gravity. With all the runes enscribed, I then worked some of my leather to create holders to strap this iron to my body. In the end, I had eleven pieces: two ankles, two thighs, two torsos, two upper arms, two forearms, and one headband. They were relatively svelte, though not nearly as nice as the ones I had been gifted in my prior life.

With these weights on my body, all I had to do was feed them ki and they would grow heavier. This would of course deplete the weight of my ki itself, but it was near a perfect exchange between the ki lost and the weight gain in the bands. And, of course, my ki would replenish itself, weighing me down again, while the weights would hold onto the ki and remain heavy. Of course, they had to remain in constant contact with me, least all the ki in the iron dissipate, but wearing the weights all the time was part of their effectiveness.

And so, today the weights were adding about 100 kilograms. The weights themselves had some sort of maximum, though I hadn’t experimented with that yet, and could only take a guess based on the quality of the material and the quality of the enscription. Still, even with the ludicrous physical strength I was gaining, I was hopeful that the weights would be effective for me for at least a month.

I laid panting in the grass until my heart slowed, then slowly got up. It’d been hard work, but things were really starting to pay off. I’d gotten my staff and custom sword, today was my first day wearing my new uniform, and my purse was still fairly heavy.

It was only noon bell, but it’d been a tough morning, and I wasn’t quite in the mood to head to the hidden valley to practice my ki attacks, as I had been doing recently. Instead, something deeply nostalgic in me was calling out to me to rest and have a pint: I’d been going at it for six solid weeks now, with no breaks. Though my massive ki surplus meant my body didn’t need the breaks, and my old-fashioned, old-man stubbornness meant I could power through whatever weariness my mind felt, I took a moment to reflect on my current state of affairs.

This lasted only a moment, before I exclaimed “Fuck it!,” and I was stripping down and jumping into the pool by the oak tree. I had finally gotten into the habit of packing actual soap, rather than just using a bit of sand, and I scrubbed myself down good, before drying myself off with my water ki, and changing into my spare outfit. Slinging my bag and weapons over my shoulders, I made my way back into the City through the West Gate.

Since coming back, I hadn’t taken to spending any time drinking … or even socializing for that matter. While my long term plans were still very much in flux—or rather, nonexistent—the overhanging threat of future knowledge had been pushing me hard since my return. But even with the surety of disaster looming, there remained a need for rest and relaxation. My feet wandered as my mind did and soon I found myself stopped outside a pub.

“The Prancing Pig,” I muttered.

This was one of my old haunts back in my first life, with the early crew: Becca, Sam, and Lennie. It was, and remained, an odd place. As far as anyone knew, a pig was a mythical version of a Boar with no hair, no tusks, and a cute squawk. Why someone from Dorflich would think naming a tavern after it was beyond me. Still, its regulars found comfort in cheap food and even cheaper beer.

Shaking my head out of my reverie, I made my way inside. The building was stone as were most buildings in the City, but curiously had no windows at all. The interior consisted primarily of a single room. A bar with stools took up the right rear quarter. The right wall and the front wall both had a high counter, together with stools. In the rest of the room, but primarily scattered left, there were about a dozen 4-person tables.

It was too late for lunch, and too early for after work drinks, so the place was fairly empty, with perhaps a dozen persons at most. I went up to the bar like the regular that I had been—was I still?—and felt a few pairs of eyes track me like a newcomer before flicking away again to their own business.

A heavy-set man with muttonchops was polishing mugs behind the bar. “What’ll you have?,” he growled.

“Ale, and the daily.”

“Boar ribs.”

“That’s fine.”

The barkeep pulled a cold mug out of an ice box, and filled from the tap on a large cask set against the backwall. Sliding it in front of me, I returned my thanks with a nod. I took a sip and sighed, feeling tension I didn’t know was there release from my shoulders. I hadn’t had a drink since coming back, and before that it had been… My forehead creased trying to remember.

The clatter of the plate of ribs landing in front of me brought me back to the present. I bit into the first rib and remembered why we used to haunt this place: covered in a spiced, earthy rub and slow cooked in the oven for bells until tender, these were delicious. And with the common attacks by Boars, they were cheap. And, well, they sold more beer too.

Of course, at that point, a scuffle across the tavern caught the attention of everyone both involved and not involved in it.

“—en’ ya mother would be ashamed of you,” was all I caught when my ears finally tuned into the redhead at the center of the scuffle. She was standing aggressively with her hands on the table, her chair flipped over behind her, the three young men at the table leering at her. “If you’ve got the business, then I wanna hear it. I didn’t come here for a social venture,” she growled the last two words. This seemed familiar somehow.

“Hey babe, I just wanted to buy you some drinks and get to know you better,” the blondie on the right said. “We can’t go into this without knowing who we’re dealing with, if you know what I mean.”

“If you get handsy with me, I won’t be to blame if I break you,” she replied, waving her fist in front of his face.

“Oh, you mean like this,” and blondie brought his foot into the back of her right knee to unbalance her, reaching out with one hand to pull her into his lap. I had begun moving at the beginning of the exchange, and had now neared enough to deftly rebalance the redline with a hand to her elbow, while gripping blondie’s forearm with the other.

“If the lady asks to be left alone,” I emphasized as politely as I could under the circumstances, “you should leave her alone.” Blondie stood up with his face close to mine. He leered down at me with a few centimeters height advantage, but I coldly stared back at him from under the brim of my hat. Blondie’s two confederates belatedly scrambled to their feet at my interruption, but seemed unsure of what to do.

“Hey! I can handle myself, thank you very much,” the redhead butted in. With a glance, I saw that it was indeed Becca. Damn it been a long time she he’d seen her. And here she was, pissing someone off again. Well, they probably deserved it in this instance, but still, Becca was a prickly as a Porcupine.

“And you very well could handle all three of them,” I said calmly. “And with just a scrape or two. But what about that fourth guy when he hit you from behind?,” I jutted by thumb back behind me at a man leaning against the wall with pint in hand, looking at us just a bit more intently than the rest of the crowd. Becca glanced once, then twice, at the man against the wall. A shadow of comprehension crossed her face before she smothered it again behind her cool façade, and just stared at me.

“Yes, that might have been a wee bit of trouble,” she said sardonically, before whirling on blondie, “So, fuck you Reggie. Come on weirdo,” she said catching my elbow and dragging me away.

“Weirdo?”

***

Back at my place at the bar, I found myself staring at Becca while she gnawed through the fifth of my ribs. And, I would note, drinking most of my beer. I waved at the barkeep for a another.

Becca was… focused solely on the plate. Well, that wasn’t how I expected my first conversation with a friend after traveling into the past to go. Correction, she was adroitly avoiding turning her head to look at me, only sparing a glance occasionally. Still, she hadn’t said a word since she dragged me back to the bar, and a few extra decades of life can’t possibly prepare you to have a conversation with your oldest friend who no longer remembers you.

“So,” she finally said, biting off the word, “you got a name here?”

“Evert. Evert Kallstrom.” Positive steps! And followup: “And you are?” I asked as friendly as I could, knowing full well who she was.

“None of your damn business.”

“That’s a little harsh.”

“Ugh,” she grunted. “Rebecca Little. Re-beck-ah. Don’t forget,” she bit into another rib, “the Re or I will beat you harder than Reggie.”

“You didn’t beat him at all.”

“Figyah of speech,” she said, wiping her chin. “I am way out of his league.”

“I didn’t take you for the dating type.”

Becca—I wasn’t going to call her Rebecca—fumed at this while I put on my best grin.

“Anyhow,” I continued before this got out of hand, and turned to face the backwall “I take it you focus on hand-to-hand, rather than any specific weapon.”

“Yeees…,” she got out, uncertain in my change in tack, “what’s it to you?”

“I tend to prefer the sword and staff myself, but I’ve been looking for a partner for unarmed sparring.”

“You are an idiot,” she said nodding in understanding. “I thought it was just the clothing—I have no idea what you’re wearing—but you are definitely an idiot.” Several seconds later, “Are you are a farmer?”

“No, spiritualist,” I said sipping my ale. Wow. Young Becca was difficult, but something still didn’t add up. “Wait, why exactly am I an idiot?”

“Uggh,” she mock-cried. “Totally a farmer,” under her breath, before biting into another rib. After several more seconds, “Because it’s sword or staff, not sword and staff.”

“Ah, yes,” I said, “that,” completely not understanding what she wasn’t understanding. “Still,” I continued, “you interested?”

Becca bit into the last rib—I was going hungry wasn’t I—and very conspicuously chewed on it before swallowing. “Well,” she said, “conveniently, tomorrow suddenly freed up for me. And after today, I’m really going to need to punch something. So,” she grinned playfully at me, “sure, I can spar with you.”