The crazy bitch wasn’t kidding when she said it was hard. I have run four times as much as before, waking up almost two hours sooner and eating double the amount, is this some kind of torture? Is this retribution for some kind of bad action I’ve taken?

I drop limply to the ground like a bag of flour, heaving, my chest rising over and over again as my lungs try to fill back again as my heart gets its shit together.

“That’s all you got? Time for some spar, remember, you can’t stop moving or you will be punished,”

Is she crazy? Give me a second to rest so my heart doesn’t pop out from my chest. Whatever’s inside of me, it’s going to burst any minute now.

She looks at me, her eyes cold, but her smile evil.

“So, we’re finished? Guess you won’t be leaving this place either, better to just give up and stop pestering me”

“I get it, stop yapping, come at me… you…” She throws a hard glance at me, daring me to continue. I bit my tongue

She doesn’t wait anymore and comes at me, holding her training sword at waist level. It always surprises me just how fast she can strike. Her sword arm can be resting one second, and finishing a strike at the other. Its ludicrous speed and precision.

This is where “that man” and Joanne stand apart. Both of them are overwhelmingly strong people, but when we spar.

“That guy” is always holding back, as if he doesn’t take me seriously, which he probably doesn’t. Fuck him. Standing there, waiting for my strikes and effortlessly redirecting them, avoiding them or guarding against them. He can finish me whenever he wants to, and he wants me to know that.

The crazy wolf witch, however, goes all out, she must be seriously holding back but, she doesn’t wait for me to do something, she forces me to move around, never resting, what she wants me to know, is that she’s an unstoppable force of nature, no different from a monster, and if I want to do anything about it, I have to be quick.

“Not going to attack? I’m still waiting Lucius,”

She agreed to train me weeks ago. At first it was just an exercise routine, not much different from mine, just running back and forth. She seemed bored with it a few days after, so she started to pile on exercises.

It changed rapidly, now she makes me run until I can see the face of the deep, gives me at most a few seconds to recuperate, beats the shit out of me, gives me some tips, and proceeds to beat the shit out of me again, to finally leave me practicing sword strikes all on my lonesome.

Wish I knew a word to describe her teaching methods beyond “tiresome”

After the completely one-sided beating concludes, she begins her explaining while I’m belly up, somehow counting stars on the clear, sunny sky.

“You’re doing fine for starting old. We’re still beating your body to a state where you can take this amount of abuse and keep going,”

My head rings. I’m only concentrating on her voice.

“Wait. Old? How young were you?”

“Training starts at five years old, the elder among the tribe teach them all there is to the life for a few years, it doesn’t get physical until eight, by ten years old you need to have this in the bag or you die,”

“that’s…. tiresome,”

“Well, yes,” she said all matter-of-factly as she looked down on my face.

I’ve had this idea on my mind for some time, but I really want to leave this place, I can’t stand to live with half of the people in my home, I can’t look at “that guy” without getting angry, there has to be more out there.

“Do you think I can make it?… out in the world?”

“As an adventurer? Well, it depends, if you keep yourself to easy jobs, yes, but I don’t think you can make a good living like that”

“oh” So I need to get stronger

Must be good to be like my step- “brother”, having life already figured out for you as everyone moves aside so you can succeed.

As I continued to think about this and that, I heard someone approaching us, running full speed.

“Mam, Miss Joanne I have urgent news,” It's Ebin, one of “that guy’s” cronies, though I don’t have anything against him. He gasped for air in between phrases “Some farmers… said they saw a pack… Katillr… roaming close to the village!”

“How many?” she asked

“Don’t know… more than five for sure. They seemed to be looking. They didn’t attack… one of them was way bigger. They said it may be a dread wolf,”

That name caught her attention. Her eyebrows perked up in a funny, yet serious expression.

“Interesting. If it’s a dread wolf, then I guess I better earn my keep, Lucius. Come with me,”

“I’m sorry Miss Joanne” He interrupted “But don’t you think it’s dangerous to go with young Lucius?”

“Have you ever seen a dread wolf?” Joanne asked hands on her hips, a slightly annoyed look on her.

“No, I’ve lived all my life here, never seen any big animal. The biggest thing I’ve seen was one of those big ass deer’s”

Never even heard of, let alone seen, one of those myself either

“don’t worry, I’m enough to keep the both of us safe, even if it’s a dread wolf,”

She kicked me lightly on the shoulder to call my attention

“Get up, let’s go to work, this will do wonders for your training”

“Can I at least rest for a few more minutes?”

“No rest, we don’t know what they want”

Tiresome