Kyle looked around the training area with a shocked look on his face, when he had walked in here there had been only four other people his age waiting for them and now their unconscious bodies were strewn around the room, Kyle himself was in pretty bad shape having taken several hits from the one responsible and what was worse was that he knew that the culprit was holding back.

The culprit was of course the same teacher that had interviewed Kyle and Fi yesterday. Of course, the worst part was that even with all of them working together they had been unable to so much as make Reginald move from the exact same place that he had been when Kyle had walked in.

When Kyle had walked in with Fi in her usual position wrapped around his neck the other students had blatantly stared at him, there was only one other person in the class that had a companion of his own. Kyle wasn’t quite sure what it was supposed to be, to him the thing just looked like a hairless rat.

Unfortunately, it didn’t seem like Fi was the one most of them were interested in. There were very few Aethereal Humans who lived outside of the empire and there were many people who hated them. This was especially true among non-humans of which there were three in this class a dwarf girl with long dark brown braids and an impressively well-built physique, a reptilian Beastwoman whose skin was covered in fine scales that shimmered different shades of green in the light and another young man who appeared to be a Moon Elf. Of these three, two of them were glaring at Kyle with outright hostility in their eyes but the reptilian girl was definitely more interested in Fi than the young man with glowing blue eyes her gaze so firmly locked onto the companion that it seemed that she had yet to even notice Kyles’ presence.

“Ah Kyle you’re here,” Reginald called out. It was obvious that he had noticed the looks the young man was getting but unless they actually tried to do something to him, he was going to leave things be. If Kyle couldn’t deal with this sort of thing by himself, he just wasn’t going to make it in the cutthroat world that Adventurers lived in.

“Alright I know this is your first day but we’re going to just leap right into it,” Reginald continued casting his golden eyes around the room at his students. “Your first lesson will be for all of you to fight me at once. The only rules are; no magic and no attacking each other.”

Just because he wasn’t going to help Kyle didn’t mean he was going to let his students cause problems on the first day by attacking him. The other rule was there because this was a class for warriors and not everyone here had unlocked the Mana Manipulation Skill. This would actually leave Kyle at a slight disadvantage as he hadn’t had time to level up his Chain Fighting Mastery as much as the rest of the students had been able to level up their own weapons Skills.

“I will be using my Mentor Skill to lower my stats to the class’ average and limiting some of my Skills so that this is a slightly fairer fight than if I went full strength,” Reginal smirked as he said these words. The person who had taught him when he was a student here had used these exact same words and his entire class had reacted the same way as all young people who were proud of their own strength would react when someone told them that they couldn’t win a fight even if their opponent let them all attack at once while they were holding back.

The faces of the students all turned towards Reginald as they glared at the Beastman who simply grinned at them. Reginald was currently unarmed and was only wearing a pair of pants revealing his massively muscled frame which was covered with the scars that he had received while he was an Adventurer. His Class had developed from the Brawler Class which was a Class that focussed on the Unarmed Combat Skill so being unarmed didn’t actually make much difference to him, not that his students knew that.

Getting his students to fight him before they had even had the chance to introduce themselves was a test of their ability to adapt and work together to defeat an opponent more powerful than they were individually. Even if they worked together perfectly which was all but impossible in their current circumstances Reginald knew from experience just how much more powerful he was than his students, even when he limited himself as much as he was now.

Gloria the dwarf was the first to make a move, her race was known for their short tempers, so this wasn’t much of a surprise to Reginald who knocked the first of the two axes she wielded aside before countering with a vicious hook to her gut that sent her flying backwards.

Seeing this the two other students who had followed Gloria’s lead paled briefly as they saw their classmate tumble across the floor. Kyle grimaced his father had literally beat how much of a bad idea hesitating was in this sort of situation and quickly decided to help them out sending his chain arcing towards Reginald as he turned towards the young Moon Elf who was now the closest.

Denner the young Moon Elf’s eyes widened as a chain flew past his head towards Reginald and he quickly realised that someone was backing him up. As Reginald ducked under the sudden attack Denner flicked the slender blade of his sabre at his face but Reginald simply bent further backwards kicking out at Denner’s chin as he completely flipped over using his hands to spring back to his feet just in time to catch the haft of the strange spear-like weapon had been heading towards the back of his head with a grin.

Sasha the serpent Beastwoman hissed at him as she twisted part of the shaft of her weapon which was known as an addertongue. It was called this because of the forked blades at the end of the weapon. In between these two blades was a small slot in which a third blade which was often coated in poison was concealed, twisting a part of the haft of the dangerous weapon would activate the spring-loaded mechanism which would launch the blade outwards fast enough to penetrate even the toughest of hides. The concealed blade shot out towards Reginald’s face as he turned towards Sasha but the other Beastman simply stepped around it and thrust his palm out towards Sasha slamming into her chest with enough force that she simply let go of her addertongue and fell to her knees gasping.

Kyle swore loudly as he watched another of his classmates fall before their monstrous tutor, by now Gloria had managed to struggle back to her feet and was charging back into the fray as Reginald turned towards the final student who swung his fist in a motion that Kyle was very familiar with from his own Unarmed Combat Skill.

Will’s eyes widened as Reginald countered his Hook Skill with a Hook of his own slamming his fist into the smaller boys with an unpleasant crunching sound before his other hand grabbed Will and threw him bodily at Gloria.

Seeing that his was about to get messy Kyle decided that using his chains was just going to end up with him accidentally hitting one of his classmates and charged at Reginald just as Gloria ducked under the flailing Will, one of her axes flashing up towards Reginald’s neck.

Spinning again Reginald lashed out at Gloria with a kick causing her to abandon her attack rather than take another hit which she knew would put her out of the fight. Kyle tackled into Reginald as hard as he could trying to knock the large Beastman off balance before he recovered from his kick only to receive an elbow to the back of his head that made his vision turn blurry, but he tightened his grip on the larger man. If he couldn’t knock him over then he would at least slow him down while his classmates attacked.

Gloria’s eyes widened slightly as she saw Kyle look up at her with his faintly glowing eyes. Her family had always told her to beware of Aethereal humans due to their relationship to the Empire, but Kyle was willing to take the rain of elbows that was falling on his head as he attempted to hold Reginald back.

Now that Kyle was hanging off him Reginald knew that the other students would capitalise on the opening that it gave them and for that he was impressed with the young man but unfortunately Kyle’s actions also left himself wide open to attacks and already Reginald could feel his grip beginning to weaken as he smashed his elbow back down onto the young mans head once more before grabbing the two axes that were swinging towards his head and headbutting Gloria an action that he instantly regretted as he had momentarily forgotten that dwarves had the toughest bones of any race and what was worse was that he actually had slightly lower strength than Gloria with his stats lowered down to the class average and the blades of her axes were slowly inching towards his neck.

Will was still fuming about being tossed aside by Reginald and charged headlong back into the fray seeing that the situation right now was far more advantageous and started pummelling Reginald’s side with his unbroken left hand causing the Beastman to grunt in pain as he drove his knee into Gloria’s stomach and swung her into him sending them tumbling to the floor in a tangle of limbs.

Seeing this Kyle decided that it was time to disengage, he had taken too many hits before and even now his vision was still blurry so he threw a Hook into the same side that Will had been hitting drawing another grunt from Reginald as he attempted to drive his elbow into the back of Kyle’s head once more only to find that Kyle had activated his Dodge Roll Skill throwing himself backwards in a motion that Reginald thought looked closer to a backflip than a roll.

Looking around the room he shook his head Denner had been knocked out when his head had hit the floor after Reginald had kicked him away. Sasha was still trying to catch her breath having crawled a short distance away so as not to get attacked while she was down and was only now trying to drag herself to her feet. Will and Gloria were still swearing at each other as they tried to untangle themselves and Reginald took this chance to kick her axes away before turning towards the final member of this class just in time for the weighted end of Kyle’s chain to smash into his face propelled by Kyle’s Lash Skill.

Reginald licked away the blood that flowed from his split lip with a grin, it was good to see that some of his students still had some fight in them but before he dealt with Kyle whose face had paled upon seeing the look Reginald was giving him he decided to deal with the others first reaching down into the tangle of limbs beside him ignoring the strangled squawks of Will and Gloria as he grabbed their heads and smashed them together which was enough to knock Will out but Gloria’s toughness required a special touch and Reginald lifted her up before smashing her into the ground causing her to go limp. Luckily the training area had inscriptions that were essentially an upgraded version of the magical item that Yuliah had handed out in Farholt that protected against damage past 10% of a fighter’s total health as well as lasting damage like what happened to Ryan. An inscription this powerful could only be placed on something the size of a building due to the complexity and power requirement which was why Yuliah had to settle for the weaker versions.

Seeing the familiar domes of protective magic cover his new classmates after this attack Kyle swore again, he hadn’t doubted Reginald when he had suggested that they wouldn’t be able to defeat him if they attacked him all at once but seeing them drop one after the other like this was still shocking.

Reginald raised an eyebrow, he hadn’t thought that attack would have dropped their HP down below 10% and made a mental note to make sure that everyone put some points towards their Constitution the next time they Levelled Up. He had simply assumed that that would have been enough to knock them out which the inscriptions did nothing to guard against.

Sasha hissed again in rage at seeing her two classmates taken out so easily, she didn’t really know much about any of them but she wasn’t the sort of person to just let something like that happen in front of her without trying to do something about it and she activated her Beast Form causing two flaps of skin to peel away from the side of her neck to form a cobra-like hood as her tail lengthened becoming long enough that she could no longer keep it hidden. This form also gave her access to several Skills that she couldn’t use in her normal form such as the venomous spit that she launched at Reginald’s eyes as Kyle backed up his scaly classmate by using his Entangling Coils to prevent Reginald from dodging but to his surprise Reginald didn’t even attempt to dodge the attack simply swiping the viscous liquid out of the air with his bare hands before smashing Sasha’s now fanged visage with his venom coated fist.

Blood streaming from the small nub that was her nose the girl lashed out with her powerful tail sweeping his legs out from under him as she thrust out at him with her addertongue but in a impressive feat of gymnastic ability Reginald bent around the attack using Kyle’s chain to pull him in as he pushed off the ground with his spare hand causing Sasha to hastily withdraw her weapon instead of continue her assault as Kyle narrowly missed being impaled.

Kyle dived past Reginald as the Beastman reached out to grab him. His mind was moving at speeds it had never reached before as he tried to figure out what Skills Reginald was using, he had never had to fight an enemy who always seemed to know where attacks were coming from, his parents could both use similar Skills but Kyle was guessing that Reginald was using a combination of Skills to bring about an effect that almost felt like clairvoyance . In fact, for all he knew it could be clairvoyance though he had a sneaking suspicion that clairvoyance would be regarded as a Mental Energy Skill of some sort which Reginald had told him he had no affinity for.

Sasha caught his eye and shook her head, they didn’t have time to dwell on those things right now, first they had to prove that they belonged here, and Kyle nodded preparing himself to fight.

For the first time since the class began Reginald felt pressured by these two as they began to work together, Sasha attacking him up close with her addertongue as Kyle provided support from a distance with his chains darting in to pummel him with punches and kicks whenever it looked like Sasha was in trouble. This was what Reginald had been aiming for all along, he would still be able to defeat them easily enough as he could feel his HP was almost at the point where he could activate one of his more powerful Skills if he needed to but these two were finally working together, up till now the students had been cooperating to a certain extent but Reginald wouldn’t have quite called it teamwork as they usually just ended up getting in each other’s way but these two were actually doing rather well and a smile appeared on the Beastman’s face as he realised this.

But he had his pride as a teacher to think about and there was no way that he was going to let these inexperienced kids fight him for much longer, that would defeat the other purpose of this lesson.

Reaching out he grabbed the shaft of Sasha’s addertongue before kicking her in the chest sending her flying backwards at the wall with enough force that the protective inscriptions activated to prevent her from taking too much damage before swinging the weapon in an arc behind him catching Kyle in the side of his head as he rushed in to try and help before turning around to look at the young man who was now the last person standing.

“Well then,” Reginald said suddenly. “I think that’s enough for now, don’t you?”

“Huh!?”

“There are some potions in the cabinet over there go and get them,” Reginald continued ignoring Kyle’s confused outburst as he turned towards the two companions who were also staring at him with dumbstruck expressions on their faces. “If either of you knows a healing spell start casting it on the students, if you don’t then follow me.”

The three looked at each other, shrugged and did as they were asked, Kyle walking over to the cabinet and pulling out two trays of potions labelled ‘Stamina’ and ‘Health’ potions and placed one of each down next to his classmates as Fi went around healing the worst of their injuries and the rat-thing followed Reginald out of the room and not long after they returned with three buckets filled with water with which Reginald commenced the time honoured tradition of rousing his students by throwing the freezing cold liquid over them.

The previously unconscious students awoke to the sudden sensation of being cold and wet with all the grace one would expect and spent the first few seconds they were awake cursing Reginald as he moved on to the next to give them the same treatment.

Soon everyone except Kyle was dripping wet and glaring at Reginald who smirked back at them from the same place he had been standing when Kyle had walked in.

“So, what did we learn?” Reginald asked looking at each in turn. “Gloria?”

“That we need to get stronger,” the dwarven girl replied immediately causing Reginald to roll his eyes.

“Yes, well you’re not wrong but that’s not the answer I was looking for,” Reginald replied. “Denner, what do you think?”

The moon elf held a hand up to his chin in thought for a few seconds, he had been the first to be knocked unconscious, so he didn’t think he had much to add to the conversation.

“That we need to be more flexible in how we attack?” Denner asked tilting his head to one side.

“Not a bad answer,” Reginald admitted. “But sadly, not the one I was looking for. Will you’re up.”

“We need to be more careful when challenging a much more powerful enemy,” Will replied excitedly. His Class was that of a Brawler so seeing Reginald’s fighting style had been educational in and of itself. Brawlers were often seen as a weaker Class because they specialised in Unarmed Combat, so they didn’t usually equip weapons which meant that their attacks were generally weaker than Classes that did but Reginald’s attacks were almost as powerful as some of the Adventurers he had seen even when he lowered his stats down to their level.

“I used my Mentor Skill to lower my stats down to the class average,” Reginald sighed. “Which means with the Skills I kept active I was about as powerful as a Level 4 Miniboss which two of you working together should have been able to defeat. So, while it’s not an untrue answer, it doesn’t quite apply here as I wasn’t that much more powerful than you.”

A Miniboss was a type of monster that controlled a small group of other monsters of the same type that could only be found in Dungeons. They were less powerful than a true Boss that was the same Level that they were but as there could be multiple Minibosses on the same floor of a Dungeon in some cases they were even more dangerous than the actual Boss.

“Sasha, your thoughts?” Reginald asked turning to the second last student in line.

Sasha had been the second last to be knocked out and was confident that she had figured out the answer that Reginald was looking for.

“That we need to learn to work together properly,” she replied causing Reginald to smile and nod his head.

“Correct, while some of you did attempt to work together for the most part you were simply acting as individuals instead of a team,” he said. “You got in each-others way and you didn’t try and help each-other when something went wrong.”

“In fact,” Reginald continued. “It was harder fighting Kyle and Sasha by themselves than it was fighting the rest of you together.”

“The Aethereal?” snarled Gloria causing Reginald’s eyes to narrow dangerously. “He was basically useless! The most useful thing he did was slow you down.”

“First,” growled Reginald in a voice that sent shivers down the spines of the students. “I will remind you that racism isn’t allowed at this school, so unless you want to be kicked out on your first day, I suggest you think about that. Second with all of you crowding around me that was the best thing he could have done. If he had tried to keep attacking you with his chain, then there was a chance that he would’ve hit one of you. Third, he did the most damage to me of all of you, the only one who came close was Sasha.”

Gloria gulped, if she got kicked out on her first day for something like racism there was no way that she would be able to become an Adventurer. The Adventurer Guild accepted all Races so being a racist was just a good way to get beaten up by someone stronger than you were.

“Oh, and one final thing,” Reginald said as though he was just remembering something important. “Kyle’s stronger than that. As you may have noticed his Class and weapon choice are a bit different from normal ones. He’s actually just as good at magic as he is at anything else.

The other students frowned slightly, they weren’t sure where Reginald was going with this.

“This is a class for warrior types, so I told you not to use magic,” Reginald explained. “But actually, I want you all to learn some other method of fighting, whether that’s magic, or some other form of ranged weapon is up to you, but a warrior’s job is to be able to deal damage in all situations not just when you can get up close and personal with what you’re fighting. So, now Kyle and I are going to demonstrate why having different fighting styles is useful. I’m going to keep my stats and Skills the same as they were before and this time Kyle’s going to come at me with everything he’s got.”

As he said this Kyle’s eyes widened. Reginald had been able to take out the whole class without so much as breaking a sweat and now he wanted Kyle to fight him on his own?

“Don’t worry Kyle,” Reginald laughed seeing the look on Kyle’s face. “I don’t expect you to beat me, I just want you to prove my point.”

The other students quickly moved out of the way as Reginald suddenly seemed to grow even larger in their vision, Gloria glaring at Kyle who simply stood there his chain hanging loosely from his wrist.

“Well then, Kyle,” she muttered angrily. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”