He led them down another of the doors that was in the wall of the training center. The room was incredibly large so much so that they could barely see the roof. All kinds of obstructions where placed in random order around the room and seemed to make some kind of obstacle course. There was an angry grunt from behind him and he looked at Oak in surprise.

“This is evil, this is pure desecration!” He said his low rumble quickly turning into the sound of an avalanche. “Killing trees to make fake trees! Who would allow this wantom form of destruction!” Oak was angry, outraged even. 637 took a look around and did indeed see that there where fake tree's made from very real wood. It was kind of ironic to him that they would make fake tree's from real trees what was the point.

“Well” Luniera said to calm him down. “We have been made slaves remember, just add it to your list of things to get vengeance for once we have the chance to get out of here” Oak looked at her and for a moment it seemed he would start a rampage but he surprisingly calmed down and nodded. “This would indeed be the most logical of options.” Oak conceded to her words and calmed down, the angry look however never left his eyes.

“The purpose of this course is to get you kids used to moving in any kind of enviroment.” The instructor was telling them “You will have to move through the course with speed and keep your eyes open and your body ready for anything because there are some traps and pitfalls in the course so stay on your toes!”

“Also for this exercise you will be doint it together with your partner. Teamwork is necesarry dont forget that!”

637 and Snowflake where up first and moved to the starting line of the course. They looked at each other and Snowflakes body was already pulsing in anticipation. As soon as the instructor gave them the signal theys tarted to run.

637 soon noticed that his body wasn't as reactive as ussual because of the earlier training and his movements where no longer as fast or as smooth as they had been when the day started.

The first obstacle they encountered was a simple slanted wooden wall that was probably about 2 and a half meters high. Snowflake suddenly moved forward in an increible burst of speed his body pulsating violently as he jumped the distance in one huge leap using his hands to vault over the wall.

Surprised by this feat 637 himself sped up a bit and set his foot at about a meter high with slight leap then used the momentum to propel himself up and over using his hands as leverage to help him vault over and land smoothly enough on his feet.

Snowflake looked at him with a grin. “This is kind of fun!” 637 couldnt help but look at him in amusement. Seems his shyness was nowhere to be seen when he was this exited.

The second obstacle was a pond of water that had a rectangular shape dug right in the stone floor. On top of the water were logs wich floated on the pond in wat seemed to be a random pattern. Snowflake didnt even pause and jumped on one of the logs he thens tarted jumping from one log to another with ease not even once coming close to losing his balance.

Pfffff that glowing power thingy is pure cheating 637 thought to himself.

He himself made the jump onto the first log and immediately lost his balance landing face first on another log and falling into the water. With a splutter his head rose through the waters surface splashign water straigh back in his eyes. With an annoyed face he started swimming to the other side of the pond to rolling over the ground and hysterically laughing Snowflake who seemed to be having the time of his life.

“Yes yes” 637 grunted “my balance is terrible “ He wiped away the blood that started to flow from his nose. The impact seemed to have bloodied him a bit but his nose didn't seem broken so he moved on.

The third obstacle were the makeshift trees they where talking about before. The trees where rather closely packed together and there were some ropes hanging from the branches. Probably meant to be vines he thought to himself. The floor with this obstacle as well was more water.

Not fancying another swim he made a running start and jumped to one of the ropes and used the forward momentum to sling himself onto another rope and he kept this up until he had reached the other side. When he had finally reached the other side he gave himself a pat on the back .

My balance may be terrible but this i can do! Then he looked up to see the wide grinning Snowflake infront of him. How! He hadn't even noticed the small boy getting here. “bloody magic bloody cheats” he started to mumble below his breath.

The obstacles continued one after another the course seemed to be endless there was a rope bridge with barely any planks that was hung between platforms. A net they had to hang from and use to climb onto a higher platform wich forced them to take a dive into the water from quite a distance the platform must have been atleast 10 meters high!

Snowflake cleared any and all obstacles with ease zooming around like he was some kind of bird he just put his foot lightly onto any surface and then seemed to soar to the next. The speed he was keeping up was incredible, 637 was having trouble keeping up. After barely avoiding some pitfalls that suddenly appeared to make them test their reflexes they reached the end.

This time it was 637 who was panting and Snowflake didnt seem in the least and still had that bloody grin on his face. 637 felt a real urge to give the kid a smack to the back of his head. But he ultimitely decided against it and sat down on the ground panting as he watched the second pair moving towards the starting line. Apperently the instructor was having them go one pair at a time.

The other pairs had more trouble getting through it than 637 and Snowflake did. This rasied 637's pride a bit. It was just that Snowflake was abnormal not that he was bad at this. Seeing this reaffermed put him at ease. Then Oak and Luniera where up. Oak with his unwieldly body had trouble doing nearly any of the obstacles but Luniera was the compleet opposite none of the obstacles seemed to bother her at all as she just vaulted the first wall in the same manner as Snowflake had done. Meanwhile Oak was trying his best to reach the top and seemed to be clawing the wood to struggle over the top.

The sight of it was quite hilarious and he could hear more than some of the kids giggling softly at the image of the huge boy struggling to do the obstacles. The fall he made while on the logs was spectacular causing some of them to be unable to hold it in anymore and go into fullblown laughter.

Even 637 couldn't hold it in there and grinned a bit at the misfortune of the Treeman.

The most surprising however was the pair after him. The tall boy with the red tattoos made pretty good time but the little monkey boy that was with him was incredible he was even faster than Snowflake had been he even used his tail to swing from tree to tree not even bothering with the ropes. He was already finished before Tatt's was even halfway.

After they had all finished the obstacle course the kids seemed to warm up to each other a bit and most of them where talking to each other and some where even laughing together.

“Well im glad you guys are having fun!” The instructor said making the room fall into an irie quiet.

“The next training however none of you will like. Im absolutely positive of that!” He said with a hint of a sadistic smile. “Next up Little children! Will be the pain resistance training!”

The children's faces turned blank at his words and most of them lost all the colour in their face.

So this is where the real training starts 637 thought to himself. Well im bloody well ready, he convinced himself and followed the Instructor into another of the dark hallways.

After walking for a few minutes the already nervous kids were led into a room that was covered in grey lines that where somehow woven into intricrate patterns. The lines gathered in the 8 corners of the room and then they met in the middle into some kind of octogram.

The lines from the upper corners where the most miraculous they somehow seemed to be floating in the air when they connected to the Octogram. They had no physical form of any kind yet somehow seemed as if they were just drawn onto the air.

The Octogram itself was the most complicated design of all it was about 2 meters in diameter and around the edges of the octogram was a line for a slightly bigger octogram. In between the lines this created, there where hundreds of symbols and runic markings that 637 didn't recognize. But one thing he was damn certain off this was wat was called a magical empowerment web.

The purpose of the whole room being covered in the intricate design was to make the magical circle stronger and more importantly permanent. They could not be undone unless there was magic of an even stronger class there to defuse it.

“This is wat we call the Octogram” The instructor informed them “It links magical energy to all of the nerve cells in ones body and then makes them simply feel pain. It somehow manages to bring you to the utmost limit, a limit when reached will not allow one to pass out. It might not be one of the prettiest ways of training but it is one of the most usefull and necessary. The only question is who will go first?”