His face suddenly got redder as he realized that he was blatantly staring at us. “Well, I guess we have a really talented batch of recruits this year. We will speak after this lesson is over.” He said after he regained his composure.

Continuing as if the previous incident never happened he said: “How did it feel? Fantastic, right? We call this practice meditation. Note that as you increase your mana regeneration you will be able to keep training for a longer time. Cultivators at my level are able to meditate at maximum capacity for months!” Months? If they spend months on cultivating, then there may have been a hint of truth in his words when he said immortality. Now that I think about it, how old is he?

“Now that you know how to meditate I will teach you how to make yourself even stronger during combat. This technique becomes more powerful as your base strength increases so don’t neglect meditation! Not as if anyone would willingly do that.

It is very simple actually. You have to repeat the process of meditation but instead of letting the mana seep into your body you have to force it into it! The power you receive depends on the amount of mana you injected. If you fight against beasts, you have to be carefully balance power and endurance!

If you inject too much mana you will quickly run out of mana and if you don’t inject enough, you will be eaten! Remember kids: Balance is important. Everyone has to find his or her own balance and constantly adjust it depending on the current situation and strength.

We call this technique mana empowerment. THIS is what gives us an edge over the beasts. It is the main reason we are able to protect our lands from the beasts since these dumb monsters are not able to do this.

In the beginning your body will feel uncomfortable so when you feel that you can’t take any more reduce the influx of mana. Don’t worry, you will soon get used to it. You can practice finding your balance on these metal dummies.” He said and I looked around in confusion since there was only the metal pillar he used present.

Suddenly dozens of metal dummies with a form similar to that of a human appeared about a meter above the ground and slammed into it, sinking into it. What the hell!? How did these appear?

“Don’t be surprised, I conjured them. Maybe I will teach you how to do that later so concentrate on practicing mana empowerment for now.” He laughed when he saw our awestruck faces.

I will learn how to do that? YES! It has always been one of my greatest fantasies back on New Pandora to conjure magic! But first I have to punch some dummies to find my balance? I hope it will be worth it.

I began to inject mana into my muscles and immediately noticed how a weird feeling came over me. Sure, I felt more powerful but this felt as if my body was exploding. I immediately reduced the amount I injected and the feeling reduced until I only felt bloated.

I looked towards my friends and found them staring at me in turn.

“Well, I guess we should find our balance or whatever he meant with that.” Greta said cheerfully.

“Wow Greta, good advice. Very good advice. Do you have any other wise words you have to add, great master of, uh, wisdom!” Frank retorted in an annoyed tone.

“Can we start training now? Look, the teacher is already looking at us!” I interrupted them. Had they continued, we would never have started training. This was not the first time they had bickered like this. They did this all the time in the second half of the ride.

Noticing watchful gaze of the teacher they hurriedly positioned themselves in front of the nearest dummies. Looks of concentration could be seen on their faces as they prepared to strike.

I should probably start too. What would be a proper balance? I don’t know how long the training will last but I can feel the mana filling up my core rapidly due to the newly created matter in my core. I guess I should start with the same amount I generate. That way I can go on indefinitely.

Doing just that I could feel an incredible rush of power come over me. I felt lighter and more powerful than ever before. Clenching my fists, I took a deep breath to calm myself down. Then I struck the dummy with all my power in the torso.

My fist was unbelievably fast and reached its target, causing the dummy to slightly vibrate. I could feel the skin between my fingers ripping and my knuckles were hurting like hell! OUCH, why didn’t he tell us that this would happen!?

I could hear slight groaning around me and the kids around me were all holding their swelling hands.

“You have just learned one of the most basic principles of mana injection: Reinforce EVERY single part of your body or you will injure yourself! This is a lesson that is best learned by practical experience. Being injured by your own punch is one of the least worries you will have when facing a beast whilst leaving some parts unprotected! Continue, but this time don’t leave anything out!”

He might be an asshole for not telling us beforehand but he is right. Every small mistake can lead to death against the beasts. The large amount of warriors that die every day are testament to that.

Continuing with new motivation I strike the dummy with my fists again and again. Even after what seemed to be an eternity of continuous strikes with all of my power behind them the dummy didn’t have a single dent on it. As I directed a big chunk of the mana into my arms I was thankfully unhurt too.

After realizing that I could focus on specific regions of my body I experimented on which areas would cause the dummy to vibrate the most. Unfortunately, the result was me being mentally too exhausted before I could accomplish anything substantial.

Directing mana into specific regions put a huge strain on my mind as I had to have complete control of the rapidly flowing mana and concentrate on some mana veins more than others. It took some time to find out how to differentiate them at all and even then it was extremely hard to not let my concentration slip.

As I sat on the ground to recover from my fatigue I noticed that everyone else was still striking the dummies. The sounds Owen produced with his punches were especially loud and I could already see a small, almost unnoticeable dent forming. He had an extremely concentrated expression on his face and didn’t show even a hint of exhaustion.

Well, that is unexpected. I really didn’t expect him to be so talented at physical activities. I guess I shouldn’t belittle just because he can be annoying as hell.

Frank and Greta weren’t that much worse than him though. Their strikes unceasingly hit the dummy in front of them and together those three produced something akin to a melody of vibrating metal.

I guess this is the benefit of being reared by retired warriors, huh?

Not wanting to be outdone I stopped my futile tries at finding out which areas were the most effective ones when striking against the metal dummy and just hit it in a frequency that augmented the melody my friends were making.

Not focusing on specific regions was far easier and I nearly enjoyed the training session. Nearly. The mental fatigue was still present and I could feel my exhaustion growing with every second that ticked by. Suddenly I ran out of mana and I barely stopped my fist from hitting the dummy. It seems that I had unconsciously increased the mana flow.

At the very least the dummy had a few small dents in the places I had hit it repeatedly.

Plopping onto the ground I lazily observed the whole training site and realized that about a third of the children present were also laying on the ground. Some had even closed eyes and didn’t seem to be awake.

It couldn’t have been this exhausting, right? Though I am tired it is nowhere near passing out. Maybe their mana output was too strong so they fell unconscious? With every passing moment here I get more and more questions. Maybe I should try asking him. I know he said that he wouldn’t answer any but it can’t hurt to try, right?

I heaved myself off the ground and went towards the teacher. Noticing me, he threw me a curious glance which I answered with a stare.

Arriving at his side I began the conversation with my sweetest and most childish voice:” Um, hello Mr. Teacher. I know you said that you wouldn’t answer any questions but can you make an exce-“

“No, I won’t! I stand to my word so fuck off and go hit the dummies!” At first he was still surprised but when he realized what I was talking about he screamed at me and kicked me back to where I came from.

Even though he hit me with an enormous force which should have broken all of the bones in my rear area I just felt a lot of pain from the kick and flew face first into Owen. I hit him in his stomach and he doubled over from pain.

As we regained our bearings on the ground I felt a stinging sensation every time I moved my head and my ass hurt so much that I probably shouldn’t sit for some time whilst Owen was puking on himself. Why did he react so excessively? I mean all I did was ask a question, right?

By now everyone had stopped training and looked at us and the teacher. Owens current state obviously terrified them and the angry expression of the teacher didn’t help.

“LISTEN UP YOU BRATS! NO ONE QUESTIONS MY WORD OR DISOBEYS ME, OR ELSE THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS TO YOU! MY WORD IS ABSOLUTE!” He shouted in a loud voice. His face was contorted into a frown and he stared each of us down.

What followed was quite understandable, really: The children started to cry. When one started it caused a chain reaction and it didn’t take long until everyone, including me, was in tears.

The teacher was visibly disturbed by this, he was most likely used to more mature pupils and didn’t expect us to react like that.

“Hey, STOP CRYING!” His words made some of us cry even harder, “Wait, wait, I didn’t mean it like this. Kids, don’t fucking cry!” Wow, I didn’t expect him to be that bad with children. Well, he deserves it for hurting me and Owen.

But really, can he blame us for crying? We were brought away from home not too long ago and thrown into a completely new environment while the only explanation we got was that we would be going to the Academy

Then a teacher suddenly injures two of his students – meaning that this new environment is not only new, but also hostile and dangerous.

Add homesickness to that and you have a lot of crying children.

“Greg, what is going on?” Hearing the commotion another teacher, a sturdy middle aged man, came over. Far behind him a significantly older group of children curiously looked over at us.

“Well, they are just crying because they are new to my way of teaching students. It is nothing to worry about, in a few weeks they will be used to it. Now, if you don’t mind I would like to continue my lesson.” The asshole said. Really? Excessive violence is your way of teaching children? I have to say we really had bad luck to be taught by such a primitive.

The other teacher frowned at his words “This is not the first time we have talked about this, Greg.

They may be your students but this doesn’t give you the right to treat them as you wish!” He hissed.

Why couldn’t we have gotten this teacher? I bet he wouldn’t abuse us like that old man.

“I don’t fucking care about your feats in the last horde, your teachings are outdated! Old men like you should just retire and let us do the work. It is quite obvious you have become senile.” The middle aged man smiled.

“HA! If I let young fools like you take over than I would have truly gone senile. Every single person who studied under my guidance became a great warrior. The same can’t be said about you, Ian.” The asshole retorted.

Now both of them smiled, though Ian’s smile seemed forced.

Their voices were unexpectedly easy to understand despite the sound of crying filling the air, though I think that I am the only one from my group who listened to this conversation. By the time the middle aged teacher came I had already stopped and listened attentively.

“Well, at least we aren’t stuck in the time before the last horde like you! Just accept that your generation was foolish!” He spat. Ouch, that was mean.

His last sentence made Greg furious “YOU DARE, BOY!” his booming words were the last I heard before I was embraced by darkness again.