Chapter 50 — A Day of Training

  “Haah!” Laiya yelled out as she thrust her spear into the training scarecrow the family had made that morning from gathered grasses, branches, and the remains of the previous family’s ruined bedding, repurposed thanks to Warnel’s [Mend Material] Ability.

  “Back!” Falma shouted, and loosed an arrow into the scarecrow’s head once her sister had cleared the space. She was doing much better now that she had a bow better suited for her current Strength.

  Toren sucked in a pained breath as he took a blow from Emina’s frying pan against a raised arm. He had told her to swing with full force. The padding and internal metal plates prevented broken bones for the most part, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. In fact, bruising the bone was exactly what he needed if he was to raise his [Bone Strengthening] Skill.

  He followed up with a telegraphed swipe of his new maul, making sure to growl and act intimidating. When Warnel’s wife dodged back and successfully timed the step-in to take advantage of the large maul’s long swing, Toren activated [Flurry of Blows] to immediately reverse the war hammer, exactly glancing the eye-slit of her helmet.

  Emina fell back with a yelp that made Warnel grip his sword tighter between the training swings he was doing on his own.

  It was mean, but Ability activations could often surprise novices and cause them to panic. Better to let them experience that in training than be surprised and killed during real combat.

  Toren dismissed the notifications. The [Club] increase was very welcome. He had been hopeful that the drastic change in weapon would give him the push needed to improve the Skill, but more than that, [Combat Awareness] used together with [Mana Sensing] changed everything, allowing him to readily find remaining flaws in his techniques, and using the awareness Skills while teaching the Hatterwicks was helping him define to himself the parts of his technique that were foundational.

  “Your timing was correct, but experienced fighters will often use Abilities to cover openings and when caught off-guard. Getting an instinctive feel for the moment of Ability activation is important,” Toren advised Emina. Of course, that was easier said than done. Especially for Professions that didn’t use [Mana Sensing]. At the least, she would learn to feint at openings to draw a premature Ability activation.

  Getting her breathing under control, Emina nodded and rose from the ground to return to a ready stance and try again. “I’m fine. Toren, let’s try again.”

  Toren slammed the butt of his maul into the dirt and took an imposing stance. “Alright, Emina, come at me. Don’t forget to use the edge of your pan as well as the flat.”

  Emina’s words had been more for Warnel’s benefit. The man was understandably unenthusiastic about having to stand by as an armored wall of muscle with a maul roughed up his wife—especially after the abduction and what followed and how powerless he had been to do anything about it.

  To his credit, Warnel had committed to gaining the strength needed to protect his family and had taken the [Sword] Skill when they went into town. Toward that end, Toren currently had him practicing his swings and distance perception by repeatedly cutting at the same leaf of a nearby shade tree from different angles. The exercise would, with luck, help Warnel repurpose his [Exacting Measurements] Ability to knowing the range for his sword swings.

  The hatter wasn’t as helpless as expected either, having both the [Sure Cut] Ability and the [Knifework] Profession Skill. The trick was getting his combat-useful [Haberdasher] Abilities and Profession Skills to synergize with the newly added [Sword] Skill. Though [Sure Cut] and [Knifework] weren’t combat focused, like they had seen with Laiya’s success, creative thinking about how and what the hatter wanted to cut allowed application toward combat purposes.

  That, and just teaching him the basics of combat.

  Toren’s own [Berserker Knife Arts], for example, didn’t provide knowledge for proper sword technique, but footwork and distance were universal enough to see the man visibly improving as he worked through the exercises and sparring. With sufficient dedication and experience, he was already looking to become adequately capable for a non-combatant Profession. If Warnel could unlock [Combat Awareness] for his next trip to Farharbor’s Celestial Mirror of Truth, all the better.

  Continuing Falma’s bow training was easier than her father’s situation. With her no longer straining to draw the bow, Toren only needed to give the girl occasional pointers while she practiced, then have her run the orchard to build Constitution, Agility, and lower-body Strength. Knife or club training would come later.

  With Falma, he wanted her to build her Attributes and unlock [Physical Conditioning], which was one of several Skills known to increase the rate of related Attribute increases, [Meditation] being a similar one for mental Attributes. As a Professionless, she couldn’t gain levels and Attribute Upgrade Points from XP, so they would have to focus on improving her Skills and natural Attribute growth to get her strong enough to fight. That it would improve her future Profession-quality was a further bonus.

  For Laiya, he started with club basics together with her mother before teaching her some tactics to practice and having her return to her spear forms. Later, he had the Hatterwicks come against him together in team sparring to improve their coordination and to raise the difficulty for himself.

  As for his own training and Skill improvements, he also had a plan.

  At the start of the day, Toren had wanted to take Laiya with him and immediately set about tracking down the zoot den but was feeling uneasy about leaving the Hatterwicks to defend themselves while he hunted. After talking with the ranch-hand that had come by to return Fancy and the wagon to Blue Raptor Ranch, he decided to spend the rest of the day training the Hatterwicks, and he was glad to have made the choice.

  When asked about the high-tide, the ranch-hand confirmed that the high roads would swarm with the land-based creatures of the jungle, forcing them into attacking every stead to escape the opportunistic tier-2 predators on both land and in the water. He further recommended that they clear out as many beasts from around the property as they could before the flooding started.

  Toren had been thinking the same. But with the severity of the threat, they would all need to be able to contribute. He couldn’t hog the XP and fighting experience for just himself and Laiya. They would all need turns participating in the cullings.

  Overall, Toren was growing cautiously optimistic at their chances. Not only were the Hatterwicks rapidly improving. The choice of [Flurry of Blows] was proving itself just as strong as he imagined.

  First thing that morning, he had felled a good-sized tree with his new maul using [Wilderness Harvesting] and [Flurry of Blows]. Toren was sure it wasn’t a perfect comparison to fighting a tier-2 beast, but the tree’s mana-reinforced trunk hadn’t stood a chance from the sudden assault of wood-splintering blows. He may have even underestimated the power of strikes that were weightless while swinging then full weight at the moment of impact.

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  Feeling each impact rattle and numb his arms was still rough, and it was only thanks to [Bone Strengthening] and [Burning Blood]’s healing that he was able to push [Flurry of Blows] as far as he already was.

  Now he was using [Flurry of Blows] to precisely control where and with how much force he struck the Hatterwicks with, and after unleashing a series of strikes to send the father and daughter pair flying roughly to the ground, a series of notices appeared.

  Toren grinned under his helmet. He suspected reaching Skill level 10 was what had allowed [Knife] to evolve to [Berserker Knife Arts], but now he’d confirmed it. If he could do the same with [Spear], then there was a good chance the three Skills would merge into a general weapon Skill—which would extend it to swords, and his enchanted sword in particular. It would also allow him to properly teach Warnel.

  Yes.

  Toren winced as new knowledge was carved into his mind.

  A break was called for lunch, and Toren had the family review what they each learned while Emina prepared the meal. The constant improvements they were all seeing were no doubt thanks to the increased potential granted from their recent XP gains and the increased mana density in their diets. The mana density was one of the benefits that drew people to tier-2 regions even with the increased danger.

  Tier-1 regions were safer, but the wealthy and powerful hoarded the ley-line nexuses and places of high mana density, leaving the common people to struggle to advance. Toren had read about cities with giant mana gathering arrays similar to the inscriptions on mana coins, increasing the density for all within the city, but fierce debate was constant over whether such methods further impoverished the surrounding lands.

  The capability to passively gather and store mana was what made mana coins so valuable—not the gold and gems or crystallized ent blood they were usually made from. If owning even one effectively doubled the mana a person could use in a day, what would that mean for the person’s growth or productivity? Here in a tier-2 jungle their value was effectively doubled. Warnel had been smart to receive his enlistment bonus in mana coins—if not for the Conclave goons and getting robbed.

  They still put the Hatterwicks' remaining mana coins to use to replenish everyone’s mana reserves as needed for continuing the day’s training.

  The Hatterwicks held out as long as they could, but it was long after everyone else had retired and Horevi was approaching the horizon when, covered in rivers of sweat, Toren recieved the notice he'd been pushing his limits for, and an exhausted cry triumph broke free from his throat.

  Yes!

  Burning Phoenix in the Sky! He’d done it!

  Hells yes!

  ~~~

  Name: Toren of Theravos

  Race: Human

  Age: 20

  Profession 1: Level 5 Burningblood Berserker (4500/10000)

  Mana: 72/72

  Strength: 16

  Constitution: 13

  Dexterity: 14

  Agility: 12

  Wisdom: 12

  Intellect: 8

  Will Power: 18

  Perception 15

  Appearance: 8

  Charisma: 8

  Luck: 10

  Attribute Upgrade Points: 4

  Traits:

  Sacrificial Guardian

  Abilities:

  Burning Blood (Rank 1) Proficiency: Mid

  Control Blood (Rank 1) Proficiency: Low

  Flurry of Blows (Rank 1) Proficiency: Low

  Ability Upgrade Points: 4

  Profession Skills:

  Severe Wound Recovery 5

  Focus Rage 3

  Combat Awareness 3 → 5

  Berserker Weapon Arts 1

  Pain Tolerance 5

  Physical Conditioning 5

  Intimidate 3

  Skills:

  Danger Sensing 3

  Stealth 18

  Mana Sensing 14

  Wilderness Harvesting 12

  Theravos Language 11

  Religion 10

  Meditation 5

  Bone Strengthening 3

  Divided Focus 1 → 2

  Hunting 20

  Archery 19

  Running 12

  Wound Binding 8

  Arithmetic 4

  here, and .