"I hope you enjoy the cold, as it is still summer and soon this place will be much colder." Mary spoke.
I was wearing some heavy clothes prepared for the harsh climate of the icy mountains, but I never felt any cold. Isolating myself from the surrounding environment was the first thing I learned to do using my shell.
"Don't worry about me." I answered.
Despite the location being such an isolated place, there were dozens of servants and guards everywhere. All guards wore armor with the crest of the house.
Our access is still very limited to the castle, so after being left at his door, we were guided directly to the rooms that were prepared for us. Once inside, they locked the door from the outside leaving us waiting.
The place was much less friendly than I expected, we were left as prisoners with access to only a small part of the castle where there was nobody but us.
'I didn't expect an excursion, but this is too much.'
Since there was nothing to do, I decided to train my body physically with push-ups.
After a while, I take off my shirt to look for improvements, but the conclusion is the same as before.
'If I want to advance in my physical abilities, then I need to continue my training just like the old man taught me.'
I was still a skinny boy with a body just a bit defined by the daily workouts of the last four years.
After looking myself a little in a mirror positioned in my room. I notice that my scar, Hanzor had grown and a name was below it now.
*Hanzor: The ability to see true darkness at all times, if a creature of darkness is overwhelmed by the summoner, she becomes part of the summoner. Abyss creatures can also come to your aid if enough tribute is provided to them. Any creature summoned needs elementary particles according to its capacity to be able to stay in that dimension.
* Cerberus *
'It looks interesting, I can't wait to test it.'
'If these scars are going to keep growing constantly on my body then I at least need to give it a name, I think from now on I will call them Body Runes.'
If there's a word that would define Gremory at that moment, "cute" wouldn't be. The marks had a grotesque appearance to him since they looked like battle scars, especially with the cut on his face made by the goblin.
---
Night came, and we were still trapped inside the rooms separated by the wall, not even food or water was brought to us. It went on until the next morning when an old man knocked on the door.
"Wake up your shit bags. Today begins the first day of the rest of your life. My name is Vendryt Burlaf, but you can call me your worst nightmare." He spoke while unlocking the bedroom doors.
Everyone got up in the same clothes as the day before.
"It's a hono..." Xander tried to speak but was quickly interrupted by Vendryt.
"I didn't permit you to speak. It seems that I got stuck with the task of teaching little brats them, so from today on forward I will be your teacher."
He started walking, and we followed him to the back of the castle.
All the way we didn't find anyone but the teacher and some guards, but as soon as we got there we could see above that the castle was very busy.
The place where we were, was completely open with an extremely large and round platform that was in the middle of the precipice with only a small bridge connecting it.
The whole platform looked like a big rune due to the massive designs on it.
Although the time I spent in the castle gave me the impression of being an abandoned place, just by looking up I could see how wrong I was. On a balcony at the top of the castle, there were at that moment several people watching us, the same eyes that I felt during the party.
'Now I understand why they are always nervous, it must be difficult to grow up in such an environment.'
"Get ready, your training starts now" Vendryt spoke while pointing to bridge
"Wait, we haven't eaten since yesterday." Luther spoke.
"Do you want to eat? So deserve to be fed first. Your job is simple, defend the totem in the middle of the platform for 10 minutes, and then you can have breakfast fat boy." The teacher spoke while pointing to a wooden totem.
"And don't worry about your wounds here either, this platform was created a long time ago by the founder and is imbued with one of his restoration runes, as long as the platform is energized you can even die in there that in the end will be brought back to normal. As long as you don't fall over the precipice, good luck!"
Yuno, Mary, and Kiel looked concerned but Xander and Luther took the lead, and we followed.
The bridge was raised as soon as we passed it, and Vendryt started to energize the platform from a distance using his elemental magic.
"Hey, I have to make you a request." Xander says to me.
"Go ahead" I answered.
"As you can see, they are watching us up there, and you have already been defined as a member of the family. So if possible I would like you to hold on for a little bit at least here."
'If I do that they will owe me for the simple fact that I stand still. I wish everything was so easy.'
"I can do this, but I will intervene to defend the totem if I feel it necessary"
"Fair enough, thank you."
We got to the wooden totem and waited in guard position.
The first minute passed and nothing happened, but when the second minute was about to end we started to hear noises coming from the precipice.
Until they appeared from all directions. We could see several ice golems that were climbing and now went up on the platform.
'Golems again? Are mages limited to these creatures without a brain?'
'Not that mine has one, but still...'
As soon as they started to approach, the freezing atmosphere became even more freezing and even I had to reinforce my shell to protect myself from the cold.
"Shit, I can't make fire here." Yuno spoke desperately.