"So this is the house you prepared?" Alice said in a criticizing tone… of course, no matter what, someone who all her life lived in a castle my two story home could only look humble at best.
"We are here to train… the house doesn't matter. if you guys weren't here, I would have just slept in the open…." there wasn't any wild beasts here after all, I could even walk around in the nude!
"Yes Master, thank you for preparing for our conveniences…" Systy was much more satisfied with the settings… contrasting to how Alice looked, Systy was more like a goddess.
"Hmph! I guess this also comes in a training menu!" Alice still gave me a hard time because she was used to luxury but she will be wrong if she thinks she will just train and fight in here, No! She will take care of herself, even do the housework… all the work will be distributed among us evenly. So we will get the same rest and leisure time and also the same amount of time for training…
As we selected our individual Rooms, I explained the rules and the work schedules for everyone.
"What do you mean? I am not going to do commoner work!`` It was Alice's haughty remark. it seems, changing oneself really wasn't that easy, even though she had told me how she couldn't be haughty if I acted humble even after I was stronger than her.
"Master I can do those chores, handling 2 people isn't a big deal for me…." Systy was being as understanding as she always was, but no, I will not accept this!
"Alice, whether you like it or not, you will have to do the work! Training means leaving all your luxury behind! And Systy, you will not do any of our work got it…..? Believe me, if by working for us you lag behind in training, you will regret it!" My forceful remark got them stunned for a moment but they had to be serious about this. I knew they were still little girls. I mean Alice couldn't be over 13 years old and Systy herself might be a lot more intelligent for her age but she was still 14 years old. I had to be the one in charge or they wouldn't be able to use these 3 years to the utmost….
"Do you understand me?" I said looking at them. Looking serious, it seemed that even being the young one, they held my words higher, as the one who was the head of this group.
"Hmph! I can't cook so I will not do that!" Alice retorted still looking a bit annoyed but it seems that she got my point, although I don't know why she blushed while answering me? Systy nodded to it too. seems that both of them had taken my word seriously..
"Alright everyone, make yourselves settle in first. for today, we will not do any training. you can do any exercises you want all by yourselves…. And Alice, it's okay if you can't do something, but don't worry, you can be our helper for cooking until you get the hang of it." Alice seemed to get irritated but didn't voice any arguments. As such, I went outside to get a feel of this place…
Hmm, It seems that space here really is infinite…. And I can feel the wind on me but I wonder where the sun rays are coming from?
{Answer: this space has been copied from the real world… The Scenery can be altered to the Edge of the world too if Master desires..}
Well I guess we can call it a living breathing Illusion.
{Answer: Affirmative}
Just when I was thinking maybe I should check out the inside of the house too, Alice and Systy both came out of the house… they were surprised by the clear grass plain all around us and the gentle wind that was tickling the skin… Even the air seemed fresh to breathe. a sound of a river flowing from some distance away could be heard and the sky was all blue. Although the sun couldn't be seen. It was light. which meant it was day time now.. For some odd reason, space could only copy the atmosphere on the planet, so everything else out of it did not exist in this space, not even an illusion….. So we could say that there was an illusion of sun rays but no sun could be found.
"Wow, this looks just like the Real World!" Systy looked like she enjoyed the whole place. Being an adventurer… She looked excited by finding this place entirely.
"I guess, I will have to admit that building is your specialty." I think Alice gave me a complement.
"Okay then, hear me out. see that small building? That's where the gate is. we can get out from there, so let's call this Area; 0-point zone. Now, since this is a limitless space, you can go as much distance from here as you want, but remember, if you lose the 0-point from your view and can't think where it is, it will be near to impossible to get out of this space…. So keep that in mind and don't stray too far away…. Although I could feel you guys where you are, but if you get too far away, I won't be able to find you."
"So you saying we have to keep ourselves close or we'll get stranded?" Alice asked and I shivered a bit at the word Stranded… I mean I did have to live for many years while stranded. It was kind of like my most unlucky word right now.
"Yeah… so don't…. Leave too far away…."
"Haaah! Is that your weakness?" Alice asked in a sarcastic tone because I had given a weak reply….
"Alice don't treat Rekka like that, any one will be the same after getting lost since their birth!" At Systy's rather forceful words, Alice seemed a bit apologetic.. But I think the way Systy just talked to us was different, she was casually talking to us. Well it's better this way.
I went around the house and fixed our water line from the river, since the water current was good, it didn't need much work… After fixing some more loose ends like many things in the kitchen and my room, I went out holding Amanori. I was going to check out my limit, since I will be training from tomorrow. I needed to see where I stood right now…
"Say Amanori?"
[Yeah?]
"What do you think I am capable of right now?"
[Well you can handle Miasma... so I think you're developing well.]
I was releasing Miasma. This was Amanori's power, as I enveloped myself in this power, I felt pain coursing through my body but my strength had increased too. just like spirit energy enhancement, Miasma can also do the same, but this pain that enveloped both my body and mind takes a lot out of me.
"It hurts…. Like my body is being ripped apart…"
[That's what is supposed to happen but look at yourself, the aura, the sheer fighting power you give off, isn't it unreal?]
It was true. This overwhelms even the time I could exert 300% of my power… the spirit energy enhancement only brought out the upper limit of the strength my body could produce. It only meant that I was already capable of using that much strength but this power… it rejected the upper limit and pushed the body to the point of destruction. Removing all limiters of the body. To think I only touched the surface… I can't even fathom what half of the power Amanori has would do.
"That it is but ooh man I can feel the curse too…" It was only a few seconds, but I was already on my knees… Amanori's curse wears the users life down by constantly eating life force and attacking the wielders soul.
System: how much power have I been able to pull..?
{Answer: Approximately 10%. Body is stable, master's body can recover faster than the destruction and the mental condition is under control. Master can continue to use this power at the current rate.}
so even though I felt weak after turning it off... it didn't pose a lasting effect... it seems unlike in the Edge of the world, my resilience has increased quite a bit. but still, my limits are only 10 percent huh? As I thought, I am still unable to draw out that power….
[Let me just give it to you…]
What Amanori meant was she would drop that power on me. But it would be life threatening for me, since she can't navigate the power outage, it would be like suddenly falling thunder. In my way, I was drawing out the power from her so the navigation was all under my control…
"Are you trying to kill me Again?! You know what happened before, right? I just died." Hearing me Amanori made a mischievous smile. I could feel it in my head, she was making fun of this situation..
"Well, I have three years on hand. hopefully I could at least draw half of your power and use it…"
As I stopped pulling power from Amanori, I felt my body get sluggish..
{Notice: Master's body has accepted the Miasma. After further use the body would develop and this ailment would cease.}
I get it! It was like your first day at the gym. You will feel sore until you get used to it and soon the soreness will cease…
"Hey what were you doing?" I was thinking to myself, and since my body was slumped over, I was lying face down on the grass when Alice and Systy came.
"What's up? I thought you were doing your own things?"
"Yeah up until I felt that chill from this place, was that you?" ooh Alice must have felt Amanori's power.
"Yeah that was me. I was getting the feel of what I wanted to do these 3 years…."
"Master, what kind of power was it? you look super exhausted." Systy said, peeking from beside Alice.
"Hmm, weren't you Calling me by my name? What happened?"
"Err.. I .. uhh it kind of feels embarrassing!" Systy shyly said hiding her face with her hands.
"Hmm I see, well it can't be helped. Call me whatever you're comfortable with."
"Yes!" well Systy looked easily pleased.
"Feel this nice weather you guys. Because from tomorrow, this will be a living hell." I said drifting the conversation to our training.
"Ehh Why?" Alice asked as if what could happen….
As such it was tomorrow, I mean it was now the start of our training. Last night we all had a good night's rest and today we woke up to a hot boiling hell… it looked barren all over the place. It was hot, the air felt musky when you would take a breath, it felt like molten lava.. Just kidding! The thing is the air also feels gross anyway. This scene that I am calling the living hell is the illusion of the Edge of the world. What more hell can there be in this world?
"This is the place I grew up in. since you guys wanted hell, I give you hell…. Now get started to train, at first I'll see what you are bad at, think about the stuff you wanna improve on, then see why you can't improve in that department, okay? push your body to the limits, if you fall because of exhaustion, stay down and get up when you recover, simple isn't it?!"
As I gave my speech at the start of our training, Alice and Systy could be seen shocked. Still it didn't last long and soon it turned into a serious expression. They were here to get stronger and every difficulty I would throw to them, they had been resolute to surpass them.
It was too early to make a specialized training menu for them after all. At first I have to see what they are lacking the most.
So from morning we all started training. I used Amanori's miasma continuously to try and get used to it. until now I had been using Miasma outside myself which meant although I controlled it, my body had not been under its negative effects, but that was an immature way of using miasma. it could only do so much, so that's why it won't work against stronger monsters or high level fighters. As such I needed to use the Miasma internally. From now on, it could increase my power instantly, even my body's defense was greatly increased in this form. even if I took Alice's strongest explosion spell at point blank range, it would only leave a few scratches… and Miasma was anti magic material, a defense that practically nullified magic, I would have to only watch out for physical attack if I master using Miasma.
As I started on my training, Alice used her explosion spells to the point her mana depleted to nearly exhausted, then she started to do hand to hand combat. She also had strong physical capabilities and her body was also capable of taking heavy hits, so the only thing she needed was to increase her stamina and battle instincts, which was already incredible. The only thing stopping her growth was her small battle experience. but as she would fight with others, this would soon vanish too. She even used the breathing techniques that I had taught her. of course these are just the basics, once her body starts to develop from all this training, her explosions would automatically level up making her base strength double by the end of it.
I couldn't believe that in a few weeks she was able to get to a point where she could use the technique in training. In my 2nd world, people needed to get at least a year's worth of training to learn that technique. That too would only let them be able to use the technique for a few minutes at a time. Man being a prodigy was nothing to scoff at.
Now, Systy had much more training to do. She had to increase her Mana. She was already good at water magic; she could even use ice magic. It could be said completely opposite of Alice who used explosions of fire to attack and even defend. But unlike Alice, Systy didn't have that much strong physical capabilities. It was incomparable to any civilian of course, but it still was nothing to the overwhelming strength I had or the heavy hit that Alice could sustain, so although Systy had more adventure experience than the 2 of us, she was lacking in raw power, stamina and mana.
So for now the only way I had thought to increase those was to push herself to the limits with specific training. The body would always develop from putting pressure on it, that's just how cells become stronger. Leaving the worldly problems behind, once you get into this training, I am sure you can improve so much more.
As this training continues, I even used gravity magic to make myself heavy. I first added 10 fold to myself, it slowed me considerably. Even Alice asked me to do the same to her, so I accepted her request then made her 10 folds heavier. The thing that happened was she got splat to the ground.
"Sorry I guess it was too much," I said and tried to remove the weight.
"NO! I can get used to this!" Her stubbornness knows no bounds…. if she just used mana then she could move a bit more easily, but since I wasn't using anyhting to enhance my strength, she was also doing that.
...
It had been only a week since we had started training and since then, I saw that Alice was the one most exerting herself. I didn't know what made her push herself so much but I was getting worried… If I told her to slow down a little, as unruly as she was, she would definitely shrug off my advice.
"Alice, we have a lot of time. If you injure yourself by pushing too much, that time will be wasted while you recover." Systy gave such advice and it was a miracle! I saw that Alice nodded.
"Alright Make it half…" just as she said, I decreased the pressure to 5 folds. Alice still looked like she couldn't move a muscle but soon she started moving, albeit slowly, but it was better than when she was splat on the ground.
I never thought Alice would listen to anyone but my Grandparents… well it is good that they are getting along…
[They do have a common ground.]
Hmm what's that?
[You see they both want to get strong like you.]
Hmm well that is true.
After that even Systy took 2 fold of pressure on her, as such our training continued. Sometimes we fought and sparred with each other. After months had passed, it was like we were getting used to the constant training and fighting exhausting ourselves. even the weather on the edge of the world was nothing. We just got used to it too. so I took it up a notch. I used Illusion to create harsher weather like the north pole on earth where everything was cold to the freezing point, then I made a fire hell where it was like where we were walking on the fire itself. I even regretted making these illusions because it felt like I was punishing myself for nothing, but on the other side the girls were holding on like it was nothing to them.
I always knew that girls would endure more than men but this is just unbelievable….