"Haah… Haah…" I dragged my feet behind me as I finally arrived in the garden. The young men and women were waiting while taking a sip of water to quench their thirst and cure their parched throats.
Garp turned around and grinned at my sorry state, "Time for next training."
"Let me guess… Running?" My feet were already killing me, and another lap could be considered torture.
However, Garp shook his head and pointed at a black-haired young man who stood up after getting the signal.
"You will spar against Dante. If you can land one hit on him, you can rest for a day."
"Wha, that's easy!" I cheered and dropped the heavy bag. I moved my limbs around, trying to get a feeling of them again.
Garp smiled and didn't say a word. He took two wooden swords and threw them at Dante and Liam.
Dante slowly spun the sword around, concentration filling his face. He was a handsome youth with athletic built and confident-looking eyes.
There was no hesitation or fear in his features. Instead, pure calmness and sharp accuracy.
After taking the sword into my hands, I remembered the Marine Swordsmanship. Images flashed in my mind, and my body slowly began reacting.
I raised the wooden sword above my head and opened my eyes. In front of me, Dante was slowly approaching with the sword tip pointing down.
Garp and the rest of the apprentices watched the scene with great interest. They knew that Liam lacked a lot of stamina and physical strength. However, they didn't know about his fighting prowess.
Garp only heard that Liam had killed some low-level pirate, who honestly shouldn't have been in New World in the first place. Sometimes, there are pirate crews that were born in New World and never had to travel through Grand Line to experience the hardships.
"Dante, right?" My words didn't really seem to affect my opponent. Dante didn't even flinch and was utterly concentrated on the spar.
There was a slight twitch around my eyebrow, and I decided to concentrate on the fight. The grip on the hilt tightened, and I was getting ready to slash down.
After Dante took another slow step, I attacked by slashing the wooden sword down. The attack seemed swift and accurate.
I used the downward slash technique that I learned from the second book.
There was a feeling of victoriousness rising inside me after seeing that Dante had no intention of dodging.
However, when the wooden sword was about to hit its target, Dante made his move and casually flicked his wrist, which moved his sword in an upward motion that deflected my wooden blade away.
A sharp pain assaulted my wrist, and the sword was flung backward with great momentum. I gritted my teeth and tried to pull the sword back, but Dante's simple defensive move possessed incredible power!
Dante took a long leap forward and slashed the sword down.
Smack!
The sword was slammed into Liam's shoulder and caused his grip on his sword to disappear. He couldn't do anything except helplessly watch as his wooden sword fell to the ground with Dante's sword resting on his neck.
The young men and women shook their heads and returned indoors.
Garp grabbed the fallen sword and nodded at Dante, who bowed politely, and stepped back.
"You lost." His words entered my ears, and I finally realized that I had lost. The fight most likely didn't even last five seconds, and even that would be a high estimation.
"Sigh… What is my punishment?" I uttered the words through my tightly-closed lips.
Garp smiled and grabbed Dante's heavy-looking bag before tossing it over to me. I caught it, and it dropped instantly to the ground.
My eyes shook as I looked at the bag that felt over dozen times heavier than mine.
"Run another lap, but this time, you need to carry Dante's bag." Garp's voice told me my worst fears. Soon, he left with Dante, who gave a sorry smile while leaving.
I looked at the bag in front of me that was causing the ground to cave in. How in the world should I carry it?
I tried to pick it up, but it didn't even flinch.
"AAARGGHHHHH!" Liam's muscles bulged, and vessels protruded. He rooted his feet to the ground and tried to pick the bag up. But, it was impossible!
Then, he tried another method. He wrapped the straps around his forearm and began dragging it instead!
Slowly, the bag began moving while leaving a destroyed ground behind. I didn't have another choice other than dragging it.
A trail of blood dripped down from the corner of my tightly-closed lips.
After half an hour, I finally dragged the bag out of the building and reached the streets. The nearby citizens looked at what I was doing and understood after seeing where I came from.
They gossiped amid laughter. The middle-aged women understood that Marine Hero Garp had another recruit and seemed to be quite of a troublemaker.
Liam himself didn't know it. But, the reason why Garp was training him so hard was so that he could catch up with other recruits and so that his troublemaker personality would get quenched before he got into trouble with higher-ups.
"Come on…" The bag was slowly moving, but it would take an entire day for me to finish the lap. However, that wasn't the thing on my mind right now. Instead, it was the endless thirst and pain.
After hours and hours of dragging, the sky had gone pitch black, and the only light that came was from the square-shaped windows of the nearby building and street lamps.
Then, a disheveled-looking man reached a cabin-like building with his palms covered in blood and straps of the bag stained in dried-up blood.
Liam took another step and finally reached the garden. However, he didn't stop holding the bag's straps, and it looked like his hands were glued to them.
Then, Garp came from the indoors and saw the scene. He saw the scratching marks on the floor and smiled slightly.
He removed Liam's hands from the bag and saw his hazy eyes. He was staggering from side to side and looked like he was unconscious.
Garp effortlessly pulled the bag up and tossed it toward the storage room. Then, he said.
"You can rest now."