The journey was a lot less exciting for the girl, she was scared of her situation, but found safety in a mysterious stranger with a kind look. He was a bit strange, asking about some very obvious things that he had apparently forgotten or confused with other things. 'Either way, his hair is prominent in the very north, so he must've come from there, so he probably is a supporter of mine.'
Her thoughts were separated from reality, but they did hold some truth. In the very far north of where they were, people had a natural blond hair color and they were mostly supportive of the woman. But if Lucas came from there or not is something entirely different.
The girl was always cooped up in her room and could only read about history or fairy tales, so she didn't have the best social skills or awareness. Things that you couldn't say or should avoid seemed obvious to Lucas, but strange to her. Nevertheless, she was someone of high standing, so etiquette and formal behavior were part of her personality. The problem was that she was easily manipulated.
During their journey they had to walk from the little outskirt village to a city, this would've taken Lucas about a month if he would consistently train. But the girl didn't have the best stamina, she was weak when it came to physical prowess. After barely a day of walking she was covered in sweat and completely exhausted. Lucas looked back at her, seeing her state, he decided to leave it at that. "Alright, let's rest for a moment."
The princess couldn't answer as she was panting heavily, she took a jug of water out of the ring and started to drink at a pretty fast pace. 'There goes half of our water supply, great.'
'We don't have a water supply as long as we have magic, so stop griping.'
After she had gained some of her stamina back she was starting to get sleepy, the exercise proved too much for her. "How are you not even tired?", she was curious about how this stranger had a surprisingly good condition.
"Training and determination, so what if your legs hurt, so what if your body is in pain of walking, just keep going.", Lucas' explanation wasn't satisfying or useful, she was hoping Lucas had a speical spell or a secret for having a better condition, but he proved the opposite.
"Pure determination?", she was hung up on that statement, like it had some special meaning, but Lucas obviously couldn't look into her head to see what she was thinking about.
Lucas wasn't too bothered with her, his training had to continue, they had only been walking for a day, but at a much slower pace than normal, so Lucas had the time to almost form another rune on his core. Every bit of progress filled him with a special kind of happiness, he couldn't put his finger on it, but it felt good. His willpower or mental training had been put on hold ever since the princess was with him. He didn't mind forcing his body to improve, but he couldn't let his mind become fuzzy when there could be some people chasing after them. What he did notice was that the completion of runes started to become a lot slower, even with the same amount of work, he barely got anywhere.
Night came and the princess fell asleep like a concrete block, nothing could probably wake her up. While she was in dreamland, Lucas decided to continue his training, he picked another book from his backpack. He had already read all of the books he had gotten from Venion's secret room, but he simply didn't understand everything about it. There were certain things he couldn't wrap his head around, the book about magic principles helped him in a lot of different ways, but there were still things he needed to figure out himself. One of those things was the book about Fire Intensification.
Through the absorption of magical energy from a certain element, you could intensify their power. This seemed like a very useful power, but he didn't have any magical source so his study ended there. There were other ways to increase the power of intensification, but it wasn't obvious to Lucas. He would need to use energy from the core charged with the fire element and let it take a certain route through the body's meridians before letting it return to the core. The meridians were something he didn't understand, he could charge energy with a certain element, sure, though it would hurt immensely if let loose. Yet the path was something he didn't know.
The night was long, and Lucas was tempted to continue his mental training as well, but for his own safety, he only used willpower training to sense his surroundings. This wouldn't deplete it too much while he could still train. Circulating his core was standard, he almost never stopped doing it, causing constant pain in his center, but Lucas didn't mind the pain. He could see himself improving and that was what's important, the joy he felt when the rune was starting to form on his core was enormous.
'Even with the most simple of training, you could become a lot stronger.'
'Yes, but at the speed we're going now, we would need a week to form the next rune.'
The rune wasn't finished and it would probably take another day of constant training before he could completely finish the rune, but that didn't bother Lucas. The sun started to come up, so Lucas had spent another night awake, not that it mattered to him, but someone else did. The princess woke up to see Lucas training, he was doing some pushups and other athletic exercises. This while he was also circulating his core and using his willpower to train his senses. He was overloading his body in a lot of different ways, but it held strong. The girl woke up yawning before wondering how long she was asleep. "How long have you been awake?"
Lucas didn't interrupt his training, simply answering between pushups, "I didn't sleep.", her eyes widened. "What? You didn't sleep, you know that the body needs sleep right? How could you not sleep?"
'I guess we shouldn't tell her that we've been awake for more than a month while enduring experiments.'
"Someone had to protect you while you slept, if we both went to sleep then we would've been easy prey.", she grew sad from that statement, "I, I'm sorry, I'll stand guard for the next night."
"Don't worry about it, we can take turns or I'll do it alone, I don't mind."
"Still, I want to apologize."
After another few backs and forth, Lucas started to move again.
He started to gain some respect for her, she was obviously privileged in her normal life and had everything she wanted at her fingertips. She was pretty on top of that, making her life seem like a dream for many girls. But during the journey to Avesta, she had shown weakness after weakness. Her obliviousness to a lot of things and her stamina was horrendous, yet she didn't give up. Even Lucas had to praise her in his mind for her achievements, no matter how small.
They walked the entire day, and while Lucas didn't even feel tired at all, she was drenched in her own sweat but didn't complain about it.
'I definitely thought she would've started to complain about now, or ask me to carry her.', but every time he looked back he could see the exhausted princess push herself further.
'I guess she's starting to become a bit more determined.'
Out of respect for her drive, Lucas allowed a few resting moments for her, Lucas could also focus on his training during those moments so he didn't mind it as much.