"That reminds me, I recently hired a new military strategist for the Duchy. Because we are not currently at war, he will work as the leader of the Duchy's mages. I'm going to introduce him to you later today at the training grounds. I wanted to let you know, so you can act like you still have your memories."
"Ok, I'll try my best. What happened to the old military strategist?"
James scratched his head, "the Duchy has not had a military strategist during your rein. It was because you didn't like to be told what to do and would rather teleport around the battlefield however you saw fit. Since you lost your memories and probably will need some help if we have to fight against an enemy, I decided to bring in someone to help. His name is Tyler Vega. He is the son of a Viscount family that is known for having strong strategists."
"I will definitely need someone who knows more than me on the battlefield in a time of crisis. Good job thinking about it before it would be too late."
"Thank you my Lord."
"Ok, that's everything I needed to let you know. I'm going to go back and see if Becca is awake to start training."
"Ok, I will bring Tyler over to greet you later."
When I returned to my bedroom, Becca was already awake and putting on her training gear. I put one arm over her shoulder and gave her a quick hug.
"Good morning, Becca."
She looked up at me from her seat.
"Good morning. Where have you been?"
"Even with your best effort, I naturally woke up earlier than you, so I stopped by to see James and let him know that we are going to visit your parents in a few days and also about the change in the law we talked about yesterday."
Becca nodded in understanding. "That makes sense. Good job staying on top of everything."
I smiled at the compliment. "We are definitely multitasking a lot of things at once, so it's important to deal with things as soon as possible or we might end up forgetting and leaving things undone."
"I'll start taking some notes to keep our priorities straight. Have you had breakfast yet? I had them leave a plate of food for you.
"No, I haven't eaten anything yet. Thanks for thinking of me."
I quickly ate my food in 10 minutes and we were ready to head out for our training. I only brought two stamina potions because I didn't want Becca to overwork herself. We would train until exhaustion and then drank our stamina potions and go about the rest of our day.
Today, Becca was working on her ice skating ability. Any slip during a real battle could mean defeat, so she needed to be able to ice skate like it was second nature. She also worked on trying to add height to her ice while skating so that she could increase her speed with ramps and be harder to hit.
Since we weren't working together, I practiced my aim of my basic spell. I wanted to be as accurate as Becca, so I could use my basic attack with no control when attacking a none moving object at any distance.
After an hour of training, I could see James approaching with two people behind him.
They both had light blonde hair and dark blue eyes.
I called to Becca to get her attention, "Hey Becca, they are coming, stop practicing for a second and come over."
James waved his hand to the man standing next to him and announced, "Hello, my Lord. This is Tyler Vega.
I held my hand out for him to shake. "Hello Tyler. James told me he was going to bring someone to be the new military strategist, but I was expecting someone older. You look to be the same age as me."
Tyler took my hand and shook it vigorously. "First of all Duke Harrison, I am a big fan of yours. To be so young and already be the captain of the Royal mages is a testament to your unparalleled talent! I hope to work under you and reach the same heights as you at a young age.
I am 23 years old myself and just graduated from the academy. My father is the best military strategist out there, but he has already been working as the main strategist for the King for decades now. I hope to surpass him as I work under you! If you are worried about my skill level, I can spar with you to show my skills! I am a high level intermediate plant mage!"
Tyler seemed like a positive and upbeat person, but something he said irked me.
"Your ability to spar has nothing to do with your ability to be a good military strategist."
Tyler smiled back at me thinking that I misunderstood him. "Duke Harrison, what I meant to say was that when you have a spar with me, I can show off how I strategically place my mana sucking plants in a way that can overwhelm the opponent. People think they are managing it well before I pull a trick up my sleeve and they get overran before they know what hit them! It's a style I personally created for myself. I'm sure it will be enough to give me passing marks."
Is he a little dense?
"No Tyler, you are misunderstanding me. I don't care about your fighting ability at all. A military strategist does not need any fighting ability. They could technically have no magic at all. They just need to be able to tell other powerful mages what they should do to help us win battles. I would be impressed if you could teach your unprecedented intermediate plant magic fighting style to other intermediate plant mages and use them to make winning a large scale battle much easier. However, that is not something we can test out right now.
Also, I'm not an expert in strategy. I'm not sure what the best way to test your strategy skills would be, so I'll give you a very simple challenge. As long as you can pass that, I'll trust that your academy education and James' judgment were accurate.
The challenge is: beat me in a game of chess."