The Elven kingdom was north of where the keep was, the valley where Ash lived was considered the northern part of the kingdom, and the keep north still, but the elves lived even farther in the north. There were a lot of forests and mountains in this region, and the elves unlike humans liked to build with nature and complement it unlike humans who cut down nature to make their cities. After starting their journey on foot, they after a couple of hours entered a thick forest, which made them slow down which he was glad for. The only reason he kept walking was because Aria was walking in front of him.
"Ah we are finally among the trees, I just feel so open and unguarded out there in the open, I don't know how you live like that," said Aria looking around the thick canopy and vegetation.
Ash on the other hand felt uncomfortable here that anything could jump out from anywhere any second, and it was much better living in the open where you could see any danger coming from a mile. As a result, while Aria let her guard down a little, Ash pulled his up and became the more serious one. Aria was in her element, humming and moving with an exciting energy.
"Are there monsters or beasts here?" asked Ash.
"Nothing too dangerous, there used to be Urks here, but we ran them out, they are violent," said Aria.
"Aren't there numbers increasing lately, there have been a lot of sightings and incidents lately" said Ash.
"No surprise, they breed like rats, you know they are cold, demon borns, it is believed that demons made them and left them here to decrease our numbers, they are abominations and they used to be a real problem back in the day, attacking villages, they would kill without any care, rape women and eat kids," said Aria.
"They like living in forests and dark places, it is pretty common, our scouts find them around the kingdom almost weekly, sooner or later their numbers will increase too much that we'll have to deal with them seriously," said Aria.
"Where are they now?" asked Ash.
"Everywhere really, but mostly in the west, the dwarves and races who live in the east are the only ones who don't have to deal with them, but the half-breeds, humans, and us, all have our kingdoms bordering the western areas where they live" said Aria.
"You look sad, have you ever had the misfortune of having met them?" she asked.
"No, it was my older brother, Caleb, two years ago, there was a sighting near the village, so he and some of his friends went to check it out, I mean they were the best in the village, only one of them returned barely," said Ash.
"Sorry, and may your brother rest in Lyron's halls, you have the blood of warriors then, your brother sounds brave," she said. For Elves dying in battle was an honorable thing.
"Yes, he was, much braver and kinder than me," said Ash,
"Let's take a break, we can have something to eat," said Aria stopping and sitting down under a tree, taking out an apple from her bag biting into it closing her eyes, and leaning back against the tree. Elves had sharper teeth he noticed. Ash began to sit down in the shade of a tree, he expected to hit the ground as he bent his knees backward but he started falling behind soon and was found with a panic drowning in the shadow of the tree. Before he could make a noise, he found himself again back upright sitting on the ground, only this time the ground was made of rock tiles, and the forest around was gone, he was in an old ruin of some sort of temple or something, with only the half broken pillars left standing. A few feet across him sitting on a broken pillar was Blade reading a book.
"What?" was all he could manage to say in all the chaos his brain was going through.
"Finally, I was tired of waiting when were you going to stop, that elf can surely run her mouth for decades," said Blade closing his book.
"Where am I? You can't just, What about Aria? Won't she notice?" he asked. He would have more angrier even with Derek, but Blade scared him a little.
"Stop whining, I put on a time dilation spell, you'll be back, she won't even notice," said Blade.
"This is a lot of work just to train one brat, nobody deserves that, especially not you, you are a real lucky boy," said Blade coming forward.
"So, you better not waste my time and do whatever I tell you to do so that we can get this over with as soon as possible" The irritation in his voice was clear and it made Ash scared of the guy even more.
"Now take your sword out, and stand with your legs shoulder width apart," said Blade, and Ash did so.
"Do you know any of the forms?" Blade asked.
"Yes, my previous teacher taught me a couple," said Ash.
"Show me"
Ash began showing the forms he had practiced so many times.
"Mediocre, and they aren't even supposed to connect," said Blade shaking his hand.
"Now look carefully, I'll show you three, they should be learned in parts of three, for defense, offense, and middle, I'll show you all separately and then how to change from one to another, the only way to improve is repetition, so get on it, you'll be doing this for an hour, and if you have some energy left we'll look at some magical training," said Blade.
This was the part Ash hated, repeating like an idiot those same movements over and over again, he knew its benefits but it was too slow and boring why can't they make it a little less boring? The sword was heavy his arms started to hurt as time went by, but he kept doing it, he was too scared of Blade to stop, after all, it was up to him to send him back to Aria, whom he preferred much more than Blade. The hour went by excruciatingly slow, Ash must have done the forms a hundred times. His arms and back hurt like hell.
"Fine, that should be it, for today, eat properly, so that you don't get any thinner than this," said Blade.
"Wait what about, the magic training?" asked Ash, that was the only reason he went on for an hour without stopping.