I stood there for a moment, adrenaline making my hands shake. The guard was dead; a combination of me stopping his heart and then beating him in the head was too much for anyone to survive. I took a few slow breaths to try to calm my pounding heart.
I had just killed a man. Yes, a bad man, but still. My entire life I had been peaceful. I had to remind myself that I had been brought to this world to kill Ralcor. So while killing this nameless guard made me feel slightly ill, I was going to have to get used to it, and fast.
But first, I needed to hide the evidence. I shook my head to try to clear my thoughts, then stuffed the shadow stone back in my mouth. I had nowhere to carry the club, so I slid it back in the loop on his belt. After that I grabbed him by the ankles and began dragging his corpse down the tunnel, towards the exit.
If you've never dragged a body, you should know that it's a lot of fucking work. And this guy wasn't particularly large, but he was dense and muscular and wearing armor. So pulling his ass out of the tunnel was very tiring, but I couldn't stop there. I pulled him past the treeline, then finally let go of his boots.
His body would be found within hours if I left him there, and it would raise an alarm. I had to bury the bastard. I dug through his pockets and coin purse, filling my own pockets with a few coins and more importantly a dagger. I used that to help pry a hand-sized rock from the ground, which I then used to start digging.
Digging a body-sized hole with a rock was a lot of work. I began to fear that I would get caught, and that fear made me move quickly, dirt flying out of the hole. It made me wish I could use elemental magic. That would have made short work of this whole scenario.
After a small eternity, I finally had a hole big enough for the guard. I removed his iron-banded club and rolled his body into the hole, then used my rock tool to push dirt over his body. When I was done I kicked the excess dirt in all directions so that only a small mound remained. Nothing overly noticeable.
"What a way to start the day," I muttered to myself as I looked around. At least I had his club and the belt that held it. The belt was too small for me, but the loops that were designed to hold the club were easy to remove and loop onto my own belt. His dagger went on the other side of my belt.
The side of the goblin mountain was on my left, so I started walking. I still didn't know how to get to the tree I had first found, but after half an hour of walking I came to what I thought was the tree I had used the day before when leaving the elven city. With a deep breath, I began to climb those stairs.
I was grateful for how Silvy had changed my body. In my previous life I hadn't been out of shape, but I also hadn't been particularly strong. Climbing all these stairs would have killed me. I still had to take a few breaks, but I finally made it to the top, more than a hundred feet above the ground. I stayed there for a second, catching my breath and looking around.
And only a moment later, a rather angry looking elven man approached me in an aggressive manner. An elaborately gilded badge was pinned on one side of his vest, so I assumed he was some form of guard or law enforcement.
"Who are you?" he demanded, hand resting on the hilt of a short sword at his belt.
I raised both hands to him and took another deep breath. "I'm a friend. My name is Aaron, and I've come here to see Sword-Master Althidon."
The elven man studied me for a moment with narrowed eyes, then finally nodded. "See that you go directly to him. I don't want you wandering around."
"If you could point me in the right direction, that would make it quicker, then," I said, slowly lowering my hands.
The man glared at me for a moment, then turned and pointed behind him. After that, he walked away, continuing to patrol the city.
"So, looks like elven cops are assholes. Who would have guessed?" I muttered to myself as I started off in the direction he had pointed.
The elven citizens gave me strange looks as I passed by. After all, I was not only human, but wearing jeans and a Slayer t-shirt, so I looked nothing like them. Had I worn my new cloak today that might have helped, but I left it at Silvy's house.
After a few minutes, some of the buildings and landmarks began to look familiar. I made a few wrong turns, but finally recognized my surroundings and managed to wander to where Sword-Master Althidon worked.
The sound of wooden swords clacking against each other was loud enough that I was able to follow it. Soon after, I found myself watching a group of young elven men being run through basic motions. Well, they looked basic to me. But then again, I had no clue what I was doing. I was more likely to stab myself in the foot with a sword than parry an attack.
I let them train for a few more minutes, then stepped close enough for Althidon to see me. He briefly glanced at me but continued his instruction until the men had run through a parry motion a hundred times. Literally a hundred, he made them count out loud. After that, He directed one of his associates to continue the instruction and stepped to the side to talk to me.
I finally approached him and made sure to bow with my right hand over my heart, as I had seen Taranath do the day before. Althidon acknowledged my bow with a nod of his head.
"You look like shit," he said gruffly, eyeing me up and down. "Your hands are filthy, your face is dirty, and you're sweaty. Do you not bathe?"
I sighed. "I had a run-in with someone this morning and had to fend for myself," I replied. Well, it was close enough to the truth. He didn't need any details.
"Come here," Althidon said and turned.
I followed him around the formation of training men and he took me to a washing area. The tree had grown into several wooden bowls that held cool, clean water. At his direction, I washed my face and hands. Afterwards, I felt much better.
"Thanks," I said as we walked back to the training area.
"So, did you win?" he asked as he grabbed a training spear from a nearby rack.
"Win what?" I asked.
"You said you had a run-in with someone this morning. Did you win?"
"Oh," I said, unsure of how much detail I should give. "Yes, I did."
"Good," Althidon said, nodding. "How did you do it? With the dagger or with that club?"
I looked down at the weapons hanging from my belt. Could I trust Althidon? The elves and goblins used to be friends, after all. Taranath had seemed pretty excited at the thought of our two people trading again.
"Can I trust you?" I asked Althidon. I figured he was the type of guy that would appreciate directness.
He crossed his arms and frowned. "That's a strange question. Almost useless. If I were to answer yes, how would you know if I was telling the truth?"
I shrugged. "Can I, though?"
He chuckled. "Probably. I know what your goal is, and I hate Ralcor as much as anyone else. Seeing him gone would be a good thing, and if you're gearing up to do that, then yeah, I'd say you can probably trust me. Why do you ask?"
I took a deep breath. Silvy had told me this was a bad idea, but I wanted to be honest with this man. "Yesterday, I told you I had the ability to learn magic. After I left here, I learned what type of magic I could use."
"And?" he asked impatiently.
"A goblin guard tried to attack me in the tunnel that leads out of their mountain city," I said. "I used blood magic to stop his heart. Then I hit him in the side of the head with this club."
Althidon's eyebrows drew down and he stared at me for a moment. "Blood magic. That can be a nasty thing, indeed. A lot of us don't trust it, but I know it can be used to heal as well as kill. How did you do it?"
"I stopped his heart," I replied simply.
Althidon nodded. "Well, if your end goal is to attack Ralcor, you'll need all the help you can get. Killing with elemental magic is still very possible, but not nearly as easy. I suppose it's appropriate that you can use blood magic. You won't be training it here, though." He handed me a training spear. "Now, let's get started."
I took the spear from him and he ran me through the basics, from fixing my stance and grip to basic thrusts. It appeared the spear really was a simple weapon compared to the sword. Those elven men were spending weeks, months, just learning new parries and attacks. After one day I already knew most of the moves with a spear, and now I just had to practice over and over until I was better at them.
After Althidon had me practice some basic moves for an hour, he went to the rack and grabbed a sword. The hilt looked normal, but the blade was made of two dozen thin sticks lashed together.
"Now it's time to see how much you've been paying attention," he said, raising the sword. "I won't move too fast, and I won't use any advanced techniques. I just want you to practice deflecting my moves and keeping me away from you. Remember, the biggest advantage of the spear is the reach. Don't let your opponent get close to you; kill them before they can close the distance. Ready?"
I raised my spear. "Ready," I said.
Althidon nodded, then stepped forwards and swung his sword at me. Just a simple attack, like he wanted to hack into my shoulder. I moved the end of my spear to the left and deflected it, then drove the padded tip of my practice spear into his shoulder.
"Very good," Althidon said. "Again."
He attacked me again, this time from the other side. The response with a spear was quite simple; the weapon was so long that simply moving the end of the spear to intercept rendered his attack useless. Plus, it put the tip of the spear right next to him.
Althidon tried an overhead attack, and I deflected it in the same manner. He even tried an upwards swing, but I slapped it down with my spear. After a few attacks I really felt myself moving into the role. My sense of focus sharpened and I felt ready for anything.
"Excellent," Althidon said. "As long as you only fight complete beginners, you should have the upper hand." He laughed at that, and I joined in.
After that, he called over one of the young trainees, and handed him the practice sword. He then instructed the young man to attack me and try to land a hit, but not to go too hard.
The only thing that saved my ass was the length of the spear. In order for him to attack me, he had to take several steps closer, during which I was almost always able to see what his attack was going to be. That made it easy to respond, which I usually did sloppily but effectively. Althidon watched us, grunting approval from time to time, and instructed the other young man on how to improve his attacks.
We spent two hours doing that. My shoulders and hands ached, but a bit of adrenaline kept me going strong. I didn't realize how fun it could be, but I avoided telling Althidon that, as he'd probably chastise me for not taking it seriously.
All in all it was a great practice session, and it gave me hope for my future.