Arthur woke early the next morning, his body refreshed, his mind clearer than it had been in days. The soft silver moonlight filtered through the barracks window, painting pale patterns on the wall, as if the heavens had claimed it as their canvas. The world was still, caught in that fleeting moment before dawn. It was the final moment of peaceful tranquility, as if the world was waiting on held breath for sunrise. For the first time since being thrust into this reality, he felt almost... at peace.
The air was crisp, carrying the earthy scent of dew, and for a moment, Arthur let himself enjoy it. In fact, he cherished them more now, since losing everything. In less than a day he had died, been brought back to life in another world, suffered an identity crisis, got battered repeatedly and lost everything in his new life before being sent to the army. Going through those experiences had a way of changing a person. For Arthur, apart from the bitterness, rage and misery, it had made him appreciative.
Training began under the moon's farewell, as they worked with the rising sun until daylight had fully replaced the night.
He would be lying if he said he hadn't expected some sort of hidden gift or cheat since he transmigrated to the world of Pandora. But with each grueling day, his hope dimmed. Sun had promised something, he'd given him something called a concept. Whatever it was however, he had yet to see any sight of it.
'Maybe it was some kind of joke', he lampooned inwardly as he fought through a gruelling session of training.
Training began the same way it always did: grueling physical drills that demanded strength his body had yet to develop. Though Arthur pushed himself harder with each passing day, the improvements were slow and painful. He wasn't blind to the differences between himself and the others, he was barely keeping up. By the time he finished his endurance run, the others were already halfway through their weapons training.
And that, as usual, was where things truly went downhill.
The sword felt clumsy and foreign in his grip, like having someone else's hands stitched onto your wrists. The sharp weight of Officer Mara's gaze bore down on him as she barked corrections, her voice steady but tinged with disappointment. Glancing to his side, Arthur saw Noah, moving in a humiliating contrast to his own pathetic skills. Noah moved like water, his strikes fluid and precise, as though the sword had been born in his hands. Since their fight, if Noah had any lingering anger from losing to Arthur, he didn't show it.. In fact, Noah didn't acknowledge Arthur at all, as though he were little more than a ghost standing beside him.
'Well that doesn't matter now anyway' he thought with a tinge of regret as he glanced at Noah through the corner of his eyes. 'That ship has long sailed. If only the prick had tried talking to me first, maybe things could've been different.'
Arthur found it hard to bury his resentment towards Noah, but at the same time he understood the boy. It was an uncomfortable position to be in. He knew to some extent the reason behind Noah's actions, and also knew that at his heart Noah was a good person who didn't deserve to be here, training in the army with a collar around his neck. Yet, Noah had tried to beat him, sneaking up on him while he slept. For fuck's sake, Noah had smiled as Officer Skelter beat him almost to death.
His thoughts drifted, as he contemplated his conundrum, Arthur welcomed any distraction that prevented him from focusing on his aching arms and the droplets that stung his eyes. Arthur hadn't come here to win anyone over, it was just sad that he had lost that opportunity to do so. He didn't care about the rest of the squad. Whether they hated him or just wanted to avoid him, Arthur couldn't care less.
They had watched as he got battered, they allowed it to happen. Arthur had spent too long allowing him to get punished for the sins of the old Arthur's past. He had shouldered the weight of those sins as he took over Arthur's body. But not anymore. He wouldn't endure those beatings in silence anymore.
If they fucked around now, well, they could very well find out. If they came, he'd fight back. Maybe not with a sword, but in whatever way he could manage.
As usual, he alone was dismissed after weapons training. Unlike the rest of them, he hadn't undergone his trial yet, so it was impossible for him to actively manipulate mana, meaning these sessions were a waste of time for him. Officer Mara dismissed him with a curt nod before turning away to the rest of the squad.
Saluting, Arthur left the training grounds. However he had no intention of resting. He had once been Reshi, a talented and strong soldier, albeit quite rusty during the end of his life. However he remembered everything he'd done to become strong. Every drill, exercise and quite literal torture that had propelled him to be considered a monster in the Central Republic's forces.
He left to go to another training ground. This one was abandoned, well, more like uninhabited. It hadn't been maintained since there was no squad posted at the nearby building, nevertheless it served his needs well enough. Calisthenics. That was what his personal training would be focused on. For his upper body he went through a series of circuits consisting of multiple variations of push-ups, pull-ups, and a variety of other exercises. Afterwards, he started on his sprints, pushing himself to his limits until his muscles screamed in protest. And then pushing himself further.
Finishing off with stretching he finally finished his routine with deliberate precision.It was an exhausting cycle, but it gave him a sense of control. Every day was a chance to reclaim his strength, his dignity. After he finished, he went and visited the infirmary wing where he would regularly meet with the male healer.
He had begun to appreciate the healer's disconcerting, emotionless professionalism, after all, it was definitely better then how everyone else treated him.
"Hello sir, can you heal me again."
The healer looked at him before sighing in a rare show of emotion. "It'll be from your own energy again."
"That's fine."
Stretching out his hand, the healer placed it on Arthur's head. Then he felt a faint warmth rush through his body as his muscles were healed from the day's exercise. The process drained his energy, leaving him weary, but it was nothing a good rest wouldn't fix. This way, he was able to fully exert himself everyday.
There was another reason why he visited the infirmary wing. Arthur wasn't an introverted person by nature, and the solitude weighed heavily on him. He trained alone, lived alone, and healed alone. But there was one place he could escape the gnawing ache of isolation, the infirmary, where Marsh, the young boy who had guided him back the first time he woke up, was always waiting with an earnest smile.
"Hey, Marsh," Arthur said as he saw the boy further down.
When Marsh saw who it was, his face split into a wide smile, running over excitedly.
"Hey Art. Wanna go on a walk?"
"Sure", he responded, failing to hold back his smile.
" Hey Marsh, I never asked, but what do you want to be when you're older?" He asked as they strolled across base, attracting not a few disgusted mutters. All directed at him of course.
Marsh, small and bright-eyed, tilted his head, his mop of unruly hair catching the light. "I want to be a soldier, Art." Marsh's voice was unusually firm as he responded, his face fixed in a grim expression.
Arthur raised an eyebrow. "What, you wanna run around with a sword in the air, especially with that smile. I doubt you even need a sword for the enemy to drop dead" he teased lightly.
Marsh shook his head emphatically, his grimness shattering into a grin. "Oh shut up Art. I wanna save people."
"Can't you do that as a healer?"
Marsh hesitated, but shook his head after a second of consideration. "No. Well yeah. I want to learn how to heal as well, but I want to fight on the frontlines too. Just being a healer isn't enough. It isn't enough," he finished in a hoarse whisper.
Again Arthur realised that being a boy on the frontlines wasn't common. No doubt Marsh had his demons as well. He pushed down his curiosity, it wasn't his business. If Marsh wanted to confide, he could do so in his own time.
"Oh, so like a frontline medic?" He continued, wanting to keep Marsh's thoughts occupied on the conversation and not on whatever he was thinking about.
"What's that?"
Arthur paused. 'Huh, does this world not have frontline medics?'
Back on Earth, that was exactly what Reshi had been, a soldier who fought and healed in equal measure. It surprised him that a modern civilisation like this didn't have the same here. Sure a lot of ancient traditions had revived since humans had settled on Pandora, but well, it was a basic army unit. A frontline medic.
"Well," Arthur began hesitantly, "it's like a healer, but they're out there with the soldiers during battles instead of staying back at base. They fight alongside everyone else but can also heal injuries on the field."
Marsh's eyes widened in awe. "Ohhh, you mean a saint!"
"A...saint?" Arthur asked, thrown off by the term.
Marsh laughed at his confusion. "You're serious, aren't you? A saint's like a legend. Someone blessed by two gods. But one of them has to be Asclepius, the god of healing. Without his blessing, it's impossible to be a true saint. Do you know how hard it is to get a blessing from Asclepius? I doubt I'd become a Saint"
Arthur blinked, intrigued. He'd heard of saints in the novel but had assumed they were a standard paladin archetype. This was something far more complex.
"Why does Asclepius matter so much?"
Marsh explained with a mix of excitement and reverence. "Healing takes energy—either the patient's or the healer's. But if a soldier's gravely injured, they usually don't have enough energy to give, which means the healer has to use their own. Do you see the problem now?"
"Not especially."
Marsh laughed again. "Think about it. If you're a fighter, you're already expending so much mana and energy. It's impossible to do both, you'll lose too much energy and mana before the battle even starts. So usually it's better to have a person just suited for one. If you're not a saint that is. You see, Asclepius's blessing changes that. It lets you draw energy from other sources, sometimes even from enemies. Like the Dark Saint."
"The Dark Saint?" Arthur's curiosity deepened. He had never heard of him before, he wasn't mentioned in the novel. "Who is he?"
Marsh's voice grew quieter. "She was the last saint. Her blessing let her draw life force from others to heal her allies. There's a story about her entering a battlefield where Thoracen soldiers were losing against the dwarves during the war a hundred years ago. She wiped out half the dwarven army by draining their life force and using it to bring her side back from the brink of death."
Arthur shivered. The idea of one person wielding such power was staggering. "What happened to her?"
"She disappeared fifty years ago," Marsh said softly. "Well she's believed to be dead. If she were still around, the rebellion wouldn't have lasted this long."
Arthur considered the boy beside him, his enthusiasm tempered by the weight of the story he'd just told. Marsh's innocence and determination reminded him of a younger version of himself, a time before the world had stripped him of his naivety.
"Well," Arthur said, offering Marsh a rare, genuine smile, "if anyone could become a saint, it's you."
The boy beamed, his grin wide and unrestrained. "Thanks, Arthur!"
Leaving the infirmary, Arthur carried Marsh's grin with him like a small, fragile ember of warmth. It was rare, these days, to feel something lighter than the weight of survival.
The routine of the day melded into weeks, marked by exhaustion and solitude. Arthur's muscles burned with every calisthenic, every sprint, every stretch, but the pain grounded him. It was something familiar, something he could control. He trained harder than ever, building himself piece by piece, forcing his body to obey. It was slow, painstaking work, but it was his. Each night he left the healer's wing drained but proud, his body recovering under the healer's steady hands and his own reserves of energy.
Evenings brought rare moments of respite, like his conversations with Marsh, the young boy's earnestness was a balm against the day's trials.
'It's sad, we're almost the same age. Marsh was less than six months younger, but I see him as a boy.' Perhaps it was his innocent earnestness, or that smile that didn't belong on a war ground. Or maybe it was his own experiences, as Reshi and Arthur, propelling him to mature and lose what Marsh held in abundance.
Arthur loved his talks with Marsh, they kept him sane. But the solitude that followed was unavoidable. Arthur had become an island, isolated from the rest of the squad. Their disdain was palpable, their whispers a constant reminder of his place. Criminal. Noble. Two labels that made him a perfect target.
As he walked back to base, finishing a supplementary sword training session, Officer Mara approached him.
"Cadet", she called.
"Yes Ma'am?"
Sighing Officer Mara met Arthur's deep scarlet eyes. She didn't like seeing Arthur, it left her conflicted. On one hand he was someone who had attempted to do something despicable. On the other, he was barely fourteen, a boy. When she looked into his eyes, she saw an unsettling maturity and melancholy. It made her feel ashamed somehow. Why, she had no idea.
"I've sent a request officially. You will be ceasing sword training. It is evident to me you possess little talent for it. I've transferred your weapon training to Officer Skelter, he teaches spear techniques to the duns. Go report yourself to him at once."
>>>>>>>>>>——— Dun means people with insufficient mana talents to be considered into the mana squad units ————<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
Arthur felt the blow keenly, though he hid it well. The recommendation stung, but he couldn't deny the truth in her words. The sword was not his weapon, not yet. Still, the thought of facing Skelter, the man who had beaten him within an inch of his life made his stomach churn. He also knew that Officer Mara was aware of that fact. But then again, why would she care? He could see it in her eyes, like everyone else's. Hatred, or disgust. It was hard to tell, both emotions had a similar look in one's eyes. But it was definitely there.
'I'm an idiot for thinking she at least would be fair.'
Saluting stiffly, he turned away from her wordlessly.
Officer Mara watched him with a tinge of regret. She had no connection with the boy. Not with either of the criminals. But, for some reason it still felt like betrayal. Both of them knew what Skelter had done, and both of them knew he'd do it again. Yet Arthur needed to learn how to use a weapon properly, otherwise he would be dead far before the Army's Dog, James Skelter killed him.
Shaking her head at the retreating figure, she chuckled softly. 'Here I thought I hated nobles, and hated rapists more. Am I taking pity on one?'
But another voice whispered back in her mind, a part of her she tried to bury. 'Attempted only, and many nobles have done far worse without punishment. And there's one thing even you can't deny. He's only a boy.'
///////////////////
It took a while to find Office Skelter's building. Namely because no one wanted to talk to him, besides telling him to fuck off.
As he walked he noticed a definite change in the air.
It began as a whisper of unease, a faint crackle on the edge of perception. By the time Arthur reached the South Wing where Officer Skelter was based, the tension was suffocating, the hum of an impending storm pressing against his ears.
All around, soldiers began running around, their faces fixed on a grim expression. Everyone ignored him, rushing past with an urgency that gave off a distinct feel of wrongness.
"What the hell is going on?"
No one answered him, not even bothering a second glance his way.
He saw Officer Skelter and his unit, fully armed, their military armoured body suits shimmering under the harsh lights of the base. Skelter's eyes locked onto him, blazing with fury.
"Cadet!" The barked word cut through the chaos like a whip. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?"
Arthur faltered. "Officer Mara sent me to—"
"YOU IDIOT!" Skelter's roar was deafening, his words laced with contempt. But what he said next froze Arthur in place, his blood running cold.
"YOU'RE BEING MOBILISED. THE ENTIRE BASE IS. GET BACK TO YOUR SQUAD IMMEDIATELY!"
Arthur blinked, his mind struggling to catch up. Mobilised? His heart pounded, each beat reverberating in his chest like a war drum.
"THE ENEMY IS COMING AND WE WILL MEET THEM. GO. NOW!!!!"
The words crashed over him, shattering the fragile calm of his routine into jagged pieces. All around him, the base was alive with motion, soldiers shouting orders, weapons being distributed, boots pounding against the ground. The distant wail of a siren rose, a keening sound that split the air and filled his lungs with dread.
Arthur stood frozen for a moment, his hand tightening around the note in his grasp. Then, with a sharp breath, he turned and ran, his feet pounding against the ground as panic clawed at the edges of his mind.
The wail of the siren cut through the air like a scream, drowning out the pounding of Arthur's boots as he raced back to his squad. The scent of metal and sweat filled his nostrils, mingling with the rising heat of bodies moving in frantic preparation. It was a pungent smell, one which had been familiar to him, in another life.
It was the smell of anticipation, and not a little amount of fear also.
The war was here. He'd trained for weeks, endured beatings, isolation, and grueling drills. But none of it had prepared him for this. Not really. His hands trembled, his breath quickened.
This was no training. No sparring match. No second chances.
The war was here.
And he was not ready.