Redrick was sitting on the cold floor, drinking some water out of an old tea cup.
Lamia was resting on one of the benches looking at the altar of the sun god.
A few days had passed already since their first training.
Redrick had learned that the miss Serpentine had great battle instinct, her defense was her strong suit because of it. But that on it self was a problem. Her atack was mediocre at best.
The young man sighed and looked at the noble lady on the bench.
'We have to try something else'
Redrick had tried different methods and tips to improve her sword fighting but nothing really helped. It felt like she was holding herself back.
'A good defense is great but you can't win a fight while only defending. Her gift is also more atack oriented. It would be a waste if she stayed like this'
But the noble lady wasn't the only one facing some problems. Redrick himself had lost a lot of weight and muscle mass before going to Celles, so his atacks were quite weak compared to other man his age.
He was also quite rusty, his guard job did need a good fighter but he never really had to do anything except moving stuff and keep watch. There was also no motivation to practice and improve his swordmanship back than.
That had changed the last couple of days.
While Lamia grew frustrated with her slow progress, Redrick, on the other hand, was enjoying his rapid improvement.
He ate more food than he had ever eaten before, wich caused him to gain weight. His muscles got damaged during training, they healed overtime and than grew stronger.
But what advanced his swordmanship more was teaching Lamia. He was thinking about different ways to face an enemy, figuring out what his opponents ideal move was. This broadened his horizons.
Redrick looked up to see the ceiling
'I never really had a chance to learn like this with my siblings'
His thoughts were true. All the orphans were trained by Mister Goldfield, who was seen as a talented swordmaster. He had trained every orphan except for Redrick. He was the last orphans that joined the family and the war just started back than.
The war caused Mister Goldfield to be gone for long periods of time. So the only training he could get was with his siblings. This would be great with every other family, sadly enough not with the Goldfields.
Every sibling was on a different level.
Swordmasters came from far and wide to face Mister Goldfield, but first, they had to defeat one of Redricks older siblings to earn the right.
Mister Goldfield barely fought back than.
The youngest siblings; Jasmine, Andrius, Ellie, Lynn and estel did have shortcomings but were still monsters in their own league.
They trained in different ways, had their own special skills, and fought in their own styles. But they all had one thing in common: they never learned to hold back.
This made it almost impossible for Redrick to improve during a sparring. The fight was over before the young boy could do anything.
Andrius was the only who gave him some opportunities, but losing to jasmine and Ellie hurt his pride, so those opportunities became less and less.
"Mister Redrick, are you okay? We can stop if you don't feel well"
Redrick shook out of his stupor and saw that miss Serpentine had moved from the bench.
She was now standing in front of him with a concerned face.
Redrick had learned a lot the last few days, and one of those things was that the noble lady infront of him was a great actress.
It felt like she wore a mask showing nobility, politeness and grace, but there was something hidden behind it.
Redrick sometimes wonderd who the true Lamia was, but he had a feeling that she wouldn't show it to anyone. So he never really acted on his thoughts.
"Oh no no no I am fine miss Serpentine. I was thinking about a new training plan. I noticed that you have some trouble with using openings."
"I had the same exact thought. I can see the opportunities but I am always to late to make use of them."
Redrick stood up and took his practice sword in his right hand.
"Well the only way to improve that is to practice. Are you ready?"
"I was ready before you were" she said with a smile
The two continued sparring like they did most days. In the meantime on the otherside of the country, somthing of great importance was happening.
Near Serpentine a young fisherman sat on his boat trying to catch himself some food. He had curly brown hair and lacked 2 teeth on his upper jaw. He hadn't eaten for days and his hunger was now starting to mess with his mind.
Food was hard to come by in the city last to war. There were attempts to rebuild and get some agriculture going, but that didnt work out because of a cruel joke of the gods or just unlucky circumstances.
Criminals, murderes, thieves, bandits, whatever kind of scoundrel you could think of, seemed to have moved into the broken city. Most went there to claim the riches of the dead, others to live their darkest fantasies, and a few individuals were there to watch everything burn.
Rebuilding was already difficult, simply because of all the crime going on. The biggest problem was the food shortage. The lands were infertile because of the different metals and the blood that had seeped in it.
Many had tried to plant seeds, seeds of all kinds of plants. Nothing worked. The wisest and most insightful researchers of New Bellum said that it would take years before there was a chance of recovery.
So the government started sending caravans filled with supplies. The food would be distributed to everyone who needed it.
That also didn't work out.
The criminals, the powerfull and the cunning took everything they could get their hands on. They sold the food for high prices, wich caused citizens to take loans from the wrong people. They became slaves before they even knew it.
The last helping hand that the government threw their way, were letters requesting them to move to neighbouring cities.
And even that was a lost cause.
The people had no energy, no freedom, were wounded and became sick. It was imposible.
The fisherman was painfully aware that a cage was build around him. He was not like the fish he caught. The greed of the fish was the reason why it was captured.
The only reason why he was stuck here was because he was born here. If a fish were in his situation than it would be swimming in a lake that slowely started to boil.
The fisherman was so hungry that he couldn't lament his suffering anymore.
He was so hungry that he couldn't wait to get his net out of the salty sea water.
Now there was a need to put the last bit of energy he had to recover the net. His last bet needed to succeed.
And succeed it did. Four medium sized groupers were struggling for their lives. The fisherman jumped, all anger, sadness and negativity left his body and got replaced with hope. Hope for another day.
But the four groupers weren't the only catch. While killing the fish with a hit on the head, the man noticed that somthing was shining at the end of his net.
It was a bronze looking pocket watch that was in great condition. The time it portrayed looked a bit of tho.
"Whooooaaaaaahhhhww" the man yelled while holding the watch in his hand.
The fisherman suspected that the pocketwatch was an artifact with great power.
"With this I can finally leave this hell".
He ate some raw fish to ease his hunger, than started rowing back to shore.
At the shore the man noticed that somthing felt off. The wind felt alien, the sun looked suspicious and it was completely silent.
Than a big shadow lurked over the confused citizen. He was now completely enveloped in this shadow.
Moving felt hard, breathing was tedious and feeling safe was a thing to the past.
And than he heard somthing.
*click,clack ,click,clack*
It got closer and closer, the shadow didn't grow. But the noice got closer and closer.
It got closer until the noice stopped completely.
'What in God's name is behind me right.
He than abruptly felt a hand on his shoulder.
The man than spun around, too take a look at tge thing that just touched him. He was shocked to what it was.
A enormous battle ship that looked ready to go to war. In front of that ship was a slim man with. He wore a nobles coat with plain looking clothes underneath. The most atantion asking item on this man was his hat, the hat in its self was quite plane for a captain, but the feather on it was almost double or even triple the normal size.
"I believe you have somthing that is mine." Was what the man asked the Fisherman.
It sounded like a normal question, but those few easy sounding words made the fisherman's body and soul tremble.
"Who are you?" The fisherman asked.
"No one to you".
*bonk*