Again, the last few days melded into each other, with Ezra getting what he could only consider a severe bullying from Chloe. She would pulverize him with her aura before giving him just long enough to recover before she went through slow instructions of how to maneuver around a shield, how to use the strengths of a spear to overcome those of a sword, club, or axe.
“I’d train you on these as well,” she said on the first day, “but there’s no reason. You’ll have plenty of time to learn other weapons when you’re not on a quick deadline. Right now, it’s more important that you be good with the spear than anything else.”
“Wouldn’t it be better for me to be training with everyone else?” Ezra asked as she bashed his spear aside and smacked him in the ankle with her sword. “After all, I need to be alive to get any training from another Pseudo-Knight or a Knight.”
“No,” she disagreed, “because this isn’t going to take the place of your other training. Instead, this is just supplemental.”
“What’s that mean?” Ezra asked as Chloe used one of the words she sometimes did, words that reminded him that she was important or high born enough to merit real training from eight years old with someone who could teach her how to use aura.
“This is extra training,” she said. “You’re still training in lines, and this will help you when the lines break.”
“They’re not supposed to break,” Ezra replied as he used his larger frame to push her back a step. She lowered herself and didn’t go far, instead taking the opportunity to slide her shield against his and slip around his guard. She again hit him, and Ezra fought to contain his anger, instead fixing his stance.
“The lines are supposed to hold steady,” she agreed. “But even though you’re training hard and your sergeants are good, do you think that all of those other kids you’re seeing are going to be strong when a goblin stabs their foot, or a bugbear reaches over their shield and steals their spear? How about when an orc captain smashed through their brother’s shield and kills them? Do you think they’ll keep the line like that?”
Ezra knew what the answer was. The only answer he didn’t know was if he’d manage to keep himself from running away at that. He was brave, he thought, but if that happened, would he break?
“So,” Chloe continued, just as casual as ever even as she talked about other soldiers dying, “this training will help you when the others on the line fall or run. You’ll need to be able to take care of yourself there.”
They didn’t talk any more in that training session, but Ezra found it much easier to keep himself from getting frustrated as Chloe pointed out his weaknesses again and again when he remembered that she was hitting him with a stick. The enemies he was going to face in a couple weeks would be using steel and they’d be trying to kill him, not teach him.
“How good is she?” Ezra asked Jormun one night as he nursed bruised ribs and ankles in the bathhouse.
She’s good. Her footwork and movements are textbook. She’s well trained, but I can tell by the difference between how she fights when she’s using her fists versus the weapons that she only trains with the weapons. Whenever there’s a real fight, she’s using her gloves.
“Is that a problem?” Ezra said as he poured water over his head. The water’d been warmed over the fire to make sure that people wouldn’t be freezing, a luxury that Ezra hadn’t been often offered in the slums.
Not a problem, Jormun shook his head, but she’s not a great teacher for you in the longer run if you want to be a Weaponmaster instead of a Spearmaster or whatever. You’re still going to do what’s best, right?
“Yes,” Ezra chuckled. “You’ve convinced me that becoming a Weapon Saint is the true peak I… what do you say? The peak I must stand upon and conquer for you?”
Jormun didn’t say anything in response to that, but he did grumble about cheeky kids. After a moment of Ezra scrubbing the filth of the last day’s training from his body, Jormun said, Can you see why I didn’t just want you swinging your stick in the yard of the inn now, though?
“Eh, only kinda,” Ezra shrugged. “I could have better understood how to fight on the lines if I’d done that earlier, and that would probably help me now.”
Nope. You’d have done what was comfortable, what felt strongest, instead of what was right. Then, after only a month, it’d be a lot harder to train you to do it the right way, the way that won’t open you up to as many attacks. Footwork especially is easy to fuck up without someone putting you in the right place.
“Yeah, footwork’s hard,” Ezra agreed. “So why wouldn’t you just correct those movements?”
I can’t touch you to move you into the right position!
“Couldn’t you just tell me what to do?” Ezra insisted. At that, Jormun went quiet, and Ezra grinned. “Did it just sound like a pain to try to correct me without physically moving me?”
Shut it.
His victory acquired, Ezra laughed and dropped the topic. After all, he didn’t need to have Jormun admit that he was an imperfect person, just this much. After all, all joking and ribbing aside, the old ghost had changed his life. Given him access to aura and information that he couldn’t have dreamed of beforehand. Being a constant companion that at the very least was another pair of eyes. Jormun was, with the exception of not having a body, a perfect tutor, and there wasn’t anything Ezra would do to jeopardize that relationship.
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He finished his bath and retired to his room for the second to last day before they left on the march.
***
The last day passed in a blur, the conditioning lighter than every other day as, instead of everything else, the soldiers practiced marching in ranks for two hours, one hour in the morning and one in the evening. Then, packs were prepared and issued to everyone, and the extra time was spent with the opportunity to ensure that everyone was prepared for anything else. None of the recruits from the slums had anything else to buy or prepare, so they spent it wandering around with nervous energy. At least, everyone except for Ezra.
He finished his morning’s march and was then called to spar with Chloe again. This was the fourth training with her, three others happening the day before, and the rest of this day passed similarly—being buffeted by her aura and then drilled relentlessly on his footwork, on his approach, and his strikes. His bones ached, but his form was improving already, and his inner world devoured aura hungrily whenever he gave it the opportunity.
“There’ll come a point when it… filling your inner world more will hurt your soul,” Chloe explained after the final training of the second day. “More can come in, but it’ll feel like you’ve eaten too much and you might throw up if you keep going. But for your spirit. You know?”
“I can’t say that I do,” Ezra replied. “Since I enlisted, it’s been the first time that I can eat until I’m full multiple times a day. I’ve eaten a good meal on a starved stomach, though, and that makes you sicker than just about anything that won’t kill you.”
Chloe stared at him, blinking as she understood what he’d said. “Well, I don’t have a good way to explain it, then, but it’ll hurt when you’re ready to start attempting to cross the barrier into being an Adept. Let me know when that happens,” she ended up explaining lamely.
“I get it, though,” Ezra shrugged. “My inner world’s gonna hurt. Should I keep trying to strengthen it at that point?”
“If you want,” Chloe answered hesitantly. “I’m not sure if it’ll do anything good for you, but it’s possible and won’t do any lasting harm.”
They then went through a couple last-minute pointers, Chloe fixating on small things that Ezra felt were stupid, but he didn’t argue with her. Instead, he nodded along and listened as dutifully as he could until she finished.
“Look, I might be able to help you a little here and there for the next two weeks as we march,” Chloe finished off, “but you’ll ultimately be on your own. We’re going into an extermination expedition. This is going to be deadly. People will die, and more will die if you’re too afraid to do what you already know how to do. Be strong, fight well, and trust your back to people who you know and trust. You’ll be fine if you do.”
“Yes ma’am,” Ezra answered, smiling a little.
Chloe smiled back, saluted, and jogged away. As soon as she was out of earshot, Ezra put away the practice spear he’d used and whispered to Jormun, “Is she right? Is that the point that I’m touching the boundary to Adept?”
Yeah, it’s the most obvious way to tell that you’re at the juncture between any two tiers, Jormun said. The inner world starts pressing against the boundaries that your tier provides, and it’s uncomfortable. At that point, you’ll need to start establishing your foundation for the next tier, which I’ll go into more detail with when we’re closer to that.
Ezra grunted his answer back, dissatisfied with that closure, but not going to argue with the wise master. After a handful of seconds, Jormun sighed and spoke again.
Look, I won’t tell you anything, but I guess it’s payment for me not saying anything about the training. Right now, your inner world is formless. At Adept, it’ll gain a more coherent form, like hills, streets, miasma, fire, or whatever. Pseudo-Knights have a more solid form, and becoming a Knight is when the inner world becomes solid. For me, that’s when the steel city was formed from a steel wall. Every step beyond that is more conceptual, like the Masters’ understanding of the aura and its integration into everything and the Saints’ perfection of the material. That’s nothing to worry about any time soon. But you need to have a better understanding of yourself to be stepping beyond Adept. For now, though, keep strengthening the inner world.
“Thanks!” Ezra said as Jormun trailed off and floated ahead. “I didn’t think you were going to tell me anything else, so I’m really glad to have gotten this much.”
Just don’t try anything until you’re there. It isn’t dangerous to ascend to Adept, but it can be riskier than you’d expect to start mucking about with your inner world before it’s even gotten enough substance to support itself.
“Of course,” Ezra answered seriously, retreating to the bunk room, where he threw himself into pulling multiple types of aura into himself at the same time. It’d previously been basically impossible to do so, but now that he’d been taking these aural beatings from Chloe three times a day, his inner world had changed to be more… desperate, maybe. At least, it was much easier to open, and his access and influence over aura grew more proficient by the day. It was only two days though, and now the task went from impossible to mindbendingly difficult.
What he found most of all was that he would start to pull one to himself, get it started, and then try to move to the other. The more he focused on ice, the more his earth attentions suffered, and the worse his performance. Thus, instead of pulling all sorts of aura to him, he was just switching from one to the other, the flow of stone slowing to a trickle while the ice cooled his body.
This latest experiment ended in what could only be considered a failure and Ezra gave it up to get some rest.
Sleep found him quickly, and a night full of tense dreams that weren’t quite nightmares kept him stirring. When the clanging calls for wakeup sounded, Ezra couldn’t tell if he felt like he’d only slept a few hours or for a few days. Even so, he got his feet into his boots, grateful for the thick socks that he’d been provided as he’d broken them in the past weeks, put on his armor and uniform, placed his pack on his back, and walked out of the bunkroom with Boyd, Cord, and Leah in tow.
The square was full of people milling about, twice as many as always. Ezra realized that, at some point, the conscripts had been brought in, and he felt a surge of gratitude as he looked at them.
Their supplies were scarce, their equipment nonexistent, and their attitudes terrible at best. Despite his usual lack of divine respect, Ezra sent a quick prayer to Inkosuza for watching over him and providing guidance through the Madam and Jormun.
“Thank you Watcher,” he breathed. “Bless me, Jobahia with your ferocity, Baltisse with your wisdom, and Pilar with your strength.”
It was a simple enough prayer, he knew, but it was fervent enough he thought it was good. As soon as he raised his head, though, a painfully familiar voice called out.
“Ezra!”