13. The Stakes Of War

The heavy scent of sweat drenched the air, and Nathanial couldn’t help but wonder where everything went wrong. To his right was Fredrick, and down the line was Richard. At first, the news excited them. For the watchmen of the Order to take them under their wing and train them to be respectable soldiers was a blessing like none other.

Yet, on the dirt-covered ground coated with slick sweat, Nathanial was on the verge of passing out. The overwhelming amount of pain his body was enduring felt like someone was flaying the skin off his limbs, and words could not describe the current training regimen.

Somehow, some way, the three had pushed through the first few days. Swapping out their strength training with grueling exercises meant to break their spirits. Nathanial glanced over at the other two, his eyes stinging from his droplets of sweat.

Right now, his forearms were pressed firmly into the dirt ground, forming makeshift trenches as his arms and toes supported the weight of his body. They had been planking for what felt like an eternity, and while Richard was breezing through the exercise, his companions weren’t doing as well.

Fredrick gasped for air and shot a glare at Nathanial. “After… after everything and I mean everything I’ve done for you…! This is how you repay me?”

“Are you kidding me right now?” Nathanial mumbled. “Let’s not forget who it was that instantly ran halfway through the first day and tried to disappear at the start of the second!”

“That was before I found out it was impossible to escape! And how was I supposed to know that he would be waiting around that corner for me? John said he went to get water! Water, I tell you! And he lied, he lied to me! He lied to you—”

Both of them quietly bickered with each other before a looming shadow stood over them. Nathanial and Fredrick froze. The blood drained from their faces, and the slightest shuffle of their iron armor echoed throughout the barren training yard.

As Nathanial’s head creaked upward like a door slowly opening and met John’s cold, lifeless gaze—he knew that Fredrick had dug their graves.

“Am I some sort of… joke to you two?” John’s voice calmly pierced through their bodies as shivers erupted from head to toe. “Or is it because I’ve been far too lenient lately? Are you taking my kindness for granted?”

Nathanial kept his mouth shut. He knew the safest option, the smartest choice to keep their suffering to a bare minimum, was to not answer his question. And he was certain that Fredrick understood this.

“Kindness?” The word bitterly escaped Fredrick’s lips as he uttered it beneath his breath. “Is that what you call this… torture?”

And I was certainly wrong.

Nathanial closed his eyes and accepted his fate.

“How can this… hell be anything but kind?” Fredrick glared at John. “Haven’t we been through enough?”

The words that came out of Fredrick were something Nathanial understood. They didn’t decrease their strength training, but instead added on top of that with the watchman’s regimen. Even though he had adapted to the day-by-day process, Fredrick, who came from a more privileged household, didn’t.

John kneeled on one knee and stared at him. “Fredrick… you lazy bastard… it’s only been thirty seconds since we’ve started.” He gestured at Richard. “If you look at your friend, he’s been holding his own for two minutes before you two even arrived.”

Fredrick held back his tears while gritting his teeth. “He’s using aura to strengthen his body…”

Silence held onto John’s blank expression. He turned to Nathanial and nodded. “Your friend’s about to suffer. You have the option to share his burden or to let him endure alone.”

“Just have mercy on our souls.”

John snapped his fingers as Luka emerged from the side with a few stone slabs. With practiced ease, Luka, the earth contractor, placed the plates on their backs. Yet as the cold slab touched Nathanial’s armor, he immediately felt his body sink down with the pain racing through his veins.

Nathanial held firm as his body sank further down, no matter how hard he tried to push up.

I can’t fall here. I can’t.

He pushed harder, conjuring whatever strength he could muster. Beads of sweat fell onto the dirt as each ragged breath screamed for sympathy. Yet none came. Instead, John stood over Nathanial before glaring at Fredrick.

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“Look at what you’ve done. Burn the sight into your mind,” he said. “While you’re there struggling to stay upright. Your friend is practically dying because of a burden you threw onto him.”

Fredrick tilted his head, staring at Nathanial’s pale expression with a trace of sorrow and regret.

“This is the same man trusting you with his life, and all you do is bitch and moan about the difficulty of this training.” John stared at him with disappointment. “It would do you some good to get it through that thick skull of yours that this training isn’t a right. It’s a privilege. We only stepped in to help because of the potential we saw, but are you telling us we were wrong?”

“That training was different,” Fredrick weakly uttered. “It pales in comparison to this.”

“All the more reason for you to endure and push through.” John reached for a crimson vial in his leather pouch. “Healing potions are available at the end of each session to help with muscle recovery. An expense coming out of our own damn pockets.”