Chapter 158 (1/2)

This process continued until a familiar face arrived, looking for Randidly: Marco Polo. At first Randidly was excited that there would finally be a distraction, then he was worried that Shal would kill Marco for interrupting, and there was indeed a long moment of tension as Marco Polo arrived, his jovial face falling as he saw Randidly reduced to such a miserable state, hanging onto life by a thin thread.

Still, Randidly reflected as Marco slowly turned to Shal, it probably wasn’t apparent, but the thread was thin but strong. It had served him well thus far. He just seemed extremely pathetic.

But something passed across Marco Polo’s face very quickly, and he bowed slightly. Shal nodded in return. It seemed that they instinctively recognized their relative strength, and it was not close; Shal was more powerful than Randidly had expected.

What he had also not expected was that Marco would quickly come around to the idea of training Randidly, and bring his own exercises and tortures to the table. More along the lines of Mrs. Hamilton, Marco believed that repetition outside of battle would have a powerful effect on building up things like endurance and muscle memory, so more exercises were worked into the routine.

In theory, Randidly was all for it; he was tired of being almost murdered for hours on end. In practice, he swiftly was filled with dread by the exercises that Marco suggested. Often there would be heavy penalties associated with deviating from the exercises, of failing at balance, or improperly following instructions, which were much worse than simply being attacked. These were designed to inflict pain.

As the brutal training, now with Marco Polo’s assistance, stretched on, first one month, then two, and his skill growth slowed, Randidly was forced to wonder whether Shal had a point; he was a rather talentless individual when it came to the spear. But he tried to ignore those thoughts. Which was rather difficult, when Marco took to expressing them constantly.

“Ah boy, boy… you are truly cursed! To have such a powerful master, yet be so unworthy… it is a hard burden to bare. Fear not! I will encourage you no matter how pathetic you may be…”

A hot flame of rage and humiliation began to burn within Randidly constantly, driving him forward. The sighs and snide expressions from Marco were even more motivating that Shal’s brutal glares.

There were moments when it got so bad that Randidly considered murdering them both with spells, so they wouldn’t expect it. But he was forced to admit that it probably wouldn’t work, especially on Shal. And it truly seemed like they were doing it to help him…

However, sometimes it was very hard to remain focused on this fact, especially when they constantly discussed how disappointing he was. It was purposeful, Randidly knew, but that didn’t mean it didn’t affect him.

Time continued to flow on, until it had truly lost meaning to Randidly, but he believed it to have been around 6 months since they had come down to the Badlands and started Shal’s training. At that time, something else changed; he was allowed to fight other people.

The local spear users had been aware of Randidly’s hellish training, and largely made fun of him. During that time, Randidly transformed that chemical hot anger and turned it on those others, of whom he was insanely envious. To freely wander, without constantly training all day. So it was with great enthusiasm that he began to wander afield and challenge people.

He won.

And he won again. And again.

Honestly… Randidly felt very little challenge from them. He perhaps hadn’t realized it, because each skill had only gained about 10 or so levels, even after all this training, but when 20 skills gained 10 levels… that was the difference of 200 skill levels. It was quickly starting to add up.

He was also pleased to see that fighting in battles, and testing out different things that he had thought about while training, once more added a bit more to the speed with which his skills grew. Hoping to prolong this effect, he began taking the black potion, which still remained strangely full, much more frequently, completely cutting himself off from notifications. He submerged himself in the feelings of fighting and violence, searching for efficiency and grace.

They were eventually forced to move from the Southeast, to the middle of the East, where Randidly once more began to struggle. But Shal and Marco Polo were unforgiving teachers. They pushed and pushed, demanding constant advancement. Slowly, bitterly, he fought and continued to win.

It was now mostly due to the accumulated experience of having constantly fought for so long, and the growing realization that Randidly possessed a body that could withstand damage much better than most of the people he faced. Very quickly he realized how to force exchanges that were perhaps even a little in his opponent’s favor, but his superior regeneration passives quickly enabled him to fight through it and grasp victory.

But the string of victories was not to last. Just at the edge of the Eastern area, before the Northeast, there was a wall of Spear users who beat Randidly back again, and again, and again, and again, leaving him bloody and broken in a way that was much more dangerous than Shal or Marco Polo.