Ultimately, he only helped me a little. I understood what he wanted me to do, but his instructions were on the same level as phony fortune tellers who would claim to be from some nation west of Elknid.


    They would always use vague words and make you talk about what you wanted.


    Wait, is he one of them?


    No. He could''ve been raised by them. I''ll have to ask him about that later.


    He also still has to tell me about how he knows Karamazov, he avoided talking about it.


    It was way too dark outside for me to do anything, so I went up to my room and pulled out the book from under my bed. I flipped to the fifty-sixth page and started writing with the quill I had placed inside it last time.


    Instelday, Fourteenth Moon of Penilia


    Every page before this is now meaningless


    Create your own sword style, one without rules


    Get better with the sword


    Become great at the sword


    After writing down everything from today, I ripped the fifty-five pages that came before this one out of the book, but I pulled too hard and ended up ripping the entire book in two.


    I didn''t need it anyways. I don''t need to analyze every way that Koyo is wrong if I make my own perfect swordsmanship.


    I wonder if he''s lying to me. He could still be playing favorites, and this way I''ll never win against Koyo.


    That didn''t matter, if I agreed with what he was saying then he must be right. I don''t just listen to people whenever they tell me to do something. Actually, I almost never listen to people because they don''t say anything that''s right.


    If he was lying, he wasn''t lying fully, and so it didn''t matter. I''m going to make something so great that Koyo is going to lose no matter what they do. Either the teacher has to interfere, and then he''ll have no dignity, or I''m going to crack Koyo''s skull wide open.


    I needed to start with my body. The teacher said that Koyo can use his sword with one hand because it works well when he does, so if I get strong enough to use my sword with one hand, I''ll be able to do it without him complaining or telling me I''m wrong.


    I can do whatever I want with my sword if I get strong enough, the only question is how long I''ll have to wait before I improve. I need to make a daily routine.


    I took a piece of paper from the torn book on my floor and wrote a list down. I''ll keep this under my bed.


    Exercise


    One-hundred rumfboig


    Seventy-five ligashtutz


    One-hundred and fifty niiboig


    Twenty-five varcart-heroom ligashtutz


    Fifty climzoog


    I would have to do these in the morning before breakfast. It''s harder for me to move around a lot shortly after I eat, so I''ll wake up earlier than both of them and get my exercise right on time to come down for breakfast.


    I''ll wait for a bit and then get my sword and start creating my swordsmanship.


    With a plan ahead, I was finally able to go to sleep, but it took a while because I was too busy thinking about what they would say when I had finally beaten Koyo.


    I can''t wait to see the look on his face when I hit him so hard he stops breathing.


    I had to smack myself in the head a few times so I would stop talking to myself. I closed my eyes and fell asleep quickly after that.


    The sun woke me up today, and it''s the first of many. My room is on the side of Anatol, so if I''m not covering my windows then I''ll wake up right when dawn comes.Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    My exercises didn''t go by as quick as I fell asleep the night before, and I ended up finishing a bit after the teacher was yelling at me to come down to breakfast. By the time I got there, I could barely move. Every single part of my body felt like it was burning, and I could only eat by moving my head around the table and eating whatever it was resting on.


    The teacher came by and saw me with my face in the eggs he had made.


    "I heard the floorboards creaking, why did you start exercising?"


    I tried to speak to him but my mouth was full of egg and I couldn''t spit it out because the rest of my head was on the plate. He grabbed my head by the sides and pulled me back up so I was leaning back on the chair. I took one of the eggs with me but it got ripped apart as I was being moved and fell onto the clothes I was wearing.


    I still couldn''t move at all, and my head fell to the side when he let go of me, but I could see him now. I felt the yolk of the egg drip down the side of my face. He was looking at me with disgust, and he wasn''t really trying to hide it either.


    He took a handkerchief that was on the table and used it to wipe my face down.


    "You''ll have to deal with the clothes yourself. You didn''t tell me why you started exercising."


    I had to wait a bit so I could swallow the egg that was in my mouth, and it was even hard to do that. After a few moments of him standing there awkwardly waiting for me to be able to speak, I finally said something.


    "I''m getting stronger."


    He grinned at me before speaking.


    "Is that right? Why are you deciding to get stronger now?"


    My voice was quieter than usual, and it sounded like I was forcing myself to breathe out while talking to him.


    "You said that I should swing the sword how I want to swing the sword."


    "I''m not sure you''re going to be swinging a sword today."


    He was still grinning at me. He was right. I had no idea what I was doing, and I wouldn''t be able to actually practice with my sword at all. I can''t swing a sword like this, I definitely can''t create a whole new style like this.


    I leaned forward again so my head would lay face down on the table and I wouldn''t have to look at him right now. Before my head actually hit the table he caught me and leaned me back on the chair like how I was.


    "I''m just teasing you. I actually am glad that you''re taking my advice so soon, I thought you''d throw a fit and hole yourself up in your room for at least a month."


    "Why would I do that? You''re just trying to help me, right?"


    He wasn''t grinning at me anymore, but instead just smiling at me. He looked like he was thinking about something. When he spoke again, his voice wasn''t how it usually was. It was lower, more like one of those old men you''d find sitting on the side of the road.


    "Yeah."


    He stuck his right hand out and put it on my head. He moved his hand around and messed up my hair, patting me on the head a few times before leaving the room while mumbling to himself.


    I do not know what that was about, but I still couldn''t move. I sat in the chair for a while and I started to inch myself back up the stairs and into my bed. After a while of stopping to lean on the wall, tripping over myself with each step, and nearly breaking my nose after the twentieth time of falling flat on my face.


    When I finally made it to my bed I was only able to stay still if I was lying down sprawled out. Any time I tried to bend my knee, move my arm, sleep on my side, or even move my head from looking straight up at the ceiling I would be reminded that my entire body is in pain.


    I laid in my bed for the entire day. Even when I was able to move slightly, it wasn''t enough for me to get back off the bed that I had just been able to throw myself onto. Even if I stood up for a few seconds I know that I''ll crumble right after that, and I''d rather be forced to lie down on something that won''t hurt me more than I already am.


    This wouldn''t work. I don''t know how long it''s going to take for me to not be like this after exercising, but I plan to increase the amount of exercise if it ever gets easier for me. I want to stick with that, so I need to change something about the exercise.


    Changing the things that I do won''t work, I need to train my entire body, and the ones that I chose help me do that best. Changing the amount that I do will make it so I don''t get the strength that I''m looking for, I need to be constantly working if I want to catch up to him.


    I would have to change the time that I was exercising, that way I wouldn''t have to worry about my entire body refusing to move after.


    Alright, the next time I''m actually able to go through with my list of exercises, I''ll do it right before I fall asleep. When I wake up in the morning, I''ll be able to practice with the sword, and then I''ll be able to do my exercises that night as well.


    However, my body refused to listen to me for a whole week. For seven whole days I was stuck barely moving myself to eat and then struggling to get back to my bed. The pain was different every day.


    For the first few days, it was some sort of pinching feeling. Every time I would move in a way that my body didn''t like, which was any way at all, it would be like someone was grabbing my legs or my arms as hard as they could like they were trying to rip my limbs off.


    After that faded, it just felt like any other ache that I''ve had, like when I slammed my knee straight into a boulder by accident and had a limp for a month. I still couldn''t move well though, and this time it hurt whether or not I was moving. It was hard for me to fall asleep.


    Finally, the next week arrived after the torture of being forced to do nothing for that long. I made sure to eat a lot that day, but I didn''t practice at all. I didn''t want to risk ruining myself before I even got the chance to go through my routine for the second time.


    The sun finally set and I got through with all of the exercises very quickly. I felt strong, and even though my body had a similar sort of pinching feeling, I didn''t fall to the floor, I didn''t have to lean on the wall.


    I went to bed excited, I can''t wait to finally see how much I''ve grown even with two nights. If I could barely move for a whole week, then I must be much stronger than before. I fell asleep easier than any night for the past seven days.


    I woke up ready for a day full of just swinging my sword.


    My body had other plans for me, and once again I could not move.