“Of course not!” the half human half halfling man said. He raised his arms, fists clenched, and pumped them backwards. “If anything, your speech has only increased the fire burning inside of me!”

Aleister felt a bit wearied out by his enthusiasm and even was a bit surprised. He pegged him to have been the first to leave and even the least interesting of the bunch, but as he looked at the man’s shimmering eyes, Aleister realized he was wrong and underestimated the man.

“I’m sure you picked us out of all the applicants for the reason, so you would understand what I am giving up to be here,” the middle-aged man said.

“I don’t have anywhere to go or anything to do,” the half-elf said. “So of course I choose to stay.”

Malozar said nothing for a moment. “My answer is the same.”

Aleister nodded and turned around. “None of them left, just like I predicted.”

Luo Yun walked up and rested his hand on Aleister’s shoulder. “I’m glad to see it.”

“Do we start our training right now?” the young man asked.

“Of course you do. But brace yourselves. You cannot anticipate the torturous first assignment.”

“Stop trying to scare us and hurry up!” the half-elf said.

Aleister tilted his head. “Luo Yun, give them their assignment. And none of you may back out now.”

Luo Yun grinned. ‘Are you sure you want to start them with that?"

“Of course. What else are they here for?”

“I’m serious, all of this ominous talking is getting on my nerves.”

“Well then, here’s your first lesson,” Aleister said. “Patience is key. And because of your impatience, I’ve actually decided to punish all of you. That’s right, all of your actions will affect each other. Use this as motivation.”

“What kind of punishment do you want to give them?” Luo Yun asked.

“Since the lesson here is patience, then its quite simple. I require all of you to stand here in this room until I deem your time to be up.”

Luo Yun walked past the group and pulled on the blind. Darkness eclipsed the room. “I know at least one of you ha some sort of division, but that’s ok.” He walked back, next to the door.

“Remember, none of you are allowed to move or leave. And with that note, I will see you in a few days.”

“Days?” a confused cry rang out. Aleister assumed it belonged to the half-elf, but it could have belonged to the half-human too.

“Glad to see you’re on the same page as me,” Aleister said, dusting his hands and taking a relaxed lean against the wall.

“What’s the point of having disciples if you can’t have a little of fun?” Luo Yun shrugged. “Besides, I shoved all the papers into the storage room. So, I need the time to sort them out.”

“Just let them deal with it,” Aleister said through a yawn. “It’s not like I have anything better for them to do for now, anyway.”

“What happened to the magnanimous Aleister from a few minutes ago that delivers an awe-inspiring speech?” Syn asked. “Although, I have to admit, this was an entertaining twist that I didn’t expect.”

“That was the emotional Aleister. This, is the calm and calculative Aleister.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Anyway, like I said, I still need to come up with an actual torturous routine for them. Ugh, that’s going to take a bit of thinking.”

“You aren’t actually going to leave them in there for days, are you?” Luo Yun asked. “Because, I think that might be extreme.”

“I’m only going to leave them in their for a few hours because your closing of the blinds was genius.”

“I don’t think it was that genius. I just wanted to use the dark to scare them a bit. Like that tingly feeling on their leg? Maybe it’s a roach or centipede crawling up their body? A small amount of paranoia never—well, I will not finish that, because it most certainly has.”

“Yes! And not only that, but since they don’t have access to light, they don’t actually know how much time has passed. So we should change into a fresh pair of clothes. Then when I open the door, they actually think several days have passed.”

“Wait, this plan is actually on the verge of being full out evil and sadistic. I can’t believe this. It’s only the first day and you’re already torturing your disciples,” Syn pointed out.

“This is their training. You tortured me during it too.”

“Of course I did. I’m not saying I disagree with your methods, but at least I waited a few weeks.”

“Yeah, but at the time I was injured and recovering from a major injury. So obviously if you’re tortured me in that state, I would have actually died instead of feeling like death.”

“Still, I do feel like this is slightly hypocritical considering everything you said to them.”

“Nope. I said their training would be torturous and put through the ringer, and that’s exactly what I’m doing. Besides, its only a few hours. And this way, they have a few hours to think about my question. Even though they all agreed verbally, I need them to have actually agreed, so if anything we can consider this test of their willpower to continue. And I once again obtain the moral high ground in this situation. Ah...it feels good.”