Sorry it took so long for this chapter. Didn't know how i wanted to continue it exactly. NExt chapter will involve more battles and will be longer so stay tuned.

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Chapter 7-Training

When he woke too once again, Sear realized that he was no longer strapped. He tried to get up but felt immense pain going through his body.

His injuries must have not properly healed yet. Realizing this, he tried calling for someone.

“Hello?” There was a loud echo in the round room. He stayed still for minutes before he heard a door open. It creaked shut and he could hear the man’s footsteps approaching. He opened his eyes and once again saw the mage.

“Awake I see. You’ve been unconscious for 6 days. I thought you were about to die.” The man said this with a chuckle, making it seem like he wished he really was. “Now that you are awake, we can begin. My name is Herj. I am a master of dark magic.”

“As you are another wielder of dark magic, it is my duty as a master to teach you. I moved to this secluded location hoping to not do this, but somehow life never goes how I want it too.” With that, he kicked Sear off the table causing a series of painful moans to come from the ground.

Sear stood with a clear limp and walked over to the “master.” “Hell of master you are, first thing you do is pit me up against some monster and then kick me off a table?” Suddenly, the man took a step back and lashed out.

In a split second, his hand reappeared by Sear’s stomach and he was launched backwards. He collided with the wall at such a speed that it felt like he was actually just traveling through a very thick paste.

He felt his body coming out of the other side of the wall. He skipped along the ground until he came to a rest at another wall. He looked up to see a trail of blood and destruction leading right to him. He saw the man emerging from what he thought was the room he was in.

“Young kid. You act as if you know nothing of the dark arts! I will teach you through pain and torture, not through nurturing and caring.” The man spit into Sear’s face causing him to swell up with anger. He attempted to attack, and summoned a sword.

He sliced at the man’s neck. The sword was spot on, and was going to decapitate the man… when suddenly the man grabbed the sword. At the last second, his hand came up and he grabbed the sword by the edge.

Sear could do nothing but stare in silence. He thought it would have been impossible for the man to save himself. Once again, he was skipped along the ground and slamming into walls. The man once again came up to him. “Would you like to continue? A one-sided battle is sometimes fun.” He charged forwards and kicked upwards, hitting Sear directly in the chin. He went souring over the “village” he was in and when he reached the end of his ascend, began to come back down.

His body rocketed down as he could do nothing to stop himself. The hit to his chin had left him semi-unconscious and it was hard for him to move, much less use dark magic. He closed his eyes and let himself fall.

He heard a large crack and felt a jolt of pain travel down his leg. He opened his eyes once more, to see his ankle sticking out of his leg at a 90 degree angle. He looked around and realized he was now out of the town. He stood on his one leg and began to hop towards the town once more.

While he would most likely be hurt more, that man was the only other person who could use dark magic, and so was quite useful to him.

A few minutes later, he reached the man. “Ahhh, you’re back I see. Do you want to continue to get hurt or will you listen to me as your master?” The man spoke with a monotone voice, not allowing Sear to see anything past his words. Not only that, but the man’s eyes, while they were deep, felt as flat as a brick wall.

Pitifully, Sear responded. “Yes. I agree to be your apprentice and I agree to listen to from now on.”

“Good.” Herj turned back and sent one last kick at him, causing him to double over and cough out. “Go get your leg fixed by a healer and then meet me. We will train by the 10’s.” The mage walked away, leaving Sear to go find his way alone.

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An hour later, Sear had his leg fixed and was walking around the town, trying to find where he had to go. He surprisingly found out that they also used pots as their currency here. He expected it to be different.

He ended up drawing up a map of the place, as he knew he would end up getting lost. Another strange thing about this town was that since it was well underground, they didn’t use the night or day as time signs, they used burning wax to see how much time had passed. The candle would burn for a full day, and there were incisions on the candle, marking each hour that passed.

He had to be back at the mage by 10 of night and it was already past 9. He rushed towards the center of the village, the place he found out the mage lived. He made it back to the building he was punched out of, and knocked on the door.

The building was made from grey and black slabs. All of its windows were covered up with rods of iron, to give it an almost prison feel. The door was made from a hard, dark oak and was reinforced by even more iron. When he knocked on the door, he could hear the echo coming from inside.

The door opened and Herj motioned for Sear to move out of the way. “Follow me.” The mage looked him in the eyes and then began walking away from the house. He passed through a deserted street. He could see lights flickering inside of poorly build homes.

This seemed to be the poorer district of this town, which he realized he still didn’t know the name of. They continued walking along the road until they came to a stop at a bridge.

The bridge went over a large river that supplied all the water to the village.

“Here is your first task. Stay in the water for an hour. Every time you fail I will attack you with harder and harder hits. Is that understood?” The man glared at Sear as if he was ready to cook him in a barbeque.

“Yes I understand.” Sear looked at the river and then realized, how was he going to stay underwater for that long without going up to breath? He attempted to take a deep breath and just jump in. A mere 3 minutes later he came up by a natural instinct for air.

Before he could even take a breath of air, he felt his body being thrown against the bridge. He heard a small snapping noise, and when he finally fell against the ground he realized his shoulder was dislocated.

“That is your first mistake.” Herj walked over and pushed Sear’s shoulder back into place, which caused a large howl of pain to erupt from his throat. “Don’t forget, you are here to learn dark magic.” He walked away again, and watched.

Sear thought about what he said and decided to use dark magic to benefit him. He cast strengthening enchantments of his body and jumped back in. While he lasted longer, he was still short of the hour by 53 minutes. He was once against slammed into the bridge, this time only harder.

He continued to mess around with this. And a few hours later he was all scratched and bruised. He looked at the river once more and thought about what he could do.

“This is taking too long.” Herj sounded quite angry with Sear. He stood up, grabbed him and pushed him into the river, and kept him below water with magic.

Sear felt the water begin to enter his lungs, and he began to lash out, trying to grab onto anything to save himself. He could feel his mind going blank, and he allowed his powers to take control. His eyes turned dark and strange symbols appeared all over his body.

Somehow, he suddenly knew what he had to do. He summoned is dark magic and infused it into his very body, he changed his body from the inside out. After a while, he could feel that he no longer felt the water in his lungs.

He felt as if he would never need to breathe again. Once again, he blacked out.

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When he woke too, he was still underwater. He pushed himself upwards, and looked around. Herj was still there, waiting. When he looked down, he saw strange markings and glyphs covering his entire body. Once he saw them, they began to retract themselves towards his heart and vanished.

“You have been underwater for 3 hours. I guess you finally figured out how to do it?” He looked up at Sear and began to walk away. “Continue to follow me, we still have much more to do.”

Sear followed and allowed the enchantment to fade away, allowing him to breath normally again. He could still somehow remember how he did that. Instead of using air to breath, he instead managed to use his magical energy as a form of sustenance. He wondered if he would do the same with water and food. It would need to be tested later.

They walked past the river and continued on further. They eventually reached a large wall of rock. It was layered with rocks of all colors.

“Your next task will be to stretch out a perfectly flat pole of dark energy from one side of this wall to the other.” Herj summoned a large pole of energy about 10 feet long and continued to extend it until it reach the wall’s length, which was 15 meters. The pole of energy was perfectly straight, and unlike Sear’s magic, didn’t ripple along the very edge.

Sear attempted to do it. He summoned a pole of energy 10 feet long, just as Herj had. He thought that this was too easy. He continued to extend it until 20 feet. At that point, he felt it begin to push on him.

He continued to extend it, to find that the parts furthest away from him had begun to sway and he could no longer control it properly. He continued to stretch it until he reached the correct length.

“Is this good enough?” Sear talked through ragged breathes.

“Not even close.” He kicked Sear, and he lost all concentration, causing the pole to explode. “You had to make a straight line but instead you made a whip of energy. I already knew that you could do that.”

“Instead of just extending and adding, more and more energy to the pole, try to instead make a large mass of energy, and extend that same mas of energy along a large distance. While you may have much power in you, it is not refined in any way whatsoever. You are the same as a great sword that is as blunt as a club.”

He stepped back and allowed Sear to continue to try. After a few more hours, he finally managed to control it. He had a relatively straight line of energy that spread from side to side. “Uhhh, that’s good enough for now. Now, instead of allowing all that energy to be released, try to consume it all back.” Herj impatiently continued to talk. “In long fights, you will have to learn how to consume any unused energy that you have.”

Sear began to slowly shorter the rod, all the while taking in some of the energy from it. He managed it, until he got near the center. He couldn’t hold all this energy he was taking back. Once again, the pole exploded, and Sear was sent flying.

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Sear continued to do mediocre tasks for the rest of the day. He found out that he could also use his energy as sustenance instead of food and water.

By the end of the day, he was once again sent to the healers to get fixed. It seemed like this would be all he did for the next few weeks. Sear walked back to the house but decided to talk to Herj before he slept.

“Hey Herj, what will we be doing tomorrow?” Sear wanted to know how hurt he would end up getting hurt tomorrow.

“Tomorrow we will be hunting giants.” Sear couldn’t tell if he was being serious or not, but Herj made no motion to continue the chat.