12th of Month of Snowflakes.

“Brother! Brother! Look! Look! I can now do roundhouse kick. Here I go, brace yourself Arvind!!!”

“Stop! Stop it, right there, Asha!! You don’t kick your brother!!!”

“Pftt!!!”

“Ahhh!! Brother, brother, help me!! Asha wants to kill me!!”

“Waahhh!!! Help me big bro, Aslak is hitting me!!!”

“What!!!”

“Aslak!!!”

“I'm not! Believe me!! This is cheating!!!!”

“Wauuu!!”

…

In the Great Courtyard, which was used to be a training ground for Aslak and Felix, was now almost a playground for 6 children, two of them were Aslak and Felix. Aslak was wearing a silvery scale-mail armor, while Felix was wearing a huge black Knight suit of armor and was moving quite rigidly in the crowd of children.

In the part of children, there were three girls, two almost 5yrs old and the third only 2yrs old. The two five-year old were, Asha and Jasmine. Asha was the girl with a slightly darker complexion with long legs and skinny hands, granting her an extraordinary stamina and agility without reducing her strength in the least bit. Infact, her sleek hands packed quite a slap if she really wanted it and wondrously, she is almost half the size of Felix, which was almost 3feets tall. It was considerable for a girl of her age. She had the same black eyes and the cheerful personality like her mother, Lady Aarti.

Jasmine, on the other hand, had black hair, pale white skin and looked very weak from a single glance, but this didn’t hide her mischievous smile which she hid. She wasn’t as skinny as Asha or Arvind but she was a lot shorter than all of them and would get bright red for any simple amount of work. Therefore, instead of playing, she would always either read and study the Arts of Governance or take care of her younger sister, Erika.

She held another baby on her back, who surprisingly had white hair. The baby, who was 2yr old, had a large head with pure white hair, large hazel eyes and baby pink skin. She looked at everything around her with a curious gaze and always had a bright smile on her face. She is Erika, Felix’s own sister.

After, Lady Faye returned two years ago, she was diagnosed pregnant, giving a shock to all the inhabitants of Cainhorn Castle. Infact, she returned in a half-insane state. It was completely unimaginable what kind of torture she had gone through in that 6months and quite frankly, Felix wasn’t in any mood of bringing it up.

The last and only boy other than Felix and Aslak was Arvind and he was a bit of a scaredy cat. In height, he stands right in between Asha and Jasmine and he, too, is very skinny and nimble, but not quite as much as Asha. He, like Aslak had a keen interest in archery and would be the best target of Aslak’s bullying during training. Infact, he is the only one who always gets bullied by Aslak in the end, because all the girls are dangerous.

Asha could very well give him a good tight slap, Jasmine could easily pile false charges on him and Erika, being just an infant could easily annoy him by either taking his cap or biting his hands. The last person on the courtyard was Sir Loann, who was sitting silently on the bench with a small smile on his face. But unlike two years ago, Sir Loann now had a lot of white hairs and he also looked quite weak and tired. He observed the blissful scene of the kids playing and fighting with each other, without interfering at all, even though it was training time for Aslak and Felix.

As they were playing, Lady Yasmina entered the courtyard and tapped on the iron railing with her ring.

Ting! Ting! Ting!

“Alright now, kids. Its now time for education. Pack your things and come to my office in exactly…10mins.”

“Awww!!” replied Asha, but even she knew that nothing can shake Lady Yasmina’s iron will. Dejected, she waved goodbye to Sir Loann, Felix and Aslak. Jasmine had already hopped merrily to Felix, handed him Erika and then went to her mother, because among all of them, she is the one with the greatest love for education and knowledge. Arvind had followed beside her, afraid that his sister or Aslak might pull some dirty tricks on him. Felix and Aslak waved them goodbyes.

…

“Alright now, you guys. Practice harder because I’ve nothing more to teach you. Oh! By the way, Aslak you should try to aim a bit lower and try to exert as much force as you can, in order to penetrate Knight armor. Don’t let your father’s Blue Archery go to waste and also, you still haven’t penetrated that old armor. How useless can you be?” he smiled at Aslak.

“Uh… that… the armor is too thick…” Aslak said pointing to the same armor which he had been given almost 4 years ago, the only difference between that and this armor was that this armor had a layer of white ice all over it and countless dents on its breastplate.

The ice was due to Aslak’s father, Julian’s signature archery technique, Blue Archery, which utilizes the battle Qi of the archer and coats the tip of the arrow in a deadly frost which could potentially give frostbite to the enemies. It is marked by its signature blue hue when it crosses the battlefield and that’s why it’s called Blue Archery. It is an uncommon piece of archery technique and is well treasured by Julian and his predecessors.

Sir Loann then turned to Felix and said, “Keep practicing, kid. I’ve got nothing to teach you anymore. Now, if you need to get stronger, you need to pick stronger opponents and keep practicing the basics. Seek out the monsters of the Cainhorn Wilds, if you dare. Take care of your sister.” He sighed weakly and silently walked back into the Castle. Aslak pouted and said to Felix, “Demon Loann is seriously generous to you, siblings. By the way, was that a pass to enter the Cainhorn Wilds?”

“Boo!!” replied Erika from Felix’s hands and waved her hands cutely at Aslak, as if trying to reprimand him.

“Haha! Aslak, I’ve said this before, he likes you more and that’s why he is still teaching you archery. He has basically given up on me. As for going into Cainhorn Wilds, I'm not so sure. I will check on it later.”

Aslak rolled his eyes and replied, “Only because, you’ve mastered the Black Wolfe Technique completely. Man, I seriously wanna beat that guy who told that you are talentless. Guh! Anyway, I will give another try to beat the crap outta this piece of sh*tty armor, so, if you also wanna practice, put Erika down somewhere she won't get hurt.”

“Yea, yea!” Felix rolled his eyes. Aslak smiled, gave a European bow directed towards Erika and turned towards the almost-blue armor.

Twang! Twang! Twang!

Felix looked at Aslak who kept on hitting the same point of the armor with his arrows, which were partially covered in a blue hue. Aslak used the concept of concentrating fire on a same point, which was the most effective way of piercing a target, but the armor was so densely made that it was simply impossible to penetrate. Even after firing almost 200-400 steel arrows the armor breastplate was still intact and Felix and Aslak doubted of what this armor was made. But Aslak was as determined and stubborn as Felix when he’s practicing swordsmanship and refused to give up.

“Die!!!”

With a warcry, Aslak kept on battering the worn-out armor. Felix shrugged his shoulders and smiled brightly at his sister, Erika and asked her, “Wanna see the great Grey Canal, little Princess?”

“Ya!!” replied Erika quite intelligently at him.

…