Cleaver Of Sin

Chapter 731: Training Ends [Castle Bonus - ]

The week passed in the blink of an eye. Students were brutally beaten up by Instructors in the name of training, pain tolerance building, and battle acumen refinement. But could any of them complain? Certainly not. They could only grit their teeth and hope the next training session wouldn’t be as painful as the current one.

Suddenly, they all seemed to miss and long for Instructor Mira, as her training now appeared to be the one that inflicted the least amount of pain and torture upon them.

As for Asher, he spent the entire week getting beaten up by his own Instructor. He, the greatest genius within the Zarethorne Empire, had lost throughout the entirety of the training without winning even a single match. One could only imagine how deep the Instructor’s battle experience truly was... truly, Cindralis was pulling together the absolute best of the best for their training in order to secure victory during this round of the Inter-Empire competition.

Throughout the week, Asher used various types of weapons; bows and arrows, shields, spears, whips, daggers, lances, name it. Every single day he returned with a completely different weapon to challenge his Instructor at the peak of the hill, and every single time, the Instructor was left utterly stunned, wondering how Asher could possess such understanding of various weapons despite coming into contact with many of them for the very first time.

He couldn’t help but suspect that Asher possessed a watered-down version of Instructor Jane’s talent, as he simply refused to believe sheer talent alone could become that terrifying. What was even more concerning was Asher’s learning speed and the way he replicated things after no more than two attempts as though he had invented them himself, although he had won every single match against Asher, still...

The Instructor finally seemed to understand why the Wargraves were feared, revered, and endlessly praised by so many people.

To be honest, he had actually felt relieved when the week finally passed. After all, Asher was simply too monstrous to teach comfortably. What if he eventually ran out of things to teach? Or worse, what if he lost at the hands of a child? Wargrave or not, a child was still a child. Handicap battle or not, he simply shouldn’t lose.

So yes... he was relieved, happy even, Asher’s talent had genuinely scared him far too much.

As the week passed, the students prepared themselves for their next training phase. They wondered what form of torture they would be subjected to next, but to their surprise, there was no entirely new training.

The final week was simply about repeating the three trainings they had already undergone before.

They had all assumed they would perhaps begin training their Astra Energy control, or maybe their Willpower, or perhaps dive deeper into pain resistance training, or even learn methods of breaking free from illusions and mental attacks.

But the Instructors had informed them that the best way to improve was to focus constantly upon the basics. Besides, what entirely new level of Astra Energy control could they realistically achieve within a single week even if they were taught? That would simply become a waste of precious training time.

And with that, their torture continued once again.

They spent eighteen hours training every single day, and unlike the previous weeks, the intensity and duration of their training had now been pushed to absolute extremes.

Wake up by 4 a.m. in the morning.

Arrive at the training grounds by 5 a.m.

Each training session lasted six entire hours.

The strength training ran from 5 a.m. to 11 a.m.

Next came the speed and reaction training, which lasted from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

And finally, the combat training extended from 5 p.m. all the way to 11 p.m.

The routine was maddening, it was brutal.

Everyone simply clenched their teeth as they continued to push themselves beyond their limits repeatedly. Their bodies broke apart, healed, rebuilt themselves, and were reforged anew. Skin tore apart and snapped back together repeatedly. Almost everyone barely managed to get five hours of sleep each day.

If they had been normal people, they would have collapsed long ago, fainted even, perhaps even died from such wicked training.

But their bodies were anything but normal, they were Awakeners, they were born to push their limits every single day. Although the training was extreme, it was still a controlled form of extremity carefully monitored by the Instructors.

It was dark at the moment as nighttime had arrived.

Various students could be seen running down from the peaks of their respective hills after once again losing to their Instructors, who continued maintaining their undefeated streaks. Even Thalric and Teo Swig had lost repeatedly against their own Instructors.

Bodies felt unbearably heavy, while sounds of pained breathing filled the air as they inhaled rapidly while continuing to run. The strength of the monsters they encountered increased continuously the farther they progressed, and it wasn’t merely their strength alone, their numbers increased as well.

And it wasn’t only that, Emovirae had also been thrown into the mix.

Sometimes the battles became so chaotic and brutal that monsters, beasts, and Emovirae would all begin fighting one another, or worse, form gigantic stampedes that chased the students endlessly through the hills and forests.

But if there was any consolation at all, it was the knowledge that today was the final day of training.

Because of that, every single student gave everything they had, they only needed to endure for one final day.

Tomorrow, they could finally eat until they were full, soak inside bathtubs for hours, sleep until they practically died in their sleep, admire nature peacefully, and simply enjoy life again.

Basically, they would never dare take basic comforts for granted anymore after experiencing this month of torture.

The moment the clock struck 11 p.m., the training officially ended, and Instructor Sam, who was in charge of overseeing combat training, teleported everyone into a single open space. He simply stared at their exhausted and battered bodies before speaking.

"Today marks the end of your one-month training. You will be leaving for the Thalvorn Empire in three days. Do your best to rest within the two free days you have," his tone indifferent as he floated calmly within the air.

"Secondly, congratulations on your increased strength. Although none of you made any Life Rank breakthroughs, the current version of yourselves can easily defeat the versions of yourselves from one month ago. Remember that. And lastly, make the Empire and Star Academy proud when you leave," Instructor Sam stated in finality before vanishing entirely without even entertaining the thought of answering questions.

Various students immediately began smiling and laughing excitedly, the day they would finally head to another Empire was almost here.

Asher simply rose to his feet, and like he had done throughout the past month, he merely nodded towards his friends and brother before teleporting away silently.

As for Finch, he teleported everyone back to their residential buildings completely free of charge, leaving many people stunned and shocked.

But what they didn’t realize was that although today’s service was free, a merchant would always remain a merchant, even an act of kindness from them was still a form of investment.

And with that, the one-month hellish training finally came to an end.

_____

AUTHOR’S NOTE: This author has been away because he took a three-day break to rest his mind, brain, and body. I hope you can understand, but I’m finally back.

Also, we are now ranked 12th on the Golden Tickets ranking, meaning there are only two spots keeping you away from your 60 bonus Chapters.

But... FatelessPen said that if you all can push to the 11th rank, he would get us to the 10th rank by himself, through the power of his wallet and credit card, so help support us.

You don’t have to support with only super gifts if you can’t afford it; there are other gifts that come with Golden Tickets, like Massage Chair, Dragon, and Luxury Car.

Finally, this Bonus Chapter was Sponsored by Aura Nova.

And as always, love you all to the moon and back.