Chapter 267: Astrid the Teacher

It turned out that the building did not, in fact, have any open beds. There was a room that had been left mostly empty, supplies having been briefly stored there, but now only shelves and a faint smell of wheat remained. Speaking briefly with Brighid, Astrid found that this might very well be the best option for sleeping arrangements available to the Wanderers anyways. Her parents had spent the last two months living out of a tent, both happy to leave more permanent accommodations to people with lower attributes and children.

“I was looking forward to a bed, but if we’ve got to choose between staying in here, going out at this time to try to find a place to sleep, or camping out, this seems like the best option,” Benedict said as they were shown to the room.

“It is a safe place,” Muti agreed. “It has been prepared for the protection and maintenance of supplies. That it is also located within where the leader lives is another promise of security.”

“The wards around this place are insane,” Skandr added. “They’re flexible, semi-permeable, protective, offensive, can be activated and deactivated without too much issue, and have a link to a matrix of users. At least, that’s what I can tell from what I can touch and see without prying  too far and getting fried.”

Astrid looked around. The Wanderers were the only people in the room. As soon as Astrid had given her request to the Duchess to be better than those who came before, the Golden Fist had dismissed themselves, going somewhere nearby.

“If the Wanderers are close by, they can take care of any regular problem that might come up,” Aleksandr shrugged. “Anything they can’t take care of, we’ll be close enough to notice and deal with ourselves. Continuing to remain close won’t do anyone any favors.”

Then, Miriam disappeared, leaving the rest for just a moment. Aleksandr stepped forward, closer to Astrid, and she stiffened. He wasn’t an imposing man, but knowing what she did about him combined their existing negative relationship meant that she couldn’t really trust him.

“For what it’s worth,” he said, “the way that Leah treated you was unkind, and she did it because I told her to. I’m not going to excuse myself for it, and I can’t honestly apologize and say that I think it was a bad thing. However, it is true that we weren’t wonderful teachers and she hurt your feelings. For that, I do apologize.”

Then, he walked to the door, where his party followed along. At the back, Isana drifted along, twirling her fingers through the air in a breezy goodbye. The other members followed suit, and the Wanderers were left alone with the Duchess, which had brought them to where they now prepared their sleeping arrangements.

“What do you think of that apology?” Skandr wondered once all of the beds were set up in the storage room.

“I think it doesn’t mean much,” Astrid shrugged. “It wasn’t much of an apology, and even if it was, any relationship with them moving forward would be broken and I don’t see it becoming anything more than professional.”

“I can’t say I understand what you’re getting at,” Skandr said, pulling out his chair and a small desk.

“I just mean that apologies only made once somebody ‘proves themself’ are less an admission that somebody did something wrong and more that maybe the person that they wronged is going to get stronger than they are someday. It’s just covering their own ass, not actually being apologetic.”

“Maybe,” Skandr answered, his face not seeming sure whether to agree or not. Astrid didn’t want to argue with him about it any further anyways, so she let the topic drop as he started in on the studying that he had been spending most of his time on recently. Obviously, it was something to do with his evolutionary quest, but he didn’t give any specific explanation of what it was.

In the years since the party had all met, Astrid couldn’t help but think about how much everybody had changed. So much of what everybody had that made them an individual seemed to have been stripped away over years of labor in the Dungeon. Astrid didn’t know if Skandr had gambled at all in at least a year and a half, and even before that, he hadn’t been doing it much. He didn’t drink either, so the sources of many of his problems, what had led him to joining her party in the first place, were gone. In its place sat a somewhat boring, if extremely competent, Wizard.

That wasn’t a comment on the kind of man he was. In truth, everybody had basically done the same thing. Benedict had no stories left to tell the party, so most nights were spent just playing around with his instruments. Felix had always been quiet, and he remained that, with any other aspect of his personality sanded away by constant fighting in the Dungeon. Muti was an exception to the rule among the party, even though her edges had been softened. Muti still knew what she wanted, loved fighting, most especially beating somebody. She wanted to be a mother, and a teacher. But the others, the Humans especially, seemed to have lost something.

Astrid knew that, most of all, she herself was an example of having been completely caught up in delving and losing anything that made her something more than a delver. That said, was there anything else she wanted to be? Everybody had changed, all she had done was hone the aspects of herself that she already liked and wanted to pursue.

Even with that being the case, she also knew she had been pushing too fast, and entering Mithril tier meant that she would have to train herself in new ways, to learn new Skills and train which ones she already had. Her weak Skill selection was a testament to that, and now would be a good time for her to work on that while also helping other people.

“Are you ready to see if you can teach another better than the Golden Fist did?” Muti asked. In response, Astrid chuckled.

“I can’t say that I know nearly as much as they do, but I’m actually going to tell people why they should do different things, not just tell them what to do and then insult them for not knowing the why.”

“Then we shall see whose teachings are viewed more favorably by those who need strengthening,” Muti grinned.

“It’s always a challenge with you,” Astrid said, though she also allowed herself to smile since now, just like the day before, she would have plenty of time to prove herself.

***

“See, what you’re doing now,” Astrid explained, “is just pushing harder with your arms instead of engaging your core as you strike. The reason why the blade of your axe is sliding off of the contact point isn’t just because it’s hitting strong armor. Axes are flexible, because they’re half bludgeoning weapons, half bladed. You can talk to Felix more about how to use an axe specifically, but I’ll tell you right now, your issue here is the strength and precision of your hit. Since you’re looking to get a better finishing move, make sure you’re delivering a hit with your entire strength.”

The mid-Iron tier man named Nathaniel she was teaching was a man probably 15 years her senior. He had threads of gray in his hair, and he’d explained that he was, originally, a Forester. It was a Class that was half lumberjack, half slightly magical farmer, but when the war began, he returned from a trip into a nearby forest to find his village had been captured, and taken to, presumably, be forced into slavery.

At that point, he’d been a high Bronze tier, but found the Duchess, joined in under her, and spent a month trying to use his much more peaceful, conservation-focused Skills in battle. His tool of choice had always been a saw, something much more precise, but he’d started his process as a fighter with throwing hatchets. Apparently, it was a trick he picked up over the years of being alone in the forest, and it had given him enough confidence to start killing monsters. From there, he found he preferred the less precise actions of an axe to those of a sword. Doubly so, because his Class Skills had been well suited to an axe, and not at all to a sword.

Now, Nathaniel was dedicated to his new Class, Arboreal Axeman, which was a slightly more magically inclined Class than it might have appeared by name. He was moving mana through his body as much as he could, and was struggling balancing that with continuing to better use his axe as a weapon instead of a more ordinary tool. Under her direction, he better settled his stance and, with an overhand blow, swung the axe into the training dummy’s armor.

A crisp clang rang out over the training area, and Astrid could tell, even just by the sound, that he’d done just what he intended.

“Yes, just like that,” she nodded. “After doing that three times in a row, try to pull Power- and Fortitude-aligned mana through your arms as you strike. I’ll direct you if you’d like.”

“Yes,” he nodded back, squaring his shoulders. With both hands on the haft, he squared his stance and did just that. Nearby, a handful of other people were training with weapons, most against training dummies, though there was a pair sparring against each other with Felix keeping an eye on them.

Today, the first one since the Wanderers had started to help the Duchess’s army, had been spent like this, with Nathaniel being the latest specific protégé Astrid was in the process of teaching. By now, midday, she’d made good progress, and was surprised at how basic certain pieces of information she needed to reemphasize with these trainees were. Of course, she’d spent a decade being trained by her mother and other guards, and that before she gained her Class. She had muscle memory of generally how to swing a weapon, even though she ended up with a hammer instead of a blade, as she had anticipated. In the case of Nathaniel, he had only relatively recently gotten his Axemanship Skill, and Astrid was pushing him not to only rely on the Skill to direct his movements.

With the third clean ringing of metal in a row, Astrid knew to move onto the next part, and she continued teaching Nathaniel. She moved through the thoughts behind a finishing move, and, unfortunately, Nathaniel continued to fail to quite grasp it. Instead of getting frustrated, though, Astrid had a thought cross her mind. As it did, she smirked a little and gestured for him to step back.

“I’m going to show you what my finishing Skill is,” she said, raising her voice and deliberately gesturing for the other people who were training nearby to come close. The spar immediately ended as Felix gestured for his two protégés to do as Astrid said. After just a few short seconds, nearly two dozen people drew closer and closer to her, and Astrid mentally thanked her past self for experimenting exactly what this Skill could do. Knowing what she knew now, she could very easily have accidentally killed somebody in this display if she unthinkingly pushed a bung of her mana into this.

“My Class is an eventual branch off of the initial Warrior Class,” she explained, not for the first time today. “It is a Class that is focused on damage, and several of my Skills carry strong areas of effect, even if that isn’t their focus. My finishing Skill is one of those, where its focus isn’t an area of devastation, but it’ll be dangerous since it can certainly spread quite a bit further than the direct point of contact.”

As she said it, Astrid walked around and gestured for how far away everybody needed to stand. Once people got to where she knew they could all be safe, she gestured for them to take an extra step, just to be sure. A few of the youngest people seemed reluctant to step as far back as she said, at least fifteen meters away from where the actual Skill would occur, but their wiser, more experienced companions didn’t hesitate to grab their foolish friends by the ear or yank them by the nape of the neck.

“My Skill has two different things that it can do. The first aspect is a baseline enhanced hit, and for an additional mana cost, I can also infuse it with an element. I’m going to use my Skill twice, to show you what the two different aspects are. After that, I can continue to work with you to try to learn whatever different Skill options you might be interested in yourselves. Is that clear?”

Astrid had already shown that she was willing to take questions, and one of the eager youngsters raised a hand quickly. Astrid found that she considered him a boy, even though she was relatively sure he was at least her same age, if not a few years her senior.

“Why don’t you teach us exactly how to get your Skill?” he asked. “You’re, so far as I know, the youngest Mithril tier like ever, so wouldn’t it be best for all of us to try to get these same Skills that you have?”

“They’re good Skills,” Astrid nodded. “At the very least, I certainly think they’re pretty good. This Skill specifically is an upgraded form of the Smite Skill, if you’ve heard of it.”

“What kind of Smite?” the boy asked, his face excited.

“Smite,” she answered, smiling right back.

His eyebrows went up and he seemed to want to ask another question, but Astrid continued, “To answer your question, though, I can’t train you specifically to gain a Skill that you want. There’s no way to know what the Great One’s going to offer someone. I can train you to be qualified to get a general kind of Skill, but who knows which ones specifically are going to be offered to you? My first ever offering for a finishing Skill was, if I’m not mistaken, Overhand Blow. Unremarkable, weak, and I didn’t take it. For you, you should get Skills that you want. If you see a part of my Skill that you really like, maybe you start practicing to get something like that. Now, I’ll answer more questions after it’s done, but first, let me give you the demonstration so you can ask better questions.”

After that, everybody went quiet again, as Astrid looked at the clearing in the training field she had planned on using as her demonstration. Now, the question was, how hard would it be to fix the crater it left behind? The Skill’s description said that Meteoric Smite left a crater, and it wasn’t wrong. No matter how careful she was, this was going to make a big mark. As she looked, somebody moved past her into the arena. Just as Astrid was about to say something, to get them to leave, Felix’s frame swelled until he was a head taller than Astrid himself. His equipment was settled firmly on his body, even his helmet on, and he cocked his head in a wordless invitation to use him.

“Felix is more than tough enough to take my attack,” she said, smiling at him, and thanking him. “That said, I don’t wanna accidentally hurt my friend, so I’m not going to use my hammer for this. In my case, I simply need to designate something as a weapon, which will be my fist. Now, like I said, I’m going to use my Skill twice, the first time without infusing any attribute of mana into it and the second time using both parts.”

Felix braced himself, his shield braced against his shoulder as he waited for her attack. Out of habit, Astrid almost rushed as fast as she could go, but instead, she held back, slowly cocking her right fist as she pushed only the smallest amount of mana required to activate the Skill into her hand. Designating her fist as the “meteor” and her friend’s shield as the “crater,” she threw what was intended to be a pretty casual punch towards Felix. However, because of the way that the Skill worked, just as she started to move, the pull between the shield and her fist increased more and more, until, with still half a meter between her hand and her target, she was pulled to fully commit to the strike.

The bones of her knuckles creaked, not quite in pain, but definitely in protest, as her punch made contact. The sound of a gong seemed to echo through the area, even though Felix’s shield was made entirely of living wood. Felix’s mana fought to resist her attack, and a shockwave pulsed over the area, blowing back shards of wood as the fully kinetic blow forced Felix to ease back to weaken the strike.

As the sound echoed through the training grounds, where hundreds of soldiers practiced with dozens of teachers, an oppressive silence settled over everybody. Faces turned towards Astrid’s display, and she felt a swell of pride in what she was able to do and show off now.

Instead of continuing to acknowledge the others who now had their attention drawn to her, Astrid returned to the people who were her students and said, “Now, this time, I’m going to infuse the attack with mana. Do you have a preference on which type I might use, Felix? Something that’s visible, but won’t be too hard to deal with?”

“Anything is fine,” he answered. She could hear the faint smile in his voice as he said it. “Maybe ice, because it’s much less likely to impede somebody’s ability to see.”

“Brilliant,” Astrid nodded. Now that they’d seen what the first part of the Skill could do, her students had gone from silently watching to still as statues. Other people slowly crept closer, and one of the people in Astrid’s training squad, a high Iron guard, jogged over to make sure that the perimeter was maintained.

With a smile, she slowly cocked her fist just as she had the first time, this time spending the extra mana to infuse the strike with ice. Looking at Felix, she quickly and quietly asked, “Is it alright if I push harder?”

“Since you gave me that warning, yes, it’s fine,” he laughed. His burst Skill remained active, but Astrid could feel the mana flow through his body under his command as he fortified his body and stance.

Moving at about the same speed, Astrid started again, though this time, she settled her feet better, twisted with her whole hips, and then, as Meteoric Smite compelled her to move faster and harder, she grunted with effort. Her fist smashed into the shield, a burst of ice coalescing over her fist and coating the shield. The wood cracked under her fist, as Astrid’s Skill fought to destroy the defense. Of course, it was unable to, and, as a faint mist burned away in the summer sun, Astrid returned and looked at her students.

“Now, what are your questions?”

A flurry of hands raised in front of her, and Astrid didn’t try to hide the grin as she started answering them with Nathaniel.