Chapter 2: Cursed tome (1) |
Neave woke up and felt… Good, if a little sore.
He felt like he’d had a lovely night's rest. His mind was still hazy from last night, and he had absolutely no idea where he was. As he opened his eyes, he met… The ground.
Dirt.
Pale and well-trodden with a few stones here and there. His sight was blurry, and he looked around. He didn’t see anything except for a seemingly endless stretch of dirt. His vision was too blurred to see what lay beyond the sea of soil.
As his eyes slowly regained focus, he noticed the sun was setting. And when his eyes fully cleared, he realized exactly where he was. He was precisely in the middle of his sect's courtyard. And judging by the position of the mountain their sect was built around, the sun wasn’t setting.
It was rising.
Clap, clap, clap…
He turned around and saw Marven standing behind him with a bright smile.
“How impressive. Honestly, I’m shocked. To think you wouldn’t even wait for the night to fall before you made your escape, bravo. Such decisiveness is worthy of praise.”
“Oh, well, the healing pill I gave you may or may not have also been a sleeping pill that was supposed to prevent you from getting funny ideas. As well as put you to sleep on time. If you stayed up as late as usual, there’s no way you’d be rested enough to train properly.”
Neave’s stomach sank.
He had felt that his father catching up to him was a distinct possibility, but he hadn't expected something like this. His father, the well-respected and wise sect master of the Zearthorn sect, looked like a devil to him.
“Well then, I think it is time to begin your training.”
***
Neave was a master at not allowing himself to be forced into anything he didn’t want to do. He had demonstrated this skill by braving hundreds of beatings until he was finally exempt from the daily training. Unluckily for him, his father was a master at getting people to do exactly what he wanted them to do.
He first wanted Neave to start running, but Neave simply refused. Then Marven pulled out a small stone golem from one of his dimension rings. Golems were quite frightening monsters, usually. But wild golems, which were monsters, were very different from artificial ones.
Neave was shocked to see his father use something as precious as an artificial golem to get him running. He frowned as he inspected it. It was relatively small and had frog-like legs and long, thin arms.
After putting his hand on the gem exposed on its forehead, Marven grabbed the little golem by the neck. It suddenly jolted and looked like it was trying to free itself from his grasp.
“Alright, Neave, here is how it will go. This little toy here is an artificial golem. I’ve commanded it to chase you, and if it catches you, it will mercilessly smash your crotch into bits.”
Neave scoffed.
That was undoubtedly a bluff. And if it wasn't a bluff by some miracle, he was sure his father would regret doing something like that to him. The moment Marven released the golem, it bolted straight toward Neave. Neave panicked but restrained himself from running, certain it was a bluff.
It wasn’t a bluff.
The golem caught up with him and, as his father had said, mercilessly smashed his crotch into bits. Neave puked several times and almost passed out. His father let him simmer in pain a bit and then handed him a potent healing pill.
It fixed him up in seconds, a testament to its power. Neave could swear on the heavens that he felt his little friend was leaning a bit more to the right than it had been before.
“Alright then, you have about five seconds, and then we begin with round two.”
Neave wasn't calling his bluff a second time.
***
Neave had tried to defy his father the same way he had all the times before. But no matter how he resisted, Marven had the tools to force Neave’s hand.
After he forced him to run to near-death levels of exhaustion, Marven just handed Neave yet another undoubtedly costly healing pill and a small food pill to keep him going. The food pill was much less bitter than the ones handed out to disciples.
“Now that you’ve finished running, it is time to do some pull-ups!”
Neave whimpered a bit. Marven pulled an object out of his dimension ring. He kept some sort of metal bar in the air with qi manipulation. Then he told Neave to grab it. Neave refused, but when gripping the bar and holding onto it for dear life became the only escape from the crotch-smasher, Neave obeyed. Once Neave held onto the bar, Marven lifted the bar further up into the air.
“Alright, now, we’re starting with the second exercise. The metal bar will keep getting hotter and hotter, and the only way to cool it down is if you do a pull-up.”
There was no way this bar was anything but a regular metal bar that Marven kept afloat with his admittedly impressive qi manipulation. However, there was no bluff to call this time.
The metal was already burning his palms.
***
After he had to do push-ups and squats under similar threats, Neave was just about ready to die. Breathing raggedly and sitting on the floor, Neave swallowed his fifth healing pill and looked up at his father.
“Can we please just stop for today?”
Marven pretended to be considering his question. Either way, they were done for today because Neave would probably die if he swallowed another healing pill, even with their superior quality.
“I suppose we could.”
Neave heaved a sigh of relief.
He looked around and noticed several disciples were watching them train, keeping a respectful distance from the spectacle. Bullying Neave was one thing. Interrupting the sect master was another. Their obvious jealousy at Neave’s special treatment was a sure sign that Neave’s beatings would get worse.
Neave tried to adopt as serious an expression as he could manage. He threw one arm over his knee, folded his other leg under it, and looked up at his father. His father's amusement, however, just made him feel like a pathetic child.
“I want to discuss something with you, father.”
“Indeed? And what may that be?”
“Make me the head librarian. At least for the first floor.”
Marven's eyebrows shot up, and he asked Neave in genuine surprise.
“Exactly why would you want me to do that?”
“How much do you know about the books on the first floor?”
“I know their general contents. The books placed into the library first go through my hands.”
“Well, have you read all the books?”
Marven replied as if it were obvious.
“No. Why would I read through all of the books? I may make it look easy, but being a sect master is rather time-consuming.”
“Too consuming to properly check the books?”
“I already told you I do inspect them.”
“No, you don’t.”
Marven’s eyebrow twitched.
“And exactly why do you think that?”
“Well, for starters, I’ve read every book in the library.”