She Who Knew All (FE3H)

12. Training

Since it was now officially the start of the day, I made my way to the training grounds, which only opened after the first bell of the day rang.

I had left my own sword in my dorm room since I wanted to practice with a wooden version and had little to no real experience with an actual sword.

And so, here I was, sitting down with a book on swordsmanship, because despite being able to use it properly, I still had zero idea how it actually worked.

Sure, reading about it wouldn't do the same thing as actually swinging the sword itself, but at this point, I didn't even know how to do the most basic of practice swings.

I sighed.

I guess simply knowing how to do it without ever actually learning it had its downsides. Who knew?

Turning the page, I felt eyes on me but chose to ignore them, as it was pretty obvious why they were staring at me.

Turning the page again, I heard a loud sigh from behind me, causing me to jump.

"Gah! When did you even get there?" I said, clutching my chest as I turned to see Felix.

"I've been here the whole time. I was doing warm-ups." He said, picking up a practice sword from the weapons rack.

"But that aside, why are you reading about swordsmanship from a beginner's manual?" He asked.

I froze.

Actually, how do I explain this?

I can't just say I magically learned swordsmanship one day. That would raise too many questions!

I laughed awkwardly before shutting the book, keeping the page number in mind.

"Just going back over the basics. You can never be too good at them." I said, as Felix gave me a look that screamed of doubt.

"Right... Well, since you're here, why don't we have a little match to see who's stronger?" He asked, deciding to put that topic to the side for now, much to my relief.

"Sure, I haven't fought an actual person in a while." I said, thinking back to my literal first swordfight, back when I woke up on that hill and met everyone for the first time.

Looking over the different sized practice swords, I grabbed one that just about matched my usual sword, hoping that would help me a little.

Felix was a tough opponent, and I wasn't stupid enough to try and handicap myself for a fight with him, even if it was just training.

Weighing the practice sword in my hands, I nodded before heading into the open space of the training grounds.

Since it was just us and some students doing weapons maintenance in the back, we had the whole practice grounds to ourselves.

"Any rules I should be aware of? I wasn't trained formally, so I don't know the etiquette... If there is any, that is." I said as he shook his head.

"First to get a fatal strike wins."

"Alright, sounds simple enough." I said, nodding as we got into our places.

Readying my stance, I watched as he did the same.

Zoning in on his own stance, I tried to see if I could find any weak spots like the book had said but sadly found none.

Meanwhile, Felix was doing something similar.

'He's ikely judging me for my poor stance...' I thought, a bit upset.

"Not a stance I've seen before, but it doesn't have any weak spots. Good job." He said, causing me to do a double take.