A Spontaneous Story

Chapter 19: Training

Rin sat up with a startle. His short nap had brought on a strange nightmare. He saw a man clad in black and red armor in front of him, killing Rex, and he couldn't even move. He was stuck watching his dragon friend being cut down in front of his eyes. Rex never fought back, it was as if he was protecting something with his life, but Rin couldn't tell what it was.

He came back to reality when he felt the soft cushion of his bed under him. It was a basic-looking bed, but it was very comfortable. The wood of the floor was stretched upwards into a rectangle that had been cut out to fit the mattress inside of.

He walked out of his room and onto the wooden ring. There weren't any other sounds except for the thud of a dragon's wings. They must be practicing flying up top, Rin thought to himself. He walked to the spiraling staircase and went up the ever-exhausting twenty floors to the wooden platform that led to the outside.

Raven and Aya were standing at the back of the platform while Rex was preparing to fly out into the open. He spread his wings out and leaned down in a way that Rin hadn't seen before. "Good, now focus putting your energy into your back legs and pushing yourself off." Raven instructed.

Rin could see the muscles in Rex's back legs tighten and expand as he pushed his legs downward, trying to get as much force behind them as possible. "Now throw yourself into the air without stopping yourself with your wings."

He brought his wings tight to his side as Rin noticed that he wasn't wearing his armor. Aya must have taken it off. He bent down even further and shot off of the platform, making it vibrate viciously. The wood creaked under the pressure, Rin, thinking it was about to break, walked back into the inside of the tree.

Rex was twenty feet in the air before he finally spread his wings and allowed himself to glide out and circle around. He landed back on the platform, "How was that?" he asked curiously.

"Better than last time, but it still needs work. You'll have to train just as much as Rin needs to, though, yours will be much different." Raven turned her head to Aya, "Aya, would you take the boy to the sparring room?"

"Of course." she smiled back, "Come on then, Rin. It's just twenty-five more floors above us."

Rin scowled at her words, twenty-five more floors! You can't be serious.

Oh, I am serious. She broke into his mind, making his head throb again.

"Please tell me there's training to get rid of this pain in my head." he said, holding his hand to his forehead.

"Why yes, there is. We won't cover that until after we focus on physical combat though." she said with a smirk, "You'll just have to endure."

"This is for earlier today, isn't it?" Rin couldn't tell what time it was, the light was always constant inside of the tree.

"How did you know?" she asked sarcastically.

Rin muttered to himself, "This should be fun..."

As Rin trudged up the stairs he could feel himself starting to slow down and couldn't keep up with Aya's constant, breathless pace. He envied her endurance and wonder what it would be like to be able to go so far without even the slightest hint of fatigue.

They reached the fort-fifth floor, Rin struggling for air, held the wall in his efforts. Aya standing proudly in front of him, "Come on, that's all you can do? You're going to need more training than I thought." she sighed, "I suppose it can't be helped. You shall walk up these stairs to this floor every morning from now on. After your training is finished, you will go back down to your room as quickly as you can. There is no time to waste on a silly lack of endurance."