Gates to Infinity The Novel Series Ash and The Night Fury

chapter 3 focus on the concentration

"Have you study?" Nick asked as soon as the recruits entered the arena, he was disappointed when Ash told him how Joseph, Camerin, and Lucas left without reading the book he told them to, Cynthia, Astrid, and Mike already read the book before so he spared them.

The teens, aside from Mike and Cynthia, froze on the spot. They looked at him with wide eyes, while Cynthia and Mike looked curious why Ash wasn't with Nick in the ring. "I've read it seven times, Nick!" Mike said excitedly with a wide grin on his face.

"I read it twice." Cynthia added, "Once when I was 13 and I read it again before the first day of the training".

Nick nodded approvingly at them, he looked at the rest with a questioning look. "Why would you read a book when you can just kill the dragons?" Joseph asked to try and defend himself, Camerin and Lucas nodded their heads eagerly in agreement.

Nick smirked deviously at them, "You lot aren't going to fight dragons today ." He announced as he motioned for them to follow him, the teens looked at each other in confusion before following him out of the arena and into the forest.

They walked deep into the forest until they arrived at a big clearing where a pile of axes and sacks were in the center of the clearing, they also saw Ash leaning on a tree with his arms crossed, beside him were a row of target board nailed on the trees.

Ash walked over to them and motioned for the pile of sacks, "Take one, each of you." He said simply before going to sit under one of the trees behind them.

"You heard the Legendary Hero." Nick said as he joined Ash, "Take one of those sacks".

"For what?" Astrid asked in confusion as she looked at them with a raised eyebrow.

"Just do it as I told you." Nick said shortly. The teens except Cynthia shrugged before each took a sack, a frown of confusion was on their faces as they did so. "Run around the clearing while carrying those sacks, keep running until you couldn't run anymore." The teens looked at him with wide eyes filled with disbelief.

"What?!" Joseph exclaimed in disbelief, "Why are we doing this?!".

"Yeah!" Lucas protested, "We are supposed to learn how to kill dragons!".

"You are going to train for endurance, strength and accuracy." Ash explained to them as he had enough of their complains, "You need stamina to fight evenly against dragons, so running while carrying those sacks would be the perfect way to train your endurance and stamina." He then motioned to the axes and target board, "You will later throw those axes and try to hit the target board, it will help with your strength and increase your accuracy, you will need them if you plan to catch a dragon using a bola".

"Oooh." The teens said as they finally understand the reason for the training.

"Not just that though." Nick added silently with a devious grin on his face.

The teens ran around the clearing while carrying the sacks for as long as they could. Mike was the first to collapse in exhaustion, his size was a disadvantage for him as it's harder and more tiring to run with a big body instead of a slim one. Camerin and Lucas were racing each other and tried to outrun each other, they waste their energy because of that and collapse at the same time. Astrid and Joseph last longer than the rest, but Astrid didn't have enough training for endurance and collapse a few laps after the twins. Joseph last the longer, but he only managed to run another lap before collapse as well and the last one is Cynthia she last very longer, she ran 20 laps.

"Ash?" Nick asked once all the teens collapse in exhaustion.

"Mike had run 5 laps, Camerin and Lucas managed to run 8 laps, Astrid is halfway to the 11 laps, Joseph is 12, and Cynthia is 20." Ash answered as he looked at his note book, he was keeping track for how many laps the teens except Cynthia managed to reach before falling in exhaustion.