Twisted Faith

Chapter 2

Sweat dripped from Athanasia's face as she finished her sixtieth lap. Lucas made her run laps around the forest to build up her stamina, endurance, and strength, so that her mana wouldn't harm her, and potentially kill her.  

Normally wizards don't have to build up their stamina and endurance, but because Athanasia had overwhelming mana that was even stronger than Claude's, she has to focus on all parts of herself to protect herself and others from her own mana.  

  Lucas could absorb her mana, so the chances of that happening are slim, but hey it's better to be safe than sorry.

" Offf, this is-" Athanasia paused to take a deep breath, trying to calm down her irregular heartbeat.

"Tiring. Yes, I know." Lucas said boringly as he floating above Athanasia.  she glared at him. "Take a short break and then do forty more laps." Athanasia mockingly repeated after him. 

Athanasia stared at him  almost pleadingly as she said, " I get that this-" Athanasia paused as she motioned to everything around her, " is to strengthen my Stamina and endurance, but  come on, is it really necessary?" She paused again "and don't people necessarily meditate to gain control of their mana or something?"

" For your first question, you'll soon learn why. " Lucas paused as he summoned a peach, " And for your second question, don't  ask me something you know the answer of?" Lucas said as he ate the peach. 

Athanasia sighed as she prepared herself to run again, tying her shoelaces, and taking a sip of water. Her foot felt numb and dirty; probably from all the blood, splinters, and mud.

 The only thing stopping her from quitting and laying down on the dirty forest floor was her goal of becoming Empress.

Finally, after a long fifty-six minutes and thirty-two seconds, she finished all of her laps. Athanasia could've sworn that for just a minute Lucas looked impressed before he returned to his usual cocky attitude. 

Lucas cockily said, " You could've done better. Take a break for an hour then we'll finish training for today." Athanasia smiled gratefully and ran off to a tree to rest. Thinking that the rest of her training would be way easier, considering that what she had just recently finished was extreme. 

But boy was she wrong.

" Athanasia your done for today," Lucas said as he handed her a bottle of water. Lucas was sure he heard her mutter finally and a few curse words directed at him, and a glare, Lucas barely kept in his laugh as he turned around, hiding his amused smile.

Although today was her first day of training she ran laps, ran through obstacles, and meditated for 6 fricking hours, and Lucas evilly said that this was just a warmup for the training that is to follow.

Athanasia's stomach soon grumbled, and fortunately, Lucas just so happened to hear that. Surprisingly, without making fun of her, which was confusing in itself, he summoned a table full of different types of food,  Athanasia stared at him awestruck for a few minutes.