Chapter 11: Not again
"I saw her smile when Faron collapsed last week."
"She did!"
"I heard she once ran with the Silverfang Legion for three days straight without stopping."
"That explains everything."
Elion barely listened. His lungs burned, his legs trembled, but he kept going.
His pace was steady, not fast, not slow. Just enough to survive.
Sweat dripped down his face.
His shirt clung to him.
Every breath scraped his throat raw, but there was sothing fierce behind his exhaustion, a quiet fla that refused to go out.
I used to stop here, he thought, passing the half-hour mark. Right about now, I’d get a cramp. Hide my weakness behind a limp. But not today.
He pushed harder. The changes in him were like a blessing.
Before, he would feel like his body had been injected with liquid tal at this point, but now, even though he definitely felt tired already, Elion also felt that he would be able to go on for much longer.
Of course, Selene noticed.
Her sharp eyes narrowed as he passed her station again.
The boy who used to shuffle like a ghost now ran with sothing different, sothing alive.
His form wasn’t perfect, far from it, but his determination was unmistakable.
He didn’t look like he was about to die at any mont.
Which was surprising, considering that only two days had passed since their last session. How can a person change this much in forty-eight hours?
As a physical training expert and a beastnt who spent the majority of her life doing physical training, she was well inford about the limits and growth curves of a mortal body, and the rate at which Elion’s body had changed was not normal.
Still, it’s not like I know everything I know there is to know about this world.
She crossed her arms, lips twitching into a rare, approving grin.
"That’s more like it," she muttered.
An hour in, the gym reeked of sweat and fatigue.
Students were dropping like flies, collapsing against the wall, or slowing to desperate jogs.
Selene’s voice cut through the chaos like steel. "DON’T YOU DARE STOP! This is where strength is forged! Not in your comfort, but in your pain!"
Groans answered her.
"Soone tell her pain doesn’t make you stronger, it just makes you hurt!"
Lira gasped. Even though she was a catkin, Lira was one of the many who specialised solely in being a mage and took pride in it.
It was obvious she never took physical training seriously.
"Keep talking, and I’ll make sure you hurt!" Selene shot back, sharp ears twitching.
That shut everyone up.
Elion’s breath ca ragged now, his vision tunneling.
His legs felt heavy as stone.
But every ti he thought of slowing, he rembered the dungeon, William, the fall, the darkness pressing in, the helplessness, the laughter of those who’d called him weak.
He thought back to the many monts when he was tornted by William, the rage he felt, the weakness when he realised there was nothing he could do.
The tis when he felt like maybe it would be better to end it all, the hollow emptiness in his heart, the agony.
Not again.
He forced one foot ahead of the other, teeth clenched, jaw tight. He never wanted to feel like that again.
Move.
Just move.
Two hours.
By the ti Selene finally shouted, "STOP!
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