“Sure,” Dan said to Daeson, feeling a little sick to his stomach as he forced a smile onto his face. Even if he were uninjured, he doubted that he would be able to get away from the elf. Plus, he wasn’t completely wrong. Dan really did need some training and polishing. Everything he had accomplished so far had been by the seat of his pants. Even without looking at his presently-destroyed body, he was very lucky to have made it as far as he had. A misstep or two at any point would’ve ended with him in an unmarked grave or enslaved.
Of course, Dan reflected to himself, enslaved was still on the table. Daeson didn’t strike him as the worst sort, but he recognized his type from graduate school. Professors and researchers who only cared about their research. Anything that didn’t advance them towards their hypotheses, sometimes including facts that disproved that hypothesis, would simply be discarded.
Right now, Daeson saw him as a valuable piece of research and nothing more. So long as Dan continued to learn and “prove” that humans had the potential to fight alongside elves against the Orakh, he was liable to be treated well. Luckily, with the help of the System, it shouldn’t be all that difficult. Of course, there was no real need to let the elf know about the System. In fact, Dan had a sneaking suspicion that informing Daeson about the System would lead to the elf trying to cut him open and remove it.
“Great,” Daeson smiled and motioned for Dan to follow him once again. “The healing potion will need some time to work, and I’m sure you would like to get some rest after your little excursion. Let me lead you to your room.”
He followed Daeson as the elf led him to a fairly large room with a bed and a dresser. Gingerly, Dan laid down a beaten-up travel pack as the elf excused himself from the room. He sighed as he looked at the pack. He had only been on Twilight for two to three weeks and already he needed a replacement. Even his armor was slashed up pretty badly by the stalker and stiff with Dan’s blood.
Thankfully, his right hand had repaired itself enough that Dan was able to slowly strip himself one-handed and wash his upper body in a silver basin of water that he assumed was provided for that purpose. Dan was tired enough that he really didn’t care if there was some other cultural or ritualistic significance to the water. Once he was somewhat clean, albeit still smelling fairly awful from the sweaty, long-distance chase, Dan slowly lowered himself into the bed. Almost immediately, he fell asleep.
The next morning, he stood up and was rewarded with a sharp burst of pain from his left arm. He winced and inspected the wound in the silver-framed mirror sitting next to the basin. As far as he could tell, the System had handled the infection, but large gashes still remained. It was clear that they were healing. He couldn’t see bone any longer, but even with the help of the nanites and potion, it would still be at least a couple days. He held up his right hand and sighed in relief. A night had been all it took to shed the burnt and charred skin. It looked out of place and overly pink compared to the rest of his moderate tan, but he was able to make a fist without pain, so he would take that as a win.
Dan stepped out into the corridor and cocked his head quizzically. He really had no idea how to find Daeson. He barely even had an idea as to how to get back to the kitchen, let alone the front door of the mansion. A second later, his confusion was cut short by the elf walking up the hallway.
Now that Dan actually had a proper chance to look at Daeson, he saw that the elf was about an inch taller than him, making him six foot one. Daeson had finely-boned features and gold hair to complement his golden eyes. Everything about his appearance oozed boyish charm, balance, and symmetry. In short, if it wasn’t for the sharp, predatory teeth that he was currently smiling at Dan with, he looked like he could make a living in a boy band.
“Daniel!” the elf beamed at him. “I’m glad you are up and about. I’ve taken the liberty of putting alarms in your room to alert me every time you awaken. Humans require so much more sleep than elves, so this way I can continue working when you go to bed, then meet up with you when you rise without losing any unnecessary time.”
“Thank you for the consideration,” Dan replied, internally wincing. Already the elf was tracking his every move. Hardly surprising, but definitely not an ideal turn of events.
Daeson glanced down at Dan’s more or less healed right hand. “I am glad to see you so intact. “It means we are already prepared to begin my research today. No, our research.” The elf smiled, his sharp teeth making him look like a particularly self-satisfied alligator.
“By research, do you mean training?” Dan questioned, trailing off as he glanced uncertainly at Daeson.
“Of course, Daniel!” Daeson nodded, once again waving for him to follow and turning without checking for a response. “The fools at the academy barely recognize xenology as a valid field. What little grant money gets doled out all goes right to the Lythtal selective breeding programs.
“It’s true that everyone can see the value in a seven-foot-tall wolf-man that can stand toe-to-toe with an Orakh warrior, but we are still centuries away from that research bearing any fruit. Plus, the Lythtal can’t even use mana. At best, we will be able to put them in heavy armor and use them as infantry, but they don’t have the power to turn the course of the war on their own. Frankly, all of the research I’ve seen shows that breeding them to be larger and stronger makes them more aggressive. When I tried to tell my colleagues that the last thing the Empire needs is a slave revolt, they all shouted me down. Whispered behind my back that I was simply jealous because their research was bearing fruit.”
Dan stopped abruptly as Daeson halted in front of a room. The elf whirled around, his pupils slightly dilated as he stared intently at Dan with mania-filled eyes.
Daeson spoke quickly, barely registering his existence. “Daniel, you are the human development test case we need to focus the Empire’s energies on. More importantly, you can save my name. They stripped me of library access and lecturing privileges. If I didn’t have tenure, I would have been removed from the faculty entirely. Shallow, jealous politicians, all of them. If I am to put them in their place, it cannot be through half measures.”
“I really don’t understand what you’re talking about,” Dan responded uncertainly.
“If humans are going to make an impact on the war with the Orakh,” Daeson replied, finally focusing on Dan, “you will need to fight at least as well as an elven youth. Unfortunately, that means we are going to need to make up hundreds of years of magical and martial training in a few scant decades. The only way we can do that is to increase the intensity of your training. You will be risking your life frequently, and your only breaks will be sleep. If you can survive with your mind intact, I am sure that I can carve you into something… truly special.”
“That doesn’t sound that much different than what I’ve been doing on my own to date.” Dan shrugged. “How do we get started?”
“Behind this door is my gymnasium,” Daeson answered with a toothy smile. “Today, you demonstrate what you can do, and I will begin your magical training. Given your rather severe injuries, I won’t expect you to run the obstacle course today, but starting tomorrow, you will be expected to make a single run in under three and a third minutes before we can begin magic training. After all, your body is the shell that holds your magical potential. If the shell grows thin and weak, it will shatter during your next rank up and create a terrible mess. Given that the servants have left, I really don’t want to have to clean up a botched rank up on my own. Burnt viscera was never my thing.”
Dan sighed and followed Daeson into the room. It was huge, two stories tall and thirty by sixty feet wide. Almost half of the room was occupied by a track that ran through a series of rotating wooden beams. Periodically, there were gaps where an individual would have to jump across a clearing or use their upper body to navigate a series of pegs or bars to cross the gap. Clearly, this was the obstacle course. Dan could already feel those wooden poles slamming into him. He sighed. Daeson wasn’t lying; this wasn’t going to be pleasant.
The elf led him over to another corner of the gymnasium. There, a mannequin stood alone in front of a wall made of a dark matte material. The ground and wall were scored with scratches and small divots. Daeson clapped his hand down on Dan’s good shoulder.
“Now,” the elf filled the complete silence of the gymnasium. “I’ve already seen that you have a thunder and fire affinity. Are there any other affinities I need to know about?”
“I also have a spatial, force, metal, and gravity affinity,” Dan replied. If he was going to rely on Daeson for training, he might as well get training in everything. “I haven’t really developed the metal and force affinities, but they’re there.”
“Good, good!” Daeson shouted, manic glee in his eyes. “Six affinities! If we can pull this off, I’ll wipe the smug smiles off their faces for good. You have the makings of an arch magi; it’s just a matter of putting in some effort.”
Dan sighed as Daeson cackled to himself and looked past him. The elf had saved his life, and he certainly was capable, but Dan couldn’t help but feel that living out in Twilight’s wastes on his own for this long couldn’t be emotionally healthy. Regardless, the die was cast, and Dan was stuck with an incredibly powerful being of questionable mental stability for the foreseeable future.
