“My lord, welcome to Valorn.” Helena said with a big smile on her face. I smiled back and went out into the garden.

  “Despite everything, it's a beautiful world,” I commented, walking around the garden.

  The place was beautiful, I had to admit, the person who had designed this place really knew what they were doing.

  The garden was like a small maze made of light green bushes and rose bushes. I could swear those roses were redder than blood itself. As you walked through the maze, you would find some statues. Maria explained to me that they depicted important deeds of the Marnov family. That’s what I had thought, but honestly, I found some of the scenes portrayed hard to believe. I mean, there was a statue of someone literally destroying an entire mountain, but the statues were well-crafted, and to me, that's what really mattered.

  In the center of the garden, there was a gazebo where we stopped to pass the time. Maria served me some biscuits with tea while I contemplated all the beauty around me. Honestly, it had been a long time since I had done that, just taking some time to relax. It was nice… for the first two hours.

  “Do you think Larry will still take a long time?” I asked Maria, who was standing beside me in the gazebo.

  “Unfortunately, I can't say, my lord,” she said, bowing slightly. “Lord Larry didn't specify how long he would be gone.”

  I sighed heavily and rolled my eyes. Having free time was something I always valued greatly, but in moments like this, it was the worst thing that could happen to me. Of course, at first, I was entertained, looking at things around me, listening to Maria tell me stories about how the Marnov family had used fire magic to speed up mining processes and things like that.

  But now, having nothing to do gave me space to think about the fact that I was far from home, in a place where I didn't even have common sense. What if they couldn't send me back? What if I was trapped here? Would I never be able to see my friends again? What was I going to do with my life if that happened? In my world, I was in a good school, and I had a bright future ahead of me, but here... I knew nothing.

  “My lord? Is something wrong?” Helena asked beside me. She looked worried. That's when I realized I was hyperventilating.

  I stood up and did a light stretch to calm myself down. I was NOT going to have an anxiety attack now.

  “Where do the guards train?” I asked. I knew one of the two would give me the answer.

  “It’s further ahead, my lord,” Helena said. “Just past the garden, is the knights' barracks.”

  I nodded and started walking in the indicated direction. As always, the maids followed me wherever I went.

  Leaving the flower maze, we found the knights training in the open air. It wasn't exactly what I expected. I thought they would be in an imposing building full of swords on the walls and things like that, but considering that the specialty of the House of Marnov was fire, I guess it made sense for the soldiers to train outdoors. I don't think Jhones would want his soldiers setting the barracks on fire every time they trained.

  The soldiers were dueling with each other using wooden swords. Garnold was supervising the fights and yelling things at the soldiers. This surprised me a little; I thought he would be with Larry preparing things for us to leave. I approached with the maids.

  “Garnold, good afternoon. I thought you would be with Larry. Aren't you supposed to protect the duke or something?” I asked.

  Garnold was in his full suit of armor—with the exception of his helmet—and rested his hand on the hilt of his sword. He bowed slightly in a greeting and replied.

  “I'm glad to see you on your feet, my lord.” He returned to his original position. “I was sent by His Majesty to ensure your safety, Lord Martins. Duke Larry has his own personal escort.”

  “I guess that makes sense.”

  I then began to observe how the guards fought while I stood next to Garnold. They seemed young; I don't think any of the fourteen soldiers training there were older than twenty-five. To be honest, I don't understand anything about fencing, but those guys seemed good. The sound of the wooden swords clashing could be heard all the time as they dueled with each other. I was itching to fight too.

  “My lord, you seem interested in the fights,” Garnold commented, smiling. “Has any duel caught your attention?”

  “Oh, I don't know much about fencing,” I replied, cracking my fingers in nervousness. “I'm just wondering if there's any place I could train my techniques too.”

  “Of course, my lord, one moment.” He replied and turned to the soldiers. “ATTENTION!” he shouted.

  All the soldiers stopped their fights and stood next to each other in an organized manner. They seemed serious, attentive to their captain's words.

  “Lord Ethan has come to honor us with his presence at today's training and needs a training partner. Which of you gentlemen is willing to train with him?”

  It wasn't exactly what I was expecting, but this way I would be able to train better, so it didn't matter. To my surprise, all the soldiers raised their hands, volunteering to be my training partner.

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  “Choose whoever you want, my lord,” Garnold said.

  For me, it didn't make much difference. They all seemed the same in combat skills, they even wore the same standard clothes—light white shirts, brown leather pants and boots.

  I sighed deeply and took off my tunic—which Helena promptly took for me—entering the training area.

  “The first one in line will do.”

  “Certainly. Gabriel, one step forward. You will duel with Lord Ethan. Karl, hand your sword to the lord so he can duel.”

  “Oh no, that's not necessary,” I interrupted him as I finished stretching. “I don't even know how to use a sword.”

  “Do you prefer a spear?” Garnold asked and snapped his fingers. Promptly one of the soldiers went to get a wooden spear.

  “No, thank you very much.”

  “I don't know if I understand, my lord. Do you intend to fight unarmed?”

  “Trust me, it's better than me trying to use a sword.” I looked at Gabriel and smiled. “When you're ready, just attack me.”

  Gabriel looked at Garnold as if to confirm if he should really proceed with the duel. As soon as Garnold nodded, he spread his feet and lowered his body into a battle stance, holding the sword firmly with his two hands in front of his body. Following his example, I also got into a fighting stance. I raised my fists, keeping my hands closed in front of my face, slightly lowered my body, and positioned my left foot in front of my body. This was going to be interesting.

  “Ready, Attack!” Garnold announced, starting the fight, and Gabriel immediately advanced toward me.

  Predictable, it always started like this. I waited for him to get closer and make his move. Gabriel delivered a strong transversal blow with his wooden sword, it probably would have hurt a lot if it had hit me, but I simply took a step to the right and watched as he fought against his imbalance. It was a little funny, and I couldn't help but laugh.

  Gabriel recovered and glared at me angrily. Okay, I shouldn't have laughed at him, but I couldn't help it! He started attacking me again with his sword, each blow seemed strong enough to leave a good purple mark on the body, but he was too slow. I kept moving around the field, leaning to the right and left to avoid the attacks. At some point, I started using the back of my hand to deflect his sword and unbalance him. You could see that he was struggling to stay on his feet.

  As the fight continued, I could see that he was getting tired. His breathing was heavy and his attacks were less precise. He had started trying to stab me instead of cutting. It was a stupid idea at the very least, as every time he missed, he left his guard wide open. Finally, when he used too much force in a transversal cut against my chest and I dodged to the right, I decided to end the fight. I spun my body with speed and landed a kick against the base of his feet, making him fall hard on his back on the ground...

  “End of the Duel!” Garnold announced.

  Gabriel had his hands against his chest and a desperate expression on his face... maybe I overdid it a bit with the blow, he must have been out of breath when he hit the ground. I approached and made him sit up to be in a more comfortable position and began to instruct him to breathe more calmly.

  “Come on, calm down,” I said, making him look at me. “You need to try to breathe slowly or you'll only make the situation worse.”

  He didn't seem very confident in my words, but he did what I said anyway. Gradually, he returned to breathing normally.

  After making sure the guard was okay, I stood up and looked toward the other soldiers with a smile.

  “So, who's next?”

  The next soldier in line approached with his sword and positioned himself in the same way as Gabriel, ready for the duel, it even looked like a replay, I guess it makes sense for them to have the same fencing style since they train together.

  “Let the second duel begin!” Garnold announced and my opponent advanced toward me.

  It seemed like I was fighting a faster version of Gabriel, he used the same techniques and blows, but I noticed that his blows had less strength and greater speed... it didn't change much, when I saw that he wasn't going to show me anything new compared to the last fight, I decided it wasn't worth prolonging the fight. I waited until he delivered one more blow and advanced toward him avoiding his attack getting close enough to attack him. Jab, right cross, and a left hook, with this sequence of blows the soldier ended up dropping his sword and holding his own stomach in pain.

  “End of the duel” Garnold announced and I relaxed my shoulders.

  Stretching again—a habit I picked up due to my nervousness—I watched as a boy a little younger than me came up to Garnold and said something.

  He looked cheerful, wore leather clothes with gold embroidery, on his head was a brown hat with a red feather and a small knife was attached to the side of his waist.

  “Lord Martins, I fear we must end our practices here, Larry seems to have returned from the city, we must prepare for the departure.” Garnold explained and looked at his soldiers who promptly began to prepare for the trip. “Peter will guide you along with your Maid to your accommodations for the trip.”

  The boy took off his hat showing more of his black hair and bowed respectfully.

  “My lord, I am Peter the messenger, I am a direct servant of Lord Larry” he then straightened up, putting his hat back on “please, follow me, I will take you to where my Lord awaits you”

  I nodded, taking my tunic back from Helena, we were finally moving on, I might not have been here for long, but everything was so strange... there was no way I couldn't feel out of place, all I wanted was to go home.

  After another hour of preparations, such as loading the carriages, saddling the horses and things like that—Yes, the trip would be made by horse and carriages—we were finally ready to leave.

  “We are ready!” Garnold announced, approaching where I was waiting with the maids, Larry came to his side with his personal guards “if you are also ready, my lord, we can leave immediately”

  “Finally!” I said, getting up and dusting off my clothes “I think I've never had such a long preparation for a trip, and I've already made international trips”

  They quickly looked at each other and I started walking toward the carriages, there were about thirty people in total, including me, Garnold, Larry, Helena, Peter and Maria, the other members were guards or servants—about twenty soldiers and four servants besides the carriage drivers—I found it a little strange that we were leaving in the late afternoon, but the sooner we left, the sooner we would arrive at our destination.

  “should we say goodbye to Jhones? I believe he is a friend of yours or something, after all we stayed at his house for a while, right?” I commented observing the horses, they were magnificent creatures, they seemed well trained and well cared for.

  “oh that's not necessary, I'm sure he must be very busy managing his father's lands, we can move on” Larry commented adjusting his own clothes “Now, my lord, Peter will guide you to your carriage, Helena will go with you too, think of the two of them as your personal servants, whatever you need, you can ask them”

  “Thank you... I guess...” I reply and see Larry walk away with his personal guards

  “My lord, I will travel next to your carriage on my horse, you can rest assured, we will keep you safe throughout the journey”

  I nodded and entered my cabin with Helena and Peter, this was going to be a loooong trip.