Everette was watching Theo´s sparring match and went up to Theo and clapped, “good job Mr. Dawes, remember, never let your guard down, that'll be the difference between who will be able to go back home and who might be buried in this beach” Everette said addressing everyone there, they all shuddered at his words, “Ok trainees, I'd like to announce that we’ll be having a little competition in 2 weeks, the top 16 recruits will be joining me on a special garrison so do your best!”.

After training was over, Theo and Ferdinand went to have dinner, “Are you going to try to be on Everette´s garrison?” Theo asked as he was gulping down his food, “Probably, but it’s mostly because I want to become an officer soon, and the best way to do that is to get noticed” Ferdinand answered, “Is being an officer a big deal?”, Theo asked, “Is not that its a big deal, but my goal is to become a top military man, so for me it makes sense, what about you?” Ferdinand then asked, “Well I’m not sure”, “You should go ahead and try your best, with me by your side your progress will be steadfast and the higher you go you may get access to special spells and artifacts,” Prim said to Theo,

After pondering for a bit, Theo answered Ferdinand “I think I will also try to get on the garrison squad”, Ferdinand said “That’s great, we’ll have to up the training a bit then, there are a few skilled men and if we draw them it could be troublesome, especially for you, so how about this? in the morning conditioning will be doubled, stamina is vital in fighting, then well skip Everettes training is a little too elemental, so well work on your dagger techniques and after supper, we work on skills and spells, how does that sound?” Theo looked at him with slight shock on his face.

“Sounds tiring” Theo smiled, “Oh it will be, extremely,” said Ferdinand while smiling, They talked afterward, and then went to train.

In their first training session, Ferdinand asked Theo to show him all his weapons, when he saw that he had two daggers, “Wow you have two daggers, do you know how to use them?” Ferdinand asked, “No I don’t, they were given to me a week before I left home,” said Theo, “Then we will start with the basics, daggers can be a great offensive weapon, since you have two of them Ill teach you double wield blade combat techniques” Ferdinand spoke to Theo as he took a stance.

“I will teach you my fighting technique, it will be adapted for your dagger-wielding, it is called, the flower wind stance, it is meant to be a fast and swift technique, there are a total of 36 moves in it that you will need to learn to master the technique, now follow my moves”

For about an hour Theo was being taught by Ferdinand, then a couple of officers walked by, they stopped when they noticed Ferdinand, and approached him, as they walked towards them Ferdinand told Theo to stop, Ferdinand then greeted the two officers “Good afternoon officer Brighton and officer Weiz”, “Good afternoon trash, who is your friend? a fellow cannon fodder?” said the officer named Brighton.

“He is Theo Dawes, we´re training together,” said Ferdinand with a smile on his face, “I don’t think these guys are friendly,” Prim said to Theo, “Why are you training, all you need to do is be proper targets if we get attacked, we´re the ones that will be taking care of things,” said the other officer, “Well just in case your strength isn’t enough to protect all of us, we´ll train to try and be of assistance” Ferdinand said sarcastically.

Officer Weiz then grabbed Ferdinand by the collar “You better watch yourself you banished trash” Theo grabbed his dagger and went forward but Ferdinand held his hand up telling him to stop, “My apologies Sir, I meant no disrespect” Said Ferdinand, the officer pushed Ferdinand down “Be more careful next time, and you! you should probably steer clear of this trash, or you might get sucked in” then the officers left.

“You ok?” Theo asked while helping Ferdinand up, “Yeah, but I should probably tell you I’m not too well-liked by the upper ranks so if you want to stop training with me I´ll understand” said Ferdinand, “Why would we stop training? thanks to you I see a path for myself I never thought possible”.

“Great, but I should probably explain a little on why they came just to mess with me, my family is a mix of highborn and nobles that live in Vermilion City, I was set down the path of becoming my father’s successor, but when he died my older brother took control and banished me, that’s why I´m here, the only other way to get back and help my family is by becoming a strong military, man,” Said Ferdinand, Theo looked at him in a new light, before he just thought that Ferdinand was a well-liked noble that had all the opportunities, but he misjudged him.

“Thank you for telling me, I don’t care for titles or status, all I care about is keeping my family safe, so let’s go back to training,” Theo said while grinning, “Ok then let’s keep going,” said Ferdinand.

Ferdinand and Theo went back to training, and they kept this up for the next 5 days, conditioning in the mornings skipping their regular training, and having sparring sessions, then at night, Theo would expand his mana and practice mana manipulation.

In these 5 days Theo´s mana restoration technique improved to C rank, helping him restore 20 mana per second, and his mana core can hold 300 mana now, he can now use mana restoration while in movement, but his restoration decreases to 5 m/s when he infuses himself with mana he expends 2 m/s for every body part enhanced, if he enhances his whole body it takes 36 m/s at the strength he can manage now, so if he fights all out he will only be able to keep up his mana for about 10 seconds.

As they were sparring again, Theo decided to go all out for 8 seconds, “Be careful Theo, if you expand all of your mana too fast you could black out from the strain on your core”, Prim said, Theo went ahead anyway, he jumped at Ferdinand, his speed greatly improved, Ferdinand went on the defensive, for the next 8 seconds Theo attacked Ferdinand intensely, Ferdinand was surprised but he knew what Theo was testing, so he couldn’t keep this up for long.

As Theo was nearing his limit, he could feel his head starting to hurt and a piercing pain starting at the center of his chest, he saw Ferdinand being pushed back and decided to keep going, he went for almost 10 seconds, then felt a big pain in his chest, his eyes rolled up and he dropped.