Mr. Arasaki

"Get up David".

"Yes father"

"Next time you're performing the 'Cuchilla', lower your body a little bit more, your right leg stretched farther towards the front, keep your blade exactly parallel to the plane you're standing upon, and increase your attack speed. You did well".

David got up from the floor of the field at the backyard of his house.

He began to dust his sandy butt and put back his sword into the sheath hanging askew on his back, bending towards the right side. The sheath was held by a belt he wore across from front to his rear.

He had a long black hair which extended below his shoulders with the tip of his hair dyed light red.

He was 17 years old, about 6 feet and light skinned.

In order to level up, he had training sessions everyday with his father, with most of his training at this point focused on swordsmanship.

Being on the verge of becoming an adult, Mr. Arasaki had insisted on these training sessions for his son with the claim that the world was a dangerous place, self defence was of utmost importance, and that one could only defend themself if they attain power greater than any enemy they could likely encounter.

The training sessions we're mostly insufferable for David, especially because he couldn't figure out why it was so important to be that strong in the present age of tranquility.

However, he dared not show even the slightest disrespect in rejecting his father's counsel.

It would probably have been bearable for him if his mom was around, but the only thing he knew of her up until then was what his father had told him; that she had died of illness after he was born; hence, he never knew his mom.

Mr Arasaki was training his son to use a special ancient move called the 'Cuchilla'.

The 'Cuchilla' was a popular ancient technique used by great warriors in the past. It was used only by the best of the best because of the complexity of it's nature. However, Mr. Arasaki had insisted on David mastering it for some reason, and despite the difficulty of the technique, his word was law.

The technique involved the user squatting, with either right or left leg and arm stretched forward, and the other leg and arm backwards, with the backward arm holding the blade, pointed towards the target.

The stance, though sounding simple, had so far proven to be extremely difficult to master.

It had been three days of dedicated quality time given to just this move alone, and yet not much was to show for it.

One of the reasons the 'Cuchilla' was so difficult to pull off was not even in the stance but in the direction of one's chi properly while taking the stance.

For the attack to be very effective, one had to take the perfect stance, along with the perfect direction of chi, focusing it on the arm holding the sword which will enable the arm to perfectly pull off the lightning fast move.

A slight deviation from perfect parallelism with the plane upon which the user stands, even by 1 degree would make the user loose balance because the enormous energy the sword would move with, as a result of the chi focused on the arms would allow the user no control over his body, after the move has been made.

The aftereffect of wrongly executing this attack is dangerous because, since the user looses balance, they would definitely miss their opponent and their loss of balance creates an opening for a deadly counterattack by the opponent.

Because of this, the 'Cuchilla' was only used by experts in battle.

"It's okay for now, get some rest, you'll be needing it for our trip tomorrow.

"Yes sir", David replied.

Mr Arasaki was Mrs Edga's older brother.

He lived in the South, while she lived in the North.

Mr Arasaki was planning on moving entirely to the North, his reason being that he just felt it would help him connect more with nature since it was less busy, and had more hills, mountains and elevated places.

He had sent a letter to his sister already to inform her about this and intended to stop by her place for a bit before moving to his new house.

The new house was also already paid for and ready.

Mr. Arasaki and his son moved inside to rest from the training session.

**********

The cave was dark as night, with the only ray of light coming from the little window, and shinning diagonally across the room.

Even with the light, the figure in the room could not be seen as he was seated in the shadows, on the ground, resting by the wall.

His mind wandered here and there, thinking of every possible way to escape the hellish experience of the dungeon.

Two days had passed since his trial at the council.

He was beginning to lose hope.

Could it possibly happen that the council will eventually take a decision that would be in his favour? Most likely not.

'It appears I'll have to become a traitor and work an escape route out of here, leave the temple, and never come back again. Even though that means I'll be on the run for the rest of my life.

But how will I pull of such a thing?, This dungeon is secured with guards all over, armed to the teeth and it's a long way up. I need to find a perfect opportunity to escape.

Usher got up and looked out the window.

One could only view the body of the mountain opposite, through the window, and be able to slightly see the top if one bends the head a little lower. The view when the head is raised is still the mountain as it goes down to the deep covered with fog.

That meant, even if one could find a way of removing the window, jumping out will only lead to falling into the abyss.

'Karrrrrkkk-Thhummm'.

A very loud, ear piercing sound filled the atmosphere.

Usher immediately got up from his feet and looked out the window, bending and adjusting his head get as much view of the mountain top as he could because the sound had come from that direction.

"What was that?"