Weapon

Even though Grey had beaten Khan, the man never let him slack. It was obvious, of course, because, not only had he only won because Khan handicapped himself, training should never cease. Lest one wish to stop growing.

Grey had improved a lot in the past year, and his 10th birthday was soon coming. The warnings about letting his strength get to his head never stopped, either.

A month before his birthday, Lucas pulled Grey aside from his training. Khan was pissed at the interruption, yelling at Lucas, but a few words calmed him down. 

Grey found himself waiting in the garden, Khan next to him, as his father kept bringing boxes outside.

Whenever the boy asked what was happening, he would receive a, "It's a surprise!", in response. Khan also refused to elaborate, so Grey was left out of the loop.

He had a few ideas, of course, but the one that came to mind as the most likely was that it was time to choose a weapon. Fallen Star and Grey had spoken over the years, and they agreed that it was best to learn several weapons; at least one from close, medium, and long range each.

As Lucas grabbed the last box, he hurriedly shooed Grey back inside. He was clearly enjoying this too much, but neither Grey nor Khan had plans to stop him. Samantha, who was waiting for Grey inside, seemed rather annoyed, but she went along with what Lucas had planned. 

She put her hands over Grey's eyes, imbuing them with some mana so that he couldn't look through them. 

10 minutes passed in this way, as Grey hummed a tune he had heard, trying to ignore the constant clattering. 

The door to the garden swung open, and, in a giddy voice, Lucas said, "Come on! Hurry!"

Grey, not one to procrastinate, immediately removed his mother's hands, and walked out the door. 

What he came upon was rows and rows of weapons, neatly stacked on weapon racks. The sheer amount of weapons shocked him. Grey could see bladed weapons, blunt weapons, pole arms, bows, and more.

In a grandiose manner, Lucas exclaimed, "Welcome to my Emporium, good sir. Please, take your pick." Grey was now very embarrassed for his father, and Khan facepalmed, but no-one made an effort to stop it. 'Let the man have his fun.' They both thought.

Grey began to walk through the aisles, and Samantha stood next to Lucas. He heard hushed whispering, but dismissed it, looking through the weapons. She didn't seem to share the same opinion as them.

He picked up weapon after weapon, giving them a swing or two, before putting them back. They were all made of wood, but they seemed masterfully crafted.

Grey started with the short range weapon, shifting through daggers and hammers. None seemed to fit him, so he moved on.

He came upon the axes next, and began to use them. Picking up a double-bladed short axe, something changed. It seemed to work with him, so he kept it. That didn't mean he would learn the axe, of course, for other weapons could click too.

He went onto the final section of close range weapons, the swords. Rapier, jian, katana, Grey tested each blade. The final weapon in the section, a short sword called a 'falcata' clicked. He didn't know why, but it seemed to fit better than the axe. 

'Once I master this, I'll come back to the axe. It's good to have variety.' He thought.

Grey placed the axe back where the falcata was, heading to the mid-range weapons. This was your spears, pole arms, great swords, longswords crossbows and such.

The first weapon he grabbed, a spear with two sharp sides and a point, felt right. It was your classic weapon, a true beast in the mid-range section. He still went through each weapon, just in case another clicked. Nothing happened, though, for the other weapons didn't seem to resonate with him.

All that was left for Grey was long range, and in that section sat bows. Only bows. Grey had pondered this before, but there were no guns here, oddly. He turned to his father, only for the man to speak before he could even ask the question. His face must have given him away.

"Guns are cheating! There's no art to them, you just aim and pull. No effort!" Samantha quickly shut him up after he had said his piece, afraid the man would go on another rant.

Turning to face the bows once more, Grey chuckled. His father was a strange man.

The longbow, a bow developed by the elves. No reaction. The short bow, developed by the dwarves, no reaction.

Grey ended the section on a complex looking bow, it had pulleys and thick cable, instead of a bowstring.

It was a compound bow, and it also clicked, similar to the axe, falcata and spear.

Grey yelled, out, "Dad. I've chosen." 

As he exited the maze of weapons, his father commented. "Nice choices, son."

---

Grey stood in front of his weapons. The labyrinth had been cleared, so the garden was now spacious again.

"What do you want to start with, Grey?" Lucas asked.

Grey pointed to the spear, citing that it was the most versatile, and thus, the best starting point.

Lucas nodded and then went to collect his own spear. Stood in front of Grey, he began his lesson.

"Grey, the spear you've chosen is both good at stabbing and swiping. It keeps enemies at a nice distance, and the blade is long enough that it isn't hard to parry. The downside of it, like all pole arms, is that distance is your best ally and worst nightmare. If an enemy makes it past the length of the steel, you're dead."

Grey listened on, enthralled by the lesson. Lucas spoke for a while, telling him of both the upsides and downsides of Grey's choice.

"Let's now move onto stances, and styles." Lucas showed Grey the most common stances of the spear, and about how to use the blade. The boy swiftly selected the style that felt the best for him.

"This is 'Ares' Cry'. It was invented by my master, and named as such because of a folktale. It was said that at his last stand, Ares, the god of war, let out a beastly war cry, before slaughtering a whole army with just his spear. The man died shortly after of blood loss, but his battle was immortalised." Lucas rambled about the history of the art Grey chose, which the boy happily listened to.

"Is Ares a god, or just called a god?" He asked, a slight hint of malice in his voice. Lucas quickly responded, fearing that Grey might not learn it until he got his answer. "He was a human with the title of god. Don't be silly, there are no such things as God."

Grey mumbled under his breath before turning back to Lucas and smiling.

It was time to begin.

---

"Up, down, push forward and slice up." Lucas voiced out an order and Grey followed.

Swinging up to push the enemy back, and reversing the flow to do the same, followed by outstretching his arms in a lunge and slicing up. Grey followed his father's command to a T, yet.

"No, no, that's all wrong! Look at me, OK! Look!" Lucas was dissatisfied with Grey's performance, and took it upon himself to show Grey the motions again.

"Use that perfect memory of yours, and watch!" He barked.

"Up, down, push forward and slice up." Lucas did the motion, and Grey found no difference with what he was doing, so he asked.

"Dad, I did that. So where am I going wrong?"

"Well, your up wasn't swoosh enough, and your down wasn't swish enough. Not only that, your push forward and slice up was missing its woosh." He told the boy.

Lucas was a great teacher, he just struggled with his explanations, choosing instead to use onomatopoeia to explain. It helped, sort of, but also made it a lot more confusing. Grey had asked several times to go back to using words, but always received the same response.

"Nope. When you're doing the motion, you should try to embody the sound, and all will be solved. If you need words, you aren't talented enough. And trust me, you are; so this shouldn't be so hard."

Whenever his father said this, Grey felt like choking him to death, but held it in, doing as his father said. 

Once again, Grey went through the motion of up, down, push forward and slice up. This was the third movement of 'Ares' Cry', 'Lacerate'. It could be done from any angle, but the starting point was this. 

Grey had been at this for almost a month, so getting to the third movement was extraordinary. Unlike martial arts that required constant practice, once you reached a certain level of proficiency in a weapon art, the only thing that could develop it was experience.

As Grey performed 'Lacerate', he tried to do as his father said, embodying the sound of the blade. Lucas watched on in shock, as Grey performed the move perfectly. He knew that he was being difficult with his explanations, as he followed what his master had taught him, 'If one cannot learn through this, then they are not worthy'. However, he hadn't expected this. Every time Lucas performed a move, he would explain in words, and each time after he would use sound.

The practice would let you get a feel for the sound, and from there, personifying the sound whilst doing the motion would create a perfect outcome. It was a special teaching method devised by his master, yet it was supposed to take weeks for each step, not a mere week in total, like Grey. 

It had only been 3 weeks, and Grey was already finished with movement 3. Well, he would be after doing the move perfectly 10,000 times in a row, with different angles too. He couldn't just do up, down, up, now, could he?

This was an unprecedented speed of development, even for the Hunter, Lucas, who had seen many talents whilst out in the field.

'I'm sure you'd be proud, master.' He thought.