Learning...

"Grandma How long a person can live?" Alan asked his grandmother curiously.

"Dear, generally if a person is healthy and do not face any misfortune, he may live for atleast 130 years."

"Alan dear, knowing how to read and write is an essential and basic requirement for trading and in many other areas. If you don't know how to read and write, you may not be able to get a decent work in the city or many not even be able to work in a reputed organization. So lets start with the letters." The old lady told Alan and started teaching him letters.

Alan start to absorb everything his grandmother taught him like water being absorbed by the sponge. Within a few day he was able to read and write without much of a difficulty.

Within a couple of months he was proficient in readig, writing and many other skills his grandmother taught him.

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An year later,

A boy can be seen running in the forest behind a white deer which seemed to be having an arrow stuck in its belly. It tried to escape desperately but an wooden arrow flew across and struck to the base of its skull and it collapsed. Its legs twitched for a few seconds and the it went limp. Alan reached near the dead deer and felt sad for killing such a beautiful animal.

He put his small hand on its head and wispered an apology for killing it. He took out a small hunting knife, which his grandmother recently gave him on his 8th birth year as a gift.

He began skinning it, as his grandmother had shown him few months ago so that the hide was removed from the carcass intact and was not damaged. He then began to slice the meat and stored it in his bag. Then he dug a small pit and burried the remains of the deer's internal organs, so that it would not attract any unwanted attention for other beasts. After that Alan began his journey back to his hut.

In the past 6 months, he had learned Archery, short knife close combat basics from the manuals given by his grandmother. At last she stopped worrying about her grandson's getting injured by sharp objects and started teaching him about weapons.

Alan learnt about different weapons, their strengths and weaknesses theoretically. As he didn't had access to all thoses weapons.

His grandmother was very particular about him learn atleast one long range weapon and as much as the close combat weapons as possible.

For the time being, she had produced a Bow & Arrows to be used as a long range weapon. A short hunting knife, a pair of short but very sharp Axes for dual handed use. A wooden staff which was 8 feet long without the sharp metal head. And even showed him about the hand to hand combat.

She could only show him couple of postures and few moves as she was not in her prime anymore, and cannot move as effortlessly as she was 40 years ago. Besides she was not a fighter. Rather, she was a healer back then when she was in the city.

Alan learnt remaining basic moves along with techniques with the help of all the manuals given to him. From these manual he even learnt many useful tricks which helped him to generate great power with minimal body movement.

Once he learnt the basic combat skills and gained theoretical knowledge of many weapons, he started going on hunts outside the safe zone.

His grandmother was worried about his safety initally and was always checking him over as soon as returned back for any physical injuries he might sustain.

As time passed by, she also began to relax and was trying to look for new topics or skills to teach Alan in the hope of providing him with the knowledge that might one day be useful to him in the outside world.