Turning Up The Heat

Remain standing, was he serious? He did realize that I was abnormally strong for a first milestone child right? Time to blow this man's socks off. This wasn't a hard challenge until I learned about one of the difficulties. After about five minutes grandpa left and I realized that it was only getting hotter, or that's how it felt at least.

I went up to Filford who was using a large hammer to shape a piece of burning ore. I didn't get too close to avoid his smithing space and asked, "May I please have some water?"

He chuckled and exclaimed, "Water, that would make this too easy!" He looked at me and raised his eyebrows, "Now the challenge begins, how long can you stand dehydrated?"

I finally realized how hard this was gonna be. I already started getting blurry eyesight from time to time, and it rapidly became more frequent, after fifteen minutes, I went blind before passing out.

***

I leaned up in my bed and wondered who carried me here, and how long it had been. After a while my dad walked in confused, he had no idea what training I had been doing. He tried questioning me but I used the situation and acted just as confused as he was. It seemed I had slept for about four hours, making it just barely afternoon. I got out of bed and went down the stairs before immediately chugging water in the common room. I sat down at my usual table and a waitress eventually came over. It was the same waitress from my first day here.

"Salutations young adventurer, it looks like you've been busy with training. What can I get for you today?" she asked me.

"Let me think, I just want something small… Can I get a three inch sub-sandwhich and a large water?" I asked back.

"No problem, we'll have it out soon, anything else?"

"Nope, thank you though!"

"Alrighty then, can I get a name for this order?"

"Karito, Karito Hale."

"We'll have your food to you shortly."

As I waited for my food I pondered what I was going to do about training, from what I could tell there were two ways around it, one; strengthen my body and mental fortitude, or two; use magic. Now their were no rules against magic, if anything it was encoraged, but I didn't have the water element to keep me hydrated. I could make a small breeze to cool me down a little but besides that it was all on my body. This wasn't good.

The next day I went back to Filfords shop and began again. With my breeze cooling me down it definitely was a lot easier, but it wasn't enough. Sweating was once again immediate and I went about seven minutes before my vision went blurry. Speeding up the air everyonce in a while kept me awake for the most part, at eleven minutes, I went blind, and aat thirteen I was out for the count.

Day three was a little better, all my times went up but not by much, I lasted fifteen minutes. I then took a day of break a his shop is closed on day one of weeks. It seems my parents knew I was in some sort of training but couldn't figure out why I was coming home unconscious, and grandpa wasn't spilling anything.

Every time I went it got a little better, but I didn't really have a break through until my seventh day at the shop. I made it about eleven minutes before my vision went blurry, I was using the air to balance my self this time and take some of the weight off my body, and it worked great, I didn't go blind 'til minute seventeen, and I passed out at nineteen. Now I had a strategy.

Every couple days I'd train with my dad and mom, though a lot of the time either one or both of them would leave pretty quick for a mission. For the first time in ages, I was alone with my dad since my mom went on a mission, and I knew what I wanted to train. Using my air as propulsion I upped my speed by a small amount. For hours me and my father clashed swords, he was only blocking mainly, but once we entered the last hour he started attacking. I practiced dodging, running, jumping, and all sorts of movement. My air element was definitely improving, I was becoming much lighter on my feet, every day I went to filfords I was going up at least a full minute now, and training air with my parents as much as possible. I had faith, I knew I coud do it.

From twenty minutes to thirty in a week, then to forty five in another week, after four weeks of this I finally reached an hour. I was drinking an immense amount of water though, which eventually lead to my parents finding out since they went through the same thing. At first they didn't agree until they heard about my progress, once they knew how well I was doing they hesitantly agreed to letting me continue. And after three months, I had stayed standing for four hours. That was half of the time I needed. Wake up, eat, drink loads, train, and sleep were my usual days, I'd get a break once or twice every two weeks.

I was tired and fatigued almost constantly, but the fact that I was doing so well kept me motivated. After seven months I finally got a break, one week to just rest and collect my thoughts. I didn't do much that week, just rested and ate and talked with my adventurer buddies, Bill, Lilly, and Hera. They had just got back from a long mission and planned on staying for a while, so it all worked out. I told them everything, they told me all of their new adventuring stories, and it was a great time. Although I was way younger then them, they actually have normal conversations with me, it was nice. Once my break ended, I went back to Filfords shop with confidence, this was gonna be the time that I won.