Full Sprint

With the last year or so consisting of my vassals continuing their own educations before rendezvousing with me in the exterior yards for our five hours of nightly training, it was difficult for me to see their slow and steady improvements with the days as they passed.

It was because of this, that I hesitated after everyone began their dexterity drills and instead peered into my Eternal Eye to look back on our first night of training and a few periods thereafter before committing to the exercises and observing them over the course of our training.

And the differences were astounding.

Most notably with Jaimess, who comically struggled with strength and agility drills at first, but within months had improved to the point that he was nearly on par with the rest of us on those fronts, and many others.

His dexterity and coordination in particular had increased by leaps and bounds. Made evident by the shade ball that seemed to be magnetized to his hands as it ricocheted off the trees at a dribble-like pace; just like Toril, soon after we first began. In addition to that turnaround, he no longer tripped or fell when jumping rope and regularly looked bored during our routine balancing acts in the trees.

His dagger play had similarly improved. No longer was he awkwardly wielding the wooden blade or fidgeting whilst tucking it into his belt or otherwise handling it. More so, he hasn't inadvertently 'cut' or hit himself in over four months as he swung and stabbed at the amorphous flesh of his doppelganger with a surprisingly tenacious ferocity.

Jonet too was a bit sluggish after first starting. Though not as badly as Jaimess and not for the same reasons.

She was hesitant to fight. And the reason was made evident in her facial expressions when fighting.

I knew not the specifics, but I'd seen it before. The look of the indoctrinated or brainwashed that I was certain revolved around the notion that she shouldn't fight, only heal. Under what logic or for what reason, I couldn't have cared less to find out. I only knew that her hesitation wasn't caused by fear or trauma, and so I cared only about her overcoming such avenues of thinking.

It took time, it took gentle and not-so-gentle words of encouragement, and it took effort. But eventually, she overcame her pacifistic beliefs and began putting her all into our combat training.

And she developed rather quickly after doing so.

Or rather, she simply started to practice what she'd been holding back this entire time- A natural-born athletic talent. A talent that she then began striving to perfect into a perfect ability.

Whether it was our coordination training or weapons drills or anything else that we found ourselves doing, Jonet displayed a fluidity and elegance akin to a dancer or circus performer. It was like watching an athlete in their competitive environment, with motions that appeared more like demonstrations of a sacred art rather than the repetitive training I'd scheduled for us.

Toril on the other hand was already adept and coordinated with his body movements. Still, I made him continue on dutifully with the drills so that I could instill in him a non-complacent attitude and the notion that he should strive to constantly improve himself. As he'd one day become my sergeant major, I felt that those traits would be among the most important for him to develop early on. With that in mind, I spent most of the abundant free time I had in the past year transcribing books for my vassals to study.

Algebra and geometry; classical mechanics and simple machines; the scientific method; hygiene and germ theory; astronomy; philosophy and sociology; psychology and physical health; culinary science and nutrition; military doctrine and logistics. Even magic and spells. Almost everything I'd either professionally or casually studied over the course of my past life and in a little of this one was summoned forth from my Eternal Eye and painstakingly copied on paper for my vassals to learn at their own paces.

And I rigorously tested Toril on them.

It took over six months, but eventually his catchphrase- 'I don't understand, My Lord,' had reduced in frequency to an all-time low. And conversely, his formerly lacking prowess in elemental manipulation had grown to an all-time high.

Looking at it now, he was clearly the best among us at manipulating fire; and his air manipulation wasn't too far off from mine, who claimed the greatest handling of the air out of the four of us.

Jaimess on the other hand was undoubtedly the strongest in terms of gripping the earth beneath us. And Jonet seemed to have an innate understanding of water manipulation, most likely due to her ice affinity.

Overall, it was clear to me that we all were ready to move on to the next step.

"Alright." I sighed after hitting yet another tree with a column of air. Then looked my three little followers releasing their holds on the elements and turning to face me with their undivided attention.

"I feel like we're ready to move on to the next stage of our training," I explained, stepping over to them. "Going forward, we'll continue with an hour of dexterity drills. However, instead of drilling with weapons after, we'll be sparring."

"Against each other, My Lord?" Toril raised a single, brow as he asked.

I simply shook my head and pointed to the ground and watched as their heads turned to their shadows condensing and rising from their two-dimensional plane.

"You've seen it before, but allow me to tell you all a little about my Doppelganger Spell." I grinned before starting to pace. "These shade puppets are indeed clones of yourselves. As such, they hold the same strength and abilities that you yourselves have. The difference, however, well…" I sighed before sending an order to the doppelgangers.

And as one, they jumped to life; reeling back their arms to deliver a sucker punch straight to the faces of the originals.

Their heads simultaneously rocked back in a comical fashion before they fell limp in the snow, groaning and rolling about.

And then they started scrambling.

"What!" Jaimess shouted first as he frantically waved his arms around. "I- I can't see!"

"Yeah." I reached out to withdraw the shadow mana infecting their bodies and waited a few moments for them to regain their composure and get back on their feet. "How'd it feel?" I asked, trying not to smile in amusement.

"Like a strong punch from a soft hand." Jonet immediately huffed.

Followed by Toril's shivers. "It was cold, My Lord."

"And blinding," Jaimess added with a curse under his breath. "Literally."

"Seeing is believing." I shrugged before turning pivoting away from them in an attempt to hide my amusement. "Being 'killed' by your doppelganger means being infected with shadow mana, which in turn robs you of your senses. Despite you being convinced otherwise, a blade of shadow will never cut. And blunt strikes will sting a little, but shadow magic in itself isn't life-threatening. It is because of this handicap." I added with a warnful finger. "That your doppelgangers will not hold back in the slightest. I may have said that we'll be sparring, but we'll be required to fight with all our might to defeat ourselves."

"I accept the challenge," Toril growled, facing his doppelganger with a wicked grin.

'Not as if you have a choice.' I chuckled to myself before facing my clone with an excited grin. "We'll go for an hour. The rounds will last until there's a winner, with a five-minute break in between. Once the hour's up, we break for thirty and go at again with weapons."

With that said, I raised my arm like a proctor starting a race before letting it fall.

"Fight!"

I lunged forth with a jab after my call. And so to did my doppelganger, closing the distance in just a few steps with a pair of jabs that first countered my own before landing square in my jaw, jarring me slightly to my knees and leaving me with the stinging residual pain of a slap. I swung out a backhand as I attempted to right myself and my clone briefly halted his advance to deftly dodge my swing, before lunging forward again with his foot. Stamping his semi-solid boot onto my unguarded ribs and spreading the stinging pain throughout my torso.

I felt a wet, labored cough as I turned, fought, thrashed about in the snow to turn my back to the ground and achieve a favorable position before my clone was upon me.

My umbral self, however, simply stepped forth and punted my head like a football, jarring my entire world into a blurred landscape of white and browns and filling my mouth with the ferrous taste of my own weakness. I then felt a slight pressure- a weight, along with the cold touch of darkness making contact with my chest.

Then my nose erupted in eye-watering pain.

Followed by my eye.

Then my cheek. And chin. And another eye. Again and again. Erupting in new plots of pain on my face from the rain of my doppelganger's hands while I vainly attempted to block as best I could and fight back with blows to the ribs and kicks to the back of the head.

When I accepted defeat and called the match, my doppelganger immediately halted and removed himself from on top of me to step aside and idly stare as I regained my footing.

'Jeez.' I spat as I headed towards a nearby tree, turned, and sat on the ground to look over at my equally worn and beat-up vassals and their own idle clones. 'No time for warm-ups, I suppose.' I sighed. Then began thinking back to when I first designed the spell and the conditions I put upon it. That it remained persistent in a two-dimensional form and grow alongside the original; to not only follow my orders, but to be able to make their own timely decisions, and to mimic magic as well as physical capabilities.

While I had yet to verify the last condition and everything else seemed true, there were the natural aspects of the spell that I'd simply glossed over in the past or was just learning of now. That they obviously didn't tire or feel any pain and that they'd forever remain calm and rational in any given situation. And while they were as physically strong as the original, their somewhat bouncy flesh made their strikes feel more like a rubber fist pummeling me in the face.

In short, there were no breaks on this train.

Which meant that I couldn't simply match such tenacity in kind. I'd tire within seconds and be no better off than in the last round. Yet I couldn't remain idle or neutral, as my umbral clone would immediately go on the offensive.

Leaving me with only one avenue of approach.

Adapt.

With my plan of attack settled, I rose to my feet and led my doppelganger a few ways away from our resting area before settling into my guard and engaging with a front kick.

My clone easily parried and after taking a single step towards me, stretched his arm out beside him and lunged. Following through with my kick, I ducked as I stepped into range and spun, outstretching my own arm as I twisted to slam the back of my fist into my own umbral self's face; rocking his face backward before he rocked forth again, his arms raised overhead.

Digging the ball of my foot into the ground, I halted my spin and put as much power as possible into my rotation before stepping off, driving my fist right into my clone's mouth just as a pair of hammer fists crashed into my back.

The rubbery and vacantly cold feeling of shadow flesh against my hand disappeared in an instant and was replaced with the stabbing, searing, shocking touch of spinal pain and the plush feeling of snow beneath my body.

I pushed past the pain and scrambled, reached forth to my doppelganger's ankles, and leaped forward, tackling him to the ground and allowing me to gain the mount with only a little struggle.

And then the slugfest ensued.

I repeatedly punched down with all my weight onto the doppelganger's chin, forehead and throat as he fought and thrashed beneath me in much the same manner as myself in our first round; only my already weak punches were lacking in power due to my growing fatigue.

Realizing I can't continue much longer, I leaned forward and set my forearm under my doppelganger's neck before pulling my free arm back. And with a feral scream, I slammed the heel of my palm into his temple. Breaking his umbral neck against my arm and causing the mana to immediately dissipate before me and resettle into its two-dimensional form atop the snow.

I allowed myself to collapse in exhaustion and just lie there for a minute before returning to the rest area.

The others were still engaged with their clones in their own areas of our little patch of forest. Unsurprisingly, Toril was holding his own against his clone and was only struggling with overcoming the mimicry aspect of the spell. Conversely, Jonet was; for the most part, able to defend against her umbral self but was still getting beaten severely.

Jaimess on the other hand was basically being bullied.

I made sure to capture the sight well in my Eternal Eye, as this was still just the beginning of our training regimen. To use the time-favored analogy, we'd been taking our first steps and were just beginning to properly walk. And once we were able to walk, I planned to have us sprint without pause until the awakening ceremony.

And with that in mind, I summoned my doppelganger once more and reengaged.

The next few rounds with my clone were variations of the first two. In some, I lost. Others, I won. In all of them, every punch, kick, block, counter, or grab thrown between us had been met in turn by the other. And by the end of the hour, we all had bruises and scuff marks covering ourselves from head to foot; excepting our enchanted clothes, of course.

I allowed for a fifteen-minute break before we went back at it with weapons and took those fifteen minutes to thoroughly think about my fighting style with my chosen weapons.

I'd experienced a few engagements involving knives in the past and had even received professional training in knife fighting. Though the same couldn't be said for the spear. I was, however, at least able to get a proper sense of form through all the documentaries and demonstrations I'd seen over the course of my extensive history resurfacing through my Eternal Eye; but with no proper training, I was fully aware of the potential losses.

I'd essentially be freestyling, I concluded. And then decided that I'd accept the risks for now and ask my father for a tutor as a contingency. Until then, I'd follow my intuition and swap with my daggers whenever appropriate.

After the fifteen minutes were up, I spawned our doppelgangers and they formed in much the same way they always had. Only, after we took up our arms, the limbs of the umbral clones amassed in darkness and began growing- morphing into the same shape as our weapons.

And then they engaged.

Luckily, my doppelganger wasn't as formidable in this hour, due to my own lacking experience with the spear; resulting in noticeably longer rounds. Though I was fully aware that that would change with time.

As such, I took my time whenever possible and focused on fighting with the proper form and technique rather than blindly trying to kill my opponent. A process that I quickly became enthralled in and became surprised when the time came to end our sparring session for the night.

"From now on." I started after our rest period had ended. "I'll be teaching you my theories on Advanced Manipulation and Elemental Fusion."

"Elemental… fusion?" Jaimess repeated slowly.

"It's exactly as it sounds." I proudly grinned. "Once I teach you the theory and you learn the basics. We'll begin training our magic. I have some ideas on how to take each of your magical attributes to new heights."