05. Rusty, but nasty

Years were passing by, and Mattheia was growing into a healthy teenager under the eye of his dedicated mentor, Nine, now supported by a group of experienced trainers, and - of course - his loving parents.

Versatile as she was, Nine could easily handle majority of training sessions, and was also helping with a number of everyday chores at house, but for some specific tasks and to keep the kid's environment fresh, more people were needed.

Mattheia was now fourteen, meaning two more years to reach the adulthood. He already managed to learn all the basics about the world, and gained a number of skills related to martial arts, swordsmanship and magic. However, due to his age, he also started being interested into opposite sex, and - since he spent most of his life with her - he ended up having a crush on Nine, or that is how it looked.

She still recalled him being silly and screaming "boobies" when breaking into the bath when she was using it, but back then Mattheia was still several years old, and now he was nearly an adult man. Situation changed a great deal.

For some time, Nine actually allowed him to peek on her, even letting him think he was not caught. Everything for the sake of the kid to learn variety of things, including knowledge about his own body, and differences between opposite sexes, which she considered to be as important as knowing about different races around the world.

However, she was aware that with the approach she had towards this young man, Nine had to be careful to not let anything go out of hand. After all, she had a plenty of bad experiences related to men she met throughout her life. Due to her beauty, being well-endowed and with great figure, wherever she went, there were always men ogling her, and given all these memories she wanted to be sure Mattheia grows into a proper man.

Since that was the case, Nine's approach towards this young lad started changing as he was growing up. Right now, as he reached fourteen, allowing him to go into her bath and letting him see her breasts was no longer an option. Obviously, the boy would still try to find a way in, and this ended up turning into a sort of competition between the two - Mattheia was using skills he learned to get into the bath, while Nine was applying her knowledge to keep him away, turning each such event into a training session.

Her skills were still on a much higher level than Mattheia's, even though the kid had bigger potential than she did, therefore since introduction of this challenge, he never managed to get into her bath, much to his discontent.

The problem this caused was that Kabanos family heir, despite being raised under strict discipline, continued to have mischievous nature, and whatever failure he might have faced with Nine, he would unwind on others, mainly maids and his martial arts instructor - Junie.

Junie was a human woman with extraordinary combat prowess coming from her abnormal innate energy levels, uncanny for her race. When Nine met her for the first time, she could not believe that the person in front of her is really human. Usually, humans were much weaker than any beast-kin, had way shorter lifespan than elves and nowhere close energy levels in comparison to beings with high magical affinity like faeries. Of course, they were quite balanced in each of these categories, but rarely really excelled in one of them. However, the case of Junie was different - all her stats were over the top for your everyday human, especially her energy levels giving her aptitude to learn magic. Knowing that, Nine actually found it disappointing that Junie chose martial arts route, thinking it was a waste, and even offered a hand in teaching her, but Junie kept assuring she was happy with her choices and still had lots to learn in terms of martial arts so taking in anything else would take her too much time.

Nine could not deny Junie's achievements as, through her nearly thirty years of life, that woman managed to win every important competition between combat masters. She even faced weapons and magic bare-handed, winning all matches. Junie maybe did not have magic skills like Nine, but Mattheia peeking on Junie had to be ready for something else than magical hurdles - a heavy beating.

Junie was hired as hand-to-hand combat instructor for Mattheia by his father, Carrera, who personally was trained in several martial arts, and found her abilities to be top notch. However, seeing the initial approach from Junie, Nine actually thought it was more of Junie using the kid as a punching bag than teaching him something useful. Much to her surprise, it turned out that Junie's methods were actually raising the kid's base stats Nine could see owing to one of her special skills.

Still, the thing was that strong defense prepared by Nine caused the young man to take it on the other teachers, and going for Junie could wreck havoc all around the place. It was a huge headache for head teacher Nine.

Before she managed to get there, the fight has already began, and Nine appeared the very moment Mattheia got knocked down. It was not such a big surprise, as physically Junie was nearly at the level of swordsmanship master Galhardt, while possessing high agility and innate energy usually used by high level magicians. Honestly speaking, Nine was unsure if she could win against Junie if they had a serious fight.

With Junie's skill, Nine expected the result of Mattheia's actions, so seeing him on the ground did not come as a surprise. However, his reaction was something unexpected - for most such cases, that boy would just clench his teeth and say "I'll win the next time", but here he did not say a word, and ran away with ashamed look on his face.

Nine wanted to run after him, but Junie caught her hand.

"Just let him be" Junie said "He needs to learn his lesson. I get he's got potential, and I honestly am surprised how fast he picks up the new stuff, but we also need to work on his attitude. You said it yourself, that we cannot go easy on him."

Nine sighed and stopped.

"I'm worried though. Have you seen his face just now? He had such a pitiful look, unilkely of him. Wait, did he...?"

Nine was using one of her special scouting skills, observing Mattheia from the air, using eyes of a hawk.

"He's going into the woods! That rascal!" her voice started sounding anxious "Didn't he hear that mayorcs started appearing in the area?"

"Did they?" Junie asked, visibly surprise "It's first time I hear about it."

"Are you joking? Everyone in the tavern was talking about it."

It suddenly occurred to Nine that she did not talk with anyone from the house about it, and assumed it was the common knowledge for some time now.

"That's not good, we need to follow him. You go and get Galhardt, and make sure everyone in the house is aware of the situation. I'm going straight after him."

She started running at full speed, augmenting her body with magic, but - since Mattheia also obtained that skill already - she was not getting closer to the kid. If she had known, she would not teach him this that soon.

While Kabanos family house was alarmed, Mattheia already managed to reach deep in the woods. She was roaming the area from the very young age and claimed he knows all of its secrets. However, it was just a boasting of a person who was yet to become an adult, and was nowhere close to actual truth. After all, this was an ancient forest, much older than any of nearby settlements, hiding many mysteries even the oldest folk did not know about.

Mattheia actually felt ashamed because of what he did this day and could not look Nine in the eyes after getting two defeats over a single day. He needed a moment to calm down, to be away from everyone and their expectations, and for years now, being out in the wild would always help him whenever he felt bad.

The problem was, he ran into trouble quite quickly. He had no idea, but there were mayorcs in the forest, awful and violent creatures. These were considered one of the worst races on the continent - while counted as one of intelligent being, mayorcs were listed at the bottom of intelligence ranking, and were the most likely race to attack others without thinking, mainly due to their stupidity.

Since these creatures were generally idiots, and their only relevant traits were purely physical, Mattheia's current level was enough to handle couple of them, and he honestly wanted to try facing them on his own to prove himself, therefore he ended up in the fight.

As expected, he managed to easily defeat three of them. Unfortunately, this action alarmed other mayorcs, and the boy was now being chased by several dozens of frenzied creatures, coming from different directions. The only option he had now was running to find a place to hide.

He recalled several spots where he had better chances of doing that in the northern part of the forest, though it was quite a long distance, therefore it was possible he will not be able to make it. Either way, he had nothing to lose so using magic for physical augmentation, he started running at full speed.

About two kilometers farther, mayorcs ambushed him and the fight started. While attempting to chase them off, Mattheia used a magic Nine taught him for fending off animals. He knew it was unlikely for this to defeat mayorcs, but he hoped it would be enough to cause a distraction that could give him a moment to run away.

The plan seemed to have worked in the initial phase. Then, unexpectedly the strength of spell crushed the ground under him, causing him to fall under ground.

It took him a moment to pull himself together, and when he did, it turned out he got into a cave system underneath the forest - a place he had no idea existed. It seemed that there were no mayorcs around yet, meaning he had at least a short moment to take a breath. Too bad he had no idea about this place, and the longer he stayed in the same spot, the higher likeliness that mayorcs will find him.

"Mattheia, clear your mind, calm down and think" he said to himself "For some reason they did not follow me underground. They may be scared of going through that rift or of going inside the cave, or maybe they know of another way? What should I do?"

He wondered for a while longer as to what to do, and ended up deciding to go straight ahead in hope of finding the exit. As he was walking he bumped into something, and heard a voice.

"Hey, what's the big idea!?"

That voiced was pissed off, but despite looking around, Mattheia could not find the source.

"Excuse me, who's that?" the boy asked.

There was no reply for a moment, so he was about to leave, then the voice reached him again.

"Wait, you can hear me?"

"Yes, I can. Not sure who am I speaking to, though."

"Amazing! Who would have thought something like this is going to happen?"

Mattheia was still looking for the voice's source.

"Sorry, but I don't get it. Who are you?"

"That's a good question" the voice replied to him "I'm not entirely sure myself."

"How can this possibly be?"

"No idea. Until now, I thought no one could hear my voice, so I'm as confused as you. Still, no point in looking for the answer now. I can feel trouble in the air, so better pick me up and let's scram from here."

"I still don't..."

"Just in front of you, check in the dust and you will see."

Mattheia thought he was going crazy, hearing voices in his head, but for the sake of his sanity, he started moving hands through the sound and picked up something. Once he raised a long piece of metal he tore from a skeleton's hand, it turned out it was a sword, completely brown one, likely due to the rust.

"Thank you" he heard the same voice saying that.

"Ok, ok, wait a minute. So, do I understand correctly? That voice. You are a sword?

"You're not the only one shocked here. I can't actually believe it would take that much time to find someone who can hear me. Until now, I was thinking I'm imprisoned in this metal junk as a punishment, and that no one replies to me is part of it."

"So I'm the only one you managed to talk to?"

"As far as I remember, yes. Though I have no idea how long have I been here. It must have been ages."

"Based on the sword's condition, and the skeleton holding it, it's been a really long time now."

"You can tell? I have trouble with seeing how much time passes by. After all, the way swords are getting older is different from living beings."

"I doubt I can help you find out now, but I can definitely take you out from here. Still, if I were to choose, I'd go with something that doesn't look as if it was going to break."

"Don't worry about that, I can still cut."

"I'd like to trust you, but I'd rather try with magic and punches first."

"You know that what you are saying is unpleasant?"

Mattheia shook his head.

"By no means I wanted to offend you, I'm just stating the obvious."

The sword made a tongue-clicking sound.

"Whatever, I won't complain since you are taking me out of here."

With that, the boy started walking into previously selected direction, using light magic to see the route in front of him.

There was a number of footprints on the ground, meaning he was not the only one inside the cave.

"With so many, how is it no one else found you before?" he asked the sword.

"Oh, they actually did, but none decided to take me. Apparently, my looks made them drop the idea."

"Well, I don't blame them, given your state."

They cut on the chitchat as multiple sounds started echoing around, and Mattheia found a niche to hide in. As he hid there, a dozen or so figures passed the place where he was.

It seemed as if they were rushing somewhere, therefore the boy decided to carefully follow them, hoping they will lead him outside. And he was not disappointed since moments later he managed to reach the forest again. However, the sight in front of him gave him chills - there was a huge fire in the direction of the village where his family house was.

Scared that something must have happened, Mattheia started sprinting back home, completely disregarding what's going on around him. Fortunately, he had this talkig sword with him now.

"To your right, dodge!" the sword warned him, and the boy avoided a strong swing of a bat from a big mayorc.

He had to stop, surrounded once more, this time by even bigger group. The boy tried the same tactic as before, but getting through was still not possible, so he started throwing everything he had at the opponents - spells and punches.

"C'mon, you won't be able to deal with them like that!" sword was shouting to him "Use me, you won't regret it!"

Mattheia decided he had nothing to lose, and finally took out the sword and attacked with it. Surprisingly, the weapon was really swift and managed to cut way too nice for something looking so rusty. The boy started using everything he learned from his swordsmanship teacher, Galhardt. After several minutes of fight, he noticed there were no longer enemies around, only corpses of the ones he was fighting.

"It was crazy!" he said, looking at the sword "I didn't expect something like that!"

Over the course of fight, the color of sword changed, and there was barely any sight of the rust it had before, only covered in blood and insides of the mayorc.

"I was only acting useless to not be picked by just anyone, though I started losing it as you noticed before" the sword started explaining "Imagine being a sword, cutting through all these sweaty orcs, intestines full of shit. I tell you, being a sword is not an easy life. If I were to choose, I'd have even preferred becoming a bug od a pornstar instead of a fucking piece of metal. Not that being a sword doesn't have perks, but I cannot walk, which sucks."

"Wait, what's a pornstar?"

"I don't really know what that word means. It just somehow came to me as something I should say, no idea why. Disregard it."

Mattheia wiped the sword with a piece of mayorc's cloth and hanged the sword on his back.

"I'm amazed how well the cuts were, given all this rust..."

"Well, to be honest with you, it wasn't rust actually. I told you just a moment ago, that swords cut through intestines, so you know..."

The boy connected the dots, and made a wry face.

"You could've put that in a nicer way."

The sword laughed, and Mattheia continued the run.