Chapter 10

The Training Ground was right outside the first-year's school building. It wasn't considered too big; as the majority of the area was the field and right beside it is the playground, a single lap was roughly two hundred metres or so. To normal people, running a hundred laps around the plaza was definitely not a simple task. Especially, to these young students who, majority of the bunch are pampered by their family, however, some noticable few seemed to had the foundation of a pokemon trainer, it wasn't actually that hard. As long as this bunch ran seriously, they'd manage to finish running their twenty laps within an hour or so.

After Caleb and Diantha had started their sprint with their pokemons, the 'great army' of running was formed behind them, many sounds of schadenfreude immediately echoed out. However, the two people didn't even bother to care about them. They were already ahead by a few laps after several minutes, but that didn't meant they would slack of nor slow down.

This was part of the pokemon training activity and they treated it seriously. Magby's carefree look was taken away, his fire-type temperament that was usually kept hidden were exposed as the temperature around him heated up.

Ralts was actually keeping up with the group, it was commendable considering it is a psychic-type that are well known for their lack of physical strength. Although, she is currently panting heavily after they had done their 7th lap around the field.

Whilst running, Caleb suddenly said to Diantha. "Ralts looked as if she is already out of breath. Should we stop and let her catch a breather before continuing? She already did a very good job keeping up with Magby and us."

Diantha already noticed her Pokemon's dillema even before Caleb's reminder. She shook her head, saying. "You don't have to stop with us. I'm not that narrow-minded you know, I can understand. You should worry more on those three behind us."

"Hmm? What do you mean?" Caleb turned his head, he then saw three people and pokemons that were closely following behind. He was surprised, he knew that they were the first ones to join them in sprinting, he didn't knew though that they were also matching their pace.

Caleb was stunned. "Woah! Those guys are serious. But, what do I have to feel worry for anyway?"

Diantha felt helpless as she replied. "There's a prize if you can take first place in the overall score you get in the activity. Do you honestly don't know that? Seeing how hard those three are going at it, their intention are obvious."

Caleb frowned as he was clueless on it. Not wanting to be clueless about it. "Spill it. What's the prize? Seeing them sprint even though they are already panting like pigs... What's so great about the prize?"

"Ugh... I get, I get it." Diantha sighed as she stopped after doing another lap. "Besides academic points. My father said it is unique every Saturday, so he isn't exactly sure. But, according to him it is either a random TM, equipment of some kind or TP which is Trainer Points, that could be used to exchange resource in the School."

"Well..." He also stopped. It was already their 8th lap, but he was still breathing fine. "Since their's a prize, I would gladly take that for myself then. Hehehehehe, see ya Diantha."

After they were done talking. He and Magby left the two as they suddenly sped up. Making everyone know he wasn't doing his best earlier.

It had to be said that even though Caleb sounded overly confident when saying that, his physical fitness truly stood out from the masses. Once he'd sped up, there was no one from the students who could actually catch up to him.

At that moment, Instructor Ross already arrived beside the field. He simply stood there as he calmly watched the students run. His gaze was quickly attracted to Caleb, and his gaze changed slightly before returning to normal.

Time quickly passed. As the number of completed laps increased, the breathing of the running students gradually became rougher. The physical fitness of the students was revealed at this moment. Instructor Ross had never said that they were prohibited from resting, so everyone had to stop occasionally after doing a lap or two slowly but surely doing their long-distance running.

There were more than ten people running at the very front of the group; their speed wasn't slow at all. Of the group, the leader was Caleb. Although he has already runned so many laps, his breathing was still fine even though he is beginning to breath a little roughly. Amazingly, his speed hadn't decreased at all the entire time.

All of the students had completed a hundred laps within the stipulated time. They were now standing in the middle of the Training Ground Field, resting.

Instructor Ross expressionlessly turned towards the students as he indifferently said, "The people whose names I call, step forward. Joshua, Fred, Jin, Karen, Dust, Gort, Holland, and Rose."

A total of eight students were called out by him. The students had clearly never expected Instructor Ross to be able to actually call out the names of eight students, even though they hadn't given any self-introductions.

The students who were called out slowly stepped forward.

Instructor Ross indifferently said, "You eight can go back to the track and redo another set of laps, this time do thirthy instead of twenty."

"Ah?" The eight students who were still tired from running were immediately astonished, while the other students erupted into an uproar.

"Teacher, why?" The tall kid named Jin stepped forward with an angry look on his face. Out of the students who'd completed their twenty laps, he'd been in the first group of people; he was one of the first people that had finished.

Ross coldly replied, "The Trainer Oro doesn't need students who're full of tricks. If we train and educate a person like you, who has strength but not a good and upright attitude, the only thing you'll bring to any country is catastrophe, not help. Jin Skyson, say it yourself, did you run the full twenty laps just now?"

"I naturally ran enough." Jin Skyson protested.

Instructor Ross laughed. "You ran enough? If my memory serves me right, when everyone started running, you unhurriedly walked two laps even though considering that your Instructor, I, commanded you to run and not half-assed jog like a fucking sissy. You could have just took that time to rest, then continued your run. You only started to catch up when the leading group were on their fifth laps. Because of this, you didn't run a full one twenty, but eighteen. I believe that I'm not the only person who saw your laziness in the beginning."

"I…" Jin Skyson's face immediately turned bright red. He never thought that Instructor Ross, who by the looks of it knew his influencial background considering he already knew his family name, but still would be able to reveal in front of everyone his crafty tricks as if he doesn't care at all for the consequences of offending him. "But, just because I ran a few laps less... you can't have me do it all over again, with ten more laps too! I'm a heir to Skyson Construction and Institution, you couldn't be this cruel to me!"

Instructor Ross snorted disdainfully. "I've already explained the reason of you being punished, yet you dare threaten me!? Who do you think you are, huh? You shitty snot, go do some laps while I'm being nice, don't waste everybodies time. If you are dissatisfied go tell your father, I don't care!"

"You…" Jin Skyson was completely flabbergasted. In reality, he could have finished the twenty laps albiet with some difficulty with his above-average fitness. He constantly train with his mother who had pushed him to work out with her, because of this he was confident to say he is amongst the best of all the students in his class, Class 1. However, he'd never expected that he'd be treated like this with his powerful background nonetheless.

Another punished student named Rose was about to furiously speak up too, but one glare from the Instructor made her shut up meekly.

Ross looked towards the other students and spoke indifferently, "Although I have a bad temper, I definitely keep my promises. The eight people who I called out all did trickery during the 'warm up' whilst running, and did not complete their twenty laps. If you're unhappy with it, you can go and report me to the principal. But for now, you can go and do some run."

Under Ross's overbearing might, the eight students who'd been called out could do nothing but dejectedly go on to the track under the gazes of their classmates and schoolmates. They obviously were feeling shitty, and being stared upon like this made their face so red like a monkey's butt.

The remaining students expressions had completely changed; they didn't even dare to breathe heavily whilst looking at Instructor Ross. It had only been an hour, yet Instructor Ross had already established his absolute authority over the first years.

Ross took a breath before continuing on. "Now that we had those brats out of the way. Students who I call come forward, Caleb, Diantha, Marva, Eusine and Viola."

Those that were called had a shitty look on their faces, they had just witnessed their classmates being punished brutally just now.

'Did we do something wrong?'

This thought was the only thing that was repeatedly going through their brains. As they try to comprehend.