The next day on the training ground the Marquis gave the next instructions for the training, teaching them how to do horizontal slashes, vertical slashes, diagonal slashes and trusts.
"Starting from today you will start swinging your sword upwards, downwards, to the left, to the right and diagonally for the coming 18 weeks. Every slash will be repeated 100 times with the same amount of strength. After every week you will add 50 times by every slash until you reach a thousand times.There is enough time to take breaks because this training method is for trainee knights of 15 years old."
"We won't disappoint you Commander."
"The prince is right, we won't fail you.
"That's good to hear, because once you both have reached thousand I will open your dantian and refine your aura, so that I can teach you both how to channel aura in your swords without breaking it."
"Did you hear that First Prince, I will also soon be able to use aura and I will catch up on you."
"I don't think that you will surpass me who already has aura?"
"You will see with your own eyes in the future how I will become the strongest sword of the kingdom."
" Prince and young master, less talking and more training"
"Understoond Commander."
"Yes Commander."
For the first six weeks the prince and the young duke kept progressing at a steady pace after that it became more and more difficult for their bodies to keep following the pace of their progress. Especialy for Arthur who kept wearing his weights without using a drop of aura.
Two months later Viktor ran screaming from happiness to the training ground of the dukedom of House Vermius.
"Yes I finally did it, woo hoo!"
'I hope that father and mother will give me a present and that the prince will take me more seriously. I'll wait for tomorrow for his expression.'
The next day at the training ground before the Marquis arrived.
"Proficiat Viktor, you finally did open your dantian, you're now finally also an aura user, how did your parents react when you told them?"
"My parents are thinking about hiring a top tier blacksmith to make me a sword as a present for becoming an expert."
"I'm jealous, my father said I should wait until we have finished the training and before we are going to enroll in the Royal Academy."
Arthur and Viktor kept talking until The Commander entered.
"Good morning, first prince and young duke."
"Good morning sir."
"Good morning Commander, yesterday afternoon I opened my dantian and am finally also an aura user."
"Proficiat, young duke, so it means that we can upgrade the training."
"No, that's not what I meant, pffhh."
'Why did I say that now I will really die this time.'
Viktor sighed and wanted to punch himself until the commander started laughing.
The two young boys looked at the commander with their questioning eyes.
"I was just messing with you, we are going to meditate for the coming 10 weeks and five days. The first thing you will do is repeating the thousand slashes and in the next first 5 weeks you will refine your aura once you've finished your physical training everyday. After that you will refine your mind to stay true to yourself and not become consumed by the sword and become addicted by the sword. Understood."
"Yes, Commander!"
They shouted in unison and started the last 11 weeks from their preparations to learn Royal Swordsmanship.
In the training grounds you could find Arthur and Viktor sitting on the ground meditating. They were refining their aura, the first step was to cultivate your aura and reach the level of beginner Master. So the Commander was giving Viktor instructions on how to cultivate his aura so that he would have greater potential.
The next step was to imagine all the elements in your mind and see how your body would react to it and try to recreate it and to materialize it with your aura. That's how a bloodline without aura users would cultivate, but as a family of aura users they could also use an already partly refined element that runs down in their blood. If you wanted to succeed to the throne in the Zenon Kingdom you needed to achieve some things such as having at least a fire aura or mana at the level of a Grandmaster.
In the past when aura was just a new ability, some people tried to have as many possible elements, but died very soon because their body couldn't hold all the power and was destroyed. Now it is impossible to get an elemental aura without a good bloodline or a blessing from a God.
Nobles did find a solution by refining and cultivating one element, so that the next generation would find it less difficult to materialize their old element.
Arthur chose two elements because in the Reinhardt family it was not uncommon for the king to have multiple elements, such as his paternal grandfather, the king before his father, chose the fire and the wind element to reinforce his fire aura. It wasn't that difficult for him because his mother had a wind element.
The chosen elements by Arthur are fire and lightning because his mother is from the Thunderwolf Marquis Household and in his past life he found out that fire alone wasn't strong and fast enough while fighting against the Gods.
The boys kept coming from early in the morning till late in the evening. On the fourth day Arthur was able to materialize the fire element and received some praises from the Commander.
"Your growth is monstrous, First Prince, if you keep the pace you may reach the Supreme level before reaching the age of thirty."
The Commander said laughing looking at Arthur's red aura burning like a flame.
"Viktor, we need to speed up the pace a little so that you can catch up to him."
"You're right Commander, we need to speed up."
At home Arthur manifested his flame aura on his hand and showed to his parents, they both looked surprised at him.
"Art, good done you should try to keep doing your best and keep in mind that we will always be proud of you."
"Yes mother, I will keep that in mind."
Arthur said smiling.
"My son, since your birth I could see you were born for greatness and I want to witness your growth and how your influence will change the kingdom."
King Marcus Reinhardt said.
"Thank you for the praises, but this is just the beginning father."
'I love the self-confidence that you radiate.'
Thought the king to himself.
After that they kept training day in and day out, with the decreasing temperatures because winter is coming soon. On the twentieth day of aura refining and cultivating Viktor advanced to the intermediate Expert level and on the thirty-second day Arthur was able to also use the lightning element with a lot of effort.
With the security of the palace they were able to keep the achievement within the royal palace and the duke's mansion but two days after that Arthur was able to use the lightning element a butler had leaked the information after being drunk in a bar.
The information spread like fire and in no time all the nobles from the kingdom began sending presents and marriage proposals to the First Prince and the young Duke. They received money, swords, elixirs …and refused every marriage proposal politely. Even some nobles, kings and emperors from neighbouring countries had sent presents and marriage proposals.
***************************************************************
On 24th of December 1789 [na 24th of June 1789]
After receiving all the presents the days passed really quick as they both had refined their aura and their minds. Viktor almost reached the advanced Expert level and Arthur is able to use both elemental auras at the same time for some time. Now that they had advanced and the deadline had passed it's now time to begin the training of Royal Swordsmanship.
The Commander stood before the children and began his explanation.
"Now that we have finished refining your aura and minds, I will be starting to teach you the Royal Swordsmanship of the Zenon Kingdom. The strength of Royal Swordsmanship lies in the raw destructive power, its swiftness and defense. The swordsmanship is divided into seven forms as I said at the day we met first at the training ground, they are also divided in multiple chapters and they too are divided in multiple moves and secret moves. There are in total 735 moves and secret moves."
"Wow, that are to many moves to remember." Viktor said.
"Viktor, the knights and nobles who learn the Royal Swordsmanship to perfection are only taught up to and including the 6th Form, the last is only for people with the royal bloodline are allowed to learn them."
"What the Prince said is right, young Duke, even I, the Commander of the Royal knights, only learnt the six first Forms and the 6th Form is only for the upper knights and nobles with potential."
"So, with what are we going to start Commander?", Arthur said.
"We are going to start with Form 1 - Stone Pillar Form for trainees, chapter 1 Roots of the Mountain."
"What is the Roots of the Mountain?" Viktor asked.
"It is the first chapter where you learn to use pure aura and physique power and it's the foundation where you learn to use aura like a shield or to reinforce the body. Because of your age his Majesty the King, the Duke and I have chosen to teach you the three first forms without the secret moves. Once you have finished your five years at the Royal Academy you will be taught the rest."
"Regrettably, my father, the Duke, said that the secret moves were so strong that centuries ago an Expert from our kingdom's army was able to kill three Masters from the Sarrain Empire with one slash."
"What the Duke said is true, so that's why you'll have to wait after finishing the academy because it's too much power for a knight, so we don't even need to talk about children like you."
"Yes Commander.", they answered in unison.
"Now that you have understood that, let's begin in the coming two years you will be learning 210 moves of the Royal Swordsmanship, I will teach you one chapter per month, so that means you will learn all the chapters within 21 months of training. The last three months will be used for me to take time and help Viktor refine his aura. After that you don't need to come to the training ground, because the last 6 months were given to you so that you can refine your flaws, evolve your skills, reach a higher level of aura or something else you want to do. So first Prince you don't need to come anymore after learning all the moves."
"Understood Commander.", Arthur said.
"Let's begin with the first Form, it isn't elemental so if you want you can add an elemental of choice.."
'Shhring'
The Commander took out his sword out of his scabbard and began his explanation.
"Chapter 1 - Roots of the Mountain, First Move Mountain Stance, Second Move Stone Cut, Third Move Rock Splitter, Fourth Move Aura Anchor, Fifth Move Pillar Guard, Sixth Move Bedrock Bash, Seventh Move Ground Pulse, Eight Move Foundation Slash, Ninth Move Weight of the Earth, the Tenth and Last Move Seismic Thrust are all the moves your going to learn this month. When you hear the names you think it is too much but once you can use them the first chapter will be seen as a move."
After telling all the names of the moves from the First Form, First Chapter, the Marquis started showing the moves and explained how to circulate the aura in the body, he gave his own opinion and points of interest to maximise every move to it's limit with as less possible aura needed so that prolonged battle becomes possible whenever needed.
"I also need to tell you that in January you will be having another instructor because I need to go somewhere, where I will be representing the King and after that I will need to go home to my household for personnel business. So we will not see each other for some time."
"To bad Commander, I hope you will return soon.", Viktor said with an unhappy face.
"No problem Commander, once you're done you should come back with your son, so that we can meet. I heard he is the same age as us and heard rumours that he will be attending the academy with us."
In my past life he was able to become the next Marquis, I even had given him the title of a duke during my conquest because of his good performance.
"We'll see then if he can come with me or not, because he has been training and preparing to enter the Royal Academy and with other noble children at the Marquis estate."
"You can invite them too if you want."
"Thank you, First Prince, I will tell them. Now we should continue the training. You should try to repeat the moves I just showed so that you can practice on your own."
"On our own?", Viktor said.
"Yes on your own, because to learn the moves the best you do it best on your own to improve the moves in a way that it will grow and change with the body. So on the first day like today you will be taught 10 moves. After that once six days past you will be checked if you learned it right you will be checked again 3 times that month to be sure. The month is to give you enough time to get used to the moves. That same process will be repeated for 21 months until all the 210 moves are mastered."
"Ok Commander, understood.", they answered in unison
"But can we also try to spar or not?" Viktor asked.
"Only under supervision because you are both heirs, safety must be guaranteed."
"Okay, good to know."
"If you want , you can do the first spar on New Year's eve."
"Yes, yes , yes, I can finally show my skills and defeat the prince."
"No, no, no, the winner is already decided and that will be." Arthur said while yawning, mocking Viktor in his face.
"Because the difference is in level in mastering aura, aura won't be allowed because the prince could kill you in one strike, so you will both be wearing bracelets on both arms and legs to block the use of aura. The fight won't still be fair because the prince is in a higher stage. So the the supervisor will decided the winner on only by being the best able use the moves"
"For me it's good, now it's more honest because I don't think Viktor had thought about the difference in our physical power."
"I didn't, but with these rules beating you won't be even a dream but will become reality."
"Commander, can you show about 5 times all the ten moves, after that we will be training on our own."
"Yes, what the prince said."
"Okay, the first four times I will show it with the power of a beginner Expert and the last will be shown with the power of beginner Supreme Ruler but I will reduce the speed so that you can still watch all the moves"
The boys both nodded.
At the two first times they wrote everything down, even some little details. At the third and fourth times they were memorizing the moves while trying to copy it.
"You two should sit in the tribune to stay safe."
The Commander already showed it four times and asked them to sit in the tribune. As they sat down they felt and saw the training ground trembling. The whole training ground was completely filled with a dark aura filled with light points, it looked like space with all his stars within it. After having released a part of his aura the Commander absorbed a quarter of the aura in the air and condensed it in his sword. Next he started demonstrating, with every movement he made the whole training ground tremble. As he finished his demonstration he absorbed all the remaining aura with his body.
"What do you think?"
As the Commander looked back at the tribune he saw the two boys with surprised looks on their faces.
"This realm is needed to rule your dukedom, young duke and once you have learned the Duke's swordsmanship, you can become the strongest of your era after the First Prince."
"Is that true, can I become the second strongest of the kingdom?"
"Yes, I am the strongest sword known to our kingdom and the central continent but in reality I am the 23th Sword of the Zenon Kingdom, because the past King Arthur Reinhardt had chosen to hide their power from the public. He had the past Royal Magic Tower Master make a potion to hide there so that people would think that they were only at the level of Peak Transcended."
"Do you know who they are?" Arthur asked.
"Yes, from what I know you should have met at least eleven each."