When William opened his eyes, he found himself in the same place where he lost consciousness. The only difference was that there was a leather sack bag a meter away from his face.
The young boy gingerly moved his aching body as he forced himself to a sitting position. When he opened the leather sack, he found a water flask, beef jerky, and a small bottle of recovery potion.
William wolfed down the beef jerky with a vengeance. He was starving and he ate the jerky as if it was the most delicious thing in the world. When he was done eating, he drank half the water from the flask.
The young boy allowed himself to relax for a few minutes before drinking the recovery potion to ease the pain in his body.
'I'd better find a place to stay for the night,' William thought as he scanned his surroundings. It was not hard to find a place to rest, but the boy was worried that his "unknown enemy" would attack him during the night.
The red-headed boy shuddered at that possibility. William was not stupid. When he saw the leather sack, he knew that the one who attacked him was the one responsible for the next stage of his training.
'If it was the me from two months ago, I might have not lasted ten minutes,' William mused as he searched for a good place to pass the night. He finally understood how important stamina was during a fight of attrition.
'Owen's training was to increase my stamina,' William pondered. 'Then what is the purpose of this training?'
William thought long and hard, but the only reason he could think of was that he was being trained to enhance his senses in order to react to dangerous situations.
William had only taken ten steps from where he lay when something hit his head and made him lose consciousness once again.
A man wearing ranger's clothing stepped out from the darkness and picked up the leather sack that William had dropped. He gave the unconscious boy a side-long glance before walking away with an indifferent expression.
-----
'Sht!' William cursed internally.
It was the second day since he had entered the forest and his situation had not improved. In fact, it even became worse. He had just finished drinking water after waking up and a barely audible hisses pierced the stillness of the Silent Forest.
Several arrows flew from different directions and they were all aimed at him! William activated his movement speed and dodged left, right, and center, but the arrows kept on hounding him. This time, the arrows were literally hounding him like homing missiles.
No matter how he dodged, they kept on coming back!
'Fck!' William cursed for the umpteenth time as he summoned his staff to help deflect the arrows.
His Parry Skill activated and deflected some of them, but he was pushed back every time he did it. The arrows were surprisingly sturdy and seemed to be made from a very hard metal. If he was not gripping his staff tightly, it might have already flown out of his grasp.
Another day of cat and mouse ensued and it only eased up when the sun was at its peak. William almost collapsed from exhaustion due to lack of food and water. It seemed that the cat had left the mouse to allow it to get something to eat and drink.
William gritted his teeth as he climbed a tree to pick some fruits from its branches.
'If the Second Master can see me right now, he might start calling me a monkey,' William thought as he snagged a few fruits to serve as his lunch.'
-----
Somewhere in Celine's house…
Oliver sneezed while seated on his perch.
"That little monkey William must be thinking of me," Oliver muttered. "I hope he's suffering right now."
The Parrot Monkey closed his eyes and returned to his nap. Celine had already been notified by Owen that William was undertaking intense survival training in the Silent Forest. Oliver was quite tempted to join the fun, but Celine forbade him.
He could only grudgingly obey his Mistress' order while praying that William's suffering would intensify with each passing day.
----
A month passed, and a ragged wild boy, who was covered in dirt from head to toe, jumped along the branches of the trees in order to escape the hunter that had been harassing him all this time.
Aside from the constant harassment, William was also suffering from the constant ringing sounds in his ears. These sounds would often haunt him when the deafening silence descends after his attacker stops his assault.
Before, he thought that Owen's training had been harsh, but it couldn't compare to what he was experiencing right now. Aside from eating twice a day, and getting forcefully knocked out at night, his day revolved around trying to escape whoever was bullying him.
There were times when he had enough and instead of running away he charged in the direction where the arrows were coming from. However, each time he did it, he was unable to find his assailant.
There were even days when he just wanted to call it quits and just allowed himself to get hit by the arrows, but that didn't help him either. The blunt arrows were coated by a very powerful drug that caused excruciating pain. The pain was so intense that he felt like dying.
After experiencing it once, William didn't allow himself to get hit even once and just focused on running away.
Another whistling sound reached his ears, but this time, William didn't panic. He stepped to the side and allowed the arrow to pass harmlessly in front of him. More arrows flew in his direction, but William calmly dealt with them all. Those he could dodge, he dodged. Those he couldn't, he deflected them with his wooden staff.
In that one month of hell, William's sensory perception had reached a high level. His Sixth Sense, that warned him of danger, had also been heightened to an incredible extent. Sometimes, his hidden assailant would fire arrows that emitted no sound.
That is when William's Sixth Sense would kick in and tell him that a hidden danger was approaching.
When the sun was about to set, William successfully deflected a silent arrow that was aimed at his head. After that, no more arrows flew in his direction. Instead a loud thump was heard on the ground three meters away from him.
The steel arrow that was stuck on the ground was a real arrow and not a blunt one. On its shaft, a piece of paper was tied. William didn't pick the arrow right away, instead, he let his senses scan the surroundings to make sure that this was not another ploy from his hidden adversary.
After making sure that there was no danger in his surroundings, William picked up the arrow and took out the written letter. After reading its contents, William sighed and sat beside a tree to rest.
Soon, a loud snoring sound echoed inside the forest. William slept deeply without a care in the world.
A thousand meters away from the sleeping boy's location, a man stood on top of a tree branch. He was none other than Trent, the Sentinel of Lont.
He was in charge of William's Perception Training.
The Silent Forest was not a simple forest. It was the most appropriate place to train someone's perception. People thought that absolute silence didn't have a sound, but they were dead wrong in their assumption.
When you were in a place that is totally deprived of sound, you experience an ear deafening silence. Your ears would start to hurt because you would experience "Phantom Noises". Ringing sounds that wouldn't go away and would haunt your every waking second.
In William's former world, these sounds were associated with tinnitus.
Just like William's stamina training, the Perception Training also trained a person's willpower.
Trent took his leave because his mission was over. It was now time for William to begin his Martial Arts Training under another one of the experts of Lont.
-----
Dwayne, the monk that held the profession Drunken Executioner, sipped his alcohol from a small wooden bowl. He had seen Trent's arrow flare rise above the canopy of the Silent Forest and knew that William's basic training was over.
The monk sighed in satisfaction after emptying the wooden bowl filled with alcohol.
"So, it's finally my turn," Dwayne said with a sinister smile. "It has been a while since I taught someone Martial Arts. I hope that the Commander's grandson is better than the last student I taught."
Dwayne could still remember that so-called genius that was raised by the monks of his order.
In just a single session, the boy had been crippled and all the elder monks almost went mad in anger. Because of this, Dwayne was excommunicated from the temple and was not allowed to step onto another Holy Ground ever again.
Dwayne didn't get mad at the treatment he received. He even felt liberated because he was sick and tired of being a goody two shoes. He roamed the land doing anything he pleased. Sometimes he would wipe out bandit groups along the way, sometimes he would become the bandit and terrorize the innocent souls who were unlucky enough to cross his path.
That was how he got his nickname, the "Drunken Executioner" because he would always be seen carrying a jug of alcohol with him when he committed these nefarious acts.
He only stopped his rampage because he had encountered James who was guarding the merchant group that he had chosen to attack.
With just a single slap from the old man, Dwayne and his short-lived tyranny came to a complete stop. James was supposed to bring him back to the authorities, but changed his mind halfway there.
Since then, Dwayne had become James' loyal subordinate and followed him like a tail. He was someone who respected the strong, and James was by far the strongest person that he had met in his life.
"Well, since you are Commander's grandson, I guess you will not break that easily," Dwayne muttered as he stared at the alcohol-filled bowl in his hands.
The monk's eyes narrowed as he stared at the Silent Forest in the distance. He had always wondered what it felt like to have a disciple. Dwayne knew that William was already Celine's disciple, so he had already given up taking him in as his own.
However, he was still itching to impart his knowledge to his Commander's grandson. He had a feeling that William was going to accomplish something big in the future, and he wanted to be part of that future.