“`
Rein used to be shorter than him, only reaching up to his eyebrows.
But in less than half a month, Rein had grown rapidly, almost as tall as him!
This greatly amazed George, who grabbed Rein’s arm and exclaimed, “Rein, what on earth have you been eating recently? How did you grow so fast!”
But the next second, George froze; he lowered his head to look at the arm he was holding.
He couldn’t get his hand around it!
George instinctively pinched with his fingers, feeling the firm yet elastic sensation from his fingertips.
George was stunned!
“Re…Rein! You’ve changed… way too much!!” George stammered, eyes wide and mouth agape.
Not only had Rein grown taller, but his entire figure had also become larger, though it wasn’t immediately obvious since his build was still proportionate.
Fortunately for George, it was the arm he touched; had he felt Rein’s chest or back, he would have encountered the rigid metal bars of the ‘plate armor shirt.’
“Smack!”
“Two big guys, cut out the touchy-feely,” Rein protested as if annoyed.
Actually, Rein wanted to prevent George from continuing to touch him here and there, exposing the fact that he was wearing a cotton plate armor shirt.
It wasn’t that he worried George would tell others, but naturally, the fewer people who knew about it, the better.
“Sigh… Rein, this change in you is just too great!” George seemed quite disheartened.
“When you eat well, you naturally grow tall!” Rein gestured towards the eggs, milk, and meat he had just bought, sitting to one side.
George looked puzzled, then suddenly his expression cleared, “No wonder!”
“Right, what did you want to see me about today?” To avoid dwelling on the issue, Rein changed the subject.
“I just got a notification from the manor: training for page boys is resuming this afternoon,” George said, slapping his forehead as he remembered the matter at hand.
Huh! I had planned to visit the Habsburg manor later to settle the matter with the greyhound puppies, but I didn’t expect the training to resume in the afternoon.
After a brief consideration, Rein decided to attend the page boys’ training in the afternoon, and after it ended, he would head to the manor’s kennel to pick out a greyhound.
Rein naturally brought along his cotton plate armor shirt and dagger, but left the Dual-Handed Greatsword behind; it was just too conspicuous.
In the afternoon.
Outside the training ground of Habsburg manor, the page boys’ training began anew.
Today’s session was focused on the basics of swordsmanship.
“We’ve learned the basics of swordsmanship before. Basic swordsmanship has only three moves, but whether it’s the striding thrust, downward slash, or upward sweep, they are all offensive moves with no defense techniques,”
“So today, we are going to learn how to use the long sword in your hand for defense!” the swordsmanship instructor Humbert declared loudly.
“Rein, come forward and demonstrate with me.”
“Yes, Instructor!” Rein was taken aback for a moment but quickly agreed and briskly walked to the front.
“Are you ready?”
“I’m ready, Instructor.”
“Hmm, the rest of you, pay close attention to my demonstration,” Humbert nodded and then turned to address the group of page boys loudly.
Humbert raised the wooden sword in his hands level to Rein’s chest and delivered a rapid striding thrust.
However, Rein on the opposite side found it odd that the instructor would thrust such a slow sword, even for a demonstration; it just seemed a little too unrealistic.
“Surely the instructor must have something up his sleeve?”
Therefore, Rein naturally took a step back, easily dodging Humbert’s thrust.
Just as Rein thought Humbert would follow up with another attack, he found that Humbert was looking at him with a strange expression.
The scene unfolding before him was a bit different from what Humbert had anticipated.
Although he had long known that Rein had a natural talent for swordsmanship, having sparred with Rein several times, Humbert was also aware of Rein’s general strength.
But the thrust he had just performed was executed with seventy percent of his real strength; logically, Rein should have barely failed to react in time, with Humbert’s sword tip pointing directly at his chest.
Then, Humbert would have used this as a proper demonstration, to tell all the page boys about the importance of defense, and how to do it.
“`
Humbert had not expected Rein to be able to dodge so easily.
Clearly, this was a failed demonstration!
“Rein, very effective defense, let’s go again,” Humbert said.
This time, Humbert’s gaze was noticeably more serious, and he planned to use ninety percent of his strength.
After all, if the demonstration failed twice, he wouldn’t know how to explain the content that was supposed to follow.
He couldn’t possibly switch to someone else to demonstrate, could he?
Would he still have any face left as the manor’s senior guard and the children’s swordsmanship tutor?
Clearly, Rein was not aware of the swordsmanship instructor Humbert’s inner thoughts and immediately nodded:
“Alright, instructor!”
This time, Humbert didn’t ask if Rein was ready, and as soon as he saw Rein take his position, he suddenly thrust forward with a striding motion.
“Whoosh!”
This thrust was much faster than the previous one, so fast that it even slightly pierced the air, producing a faint whistling sound.
Rein’s eyes narrowed, and he silently sighed to himself that instructor Humbert was finally taking it a bit more seriously this time!
The previous attack was too perfunctory, but this one was much stronger. The question was, just how much of his real skill was the instructor using this time? Fifty percent? Or perhaps sixty percent?
While Rein pondered this in his mind, his body’s movements were not slow in the least.
Retreating quickly as if by instinct, Rein swiftly swung his sword, using the “strong” part of the blade near the hilt to block Humbert’s thrust.
Perhaps it was because his attributes, especially his spiritual power, had greatly improved, Rein was able to grasp Humbert’s longsword trajectory very well.
Moreover, being accustomed to the heavier Dual-Handed Greatsword, swinging the wooden sword felt like waving a straw, quick and easy, so the block was not difficult but rather smooth.
“Bam!”
The two wooden training swords struck each other swiftly and then separated sharply.
One could see that Humbert’s wooden sword had been knocked aside, while the tip of Rein’s sword pointed steadily at Humbert’s chest, motionless.
At this moment, Humbert could no longer suppress the surprise in his heart, quietly uttering “huh”, while his mind was overwhelmed by a storm of shock.
“If the first time could be put down to my own underestimation, leading to the sword being easily dodged by Rein, but this time, I deliberately caught Rein off guard.”
“Moreover, the speed of my thrust this time was obviously much faster than the last.”
“But even under such circumstances, Rein easily blocked it.”
“This…..”
Humbert didn’t know what had happened to Rein lately, but he hadn’t seen the boy in just half a month, and his strength had improved to this extent?
As for the other children who were watching, some were enthralled, others were shocked and bewildered.
Most of the children had only seen the swordsmanship instructor Humbert and Rein exchange blows at an extremely fast pace, then heard a “bam” and it was all over.
As for how Rein defended, they really didn’t see it clearly.
Humbert was slightly stunned, then a flash of insight struck him, and he immediately thought of a way to cover up this failed demonstration.
“Ahem… Rein just demonstrated very well!”
Humbert cleared his throat and continued:
“Just now, I attacked Rein with a striding thrust, and Rein sidestepped and quickly blocked my thrust with the ‘strong’ part of the blade, then counterattacked with a thrust, a very good response.”
“Everyone should learn from Rein’s defensive tactics, very standard and practical!”
Upon hearing Humbert’s praises, Rein was clearly startled.
This did not seem to match the demonstration he had anticipated; shouldn’t it have been him thrusting and then Humbert calmly blocking?
But then again… what the instructor just explained seems to make a lot of sense!
…
The group of children looked at Rein with a mix of shock and envy.
The one with thick eyebrows stood out the most; as the second-best swordsman among the children, he knew deeply how difficult it was to practice the rapid sequence of defense and counterattack that Rein had just demonstrated.