Bog Standard Isekai

The next morning, the Lance exited the tents with such a quick intensity that Brin was sure most of them had already been awake before the trumpets.

This time, there was no fumbling around looking for supplies and no worrying about who would do what. Meredydd had agreed to do the armor for the three members of the Lance who'd been called out on doing a bad job, and Cowl had been convinced to relent and let the Lance use his sharpening stones as needed, without supervision, with Brin promising to fund a replacement if they ruined his nice one. He in turn was able to give his full attention to packing up the tents, and while he still was a bit more of a micromanager than Brin would've liked, he wasn't near as much of an impediment as he'd been the day before.

Govannon and Anwir had been chosen to sleep in their armor, so after sharpening their swords they left directly to start on Cid and Hedrek's horses. Then they'd prepare their own, and then help with anyone else who was late to arrive.

For Brin's part, he mostly shouted at everyone. He'd decided to split his mind, keeping only a quarter for himself, and use the rest of his mental space to assign a watcher to each of the men.

The last touch was a Directed Thread running a Mouth Manager, so that each of his split minds could get a chance to give directions. The result made Brin feel kind of cool.

"Govannon, sharpen first! We need you at those horses. Anwir, slow down and do it right! Hedrek, that buckle is wrong. Undo it and try again! Rhun, help Hedrek. Cowl, leave it, Aeron knows what he's doing! Aeron, not like that! For the love of Solia, I just told Cowl that you know what you're doing! Cid, sir, if you don't mind, Rhun and Hedrek need help."

The result was something even more chaotic than yesterday, but it was also faster. Everyone was in the right place, and they were all working at the same time instead of being bottlenecked by Cowl. When the last of the men set off towards the corrals to get the horses, they were among the first instead of the last.

They lost some time against the other teams while the men were preparing the horses, but even this was a positive sign; they were actually taking the time to be thorough and he knew the judges were looking for that.

When Brin rode with the rest of the men and found their place in line, they found that they were faster than nearly half of the other Lances instead of being among the last. That was better than it sounded, because the other Lances had also all improved from their performance yesterday. The competitive spirit was infecting more than just their Lance.

They didn't need to wait nearly as long this time for things to get started, and they didn't practice a [Charge] this time, either. A [Knight] named sir Crost rode in front of them and announced that he was their Hundred Man Commander before riding on to say the same thing to the next Lance. He told them that he'd be directing them with hand signs, which Brin didn't understand, but apparently Cid did.

Soon after, Crost signalled them, and Cid shouted, "Ok, he wants two rows of five. Hierarchical rank. Follow me."

Cid started forward, and the Lance rushed to join him. Hierarchical order actually meant that the highest ranked person would be the front middle, which left Brin on Cid's right and Hedrek on his left, while Aeron headed up the second row.

The Lance seemed to have a good sense for how much space should be between each horse from the training that Derec put them through, because when Cid led them to join up with a few other Lances riding the same direction, they all seemed to fit together perfectly.

The High Commanders gave orders to their Lieutenants, who gave orders to their Hundred Man Commanders, who in turn gave orders to their Primes, the entire thing a huge complex web of communication. At the same time, it was simple, for Brin at least. He only needed to follow Cid. Cid in turn, also didn't need to do much thinking, since Crost's orders were quick and clear.

Brin only had to follow along, and if he didn't understand the point of this maneuver in particular, it didn't really matter. He only needed to follow orders.

This training wasn't actually for the knights, or at least it wasn't mainly for them. The point of this exercise was for the leadership to get used to working together and to learn how to coordinate. With that perspective, Brin kept Invisible Eyes high up above and watched, learning what he could.

Any time one of his Invisible Eyes drew too near one of the commanders, some kind of anti-illusion enchantment would knock it out. It was frustrating, but also good to see that the people on his side weren’t totally defenseless to spies, and there was still plenty Brin could learn just from hearing the shouts and the trumpets, and watching the hand signs.

The first part of the day was slow and easy, with simple movements and drills. They broke for a midday meal and then in the afternoon things got more complex and interesting. Right before sundown they started using Skills.

Brin himself got hit with a few, and it was an odd experience. Out of nowhere, he suddenly knew that he was supposed to shift to the side. He leaned to the left, and at the same time his horse stepped to the side. Brin had never seen that kind of lateral movement out of a horse except for in the horse competitions in his old life, and here they were all doing it in perfect harmony.

Later, his Lance was galloping across the field, when suddenly they stopped. They didn't slow down, they didn't come to a screeching halt; their momentum just ended.

Another hundred knights crossed their path, galloping through the space they would've just run into without a Skill stopping them, and then Brin's group was running again. The starting motion was as abrupt as the stop had been, as if someone had just stopped them in time and then let them go again.

That night, a [Watchful Knight] came by to drop off another note giving them their rankings.

They were ninety-fifth out of two hundred. The rest of the Lance gave out a cheer when they heard the news, clearly gratified to be on the better half of all the knights here, especially since they were so new, but Brin thought they could still do better.

The biggest ding in their score had come due to an "undecorous air of panic". That had only come because they'd been trying something for the first time. They'd be a lot smoother tomorrow.

The men needed no encouragement to swap ideas about what they could do better. Brin had even meekly offered to stop shouting at them so much. Govannon and Hedrek looked like they might want that, but they were cut off by Aeron and Rhun who insisted that his shouting was a necessity.

The next day the Lance moved a lot smoother. Brin kept up his shouting just to help everyone remember their roles, but didn't need to correct anyone nearly as much.

One minor spot of drama happened when Hedrek decided to help with the tents even though Brin did his best to guide him away from that chore and folded it completely wrong.

Govannon tried to push him away and do it for him, saying, "You're such an idiot, Hedrek. Why can't you just do something right for once? We've seen Cowl do this six times and--" ℞Ἀ₦ȪＢÊS

Hedrek shoved Govannon out of the way, knocking him to the ground. "It's a dark day when a runny-nose bedwetter with a Class for children calls a true [Knight] an idiot."

Then he bundled up the tent in a ball and shoved it into the locker. Cowl meekly came along after to refold it, and Hedrek pretended not to notice.

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Fetching the horses went smoothly, and when they lined up on the field there were only sixty teams faster than them.

The formation exercises only lasted an hour, with the leaders firing their Skills right away.

When they got back to their camp, Brin was pleasantly surprised to find that he wouldn't have to spend an hour wandering around trying to figure out what was going on. A page was waiting for them with instructions.

"I'm to pass on your instructions from sir Galan. Sir Gurthcid, you're wanted in the command tents. Sir Brin and sir Rhun, you'll learn counter-fencing, east of the corrals. Sir Hedrek, you may join sir Gurthcid or sirs Brin and Rhun. The rest of you will be attending a lecture on laws and standards. Sir Galan reminds you to pay attention, as there will be an assessment in the form of oral debate."

They all sounded pretty interesting to Brin, so it was nice that he could go to all of them. He returned all his split minds and threads, and sent out directed threads to watch the two other groups.

He walked side by side with Rhun, and they quickly found the spot the page had directed them to. Around two dozen knights were hanging around inside an impromptu practice circle. From first glance, none of them were actually [Knights], they were all near level 30, and most were around Rhun's age. There were weapon stands with all different kinds of martial instruments. Swords and spears, warhammers, maces, and axes, and several different kinds of polearms. None of them looked to be especially high quality, just regular steel.

Sir Crost, their Hundred Man Commander was the most senior knight there, and he looked like he was to their instructor. Sure enough, after Brin and the others waited for a few more knights to arrive, he cleared his throat and said. "Now then. I bet you're all wondering what counter-fencing is. Probably never heard of it before? That's fair, because the counter to fencing is more fencing. We'll get into that in a bit, but first I want to establish a baseline. If you're here it's because you've demonstrated a solid foundation, but most of you weren't formally trained so you might be lacking some vocabulary. Let's get into it."

Crost talked, and another senior knight demonstrated, going through different cuts and jabs with a slim fencing saber. He showed them the right way to lunge, the difference between a feint and a beat, three different ways to guard, and how to advance without crossing the legs.

It was all things that Brin kind of knew, but his melee training with Hogg had been the "learn by doing" variety. Crost went more in depth, talking about which moves were the best counters to which. "If your enemy has [Blade Mastery] then he'll pull off each move perfectly. But a perfectly executed lunge still has many openings. It's all about choosing what to do, and when."

Brin had directed threads start turning this into a practice plan; he needed to try all of this out himself. Intentionally, instead of just doing the moves on the fly when he got into that situation.

Crost also spoke about distance, something Brin thought he understood, but apparently he was wrong.

"At melee long distance, you should be able to hit your opponent with a full lunge and a preparatory half-step. You need to know exactly how far that is for yourself and your weapon of choice. Everyone get into the guard position at long distance from a practice dummy. We don't have enough for everyone, so it's fine if more than one of you are aiming at the same one," said Crost. "I think you'll notice that the distance is a lot longer than you think it is."

Brin measured it in reverse, by tapping the dummy at a full lunge and then stepping back half a step and into the guard. Crost was right. It was nearly eight feet away; it felt like it was a safe distance away, but it really wasn’t.

"This is the amount of space you need to take advantage of an opening. If someone is this far away from you, then don't take your eyes off them. They only need half a wink to put a blade at your throat. On the other hand, if you are paying attention, then any attack from this range will put them in danger of a counterstrike."

The other obvious thing Brin noticed was that Long Distance with the spear was much longer than with the swords most of the other men were using.

He showed them short distance, and close distance. "At short distance, an opponent can hit you without moving their feet. If you're at short distance with someone, expect to get hit. The best fencer in the world might still get tagged by a rookie; you can’t count on avoiding anything at this range. That's a bad deal if you get suckered into an unarmored duel. So don't do that! You're knights! Keep your armor on. I'd say that short distance is the best place for a man in armor, but you've got to be careful, because if near distance is the best, close distance is the worst."

Crost demonstrated by moving just six inches closer to the other senior knight, and then reached out and grabbed his armor. He twisted and threw him to the ground. "At close distance, your opponent is in grappling range, and that's our biggest weakness. Getting us to the ground is the one reliable way of dealing with a [Knight]. A lot of the work of a [Knight] in combat is managing distance. Too far and you're just wasting time. Too close and you're putting yourself in danger. Next time you're training with your Lance, I recommend practicing just that. Have two of your Lancemates try to get into grappling range while you hold them off. You don't want your first time in that situation to be on the battlefield."

Brin added that to the mental list of things to practice. He could totally make some Mirror Men and have them practice this. It didn't matter that they weren't all that strong or fast, they could at least help him work on helping him estimate distances and practice standard blows and counters.

"Alright, for this next part, I'll take a volunteer. You, sir Brin, step forward please," said Crost. He asked Brin to perform a standard lunge. Spear fully extended, with the weight of his body on his lead foot.

Crost shook Brin's shoulder. "Now, this is pretty sturdy from the front. But what happens if I come from the side?"

He pushed lightly against Brin's chest, and Brin staggered backwards to keep from falling.

"Completely off balance, no matter how strong you are, right?"

"Right." Brin nodded.

"Wrong," said Crost. "Try me."

Crost made the same lunge pose, and Brin pushed him lightly in the same place, but he didn't budge. Brin pushed harder, and Crost still held firm. It wasn't until Brin really put his back into it that he managed to make Crost move, but Crost slid rather than losing his footing.

"Now, how'd I do that?" asked Crost. When no one answered, he said, "It's not that complicated. I have high Strength and high Dexterity.”

“What? No!” said Brin. “It’s not about strength, it’s about leverage! You’re… you’re leaning your body in a way I didn’t notice or something.”

Crost tilted his head to the side, raising his eyebrows in a mildly patronizing way. “A little bit, maybe. But are you sure? Let me ask you something young sir. When you learned to fight, were you much weaker than you are now?"

"Yes," Brin said.

Crost nodded. "And when you learned to walk, you were weaker still. When you learned to run and jump and climb trees and all the other things people can do with their bodies, you were a pre-System child. You learned your limitations like that. Some of those limitations are still in place, but some aren't. Are you sure you know which is which?"

Brin smiled. "Show me."

Crost took the entire group through some of the strangest exercises he'd ever done in his life. It was less like combat training, and more like lessons in interpretive dance. They practiced abruptly shifting their momentum in ways that would snap a normal person's ankles. They launched straight to their feet from flat on their faces by pushing against the floor. They practiced blocks that should be impossible because they were at angles that shouldn't have a lot of power.

A lot of it felt like Crost was teaching them wrong on purpose, and when Brin suggested that, he told them it was sort of true. "A lot of this won't work against someone at your own level of Strength, but I never ran into much of that. Usually it's someone weak who thinks they can surprise you by being tricky."

They also practiced more edge cases, like stepping off a fence onto open air and then stopping and pulling themselves back with their back foot. It was a move that didn’t look like it should be possible, and the force made Brin’s calf muscles feel like they were going to tear, but somehow he managed it.

The last thing that Crost made them think about was friction, or rather the lack thereof. When two men with high levels in Strength clashed blades, there was a strong force pushing them both back. Crost insisted that rather than try to find a way to plant yourself on the ground, you were better off just expecting that you’d be sliding around a little bit with every strike. He had them practice pushing each other and sliding across the ground rather than tripping or trying to stay firm.

It all came down to footwork, which seemed obvious in retrospect but wasn’t something Brin had spent a lot of time thinking about. Fighting was something he did with his arms, and his legs just sort of took care of themselves.

Through training, you have earned the following attributes:

Dexterity +2

When they were done, Brin couldn't have been more excited because he had a hundred more things he wanted to practice. He already had ideas on making the perfect glass dolls to work on this stuff; he could have them practice while he and the rest of the Lance were doing conditioning.

When their scores from the joint training came in, he saw that the [Watchful Knights] had noticed Hedrek and Govannon’s little spat, and that Hedrek had also attached his pauldrons incorrectly. Even so, the Lance had once again jumped up in the rankings, now in fortieth place, a ranking that had a lot of other Lances turning their heads and taking notice. Who’s the loser squad now?

Cid also had extra news for them. Apparently Brin wouldn't get a chance to work on trying out all the new tricks he'd learned today.

"The joint exercises are ending now. Get a good night's sleep tonight. Tomorrow we'll be setting off on our first patrol."

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