Crippled Body, Unbroken Will

Since discovering he was essentially half-crippled, Ashen resolved to double down on his training.

Instead of waking up at 7 AM for morning classes, he started rising at 5 AM and headed straight to the training field, spear in hand.

That wasn't the only change. 

He kept his Breathing Bracelet active at the highest level he could handle whenever he had free time. Otherwise, he maintained it at a slightly lower setting to avoid interfering with daily activities. 

The same applied to mana circulation—he constantly cycled mana through his circuit, whether in class, training, or even resting.

At first, the overexertion wrecked him. 

By the end of the first day, he collapsed onto his bed with a splitting headache from juggling too much at once. 

His breathing was labored, his body aching from the constant strain, and his mana circulation had become so sluggish that it felt like he was forcing it through mud. Letting it flow naturally would have been faster.

He considered dialing it back more than once. 

He had set the training regimen himself, and nothing stopped him from easing up on it. 

Sometimes, the thought of taking a break for a few days whispered in his mind.

A couple of days won't hurt.

It won't change anything in the long run.

You've worked hard enough.

But every time that temptation crept in, he reminded himself.

He was crippled.

This sanctuary wouldn't last forever.

Monsters waited beyond these walls.

The nightmares of his family and Alice being devoured haunted him, a reminder of what failure would mean.

But beneath all that, a deeper reason pushed him forward.

He had wasted most of his life as a degenerate, betraying expectations and crushing hopes. Now, for once, he wanted to give it his all… to prove that he was more than a disappointment, that he could be better than that defeated figure.

So, no matter how brutal the training became, he refused to quit.

At first, nothing changed except for the escalating agonizing days and the increasingly worried looks from Seraphine and Braun. 

But after two weeks, he finally noticed something. 

His spear strikes had changed.

The thrusts that had long refused to go faster now accelerated with ease. His sweeps and slashes felt smoother, more fluid… more free.

It didn't take long for him to understand why. 

The constant mana circulation had synchronized with his spear techniques, subtly reinforcing his movements. 

Mana was, at its core, an energy guided by will. Every time he willed his strikes to be sharper, his body responded, aligning with the mana flowing through his veins.

For a moment, he wondered why the coach hadn't taught them this. Then he remembered the grueling two weeks of hell it took to reach even this small improvement. 

The others likely weren't ready to torture themselves this much just for this level of gain.

But no matter how minor the progress seemed, to Ashen, it was as sweet as nectar in a scorching desert.

He knew now that he was on the right path.

And he would take even the smallest improvement over stagnation any day.

*

Another month passed, and the insignificant gains stacked up, becoming visible progress.

Now, Ashen won almost every spar in the coach's class, much to the latter's growing astonishment. 

The mandatory missions he undertook with Seraphine and Braun each week became easier, barely feeling like challenges anymore.

More than that, the constant mana circulation and breathing technique felt less taxing with each passing day. The headaches and grueling lifestyle that once plagued him became almost a thing of the past.

That is, until he decided to push the difficulty even further.

The moment he felt the first signs of leeway, he increased his mana circulation speed and raised his Breathing Bracelet to level six. A level one step away from completion. 

Just like that, the misery returned, as if he were back to day one. But this time, he soldiered through it without complaint.

Sometimes he wondered how he managed to keep pushing himself like this, especially when just two months ago, he had been a complete lazybones.

Maybe he underestimated his own genius.

Or maybe this was just his real self beneath all the sloth and depression.

Perhaps an entirely different matter is at play here, but Ashen didn't have the mental capacity to linger on those thoughts as he kept pushing himself past his limits, for every moment of his day.

In the meantime, Seraphine and Braun noticed his rapid progress and curiously asked about it. 

Not one to hoard knowledge, especially when their lives could be at stake, Ashen showed them everything. Every trick he stumbled upon, every method that could yield better results, he taught it to them.

Unfortunately, he underestimated his own freakish adaptability. 

No matter how hard they tried, neither could last a full day. Braun barely made it six hours before giving up.

It wasn't that they were too weak or dumb to grasp his methods. 

It was simply physically impossible for them. Meanwhile, Ashen, with no prior training in such multitasking, had been sustaining it for over a month.

Still, he insisted they try to keep both the breathing and mana circulation techniques running at a lower setting for at least a few hours a day. 

It was better than nothing, and to his knowledge, no one else aside from them was even attempting it.

After observing them for a while, Ashen realized something… both of them were pretty talented compared to others, but Seraphine… She was a genius in her own right. 

After two weeks of relentless attempts, she managed to maintain both techniques for an entire day. He should've expected as much. This was the same girl who had developed a healing spell on her own not long ago.

Aside from that, the coach decided to intensify their physical training by gifting them yet another trinket. A pendant.

The pendant had two functions: one to monitor the wearer's physical health, and the other, its primary feature, to amplify the gravitational force only for the user.