The Succubus

5

Matt had to admit that sounded truer than he’d like.

The training aid landed a blow that brought Matt out of contemplation and back into the fight. With a pivot and an upward slash, Matt deflected the next blow and brought his sword down on the training aid’s collarbone. The blow was hard and clean enough that the lights flashed red, signifying a ‘kill.’

The aid had a programming oversight that didn’t handle overhead attacks on its right side well. It was hard not to abuse it. Matt didn’t want to develop habits that might get him killed but finding an obvious flaw in an opponent was possible, too.

The beep chimed, signifying the start of his three-minute rest interval.

He picked up his water bottle, wiped the sweat off his face, and stretched. When he noticed someone was in the other corner of the room, he came to a halt.

Shit! Is it that late already? Am I late for work?

Matt quickly checked his pad and saw it was only 4:23 a.m. Looking closer, there were actually two someone’s loitering in the corner, the man and woman who had checked in yesterday.

The strong ones.

He didn’t want any trouble, so he turned down the volume on his pad so the beeps wouldn’t disturb the training duo. The last thing he wanted to do was piss off a customer, let alone a powerhouse who could probably level the building in seconds. Matt wasn’t sure what a Tier 5 was capable of, but he knew they were stronger than most people on the planet. Lilly was only a Tier 4 world and, therefore, only had rifts up to Tier 4. Anyone higher Tier than that needed to travel off-world to find higher Tier rifts to help them progress.

Matt continued to practice in intervals. As a Tier 1, he didn’t have enough essence or physical cultivation to keep up with nonstop, high-intensity combat. Right now, he was only marginally stronger than he’d been before his Awakening.

During a lesson about high Tier cultivators at the orphanage, he had seen a recording of a competition between two Tier 15 participants. The combatants were so evenly matched the fight lasted over an hour of nonstop fighting. Matt’s heart would explode if he fought at that intensity for that long.

Cultivation was the journey of power and strength, after all. The normal human limitations quickly fell away as you ascended.

Matt cleaned up his area and stored the training aid along the wall, preparing to go shower. As he crossed the common room toward the staff housing hall, he saw Zephyr. The old man had first stumbled in around two months ago and never quite stumbled back out. The entire time he’d been here, Zephyr followed a strict routine; he drank until he passed out on a table, woke up, and then kept drinking.

Matt had eventually taken it upon himself to make sure the grumpy old bastard got into his bed most nights and ate at least one meal a day. The look of loss and despair in the man’s eyes was easy to recognize.

It stared back at him every time he looked in a mirror.

He saw it in everyone who’d lost people in the rift breaks.

He couldn’t fix Zephyr, but he could at least stop him from killing himself before he worked past whatever loss had broken him.

“Come on, Zephyr. You need to sleep. Preferably in a bed. And drink this.” Matt shoved his water bottle in the man’s hand and glared till he finished it off.

“All right, give me your arm.” He hooked an arm under Zephyr’s and helped the man shuffle to his room. He grumbled nonsense at Matt the whole time.

A Tier 4 reduced to this is just depressing. Who did he lose to end up like this? Spouse? Kid? Mother? Father? Brother? Sister? Some shitty combination of those?

Matt fished the key card out of Zephyr’s pocket and dumped the old man on his bed. Before he left, he filled a glass with water and left it on the nightstand.

Is there really no escaping the pain? Will ascending to higher Tiers not even help?

 

   

The next morning, Matt once again started in the training room. At 5:00 a.m., the redhead and the dark-haired man strolled in. Unlike yesterday, though, the redhead came over to his side of the gym. Once she confirmed she had his attention, the woman held out a hand to shake.

“The name’s Dena. Sorry, I either didn’t get your name when we checked in or forgot,” she said with a smile that removed any sting from her forgetting his name.

“No, ma’am. That’s my bad. I must not have introduced myself. The name is Matt.” He took her hand and gave it a firm shake. “Is there something I can help with, ma’am?”

“There actually is. I’m in need of a sparring partner who specializes in longswords. My husband Eric, over there…” She pointed a thumb over her shoulder at the man, who just nodded along at the mention of his name. His concentration was fully aimed at a floating ball circling his hand. “He’s too busy working on his mana control. Would you be interested? I’d pay the standard f*e.”

Matt was interested, but there was no way he could take Dena’s money. If Benny found out, he’d be out on his ass so quick his head would spin. Then he’d be truly screwed.

“I’d be happy to help, ma’am. Though I can’t accept any payment. Part of my duties is to assist guests in any way I can.”

Dena gave him a look that said she sensed something was wrong but wasn’t going to press it.

“How would you like to spar, ma’am? I’m only a Tier 1, so I won’t be able to challenge you. But if you need to practice a certain move or technique, I’m happy to fill whatever role you need me to.”

“I’m more looking to practice my staff technique against the longer weapon, so I’ll reduce my speed and strength to match yours.”

Matt shrugged. “Whenever you’re ready, ma’am.”

He pulled his longsword up into a neutral stance. When Dena moved, Matt sidestepped the thrusting butt of her staff and retaliated with a cut toward her leg, but she stepped out of range of the slash.

As the fight progressed, it became clear Dena wasn’t very used to the staff. Which was probably the only thing that stopped her from easily annihilating him. Even with her speed and strength reduced to near his levels, Matt struggled to take the lead.

Whatever her normal weapons were, she was well accustomed to melee fighting, and it showed. The Tier 5 was always ready for every move he could think of, and it let her control the flow of the fight effortlessly.

She called the end of the spars at 6:00 a.m. after several rounds of combat. The breaks in between were purely for Matt’s benefit. Even after an hour of training, she’d yet to sweat a single drop.

Reaching a higher Tier truly was stepping above the common man.

“Do you train here every day? Or do you have a set schedule? This was a far better practice than I thought it would be. You have good instincts with that longsword of yours.”

Matt futilely tried to get his breathing under control before answering, “I’m here every morning, ma’am. Also, I’d be happy to spar with you as much as you’d like. It was far better than the training dummies even turned up to Tier 2.”

“Good. I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

 

   

Every morning for the next month and a half, Matt sparred with Dena. Occasionally, Eric would get fed up with his mana control exercises and also treat him to a thrilling longsword vs. longsword sparring match.

Apparently, the taller man was the dedicated melee fighter of the duo, but he’d found his mana control to be lacking recently and worked to shore that up.

The few suggestions Eric gave Matt about longsword combat had greatly increased his confidence with the blade. The advice was nothing revolutionary, but he shared tips about attacking from unexpected angles and a few feints that Matt found enlightening. Matt believed he was good, but the older man seemed to be one with the sword.