I took his hand.
He pulled me to my feet. My leg screamed. My shoulder throbbed. Everything hurt.
"You look terrible," Kael said.
"I feel terrible."
"Yeah, but you look it too." He put an arm around my waist to steady me. "Come on. One step at a time."
We walked to the door. I leaned on him more than I wanted to admit.
"The quest says I have until midnight," I said. "That's... what, eighteen hours?"
"Seventeen and change." He pushed the door open. "Plenty of time."
"Plenty of time for what? To die of exhaustion?"
"To surprise yourself." He guided me outside.
The morning air was cold and sharp. The sun was just coming up over the rooftops, painting the sky in shades of orange and pink. A few birds were singing. It was beautiful, in a quiet way.
I hated it.
"I can't run twenty kilometers," I said.
"Not yet you can't."
"I can't do a thousand pushups."
"Not yet."
"I can't—"
"Arlen." He stopped walking and turned to face me. His golden eyes were serious. "You just spent an hour running from a supernatural hunter in a magical maze with a broken leg and cracked ribs. You survived. That's more than most people could do."
"That wasn't running. That was limping and crying."
"Limping and crying while surviving." He squeezed my shoulder. "You're stronger than you think. You just don't know it yet."
I looked down at my bandaged leg. At my bloody shirt. At my shaking hands.
"Okay," I said. "Okay. Let's try."
He grinned. "That's the spirit. Now let's start with a light jog. And by light jog, I mean a slow hobble."
---
The first kilometer was agony.
Every step sent a shock of pain through my leg. My ribs ached with each breath. My shoulder felt like someone had poured fire into the wound.
Kael jogged beside me, matching my pace.
"You're doing great."
"I'm dying."
"You're not dying. You're just uncomfortable."
"There's a difference?"
"Big difference. Dying is when your soul leaves your body. Uncomfortable is when you wish your soul would leave your body." He dodged as I tried to punch him. "See? You still have fight in you."
"You're insufferable."
"Been told that before. Kept living anyway."
---
The fifth kilometer, something changed.
The pain didn't go away, but it became... manageable. Like my body had accepted that this was happening and stopped complaining.
Or maybe I was just going into shock.
"Your pace is improving," Kael said.
"I'm pretty sure I'm hallucinating."
"You're not hallucinating. You're just tired." He pointed ahead. "See that bench? That's our halfway point. Ten kilometers."
"That bench looks like it's a hundred kilometers away."
"It's not. Keep going."
---
We reached the bench at 9:47 AM.
I collapsed onto it. My chest heaved. Sweat poured down my face. My leg had started bleeding through the bandages again.
Kael sat down beside me, not even breathing hard.
"You know," he said, "for someone who almost died yesterday, you're doing pretty well."
"Define 'pretty well.'"
"You're not dead."
"That's a low bar."
"It's the only bar that matters." He handed me a water bottle. "Drink. We've got ten more kilometers to go."
I drank. The water was warm, but I didn't care.
"I can't feel my legs."
"That's normal."
"Is it?"
"No. But I'm trying to keep you positive."
---
The tenth kilometer was harder than the first ten combined.
My body had stopped complaining. It had moved past complaining into a kind of numb acceptance. My legs moved because I told them to move. My lungs breathed because I told them to breathe.
Kael stayed beside me the whole time.
"Fifteen kilometers done," he said. "Five to go."
"I'm going to die."
"You've been saying that for ten kilometers."
"This time I mean it."
"You've meant it every time." He nudged my shoulder. "Come on. The clinic's just ahead. You can collapse when we get there."
"I'm going to collapse now."
"No, you're not." He grabbed my arm and kept me upright. "Collapsing is for after you finish. Not before."
---
We reached the clinic at 11:23 AM.
Twenty kilometers
I didn't collapse. I fell. Face-first onto the floor of the clinic's small lobby. The impact sent a jolt through my ribs, and I groaned into the worn linoleum.
Mrs. Park looked up from her desk.
The elderly healer was small and round, with silver hair pulled into a tight bun and spectacles perched on her nose. She'd been patching up hunters for fifty years, according to Kael. Nothing surprised her anymore.
Or so I thought.
"What in the name of heaven are you doing?" she asked, peering at me over her glasses.
"Resting," I mumbled into the floor.
"On my floor?"
"It's a very nice floor."
She clicked her tongue and stood up, her joints popping. "You're bleeding through your bandages again. I just changed those this morning."
"The run didn't agree with my leg."
"The run?" She walked around her desk and stood over me, hands on her hips. "You have three cracked ribs, a healing puncture wound, and enough internal bruising to make a normal person bedridden for a month. And you went for a run?"
"It was a light jog."
"Twenty kilometers is not a light jog. Twenty kilometers is a marathon for healthy people." She grabbed my ear—actually grabbed my ear—and twisted. "Get up. Now."
"Ow, ow, ow—"
"I said up."
I scrambled to my feet. Mrs. Park was maybe a meter and a half tall, but she had the grip of a steel vice and the authority of a general.
Kael stood by the door, arms crossed, trying very hard not to laugh.
"Not a word," I said.
"I didn't say anything."
"Your face is saying everything."
Mrs. Park ignored our exchange. She grabbed my chin and turned my head side to side, examining my face. Then she lifted my shirt, checked my bandages, poked my ribs hard enough to make me yelp.
"Hmm."
"Hmm good or hmm bad?"
"Neither. Just hmm." She released me and walked back to her desk. "Your wounds are healing faster than they should. Much faster."
"They are?"
"Three cracked ribs should take six weeks. Yours are already knitting. That leg wound should still be weeping. It's almost closed." She sat down and fixed me with a sharp look. "What are you?"
"Just a hunter."
"Hunters don't heal like that. Not even S-ranks." She glanced at Kael, then back at me. "You're hiding something."
I opened my mouth to deny it, but Kael spoke first.
"He's training," he said. "Hard. The body adapts."
Mrs. Park snorted. "The body doesn't adapt that fast. I've been a healer for fifty years. I know what natural healing looks like. That"—she pointed at my ribs—"is not natural."
There was a long silence.
I didn't know what to say. I couldn't tell her about the System. Could I?
Kael caught my eye and gave a small shake of his head.
Not yet.
"I have a good healer," I said finally.
Mrs. Park stared at me for a long moment. Then she sighed.
"Fine. Keep your secrets. But if you're going to keep training like a madman, at least let me re-wrap your bandages first." She stood up and gestured to a cot in the corner. "Sit."
I sat.
She worked in silence, unwrapping the bloody bandages from my leg and shoulder, cleaning the wounds with a solution that stung like fire, then wrapping them again with fresh gauze. Her hands were old but steady.
"You're going to kill yourself," she said quietly.
"No, I'm not."
"Boys your age always say that. And then I have to tell their mothers they're never coming home." She tied off the bandage on my leg and looked up at me. "I don't know what you're training for. I don't know what happened to you in that dungeon. But whatever it is, it's not worth dying over."
I thought about Dorian. About the wyvern. About the feeling of being left behind.
"It is," I said.
Mrs. Park's eyes softened. She patted my knee.
"Then at least eat something before you pass out. There's rice and fish in the kitchen. Kael, make sure he eats."
"Yes, ma'am," Kael said.
"And for heaven's sake, stop bleeding on my floor."
---
The kitchen was small and cramped, with a wood-burning stove that Mrs. Park used for cooking and, apparently, for heating water. Kael reheated some rice and fish while I sat at a tiny table, trying not to fall asleep face-first into my bowl.
"You should eat," he said, setting a plate in front of me.
"I'm not hungry."
"Your body doesn't care if you're hungry. It needs fuel." He sat across from me. "Eat."
I picked up my chopsticks and forced down a few bites. The rice was warm, the fish was salty, and after a minute, I realized I was starving. I ate faster.
"See?" Kael said. "I know what I'm talking about."
"You're not a nutritionist."
"I'm a several-thousand-year-old knight who's kept himself alive through multiple wars, famines, and the literal collapse of dimensions. I know a thing or two about staying alive."
I finished the fish and pushed the plate away. "What now?"
"Now? You rest for an hour. Then you do your pushups and squats."
"In an hour?"
"The quest says you have until midnight. That's twelve hours. Plenty of time."
"I can't do a thousand pushups."
"You can do a hundred. Then another hundred. Then another." He leaned back in his chair. "You don't have to do them all at once. You just have to do them."
I stared at the ceiling. The same cracked ceiling as my room. Same water stains. Same peeling paint.
"How did you survive?" I asked. "When you were... you know. A summon. Before me."
Kael was quiet for a moment.
"I waited," he said. "In the void. Between dimensions. There's no time there. No light. No sound. Just... nothing."
"That sounds horrible."
"It was." He looked at his hands. "But I knew someone would come. Eventually. Someone worth serving." He looked up at me. "And you did."
"I'm not worth serving. I'm a classless orphan who got betrayed by a B-rank party."
"You're a classless orphan who got betrayed by a B-rank party and survived." He pointed at me. "You summoned a universal-tier knight from the void between dimensions. You ran twenty kilometers on a broken leg. You're about to do a thousand pushups and a thousand squats." He smiled. "You're worth serving, Arlen. You just don't know it yet."
I didn't know what to say to that.
So I didn't say anything.
---
The pushups started at 1:00 PM.
I did them on the floor of my room, because Mrs. Park said if I bled on her lobby floor again she'd charge me double. Kael sat on the bed, counting.
"One. Two. Three. Your form is terrible."
"My arms are shaking."
"Then shake less. Four. Five. Six."
By fifty, I collapsed.
"That's fifty," Kael said. "Only nine hundred fifty to go."
"I hate you."
"You love me. Get up."
---
By three hundred, my arms had stopped shaking. They'd gone numb.
"That's probably not good," I said.
"It's fine. Numbness means you're pushing through the pain." Kael tossed me a towel. "Wipe your face. You're sweating on the floor."
"I'm sweating everywhere."
"Then wipe everywhere."
---
By six hundred, I couldn't feel my arms at all.
"I think they fell off."
"They didn't fall off. I can see them."
"Then why can't I feel them?"
"Because you've done six hundred pushups. Your nerves are confused." He stood up and stretched. "Take a break. Drink water. We'll do the last four hundred after."
I rolled onto my back and stared at the ceiling.
"I'm going to die."
"You've been saying that for hours."
"This time I mean it."
"You've meant it every time." He dropped a water bottle on my chest. "Drink."
---
The squats started at 4:00 PM.
My legs had already done twenty kilometers. They were not happy about doing more.
"One. Two. Three. You're wobbling."
"My legs are made of jelly."
"Jelly doesn't wobble that much. You're fine. Four. Five. Six."
By two hundred, I couldn't stand up without holding onto the wall.
"Use the wall," Kael said. "No shame in using the wall."
"There's plenty of shame."
"Then fall on your face. Your choice."
I used the wall.
---
By five hundred, I was crying.
Not because I was sad. Because my body had run out of everything—energy, strength, willpower—and was running on something else. Something raw and desperate.
"Five hundred one," Kael said softly. "Five hundred two. You're doing great."
"I'm not great."
"You're still moving. That's great."
---
By eight hundred, I stopped crying.
I stopped feeling anything. My legs moved because I told them to move. My lungs breathed because I told them to breathe. There was nothing else.
"Eight hundred fifty," Kael said. "Eight hundred sixty. Almost there."
I didn't respond. I couldn't.
---
At 7:32 PM, I finished.
One thousand squats.
I lay on the floor of my room, staring at the cracked ceiling, unable to move. My whole body was shaking. My vision was blurry. I couldn't feel my arms or legs.
Kael sat on the edge of the bed, looking down at me.
"You did it," he said.
"I did it."
"All of it. Twenty kilometers. One thousand pushups. One thousand squats." He shook his head. "I didn't think you would."
"Neither did I."
"But you did." He smiled. "You're tougher than you look, Arlen Vale."
The System screen appeared.
---
[DAILY TRAINING REGIMEN – COMPLETE]
Objectives:
· 20km run – COMPLETE
· 1,000 pushups – COMPLETE
· 1,000 squats – COMPLETE
Rewards:
· +5 to all stats
· Skill: Endurance (Passive) – UNLOCKED
[BONUS REWARDS – FIRST COMPLETION]
Reward 1: Quick Recovery
· All injuries healed at an accelerated rate.
· Current wounds: Healing (3x normal speed).
· Duration: 72 hours.
Reward 2: Summoner's Vitality (Passive)
· Maximum HP increased by 50%.
· Stamina regeneration increased by 30%.
· Resistance to physical debuffs increased.
Reward 3: Skill: Predator's Focus (Permanent)
· No longer requires borrowing from Kael.
· Effect: Temporarily slow perception of time.
· Duration: 5 seconds (scales with level).
· Cooldown: 10 minutes.
---
I stared at the screen.
"Quick Recovery?"
Kael leaned over to read it. "Oh, that's nice. Your injuries will heal faster. You won't be limping for weeks."
"Summoner's Vitality?"
"More HP. More stamina. Harder to kill." He grinned. "Useful."
"And Predator's Focus..." I looked at my hands. "Permanent. I don't need to borrow it from you anymore."
"Looks like it." He sat back. "The System rewards effort. You put in the work. Now you're getting the benefits."
I focused on the skill. The world slowed.
Just for a moment. Just for a heartbeat. But I could see every dust mote in the air, every crack in the ceiling, every detail of Kael's expression.
Then time returned to normal.
"That's... incredible."
"That's just the beginning." Kael stood up. "Now rest. You've earned it. Tomorrow, we do it again."
"Again?"
"Every day, Arlen. Every single day. Until you're strong enough to face them."
I thought about Dorian. About Bianca. About the dungeon.
"Okay," I said. "Every day."
---
There was a knock at the door.
Mrs. Park's voice came through the wood. "Boy? Are you still alive in there?"
"Barely," I called out.
The door opened. She stood in the doorway, holding a tray with a bowl of soup and a glass of water. Her eyes scanned the room—the sweat on the floor, the blood on my bandages, the way I was lying motionless on the ground.
She sighed.
"I've treated a lot of hunters in my time," she said. "Seen a lot of training. Fools pushing themselves too hard, too fast, thinking they're invincible." She set the tray on the table. "You're not invincible. You're just stupid."
"Thank you, Mrs. Park."
"It wasn't a compliment." She knelt beside me—slowly, her knees cracking—and pressed a hand to my forehead. "No fever. That's something." She checked my pulse, my eyes, my bandages. "Your wounds are healing. Faster than they should."
"Genetics."
"Genetics don't work that fast." She fixed me with a sharp look. "I don't know what's happening to you, boy. I don't know what you're training for. But whatever it is, it's changing you."
"Is that bad?"
She was quiet for a moment.
"I don't know yet." She stood up, wincing. "Eat your soup. Sleep. And for heaven's sake, stop bleeding on my floor."
"Yes, ma'am."
She walked to the door, then paused.
"Kael."
"Yes?"
"Make sure he doesn't die. I don't like burying young people."
"I'll do my best, ma'am."
She nodded and left.
---
I ate the soup.
It was chicken, with vegetables and thick noodles. Warm. Salty. The best thing I'd ever tasted.
"Mrs. Park is a good person," Kael said.
"She is."
"She doesn't ask questions she doesn't want answers to."
"I noticed."
"She knows something's different about you. But she's not pushing."
I finished the soup and set the bowl aside. "She's scared."
"Of what?"
"Of me." I looked at my hands. "She's been a healer for fifty years. She knows what normal healing looks like. Mine isn't normal."
"No. It's not." Kael sat on the edge of the bed. "But that's not a bad thing."
"It feels like a bad thing."
"It feels like change." He leaned back. "Change always feels bad at first. But you'll get used to it."
I lay back on the floor. The tiles were cold against my skin.
"Hey, Kael?"
"Yeah?"
"Thanks. For being here."
He was quiet for a moment.
"Where else would I be?" he said. "You're my summoner. I'm not going anywhere."
I smiled.
Then I slept