Today was Lerick's last day at the Military Camp.
A hundred Hellfire Soldiers stood in two rows, chests out and hands clasped behind their backs.
Three months of grueling training had left them tanned and strong.
If only my nephew had worked half as hard as them, he wouldn't have died in the Rat Tide...
Lerick felt a swell of pride, but he kept his face stern and forbidding.
"Today is your last day. I've trained you for three months, and two of you have become Professionals..." Lerick's gaze swept over the Soldiers who quietly straightened their backs. "But I'm not satisfied!"
"Have you ever killed an enemy with your own strength?"
Ignoring a hundred angry stares, Lerick slowly took off his coat.
"Pulling a trigger? Even the women at the Spinning Mill can do that!"
Finally, he removed his bracers. Wearing nothing but a set of Faster's clothes, he beckoned to the cavalrymen he had spent the past three months with. "Show me what you can do now."
The Soldiers did not move.
"What are you waiting for? You don't even have the courage to fight another human? Then run the moment you see Ratfolk on the battlefield... Bunch of cowards."
At last, someone snapped. The two Professionals in the ranks stepped forward one after the other, spurring the rest to charge.
A hundred Soldiers swallowed Lerick up. Nothing could be seen but rising dust, and nothing heard but shouts.
Ten minutes later, Soldiers lay sprawled all around him. Lerick was still standing, his face bruised and his breathing ragged.
But he had won. With the physique and Combat Arts of an Elite Warrior, he had taken down all hundred Soldiers.
Such was the brutal gulf between Professionals and ordinary people.
Lerick straightened up. "See the difference between you