Restart Again: Volume 1 by Adam Scott (pocket ebook reader TXT) 📕

“Make sure you drink plenty of water today. That will help reduce the pain faster, and help keep it at bay in the future.” I slid quickly into my shirt and pants and followed Lia out of the bedroom into the full light of day. After taking a moment for my eyes to adjust, I found Marten sitting at the table eating a slice of toast.

“Mornin’ you two. Sleep well?” He didn’t turn to regard us, but he pushed out the chair next to him with his foot, which I took as an invitation to sit.

“As always,” I grinned pleasantly to him. Lia rolled her eyes and moved to the kitchen to prepare something alongside her mother.

“I’m so sore this morning!” Lia whined, taking a moment to stretch again before she set to work slicing a small asperfruit.

“Oh? Long night?” Marten asked casually, staring straight ahead out the window on the opposite wall. His face was an inscrutable mask, but I could see a devious twinkle in his eyes. Lia whirled, sputtering and blushing a bright red.

“No! You know that’s not what I meant! I-It’s my arms, from yesterday! Lux is teaching me how to use a sword, a-and that’s why...never mind!” She yelled at him, returning to her cutting board angrily. Hana laughed softly and leaned down to Lia’s ear to say something I couldn’t hear. They whispered back and forth as they worked, with Lia’s side of the conversation seeming particularly more animated than Hana’s.

“So,” Marten spoke in a low voice, finally turning to address me, “when will you and Lia be leaving us?” The question sounded like a statement, as if he already knew the answer to follow.

“Three days from now, at my best guess. Regardless of where we’re heading, I’d feel a lot better knowing Lia could handle herself in a dangerous situation.” I realized my statement might seem disquieting to Lia’s father, so I continued quickly. “Not that we’re going out looking for dangerous situations, of course. Just trying to be prepared.”

“Of course.” He ran his hand through his beard thoughtfully. “Where is it you intend on going?”

“Any straight line leading away from Yoria, I think. To be honest, I didn’t have any specific destination in mind.” Not that I know of any.

“Anywhere but north, of course,” Marten stated matter-of-factly.

“North?” The statement caught me off guard. “Why wouldn’t I want to…” I realized too late that I had stumbled into a trap and recovered as best I could. “Oh, not to Doram of course, as I just came all this way from there.” We shared an awkward silence staring into each other’s eyes, refusing to be the first to look away. I’m not sure you’d believe where I’m from if I told you, Marten.

He raised his eyebrows and gave me a knowing look. “Right.” Marten took another bite of his toast and looked off out the window again. “If I were you, I’d head west. Well maintained road, plenty of towns along the way to stop at, and the border is only a few weeks by foot that way. Lybesa is lovely this time of year, I’m told.”

Finishing his breakfast, Marten stood and wiped his hands on his shirt. “I suppose I’ll be leaving now. Lux, you’ll be here to help me unload the cargo when I return?” He spoke much louder now, the conversation clearly intended to be heard by everyone in the house.

I nodded enthusiastically. “Of course, sir.” Satisfied, Marten moved to the kitchen to give a quick kiss to Hana and Lia, then retrieved his hat from the rack by the door before exiting the house. Soon after he was gone Hana and Lia brought breakfast to the table, and we all enjoyed a pleasant meal together.

After we were finished, Hana excused herself to go work on restoring her garden, leaving Lia and myself alone at the table. “So,” Lia chirped excitedly, “What are we going to do today?”

“The same thing we’ll be doing every day for the foreseeable future,” I replied, grinning. “Practice.”

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We quickly fell into a comfortable routine over the course of our last few days at the house. After breakfast was finished, I walked Lia through an extended stretching routine, followed by training with her shortsword. I showed her new forms and stances, explained which situations to use them in, and taught her new training drills to repeat. Once I finished instruction for the morning, she moved to practice the moves on her own while I followed suit with my own physical training next to her. If my injuries sustained in our escape from the dungeon had taught me anything, it was that I wasn’t as sharp as I once was with a blade.

When the physical training was complete, we would retreat, tired and sore, into the house for rest and refreshment. Lunch usually consisted of small portions of some sort of game bird and assorted greens, which we ate voraciously to try and regain any bit of energy we could. After our meal we would return to our practice area behind the shed to meditate. With Lia’s newfound knowledge of the sensation of mana, she made quick progress in the field. Though it was tiring for her to access the energy in a controlled way, she was able to practice channeling the mana to specific parts of her body in short bursts.

By the time meditation was finished, Marten was usually arriving back at the house with the day’s cargo. I would set to work helping him move crates into the basement or repack an empty wagon, while Lia would take inventory and balance the numbers in her father’s ledger. Hana always had dinner prepared for us by the time work was finished, and we eagerly ate anything she made. A game of cards would follow, the rules of which I had finally begun to grasp after multiple rounds of failing horribly, which would last until Marten and Hana