( One Week Later, Leo's POV)
[ System Notification - Congratulations on completing one week of training to be an Assassin.
You have been rewarded with a level increase of +2 levels ]
Leo received the notification when he logged back into the game for the eighth day of training.
" Huh? It's been a week already?" Leo questioned, as time seemed to be flying fast lately.
The training mission that he had been given by the system was for 12 months overall, however, there was a weekly reward of 2 levels, a monthly reward of 3-5 levels and an unknown final completion reward depending on how much Leo had progressed.
These leveling rewards were more than appreciated by Leo, as he could only hunt a single squirrel in these 7 days which increased his level by only one.
With his leaderboard level already being shown as 42 on the global level rankings. Leo had some serious catching up to do and every reward was hence most appreciated.
Over the last week, there were a couple of global announcements taking place that piqued Leo's interest.
The first one was about a player named 'DemonLord69' who had cleared the first undead dungeon in the game solo.
And the second one was about some regional event being unlocked in 'Crystal City' located on the west coast of the empire.
Following these announcements there was a rush of players trying to clear dungeons solo and a rush of players heading for Crystal City, however, Leo because of his training could partake in neither.
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Leo saw remarkable improvement across all sectors after the first week of training.
The rope climbing which he could simply not perform on day one of training, he could now climb for upto 100 meters as he figured out a lot of the basics of the climb.
The first and foremost thing that was needed to climb the mountain was core stability.
Leo needed to have the core strength to support himself in a horizontal posture against the mountain and while at day one it was very hard, after his conditioning training and stretch training, by day 7 Leo had the physique necessary to withstand the force.
He figured out that the more he leaned away from the surface of the mountain, the harder it became to climb and the closer he moved the easier it became.
However, if he moved too close, his feet no longer remained flat against the surface and the load on his arms increased as there was a delicate balance that he needed to maintain to climb up.
While he did not reach the summit even once, even climbing 100 meters was a big achievement for him, as everyday he improved a little and went a few meters beyond what he could the previous day.
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In the hunting breakfast department, Leo became a much better hunter after learning how to throw daggers as just a day ago, he had his first successful hunt.
While his own sole focus was on making the shot, he was also unconsciously learning habits such as-
How to hide in the blind spot of his prey
How to ambush someone unaware
What objects to hide behind to conceal one's presence.
All these lessons were the basics of becoming an assassin and most assassins were trained in these arts from childhood.
Although Leo was late, he was picking up on it fast, having successfully hunted his first squirrel just a day ago as he managed to catch one unaware while it was drinking water.
He avoided the newbie mistakes of using a poison dagger and revealing his hiding spot to other animals from day two, as the embarrassing incident of him being chased by an antelope never happened again.
On day 8, he failed to hunt his target yet again, as his first throw narrowly missed his mark and prompted all animals to scurry away. However, he was getting closer to having a near 100% weapon accuracy with every passing day and also becoming a better hunter as time passed as Leo was sure that in another week's time his hunting success ratio would improve significantly.
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Just like his hunting skills, Leo's weapon training skills also saw a massive improvement as he could consistently hit the target tree with daggers even while being 50 meters away.
Gradually Ben kept increasing his distance to target, however, anything beyond 100 meters saw Leo's accuracy dropping below 10%.
His dagger throwing skills improved so much that Ben slowly began to teach him some tricks such as a double dagger throwing, however, Leo's accuracy with such moves was pretty low and needed more time to improve.
According to Ben, once he mastered three dagger throwing, Ben would then teach him proper close range fighting drills, however, until he mastered three dagger throws for upto 100 meters, it was going to be the same boring routine for him, day in and day out.
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After puking his guts out after the first training session, Leo learnt his lesson about never stuffing himself up to the brim during lunch, and it was a lesson Leo remembered well for the following days as he only ate until he felt half full.
Of all the training that Ben subjected him to. It was only the stretch training that made Leo feel like he was making no progress at all, as every single day the stretch training remained to be equally as painful as before.
The stretches kept becoming more and more ridiculous and although Leo made some progress with his mobility, when pushed beyond its natural limits, his muscles still hurt like hell which was why stretch training remained to be the most painful part of his routine.
For him, the bodyweight stretches were bad enough already, however, the forced stretches were even worse as the angles at which Ben tied him kept getting progressively worse with each passing day.
" One of these days, my body's going to tear apart in half," Leo told Ben, as Ben brushed his concerns off by telling him that he knew exactly how much load Leo's muscles could handle without being damaged.
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Leo's reflex training also saw massive improvement in a week, with Leo no longer falling into the nail pit anymore.
The training with stones had slowly evolved into training with old blunt daggers by day 6 and Ben informed Leo that he was planning to shift it to actual sharp daggers when the time was right.
In Ben's eyes, Leo was genetically gifted when it came to reflexes as although his conscious movement was slow, when he stopped thinking and allowed his body to make the decision for him, he always seemed to end up achieving speeds that his weak body was not supposed to be capable of.
It was undoubtedly this aspect of his training that excited Ben the most as the growth that Leo displayed after each training session was a treat to watch for Ben.
Although he did end up getting hit by the blunt daggers one every five to ten minutes, overall Leo was a beast whose instincts were being polished finely by Ben.
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/// A/N - Bonus chapter for hitting the GT Target, good job everyone! ///