[Flashback] Squire Tactics (Solo)

[Eridanus]

Day 26, Summer of 509 AV
Early Morning
Somewhere Quiet Near Syliras

The vantha made his way to the usual spot, though there was a different agenda on his mind this time. As he traveled, he recalled the conversation he had with two youths who had approached him after a training session.

The older one was Ronald Rophes and the younger one named Sanders Windflict. Both of them were squires trained since a tender young age, and showed enough promise and potential than the other squires their age. At nineteen and seventeen, the two adolescents were at the top of their age group and usually sparred and practised with the over-twenty-one adults, and were quite eager to further improve their skills before attempting to go go for knighthood.

They had actually been watching Eridanus training from the start, though the first one was out of coincidence. They had been out doing their own things as well, and when they found him training a second time they decided to approach him to exchange tips.

The two squires had enough proficiency and understanding in swordsmanship to understand that Eri had been practising to fight groups, while they had been training as well to improve their teamwork strategy and cohesion. Therefore, it was a logical step for them to suggest a friendly spar of two of them against Eri. They could actually try out their teamwork on someone for real, and Eri would be able to practise on real life groups without risk to his life.

As he hiked up a mild slope, he found the horses already tied to the tree where he usually left his blades and the two talented youths already warming up with stretching exercises.

They saw him making his way there, and waved.

"Hey," the vantha returned their greeting.

[Eridanus]

"We were just getting warmed up," Ronald Rophes remarked, as he began jogging on the spot, slowly increasing in speed.

Eridanus gave a non-committal grunt and he proceeded to remove his weapons, propping them up against the tree. Instead of warming up like the rest, he went to sit down and begin his usual meditation routine. It was always best to have a focused and clear mind before training for maximum absorption.

The squires watched him with interest, but did not comment for they had seen this ritual the last two times they observed the vantha training. Being young and energetic they found that they could not meditate for more than ten chimes before fidgeting. It was quite interesting to watch how the vantha's breathing slowed, and how his entire frame seem to simply release the tension into the air.

Eridanus could somehow feel their curious gazes on him, and he fluttered open his eyes, finding two pairs of inquisitive eyes watching him. He sighed, and he motioned for the them to follow him. Perhaps he could try out both meditation and warm-ups at the same time?

Instead of sitting cross-legged, he began to stretch both legs outwards away from him, breathing in deeply and leaning forward to reach his legs with his hands. Intrigued, the boys followed suit, though their breathing were fast and far from ideal.

Like a yoga instructorlol, Eridanus led them through a series of exercises that strained and tested one's flexibility, including his own. All the while he did it in silence, struggling to maintain a consistent breathing pace despite the demanding exercises. Beads of sweat began to form on his forehead, but he refused to get distracted by these external things, instead choosing to only focus on the present.

Present task, sound of his own breathing, move on to the next, think of nothing else.

So half a bell was spent just doing this, and though the boys were able to somewhat maintain a semi-meditative state for they were busily focusing on the straining postures rather than fidgeting.

When they have reached the end of the series, Eridanus breathed out slowly, his body ready for more vigorous exertions and his mind crystal clear and like a sponge, ready for efficient information upload.

[Eridanus]

The older boy stood up first when he realized that their strange warm-up was done, and he walked towards the horses tethered to Eri's favourite tree, reaching in to pull up a bunch of wooden swords in one of the saddlebags.

There was four in total, and as he began distributing them to their little group, he explained, "So Sandy and I were inventing and practising tactical moves and teamwork, but we don't really have a real opponent to test it on. At the risk of sounding like a douche, I'd say that the other squires refuse to let us test out our combo, while the older knights always claim to be too busy."

Eridanus took the remaining two swords, weighing them carefully and noting that they were iron-cored practice swords. At least the youngsters had the brain to know that normal wooden practice swords were too light to train effectively and were best left to beginners.

It made sense though, for if these two were really amongst the top of their age group, they should logically be absolutely deadly in a team. There was a slight excitement growing in his belly as to how good they really were.

"Erm... Ron... shall we?" Sanders asked, looking at the older squire uncertainly.

Ronald looked at Eri, who nodded curtly, and they began to space themselves out comfortably away from the clump of trees. Eri stationed himself in the middle of the large space, and he spread his legs shoulder-width apart, slightly bent, though not entering a stance yet.

The two boys looked at each other meaningfully, and Ronald gave Sanders a series of unintelligible (at least to Eri) gestures, and they both began strafing Eri, each of them stopping at Eri's forty-five degrees left and right respectively.

They took up the commonly known stance easily, which was a testament to their trained background, both hands gripping their swords in front of them.

[Eridanus]

When at doubt, assume the worse. Eri remembered the lesson learned while getting trounced by Mr.B, and he took up a cautious defensive guard. The Short Woman, he called it mentally (though never actually saying it out loud for it sounded pretty lame), for it was a combination of the Short and Woman guards for his left and right swords that he adapted to fit his dual-wielding style.

He nodded again, signifying that he was ready. The two squires looked at each other and nodded, and they began to charge.

They were fast, Eri had to give them that, though they were not as mind-numbingly fast as Mr.B, obviously. His eyes darted quickly between the two of them, constantly assessing their movements and proximity to him, constantly updating in his mind the optimal response with each second. Though his mind was actively working and analyzing, his body remained calm and still, fixed in his position as he waited.

He noticed a pattern where in within seconds the two of them would take turns being in the lead, then switching the lead position every so other second. It was quite obvious that even this simple manoeuvre had been tirelessly rehearsed to perfection, not to mention that it would take a more skilled swordsman to spot and understand the rationale behind that move.

Just as it took a skilled swordsman to notice, any common warrior would just take it as both approaching at the same time and would be unable to protect himself properly. A more skilled combatant would be able to tell what they were doing, but might be unable to assess who was going to reach him first and so if he blocked the wrong target he would be doomed on the spot.

Eridanus silently whistled in appreciation, and he focused more attention on both, and as they got nearer instead of darting his eyes between them he took gathered backwards several times, letting his eyes space out in the general space between them to capture both figures within line of sight.

[Eridanus]

It was a dangerous thing to do, but the key now was to approximate the correct target, then quickly switching to focus. It would be a test on not only his mental ability to keep up, but also his body's reaction and speed.

The squires came within striking distance, and alarm bells rang as he spotted a twitch closer to his right where Sanders was approaching, and immediately he stopped spacing out, focusing his vision by passing forward and twisting his torso to the left. As he did so, he quickly thrust his left sword to the front - which was previously his forty-five degrees left due to his torso twist.

It was fortunate that he used this guard, for the Woman shut down all attacks coming from the right, and there was a dull clack as both swords collided. A split second later his thrust met Ronald's own thrust. Eri kept his blade closer to his body, and upon colliding he quickly angled out his sword, driving Ronald's sword to the Outside of the sword and placing his own at the Inside of the sword.

Eridanus passed forward towards Ronald, pressing the advantage and the surprised squire quickly stepped back automatically, dodging the thrust but at the same time swinging his own sword to his own left to redirect Eri's sword away to the vantha's right. By doing so, he had to extend to right arm in order to keep his sword in the same position to deny Sanders the space to gain swing momentum, but it reduced support from his body from maintaining that position from a powerful blow.

The younger squire was by no means lesser skilled, and he immediately seized the advantage to hammer down on Eri's right sword, forcing him to rotate the sword so that it no longer protected his entire frame or risk getting impaled by his own sword due to the impact.

[Eridanus]

The two of them were getting him into a twist, and in order to get out of his predicament he did something unexpected for trained swordsmen to do. Relying on his old style of instinctive combat before he received formal training in Denval, he used the out-of-place position of both swords to swing hard outwards, forcing both squires to parry his blow.

Before they could use the parry to advance on him, he had already bent his knees slightly to spring forward as much as he could, twisting his body to the side as he landed so that he could tumble on his shoulder and then to his back, but also to prevent getting skewered on his own sword while rolling.

If Ronald and Sanders were surprised from his sudden move, they did not spend more than a second being surprised, and were already dashing towards Eri as he rolled again. As he recovered, he spotted them coming at him from the corner of his eyes, and instead of recovering fully he remained crouched and executed a low leap and roll to the side to put the nearest one opposite him and the other squire.

He was still partly disoriented from the roll, but at least he bought time from being assaulted simultaneously in both directions. His reflexes brought him to quickly bring both swords up in an 'X' manner, while he was still halfway recovering from the ground into a more upright position. It was a highly inefficient move, investing both swords into a single defensive stance, but he had to do it anyway because of his disorientation and inability to assess the situation fast enough.

A wooden crack signified his success at blocking, though he would be surprised if he that attack slipped through the highly defensive but inefficient stance. He took a split-second to properly take in his situation, and found that his assailant was Sanders, and that he had taken that blow in the weak of his right sword crossed to his left.

[Eridanus]

The cogs in his mind whirred at a furious pace as he quickly ran through his options, and before any of them could react he raised both swords upwards along the length of his right sword. Now he had his arms in an awkward raised position (quite unprofessional, really) but with the strong of both blades catching the weak of Sanders' blade in a scissors-like motion. He quickly 'cut' the 'scissors', pushing the hilt of his blades towards each other, and at the same time he twisted his body and his wrists to an unfavorable angle.

This caused him to jerk the sword out of the surprised squire's hands and the wooden sword clattered far away.

All of that happened in merely a second or two, and that was enough time for the older squire to readjust his position to be able to reach at Eri without Sanders getting in the way.

Eridanus quickly stepped to the right, using the already high position of his right sword to thrust at Sander's throat while using the Unicorn position of his left sword to swing it quickly downwards, parrying the older boy's attack downwards. The vantha did not stop there, and with his left sword now in the Boar's Tooth he was in a perfect position to thrust upwards.

With the downwards parry, his weapon collided with Ronald's sword somewhere at the center of the blade, with the hilt of his blade on the Inside of the sword and the point at the Outside. From the duller thud of the parry he could tell that both blades collided on the flat, and he silently marveled at the squire's foundation. The boy was truly as well-practised as he said in swordsmanship especially for one at his age.

[Eridanus]

The vantha's immediate reaction was that the flat of both blades collided, and - possibly from muscle memory from his previous self-training session - he performed a variation of the unorthodox move he used against one of his invisible foes, but instead he lunged forward with his left foot to step down on Ronald's sword as it had already been deflected to the ground.

Using that as a foothold, he extended the rest of his left arm in an upwards thrust, stopping at the squire's neck.

He was no in an extremely awkward situation, with both arms fully extended and his legs quite far apart than usual as well, for he had to stretch slightly in order to clamp down on Ronald's sword while not moving his right leg and hand.

All of these happened in the next few seconds, and there was now a moment of silence as everyone's mind raced to figure out what exactly happened. Eridanus also reflected on what he did, for quite a lot of his actions were done on a heady mix of reflexes, a little internal analysis and instinct, with a dash of impulse. Had he actually been thinking clearly and be able to slowly decide each move step by step he would not have actually done so.

Still it worked, and he found himself with both blades pointing at the necks of both squires in his embarrassingly over-stretched position.

Another moment of silence.

Ronald broke the quietness by first chuckling, and Sanders followed along, though in a weak, uncertain manner as if he was just following what the older boy did. The vantha grinned, and he lowered both blades, uncomfortably stepping inwards and recovering from his horribly over-extended legs.

Only beginners took long in their battles, that was one thing Eridanus realized. The higher skilled the combatants became, the faster the battle ended, though each and every single move was nuanced with a high level of complexities at such a high speed that only other similarly skilled swordsmen could comprehend.

Ronald and Sanders were not satisfied yet, and so they began another round after round of repeated duels, each taking at most two or three chimes before the victor was clear. He took this round of victory, but he found that the two youngsters learned extremely fast, already adapting to his impromptu style of fighting.

In the bell or two he took some victories, while the squires won others when they came up with simply ingenious partnership tactics that made Eri remind himself to ask them about, if they were willing to share. There was not much relevance to him, of course, but it might be useful if others were to face him as a duo.

[Eridanus]

They sparred with overwhelmingly intense energy for that few moments, then took much more time to rest and to discuss each other's mistakes. Then sparred again, then resting more and reflecting. It was an interesting way to learn, and Eri found himself quite comfortable talking with the two friendly squires. Ronald took the initiative most of the time, and in between spars they would ask him for his opinion on their tactics and form, and he would give his best observation and analysis.

Likewise, he did the same to garner their point of view, and he discovered his own weaknesses as well in terms of group-fighting. Sometimes he paid more attention than necessary to a single opponent, leaving himself open to the other, and so they said that he needed to always constantly be aware and not focus on one just because he wanted to complete his combo of strikes.

Next, though they were all physically and mentally strained from their intense dueling, the duo suggested finishing the session with a special training regime they call the "Zandon Series". It was named as such after an overweight boy who joined as a page, but who was determined enough to follow a series of exercises and regimes he cobbled together from constantly devouring books on self-training. In the end when he was old enough to be a squire he was one of the fittest youths around, and his body looked like a chiseled statue.

The other boys who had picked on him realized their mistake, and soon begged him to teach his regime to the rest, and so it was taught and disseminated.

And so Eridanus learned of this regime along with the squires as they led him through a mind-numbingly series of exercises. His body protested and his mind constantly told him to give up, but he could not lose his pride in front of these younglings, and this was what kept him going. He would sooner die than to give up if these adolescents did not.

The Zandon Series worked best in groups, and Eridanus found himself holding a large saddlebag holding a heavy variety of objects - including all their practice swords that they returned to it - up over his head as the two squires began sprinting in a circle at quite a modest radius, with Eri being the center of the circle.

He lifted the saddlebag up and down, crouching when he lowered his arms and standing up with the strength of his thighs and lower back as he struggled to raise the bag above his head. oocIt's basically a medieval version of the Bench Squat.

When the two of them finished their sprint, one of them would take over and do the weight-lifting while Eri and the remaining squire will sprint a round. This will continue, and so generally a set would be an instance of weight-lifting followed by two rounds of sprinting. There was no time to rest, only a short respite between two sets for a total of six sets.

The actual formula was longer, but the squires knew that their vantha sparring partner was new to this and so he had to be conditioned gradually into the regime or risk overexhaustion.

By the time it was all over, the two of them were cooling-down in the shade of the tree while Eridanus sat on the raised cluster of raised roots, attempting to enter meditation. His muscles burned like crazy, and his mind was heavily fatigued, but he felt that he had gained a lot from teaching and learning from these youngsters.

If these squires were going to be the next generation of Knights policing Syliras, he would hate to be an enemy of the entire formation of Knights.

It had been a greatly humbling experience, and when Ronald suggested another session further down the season (to give both parties time to recover and reflect on what they have learned) the vantha agreed with a wide grin.

This was going to be a good season here in Syliras.

[Emblem]

Congratulations! You Get Glorious Experience! Eridanus Skills Dual Wield- 5 XP Longsword- 4 XP Tactics- 3 XP Bodybuilding- 2 XP Meditation- 2 XP Acrobatics- 2 XP Teaching- 1 XP Running- 1 XP Lores Training Method: Zandon Series Fighting Multiple Enemies- Complete The Next Generation of Syliran Knights Comments : Damn you are just a thread machine haha! If you are going to continue to use these NPC's, they will need to be registered in the Help Desk. XP should be self explanatory, shoot me a PM if you have questions!