Vorden had the trident in his hands, and immediately he could feel his power improve. From how much it did, he guessed it was of the legendary tier.

He only knew what tier it was because during the days where he and Hilston would train, Hilston started him off with a basic tier weapon, only to slowly improve the tier as the days went on. Each one gave him more and more power, but it was never enough to match his grandfather.

This weapon was the one advantage he had over Hilston, who had no sort of gear.

"You sure you don’t want me to take over?" Raten whispered in their mind, even though it was entirely private.

Vorden gritted his teeth, and both he and Hilston went to their places on the training arena.

The two stared at each other, eyeing when the other would make the first move.

After a bit of waiting, Vorden grew impatient, and charged with the trident. He was preparing to dodge or duck under an attack, but before he knew it, he was on the floor with a stinging pain on the side of his face.

He hadn’t even seen it coming.

"Do we need to up your beast gear?" Hilston commented.

Vorden quickly got back onto his feet, using the trident to prop himself up. Instead, he was going to change tactics, letting Hilston come to him instead.

"If I have enough distance, then maybe that’ll give me the time to react," Vorden spoke in their mind, letting Raten know.

Pushing his feet off the ground, Hilston barrelled towards Vorden, and had tried to point his trident in his direction, but Hilston twisted around it with ease, and Vorden found himself smashed into the walls of the room.

Coughing out blood, there was a sharp pain inside of his upper torso. A punctured lung, wouldn’t be the first time it happened.

"Get off, let me drive!" Raten shouted as he shoved Vorden off of the mental chair, "You have the right idea, but no finesse. This is my domain!"

Suddenly, the way the boy carried himself shifted as he pushed himself off the wall, wiping blood off his mouth with a smirk.

Flipping the trident around using some fancy tricks, Raten got a feel for how it weighed.

"Ah, Raten is it? Maybe we’re getting somewhere," Hilston commented.

Before waiting for Hilston to make the first move, Raten jumped to the side, narrowly dodging a fist to the face, then thrusted the trident towards his chest, causing Hilston to step back.

It wasn’t a full thrust, just enough to create the illusion of an attack. Then he quickly lifted his trident towards where he predicted Hilston’s face would be at.

At that moment, Hilston thrusted his fist, flinging Raten back. At the same time, a small trace of skin had caught onto the trident when he charged in for the attack.

It was a very tiny microscopic red line on Hilston’s cheek bone. It wasn’t more than a glorified paper cut, but it was the first time any of them had landed a hit

Raten had fallen onto the floor as he could feel his collarbone had broken, but when he lifted his head to see his grandfather’s tiny wound, he inwardly smiled.

"Now that’s how you—" Raten was partway through bragging internally, until he was jabbed in the gut, then uppercutted under the chin.

His body lifted into the air for a second, then slammed into the ground by a foot.

Dusting off his hands, Hilston didn’t look too pleased, but he also seemed to have expected it.

"Its clear now that I’ve been wasting my time trying to force him out," Hilston commented.

He then walked over to a large folding door, opening it, revealing a man blindfolded and chained up to a steel pole. Placing his hand on the exposed neck of the man, Hilston felt the familiar sensation of copying MC cells. This was an ability unique to his bloodline.

Vorden had now taken back control of the body, and he looked away from the bound man. He did his best to ignore the muffled sounds of struggle. Despite hearing this sound nearly every day now, he never got used to it.

Hilston then hovered his giant hands on Vorden’s broken body, a warm tingling feeling spreading throughout as he began to heal him.

The broken bones, pierced lung and other various wounds began to heal, going back into place. Not always did Hilston’s healing fix everything though, as he wasn’t a doctor ensuring everything was healed in the right spot. Some part of Vorden suspected he didn’t seem to care that he gained scars from their training. The pain from some of these permanent injuries would serve as punishment for not being able to give Hilston what he wanted.

At least, that was just a theory on his end.

Once the healing was done, he was let free to do whatever he wanted that day, but the creeping dread that Vorden was going to the temple tomorrow had taken over his body. Without thinking, he stumbled through the halls, and into his room.

Once he came to, he found himself plopped onto his bed.

Flashes of the past, blood on his hands, his body impaled, sorrow, weakness, pain. Memories coming back through all 3 of them.

"Hey!" Raten shouted, snapping them all out of it.

Vorden’s eyes shot wide open, and he wiped his face, removing some tears from his eyes.

"...What is it Raten?" Vorden eventually said, standing up from the internal chair.

Right now, no one was controlling the body, it was basically asleep, and given all they had gone through today, it was well needed.

"We can’t go back to that place," Raten began, wiping away his own tears.

"I know the temple was torture, but..." Vorden nervously gulped, "What choice do we have?"

Raten paused, his hands shaking, scared of what he was about to say, but he needed to say it.

"We... We don’t have to!" Raten finally spoke, "Look, I’ve been paying attention to the guards, the servants, and when they’re at, and where they go."

Vorden’s eyes widened. He knew what he was going to say.

"Its suicide! We already tried that before, and we died because of it," Vorden shot back.

"THIS—" Raten pointed at the little one’s immobile figure, "Is suicide!"

"Raten, don’t yell, you’re going to—"

"He hasn’t reacted one damn bit in a week, and you know it. We could shout all we want about fucking— I don’t know— superheros, and you’ll get a blink if you’re lucky," Raten yelled, "We either die here, miserable, or we might not die escaping."

Vorden gulped, eyes burning, threatening to cry again.

The two stood in silence, letting the idea hang in the air. What if they could be free of this island?

"...I have wondered what it would’ve been like if we could’ve gone to the military school," Vorden managed to get out, "Be a normal kid."

"Man, don’t cry, that’s the little one’s job you know?" Raten tried to tease, but even he was getting emotionally worked up.

Raten had been thinking the same thing. The fantasy of being allowed to move and do whatever he wanted was addicting, perhaps even more. Vorden was in charge of trying to put on a good face, walking around egg shells with Hilston, and taking care of their body. Raten was only let out to fight.

Taking in a deep breath, Vorden turned towards the little one.

"Okay... If the little one says we can go, then we’ll do it."

Raten scoffed.

"... Good luck getting an answer out of him."