## Chapter 351 – The First Dream (6)
<Aaron's Parallel Story Episode 22>
***
The kid walked between Sragin and Aaron.
In the past, Sragin would have immediately drawn his sword. But now he knew that doing that wouldn’t do anything.
“A guy like him and us, Aaron, live in different worlds. You know, right?”
“What are you talking about?”
The kid responded to Sragin’s harsh words with a smile.
“Do you think a blind person would understand if you described red or blue to him?”
“What do you mean?”
“Ah, geniuses never have consideration.”
The kid exaggeratedly shrugged.
“What you do without effort, for us is something very distant and difficult. Do you understand?”
He seemed to want to interrupt. Sragin remained silent. He knew that if he exploded again, he would lose.
“For people like you, what is breathing? Very simple. You inhale, exhale, and that’s it. You can do it with your eyes closed, without thinking. But for us, it’s different.”
The kid’s eyes turned to Aaron. Aaron pondered the meaning of those words.
“Do you understand? For us to breathe, we first have to move the diaphragm. It’s a muscle near the ribs that contracts and expands to supply and expel air.”
The kid smiled.
“How do we move the diaphragm? We have to know its exact location among the many muscles in the body. Then what? Learn to control it by banging our heads against the wall. And then? Discover through trial and error how much contraction it needs so air can enter and exit. And then? And after that?”
“What do you mean?”
“What’s natural for you, for us is extremely difficult.”
The kid smiled, as if mocking something.
“Do you understand? Our realities are different. Although we’re both human, it’s as if we belong to different species. If you want to walk, you just walk, but we have to learn what muscles to move from the beginning.”
“…… ”
“If you really want to help, lower your expectations. It’s like when you play with a small child. You must return to the innocence and purity of childhood.”
The kid finished speaking. He disappeared as abruptly as he had appeared. Both men looked at the place where the kid had been.
“I understand.”
After a while, Sragin spoke, as if he had understood something.
“Let’s try again. Take the spear.”
“Yes, understood.”
Aaron took the spear.
“Adopt the thrust stance, as you know how to do it.”
Aaron quickly adopted the stance he had practiced hundreds of thousands of times.
“I’ll explain it to you in detail, so listen carefully. Why the left foot goes forward. Why the right foot goes back. Why you grab the spear like this. I’ll explain everything, from the beginning to the end. If you have any doubts, ask immediately.”
“Do we really have to go to that extreme?”
“If what that kid said is true, this is the only way you can learn. You must memorize every movement, from the beginning to the end, and understand its meaning.”
Aaron swallowed. This kind of training was new to him.
‘Memorize everything, from the beginning to the end?’
Although it seemed absurd, it also made sense. If it wasn’t like this, if it wasn’t this way, so meticulous and detailed, those without talent couldn’t advance.
‘Was that kid helping me?’
He didn’t know. At the beginning, he thought he had come to mock him. But Sragin, after listening to the kid, had changed his focus. The kid was right. If it wasn’t for him, they would have continued without understanding each other and wasted time.
In Niflheim, known for having the best accounts, even there, Sragin was considered a promising talent. His innate talent and perspective on martial arts were of a completely different level. Someone without talent like Aaron could never match him. The kid had made Sragin understand that.
‘What will he be thinking?’
The first day, the kid had completely denied the meaning of effort. Now he was teaching Aaron the proper training method for him. He couldn’t understand his intentions. But it didn’t matter what the kid’s intentions were. Aaron had no intention of giving up. Otherwise, all the time of frustration and fear would have been meaningless.
* * *
Whoosh!
He launched a thrust.
Paf!
The scarecrow’s chest was pierced.
“…… ”
Aaron pulled back the spear without any expression. Then he stuck the wooden spear into the scarecrow again. The spear tip made a pretty sharp sound.
It had been a year since he had settled here. Aaron had grown slowly but steadily. Before coming here, to give power to a thrust, he needed to adopt the proper stance. But the Aaron of now could launch the same thrust from a relaxed position. In any situation. In any stance. He could make a precise thrust.
“Uf.”
Of course, he hadn’t understood the principle. It was the result of irrational training. He had memorized all the stances and movements of the thrust.
Whoosh!
Paf!
Another thrust followed. Although his stance changed with every thrust, the force didn’t decrease much.
“This isn’t it.”
Aaron murmured. His expression showed signs of dissatisfaction. Objectively, Aaron had become quite strong, capable of launching thrusts at any time and place. But what Aaron desired wasn’t this deformed strength.
‘I haven’t understood the principle of force, or how to generate it…’
Sragin had said it. He could explain it to him. He could break it down in detail. But if he didn’t understand and assimilate it, he couldn’t advance to the next level in spear handling. Memorizing only the movements had a limit.
No matter how much they explained it to him from the beginning, he needed his own understanding. As you can’t do multiplication without understanding addition, until now, Aaron had memorized that 1+1=2. He had also memorized that 2+2=4, and 3+3=6, and 4+4=8. But if a question like 24+3=? or 9+35=? arose, he couldn’t answer. He had memorized the results. But he hadn’t understood the principle. In that state, he couldn’t do multiplication or division, or even subtraction.
In short, Aaron had only grown horizontally, not vertically.
“……”
He felt a sharp pain in his hands. He looked down and saw that the bandages on his palms were red. It seemed that the wounds had opened again during spear training.
Aaron took out new bandages. As he took off the old bandages, he saw that his hands were full of scars and scabs. He silently bandaged them. The hands, torn hundreds of times and full of calluses, hurt.
They say you can’t expect a reward for effort.
Aaron bandaged his hands and looked back. There was Sragin, dedicated to his training. With his eyes closed, he was slowly lowering his sword. A movement that would normally take one second, he was doing it in several minutes. It was a pretty arduous task, as his body was covered in sweat.
Aaron didn’t understand the meaning of that training. The only thing he was clear about was that the difference between the two had widened more than when they arrived. While Aaron memorized thrust stances and immersed himself in seemingly useless effort, Sragin had left the scarecrow behind and immersed himself in his own world, learning to train.
Before, they used to practice together. Of course, Aaron always lost. But now, they couldn’t even train together. The difference in level was so great that it was no longer efficient. Aaron followed his path and Sragin his own. They were so distant from each other that training together no longer made sense.
‘How much stronger has that man become?’
If he asked him, Sragin would answer. But Aaron wouldn’t understand the meaning of his words. They lived in different worlds.
‘This feeling.’
Aaron smiled bitterly. He had felt it before. In a distant place, that wasn’t this one. There was a hero called Han who had been ahead of him. There was also Jenna, who was almost like a companion. And Belkist, a younger hero. They started from similar points. But, as time passed, they advanced. Aaron fell behind, gasping. They moved away. Their figures faded.
If he could have at least kept up with them, even just a little. If he could have been of help.
‘This is…’
Was it respect for them? Or was it guilt for not having been of help? No, maybe. It was a much uglier and dirtier feeling.
‘Jealousy…?’
Why me? Why only me? I put in more effort. I wanted it more. But them. Those bastards. Everything I achieved with blood and sweat, they destroy without effort, laughing, mocking, as if it had no value. They surpass it. What shouldn’t be possible, they make it a reality. They undermine my value as a person.
“Ha.”
Sometimes it’s hard to bear. I can’t stay in this place.
Aaron left the training ground as if he were hypnotized. He needed a quiet place. A place where no one would bother him. Behind the training ground, there was a low hill. Aaron sat on top of it. He silently watched the sun setting. The eternal sunset. Amidst it, leaves fell. He just stayed still. The more he thought, the more his mind wore down. So he stopped thinking.
This feeling wouldn’t be eternal. He would soon forget it and could put in effort again.
“What are you doing here, so melancholic?”
Aaron looked to his side. The kid was smiling broadly. He always had that expression. As if he were above everything.
“I was resting.”
Aaron answered briefly.
“You could rest on the training ground. Why come out here?”
“…… ”
“Guess?”
Aaron suppressed the urge to shout. Leave me alone.
“You felt a wall, right?”
“…… ”
“No matter how much effort you put in, no matter how lucky you are, you feel you can’t reach it. You feel that your value as a person is being denied. You came here to overcome that, but…”
The kid continued.
“In the end, you’ll always feel that wall. You’ll always see it in front of you.”
“If you’re going to mock me, do it.”
“Mock you? That’s not my intention. What a bad mood.”
He didn’t answer. It was pointless to talk to that kid. Aaron and Sragin knew it from experience.
“By the way.”
The kid spoke.
“He’s impressive. He’s already reached the peak of the intermediate level. If he keeps going like this, he’ll soon reach the advanced level.”
He couldn’t understand his intentions. He didn’t know if he wanted to mock him or help.
“Advanced…”
A year ago, Sragin’s weapon skill was at the intermediate level. Now he was looking towards the next level. The advanced level was the true domain of the experts.
“He always had potential. His flaw was that he couldn’t control his emotions. People flattered him for being a genius, so he did whatever he wanted.”
The kid looked towards the training ground. Sragin was still training arduously.
“You know it too. He’s changed.”
“Yes.”
“No matter how furious and uncontrolled he is, there will always be someone he can’t reach. There are situations that demand patience. Just by knowing that, he’s changed. Before, if you had asked him to teach you, you would have been lucky if he just slapped you.”
Before arriving here, Sragin would have ignored Aaron’s requests with contempt. But meeting the kid changed him. He learned to hide his emotions. He learned to control himself. He learned that there are places he can’t reach with only his power. He learned humility.
‘Sragin…’
He remembered how he was the first time they met. He was arrogant. He attacked with his sword for no reason. He shouted angrily.
‘But now.’
He had changed. In just a year, he was another person. Now, Sragin was helping Aaron with his training. He was seriously thinking about how to improve and discussing training methods with Aaron. Aaron was the one who couldn’t keep up.
“How did you do it?”
Aaron asked. Had he intentionally provoked Sragin the first time they met?
“It’s no big deal. Someone like him calms down if you hit him every time you see him. It took me just a month.”
A month. It was the time Aaron had spent locked in his room studying martial arts theories. During that time, the two had had their encounters.
“Does it bother you?”
“What?”
“Think about it. He overcame his biggest obstacle in just a month.”
Is that a way to see it?
“At the beginning, I thought he could only reach the top 100, but now I don’t know. He can go further. Geniuses are like that. They become stronger just by being there. They become strong in strange and surprising ways.”
The kid murmured, looking into the distance. Then he suddenly looked at Aaron.
“And you, what about you?”
“Me?”
“What have you overcome? It’s been a year. What have you learned here?”
“I…”
Aaron closed his mouth. What should he say?
“Ah, I see. You haven’t learned anything!”
“…… ”
“Wow! While he was learning humility, calmness, and improving his martial arts, our Aaron hasn’t learned anything!”
The kid clapped. He had an expression of satisfaction.
“Wonderful! You can be proud. You’re a genius!”
“What are you talking about? That I’m a genius?”
“Yes, you are…”
The kid put a hand on Aaron’s shoulder.
“You’re a genius of effort!”