Second Genesis

Grey walked through the halls of the Church Palace, knowing he probably wasn’t meant to just casually do as much. But when had he ever followed the rules?

He had already set his checkpoint to be right when his first training session with Edmun began, so if worse came to worst, he wouldn’t have to go through that damned Ceremony again.

In fact, because he wasn’t completely certain he would be able to react in time and summon his mechanical jaw, he decided to do so ahead of time, even slipping the Skrill Mask on first.

Old habits died hard.

The halls of the Church Palace were about as one might expect. The reason Grey called it a Church Palace in the first place was because it couldn’t quite decide what it wanted to be.

Was it meant to be the humble holdings of a Goddess, focused on blessings and the prosperity of kindness and holiness? Or was it meant to be a display of grandeur and an obnoxious amount of wealth?

Standing beneath ceilings so tall it would have taken twenty of him stacked foot to shoulder to touch, and windows so arched and large he wondered how it could even be possible to blow them out of a single piece, he wouldn’t be wrong for feeling like it was a lot more like the latter.

It was hard to imagine how much wealth had been poured into this place. Not that Grey was very familiar with the materials of this world—the ones he did understand were pretty limited and related specifically to mech building—but expensive raw material had a special look to it.

A special look that was all over the place here.

Blinding whites and polished golds, artworks that looked so old they might crumble from a single touch, chandeliers that looked like they belonged beneath a dragon’s paw.

It was all so ridiculous.

’Well, maybe this Goddess isn’t the modest type.’

Grey was mostly thinking of religions of Earth. Who knew what this Goddess represented? They kept calling her "Her Holiness", but that didn’t exactly represent her Divinity.

The stink of sweat and aching limbs followed Grey as he moved. On his hip rested the simple knight’s blade that Edmun had given him. Though, by now, it was chipped and dulled from constant usage.

Honestly, Grey didn’t even know where his original lush, noble robes had gone. He looked like the quintessential squire in training right now, down to the tighter-than-he-would-like brown pants and simple low-collar linen shirt.

Even his boots screamed like they came out of a retelling of Merlin and King Arthur’s story.

If he looked at himself in the mirror right now, he would conclude only a single word.

Lame.

Luckily, he didn’t have to subject himself to that. He was too focused on memorizing the paths in the church and trying to find if he could spot Joaquin, or maybe a clue of where he might find Globb’s tool belt.

Logically, he should be somewhere in the knight’s wing right now, so finding Joaquin wasn’t going to be all that likely. But that should at least mean he might stumble into Terran.

If he poked and prodded the man enough, maybe he could find the tool belt. The fact he only had one mechanical jaw blueprint downloaded was a huge annoyance after all the trouble he went through to get the inheritance.

The sudden clashing of swords made Grey’s steps pause before he sped up a little bit. He caught a courtyard out of the corner of his eye as the Church Palace turned from mirrors to large pillars that formed the threshold of a flowing outdoor-indoor, open-air concept.

All this time, Grey hadn’t run into a single person. On the one hand, that was probably good because he didn’t know what rights he had to stroll around casually. But on the other, it also gave him no clues about where the hell he was.

It wasn’t long before Grey found an arena similar to the one he had been battling it out with Sir Trolley in. The difference was that this one was open to the air, and there were far more people.

It wasn’t exactly a large crowd, but there were still at least a dozen and a half or so knights dressed exactly like he was. Though, while their swords looked identical, they were in much better shape and clearly forged of much better material.

’Don’t tell me my "master" is also a cheapskate. Isn’t he supposed to be powerful?’ Grey clicked his tongue.

The group of knights, or maybe they were also squires, were locked in a loose ring around two youths facing off against one another with knight’s blades in their hands.

The sun glistened off their iron surfaces, the straight guards that protected their hands seemingly having seen better days.

Quickly, it was proven exactly why that was.

They dashed toward one another, their swords clashing again to a chorus of hoots and hollers. Their blade edges ran along one another, sparks flying as they nearly smashed their noses together.

’Just kiss already.’ Grey thought with a chuckle.

Their blades slid in relation to one another until their guards practically locked into place, they moved and jostled for position, their veins bulging.

At first, Grey thought that this was a real duel, and he wondered why neither twisted their wrist to gain a sudden advantage. It was a risky maneuver, but it could certainly be worth it if the enemy was clearly not ready.

But then Grey realized as the seconds passed that this was actually the point. It wasn’t a sword match, it was a pushing match, one that they were probably using to train the strength of their wrists.

The first person’s wrist to give out would definitely end up with a nasty slash across the chest at the very least.

Grey nodded to himself. For people who wielded swords a lot, wrist strength was probably something they found very important.

In a world of non-superhumans, if you were going to swing a sword, doing so with your entire body and arm was definitely the smartest way to go. But even then, wrist strength, and shoulder strength, was of huge importance.

If you could cut through a small hill on a whim, though, the calculations definitely changed.

Suddenly, the wrists of the squire on the right trembled and then gave way.

He shouted and fell back while his sparring partner just managed to pull his blade away before it slashed the former’s throat.

’Well, that was close.’

"Who the hell are you?" one of the squires seemed to finally notice Grey’s appearance.

A chorus of gazes landed on Grey.

Grey looked through the squires one by one. None of them recognized him probably because he was wearing his Skrill Mask. At the knighting ceremony, he hadn’t obscured his face at all.

"Sir Trolley’s disciple." Grey replied simply.

After he said this, the squire who questioned him, a redhead with a fiery amber set of eyes, actually nodded. He looked Grey up and down as though assessing something.

"I see. Welcome, then. Would you like to spar?"