The First Legendary Beast Master novel Chapter 23

Chapter 23: Practically Trained In A Swamp

The next morning Karl was waiting at the training grounds just as Sergeant Rita had instructed, when a large group of first year students arrived together, and a handful of senior students with black badges came walking in with casual smiles on their faces.

"Looks like we've got a new addition. Which group are you here to join?" One of the black badged students asked.

"No idea. Sergeant Rita just ordered me to be here." Karl replied with a shrug.

The students all gave him an assessing look, trying to guess what his skill and power level was at, but even with his recent growth spurt, he just looked like a handsome teen boy, not yet old enough to be called a young man.

Then the teachers arrived, two mages and Sergeant Rita, who had a bundle in her arms as she walked over to Karl.

"Flip your coat inside out. You will be the flag carrier for team five. Here is your actual flag for the mission, wear it as a cape, and I wish you luck. As I said, the first day is always the hardest." She informed him with a smile.

"OH? We get a rookie for today's training?" One of the senior students asked.

The larger of the two mages, an old man who must have been a natural mage and not one of the injected elites, cleared his throat and everyone fell silent.

"Most of you know the rules. Odd numbered teams are on defence, protect your flags as well as you can. The flag carriers are your team leaders. Even numbered teams are on offence, your senior will lead the team.

This is a group training exercise, as you alone won't be able to face down every threat that comes your way during training. Sergeant Rita will hand out the tokens at random, while the seniors know their numbers already. Senior Geoffrey is out on a mission, so Karl will be taking his place for the next few weeks."

Rita walked through the groups of first year students and passed out tokens, which everyone pulled from a bag, then the students grouped up based on the token they drew.

The fact that it was completely random, and that they wouldn't have any guarantees of a decent grouping, was already giving Karl a headache, but it looked like the others were well aware of the situation, and they were already making plans for how they would work with what they had.

That was the point of the lesson. When there was an emergency call, whoever was close to the emergency answered. You didn't get to pick and choose a front guard, healer and mages, you just fought with what you had, and there was no extra time to figure it out.

Karl's group was Dana, the mage girl who was behind him on the first day, along with seven large boys that all had shields and hammers or spears.

"Oh, come on." One of the other students groaned as they saw the group forming.

"How did group five end up with every defender in the entire class?" One of the mages agreed.

His group was five mages and three boys with short swords and daggers. If they were attacking, it wouldn't be too terrible, but they were group three, and they would have to defend a flag without anyone who could take an attack head on.