Chapter 554: Running

"So, what are we going to do now?" asked Kai with a casual expression, wondering what kind of exercises he would need to do to build his body.

However, Arba's answer truly shocked him.

"The first thing to do is run."

"Run?" Kai raised his eyebrows, slightly feeling surprised by the normal training menu. He remembered that when he trained here, he did something more intensive, albeit he soon took that back.

"Yeah. For now, let's run to India." Arba smiled.

Kai widened his eyes and said with a dumbfounded expression. "Come again?"

"We're going to run to India. We only have seven days for this."

"Are you kidding me?" Kai took a step back and looked at this person who seemed to be too serious to joke.

Arba let out a sigh and said, "I'm serious. We are going to India on foot. Is it too much to ask?"

"No, but judging from the distance alone, we literally need to run at full speed and without rest to get there. At the same time, there are many magical beasts roaming around the area. If it's only B Rank or lower, I can simply speed up, but if we are surrounded, it will be a fight."

"Yes, is that a problem? I'm not going to lift my hand unless needed, though. So, killing the magical beasts is your job." Arba tilted her head in confusion.

Kai scratched the back of his head, realizing that there was no normal thing to do while training to become a full-fledged protector. Resigning to his fate, he asked once again for confirmation. "Are you sure we are going to do this?"

"Yes. Normally, we need to spend around ten years to make our body get used to this. That's why the original plan is to train from seven years old… I mean, Leah and Devain have done it too. Aston and I practiced from when we were six years old.

"Since you wanted to skip everything and went straight to the goal within six months, I can only do an extreme measure like this." Arba let out a long sigh. "Of course, the choice is on you. The enemies are already on our doorsteps, so it's better to get going now."

Kai facepalmed and started raising his hands to stretch. He remembered that Arba kept stretching while Aston was explaining everything.

Squinting his eyes, he asked, "So, you already know about this and have been stretching your body this whole time…"

Arba looked away and gently stroked her cheek. "Well, you teased me."

"I'm going to remember this." Kai snorted and stretched his body to make sure it was ready to face continuous strains.

After a moment, Kai took out his swords while jumping lightly. "Okay, I'm ready."

"Good." Arba nodded with a smile. "I will match your speed."

"Hmph." Kai harrumphed and started running forward with his full speed.

"By the way, I will be preparing your food and water, so you only need to focus on running," said Arba while following Kai.

"Tch." Kai clicked his tongue as he soon found the first magical beast in their way. It was a lizard with a long tail and tongue.

The lizard itself had a giant body that made it impossible to cross.

If Kai took a few steps to the side, it would just decrease his speed, so the moment the lizard opened its mouth and shot out its tongue, he used his Sound Blast to launch him into the air while continuing that way.

The next hurdle came when the lizard tried to smack him with his tail, but Kai simply waved his sword and struck the lizard's tail with his Supersonic Sword.

Because of the momentum and the restriction from the lizard's tail, Kai's body flipped in the air, spinning a few times.

Luckily, Kai managed to regain his balance and used his Sound Blast to land safely, continuing his journey.

"Tsk." Kai clicked his tongue and realized that the journey was going to be harder than he expected. "Because of my speed, the restriction feels even harder. With just a slight tweak in my balance, I would have rolled or spun a few times.

"It will take more energy to adjust my balance and the speed will decrease for a while. I need to adjust my speed and other things as well, requiring more energy than I expected. If I don't do anything, I won't have enough time to reach India within seven days, let alone rest.

"In that case…" Kai felt if he didn't improve during these seven days, the training would be considered a failure, so he changed his strategy slightly.

He used his Sound Blast to send him into the air and utilized the force of his Sound Blast to speed up.

To his surprise, Arba was staying next to him, running as if she could step on the air.

However, he soon realized what she was doing was more impressive than he thought.

"Did you just step on the air? No, it's creating a small explosion force on the air with the air current. Your affinity is wind, right?" Kai asked.

Arba winked her eyes and gave a thumbs up.

Kai's expression turned serious. Even though he still continued running, Kai's mind wandered elsewhere.

He was falling into deep thought, looking down and ignoring everything.

Seeing Kai in that state, Arba couldn't help but smile, knowing that her king realized what just happened and tried to work on it.

Meanwhile, Kai muttered inwardly, "The Sound Blast magic circle itself is around sixty centimeters in diameter. That's the smallest I can do to keep my balance. However, what if I make it even smaller? I will use a smaller amount of Magic Particles to use it.

"But this will make my balance bad because I don't have enough force to step like that on the ground." Kai thought for a moment and soon widened his eyes. "Wait a minute. The most important thing in running is the front foot to give an explosive power to move forward and the back foot to adjust my body to land.

"What if I create a five centimeters magic circle on both areas? It should be enough to keep my balance while maintaining my speed. At the same time, I won't need to use more Magic Particles than I need to… Can I do that?" Kai gulped down, not realizing that an eagle seemed to be flying from the opposite direction, trying to strike him down.

In that instant, Arba increased her speed and stepped forward.

Scree.

The eagle let out a loud cry while Arba only extended both hands forward.

She suddenly opened her arms wide as if opening something and soon the eagle was ripped apart with blood splashed to the side, not hitting her and Kai behind her.

"I'm sorry, but my king is lost in thought. You shouldn't disturb him." Arba smiled and continued protecting Kai during this time.

Meanwhile, Kai started adjusting his magic circle, unaware of the eagle. He simply formed a smaller magic circle, placing it both on the front and back foot.

He tried to step on the air and launched himself by using those small magic circles.

Fwoosh.

The Sound Blast let out a Sound Wave that launched him like how he usually did. However, because the expected area was smaller than he thought, Kai's body leaned to the right, almost losing his balance.

"O-oh?" Kai regained his balance with a smile on his face. "I see. It may not be perfect yet, but this may allow me to have enough Magic Particles to have some rest during the journey and reach the place within the time limit. Ahaha, let's go!"