The storm churned and merged into a chaotic mass of clouds, moving like a living calamity.
Red lightning flashed through the towering dark, the clouds stretching upward—hundreds, if not thousands, of kilometers high.
Thunder roared like the bellow of a wounded god, each boom sending shockwaves that ripped through the sky and rattled the ground. The trees bent and shuddered under the onslaught of the rising winds.
Loid stared upward, awe and fear locking his body in place, his mouth wide agape.
The storm was coming—fast.
The winds howled with a force far greater than any hurricane he had ever known, tearing at the world like invisible claws.
The rumble of thunder split the sky, and the man finally moved.
From the folds of his black cloak, he pulled a sheathed sword.
Loid unsheathed the blade, it was long — longer than Loid had ever seen for a blade so straight. Forged without a curve, its edge looked cold and honest, unyielding. It resembled the ancient ninjatos of forgotten warriors, yet it bore the proportions of a longsword meant for battlefields soaked in blood.
No symbols. No engravings. Just polished, raw metal. A blade made not to be admired, but wielded.
The man held it out, resting it across his two palms, offering it without ceremony. The rain crashed down harder, yet the blade gleamed through the darkness, untouched by the storm.
Loid hesitated, water streaming down his face, stinging his eyes. His hands trembled — from fear, from cold, from the weight of what he was about to accept.
He stepped forward.
And when his fingers closed around the sword's grip, the storm screamed louder — as if the heavens themselves recognized the choice he had made. The man withdrew his hands and said nothing. He simply watched.
The sword weighed heavy in his hands.
Loid looked up, rain drowning the world around him. The man only stared, face carved from something colder than stone, older than the storm itself.
His voice, when it came, was low, rough — as if spoken from the bedrock beneath the earth.
"This is your life. Your soul."
The sword in Loid's shaking hands felt heavier than his entire body. The storm raged louder, winds tearing at the world like the claws of a starving beast.
The man stepped forward, each step defying the chaos around him.
He placed one gnarled, calloused hand atop Loid's head— a gesture not of kindness, but of binding.
"You shall cherish it. You shall never let it go."
The words were not commands. They were law— heavy as the sky above.
The Man pulled his hand back, eyes dark as the void between stars.
"You sleep with it."
"You eat with it."
"You bathe with it."
"You bleed with it."
Each word struck deeper than the last— hammered into Loid's trembling soul.
The wind shrieked. The earth moaned under the weight of the storm.
"Swing."
The man gave him some space and watched. With shaky hands Loid lifted the sword above his head and swung down—Terrible— he was weak, the sword was heavy— his hands trembled lifting it.
The wind blew harder knocking him out of his terrible form, striking him for being a talentless.
The storm howled around them, trees bending under winds that should have ripped them from the earth. Loid gritted his teeth, planted his feet wider, the blade held awkwardly in front of him.
"Wrong."
Before he could even adjust, the man moved — faster than sight, like a shadow pulling at his arms and shoulders, forcing them into place.
He felt a rough hand press his elbows down, angle his wrists, tilt his chin.
"Again."
Lightning ripped the sky apart, a deafening crack that made the ground tremble. The gravity of the world seemed to press heavier onto his bones, a suffocating weight.
Loid exhaled and swung.
The blade sang through the rain, but his posture collapsed halfway, knees buckling under the invisible pressure.
Another correction — a shove to his hips, a pull at his shoulders.
The man said nothing more.
The storm raged louder, closer, faster.
The winds tore at his clothes, tried to rip the sword from his hands, but Loid held on. He swung again. And again. And again.
Each time the Master adjusted him with harsh, decisive movements, not a shred of hesitation or gentleness in his touch.
Each time, the storm demanded more.
Each time, Loid gave more.
Until it no longer mattered that he couldn't breathe properly, or that his muscles screamed. Until it was just him, the blade, and the war of the world around him.
The storm completely covered the sky, darkness encapsulated everything only to be illuminated by the red lightning that cracked the sky. The rain crashed down with such intensity that it left red river flowing from Loid's body.
It destroyed what remained of the campsite. Penetrating the leaves— leaving behind holes until nothing remained
The man watched, unbothered by the assault that the world screamed.
Gravity seemed to increase and Loid knees buckled. He crashed down, his knees sank into the mud. It displaced and moved aside as if trying to consume him. His knees bled, sharp rocks that laid beneath dirt stabbed into him.
"Stand."
The man's voice wasn't loud yet it cut through the screaming howl of the storm. As if the storm weren't there.
Loid grit his teeth, muscles spasming under the crushing gravity, the endless onslaught of rain hammering down like a thousand spears.Each second stretched into an eternity.Each breath a rebellion against the suffocating weight.
The blade in his hands felt heavier than mountains.His arms quivered, his knees threatened to give again.The storm howled — a voice of ancient calamity — trying to unmake him.
Pain blurred into numbness.Numbness blurred into something else.There was only the sword, the will and the demand to stand.
Lightning slashed the sky open again, its red veins burning the heavens —for a moment, the world was frozen in crimson brilliance:
A boy, standing against the storm.
A man, watching like a monolith of another era.
The sword, the only truth left between them.
Loid screamed — not with voice, but with the defiance of his soul —and the earth beneath him cracked.
Mud split, the rain churned, but the boy did not fall.He planted his existence into the ground as if he could root himself into the bones of the world itself.
The man closed his eyes once — not in pity, nor in approval —but as if acknowledging a truth too ancient to be spoken aloud.
And still, the storm raged.And still, Loid stood.