Chapter 224 Volume IV - 69: Recovered Enough to Fight
Chapter 224 Volume IV - Chapter 69: Recovered Enough to Fight
Five days.
It took five days of rest to recover almost completely.
The combination of the dwarves\' advanced medical techniques and my body\'s rapid recovery as a wiera meant that at the end of five days I was able to stand up, do what I wanted completely on my own without fatigue and, most importantly, I could now use my right eye without any problems.
So I could fight.
Indeed, my doctor agreed with me. I didn\'t have to convince him that I was fine, he could see with his own eyes that I was even better than before.
"Congrats, Mr. Tenebra. Ye be free t\' go now."
After hearing this from my own doctor, everything happened quite quickly.
First, I was finally given normal clothes, I got rid of my sick clothes.
Then my belongings were returned to me. Foremost was the ring that provided me with a dimensional inventory.
When I put it on the index finger of my right hand, I couldn\'t help grinning involuntarily. Finally, I wasn\'t limited to dimensional buttons. I had an inventory of my own.
Of course, with a lot of artifacts...
Inside the Caleuche, I hadn\'t had much time to examine exactly what each artifact was for. So I had a lot of useless artifacts as well as useful ones, but I could always sell them, so I wasn\'t unhappy.
I didn\'t empty the ring right away as I would have preferred to be in a place where no one could watch me check everything inside the ring, but that was for later.
And so, finally... After a long time, I saw Dorhud again.
I was all packed up in my patient room and ready to leave when he suddenly walked in. When he saw me, he smiled.
"Quickly ready ye be, I see."
I smiled back at him.
"Of course, I am. I have been waiting for this moment for five days."
When Dorhud saw my impatience, he lowered his expression slightly. So my smile was involuntarily distorted.
Well... I didn\'t expect him to make that face right away.
"Well, I didn\'t reckon ye\'d be fancyin\' to join the battlefields, but I\'ll still be respectin\' yer decision."
When Dorhud smiled again, even if it was forced, I stood still for a moment.
I was thinking what to say, expecting him to advise me not to go to war. But even though he\'s worried about me, he really respects my decision.
Dorhud... he\'s really a nice person.
"Anyway, I suppose ye\'ve got an idea why I\'m here."
I smiled again, pushing the unnecessary thoughts aside for now.
"Yes, after all, President Houdhin said so himself. That you guys are going to test my capabilities before we go to war."
With that, Dorhud turned around, opened the door to my sick room wide, and looked at me again.
He had no intention of waiting, and neither did I.
"Well then, come on, let\'s be off. I\'ll be tellin\' ye on the way what\'ll happen."
I smiled and nodded, so I stepped out of my room for the first time, carrying an average-sized bag and wearing normal clothes.
"Follow me."
And with that, we started walking, through the same corridors I had passed through in a wheelchair five days before... Dorhud soon started talking.
In short, we were going to an arena not far from here, and when we got there, I was going to have duels with a few people so that they could assess my fighting strength as a soldier. Of course, according to the result, I would be assigned to a unit.
I don\'t have anything wrong with this. In fact, it\'s exactly the kind of \'test\' I want. Because I don\'t plan to hold back.
I want to push myself as hard as I can in this war and that\'s exactly why I need to show everyone how strong I am. That\'s the only way I can be on the front lines and be on the real battlefield where the real action is.
It\'s just... I just need to wait a little longer.
Just a little bit longer...
*******
Half an hour, that\'s how long it took us in a private vehicle to get to the facility Dorhud was talking about.
It was a vehicle that was... above the ground. It didn\'t fly, it just hovered above the ground. And it wasn\'t something extremely luxurious. Someone living in Holar would have to pay more than the average car to get one, yes, but it wasn\'t outrageous.
That alone was enough to show how high-tech the dwarves were.
"Here."
I did the same as Dorhud stepped out of the door on his side of the vehicle.
I stood still for a moment as air from the atmosphere entered my lungs for the first time.
Since I had gotten into the car in the garage of the government building, this was the first time in almost two months that I had been outdoors in the morning. So I found myself involuntarily looking at the sun, then grinning like an idiot.
"What are ye waitin\' for, follow me from behind."
I nodded slightly but didn\'t take my eyes off the sun right away. I wanted to enjoy it for a while, so I walked more slowly than usual.
Dorhud was about to call out to me again, but when he saw me looking at the sun, he let out a deep sigh, turned back in front of him, and kept walking.
So when we entered the gates of the facility, I was finally able to stop myself.
I\'m not satisfied, I want more, but I know I don\'t have the time.
"We\'ve arrived."
At the sound of Dorhud\'s voice, I really focused in front of me and looked where we had come to.
It looked like an indoor stadium. It even had bleachers.
"This is..."
"It\'s a fightin\' arena, and I must say quite a famous one. It\'s been completely cleared out today just for you."
"Oh... You\'ve done a lot of work."
I focused on the memories in my mind, wondering if I had ever seen this place after it was razed to the ground.
The answer was yes.
I remember this stadium collapsed, its roof had fallen in the middle of the arena.
I smiled with the strange happiness of seeing this place intact and approached the huge arena.
After throwing my bag into one of the stands, however, I suddenly paused. Because there were other people in this arena besides me, standing in the stands right in front of me.
There were three of them, two of them looked like bodyguards, while the one in front... was important.
He was the one the President had assigned for me during the meeting, and even now he had that big smile on his face.
"Hello!"
General Darbal started waving at me. Then Dorhud appeared behind me.
"Ye seem to have met my brother, heh?"
I looked blankly in the general\'s direction for a moment, and when I processed what Dorhud had said in my head, I first froze in place, then my eyes widened. I almost got a stiff neck as I turned my head toward him.
"B- brother? General Darbal is your brother?"
Dorhud nodded with a proud smile on his face.
"Well, I can say he is my stepbrother. In reality, he is my cousin. When my family passed away when I was a wee lad, I started livin\' with \'em."
I didn\'t know what to say to this sudden information. Even though Darbal kept smiling in every frame he appeared in, he was always surrounded by someone with a gloomy air, contrary to his smile.
In the original scenario... Could Dorhud have actually died in that city?
Of course, his gloomy mood could be because his country was destroyed, but...
Well... Either way, it was information I didn\'t expect to learn.
"Let\'s go over there if yer done bein\' surprised."
I could do nothing but nod, walking behind Dorhud to the general, who continued to smile brightly at us. I\'d better pull myself together... I didn\'t learn anything bad.
So, when we finally got to them, Dorhud gave a perfect soldier\'s salute. Of course, I did the same.
General Darbal, on the other hand, only widened his smile.
"Take it easy, especially you young lad. Fer today, let\'s ignore the formalities." The general held out his hand to me.
This seemed strange because of his small stature. To stand in front of him like a giant when the person in front of me was a general... it was... really strange.
I shook the general\'s hand, so when we pulled our hands back, the general shifted his eyes to the arena.
"Actually, I wanted to have a little chat with ya, but I\'m afraid we ain\'t got much time. And ya don\'t seem too keen on waiting either. How \'bout we head straight down to the arena?"
I responded with a smile, and then quickly started to make my way down to the arena.
General Darbal didn\'t say much when he saw this, he just turned around and headed toward a rather large-looking booth.
I normally wouldn\'t have even noticed the booth if they hadn\'t been headed there specifically. It was placed in an easily overlooked place, out of anyone\'s sight.
Still, when I focused, I could see what was inside. Several dwarves were looking at the arena on screens in front of them. They were the ones who would observe me, the ones who would judge my strength.
When I finally landed in the arena, a voice echoed throughout the huge arena.
"We\'ll be startin\' the tests right away."