In Search of Epsilon

An unexpected encounter

Louis woke up in a training arena.  

He had looked around the place but found out that the area surrounding the arena did not exist. He figured that he was either in a dream, or in some sort of strange dimensional space. Either way, he was trapped here. 

The training arena had a sword at the middle. It was a two-handed sword, but its blade was pretty dull, almost as if it was beyond its intended use. Louis decided to pick it up, he figured having a useless weapon was better than no weapon at all, and he noticed a small inscription on the floor.  

Swing this sword a thousand times. 

He figured that however had created this space, had wanted him to follow the engraving to escape. He sighted; physical activity was his greatest weakness. 

He believed that, when he entered the dungeon, he was forced to teleport here, and that this place detected an individual's weaknesses.  

But why would they propose something like this? he thought. If they had placed him in this arena with a bunch of beasts, he would have surely had to resort to some extreme measure to survive.  

Or maybe, they would just place him here without any escape. Leaving him here to starve would have been easier. 

Then, most likely, they left him here to train him.  

Finally, he tried to swing the sword. It was surprisingly heavy. He barely was able to do the first swing before he felt his forearms and chest exploding.  

He cursed at however had put him in this trial. He would have liked having to do anything else, rather than having to preform physical activity.  

Why not give him something fun to read, with a stupid plot about cultivating or being reborn in another world? 

These are the moments he was missing Zoe.  

He missed her strength. You needed two things to become a ruler: intelligence and power.  Intelligence, to outsmart your opponents, and power, to destroy them. 

Zoe was the incarnation of power, while he was the intelligence.  

He sat there, wondering what had happened to her. 

He finally snapped out of his daze and concentrated on lifting the sword a second time. This process took an entire day.  

He was tired, hungry, and thirsty. Magically, a red package came from the sky. The package contained essentials. Mostly food rich in nutrients, but lacking in taste, and water.  

They were training him. Of that he was sure of, but for what purpose exactly, he had no idea.  

Louis added new training regiments to his routine. He wanted to have the most balanced workout he could have. Just swinging his sword would not be enough to train. He decided to make the most of the situation.  

Finally, after a month of extremely intense training, he finally was able to do one thousand continuous sword swings. 

A small door opened. He reluctantly went towards the door.  

He now had some amount of muscle. The lack of machinery was not helping him reach his ideal, but now he could at least swing a heavy sword and not die of exhaustion.  

But, if compared to Hunters, he was a toddler, but this was enough to at least hit something with his sword. Extended fighting was still pretty much impossible.

He proceeded towards the door, and when he entered the darkness, he blacked out again.  

This happened way too often, he thought to himself when he woke up. 

This time, he woke up in a throne room. The room was filled with jewelry. Pearls, rubies, diamonds, gold, and silver decorated the room. It also had several paintings of what seemed to be a royal family. 

He was teleported without the sword, but something told him he did not need it. 

The last thing he noticed in the room was the king. The moment his eyes landed on him, his entire body became tense. How could he notice such a presence so late? 

Louis felt the need to bow, but he did no such thing. He believed firmly that kings and queens belong to the past. But, he thought that if he had to have a king, this would be it. 

The king was taller than Louis. He was massive in stature, and surprisingly muscular. He was wearing a red robe with sprinkles of gold. Inside the robe he was wearing silver and golden armor.  

The king had a rough face, with golden hair. He had the air of authority that came naturally to kings, and the same level of confidence. After staring at each other for a couple of seconds, the king, which was sitting down in his throne comfortably, finally spoke to him.