Duran's Training

## Duran's Huntsman Training

Fusia Taker

Duran Raglan

## Duran's Huntsman Training

When Duran decided to be a huntsman, rather than having him go to a student’s academy, Grace and Cedric Taker oversaw his academic learning and combat training personally.

Aside from helping Duran train his physical strength and combat style, Grace put little Duran through a series of special training. But some of the training he did…wouldn’t exactly be called training. Grace prefers to call them games. But these customized training sessions made Duran into the warrior he is today.

## Training Methods

While Duran was home schooled in his academic studies, Grace provided her personal training method that would surely set Duran apart from the other students. In a sense, giving Duran a hint of real world experience and training.

### The Cup Game

During Duran’s training with Grace, Grace introduced Duran to the Cup Game. It is a fun game for kids that Grace turned into an interesting training session. The essence of this game is to pick up a single cup of water out of the 15 to 20 cups on the table as quickly as possible and splash it on the opponent. At the same time, the opponent will cover the cup with his hand, not let you pick it up, and also try to splash water at you.

The objective of the training session is to train and link your speed and reflexes. As Grace explains if your physical speed cannot either keep up or match your mental reflexes, you will lose important reaction time. Losing that important reaction time often proved fatal to even veteran huntsmen and huntresses.

Grace even added a punishment to when Duran would lose the game sometimes. That punishment was doing a chore of her choosing.

To truly pass the test, he had to have beaten Grace’s daughter Fusia.

### Obstacle Tag

*“Fighting is a simple thing to do if your opponent is right in front of you or next to you. But how would you fare if your opponent had several obstacles in your way?”*

That is why Grace invited Obstacle Tag.

For this training, Grace takes Duran to a room as big as half of a soccer field. The room is covered in logs on the floors, hanging from the ceilings and coming from the walls. Duran is expected to tag Grace with a wooden stick while avoiding either striking these large pieces of logs or bumping into them. Should Duran strike one of these logs or bump into them, he is the loser and has to do a chore of Grace’s choosing.

The goal is to know how to fight your opponent in cramped up places with either people or obstacles in your way. This is a great practice for those who are going to fight with teams.

### General Training

During Duran’s general training, it was often overseen by Grace’s husband Cedric. But even then, Grace had prepared a suited training session that didn’t involve needless movements or aimless swinging of the blade.

As Grace explained the importance of this training, its objective is stabilizing one's body with strong limbs will lead to strong-accurate attacks and indefatigable defense.

This training module included (in her mind) three simple things:

First, literal training; Cedric was to teach Duran how to fight in combat. But Grace added an extra twist to this training session. As soon as Duran learned how to use his Aura Barrier, she wanted to teach Duran the importance of not using it so much.

Grace learned that the more you use your Aura Barrier unnecessarily, the more Aura you waste, and the more Aura you waste, the shorter you fight is gonna be, lessening your rate of survival.

So aside from just combat training, Duran had to learn this motto from Cedric.

*“If you can block, don’t use your Aura Barrier, just block.”*

*“If you can dodge, don’t use your Aura Barrier, just dodge.”*

*“If you can counter, don’t use your Aura Barrier, just counter.”*

*“If you can deflect, don’t use your Aura Barrier, just deflect.”*

*“If you know that you can take the hit, don’t use your Aura Barrier, just take the hit.”*

*“But doing this, you will outlast any academy taught veteran you face.”*

If Duran ever used his Aura unnecessarily to defend himself when Cedric saw that he could have either blocked, dodged, countered, deflected, or taken the hit, he was made to do push-ups.

Second, run x amount of miles while carrying logs on his shoulders; The purpose of this exercise is to build up Duran’s physical endurance and physical strength. If Duran got physically comfortable carrying a certain number of logs, Cedric would increase the number of logs by three the next day.

### Final Test

Third and finally, something Grace changed up personally, Duran had to defeat Grace in armed combat at his mother’s old…burnt down estate. This was only available to him when he hit 16.

Using everything he learned from his training sessions with Grace and Cedric, Duran can challenge Grace into one-on-one armed combat until either Duran himself or Grace Aura Barrier breaks. This was Duran’s final test from Grace herself and Duran could challenge Grace anytime he wanted.

Should he lose the fight, he goes back to training and can’t challenge her again for two weeks…with an addition to a few chores around the diner. If he wins, Grace would get him into the entry exam to get into a huntsman academy.

## Trivia

* Grace's Daughter, Fusia, wasn't exactly thrilled into being a part of this training session. LoL