I’m Just a Background Character, But I Used to Be a Delinquent, So Why Are the Girls Falling for Me?!

For the first time since we met…

Vara’s lips curled into a very small, very brief smile.

“I look forward to that day.”

For a moment, silence stretched between us. His breathing was still uneven, sweat clinging to his forehead, but his eyes burned with stubborn fire. He refused to look away.

Vara studied him carefully, her posture relaxed but sharp like a blade resting in its sheath. She had expected excuses, fear, or a polite retreat. Instead, he stood there, injured and tired, yet still asking for more.

That was new.

Her lips curled not fully into a smile, but close. A small, quick expression that looked almost strange on her usually stern face.

“I look forward to that day,” she replied.

Then the moment was gone. Her expression hardened again, her voice turning sharp and professional.

“But do not misunderstand,” Vara continued, stepping closer and adjusting his grip on the dagger with a tap of her finger. “A few decent moves won’t save you. You are still slow. You still think too much before you act. If I wanted to, I could put you on your back in less than a heartbeat.”

Callen swallowed but held her gaze.

“Then I’ll learn faster,” he said.

Vara nodded once with strict approval, nothing more.

“Stand up,” she ordered, her tone sharp and strict.

“Pick up that sword,” Vara instructed, her voice flat, pointing to a wooden sword lying on the ground near the post.

My brow furrowed while looking at her. She had just spent the last ten minutes telling me that heavy swords were slow and relying on a smaller, faster blade was efficient for survival. Why this heavy thing now?

I forced myself to stand straight. I walked over and picked up the wooden sword. The moment my fingers wrapped around the hilt, a shock of heavy weight stunned me. It was much heavier than the swords I had used before.

I looked at Vara, a silent question in my eyes, asking if this was really just wood.

She simply stared back, her gray eyes sharp, giving me no verbal answer, but her look clearly meant, Stop questioning.

I swallowed hard and hoisted the sword onto my shoulder.

Vara pointed to a thick wooden post wrapped with straw in the center of the yard.

“Hit that target,” she commanded. “We must focus on improving your stamina. It is still not enough.” She spoke the last sentence as a simple fact. “Every strike must be fast and sure. If you hesitate, imagine the target will kill you.”

I approached the post, gripping the heavy hilt too tightly. Sweat was already forming on my forehead from the stress. I took a quick, short breath and struck.

Thud.

The sword made a dull sound as it hit the straw. It only cut into the wrapping a little. Not deep enough to hurt anything. I relied too much on the strength of my arm to move the weight.

I immediately pulled it out and struck again. And again.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

My breathing grew heavier, turning into short, quick puffs. The weight of the wood was already exhausting me. I glanced at Vara.

She walked slowly behind me, watching every movement like a hunting animal judging its prey, patient, but ready to correct.

“You are wasting your strength,” she said, her voice quiet but piercing. “You rely too much on your elbow and shoulder. Do not depend only on your arm.”

I stopped, breathing hard. My arm felt like it was already on fire.

She placed her hand lightly on my right shoulder. The small, unexpected push almost made me stumble forward as she shifted my balance.

“Power comes from your feet,” she continued, her voice moving to a teaching tone. “Your feet turn your hips. Your hips move your core. Move your whole body, not just your arm.”

She tapped the side of my right boot with her own to adjust my footstep, it needed to turn slightly out.

I tried again. This time, I focused entirely on twisting my hips into the strike, letting the heavy weight of the wood be guided by my core.

WHUMP!

The sound was deeper, more solid. The sword cut into the straw much deeper this time. My arm still hurt, but the power came from my core, spreading the effort.

I looked at Vara. She didn’t smile, but a fractional nod acknowledged the improvement.

“Better,” she said. “Now, do it again. Faster. One hundred times.”

My brow furrowed immediately. I furrowed my brow and looked at her.

One hundred times? My whole body was already screaming from the initial dozen strikes. The weight of this sword was designed to break a man, not train him.

I stared at her, trying to read her expression, searching for a sign that she was joking or testing my resolve.

Vara simply stared back. Her expression was completely blank, telling me that there was no negotiation. One hundred strikes was the requirement.

I swallowed hard, the dryness in my throat reminding me of the fatigue already setting in. I lifted the massive wooden sword again, the weight feeling heavier with every passing second.

I took a shaky breath, adjusted my footing, and swung.

CRACK.

The sound was louder. The straw split wider. I was successfully harnessing my core strength now, but the sheer physical demand was overwhelming.

I kept going, forcing myself faster than before, but my muscles screamed at me to stop. My lungs burned. Sweat dripped down my face and onto the dirt below.

I could feel Vara watching, her presence a heavy, critical weight behind me. She didn’t offer praise or correction, only silence, which was its own form of pressure. Each swing was a battle against the pain that radiated from my shoulders down to my thighs.

Thirty-five. Thirty-six. Thirty-seven.

The world narrowed to the target post and the rising and falling of the heavy wood. I lost track of the courtyard, the manor, even Inzo who was practicing footwork drills in the corner. There was only the swing, the thud, and the raw need to breathe.

*****

I kept going, the rhythm of the heavy sword hitting the post becoming dull, agonizing routine.

Eighty-five. Eighty-six.

My vision started to tunnel slightly, ringed by a haze of exhaustion. Every muscle fiber felt ripped and useless. I wasn’t relying on my core anymore⁷ I was just hauling the dead weight of the wood with sheer desperation. My movements were slow, dragged down by pain.

I was around eighty-seven. My swing became a pathetic, dragging arc. My pace visibly slowed.

Then, Vara’s voice sliced through the haze, sharp and utterly emotionless, cutting through the heavy sound of my ragged breathing.

“Do not slow down. If you stop, you start over.”

The threat was clear. If I dropped the sword, if I paused even for a second to gulp air, I would have to restart from one. The thought of swinging the heavy wood one hundred more times was more terrifying than the pain I was currently enduring.

I bit down hard on the inside of my cheek, tasting blood. I forced my foot to move, shoving my hips into the last bit of available energy.

Eighty-eight. I could barely hear the thud over the ringing in my ears.

I gritted my teeth, lifting the sword for the eighty-ninth strike, forcing my movement to be faster, cleaner, just to spite the pain.

The next strikes were a blur of pure willpower. My arms were shaking so violently I thought I would drop the hilt. The world outside the post ceased to exist.

Ninety-five. Ninety-six. Ninety-seven.

The air was burning in my lungs. My entire shirt was soaked. I hauled the sword up for the ninety-eighth time. The swing was weak, a terrible mockery of the clean motion Vara demanded, but it connected.

Ninety-eight.

I forced my leaden arms to lift the sword once more. The sound of my own harsh, tearing gasp was the loudest thing in the courtyard.

Ninety-nine.

One more. I focused every ounce of remaining hate for my own weakness into lifting the sword high above my head, twisting my numb hips, and bringing it down with everything I had left.

One hundred.

The sword hit the post with a final, desperate WHUMP.

My arm immediately failed. The heavy wooden sword slipped from my numb fingers, clattering loudly onto the gravel. I leaned against the post, my head bowed, fighting the urge to vomit.

Silence. Absolute silence in the courtyard.

Vara finally moved, stepping around the post to stand in front of me.

“The lesson is finished ” she said, her voice still flat, but with a slight, almost imperceptible softening.

I pushed myself away from the post, intending to nod my thanks and stagger toward the manor.

But before I could even take a full, relieving breath, Vara continued, turning her back to me as she walked toward Inzo.

“Be here before sunrise tomorrow, Young master” she commanded, not turning around. “Do another hundred strikes with the wood.”

My jaw dropped.

I stood there, sweat dripping onto the dirt, staring at the back of her head. Another hundred? Tomorrow? I had barely survived the first hundred. My entire body needed at least three days just to repair the damage.

“Vara,” I managed to choke out, my voice raw and broken.

She stopped beside Inzo, who was neatly lining up his practice daggers, and glanced over her shoulder. Her expression was completely unmoved.

My walk back to my room was a blur of pure pain and exhaustion. My mind was too tired, I moved only on muscle memory, focused solely on placing one aching foot in front of the other.

I heard distant sounds of a maid, the closing of a door but none of it registered. I was like a zombie, navigating the familiar maze of the hallway.

Then, suddenly, I was inside my room. The door was closed. I was genuinely shocked that I was already here, I had no memory of opening the door. My body had worked on its own.

I didn’t bother unbuckling my boots or untying my tunic. I staggered toward the bed and simply fell onto the mattress.

The cold dread of “tomorrow” was my final thought.

I fell asleep instantly, deeply and completely, lost to the exhaustion.

To be continued….