Commanding Wind and Cloud

“I...”

As Qian Jin was about to lose his temper, a system notification sounded.

“Player Qian Jin, please pay attention. Your gaming time for today is almost used up. Be prepared to go offline.”

The gaming world started to twist and turn in Qian Jin’s eyes, and the voice sounded less and less real.

Qian Jin felt like he had a very weird dream. He dreamt about going to a place called the [Endless World], which was a virtual gaming space. Blacksmithing was also a part of his dream.

Usually, people would only be able to vaguely remember a dream or only remember a small part of the dream. People were rarely able to remember every single detail that occurred in a dream.

However, Qian Jin found that he had almost memorized his whole dream. He was able to recall the small details in the dream as if these incidents actually occurred.

He held onto an edge of the bed and tried to sit up. Suddenly, he felt a tremendous amount of soreness in both of his arms, and every single muscle in his body was extremely tired.

This situation had happened once before. He felt a similar level of soreness when he woke up after Instructor Rodriguez ordered him to sprint as fast as he could around the academy fifty times at the beginning of his stay on campus.

Compared to last time, the soreness and pain he was experiencing at the moment surpassed it by a whole level. He couldn’t find a single muscle that wasn’t hurting. His hand hurt the most, as if he battled against the instructors in the academy, and the shock from the collision of the weapons injured his hand.

When Qian Jin raised up his arms, he realized that his arms were wet; he didn’t know when this happened. The sweat covered his skin as if he applied oil on it.

It wasn’t only his arms; he also quickly found out that his chest, back, and every part of his body had a ton of sweat on it. He jumped off of the bed and took off his blanket. His sheets and blanket were soaked with sweat. If someone entered the room right now, they might mistake the situation as if Qian Jin had peed in bed...

“Qian Jin, as I was saying...”

Rollin pushed open the door again, and his eyes quickly landed on the wet blanket and sheets. His mouth opened wide and turned into an “O” shape.

“Sh*t!” Qian Jin immediately knew what his friend was thinking from just looking at Rollin’s expression. It was what Qian Jin was most afraid of.

“Rollin, this isn’t what it looks like!”

“I know, I know,” Rollin said in an understanding tone as he nodded repeatedly. However, the smile on his face told Qian Jin that he would never believe what Qian Jin’s explanation was.

“I had a dream, and I sweat a lot from it!” Qian Jin pointed at his bed and explained anxiously. He had just become the extremely ugly guy that everyone at the academy heard about; he wouldn’t be that unfortunate and be known as the guy who peed in his bed, right?

“I know, I know.” Rollin slowly stepped back and said, “Qian Jin, when people get a strong mental blow, things can happen. The act of peeing in bed is forgivable...”

Before he finished speaking, he rushed out of the room and sprinted away in laughter.

Qian Jin wanted to chase after Rollin and explain himself a bit more; but after a second thought, why would he do more explaining? He really didn’t pee in bed! On top of that, he already had the name of the extremely ugly guy, so why would he worry if he got the name bedwetting warrior?

“Washing my sheets and blanket should be my top priority.” Qian Jin quickly took off the sheets on his bed, threw it and the blanket into a wooden tub, and headed toward a river located outside of his residence. “How am I going to sleep tonight with everything wet? But then again, why do all my muscles hurt so much? Is it because that I wanted to become strong subconsciously that I trained myself in my sleep? I’m so darn hard-working! If the principal of the academy doesn’t give me a scholarship, even the great God of War wouldn’t let that slide and would punish him for that.”

Self-motivating, self-ridiculing, staying positive and optimistic when faced with any situation, this was the guideline that Qian Jin followed ever since he left his family. He was never put down by anything except for the extremely ugly guy incident.

As Qian Jin was walking through a long corridor, he saw a room in the residence that was filled with dozens of people. They were cheering and yelling loudly as if there was a competition of some sort, and it was getting to the climax.

“These energetic bastards. It would be great if I tell Instructor Rodriguez to train you guys so hard that you can’t even get up.”

Qian Jin talked to himself as he approached the river. Some students pointed at him and talked behind his back, but he ignored them all.

The incident where he got knocked out by a hat wasn’t a secret in the academy. None of the students who were with him missed it. Qian Jin’s name and history cycled around the academy for days.

There weren’t any people at the river right now. Qian Jin slowly squatted down. His legs felt powerful, but the soreness convinced him to slow down.

After he threw a wooden bucket into the water well, Qian Jin easily swung the roller and pulled up the bucket with water inside it. He lifted the bucket filled with water with his left hand.

...

“Eh?” Qian Jin held the bucket full of water in front of his face. Although it didn’t take too much energy to lift this bucket of water before, why did it take him so little effort to do so today? The bucket was full, but why did IT feel like the bucket was empty?

“Did the training in my dream actually work?” Qian Jin didn’t want to think too much. He poured the water from the bucket to his wooden tub, squatted down again, and started to wash his blanket and sheets. Suddenly, he saw a pair of feet.

They belonged to a woman! Qian Jin was sure of his judgment. The pair of white fabric shoes was simple and plain. Qian Jin’s eyes traced up the straight legs, and a big black mage robe appeared in front of his eyes.

A mage! Oh, wait! Qian Jin quickly adjusted his assessment. This girl was wearing big glasses. Her big pointy mage hat covered more than half of her face, and people couldn’t clearly tell what she looked like. She was wearing a mage robe that was a bit larger than her body size, but the greyish-white wand symbol on her chest told people that she was a mage apprentice.

This short mage apprentice was also holding a wooden tub in her hands. The tub was smaller than Qian Jin’s, and a few clothes were in it.