Chapter 5-A Sign of Loyalty

After Lena came out, there was a sudden rush of several muscular men who came in and removed the IV and dragged Stefan to get up.

Stefan, who was pulled suddenly, was still trying to maintain his balance. He almost fell over due to the hold of his body.

"Who are you guys?"

"We're going to train you. You will have a short training for the next two days."

One of the muscular men walked up to Stefan and punched him in the face, causing him to take a few steps back.

"What are you doing!" Stefan wiped his bleeding lip. "Shit!" Stefan counterattacked. He punched the man in the stomach but it didn't cause any reaction. "How can you not be in pain?"

The man grabbed Stefan quickly and slammed him down.

Stefan coughed as his body hit the floor hard. Then as he tried to stand up again, Stefan saw the ring he was wearing shine again. No one could see the light from the ring except Stefan.

Stefan's body felt a powerful transformation. He felt his muscles strengthen and the pain slowly faded away. Stefan could even stand up easily.

Stefan took this opportunity to attack those in charge of training him. Stefan succeeded in knocking down one of the biggest men with ease.

Stefan was amazed and astonished by his own body. He even looked at his hands in wonder.

"Is this because of the ring?" Stefan muttered.

One man tried to attack Stefan but he dodged well. Stefan also gave a lot of attacks to all the men.

Stefan, who couldn't do backflips before, now even did it with ease and knocked people down as if it was a regular thing for him.

All the men who had almost beaten Stefan again were lying on the floor. Stefan took advantage of this to run from the room.

Stefan went down some stairs and realized that he was in a very large mansion.

The men were chasing Stefan again. There was no other choice but to get out of this mansion.

Unfortunately, there were also guards at the main door. They attacked Stefan with sticks.

But Stefan's body seemed to be resistant, feeling no pain. He was able to fight off the two guards.

Stefan rushed to open this huge, heavy door by himself. He finally stopped running when he reached the yard of this mansion.

This was the first time Stefan had seen such a grand mansion in his life. Although his father-in-law's house was also large, this mansion looked even more magnificent. The yard of the mansion was wide and surrounded by a dense forest.

Stefan realized that Lena wasn't just anybody. Lena was probably on the same level as Dasha or even better.

All the guards had reached the yard and surrounded Stefan. They formed a circle and Stefan was in the center.

"Hey, since it's training, you can't hurt me, okay?" Stefan tried to negotiate.

But there was no playing in Lena's dictionary. All the guards had been ordered to train Stefan to win the selection in two days.

Stefan counted the total number of guards surrounding him, there were about 15. That's a lot of people to fight one person.

Stefan clenched his fists, preparing to attack. "Come forward, I'm not afraid. But still, you can't go too far."

One by one the guards began to fight Stefan. They didn't fight at the same time and that surprised Stefan. But after fighting seven people, Stefan realized why the guards didn't attack together.

Fighting one by one was more energy draining. And this had never crossed Stefan's mind.

Stefan's breathing got heavier but he kept trying to fight the remaining guards. Until Lena joined in.

Lena took one of the baseball bats carried by the guards and hit Stefan in the back.

Stefan fell to the ground because of the attack that he hadn't predicted coming from the back side of him. Stefan tried to stand up again and he was surprised to find that Lena had joined the exercise.

"You're good too. Why do you have such low self-esteem?" Lena struck the stick again but Stefan dodged it.

"Why are you fighting? I can't fight a woman."

Lena laughed at Stefan's words. "You can't choose your opponent. In the selection, you will fight both men and women. They're all on equal status, you have to remember that." Lena swung the baseball bat at Stefan's leg but Stefan managed to lift his body just before the bat hit his leg.

Stefan moved forward and grabbed the baseball stick Luna was holding and threw it away. Not stopping there, Stefan also locked Luna's hands behind her back so she couldn't move.

Stefan succeeded to keep Luna down.

"Okay, okay, now let me go. The first exercise is over," said Lena.

Stefan slowly let go of Lena but Lena kicked him in the chest until he fell.

"Don't trust easily. Besides being good at fighting, you also need to be able to predict your opponent. You must be able to read the opponent you are attacking. If not, then you'll fall like this."

Stefan accepted Lena's hand. "I gave in on purpose."

"Funny excuse." Lena signaled to her bodyguard. "Give that to him."

Stefan accepted a necklace with a half-moon symbol. He guessed that this necklace might be the identity of a group.

"As long as you work with me, you will wear that necklace. And one more thing..."

The guards walked up to Stefan and held both his hands and made him kneel down.

"What are you doing!" Stefan tried to rebel.

"Every one of my men must have a mark on his body."

A guard brought an iron half-moon. If it was combined with the necklace Stefan was currently wearing, it would create a whole moon.

The metal was heated until it burned red. That's when Stefan knew it would be pressed into his body.

"Hey! I don't want to do this! Put your hands up!" Stefan rebelled until all the guards had to hold him down.

Stefan didn't want his body tattooed. Stefan hated tattoos because they meant ownership and Stefan felt his body belonged to him, not to anyone else.

"You have promised to be willing to do whatever I want. This is the first step you must take. I will put this mark on your back so you never forgot who saved you from death."

The hot iron was so close to Stefan's back that he could feel the burn.

Csh.

"Arghhh!"