Chapter 18: Teaching students

"Haha! No need for the thanks. It's always a pleasure to work for you Mr Blakewell."

For a while, the group of men started talking, exchanging some basic pleasantries.

While the men were speaking, Oswald was just quietly watching from the side.

More specifically, Oswald was watching the two rank 1 warrior Transcendents.

Back then, Oswald had never paid much attention to them as, since he was going to be a Mage, they really couldn't do anything to catch the previous Oswald's attention. He even slightly looked down on them in his heart.

But now that Oswald was planning on going down the warrior Transcendent branch, he couldn't help but look at the two warriors differently.

He carefully scanned the two warriors, trying to acquire as much knowledge about them as possible.

The two men were tall and muscular and would look quite intimidating to the regular man. But that was all Oswald saw. There was no special aura radiating from them, nor was there a sense of oppression that he would expect to have.

But suddenly, as Oswald's gaze was looking at them, one of the warriors suddenly turned in his direction. At that moment, his eyes flashed with a bright orange light and a strange smile appeared on his face.

The second Oswald met the man's eyes, his heart skipped a beat.

Pressure!

In that split second, an immeasurable pressure, almost like a heavy hand pressing down on his body washed over Oswald.

In that second, Oswald realised how stupid his thronging he had been.

There was no pressure radiating from the two Transcendents like you would expect from apprentices, and this was not because they were weak.

No, instead, the reason was that they were strong!

They were so overwhelmingly strong for the current Oswald that their control had reached a point where he couldn't even sense their battle aura!

"Greetings, Young master Oswald," said the man, stepping away from the conversation between Elliot and Manager Fredrick.

"Haha.." laughed Oswald awkwardly after being discovered.

"Greetings Mr Kirk." Said Oswald humbly

Oswald just stared awkwardly at the tall brown-haired man with a plain face.

"About earlier…" said Oswald

Hearting this, Kirk just chuckled.

"There's no need to think too much about it, Young Master Oswald. You just need to be more careful who you look at," said Kirk.

"It's fine to do this to me and Rob, but if you meet a stronger Transcendent outside, they won't hesitate to lob your head off."

As Kirk spoke, he just patted Oswald on the shoulder when his expression suddenly changed.

"Strange? Your physique. It's much stronger than before?"

As Kirk spoke, his eyes flashed with an orange glow before a smile appeared on his face.

"Congratulations Young Master Oswald on becoming a beginner Knight apprentice."

"I really can't hide anything from you, Mr Kirk. "admitted Oswald

"You're right, I've become a beginner Knight apprentice, but it was only recently." Explained Oswald

"You know my situation and the situation of the Blakewell family, so even if I can't become a Mage, I won't give up on becoming a Transcendent!"

Hearing Oswald's explanation and seeing Oswald's resolve, Mr Kirk couldn't help but nod in admiration.

"You've got the right attitude and mentality, kid. With such things already acquired, it's just a matter of time before you become a Transcendent and surpass us talentless individuals," sighed Mr Kirk becoming a little disheartened

But this state only lasted a few seconds before a smile appeared back on the face of Mr Kirk.

"But before then, don't be afraid to come and ask for help. Becoming a Transcendent is anything but easy, and you can always run into complications and problems at any time."

As Oswald and Mr Kirk were talking and exchanging a few thoughts and ideas on breathing techniques, Elliot's voice sounded out.

"Well, that's enough chit chat for now." Said Elliot.

"It's time to get down to the serious matters" as Elliot spoke a serious frown appeared on his chubby face.

"I'm sure you men know why I'm here today." As the men heard this, the smiles on their faces also faded.

"Sigh!" The tired sigh of Manger Fredrick could be heard.

"Master Elliot, it's like this. The workers have stopped coming to the workshop and after investigation, we've found it's not by their own will. Master Elliot has always treated them well and pays much better than other similar employers. The only reason they left is because of coercion and threats they've been receiving!"

Hearing this, the veins on Elliot's face bulged as he was about to say something. But he suddenly froze and looked around cautiously.

"Here is not the place to be speaking. Let's head inside first, and we can talk more about these things."

The group of men just nodded in agreement, and under Manager Frederick's guidance quickly went to the gates of the workshop.

As they entered, they were greeted with the sight of a large open compound with many people relaxing and sitting around.

From the looks of things, the workers were clearly on break.

Oswald could see people of all ages amongst the crowd of workers.

There were men, women and yes, even children amongst them.

In this world, there were no such rules on child labour and child workers.

In this world where normal families would struggle to even feed themselves, it was even encouraged for children as young as 8 or 9 to begin working and try to bring in some extra income for the family

Hell! It wasn't even uncommon to work children to their death if you wanted to.

In the city, there were countless gangs that forcefully took children as thieves or beggars to acquire money for them.

As a businessman, Oswald's father wouldn't shy away from using child labour.

Fortunately, although Oswald's father was using child labour, he wasn't a complete monster.

The children worked low hours and also worked extremely safe jobs. In fact, compared to other jobs in this world, the children working in his father's workshop could be deemed extremely fortunate.

They were paid extremely well and not much less than that of their adult counterparts.

The roles of children were to simply clean up and transport the small intricate pieces used in the manufacturing of crossbows and arrows

The adult men and women would be the ones involved in the intricate assembly and manufacturing process.

In fact, the only reason Elliot had introduced child workers was to bring over and win entire families to work for his workshop, ensuring family loyalty whilst also being able to steal away the high-quality worker from other workshops.

And to do such a thing, the quality and satisfaction of the people working in the workshops would be high.

Due to the nature of the Blakewell family situation, Elliot had always preferred extremely loyal workers over extremely capable ones.

He wouldn't mind losing a little bit of profit to employ children if it could mean that he gains the loyalty of his workers.

As soon as the group of children saw Oswald and his father enter the courtyard, a wide smile appeared on their faces as they rushed towards him.

"Brother Oswald! Are you going to be teaching us again today?"

Hearing this, Oswald just chuckled as he patted the kid's head.

"Of course." Said Oswald with a smile

This was a situation created by the previous Oswald.

He just took pity on the circumstances of those children, especially the few that were orphans and had nobody but themselves to rely on.

Oswald wasn't stupid enough to teach the children something like a warrior breathing technique.

Instead, Oswald just taught them some basic swordsmanship and supervised them and made sure they were heading along the right path and not making

Such a thing might not seem important but if these children of around 6-12 could carry on practising and are talented enough to start transcendent training, that's when the deep foundation in swordsmanship will start to show, allowing them to have combat strength far surpassing their peers.

Such a thing was something that these simple commoners would never have been able to afford, no matter how good the pay from Oswald's father was. But the previous Oswald decided to give such training away for free.

After all, Oswald was a person with a younger sister. Seeing the children his sister's age working away had always affected him, so it was his way of trying to make up for that.

"Guys! Stop playing around, Brother Oswald here!"

Hearing the young boys shout, all the children stopped playing and looked over in the direction

"Brother Oswald?"

"He's finally back. Hurray!"

Within seconds of the boys call a crowd of eager children gathered around Oswald, all looking at him with expectant eyes.

The parents who were on break nearby just watched the scene with wide smiles on their faces.

Seeing this, Oswald awkwardly looked back towards Elliot

"Father…"

Seeing Oswald's troubled look, Elliot just shook his head as he spoke.

"Feel free to teach them for now. Right now, we're not planning to discuss anything important; we will just be inspecting the workshop and its facilities. I'm sure you won't want to join us old men on such a boring task."

Getting his father's confirmation, Oswald nodded and looked back towards the group of children.

"Well Then, all you better go out and get your training swords. Practice will start in 5 mins"

"Yes, Oswald!"

After hearing Oswald's instructions, the kids quickly set out to complete them.

As manager Fredrick looked at Oswald teaching the kids he just sighed.

It's not that Manager Fredrick disliked the idea of teaching the children. In fact, he even found it admirable, it's just that this kind of nature often made things extremely difficult for him.

After all, no matter how kind he was, Oswald was still a young master and often had a few wilful tendencies. It would be impossible for such a young master to specifically time his arrival that he would always come during the children's breaks.

Oswald would often come whenever he wanted and at random times, so once he arrived, he didn't care if the children were working or not. He would take them off work and give them some time off for training sword techniques.

For Manager Fredrick this was a complete and utter nightmare, as the jobs places where the children would be completely vacant causing him to shut down areas of the workshop just so they could keep running during this time.

Although this greatly affected the running capacity of the workshop, manager Fredrick never even bothered to complain to Elliot and the reason was simple.

For those in the Blakewell family, it was already common knowledge just how much Elliot indulged his son and allowed him to do anything. In fact, Elliot wouldn't bat an eye if Oswald said that he wanted to close the workshop for a few days so occasionally giving the children time off to practice swordsmanship wouldn't bother Elliot in the slightest.

Fortunately, Manager Fredrick didn't have to worry about such problems this time as all the workers were on break.

So after giving out a few more instructions and orders to the workers around him.

He quickly took Elliot and the two other Transcendent warriors for a tour of the workshop.

Oswald didn't pay any more attention to them and just turned towards the group of children in front of him.

"It's been a while since I last taught you guys, so you better have not slacked off in that time!"

.....

Several minutes later,

A handsome young man could be seen standing in a compound loudly shouting instructions.

"Robert, stop swinging around so wildly! Control yourself more!"

"And you, Mary. How have you deviated from the original technique so much? I need to see a stricter show of technique."