King Castor deftly deflected the wooden sword his son swung at him and gave him a tap on the rear.“Pretty good, but you need to keep your guard up and watch your footing,” He said with a smile.“Won’t I have enough Titles and Deeds that I can just beat up everybody anyway?” He asked petulantly, “Why am I doing this?”Castor twirled his sword around before swinging it downward with so much force that the wood of it audibly strained. “You can’t rely on just titles and deeds alone. An opponent close enough to your strength will be able to overwhelm your titles with skill if you aren’t properly prepared. Besides, you need to be able to show the men under your command that you can do the same work that they do. My dad taught me that. Though what he was talking about had a lot less to do with swordplay.”“Grandfather or grandpa?” He asked.“The one you’re named after Mikhail. Or at least, as closely as I could manage,” replied Castor. The former king was his father in name only. He wasn’t sure that he hated the man. He understood his motives, but he certainly held no fondness in his heart for him. Definitely not enough to give one of his children his name. The only way he’d managed to summon a few appropriate tears for his funeral was by thinking of his real parents dying back on Earth. Luckily, as long as time didn’t distort between worlds, he estimated that they had plenty of their golden years left to them. A small comfort, but one he was glad he could enjoy. “Alright, one more round and we’ll take a break okay?”Mikhail sighed, but raised his sword and took his stance.Castor looked at him for a moment. He knew they weren’t tied by genetics, but it always amazed him how much of himself he saw in him. The way he set his shoulders, or sighed, or clenched his jaw when he was upset. He even saw pieces of his parents in him, even though they were a world away. He often wondered if there was a bit of the (...)