TBMRB 09

Chapter 9

In truth, there had been another reason why I had demanded one hundred squats from him on the very first day.

I wanted to test him, at least to some extent.

I needed to measure Dietrich’s basic stamina and strength.

Although he showed a little sign of struggling, Dietrich completed all one hundred squats without much trouble.

He didn’t even start breathing excessively hard or collapse onto the ground afterward.

‘What kind of physical ability does he have…?’

Dietrich placed his hands on his thighs, leaned forward slightly as he caught his breath, then straightened his upper body and looked at me with a refreshed expression.

“Hey, how do you know exercises like this? I feel really refreshed after doing them.”

See?

Most preschoolers would probably collapse after completing one hundred squats with proper form, but Dietrich didn’t look like he was even close to exhausted.

Apparently, this level of intensity wasn’t nearly enough for him.

Fine, then. I’d move on to the next step.

My secret weapon, and what I considered the flower of cardio exercise…

“Ditty, do you like running?”

“Running? Of course I do. Do you know how fast I can run?”

That explained why he was always thundering down the hallways of the house.

“Stand around here.”

“This is the riding track.”

There was a riding track in our garden.

The ground was flat and designed for running, so I didn’t have to worry about Dietrich hurting his knees.

After checking the surface of the riding track, I straightened up.

“From now on, when I give you a signal, walk. Then when I give you another signal, run. Got it?”

“Walk, then run? Isn’t that way too easy? I was planning to show you how well I can really run today.”

“You’re going to repeat it.”

“Repeat it? How many times?”

Considering Dietrich’s abundant stamina, two minutes of running followed by one minute of walking seemed appropriate.

If I added five minutes of walking at the beginning and end to gradually raise and lower his heart rate, the whole thing would take thirty-one minutes.

Subtracting the ten minutes of walking, the actual workout would be…

“Seven times.”

“Huh? Se…ven times?”

“Seven times.”

Seven sets, twenty-one minutes.

An exercise that repeatedly raised and lowered the heart rate by constantly changing the intensity, extracting maximum efficiency within a short period of time.

It was called interval training.

Today, it was time for Dietrich to learn my favorite type of interval training: interval running.

‘After anaerobic exercise, cardio is obviously next.’

After one hundred squats and interval running, Dietrich probably wouldn’t simply fall asleep tonight.

He’d practically pass out.

If I drained his excess energy like that, Nanny would be happy and Dietrich would become healthier.

There was nothing but good to come from this situation, so why was Dietrich standing at the starting point of the riding track, fidgeting nervously?

“Walk, Ditty.”

I spread my short, chubby fingers as wide as possible while giving him the signal.

Dietrich made a miserable face and slowly began walking.

“Keep your back straight, and tighten your butt!”

Don’t underestimate walking.

Walking around carelessly without engaging your glutes was merely transportation, not exercise.

If you wanted to get the full exercise benefits from walking, you had to keep your back straight and engage your abdominal and glute muscles firmly as you walked.

Under my strict instructions, Dietrich corrected his posture.

“Why are you nagging so much over something as simple as walking…?”

Just as he was about to start complaining, I clapped my hands sharply.

“Run!”

At my signal, Dietrich instinctively increased his speed and started running.

“T-This fast?”

“Faster than that!”

When you ran, you had to give it your all.

The key to interval training was raising your heart rate as much as possible before lowering it again.

Following my signal, Dietrich began running even faster.

After two minutes of running, Dietrich started walking again at my signal. As he passed in front of me, he flashed me a grin.

“Hey, Mariella, gasp, this is pretty doable. It’s fun, too, since you switch between running and walking!”

I hope you feel that way until the very end.

Dietrich, who had declared that interval running was perfectly manageable, became noticeably quieter around the time he finished the third set.

By the end of the fourth set, he was breathing so hard that he could barely catch his breath.

“Huff, gasp… Can’t we stop here for today? Haaah…”

“Mm, no. Run faster.”

As if.

By the time he finished the final run, all of his confidence from the beginning had completely disappeared.

What remained was practically a human rag.

Interval training, including interval running, focused on improving stamina by repeatedly raising and lowering the heart rate.

That made it an extremely difficult, high-intensity form of exercise.

It wasn’t recommended for people with very poor stamina, but as expected, Dietrich had an abundance of energy and handled it remarkably well.

“My legs… huff… they don’t feel like my legs anymore.”

That was how the exercise worked.

“My heart… gasp… feels like it’s going to explode.”

Your heart wasn’t going to explode that easily.

After completing thirty-one minutes of interval running, Dietrich rested his hands on his knees and breathed heavily.

Seeing Dietrich follow along even better than expected made the aspiring trainer inside me begin to stir.

Tomorrow, I could work his abs with leg raises…

“Please don’t look at me like that. Your expression is really scary right now.”

“No. I was just praising Ditty in my head because he’s good at exercising.”

“Really? Well, I am pretty good when it comes to physical stuff.”

He regained his confidence after just one compliment.

Honestly, what a simple-minded older brother.

Still, I didn’t dislike that side of him.

It made him seem more like the child he actually was.

Today marked exactly fifteen days since we started exercising.

Dietrich had followed the exercise routine I designed for him even better than I expected.

Interval running was an excessively high-intensity workout, so I had limited it to once every two days, but apparently, that alone had been enough.

For one thing, the number of accidents he caused had decreased dramatically.

Except for the time early on when he slipped spectacularly while running through the marble hallway of the mansion, trying to show off the interval running he had just learned…

“Nanny, is your back okay now?”

Nanny, who had spent her days lying down after the glass fragments were removed, was finally able to move around little by little.

“Of course, young lady. Thanks to you worrying about me, I’m almost completely healed.”

The physician had still told her to be careful, but compared to how terrible she had looked fifteen days ago, she had healed enough that it was fair to say she was almost completely recovered.

I nestled comfortably into Nanny’s arms, enjoying the warmth I hadn’t felt in a long time.

“Where’s the young master?”

Since Dietrich, who had been stuck to me like glue lately because of our exercise sessions, was nowhere to be seen, Nanny tilted her head.

“Ditty’s out there running.”

“I’m glad the young master likes exercising.”

I deeply agreed with that.

If Dietrich had been the type who was overflowing with energy but hated exercising, convincing him would have been quite a struggle.

And while I was trying to convince him, he would have continued causing accidents.

With no butler and Nanny injured, if Dietrich had caused an accident, I would have had to deal with all of it myself…

Just thinking about it was exhausting.

“I’m grateful to you as well, young lady.”

I stared wide-eyed at Nanny as she suddenly bowed her head toward me.

Me? Why?

“I heard that the young master hasn’t caused a single accident in fifteen days.”

“He did once… But that was because Ditty was trying hard to exercise.”

“That’s all right. What matters is that the young master has become much brighter while exercising with you, and he really has started causing fewer accidents. The atmosphere in the household has improved, too.”

Nanny smiled gently as she watched me awkwardly move my lips, embarrassed by her praise.

“Thank you so much, young lady. If it weren’t for you, I would never have known that such a good method existed.”

As I received Nanny’s continued thanks, it felt as though a balloon inside my chest suddenly inflated.

Unable to endure that sensation, I abruptly jumped to my feet.

“That’s enough. I-I’m going to go see Ditty! Nanny, you rest a little longer.”

Honestly, me…

I left the mansion while fanning my face with my hands to cool down the heat rising in my cheeks.

To think I was getting bombarded with praise over something so trivial.

I could still feel a warm heat rising beneath my skin.

When I stepped into the garden like that, Dietrich—who had now learned to regulate his walking and running by checking the time himself even without my signals—lowered the hand holding his water.

“Hey, baby Ella! I finished all my running today, too!”

It had been about three days since his usual names for me—Mariella or Ugly—had changed to Baby or Ella.

Today, perhaps because he was in an especially good mood, Dietrich combined the two and called me Baby Ella as he grinned.

A servant passing by happened to see us and gave Dietrich a thumbs-up.

“Young master, I saw you running again today! You were really fast!”

“Well, this much is nothing.”

“That can’t be true. I’ve never seen a seven-year-old who can run as well as you in my entire life!”

Dietrich tried his best to maintain a dignified expression, but apparently, controlling his face wasn’t something he could accomplish through sheer willpower.

The corners of his mouth kept trying to curl upward.