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Balsquith - Dragon Slayer reloaded My last challenge was a themed dragon-slaying challenge and was great fun and went well for the first 2 weeks until I went on holiday and let it fizzle out. This challenge will be almost identical (except for the fizzling-out part) with a few minor modifications to keep things interesting. I will start this challenge on a Monday as I found the change to a Sunday start didn’t work for me at all. This challenge bases itself thematically on the book I am reading ‘Die Mächte des Feuers’ by Markus Heitz, which is set in 1925 in a world just like ours with the big difference being that dragons have survived and are not very likeable. The book follows the dragon slayer Silena, a descendent of Saint George, who works for the church to hunt dragons. For this challenge I will once again be Balsquith Dragonslayer, from the line of Saint George, dedicated to hunting down the terrorising beasts and bringing peace and harmony to the land. I will be facing the same four dragons in this challenge as in the last challenge, as they all escaped with only relatively minor injuries and have had time to recover and return at full strength to terrorise the land. Dragons 1. Sirath the somnolent – Getting up to my alarm (Health = 50pts) 2. Bredolth, bane of the Morning – Morning routine (existing routine + daily MITs) (Health =30pts) 3. Tavorth the unbending – Evening routine (existing routine + stretching) (Health = 30pts) 4. Cenolth the abeyant – Exercise/injury rehab (Health =40pts) Hero Balsquith Dragonslayer – Starting health = 10pts Rules I will fight all dragons daily with the following combat rules: Success – Dragon loses 1 health point Partial success – Parry, no change in health points Fail – Balsquith Dragonslayer loses 1 health point and dragon regenerates 1 health point Bonuses for chains Chain (7 day+) => Success = 1.5 points Chain (14 day+) => Success = 2 points Chain (21 day+) => Success = 2.5 points Bonuses for completing all daily tasks Frenzy (4 tasks/day) => Success = 1.5 points Wrath of the Gods (4 chain tasks/day) = 3 points Apothecary Earning gold crowns Reading ‘Die Mächte des Feuers’ = maximum 1 gold crown earned daily In dire need I have a list of unpleasant tasks (only when health falls below 5points) = 5 gold crowns Shopping list Healing potion = 2 gold crowns (recovers 1 health point) Dragon’s Bane = +1 hit points on dragon (1 day expiry date, use must be announced day before) (3 gold crowns)

Balsquith - Dragon Slayer I love following-along with themed challenges but have never braved one myself, so this will be a themed challenge for beginners (read: slightly half-hearted). I have recently started reading an excellent book by Markus Heitz titled ‘Die Mächte des Feuers’ (something like – The powers of fire), which is set in 1925 in a world just like ours with the big difference being that Dragons have survived and are not very likeable. The book follows the dragon slayer Silena, a descendent of Saint George, who works for the church to hunt dragons. For me the big catch here is that I will be trying to read this book in German. Over my past few challenges (and in my life in general sadly) I have been somewhat lacking in motivation and drive. Therefore for this challenge I will be introducing something external to fight against (rather than myself!) – namely dragons! So for this challenge I will be Balsquith Dragonslayer, from the line of Saint George, dedicated to hunting down the terrorising beasts and bringing peace and harmony to the land. In order to keep myself entertained I have scribbled down some rules to make the challenge much more complicated than it should be – hopefully they will keep me engaged! I will be facing 4 dragons in this challenge, which are largely the same goals as in my previous challenge, I figured that a budget dragon would mean instant death for me, so he gets to sit in his cave a bit longer! Dragons 1. Sirath the somnolent – Getting up to my alarm (Health = 50pts) Getting up to my alarm = Success Delayed but still got up = Parry 2. Bredolth, bane of the Morning – Morning routine (existing routine + daily German study cards) (Health =30pts) Reviewing for at least 5 minutes = Success Reviewing at least 1 card = Parry 3. Tavorth the unbending – Evening routine (existing routine + stretching) (Health = 30pts) Stretching routine from GMB 'focused flexibility' = Success Any other stretching effort = Parry 4. Cenolth the abeyant – Exercise/injury rehab (Health =40pts) Either crossfit upper body session or injury rehab (leg) = Success Any other 'exercise' = Parry Hero Balsquith Dragonslayer – Starting health = 10pts Rules I will fight all dragons daily with the following combat rules: Success – Dragon loses 1 health point Partial success – Parry, no change in health points Fail – Balsquith Dragonslayer loses 1 health point Bonuses for chains Chain (7 day+) => Success = 1.5 points Chain (14 day+) => Success = 2 points Chain (21 day+) => Success = 2.5 points Bonuses for completing all daily tasks Frenzy (4 tasks/day) => Success = 1.5 points Wrath of the Gods (4 chain tasks/day) = 3 points Recovering health Reading ‘Die Mächte des Feuers’ = maximum 1 health point daily Healing potion => In dire need I have a list of unpleasant tasks which I can complete = 5 health points

Balsquith doesn't give up My last challenge started strongly and ended not all that badly, but was under attack from life (and injuries) a lot which made it feel like a losing battle. Still it was, hopefully, a great learning experience and one which I can transfer almost directly into this challenge, as..... my goals will be the same! This feels a little bit like a cop-out, but I view all of these goals as core and if I can't get these down I don't want to distract myself by doing something else. So my goals are: Goal 1: Get up to my alarm Frequency - Daily Tactic - Set alarm sensibly to give 8 hours sleep Criteria - Out of bed within 5 minutes of alarm Bonus - Every 7 days on my chain unlocks something good (to be decided) Goal 2: Regular exercise Frequency - At least 3x per week Tactic - Go to gym to ask trainer about working around injuries Criteria - Any concerted effort counts as exercise Goal 3: Plant-based diet Frequency - Daily Tactic - Ensure breakfast fulfils criteria to ease the blow of life getting in the way later Criteria - At least 50% of meals must be heavy on vegetables Goal 4: Useable German Criteria - Acrue 14 points a week (30 minutes study = 1pt, courage to speak to someone = 3pts)

Balsquith regroups I crashed and burned in the last challenge, which fitted into the general scheme of the past 3 months of challenges. Even though there has probably been no difference between these challenges and the 6-week ones, they somehow felt more frantic and I never felt that I was really keeping up. Bizarrely this one week pause has been amazing and I feel really focused for the challenge to come. I will be keeping it simple this challenge and bringing out the best goals from previous challenges in addition to one all new one involving green things. Goals 1. Get up to my alarm everyday This is my oldest goal and the one which I think everything hangs upon. I have lost touch of this again recently and feel more tired than when I have been getting up early. 2. Exercise 3x week Parallettes or getting back into going to the gym – Everything counts as long as I am doing it seriously. 3. Plant-based diet – 50% I am not sure if my nutrition is good or bad – I’m erring on the side of bad. Part of the problem is that I am not entirely sure what is good and bad (and I’m weak and still eat it anyway even if I do know). The one thing everyone seems to agree on is that vegetables are good. Therefore I will aim for 50% of my meals to have vegetables as their primary component. I’m not going to be too strict on myself I just want to get back to being mindful of what I eat. 4. Learning German This was the only thing that really worked to any extent in my last challenge. I have 2 main problems with learning German. 1. I don’t do any study, 2. Everything I do learn I am too scared to use with real people. In the last challenge the model I used (which I will be repeating here) was to aim for 10 points a week attained from: 30mins focused study = 1pt, 1 act of courage in using the language = 3pts. As you can see I am starting small, but hopefully this will motivate me to either put in some focussed study or be bolder.