Stances

“You three have the fewest experience.” Kiara says after she asked Wendy, Ryul and Shalia to step forth. “Let’s pretend I am about to attack you three. How would you fight?”

Kiara then raises her hands as if she is about to cast a spell. Ryul raises his firsts, Wendy keeps her shield in front of her, but her sword is way too far behind her and Shalia raises her hands similar to Kiara.

“Can anyone see a flaw in their strategy?” Kiara then asks the other three of us.

“Their stances are all wrong.” I say with a smile.

I then walk up to them and do the same as my mother did with me and Mia 6 months ago. I give each of them a push and they fall over.

“Good eye, Darx.” Kiara compliments me as she lowers her hands. “None of you had any balance. Lesson 1, having strong attacks is all well and good, but how can you fight when you cannot even stand?”

I then invite the three newbies to try and push me, like my mother invited me half a year ago. At first, I planned to let them push me while I absorbed the blows. But Shalia’s first push had me nearly on the ground. Such strength she had. Must be because of her A rank. After that, I decided to start avoiding their pushes.

“Lesson 2.” I say. “Dodging an attack is less difficult than accepting the blow.”

Suddenly, I feel two hands on my shoulders which then pull me back and make me fall to the courtyard.

“Lesson 3.” Leona smirks as she holds her head above me. “Always expect someone to ambush you.”

Even if she is just playing with me, she is right. Imagine Kase has a few of guild guild members distract me, then one of his rogues stabs me in the back. I'm going to have to prepare for unfair fights.

As I pull myself up, I glance at the balconies on the higher levels of the castle. On one of them I notice princess Kathleen looking at us. I didn't knew we caught her interest so much. Well then, better not disapoint her.

We then decided to make it a game between all 6 of us. We each had to try and push over our compatriots. Whomever fell the fewest won. Leona was the winner with 0 falls.

After the importance of balance has been drilled into the newbies, Kiara assigns Miranda to train Ryul and Wendy in punching. Then she takes Shalia, Leona and myself aside for some magic training. Kiara first teaches us the basics on how to tap into our mana and use it for spells. Then she shows it by holding her palms next to each other and creates a ball of darkness between them.

“Darx, I want you to place your hands between mine.” Kiara instructs.

“Ok ...” I say, not sure of what she intends me to do.

“I then want you to use your magic to grab the ball from me and pull it towards you.”

I do as Kiara instructs. But when I pull my hands back the ball of darkness remains between Kiara’s hands. I try it a second time and start thinking about Mia. She already learned how to use fire magic. What if I succeed in using magic as well? I am certain it will impress her. But even after a third attempt, the ball of darkness doesn’t move.

“Don’t worry, Darx.” Kiara says. “There are still many elements to go through.”

She then directs herself at Shalia and asks, “You said you already know some earth magic, right?”

Shalia nods. Kiara then points at two stone urns that have been left for us. Each group of trainees has their own set for their training session. One of them is filled with dirt, the other with water.

"Summon some dirt from one of them and hold it between your hands." Kiara tells the pink haired trainee.

Shalia holds an open hand to the urn and little bits of dirt start floating up towards her where they gather in a ball between her two hands.

“Now, Darx. Try to grab Shalia’s ball of earth.”

Shalia faces me and I bring my hands between hers. I try my best to reach out, imagining invisible hands to pull the dirt towards me. But like before, even after several tries, it does not work.

After that Kiara explains us how to summon a ball of light with magic. Shalia quickly figures out how to do it and has me try and take the ball from her, again without success. Three attempts and three failures. This is so frustrating. Am I really not going to have any magic?

After I finish failing, Leona finally succeeds in creating her own ball of white light. It was cute to see her ears perk up. At least one of us is succeeding. Next up is water magic.

First Kiara explains Shalia and me how to use our mana towards water magic. Then she has Shalia summon some water and hold it in a ball between her hands. Once more I bring my hands in between Shalia’s and try to pull it towards me. The first attempt was just as much of a failure as before. Now the frustration is getting to me. No, I don’t want to fail any more. I don’t want Mia to be disappointed in me. I reach with my hands a little further. Then I imagine invisible hands grabbing the water between Shalia’s hands, causing my real fingers to curl. I am certain my level of concentration must cause my face to look angry. Then I slowly pull my hands back and try to take the ball of water with me. Slowly but certainly, I notice the ball of water move towards me. I almost lose my concentration from the sheer surprise, but then I go back to focusing. I pull my hands in more, drawing the ball of water completely out of Shalia’s hands. That is when Shalia lets her hands rest at her sides and the ball of water is now completely under my control.

“Congratulations, Darx.” Kiara says as she gives me a proud smile. “It looks like you can use water magic.”

I’ve done it! I’ve got magic! I now have something amazing to tell Mia. But as I start laughing, I lose control over the water and it falls to the ground.

“Don’t worry, Darx. The more you practice, the better you'll get.” Kiara says. “By the way. Would you mind checking your adventurer card again for me?”

I pull out my adventurer card like Kiara suggests. When I look upon it, I notice there is a change. In the list of skills and magics, one row of question marks has disappeared and is now replaced with [water magic]. Though the letters also look like they have been burned into the paper. This is it! A part of my adventurer card has become normal.

I can’t describe how proud I am of myself. I have magic now.

Kiara allows me to train some more in water magic together with Shalia. Meanwhile she goes and checks up on the other three. Unfortunately, I can’t train long since I only have a little mana. The same goes for Leona and her training in light magic. That is when Kiara decides to start teaching us how to increase the amount of mana we have to work with.

So first she makes us spend all our mana and after we learn how annoying it is when that runs out, she teaches us how to prevent it from happening. Well, it sure motivates me to want to expand my mana pool.

While we are training on extending our mana supply, Harold comes to visit us and asks how we are doing.

"Too early to say." Kiara says. "Those who are new to combat have only begun to learn the basics. Darx and Leona may know combat already, but those are new to magic. Though I haven't seen anybody show signs of assuming they know better."

"I see. I guess that's a good sign." Harold says. "Hey, would you mind if I steal Darx from you for a moment."

"Only if you make sure you bring him back." Kiara replies with a smile.

Harold then takes me to a secluded spot in the courtyard. Before he asks me anything, I already pull out my adventurer card and show him the change.

"I see. So it is filling out over time." Harold remarks. "Very interesting. I'm curious what the rest is going to be like."

"Me too. There are so many skills and magics. But mostly I'm wondering when my rank will finally show up."

"Be sure to let me know when that happens." Harold says. "If there are going to be future adventurers with these kinds of cards, I will need to be able to guide them. Which means, you are going to be my teacher in this regard. But Darx, I wanted to talk to you about something else."

“Oh? Like what?”

“It’s about your eyes, and the reason why they are red.”