Yes. Class is in session.

As Fenri disappeared to kill the boss of the dungeon, Verdi conjured a chair made of ice to sit on as he tried to avoid eye contact with Varrick. Citrinas sat next to him, merely staring off into space with a bored expression on her face. Even though he was quite afraid of the massive paladin, the prospect of learning how to use the supposed Spirit Power was too enticing to pass up, considering Fenri didn't seem too amicable teaching him and Citrinas wasn't the most athletic of people. It was for that reason he started the lesson by dealing with the most pressing issue at hand.

"... Hey, sorry about using God's Eye on you earlier." He apologized, causing the paladin to tilt his head, puzzled for a moment before snapping his fingers in realization.

"Ah, that? Were you still thinking about that?" He asked, the entire issue forgotten from his point of view.

"I'm sorry if I offended you." Verdi said as Varrick shook his head, his previous imposing aura now gone as he shook his head.

"Think nothing of it. I just wanted to warn you that using appraisal skills on other people is a cultural faux pas in Kolderia. I understand it's common in other nations, which is why I just wanted to gently advise you of your mistake." He said before gasping in shock, now shrinking as he looked to the alchemist. "I'm so sorry, did I scare you?" He said as Verdi looked away from him.

"Well, I did deserve it." He muttered while Varrick shook his head.

"No, no, no. You don't deserve anything but an apology from me. If I ever make you uncomfortable, please tell me. Again, I'm SO sorry about that." He apologized as Verdi felt odd, the once imposing holy paladin apologizing to him instead of the other way around. Oddly enough, his fear of the paladin faded as the pair went back and forth apologizing for the miscommunication.

"No, it's my fault. Using God's Eye is a rude thing to do in hindsight. I was just curious what other people were like." Verdi said in turn.

"You didn't know any better. I'm the one who-"

"Would you morons stop jerking each other off and start teaching already!?" Fenri shouted as she returned from killing the boss of the dungeon, the terrain fading away like an illusion as the vast, humid mud pits the boars enjoyed became a frozen wasteland once more. She stank of blood and viscera while she dripped with fresh blood, her choice in weaponry leaving her in the splash zone of her targets. "Inventory." She said, the blood on her body disappearing instantly before casting it again on the ground to deposit the filth next to her. Rather than dawdle any further, they continued their journey.

"So, Verdi, tell me what you know about Spirit power?" Varrick asked, getting straight to the topic at hand as Fenri conjured a whetstone to sharpen her knifes while they walked.

"Nothing at all. Can you explain it to me from the top?" Verdi asked.

"Spirit power is to warriors what magic power is to mages. The rules of Spirit power are nearly identical to magic, with there being two types. Vocal Spirit is for buffing allies while Instinctive Spirit is for buffing yourself. I'll be teaching you Instinctive Spirit since you won't need to buff anyone in this party." Varrick explained as Verdi nodded.

"Easy names." He noted.

"The reason is because the rules of instinctive spirit and instinctive magic are identical." The paladin said as Verdi instantly made the connection.

"Oh, so instinctive spirit needs to be in direct contact to the caster, right?" He asked as Varrick nodded.

"Right! You can move spirit power throughout your own body and anything you are touching within two degrees of seperation, such as weaponry or armor." Varrick answered, treating the simple observation as though Verdi had made a brilliant deduction.

"So what does spirit power do?" Verdi asked.

"Instinctive spirit power has two main abilities. It can either affect magic power or affect the three laws of ****." Varrick answered as Fenri cocked her head at the name.

"Three laws of ****?" She asked, unfamiliar with the term.

"An object at rest stays at rest unless acted upon by an outside ****, **** equals mass times acceleration, and every action has an equal and opposite reaction." Verdi answered after a moment of recollection.

"Splendid answer!" Varrick said while giving a small round of applause, his metal gauntlets clinking together like tin cans. "These laws serve as the basic foundation of Spirit power manipulation. Now, let's have a demonstration." He said, reaching into the snow and digging around before grabbing a fist sized rock. "Take this rock and toss it at my chest as hard as you can."

"Are you sure?" Verdi asked as he received the rock.

"Don't worry, I'll be fine." Varrick reassured as Verdi did as told, tossing the rock at the paladin's armor. As expected, it hit his armor and ricocheted off in the opposite direction, leaving a small dent in its wake.

"That is what happens when I'm not using spirit power. Please throw that rock at me again." Varrick said, reaching down and handing Verdi the same rock.

"Okay." Verdi said, grabbing it and throwing it at Varrick for a second time. As the rock hit his armor, the strangest thing happened. Instead of bouncing off his armor like earlier and leaving a dent, the rock just stopped the second it touched his armor and fell down, as though all the momentum behind it was gone. Verdi blinked and looked at the armor to find it was devoid of the slightest dent or scratch, as though the rock never even touched him.

"That was what happens when you use spirit power to cancel an impact. This technique is called neutralization. Since there was no impact, there was no equal and opposite reaction to push the rock backwards to bounce off me." Varrick explained as Verdi tilted his head.

"Can I do that test again, but with my ice?" He asked, thinking back to his fight with Fenri. Varrick nodded as Verdi gathered the snow around him and created a small ice lance to jab at Varrick. Though he pushed as hard as he could against the armor to the point that his ice would normally shatter, the ice stayed in one piece for some odd reason. Furthermore, the sensation of stabbing at Varrick was disorienting to say the least, his arm immobile yet feeling no impact against Varrick.

"Weird. When I fought Fenri, the ice shattered when I tried stabbing her." He noted while tossing his lance aside. Stabbing Varrick felt like he was pushing on the air with zero resistance, yet at the same time pushing against an immovable wall. Stabbing Fenri felt like he was trying to cut a steel block, her skin far tougher than even Varrick's armor.

"Fenri uses another spirit ability, Reinforcement. It's a passive ability that most fighting classes can use without thinking." Varrick explained, the name of the ability self explanatory. "Unlike Neutralization which outright removes the impact, Reinforcement just strengthens molecular bonds so you don't get injured."

"Any reason why I would prefer one over the other?" Verdi asked, committing both defensive techniques to memory. He could heal from most injuries, but he'd rather not end up torn to shreds again.

"Neutralization requires you predict the enemy and react before they hit you. It only affects a tiny area of impact, so it's very spirit efficient if you can predict the enemy. Reinforcement affects your entire body and burns more spirit power, but it takes less focus and you don't need to predict the enemy to block an attack. It's great if the enemy is moving faster than you can react or if you can't waste brainpower thinking about your next move." Varrick explained as Verdi nodded.

"Any offensive techniques for spirit power?" Verdi asked.

"Yes. There's amplification, which can increase speed and strength." He said as Verdi thought over the mechanics of spirit.

"It alters mass, right?" He asked after a moment of thinking.

"Correct!" Varrick answered cheerfully.

"What do you mean by altering mass?" Fenri asked, suddenly interested in the conversation.

"Varrick, correct me if I'm wrong, but **** equals mass times acceleration is the basic equation. Let's say you leap forward and your speed is constant but midflight your mass increases by using spirit power. You've directly increased the ****. If you cancel the enhanced mass, then your speed will logically increase since **** is a constant." Verdi said as Varrick applauded him.

"You've got it!" He said cheerily as Fenri just stared at the pair, confused.

"Hey, what's all this weird stuff about ****? Just amass your spirit and deactivate it after you jump." Fenri said, unable to keep up with the conversation and giving her method of using spirit power.

"How do you know how to use Spirit Power and not know the mechanics behind it?" Citrinas asked, her viewpoint one of a mage like Verdi.

"Fenri's a natural savant at using Spirit. For her, it's probably as easy as breathing." Varrick explained, reminding the alchemist just how unfair life was.

"So, neutralization, reinforcement, and amplification. Any other tricks spirit power can do?" Verdi asked.

"The last technique is Distrupt. By using your own spirit, you can destroy an enemy's reinforcement even if they're stronger and more skilled than you." Varrick explained, giving up a rather overpowered ability. Rather than being excited, Verdi just felt jaded, knowing that it was too good to be true if he could learn it.

"So what's the catch?" He asked, unwilling to get excited over a pipe dream.

"The time it takes to Disrupt someone else is based on how skilled you are and the gap between your target's spirit and your own." Fenri answered, knowing the answer to this question. "Unless you're a master, you're overwhelmingly powerful, or capable of grabbing onto someone and holding on for anywhere between a minute to an hour, it's useless." She said, likely speaking from experience. Verdi rubbed his chin, thinking of one last major thing about spirit power he wanted to know.

"You said earlier spirit can cancel magic." He asked while thinking back to the introduction to spirit power.

"Right." Varrick answered.

"So if I become a knight, my magic will become weaker?" Verdi asked, hoping he wasn't screwed over yet again by life.

"No, spirit cancels spells cast by other mages, not spells you cast. Essentially, it makes sure mages can't boil your blood by pointing at you." Varrick explained.

"Say I gathered all my spirit in, say, my left fingernail and somebody were to cut off my hand mid-fight. What happens next? Does the spirit return to me or does the spirit stay in my hand?" Verdi asked, thinking of how often he was injured.

"It stays in your dismembered hand and becomes destabilized once it's separated from your body. You'll be helpless, and a mage could even use your dismembered limb as a target for a magic spell." Varrick answered after a moment, seemingly off put by how gruesome the question was.

"Why would a mage want to use a dismembered body part in a spell?" Verdi asked as Fenri scoffed at him.

"Maybe a mage who is batshit insane and no longer human." She grumbled while Varrick answered the question.

"When spirit is focused and connected to your body, it serves as protection against a mage casting a spell using your body. When it's destabilized such as when you're dismembered, it can amplify a spell and allow a mage to fire a more powerful spell, with the most common spells being water or ice spells." Varrick explained as Verdi thought of his fight with Fenri once more.

"Explains why I couldn't just freeze Fenri's blood when we fought." He noted as Citrinas chimed in.

"Trying to freeze Fenri's blood would be impossible even for me." She said as he frowned and looked to her.

"How does that work? You're WAY higher in level than her." He asked, trying to make sense of her statement. Though magic and spirit power looked supernatural, they usually obeyed the laws of energy conservation and made mathematical sense. Cancelling a spell should require the same amount of magic right?

"Using another person's body in a spell requires the caster use 10^5 times more magic power than the defender using spirit or magic power to defend themselves." Citrinas explained.

"Why? Wouldn't you need an equal amount of power to overcome your target?" Verdi asked.

"That's due to the resonance effect, where..." Citrinas said before going into a long lecture on the intricacies of magic. Since she referred to a handful of magic theories, he had to ask her to stop and explain each one before continuing. Night came as she finished the lecture, giving a precise reason on why resisting a spell that froze your blood was easier than trying to freeze someone else's blood.

"A splendid explanation of the resonance effect and why spirit affects magic." Varrick said, giving a round of applause as Verdi couldn't help but nod. It was a dry lecture and quite technical, but it did the job.

"Good lecture." Verdi added in as Fenri yawned.

"... Okay, no, I give up. Fuck your magic." She said, unable to keep up and abandoning any notion of understanding the science behind magic.

"What part didn't you get?" Citrinas asked, puzzled.

"All of it!" Fenri said indignantly as Verdi rubbed his chin for a minute to think before snapping his fingers.

"Casting a spell is like pushing a cart up a hill then letting go of the cart. Targeting another person's body cloaked in spirit power or magic power would be like pushing a cart uphill with someone on the other side pushing against the cart for every step of the way. If their spirit is destabilized, that same person in the metaphor is helping you push that cart up higher and faster than before." He said, giving Fenri an easy to understand metaphor. She seemed to understand that better as she committed that explanation to memory.

"Why didn't you start with that?" She asked with an annoyed voice.

"Because it's severely oversimplified and doesn't take into context-" Citrinas said before going into a long rant at Fenri about the Bernourd-Jabri Effect.

"Hey Citrinas, say I put my spirit in a glass of water and destabilized it. Will that make my spells stronger?" Verdi asked, interrupting her as she explained how spirit power inherently stabilized reality.

"No. Only human body parts can destabilize spirit to increase magic power. The reason's because of the-" Citrinas said, only to be interrupted by another question.

"What about blood?" Verdi asked.

"Y-yes, blood would be a good conduit to destabilize, but I would advise against harming yourself if possible." Varrick answered, slightly squeamish about the subject.

"Can I bottle it?" Verdi asked, hoping there was a fighting style that didn't cause him to bleed out.

"No. It has to be fresh because of-" Citrinas said, preparing to go into another lecture as Varrick interrupted her.

"You must be quite curious to ask these questions." He noted as Verdi shrugged.

"I tend to get dismembered and attacked by people stronger than me often, so I want to know what cards I have." He answered as Varrick stared him.

"... I'm sorry, I think I misheard you. I thought you said you got dismembered often." He said as Verdi nodded.

"I did. Fenri here cut off my arms twice when we fought before ripping out both my eyes and most of my face." He answered as Varrick looked to Fenri. Though his face was covered by his helmet, everyone could tell he was horrified by his body gestures.

"You tore his eyes out!?" He asked in disbelief.

"Mathias never told you?" Verdi asked.

"What exactly did Fenri do to you?" He asked, now concerned by just what Verdi experienced in his brief time awake in the world.

"She tore off my arms twice, broke both my legs, stabbed me in the heart and head, strangled me, ripped off my face, stuffed glass bottles full of poison in me then kicked me to break them open, then cut me 1,000 times until I was comatose." Verdi answered as Varrick glared at Fenri, praying she was going to call him a liar. She merely looked away while coughing into her hand.

"We all do things we're not proud of in the heat of passion." She said as Varrick seemed to pause for a second. He gently grasped Verdi's shoulder as the slits in his helmet began dripping tears.

"... Let's go learn how to use defensive spirit techniques." He said, his voice cracking as he patted Verdi reassuringly on the back.