The world of nobles was alien to me. Earth had business owners, and aristocracies, but I’d never been a part of that. Now, Amanda’s safehouse was being watched and I didn’t know what to do.

“There are people outside.” I glanced at Amanda. “Watching your place.”

The four of us were sitting on a sofa, a small table in front of us scattered with papers. Gold and Agni stared at me as I spoke, the words caught them off guard.

Amanda froze.

She turned towards the entrance and then back to me with a pensive expression on her face.

“I know.” Amanda’s lips tightened.

“You know?” My voice rose. Then spoke softer, lowering my voice. “I mean, you know?”

Amanda set her hands on the table, palms down. An unsteady tapping filled the air as her fingers pressed against the wood and I saw a brief expression of worry and uncertainty cross her eyes.

Then it disappeared.

She straightened and her posture exuded confidence.

“I’m safe. They’re just trying to psych me out. It’s a scare tactic.” Her eyes rested on me. “They haven’t tried anything yet, but it might be safer for you if you leave.”

“I refuse.” I shook my head. “My guards will make sure that we’re protected.”

Whoever the nobles had hired, or even if they’d come in person, they would have a rough time if they tried anything.

My guards had already failed once, and I had to imagine they were eager to prove themselves.

“Guards?” Amanda tilted her head. “Those guys I saw at my place?”

I nodded and Amanda’s lips parted into a smile. She hooked her leg around the foldable table and moved it to the side, standing up from the sofa.

“Well, that’s a load off my back.” She placed her hands on her hips. “Still, I’m not the kind of person to do nothing.”

She gestured at the papers she had prepared for our fight tomorrow.

They disappeared.

“What’s your plan?” I smiled.

I could tell she felt a lot more comfortable now that she knew my guards were here. They had left quite an impression on her, destroying a monster in an instant and emitting as much power as possible while doing so.

That kind of magic and strength was leaps and bounds beyond ours.

“The mansion has a safe room.” Amanda said simply. “Comfortable enough for us and it has a safe exit if we don’t want to use the front door.”

She folded the portable table and carried it under her arm, gesturing for me to follow her.

I obliged. I trusted my guards, but there was never a problem with being too safe.

My arm rose into the air, and I felt two pairs of taloned feet hop onto it.

Agni and Gold chirped gratefully, taking their place on either side of my head.

Amanda smiled as she saw us. She pressed her hand against the back wall and there was a shift as a spell was cast.

Magic floated through the room, and I felt a presence wash over me, pressing against my skin. Amanda’s hair flared up with embers and the pressure disappeared.

A door appeared in its place.

Amanda opened it and waved at me to enter.

I walked through the living room and into the open doorway, my steps sinking into the carpet as I made my way into the room.

Bright lights struck my eyes as I entered the room.

The floor and walls were awash with flames. There was no carpet underneath my feet, only pure fire. Gold flapped his wings nervously on my shoulder, but Agni didn’t move.

I raised my leg in surprise and heard a giggle from behind me.

“They don’t bite.” Amanda spoke.

I felt a hand press into my back and push me through into the room.

My feet disappeared as they sank into the flames, fire spewing over my skin. Nothing happened. I raised my leg and saw my body wasn’t burnt to a crisp.

Amanda was right. It didn’t hurt at all.

“This place isn’t as bright as it should be.” I looked around. “A spell?”

Amanda moved beside me, and I heard the door closing behind her. She had a mischievous grin on her face.

“You were trying to freak me out.” I accused her.

A grin spread across my face. “It worked.”

“Good.” Amanda clapped her hands together. “We needed a distraction.”

Her clap resounded across the room and the flames trembled in response. They begin to lower into the floor and then disappear.

In seconds a simple carpeted room had replaced the flaming depths.

“Is this a fire cultivation room?” I looked around curiously.

I’d only ever been inside earth and metal cultivation rooms. Never one used to train fire magic.

I was tempted to activate my mana communication but resisted. That could wait for when I had time to sit down and explore the ability properly.

“Legally, no.” Amanda wagged her finger. “It’s designed to be a place where I can defend myself.”

My eyes shifted towards the corner of the room.

There were two large flowers, burning gently with flames on their petals. They were the source of the fire that had swept across the room.

I’d seen these plants before. They were the same kind of flower that was in her main mansion’s garden. I remembered her family had bought them because they wanted to make a cultivation room.

It looked like they had partially succeeded.

“They produce a lot of fire mana so this place kind of grew itself over time.” Amanda strode through the room.

Every step she took caused a puff of flames to rise from the carpet.

“See, I'm in my element.” Amanda twirled around and faced me. “If we were safe before, now we’re mega safe.”

I smiled.

The room was fairly large and adhered to the Mitra family minimalism I was used to.

There was a single bed up against the back wall of the room, and a desk and chair to my side. To my side was a closet filled with clothes and a couple of school uniforms.

The cultivation plants glowed gently, bathing me in their warmth.

I could feel the fire mana in the air, even without mana communication activated. Normally, I could only feel mana when there were large concentrations of an element or if it was earth and metal mana.

Was my mana affinity helping me?

“Is this your room?” I admired the area. “And here I thought you didn’t like sleeping in your element.”

The moment the words left my mouth I felt like slapping myself.

Amanda wasn’t surrounded by flames for fun. She was doing it because she might need to defend herself from an attack.

“You try raising a flaming plant without a little fire.” Amanda poked her tongue out at me. “Come on, let’s get to work.”

Amanda made her way to the bed and sat down on the carpet beside it. I joined her and Gold and Agni hopped off my shoulder.

I looked around at the safe room. Amanda was living in a vault. This wasn’t a good situation for her.

Why hadn’t she left Koshima? It would be easier for her.

The question bugged me the entire time. However, Amanda clearly didn’t want to talk about it. She was focused entirely on the fight, and I could tell why.

The duel with Shar and Vesper was another avenue the noble families were taking to chase out Amanda. There was a concerted effort to drive her away from the academy and keep her isolated inside her house.

It was frightening.

“They can’t do anything openly.” Amanda’s voice interrupted my thoughts.

I looked up and saw her gazing at me. I’d gotten lost in my thoughts.

“They can’t?”

Amanda shifted, crossing her legs, and leaning back against the side of her bed.

“My family’s company supplies fire magic to the front lines. That’s our main money maker.” Amanda raised her palm towards me, and I saw a red bead in it.

I held back a shiver, memories of Alexis’ green tumors flashing across my mind.

“Koshima nobles are a mixed bag. Some of them have connections to other cities, like us, but most of their businesses are exclusive to this area.” A look of pride flashed over her features. “Those nobles can’t do anything against us. None of them can. Our customers span entire armies, and they owe my grandfather a lot.”

Her words began to create a bigger picture in my mind. Even nobles had different levels in their hierarchy.

A city noble could never compare in influence to an immortal household like the Gesti. They also couldn’t fight Amanda’s family.

No army wants to lose a valuable source of weaponry. The Mitra family couldn’t be harmed without risking retaliation. However, they could be harassed because the armies were in the frontier cities, not Koshima.

“So, they can only watch you to psych you out?” I frowned. “That’s really petty.”

“Petty doesn’t even begin to describe those people.” Amanda sighed. “But in this case, it’s justified. My family aren’t the good guys in this situation.”

“You’re not the bad guys either.” I responded immediately.

Oubliez was at fault.

Amanda’s mother was in the hospital, the sons and daughters of people around the city had been crippled, and Alexis was in a coma he wouldn’t wake up from anytime soon.

Everyone had lost, in one way or another. And nobody had a way to vent their feelings.

They went after the easiest target.

Amanda.

Anger made people irrational, but that didn’t matter to me.

“How hard do we need to beat these people to make sure they never bother you again?” I wondered out loud.

Amanda raised an eyebrow at me.

“I just need to make sure we show them I’m not a pushover.” Amanda smiled. “I’ll probably lose any chance of repairing old relationships, but I think that boat has already set sail.

“You still have friends in our class. William and Roxxy for sure.” I reassured her.

“Maybe.” Amanda said. “I’m not sure about Roxxy.”

I didn’t know how to respond to that.

Roxxy’s half brother and father had been hospitalized because of the incident. She hadn’t seemed happy about it in class, but she also didn’t look like she was going to take it out on Amanda.

“They’ve all mentioned a meeting.” I sifted through my memories.

Roxxy had been there too. Hutton’s brother had mentioned it to her when she’d defended Amanda in class.

Wait, had she been defending Amanda? I frowned.

Now that I went through the memory properly, I couldn’t say that she was protecting Amanda. Hutton’s brother had been about to commit a huge mistake and would have failed and been punished for it.

She might have been saving him.

Something pressed against my forehead, breaking me out of my thoughts. It was a finger. Amanda flicked me and my head jolted back in surprise.

I heard her laughing as I fell onto my back.

“You’re thinking too much about this.” Her voice floated into my ears. “Let me simplify it for you. Arena duel. Kick butt. Win strong.”

I lifted myself back up and paused as I saw Amanda’s expression. It was filled with gratitude.

Then it disappeared and she cracked her knuckles.

“Let’s get to work.”

I could tell this was going to be an all-nighter. My parents had been informed, and after a while my guards reported that the watchers had gone away.

Amanda hadn’t been surprised by that development.

Apparently, they came around the same time every day, around the time when she would leave the safehouse for leisure rather than school.

They wanted to scare her into staying inside and isolated using their presence.

It was psychological warfare.

After a few hours had passed we knew that we had to get a proper sleep or else our tiredness would defeat us before Shar and Vesper could.

Amanda collapsed on her bed and fell asleep instantly.

I was immeasurably jealous.

Gold rested beside me. His eyes closed and he snuggled against the wall. I conjured a small pile of stones to make him a nest and then laid back.

We were sitting next to the fire plant, my eyes closed and my breathing steady. There were a lot of things on my plate, but I never forgot to train.

I breathed deeply and activated mana communication.

The world transformed around me, the physical disappearing and being replaced by mana.

Inside this room there was only fire mana in the air, and earth mana in the walls. It didn’t give me a headache like Koshima academy had; instead, I was filled with warmth.

There were two skills working in conjunction now.

Mana communication allowed me to see the mana around me and talk with it. Mana affinity put me on a footing where mana would respect me enough to try and hold a conversation.

Together, they multiplied the stimuli my body and mind received from the mana when activating my skills.

Emotions, thoughts, colours, and power.

It was enough to engulf me if I wasn’t careful.

However, mana sense didn't disappear from my skill list. I could still use it in key situations where I would be overwhelmed by too much information.

I focused on the fire mana surrounding me, each breath taking in their emotions. At the same time, I calmed my own emotions.

The mana could feel them now, and they would judge me if I overwhelmed them.

It was a give-and-take conversation. No longer one-sided, I had to be careful what I said. The reward would be understanding my companion more than I had before.

The mana calmed around me, drifting into orbit around my body. Physically, they manifested as flames.

In my mind’s eye, all I saw was resonance.

I breathed, and they breathed. I exhaled, and they exhaled.

We were one, and yet separate.

Fire mana had always been around me, just like earth. I could feel its familiarity, and in my heart my emotions echoed their own.

Comfort. Warmth. Companionship.

The fire mana around me wouldn’t be manipulated, but it didn’t shy away from me either.

It was curious about me.

I finally understood having affinity with an element, but not being attuned with it. Before, I could only see the fire mana and vaguely guess at its intentions.

That had changed slightly after I’d fought Oubliez, and now with my new skills I could understand it completely.

We sat there together, basking in the company of each other, but not asking for anything more. The fire mana wasn’t going to fight for me at my whim.

But it was ready to listen.

My eyes opened.

I wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but it had felt like hours.

My mana communication turned off, and I felt a wave of tiredness. I’d been concentrating the entire time I’d been training. It was a lot of hard work keeping up contact with the fire mana around me, but it was worth it.

I’d made a lot of progress. I would be able to attune to the other elements one day. I was certain of it.

A tired Gold hopped onto my shoulder, and I made my way to the door, opening it quietly.

It was a good thing that the school days were optional now. I wasn’t sure that I would be able to get enough sleep to function properly through a day of school and a duel.

Then again, my body worked in mysterious ways. I’d felt refreshed with a tiny amount of sleep before.

I laid down on the sofa and my eyes closed.

When they opened again, I could see a pair of bright eyes in front of me, and a finger was poking at my cheek.

“Wake up you lazy bum.”

Amanda grinned.

“This duel isn’t going to fight itself.”