About six months ago...

All around Lyn was water—yellowish, rancid, and speckled with suspicious brown residues. It bubbled from her exhalation. And then, after a few excruciatingly long minutes, Lyn found air. She gasped, taking in as much of the putrid smell as she could before her head was forced back into the toilet bowl.

She tried to struggle free, but there were three pairs of hands holding her down; a pair gripping on each of her arms, and another pushing down on her neck. She was strong, but she was not able-to-resist-three-heavy-women strong.

Right before she was about to choke and drown in toilet water, a hand yanked her out by the hair. She fell on her butt as her neck was made to bend the other direction. The next thing she knew, she was staring at an upside-down view of the dreaded woman.

Prissy the Tiger, or at least that's what everyone called her, smirked at Lyn. Her crooked teeth barely aligned on top of one another, while their color matched her dirty blonde tufts of hair.

"Not so strong anymore, are you?" she said as she twirled a finger around Lyn's exposed neck. "Let's see how you keep up that cocky attitude of yours like this."

Lyn readied her fists, but Prissy's underlings held them back. So, she went for the less ideal backup option: spitting on Prissy's scrawny face.

Prissy snarled like an irate tiger. "Why you little—"

She tugged on Lyn's auburn hair until Lyn's grimacing face was positioned right in front of her hand. The fist lunged forward, punching Lyn right in the nose, crumpling her to the ground.

Lyn coughed and groaned as she struggled up. Drops of blood stained the grimy floors, while the strong iron taste washed out the previous foul sting inside her mouth. Her hands trembled. Nobody had ever hit her like that without getting a strike in return. Nobody. Tiny sparks began to dance around her clenched fists.

The beep from her ankle bracelet snapped her from her rage. She cursed inwardly. If the magic sensor were to beep one more time, her sentence would be prolonged.

Reluctantly, she unclenched her hands and stopped her magic.

The blonde woman chortled in glee.

"Look at you, a high and mighty quester, reduced to such a weak and helpless state," she crooned. "This magic sensor is truly the best equalizer in the world, isn't it? You know, I think the whole world should be made to wear it, then there won't be people like you, cocky little bastards who have nothing going on for them other than stupid quester-level magic."

Wiping her mouth with her sleeve, Lyn glared at Prissy and growled, "Come at me one-on-one if you dare, you pussy."

Prissy's permanent scowl twisted even more. Her foot thrust forward and met Lyn's stomach, sending Lyn towards the rest of her gang. Before Lyn could recover from the impact, dozens of hands flew towards her from every direction, punching, kicking, slapping, pulling; the onslaught was so overwhelming that she could not tell what was being done to her body. She curled up into a ball and blocked her head with her arms, focusing on anything but the pain, anything but the blood she was heaving, anything but her humiliating lack of strength...

Finally, the bathroom door slammed open, and the attacks stopped.

"What are you guys doing?" Lyn recognized him as one of the prison guards. "Get the hell out of here, we have roll-call in fifteen minutes."

"Oh, we're just playing around, Mr. Renderson, you know, girl talk." Prissy's voice was a disgusting tone of high-pitched honey.

"Alright, well, playtime is over, get out of here."

Lyn kept her head lowered as the feet around her shuffled out of the bathroom. Her entire body was still throbbing while her mouth was still watering with blood.

"Hey, get cleaned up for roll-call, lightning mage." The prison guard gave Lyn one more tired remark, before leaving her behind.

Lyn remained on the floor as the sounds of her heavy breaths filled the empty room. After a while, she heaved herself up, blinking a few times to clear her vision.

A tanned-skin woman was squatting right in front of her and looking at her with a pair of brown, twinkling eyes. She handed Lyn a small towel.

"Need a hand?"

"Isabella," Lyn mumbled as she leaned against the wall, "what are you still doing here? Not afraid of that Pussy gang?"

Isabella chuckled. "I can't believe you still have the energy to be like this."

Lyn snatched the towel and wiped her face. Blotches of red colored the orange fabric. "None of them will ever stand a chance against me if we're outside," she grunted.

"Oh, get off your high horse or you won't survive the week." Isabella rolled her eyes. "Come on, get changed, we don't have much time."

With that, the Latina trotted out of the bathroom. Lyn was now completely alone. The pungent smell from the blood-stained floor and the lingering splashes of the murky water all seemed to be mocking her. She gritted her teeth and threw the towel at the wall. Nobody had dared to mess with her like this, ever. She had never felt so weak and so helpless in her entire life.

But this was temporary. Prisoners were forbidden to use any magic at all, especially people with quester-level magic like herself. She just needed to make it through these three months. Once she's back out there, she's definitely going to win every one of her battles.

Every single one of them.

ϟ☁ϟ☁ϟ

Present...

Lyn cocked her head to each side, stretching her neck. "Give me a sword, Millie," she said, her confident grin never once leaving her face.

"Don't bother, unless you want your sword to break," Neil pointed out. He swung his sword out from his back. It was ridiculously huge, but with his tall, broad stature, the weapon did not seem too ridiculous on him. "Let's do this proper. Full-on elemental magic versus enhancer magic."

Lyn smirked. "Alright, as you say."

Millie's glances darted from Neil to Lyn. "You sure, Lyn?"

"Of course." Lyn smashed her hands together. Tiny, flickering light speckled all over her body as if her porcelain skin was coated with mini thunderclouds. "Let's go."

She charged forward. With her body enveloped in lightning, she moved at least ten times her regular speed. In almost no time, she was next to Neil, her hand outstretched and ready to slam into Neil's exposed neck. This had always been her signature move—in the quickest way possible, strike the opponent down before they could even move a muscle.

To her surprise, Neil shifted his feet and easily dodged her attack. Lyn lost her footing, but she still managed to jump out of the way as Neil swung his sword at her.

The tall man slashed at Lyn a few more times, while she used every bit of her concentration to barely evade each of them. His fighting style was the wildest that she had ever experienced, giving her no time to breathe. The swiftness, along with the enormity, of the blade was so intimidating, it reminded Lyn of the kraken's flying legs. Or any of the giant, high-level monsters they faced during quests.

A monster. Neil was just like a monster.

Finally, Lyn escaped out of the hellish, unending slash-fest. She stood a safe distance from Neil, eyeing the tall man warily while catching her breath at last.

"Wow, you're really going all out," she said, as she wiped her sweaty face.

"Not really." Neil shrugged. "I've just been in way more duels than you since I'm a fighter." His voice was calm and stoic, a stark contrast to Lyn's breathless gasps.

Lyn felt the stares from the rest of her team, and her blood rose to her face. "Well, I'm not all out, too," she grumbled before slamming her hands down.

A bright streak of lightning blasted across the studio. It missed Neil by an inch as he leaped away. As Lyn sent a few more strikes towards the fighter, he avoided all of them, running in a zig-zag line, lunging towards her. His cool composure caught Lyn by surprise. Most people would usually be scared out of their wits by this flashy display of power, or at least be caught off-guard by one of the rarest elemental magic in the world—but Neil did not seem to be affected in any way.

Soon, Neil made his way next to Lyn; behind him, smoking scorch marks traced his path.

Lyn tried to shoot another bolt of lightning at him, but since he was so close, she could not generate a strong enough charge to reach him—the resulting impact was so weak that the swordsman dissipated it with a mere tilt of his blade. The next thing she knew, Neil's weapon was flying towards her.

Sensing danger, Lyn raised her hands to the sky. The windowpane sitting under the ceiling smashed into smithereens as a blazing light ripped through the window, across the room, and then right into the small space between Lyn and Neil.

The force from that lightning pushed both of them away from each other. Lyn fell backward, her arms burning in pain as she slid across the floor. She had never aimed a strike from the sky—the most powerful lightning she could ever summon—this close towards herself, and damn, this was not fun at all. Smoke engulfed her, making it difficult to breathe or see.

Before she could even push herself up, however, the smoke around her cleared.

It seemed that Neil had recovered much faster than Lyn. He was standing over Lyn, his large blade pointing at her neck.

The entire room was silent for a while, except for the sizzling noise from where the lightning struck, and the tinkling sound from shards of glass that were still falling onto the floor.

Lyn was defeated.

Sure, she had been defeated countless times in jail, but she had disregarded all of them. But right now, she was outside, free from the cursed magic sensor, free from the enclosed space of the prison halls.

And she was still defeated.

"Okay, okay..." she mumbled, staring at the shiny blade in front of her. "I... I lose, you win. You're as good as I expected."

Neil let out a chuckle before keeping his sword. "And your magic is as impressive as I imagined too." He held out his hand. "It's a real honor to finally see it up close."

Lyn grabbed his hand. "Well, it's obviously not good enough to beat you though."

"I told you, I've been in way more duels," Neil said as he pulled her up from the ground. "If you ever want to beat me, you should learn to rely on skills beyond your magic."

A small scowl appeared on Lyn's face. "What do you mean?"

Neil raised his eyebrows knowingly. "Just saying, you're the type that brute-forced your way through life, and that won't work against me."

Lyn's eyes twitched. The inside of her mouth had turned bitter and coarse, but she forced a smile. "Well, thank goodness I'll never have to fight you for real."

"Yeah, I hope you never have to."

She turned to the rest of the team, who was still standing in a corner, mouth agape. "Well, I guess he's in?" she said with a soft, nervous laugh. "He's... he's good, right?"

Millie was the first to snap out of her shell-shocked state. "Yeah, he is!" she exclaimed. Next to her, Raph was so flabbergasted that his face had completely lost color.

"Jeez, you really put elemental mages to shame, Lyn." Irene crossed her arms and snorted.

"Shut up..." Lyn mumbled, her face was still hot with embarrassment. "Anyway, welcome to the team, Neil. See you tomorrow for our team meeting?"

"Sure."

Lyn brushed the soot off from her top and hair. "Okay, see the rest of you tomorrow too," she muttered with her head lowered, "I'm gonna go get a drink now."

"Oh, where to—" Irene began to speak, but she stopped when Lyn turned around abruptly.

"Sorry Irene, I'm tired, I'm just gonna go by myself," Lyn said. Her tone might have come out a little too curt for her liking, but she was too distracted to care.

Carefully avoiding eye contact with her team members, she stormed out of the training studio.