CHAPTER 4: Interrupted

--Sura’s POV--

A week passed since the day that we began magic and endurance training with Ophelia-san and her daughter, Yuna. I still couldn’t fully control dark magic that I can use effectively and all I can do now is squirt some black ash from the tips of my fingertips, but now I can combine up to 3 attributes thanks to Ophelia’s teachings, she’s a great teacher.

Right now, Aishita, Yuna, and I are training under the guidance of Ophelia and after some time, Ophelia decided for me to spar against her daughter, Yuna.

“Sura, Let’s see how much you’ve grown since the past week. Have a friendly match against Yuna-chan.” Ophelia demanded, a teasing smile slowly forming on her lips.

“Eh?!, but she’s just a child?” I responded, not wanting to hurt Yuna.

“Aren’t you a kid as well? don’t be mistaken, though she usually acts like a child, she’s way better than I am.” Ophelia reasoned, still having the smile on her face.

“EH?! Isn’t it better for me to fight against Aishita-nee like we always do?” still confused, I answered.

“If you train with the same person, you’re only going to get used to fighting that person, if you train with different people, you’ll start to adapt to different kinds of ways people fight” Ophelia explained.

“Ohh…. okay”

“Go easy on me, okay~,” Yuna said while having a cute smile.

“Likewise,” I replied sending a smile back.

Both Yuna and I moved apart about 7 meters away.

“Then, BEGIN!”

As soon as Ophelia announced the start of the battle, I immediately started combining both wind and earth magic to propel myself towards the sky, then used Fireball in repetition.

“Earth Style: Defense mode.”

Yuna raised both her arms to cover her head like how boxers block punches and then she covered her whole body, making an armor of dirt and pebbles to defend against the barrage of magic that I unleashed. Though Ophelia-san taught all of us how to use Mana Armor, Aishita, Yuna, and I still use magic to cover ourselves. I don’t think she’s able to handle Mana Armor’s mental burden, especially in a fast pace match.

“that’s cool and all… but can you defend against Ignis my stro-”

“Earth Style: Cannon mode.”

Before I finished my sentence Yuna changed her form again, all of the armor that covered her whole body began to wither away and this time she pointed her hands at me, as if she’s trying to grasp something in the air. Her arms are the only ones left with signs of armor she had seconds ago. Stones gather in mid-air in front of her armored palms forming two bowling ball-size stones which then flew towards me fast, due to her incredible speed of changing form and launching an attack I was grazed by stones she launched at me, barely able to avoid her attack. I began to fall from the sky as I struggle to control the air around me, like a jet shot down from the sky but I effectively cushioned my fall using water magic and was able to quickly perform a counterattack and unleash Water Cannon using the water that cushioned my fall. Balls of water flew past her, dancing between my spell, effortlessly dodging my attacks.

She began to close the distance by abandoning the armor she had on her arms, I tried to evaporate the water I was on, using fire magic. I quickly escape the water before it started boiling and eventually turned to steam, creating a smokescreen. Then I combined both wind and earth magic to effectively aim my Stone Caliber and redirect it in case she dodges my attack. I just noticed that she was using earth magic to adjust her footing, using it to her advantage, that was the reason why she was able to dodge my every attack. To my surprise, she was able to dodge my Stone Caliber that I had been controlling over and over again but it helped me create some distance between us. She then smashed my Stone Caliber with her own Stone Caliber, fed up by my annoying spell.

“Earth Style: Launch mode.”

Using earth magic to propel herself towards me to close the distance, she covered her fist with earth magic. With how fast she was traveling I panicked, she closed the distance between us in no time. I tried to escape using wind magic, however,

“Earth Style: Grab mode”

she was able to restrict my movements by using earth magic to grab hold of my foot, rooting me in place. With that, she was able to strike me down with her hardened fist nearly knocking me out unconscious.

“Okay, that’s enough!” Ophelia shouted.

“I’m sorry, it seems I overdid it,” Yuna said smiling so that her white teeth were showing and offering her hand.

I started to lose consciousness on the ground with a bruise under my chin. Ophelia-san quickly began treating me.

“Ugh… what happened?” I asked not remembering what happened.

“You were beaten down by this little cutie right here~” Aishita said teasingly.

“Damn, you’re good!” Yuna said with no sarcasm in her voice.

“Not really, though” I said feeling down, vaguely remembering what happened.

“That was impressive to be able to last 2 minutes in combat against a B rank Specialized Elementalist (Earth)” Ophelia clapping her hands as she congratulates me

“WAIT, SHE’S B RANK!?” Aishita and I spoke out in disbelief

“Yes, didn’t I tell you?”

“No!” Aishita and I uttered

“Hahaha, I’m sorry for forgetting to tell you.” Ophelia laughed, proud of her little girl as she caresses her head.

“she’s so cool,” Aishita said with glistening eyes staring at Yuna.

“Right!” I responded looking at Yuna, amazed by her strength.

Anyways, I think she was holding back against me because we’re friends plus it didn’t look like she was serious at all, I’m in C rank and she’s B rank, even if you say it’s directly above C rank, it’s not. There’s a huge gap between C and B ranks in terms of experience, knowledge, mana pool, and reaction time, plus it’s more common for mages to get stuck on C rank because it’s too hard to rank up. Even though she had full control of the battle Yuna still thanked me for an exciting battle and shook my hand.

With the sparring over, we began setting our sight home.

***

On our way home, Yuna and I discussed how I can improve on magic combat, the first mistake she noticed was the way I propelled myself upwards and exposed many openings, she said she could’ve easily knocked me out then but hesitated, wanting a longer battle. She then praised how effectively I used water magic defensively and offensively. Another mistake she saw was that I was too focused on controlling my Stone Caliber with wind magic, I explained to her that I already mastered controlling the projectile without focusing that much, however, she elaborated that just increasing the speed and amount of the projectile would’ve sufficed. The last mistake she pointed out was when I panicked in the last moments of the fight, she told me that I could’ve easily used earth or water magic to create a wall and minimize the damage instead of using wind to escape or use magic offensively that she would have to withdraw or take the damage. I liked how she lectured me about my mistakes I learned a lot about our fight.

The next day*

Griffin heard about how my fight against Yuna and came to approach me in the room, hiding the black grimoire I was struggling to study beneath the bed.

“Sura, would it be okay for you to come with me today?”

“Certainly, but can you explain why?”

“it’s a secret~” Griffin said winking at me

“Okay, where are we going?”

“Hmm… maybe we can go near the forest where I’m patrolling every day”

Just like that, we headed to the forest.

The forest in this world, just like on Earth is full of dangerous animals, however, in this world, there are dangerous monsters as well, such as Treants, Ogres, Elementals, and many more.

We arrive at a wooden cottage just between the village and the forest, it seems it’s a lookout post or some sort of breakroom, nothing much to say about the cottage though, it’s just a cottage nothing special.

“Aishita told me the other day that you were getting better”

“I don’t know about that”

“But it seems Yuna knock you out huh?”

“Yeah… that was… embarrassing”

“If you feel that way then struggle to get stronger, but if you ask me I think you could use some close combat lessons. Mages are weak when it comes down to close-quarters-combat, only having Mana Armor to rely on.”

“So, is that the reason why you brought me along today?”

“Probably~, so will you allow me to teach you some basics to close combat fighting?”

“Sure, thanks, dad!” I smiled at him, thankful for his consideration

With that, we began training. He taught me various stances, guarding, foot works, and some reversals. Honestly, Griffin isn’t a good teacher at all, describing when opponents go “swhoosh!” and “hwaa!” to show to me when to guard or parry. It’s funny how he makes these kinds of noises, he is a natural, maybe that’s why he isn’t the best at teaching me what he knows. I appreciate it though; he’s willing to look like a fool in front of his son to teach him self-defense. Not many fathers can do that…

After practicing some self-defense, we took a short break, we ate, we talked, we laugh, we drank, it’s almost like we’re best friends than we’re father and son.

[did I ever have this kind of relationship with Akihito? Is it because Griffin’s age is close to mine?]

I began thinking about the days when I spend time with Akihito. Honestly, I was never that close to him, even though he was always there when we needed him, he was only there when we needed him. He was a good father, he worked for the family, he took care of us when mom couldn’t, but he was never the talkative type. He always wears this mask to pretend that he wasn’t tired from work, I think that’s the reason why whenever he calls me from the hospital, I didn’t know how to talk to him. He was just pretending to be okay for me, he was always pretending to be okay. I wish he’d express some of his pain with us, his family, I wish he’d tell us stories more. I wish… I talked to him more…

After thinking that, a tear began to slide down my cheek. Just a single drop, that I was quick to wipe.

***

After our break, we went outside to train again.

“Okay, let’s try some serious combat, try to incorporate everything I taught you together with the use of magic.”

“hai, Tou-san!”

Just like the sparring match between Yuna and me, we faced each other about 7 meters apart.

“BEGIN!”

As father charged at me with his sparring sword, I tried to restrict his movements with earth magic, however, he was able to avoid it, leaping forward just before I was able to grab hold of him, and he then swings his sword from high above with a downward swing. I too leaped above the ground using only wind magic and then used wind magic again to dodge midair, however, his sword was able to follow my movements, just before his sword was about to hit, I conjured Mana Armor but my arms was all I could focus the armor on, blue mana surrounds my arms completely. It was still hard to use Mana Armor as I need a lot of focus on conjuring and maintaining it. Posing like a boxer blocking, I barely block his strike, which he followed up with a kick to my stomach during my attempt, which hurt a lot and I flew downwards but I used wind and water magic to avoid crashing down. I created a sword using the water beneath my feet then decreased its temperature to quickly solidify it and turned it into a sword of ice. By that time, Griffin already managed to catch up to me, I used the ice sword, I created to block his wooden sword, however, he easily shattered my sword. To avoid getting hit, I liquified the broken sword and used it to create a strong current of water that pushed me away from him. After getting back on my feet, I immediately increased the temperature to turn the water to steam and create a cover for my next attack. I swiftly moved around using wind magic to avoid getting detected immediately, I created another sword, this time using earth magic. I was able to pinpoint his exact location the whole time, using wind magic by randomly moving the steam I created with water and fire magic, where there’s a solid object in the smokescreen, I was able to tell. I used wind and earth magic to then propel myself towards him and tried to swing at him with all my might, however, he was able to swiftly block my strike with his bare hands, with him holding onto my sword, all the smokescreen that I’ve created, including myself was swept away as Griffin threw me. As I regain my footing, I used earth magic to create some sort of tremor to at least make Griffin fall out of balance to gain an advantage in our fight. In the heat of the moment, I managed to anger a cluster of Giant Spiders and they started to attack us, I created a wall of wind to protect myself from the upcoming Spider and used the current to empower the rotation and speed of my Stone Caliber, following Yuna’s advice and managed to kill 2 with one stone, When I looked at Griffin, he already managed to quickly finish off the remaining 4.

“It seems, were tied then?” Griffin said while a grin formed on his lips

“That was a close one right dad?”

“Yeah, maybe we ought to go back home now?” Griffin said as he looks at the setting sun.

“Yeah,” I said following Griffin’s gaze.

With the practice match over, we walked back home. It was certainly upsetting that our fight had to be interrupted, I realized that dad was not even using a 3rd of his strength, I’m a child after all and I couldn’t use the other things Griffin taught me, but I at least had fun today.