“Welcome to the Martial Exchange, but actually this time!” Jenny proclaimed, as she flung the door open.

As soon as it opened, the sounds of combat and exercise on the other side were clear.

Inside a large underground arena, on a sandy floor, were a number of individuals fighting, and a number more watching and chatting.

People turned towards them at the noise of Jenny using the door as a gong, some of whom Theo recognised. There was also one person in a spar with a sword, who got knocked off her feet by their opponent, taking advantage of her distraction.

“Foul!” The crowd yelled.

“Not my fault they lost focus.” The victor defended. “The rules state tha-ooft!”

The crowd cheered, as the swordswoman returned the favour and tackled them to the ground.

“Hey! Glad you made it.” A number of familiar faces had approached while Theo had been distracted by the distraction of others.

Simo, Bruce, and Duncan approached. Some others had come along too, people that Theo swore he hadn’t met. One was a red-haired woman, the other a man with long black hair.

“Theo, this is Natalie and Damian.” Jenny introduced those two, pointing them out.

He waved, smiling.

Natalie returned the wave with a smile of her own, while Damian rolled his eyes and ignored his existence.

“So this is the Theo that Jenny speaks so highly of.” Jenny blushed as Natalie began to speak. “Welcome to the Martial Exchange! This is like the Arts Exchange, but for warriors instead of bards. You can guess what happens here. By the way, the internal magic notes you handed to the College are incredible! There’s a few theories we’re trying out. Self Awareness and Meditation is the most promising one – they’re calling it Wisdom for now.”

“Thank you, it’s lovely to meet you.” Theo accepted the compliment with the grace of a drunk somehow managing to steal a horse.

“Don’t spar with Jenny. We don’t need any repeats of the park.” Damian spoke at him without looking in his direction.

Theo found his jaw clenched.

While yes, it was true that their sparring often led to a sparring of another kind, he disliked how far that had spread.

Before he could think of a response, Damian had walked away already.

Theo un-tensed, sighed and released his hands that had formed a fist.

“Sorry about that, he’s just very serious about this space.” Natalie apologised in Damian’s place. “Would you like to spar with someone?” She tried to inject cheer in her voice, and while it was clear to Theo how forced it was, it still made him feel a little better.

“Yeah, that would be good.” If he didn’t have a reason to before, he definitely wanted to punch something now.

---

Theo found it incredibly difficult to punch anything but the ground.

He spat sand out of his mouth for the fifth time in the past minute, and got back onto his feet. He stared at Bruce, who looked sheepish as he kept his distance.

“Let’s move on to the second part?” Bruce suggested.

Theo nodded. They moved, giving each other some room.

The sparring at the Martial Exchange was separated into two rounds – skill and survival. The first round was a purely skill-based spar, with no weapons or activated internal magic. The only thing allowed was technique, which is how Bruce had managed to grapple and flip him over in every conceivable way.

The second round was no-holds barred. As long as a priest was on hand, they were allowed to use anything and everything they had to beat the other person until they were unconscious or the priest called the victor. Toying with your opponent here was considered in bad taste, as that would not only show disrespect, but also likely increase the suffering and injury both parties faced, as well as not honing the lethality needed in an actual life-or-death situation.

Theo watched as Bruce pulled out a whole host of weapons, before settling on a wooden bo staff. Duncan looked to both of them for confirmation.

“Begin!”

Theo kicked up a spray of sand as he became a meteor aimed at Bruce. He hummed with his mouth closed, clumping the ground near his target as he tried to not swallow any more sand.

Bruce stood there, staff tracking his trajectory. His legs were planted in a strong horse stance as he braced for imminent impact. He muttered a prayer, and the sand seemed to solidify, wresting control from Theo.

The bard dug his foot into the ground, arresting his momentum metres away from the martial artist, kicking off to curve around and target his right side.

Bruce shifted his grip, and as Theo leaned down for a shoulder-charge, he swung the staff like an axe at a tree, and the edge almost turned sharp as it slammed into Theo’s shoulder.

There was the crack of a bough breaking in merciless wind as Theo was thrown back spinning.

For the sixth time today, he was disoriented and a fallen star.

He didn’t bother to spit the sand immediately, content to grind it between his teeth for a moment as he took stock of his surroundings before finally spitting out a wad.

Bruce was shaking his hands, having dropped the staff. His legs had carved a deep trough through the ground, and the solid sand wasn’t filling in the grooves that had sunk to his knees.

The staff was still in one piece, somehow.

“Disappointing.” Theo whipped around, realising that not only was everyone now watching, Damian had scoffed at his performance.

His eyes stung. He told himself it was the sand.

“Are you okay?” Jenny called from the sidelines, looking for Duncan.

“Yeah.” Blinking rapidly, he found that his shoulder also stung.

Looking down, he realised why.

Beneath a powdery layer of sand, a patch of red was spreading.

The pain was also spreading, as he realised that a band of skin the height of his wrist was missing from his upper arm.

Theo absently realised that this was the first time that Stoneskin had been broken. He hadn’t infused it much recently.

In fact he hadn’t spent much effort on internal magic at all. Between Jenny, the ball, the Natureborn cultivation, and the prophecy and chest business, he hadn’t dedicated much time on improving his combat capabilities. It didn’t help that up until the spy incident, his ability to fight had been enough.

But this was the second time in the past few weeks where it was becoming clear that he didn’t know what he was doing, internal magic or not.

“You good?” This time, it was Duncan who called out.

Theo starred at his shoulder, activated Rest, and watched as it healed over and all the sand stuck in the wound was pushed out. Like grainy pus.

He finally pulled himself upright, and activated Stoneskin. His skin turned slate, but it wasn’t entirely uniform. Moss stained its surface, and he wondered if it was to do with what he’d done in the clearing. It almost glowed.

He looked over at Bruce, who had picked up the staff again and stood at the ready.

“Yeah.”