Ranvir and the others joined up with Dovar outside of the cafeteria. Ranvir both felt excited to restart their after period training, and at the same time really didn’t look forward to braving the cold and dark to do it.

“This is your first time, are you excited?” Es asked, as he walked side by side with Dovar. The warp tethered had grown wider over the shoulder and put on some height, though, he was still much smaller than the walking wall of Dovar. It felt quite like looking at the same person sized down.

Opening the door, cold wind and snow rushed through making Ranvir happy for the thick coat and gloves. Though they weren’t mittens, they were still lined with fur inside. Still Ranvir wasn’t sure trading individual finger sleeves for thicker fur was worth it.

Ranvir embraced the pressure before they finished opening the doors, letting the slight tension and awareness wash over him. The moon reflected off each fat snowflake, making the slowly drifting snow into a near impenetrable wall of white. Ranvir wondered if it would’ve been easier to see, had their been less light for the snow to reflect off.

“Sansir, can’t you do something?” Grev complained, before they’d even gone five steps into the rushing snow.

“I’m not a manipulator. What do you want me to do? Make more snow?”

“Goddess no! Don’t even joke about that!”

“Couldn’t you gather some light, that should at least help a little.” Ranvir asked Grevor. His tether was still sensitive after the morning’s disaster. Honestly, he’d hoped to have shaken it off by now, but seeing ninety percent of first year students having been laid low did temper him somewhat. Especially, since he’d been the only one to not immediately pass out in his segment of the first years. Not to mention a bunch of second-years had also passed out despite their advanced training.

Grev embraced the pressure and gathered light into three softly glowing blue spheres suspended above their heads, doling out the concentrated light in controlled beams to illuminate their path.

“How are we supposed to get any training done like this?” Esmund complained.

“You think it doesn’t snow on the front lines?” Dovar asked, his face set in a grim expression. “This isn’t even that harsh conditions, considering some of the battles we’ve fought through.”

Ranvir could practically feel Esmund rolling his eyes, even on the other side of the group.

“What battles?”

Ranvir tuned out Dovar as he started going into detail of whatever important skirmish he’d recently gotten interested in. Likely going into way too much detail for Esmund to follow, though, that never stopped him from trying.

“Are you sure you can’t do anything about the snow?” Ranvir asked Sansir. “What have you tried?”

Sansir pursed his lips, glancing to Ranvir through the corner of his eye. Ranvir didn’t say anything, just raised a single eyebrow. “Fine, I’ll try something.” He grumbled, embracing the pressure.

He sensed the taller tethered reaching out to the snow around them, feeling his power sloughing off the flakes much like Ranvir’s own power would, should he try to exert control.

Ranvir left him to it, sensing another’s approach across from the distance. They’d reached a decent field for the training, so Esmund and Dovar had stopped, the latter still discussing his battle. Ranvir couldn’t quite tell who was approaching them since they weren’t embracing the pressure, though, something about the presence reminded him of Svenar.

Deciding patience was the best way to get his answers, the person soon resolved from the snow. Master Ayvir wore no gloves or snow shoes, his only concession to the cold was his slightly thicker fur coat with a hint of fur sticking out of his collar.

Ranvir sensed Sansir expressing his power strongly, then all the snow in a two meter radius around the tethered shot into the sky and doubled in mass, before returning to ground like a sudden half inch thick snowfall. Fortunately for Sansir, he’d managed to part the snow before it could impact him.

“That didn’t work.” Sansir muttered, his brows scrunched together as he examined the snow resumed snowfall. “But there is something there.”

Sansir must’ve summoned a layer of ice in an attempt to stop the falling snow, but clearly struggled with what to do afterwards.

“Master Ayvir.” Ranvir greeted, offering his gloved hand to the Master.

“Student Ranvir.” He returned, grinning broadly. “Or should I say Teacher Ranvir? After Grevor’s invitation, I thought I’d come take a look. Hopefully, it’s okay. He still has some work he needs doing on his attuned technique.” In his other hand, he carried an unlit bright-torch.

Ranvir nodded walking with the Master as he approached Grev. “You’ve really gathered a group here.” Ayvir looked across them all. “The strongest tethered of the year.” His eyes turned to Ranvir, with glimmering light in them. “Or the best teacher?”

“I just got lucky a few times.”

“On the front lines you learn to recognize two kinds of people. The ones who get lucky once or twice, and the ones who keep getting ‘lucky’ over and over again.” He bumped Ranvir’s shoulder to tell him which one he was. “You learn to look out for those types, because luck doesn’t stretch that far.”

“Master Ayvir.” Grev greeted them, Ayvir having finished his short speech just before reaching his student.

“Grevor.” Ayvir greeted with another one of his broad grins. In the light of Grevor’s orbs, the dimple on his right cheek was cast in dark shadows. “I’m sure you’re already aware, but there’s a certain significant weakness to training light in the winter. Especially here in Elusria.” He gestured around the darkness of night, bordering on Grevor’s orbs.

“I’m going to show a little trick you might find helpful.” He lifted the bright-torch. “This is especially useful when you’re taking a break from training, but have enough strength for a little expression.”

Grevor nodded, watching intently as the Teacher embraced the pressure. He withdrew something from his power, before launching the Lance full up into the sky and started channeling energy into the torch. Ranvir couldn’t tell what he’d retrieved from his power, but the energy in the torch felt oddly impersonal.

“What did you do?” Grev asked, the light from torch had reached an equilibrium, and Ayvir stopped channeling power.

“You can’t do it, quite yet.” Ayvir explained. “but I pulled back my Concept from the energy. It’s commonly called unaffiliated energy. It’s somewhat similar to how we fill a room with energy before advancement. Unaffiliated energy can be used by any manipulator, no matter their strength, even a pre-stage. You need conscious control of your Concept in order to pull it off, however.”

Ranvir listened with interest, though he saw Es duck away from Dovar as Kirs entered the dome of light. Placing a hand on Grev’s back, Ranvir walked around the teacher and student pair, reluctantly leaving the explanation of unaffiliated expression behind.

“Dovar.” Ranvir greeted, as he approached. “How’s it going?”

Dovar shrugged. “Fine. I guess,” He looked around the group. Es and Kirs were stuck just at the border of manipulated light, kissing in a way that made Ranvir happy it wasn’t any brighter. Sansir was cursing and muttering to himself as the snow around his ankles quickly crawled towards his knees with each failed attempt. “I don’t really know what to work on. Master Sigurd always had a ready plan.”

“I can tell you what we usually do.” Ranvir said, offering the taller tethered a friendly smile, sensing his discomfort.

“Please.” Dovar gestured for him to go ahead.

“Well, we start with what you want to work on. Where do you want to start? Training with your Concept? Working on your attuned technique? We work towards a goal of your choosing.”

Dovar’s lips twitched, just about to open before stopping.

“Ask, please.” Ranvir said, smiling gently.

“I was… maybe thinking you could tell me what to work on?”

“No.”

“No? Did I do something wrong?”

Ranvir shook his head. “You haven’t, but I can’t help you pick what to train. I can help you fill in the gaps when you get that far, but I have a feeling you haven’t had any real choice in your training… ever.”

Dovar blinked, Ranvir thought he might’ve flushed, but it was tough to tell through the cold already staining his cheeks red. “Master Sigurd did tell me to train for Flesh.”

Ranvir didn’t sigh, though he had to fight it back. Personal engagement in training was always the best bar none. “Well, you could work on making snowballs while you figure something out?”

Dovar looked confused for a moment, glancing down to the snow before speaking. “I’m smoke.”

“Then it should give plenty of time to figure out where you want to go with your power.”

Dovar’s lips pursed as he squatted onto his heels, tentatively reaching for the trampled snow at his feet. “I want to work on awareness.” He said, straightening. “Large scale, battlefield scale.”

Ranvir frowned, taking a step back. “What would you need to gain that? Maybe deviate as you develop your Concept into wind? First step is advancement, either way.” Ranvir waved Kirs over, who had at some point unaffiliated her mouth from Esmund’s. “Let’s start planning.”