Kyrion and Tiffany found themselves standing next to each other face in a dirt arena. Her training fighting multiple enemies turned into a fight as a team against Gamodren.

“Kyrion summon both of your beasts for this fight.” Gamodren told him.

Kyrion summoned Issac and Jala for the first time in a while.

“What took you so long! Where’s Asela and the others, I want to get pampered.” Jala said.

Issac nodded as well. “I feel as though you don’t appreciate me anymore. Your core is pretty plain. I wonder if that tells me something about the person who owns it.”

“Hey! I know its been a while but a lot has happened. Hasn’t Psycho been keeping you caught up?”

“He really doesn’t like being called that.” Jala chided him.

“I don’t really care about that. That girl over there is Tiffany, she’s a friend I made. I need you two to help spar with her.”

“Why, because she can kick your butt?” Issac laughed.

“To think you have us rot in there for years and have us go fight a little girl. Go do it yourself.” Jala began to walk out of the arena.

“Listen it’s been a little more than two months since we last saw each other, I’m still nine.”

“Did I ever tell you that you grow like a beanstalk kid?” Issac told him. “Because yeesh. You used to be a midget. Thought you would turn out to be half dwarf or something.”

“Are you sure Asela and you are related? Last time I saw her, she was still trying to reach three feet.” Jala

“I have my suspicions, I read that humans are mammals, cows are also mammals. There has to be a connection somewhere. Wait, quit distracting me, I need you to help us fight that dude over there.”

Issac and Jala looked at him and shook their heads.

“Fine… I’ll do it, for her not you.” Jala told him.

Issac looked at him for a long moment before giving Gamodren an evil eye.” I’ve always wanted to slap the smug look on your teacher’s face.”

Tiffany watched as Kyrion spoke to the two creatures that appeared out of nowhere.

“Are you ready now?” She asked him.

“Yes! They finally agreed to help. They do seem a bit grumpy though.”

“Shouldn’t you have more control over them?” Tiffany asked.

“They are free spirits. If they don’t want to fight then they won’t. Haven’t tried using them like this on purpose though.” Kyrion looked at the mana cycling through his body and saw that affinities used by the two beasts were unavailable. “Oh great.”

“Good, great or sarcastic, great?” Tiffany asked

“Great as in I don’t have access to a good amount of my mana now.”

“Will it make the fight harder?”

“No idea.” Kyrion shrugged and readied his wooden stick.

Tiffany flourished her rapier and readied for combat. Her strength and agility grew as she compressed her mana and increased its quality.

Issac and Jala stayed within arms reach of Kyrion, the former on his direct left, while the latter was at his back right flank.

Gamodren cracked his knuckles with a smug grin on his face. “I feel sorry, children. I’ll not be going easy on you. My intention is to train, not coddle. If I see an opening I’ll exploit it for if I don’t then the creatures you face again in the Gremlin city and beyond, will.”

Kyrion and Tiffany unconsciously took a step back as a wave of mana washed over the arena. The sunlight seemed to grow dimmer as though a cloud passed overhead.

Tiffany looked up to see what had happened.

Crash

The sounds of two wooden sticks could be heard as Gamodren was standing a mere two feet away; his pipe extended to the size of a quarterstaff and connected with the staff Kyrion himself was using.

Tiffany looked back, startled to see Gamodren retreat as a whip made from water came at his face.

Kyrion heard the bird spirit click his tongue.

They now stood where they started at the beginning of the fight.

“What just happened.” Tiffany asked aloud.

“You left yourself wide open. Don’t take your eyes off of him.”

Kyrion got low to the ground preparing for a lunge. His left-hand reaches into a pouch for some seeds, which he slowly begins to drop while moving forward.

Jala sent a heavy blade of wind at Gamodren in an attempt to get their opponent off balance.

Gamodren casually swiped at the blade of wind as it got close, dismantling the attack with ease. He then stuck ground three times, creating three small green snakes that began to slither towards the group.

“Snakes? Did I ever tell you how much I hate snakes?” Tiffany said, slowly backing up as the snakes began to encroach.

Kyrion decided to dart back and position himself in front, dropping the remainder of the seeds in his previous location. “I, too, have a dislike for snakes.” Kyrion began tapping at the ground with his stick, and weeds sprouted out of the earth.

“Those plants were not there earlier.” The girl entered a thrusting stance as the snakes hit the patch of rapidly growing foliage.

The lead snake was ensnared by the weeds and soon found itself split in half from head to tail by a blade of wind.

“Kyrion, tell your girlfriend that if she won’t eat the snakes then I will.” Jala told her master.

Despite his height, the implication went over his head. “Tiffany, Jala said she’ll take care of all the snakes.”

The two lagging snakes seemed to spring upwards. Flying towards Kyrion this time.

Kyrion swung his staff to intercept one while Tiffany lunged forwards to pierce the second.

Gamodren appeared at Kyrion’s flank, ready to strike as a whip of water flew at him.

Gamodren ducked under the strike only to be hit in the chest by a headbutt from Jala. A gust of wind propelled the two forward.

“Damn, I missed.” Although Issac scowled, it wasn’t a visible scowl but more a feeling that the bird was doing so.

Kyrion took advantage of the opening to swing at the winded Gamodren only to hit the air as the attack passed through.

“Ahh!” Tiffany was sent flying along with Jala. The former was heavily winded while the latter was sent back into Kyrion’s core.

Gamodren stood at the other end as though he was untouched. But then, the weapon in his hand reverted to the smoke pipe it was.

“Looks like you lose. Though you did pretty well today.”

“Lost? Its not over yet!” Kyrion yelled, a sharp point hitting his back. A rapier.

“It is over.” Tiffany’s voice said.

Kyrion looked at the prone Tiffany. “Since when?”

Issac had an Irritated expression. “During the first clash. Damn illusions that feel real.”

“How?” Kyrion muttered aloud.

“Magic. I’m a magic man.” Gamodren answered the question. “But if you want to know the truth, this was never going to be a fair fight. This is an important lesson in pragmatism. If you can’t win a fight. No I don’t mean when there is a chance to win. I mean, when your opponent outclasses you in every meaning of the word, what do you do?”

“Surrender or try to run?” Tiffany said, picking herself up off the floor.

“Close, but not quite.”

“You don’t get trapped in that situation.”

“Correct. But how would you not know how to avoid that position to begin with?”

“You don’t?” Kyrion shrugged.

“Wrong, you need to learn spirit sensing, or mana sensing depending on your region. It’s a tool for sensing things that can’t be seen by normal eyes. Like the density and amount of mana gathered in an area, I believe the Captain of your caravan is a user of a lesser technique or so I’ve gathered. When you master this ability most creatures will be unable to hide from you. Had you known those gremlins were hiding behind it would have been a much easier fight.”

“Why not just go with sight. Isn’t it easier to just see things?” Tiffany asked.

“Yes and no. You all are young enough to learn this technique much easier as you’re still malleable. Spirit sight is a weaker derivative and won’t be able to see past those who are experts at hiding their presences. Like assassins, spies, and other similar occupations.”

“What makes you think that we can learn that so easily?” Kyrion asked.

“I’ve noticed that you can expand your senses to plants. That’s a talent not commonly seen. It requires an amount of intuition that can’t be taught. I’ve also seen you hide your presence as well. Quite unsettling when I know you’re lying in a tree napping but all I can see with spirit sight is the tree. A type of camouflage when in plants. Doing that when you haven’t been trained to do that isn’t something normally occurs in those who don’t have a sensitivity to the world around them.”

“Huh.” Kyrion thought back quite a bit and began to wonder how long Gamodren had been observing him before he started teaching.

“Tiffany has shown skill in adapting to changes in battle. She was even able to figure out that I trapped her in a different illusion. A decent battle sense needs to be refined. This training could serve two purposes in that sense.”

“Thank you.”

“Issac seems to have some way of finding me however. It’s as though he can see something that I don’t yet know how to hide.” Gamodren stopped talking as Issac seemed to be eyeing a blank space.

“I am a predator in a sense. I will not be prayed upon by anyone!” Issac aimed his beak upwards.

“Why is your bird honking?” Tiffany said.

“I’m 75 percent sure that Issac is looking right at mas…Gamodren.” Kyrion threw a seed into the air making contact with something that wasn’t visible and then fell to the ground.

“How do I see what you can see?” Tiffany asked.

“You really don’t want this ability. It’s a vain one.” Issac said.

“He said that it’s a disturbing thing to sense.”

“Interesting.” The sun came back down as Gamodren fell down from the sky.

“You can fly?” Tiffany was distracted.

“Kind of. More like floating by increasing the density of certain things.” Gamodren eyed the bird.

“I’m going back in.” Issac vanished in a puff of pretty feathers.

“What was that?”

“I think that swan may be of the salt water variety.” Kyrion shrugged and sat down.

“Now then. I need you to both consume this mysterious purple tea. As a trickster of sorts I’ll tell you some important information. Don’t drink anything given to you by someone you hardly know. Unless they’re a practived healer and you need their help to live or trust them. Not even I can be trusted at times. This isn’t one of them, but when you’re in a situation where the only one you can trust is yourself, don’t be hasty when choosing friends. For those may be the ones after you. Another thing, don’t take candy from strangers, it could be drugged.”

Kyrion’s eyes shot open as he counted off when he did such things. “So you don’t want me to drink it.”

“Oh no I do want you to drink it. But…”

“Do we need to drink this?” Tiffany asked, catching on.

“No. You really just need to inhale it. Though drinking it is more effective in some cases. You’d need to drink every last drop to get the full benefits.”

Kyrion proceeds to drink the whole thing. “If it will make me stronger.”

Gamodren’s face widened with mirth before it turned into stoicism as Kyrion seemed unbothered by the concoction.

Tiffany looked at Gamodren’s face and then Kyrions blank expression. “How did it taste?”

“Not bad.” Kyrion said plainly. “Not good either.” He turned the empty cup over to show that it was empty.

“Every last drop. Tiffany you don’t have to drink it. Remember that, though I did just confirm a suspicion.”

“If he can drink it then I can too. I’m not afraid of some bad medicine taste.”

“It’s your life.” Gamodren took quite a few steps back as the girl took a sip at the liquid.

Kyrion was lying on his back over a bed of grass that seemed to form under him directly.

Tiffany gagged, dropping the cup onto the ground before turning away.

After a few minutes of hacking, she turned back.” What was that?”

“A potion that enhances the consumers ability to sense the mana around them.”

“Why was it chewy and so revolting?”

“It was the cheap kind. Easiest to make as well.”

Tiffany was about to continue when she lost her balance. Gamodren retrieved her and then laid her a few feet away from Kyrion.

“So many colors….” Kyrion felt his body sink into a soft green substance that his instincts told him was grass. He knew there was no grass outside 6 feet from where he was landing.

Kyion felt as a substance made from various colors landed on the ground where Tiffany was standing. The stuff then reappeared much weaker in the direction the girl turned.

He then looked at his master and saw a faint trail emanating from where he stood. However, it seemed to go quite a ways away.

He noticed a creature in humanoid flesh was watching him with a powerful aura in the opposite direction. He felt this chill before when it was pointed at someone else.

Kyrion rolled over and stood up, looking to the sky, watching as most of the world’s mana seemed to flow from the world around them into three areas. The dungeon that held the gremlins, the bookstore that took them to another place, and the supposed forest of purity. He shivered as Gamodren’s clone finger touched him on the shoulder.

“This feeling will naturally fade over a few weeks but the seal has already been destroyed. Spend two hours of your day training this sensation and you will find yourself able to do so at will.” Gamodren seemed to grip harder and tap four times which meant don’t reply aloud.

Kyrion blinked twice in response, which meant continue.

A message entered his mind. “We have been followed and for some reason, I get the feeling they’re after you.”

Kyrion blinked twice again.

“Listening walls are always a thing to worry about, the main thing you should know is that the cores that were available to you after beating that snake. They were corrupted by some sinister mana. It binds the victims soul to the corruptor giving them full control over your core. Giving them direct control over your life. I was given three such cores claiming to be yours from that first trial. Suffice it to say, we now both know that you’re being followed.” Gamodren tapped twice more, marking the end of the message.

“Great, now remember repetition of good habits builds great habits for life.” He then walked over to Tiffany, who was also lying on the ground, and instructed her.