“Okay guys, now that I found my teaching style, we’ll be going balls deep into it… sorry for cussing,"

Master and students had moved to a more secluded area. This time it was near a cliff bordering open ocean to the east of the village a thirty-minute or so odd minutes away from it.

“You… children may be asking yourself why we are here, in such a lonesome area in the middle of the day. The answer is… training!” Taft’s tone was commanding and stern, but he was making an obvious parody of a combat instructor. He's even walking circles around them.

Nonetheless, is having an effect on Edwin given his nervousness. Lan seemed unfaced by it though, she just stared at him flexing her practiced deadpan act.

“This is because I have been proven that my assumptions were right. In fact, the experiment was a success thanks to you two,"

“Experiment?”

“Yes! The way I have been teaching you two magic it’s not the way I was instructed to, instead, I tried something new, and today we’ll be trying even harder, and of course, by me I mean you” He dropped the act and went back to his usual calmer demeanor “Setting the jokes aside you two did great… today we are stepping onto earth magic! Congratulations are in order”

“Cool! And what spell are we going to learn?”

“Well young Ed, the spell we are reaching towards will be this,”

Taft yet again, turned around, looking towards the sea. The sun was set high and you could see some small boats in open water.

“Stranger from below, hallowed be thy name, grant me sweet strength and strong earth to let my enemies crumble away [Stone cannon]”

Similar to last time, a sphere of about 5cm in diameter materialized in front of Taft’s stretched out hand pointing towards the ocean, but the difference was that this one was made of solid rock and looked like a brown cannonball, that got launched and fell on the ocean without much of a ceremony.

“This is basically the same spell but on earth element,”

“Can’t we learn something more… new?” Ran said. Lan didn’t speak but approved of the statement with an enthusiastic nod.

“Boring…”

“Well... yeah, we could try a different spell but it wouldn’t be good for you first, the objective of this is to accustom you two to using elemental magic by interacting with the actual element while channeling energy, you already know how to cast the same spell on water, so this will be much easier given you have to do the same but on earth instead. If we change the spell to something else, well, simply put, it would be like starting all over again from scratch. I believe this method will have you two throwing rocks in no time flat,”

“So, since we already know the spell, it will be easier to just change the element it’s using?”

“Yeah, we are going to do this for the remaining two elements as well,”

“Fire sounds dangerous,”

“Yeah, and it is, but I have something in mind,”

“And how are we going to practice here?”

“I’m glad you ask,” He smiled

Taft chanted a spell so fast Edwin didn’t even hear it, the earth beneath his feet gave away, making him fall into a hole, then in closed, he was trapped, nothing but a head sticking out from the ground, the earth molded around him, constricting him even further, he could move his hands but nothing else, he was up to his neck, he turned around to see that Lan was in the same predicament but not nearly as scared as him.

“How come you aren’t?” he asked

“It was bound to happen at one point,” Sofia answered. “We were betrayed”

“Now children, don’t be dramatic, the assignment will be this. You have to escape by your own power from this place, move and mold the earth around you to escape,”

This is crazy scary. I can barely move my fingers, much less send mana to them. How am I supposed to do this?

“How are we supposed to do this? is this safe teacher?”

“Of course it is. Unless some kind of monster pops out from the woods, it should be okay,”

“But what if it happens?”

“Then I guess I will be ditching town," Edwin’s face went pale and Taft cracked up “don’t worry, I’m not an experienced adventurer or a veteran warrior nor some kind of sword god, but I’m sure I can keep you safe, and this area is deserted anyway, now let’s get to work!”