“Hey Thera!” Yelled the overly enthusiastic green girl as she ran up to her in the training grounds, drawing the few other eyes around as she did and leaving Thera to groan internally.

Despite her better judgement, she was going to be spending the day practicing her magic with Sachel, with that plan being one of the reasons she and Ben hadn’t gone on a two-day excursion into the woods for their weekend quest. It seemed the half-dryad was committed to her goal of making a better relationship with her, and in that vein had rushed to arrange a time they could work on their skills together when they had a chance.

Not that that had been easier either. Unlike Ben, Sachel didn’t bother keeping the fact that she was now the oracle of a god to herself, something that earned her more than a little curiosity from the townspeople when the majority had never encountered one before and left her exceptionally busy spreading the word of Myriad when she’d gotten back.

Now that things had died down a bit though she’d managed to make the time to all but beg Thera for the chance to try and get to know one another better. “Were you waiting long? I could have met you at your house.”

“I wanted to start early so it’s fine. Now that you’re here, what do you actually want to do?”

“We’re going to practice, right? How about catch?” She asked as she pulled a small ball of dirt from the ground with her magic and gently lobbed it at Thera, whose response was to step out of the way.

“Even if my control has gotten better I still can’t manage something of that size, unless you’re up to try playing catch with something like this?” Thera responded, ripping a mound of dirt the size of a beachball into the air, and was about to gently toss it to the side of the girl when she thought better of it, letting it fall to the ground.

“Um, that might be a bit much for me.”

“Unfortunately that’s as small as I can go. I told you when you asked, didn’t I? You lean to control and I tip pretty heavily towards power, any practice together wouldn’t really benefit either of us compared to just working alone.”

“Um, what about life magic! We both have that, Why don’t we practice together!”

“How exactly are you planning to do that? I mean, I guess I could break Skoe’s knee again and we could rush to see which of us could repair it faster, but I’m going to assume you remember how I was fighting for your village? I wouldn’t recommend it unless you want to find a new warrior for your party.”

“Um, well, what about…” Sachel desperately thought but got nowhere and Thera could see the girl struggle, unable to think of anything to do, so she decided to throw her a lifeline despite her desire to just practice by herself.

“How about something like this, we see if you can hit me with one of your dirt balls and I’ll try to stop you with my own. There’s not many monsters in the area that do any ranged attacks so it could be some good practice.”

“Sounds great!” She agreed readily as her energy came back. “In that case here I come!”

Both women jumped back from each other, making space for their magic as they went. Satchel immediately got into it, pulling a ball of dirt from the ground and throwing it at Thera without releasing it from her magical grasp to make it so she could stop it in the event things started looking dangerous, but Thera was prepared, and rather than do something as simple as throw up a wall of dirt to block it, she decided to push herself a bit more, creating the same larger ball of dirt she had before and moving it into the path of Sachel’s attack, both blocking it and absorbing it into the mass of her own.

The move caught her off guard, but also brought out her competitive spirit and she was quick to raise another, throwing it towards Thera in earnest while trying to direct it out of the path of the bigger mass as she quickly responded, consuming the smaller lump into her growing sphere.

Back and forth they continued for a while as the day slowly passed, and a small part of Thera had to admit to herself she was having some fun. She’d never been able to treat using magic as a game before, and even if she did have a few close calls, Sachel had the skill to keep her from getting injured.

As the time wore on, the ball of earth Thera used only grew larger until she was managing something as big across as a person was tall, and she was prepared to put an end to their little game as Sachel prepared one final move, trying to outspeed her to bring her down from behind.

Thera wasn’t sure if she’d be able to manage it, but she put her best effort in, shedding the mass her magic had gained so she could rapidly bring it around behind her, only for her staff to finally shatter to dust in her hands as she did so, losing control of her spell while at the same time being knocked over by Sachel’s, who’d never predicted such a turn of events.

“I’m so sorry!” She called out as she ran over, fearing the worst. It had seemed like they’d gotten a good rhythm going and had been having fun, and she was praying she hadn’t just ruined it.

Thankfully Thera was understanding enough. “Don’t worry about it, I should have paid more attention to how long I’d been using the staff. I thought I’d be able to get a bit more time out of this one, but I guess I went a bit harder on it than I’d thought.”

“Oh good,” She said, filled with relief. “Still, it must be troubling to go through so many staves. Just how much mana do you have?”

“A lot. Anyway, it’s not so bad now that I’m a bit better with my magic and Ben’s learned some tricks to increase their durability, but it would be nice to not have to worry during my hunts.”

Saying that, she couldn’t help but eye the wooden one Ben had made Sachel from a fallen branch in her village's sacred forest. Unlike the ones she got which were plain metal rods, he’d taken a bit more time to flex his creative chops on hers, giving it a smooth, ornate shape with subtle plant carvings throughout its length to decorate it. It was almost surprising he could make such a finely crafted staff considering the hundreds he’d seen made for her by this point, but she understood where he was coming from. She needed function before form, there was no reason for him to go out of his way to make something that was so aesthetic if it would turn to dust in a matter of days after being made.

“Anyway,” Satchel started, pulling her from her thoughts. “Want to get something to eat since we’re done? It’ll be my treat.”

She had intended to end things when they finished practicing, but the prospect of food was an appealing one when she considered just how many hours there would be till either Ben or her aunt were able to cook dinner, meaning until then, her options were either to accept this or just snack on whatever fruits or vegetables were at home and ready to eat.

“Well, since you’re offering, I guess I can.”