AN: This is a fairly short chapter, sadly, but hey. It's a chapter!

Chapter 9: Corrective Training: Jellyfish Edition

There were many kinds of thieves in the world, but the ones who stole a person's time were the worst of the lot. John had been overly optimistic about what he had hoped to accomplish that day. In truth, everyone was exhausted for one reason or another save for Honey. The Succubuzz was as cheerful and perky as ever.

Tera and Kara had come to him not long after Mindy had departed and demanded that he punish them for some infraction or another. The reasoning behind their claims that their pussies had betrayed him were thin to be certain. Still, he would have been remiss had he not made an attempt to mollify them.

Training had been called off until the afternoon due to that factor. Mindy had also needed a surprising amount of rest for some reason.

At any rate, the team had wandered off to the private training facilities that their sponsor had set up. Currently, the girls had moved to various sections of the training facility.

Honey acquired a serious expression, or as serious as she could make herself seem. "Honey can do this!" She moved into a martial arts stance that mirrored one that she saw projected in front of her. As the projection shifted into different stances, Honey did her best to match them. She had natural poison and healing related abilities, but she had little more than wild instinct when it came to physical combat. She was designated as something of a medic, but even so she did need to know basic hand-to-hand combat skills.

Kara spent her time practicing her aim. She was in a room that produced holographic images for her to fire at with a light pistol. It produced a realistic recoil whenever she fire the weapon, so it was almost like firing a real firearm.

Tera sat moved rapidly through a series of hard punches and spinning kicks while making an attempt to control her flame powers. At the final movement of each combination attack, flame would erupt in a surprising and potent manner. She created whirling tornadoes of flame, launched balls of fire, and even used the explosive force of her combustion ability to hurl herself high into the air in a jumping maneuver that made her seem to be propelled by a rocket.

Mindy spent her time training that evening by hitting the exercise equipment. John spotted for her while she used everything from the free weights to the treadmill. Currently, she was working the butterfly machine while she stared hatefully at John.

The Kraken's arms moved back as the weight was released, her impressive chest was thrust forward slightly in the process. John merely noted that she paused for a moment and asked her if she was too tired to continue.

She muttered slightly then returned to her training regimen. Why he had wanted her to work on weight-lifting when she would have to fight in only a few more days was beyond her understanding. Why wasn't she working on her combat skills like the other girls? More to the point, why was she not allowed to wear any clothes?

At first Mindy had thought that her asshole of a master had wanted to spend more time alone with her. She had quickly learned that he had a different reason.

"Good. It's working. Very good." said John. He eyed the kraken critically then nodded his head slowly. Her lines of force, or mana lines if you pleased, were fairly easy to read while she worked her body in this manner.

"See anything you like, you damned pervert?" asked Mindy.

John tilted his head to the side. "Yes, you are coming along nicely."

Mindy snorted then started to perform another butterfly press but her master stopped her. "No, increase the weight by forty percent."

"Are you crazy?" asked Mindy.

"Possibly, but do it anyway." replied John in a casual manner.

Mindy snorted. She had been working out at this level for the better part of an hour. How was she supposed to increase the weight by forty percent?

The weight was reset as per her glorious master's orders. She struggled to press the weight inward for a moment then sighed. "See."

"Yes, I do. One moment." John confidently reached out with both hands and began to manipulate her breasts with a purpose.

Mindy cried out in surprise, but it did not occur to her to pull away. The sensation was quite warm and pleasant, if a bit surprising.

John lightly swirled his thumbs around her nipples while he gazed intently upon her feminine architecture. He then slipped his index fingers down and he clasped her nipples gently between his fingers. He began to twist and tweak them gently. "Fascinating."

Mindy's nostrils flared slightly and her lips parted gently. "Are they really?" What was going on? What was he doing to her?

"Yes. My plans will work nicely." said John. He tilted his head to the left then lightly traced the curvature of her flesh.

"You—You've made plans about this?" asked Mindy incredulously. Had he truly been thinking of her breasts so intently?

She hated the man with every fiber of her being, but if he could appreciate her breasts then perhaps there was hope for him.

"Indeed. Alright, try again."

"Again?" She asked, a strange warmth in her voice.

"The chest press."

"You just saw..." she said in frustration. What, did he think that groping her tits would give her super strength or something?

"Yes, now try again." said John.

Mindy rolled her eyes then sighed loudly. She made a half-hearted effort to perform a butterfly press, but to her great surprise the weight was moved easily. "Did you lower the weight?"

"No. You were simply inefficient. If I continue to tweak you as I did earlier, you should prove to be much stronger and more agile than you were before."

Mindy's eyes widened. "You mean... You did grope me to give me super strength?"

John stared at her for a moment. What had given her that idea? He had merely adjusted her mana flow.

They began to train in earned after that. Periodically, John would adjust her energy flow and she would increase her capacity by leaps and bounds. The average combat trained Kraken had a minimum of ten times the physical strength of an average athletic human. By the time they finish training, John's hands had traversed every inch of Mindy's body.

She panted heavily, sweat beaded down her sensual curvature, and her cheeks were flush. "M-master..."

"Yes? Do you need something?" asked John curiously while he spread lightly stroked the inner walls of her maidenhood with his fingers.

She gasped loudly and her pussy convulsed around his fingers. Her sexual fluids gushed heavily and she bucked against his hand a little.

"This again?" asked John in consternation. How was he supposed to work under these conditions? "Calm yourself woman."

"W-woman?" asked Mindy. She was as surprised as she was aroused. "Did you call me a woman?"

John blinked. "Clearly not, you oversexed jellyfish."

She whimpered something about not being a jellyfish before she came again, hard. She hated this bastard so much. "Please train me more..."

"Very well, get on the stair climber so I can see your form in motion from behind." said John.

Mindy nodded slowly then rose up from the chest press machine and walked over to the stair climber. She turned it on then glanced back at him over her shoulders with wide and surprisingly innocent eyes. "Is this what you want?"

"Yes." he said simply.

Her cheeks reddened slightly and she stepped up onto the stair climber then began to pretend to climb stairs for a while as her master gazed at her from behind. Every now and then she would glance back and notice how intensely he looked upon her and her breath would quicken.

John had seen enough after a while then moved in to begin his next course of action. He began to massage her back where her tentacles merged with her body. Mindy nearly fell over as the sudden sensation worked its way through her body.

She gripped the rails of the stair climber and began to pant heavily. "W-what are you doing to me, you bastard." she whispered.

John gripped one of her tentacles gently and began to caress it underneath in a bid to convince the mana flow to become more efficient. "You ask a lot of questions."

"So answer me." she said between panted moans.

"I already told you. I'm improving your prowess." said John.

Mindy whispered something inaudible then started to put slightly more effort into the sway of her hips as she stepped along with the machine. It was an inefficient use of her energies, but John opted not to correct her as it did not interfere with the task at hand to any great extent.

Once they finished on the stair climber they moved to other pieces of equipment. Eventually, Mindy was ordered to shower off then head to the swimming pool.

The Kraken sighed languidly as she swam around in the luxuriously oversized swimming pool. She had not been in a body of water of that size in quite some time. She got around well enough on land, but she was a creature of the water.

John watched as she casually swam around with incredible speed and grace. Many things began to make sense to the man after a while. He had always thought that such statements were nothing more than crude jokes. However, it seemed that a Kraken's breasts and overly round posterior did help them balance when swimming. At the very least they seemed to help Mindy.

"Perhaps they aren't as inefficient as I first believed?" John studied the graceful form of his subordinate for a moment as she cut through the water with gleeful precision.

Mindy rose up out of the water sensually while in the center of the pool. "So, do you fancy my prowess now, Master?"

John inclined his head. "You've done well today."

Mindy quirked the left side of her lip up then placed her hands on her hips. Her tentacles pressed down against the bottom of the pool in order to allow her to perform that feat of strength, but she did it solely to show him what he was missing.

Just as she was about to say something about how he was so fortunate to be allowed to be her master, Honey buzzed into the area. "Master! Master!" cried Honey.

"Yes, what is it, Honey?"

"Look what Honey can do!" said the Succubuzz excitedly, before she took up a simple martial arts stance and loudly proclaimed, "Waaah!"

John waited to see if she did anything else, but all the blond girl did after that was turn and look at him with wide, expectant, eyes. Was that the extent of her news?

She began to look slightly nervous after a moment, and he did not wish for the creature to feel discouraged. John reached out and lightly patted her on the head. "Very good, Honey."

Honey buzzed loudly for a moment then lunged forward and wrapped John in a warm hug. "Thank you! Honey worked really hard for you, Master."

"I see." He continued to lightly pet her and she nuzzled into his chest.

Mindy took in the sight of everything that had just transpired. "Master, look at what I'm doing." She leaned sideways a little then lifted two tentacles out of the water. She was literally holding herself aloft with nothing but her tentacles. They were great for pulling, whipping, or coiling, but not well desired for pushing. What she was doing was quite difficult for her kind.

John glanced at her then inclined his head. "Very good, Mindy." However, he continued to pat Honey on the head as he said it.

Mindy blinked. That was her head pat... Not that she wanted it or anything. John turned back to the head pat thief then granted her a slight, nigh imperceptible, smile. Mindy's left eyelid twitched slightly. That bastard had just smiled at the little blond moron. He had smiled. She was sure of it.

The Kraken's expression became flat and lacked any discernible emotion. She began to tremble and her face became quite red. She slowly lowered her body into the water without moving so much as a single muscle other than her tentacles. It was like a statue sinking beneath the surface.

Once she touched bottom with her feet, she unleashed a series of frustrated screams. The screams did not escape the water, but copious amounts of air bubbles rose to the surface. An astute observer might have suspected that some sort of angry crab girl was crawling along the bottom of the pool. Those who might have been able to hear underwater screams would have potentially heard the words asshole and bastard repeatedly. However, the words "I hate you!" were the most common by far.