“Master,” Jielin greeted, bowing respectfully as her right hand clasped over her left fist. On her back was a large sack which seemed very heavy.

“Mmm. You’ve done well to have won so easily. Looks like you do have the aptitude to learn my skills. What did you win from the tournament?” A small birdman asked. He was no taller than Jielin’s waist, with a head of sleek black and dark blue feathers, a tiny but sharp beak and eyes even sharper than a hawk’s.

“The prize for the tournament was the chunk of Gravitite ore master,” Jielin replied promptly, removing the large sack from her back and procuring a large grey and brown rock the size of her body. She did so with one hand, which to outsiders would have made her look like she had super strength. In truth, the massive chunk of ugly ore weighed no more than an apple, allowing Jielin to toss the ore with ease into her master’s grasp.

“Good good. I know a good blacksmith who can turn this into a nice sword for you. Anything else?” The swallow birdman asked, inspecting the ore that was twice his size in his hands.

“Yes. My father gave me 2 skyrite fragments and the village chief gave me 3 as a supplement to help improve my training before the main tournament,” Jielin continued, unravelling the string on her waist and holding a sack up. The small pouch jingled as the fingernail-sized crystals inside bounced around.

“Good. You can go ahea –“ the master cut his sentence short as he glanced towards the woods where he had been secretly training the young hawkgirl for the past 5 years. “Jielin, you’ve been careless. So disappointing. You let your victory muddle your senses, and now someone had tailed you here.” The master continued in a low solemn tone, shaking his head slowly.

“Come out young lady. I know you followed my disciple here. What do you want?” The master called out. Jielin’s face scrunched up into a frown as she realised her secret has been revealed. She had been training without anyone knowing ever since she met her master by accident. Her master had ordered for his techniques to be kept only to herself and that there would be severe punishment should she leak out his teachings.

From her original crouching position, Kina stood up from behind a thicket and strode forwards, surprising Jielin. Looking at the small birdman, Kina scoffed at his size, then looked directly at Jielin. “I want a rematch. It was unfair. You tricked me and he referee let it go. This time, I will make sure to beat the crap out of you.”

“Sorry girly, but I’m afraid the outcome will be the same regardless. If she can beat you once, she can beat you always. That’s the way my technique works. Unless you learn the same technique as she does, don’t talk about winning, I doubt you will even fight her to a draw. So why don’t you go on back to wherever you came from and forget everything you saw here.” The small swallow birdman stepped in and interrupted, causing Kina to turn her attention to him.

“Fine then, since you are her master, teach me also. I don’t believe I will lose to her again.” Kina demanded, pointing directly at the small master with a pompous attitude like a princess.

“Fine. If you can answer my question correctly, I will be willing to teach you,” the man replied, the edges of his small beak curving into a sneer. “Answer me this. What is the most important in combat? Strength? Speed? Stamina? Dexterity? Durability? Technique?”

Kina thought deeply for a while, considering her options carefully. Finally, after about a minute, she looked up from her deep thought, smiled and answered confidently, “Speed. With speed, as long as you are fast enough, you can always avoid enemy attacks and you will always be able to hit your enemy.”

“Wrong,” the master replied, shaking his head slowly. “The correct answer is Deception,” he continued, carefully studying Kina’s expression.

Kina frowned. She had answered wrongly, but inside her heart, she still felt unwilling. “You cheated! Deception was not one of the options!” She retorted angrily.

“Young lady, you can only blame yourself for being deceived by me. I never said you had to choose from the list I gave you. I merely asked you what is the most important in combat, and gave you some examples. As you can see, being able to deceive others always puts you in an advantageous position. Since you answered incorrectly, why don’t you just go on back home.”

“No!” Kina yelled back vehemently. “I’ve been tricked once, I won’t be tricked again! Fight me Jielin! See if I’ll fall for your tricks again!”

As Jielin sighed and stepped forwards, her master intervened once more. He raised his feathered arm to stop her, instead taking a step forward to meet Kina face to face, granted he had to look up while she looked down.

“Young lady. I’ll give you one last chance. How about you fight me instead. I’ll throw a punch. If you can take my blow without falling to the ground, I’ll accept you as my disciple. Agree?” the master asked slowly.

Kina grinned. While she had her powers locked by the restriction bracelet, she still had sufficient mana to enhance her body to a significant extent. Even if his punch was as heavy as a train, she was confident she would not be knocked over. Nodding her head firmly, Kina readied herself as the small master made some distance to prepare his attack.

Kina focused her eyes, more than she had ever done in her life. Her attention was all concentrated on inspecting every single detail about the mysterious ‘master’ in front of her. His every move was registered as he dashed forwards with a simple but strong jump. Kina saw, clear as day, the weight he put behind his dash, the slight shift of his left shoulder as his left hand began curling into a balled fist.

As if in slow motion, Kina determined her attacker’s trajectory, focusing all her strength into her arms to catch the fist and into her heels to prevent the momentum from the master from toppling her over. Her outstretched enhanced palm met his incoming fist. She smiled, while his face was expressionless. As her hand wrapped around his tiny fist, she braced her body to oppose the incoming impact, pushing forwards with her heels as her left hand extended to grab his shoulder and stop him.

However, the in very next split second, Kina came to realise her mistake, her oversight. The small birdman had swung his body around, pivoting on his fist that was tightly grasped by Kina and landed a kick on the back of her neck. The impact, coupled with her initial movement forwards caused her to land face first into the ground, the dirt finding its way into her mouth. He clenched his fist even tighter, managing to twist his hand out of her grip as he landed on her back.

“YOU CHEATER!!” Kina roared as she stood up in a rage. “You said I had to take your punch! I did and then you kicked me! It doesn’t count!”

“Hmph! Stupid girl. Who said you had to take my punch? I said you’ll win if you can take my blow without falling to the ground. Who said anything about the blow being a punch?” the master sneered. “I can do this all day. I already told you deception is the key to winning battles, and yet you still take me head on like a muscle head. The ability to use magic is wasted on you.”

“Rematch!” Kina yelled like a spoilt child. This was the second time she had lost in a fight and it did not sit well with her. She’s had nothing but losses after meeting this Hawkgirl and it was burning her from the inside. “You said you can do this all day? Let’s go again! I don’t care about fighting your student. As long as you beat me, I’ll leave quietly!”

“You silly girl. You really think you can win me? Fine then. If you can take this kick from me without falling, I’ll let you have your match with Jielin.” The master sighed, seeing how relentless and stubborn Kina was.

“Hmph! I bet he’s going to trick me again! Kick!? I bet he’s going to throw a punch instead,” Kina thought to herself smugly as she took up a half crouching stance to lower her centre of Gravity. Once again pouring her mana into her eyes, legs and arms, she focused on the chibi master who was already dashing forwards in an almost identical posture as before.

True enough, his left shoulder shifted, his left-hand clenching into a fist as he threw it forwards. Kina smiled. Just as she had predicted, if she was going to fight this ‘master of deception’, she was not to believe anything he said. His punch is a kick, and a kick became a punch. Kina threw her right-hand forwards and caught his punch straight on.

“Ha! Just as I suspected. Such a liar! Says he’s going to kick me, but instead punches. I’m not that dumb to fall for his trick twice,” Kina thought as she once again braced herself for the impact from the punch.

Within seconds, Kina found herself eating dirt once more. This time, she did not get up but instead remained with her face planted into the ground, blinking her eyes deliberately. She was so sure that she handled the punch. Then out of nowhere, just as before, just as she had gripped the man’s fist, he swung his body around. This time, though, his kick swept past her feet, tripping her and knocking her to the ground.

*Clap Clap Clap*

A crisp and yet slow applause rang out through the silent forest. From behind a thick tree, a young elf with silver hair stepped out, clapping his hands as he sauntered towards the young master. Kiefer had a sinister smile on his face. Were Isana or Sher around, they would have immediately recognised this signature smile of Kiefer’s which meant that he had some sort of plan in mind that would greatly inconvenience others.

“Ho? Looks like I’m not the only master of deception around here. Young elf, you must be quite skilful to completely evade my detection. Did you stalk the girls here?” the master asked in a bemused tone, clearly impressed by Kiefer’s unexpected appearance.

“Kina,” Kiefer called out, completely ignoring the master’s questions. “Looks like you got your ass handed to you. Why don’t you ask him to teach you? You might learn a thing or two.”

“Shut up dad! None of this would have happened if not for your stupid toy restricting my powers!” Kina quipped, clearly annoyed that Kiefer had been watching her failure all this time. She quickly stood back up and dusted her clothes, completely missing the shocked agape faces of Jielin and her master when they heard her call Kiefer ‘Dad’.

“So you’re her father eh? Never would have expected that. I was thinking it was weird a young girl like her would be wandering around all alone. I won’t even bother to ask how you made it up to Yurza or how you got past the patrol details. You are clearly powerful enough if even I can’t detect you.” The master commented, studying Kiefer from head to toe. “My name is Master Eril, one of 9 contractors of elemental lords. This is my summoned spirit, elemental Lord of Wind, Sayuri. May I know what’s yours?”

“Summoned spirit? Oh now that’s new. One of 9 you say? What are the other 8? Oh sorry, I’ve been rude. My name is Kiefer Trishen, father of Kina Trishen.” Kiefer introduced himself, while gesturing to Kina. “I have 2 requests as of right now, Eril. Firstly, could you tell me what and where the other elemental lords are, and secondly, I want you to train my daughter.”

“That’s easy.” Eril exclaimed. “The elemental lords are as follows, you have the 4 primary lords – fire, wind, water and earth, then 2 secondary lords – light and darkness, and finally you have 3 unique lords – time, mana and mind. As for your second request, that’s a no go since I really only accept one disciple at a time and have no energy to take care of another, especially a spoilt brat such as your daughter, no offense.”

“I see…” Kiefer muttered softly as Jielin was instantly wrapped up and bound in silver mana threads. “So if I kill her, then you will have the time and energy to train my daughter then?” He threatened. Jielin’s face immediately construed into a mixture of shock and fear, knowing that with an abrupt turn of events, her life now hung on the balance based on her master’s answer. With her mouth bound, she could only plead her master with her eyes, which were already starting to glimmer with her tears.

“YOU!” Eril immediately flew into a rage, watching his only disciple threatened. “SAYURI! Don’t leave even a speck of him alive! Tear him apart!” he bellowed as the wind picked up speed around him. Through the rise and fall of the dirt, dust and leaves, one could make out the occasional shape of a humanoid female formed by the wind.

With a thought, the wind quickly raced through the forest, weaving and covering all the space between the trees. Then, 3 sharp blades of wind shot out from different directions just as a blanket of dirt and leaves rose to blind Kiefer. As the blades tore through the blanket, the wind spirit proceeded to launch more wind blades towards the blizzard of debris.

Unexpectedly, what happened next left both Eril and Sayuri gasping in surprise. The blades that entered the blanket of debris came ricocheting back out and within seconds, the entire storm calmed down to a standstill.

“Sayuri! What are you doing? Attack him!” Eril ordered. He watched as his wind spirit soot towards the small elf child, only to back away suddenly, withdrawing her hand that had been outstretched to attack him. Quickly, she turned around and hid behind Eril, shaking her head vehemently.

“What do you mean there is no mana around him? How is that even possible?” Eril asked in shock. It would seem that he had severely underestimated his opponent, and in doing so, risked his disciple’s life.

“I see. So these so called ‘spirits’ are just a manifestation of mana with a sentient consciousness.” Kiefer commented as he took a step forwards. “Unfortunately, anything that needs mana is rendered useless once they get close to me. It would seem even your so called wind overlord will perish if she has her mana depleted. So what will it be now? Will you train my daughter, or do I have to kill both your disciple and your spirit lord?”

Eril slumped onto the ground in defeat, his wind spirit still hiding behind him. Silently, he uttered a complaint under his breath, to which Kiefer smiled and nodded. “Fuck… more work for me. Can’t believe he’s dumping the responsibility of disciplining his child to me…”