It took us the whole day to manage to properly internalize each other's positions to an instinctual level. I was almost positive we were doing it in a way that shouldn't even be possible, though I suspected the senses we got from the Fantasy stat were playing a part. Once we managed that, we were allowed to go home, with instructions to come back the next day bright and early.

When we did return, I got my wishes out of the way first thing, another fifteen points in Fantasy to shore up my biggest weakness, and because I was starting to see how valuable that stat actually was. I'd been using all five on the crew from the Beast Lord Garden, despite being able to spare two a day, because I really needed the points for the moment. I had to do three minimum, but I wasn't limited to three wishes for them. I'd be free to use those spare two wishes a day for Callie soon enough, just as long as I didn't push her past G-rank.

Today, the exercise had changed. The blindfolds were gone, in exchange we were expected to fight against ten Pavilion fighters without using any active Skills. Balam Mastery for example was fine, as was Gymnastics, but DS Mastery was out. I'd expected the training from the day before to be immensely useful for our battle, and it definitely was, but not quite as much as I had hoped. I was able to intuit and intercept blows aimed at Callie, but only when I could reach them, which with so many different points of attack wasn't all the time.

Abel, to my surprise, didn't seem even remotely disturbed by this. During one of our breaks, I asked him about it, and his response shed some light on things. "Of course you aren't keeping up." He said with exasperation. "I told you that the rock exercise was only step one. I also told you step two would involve combat. This would be that. Learning to integrate your combat style into a whole is about more than keeping in mind where your other half is and reacting when they're attacked."

"How to explain this?" He asked rhetorically, stopping to gather his thoughts. "What you have right now, is the beginnings of an instinct. You react when your partner is attacked, by that isn't true cohesion, it's just a learned reflex. You've spent years training yourself and being trained by experience to protect your own body first. Your instinct is to survive, and then to react after that. You still need to unlearn that. The reflex you gained yesterday is the beginning of that process, but not even remotely close to the end."

He didn't bother allowing me any more questions, just sent me back out to fight, but as I experienced things, I understood. Deflecting an attack against Callie was beginning to be instinct, but that was still limited. I was reacting, but it was because I was prepared to react. I was waiting for it. This was all still a conscious effort on my part, even if that was fading. It would take more than a few hours of training to completely abandon all of my survival instincts in battle and learn to rely entirely on a partner.

Even thinking about it like that felt...dangerous. So much could go wrong. That was the point though. Trust. Absolute knowledge of and faith in your partner. I'd seen what it led to during the siege, seen what that kind of combat style could become. Mel and Abel were monsters alone, but they were a force of nature together. Granted, the instincts couldn't be completely abandoned. I knew that. Abel fought alone at times, as did Mel, and if they had just thrown away all survival instinct at those times they would probably be dead.

I assumed that would be covered later in the lessons though. For now, we just had to focus on being part of the whole, on knowing each other better than we knew ourselves. As we fought though, that seemed to become easier and easier. The training we'd done together over the months and the awareness we had developed blended together into one cohesive whole, letting us operate on a level that was already far beyond what we'd been able to do before.

It wasn't enough. Not yet. These were Pavilion warriors, powerful and skilled combatants who focused on martial prowess above all else, and they were a unified fighting force. Not like we were trying to become, but they knew each other, and they weren't liabilities to each other. Our biggest advantage was in the Balam Mastery Skill actually. Callie and I both used Balam for our combat style, and the circular nature made a shifting front much easier to manage. Circling each other and taking advantage of this new defensive sense we had.

The longer it went on, the more sense I made of what Abel had said. I was waiting for Callie to be attacked even now, but it was an action I was taking. The downsides to that became apparent under the barrage of attacks. After I intercepted one, my body began to relax because I'd accomplished my goal. I wasn't in danger, and I'd defended Callie like I planned, so my task was done. It left me vulnerable for the followups and to attacks from other angles.

I had to continue to polish this instinct like he'd said, to become more in tune with danger to my partner and less in tune with danger to myself. It didn't help that my normal survival instincts were screaming at me to react to attacks on my person. Trusting Callie to protect me mentally was great, but it was harder to force my body to ignore danger, which slowed me down and interrupted my flow of battle as my muscles tensed. That might not be much normally, but against attackers this good, it was a big problem.

Which was the point. Making sure we had to perfect the skills they had started us learning to advance. I desperately wanted to use my overlay for this training, but I knew that having an instruction manual would actually be a liability here. I was supposed to be training my reactions, and being able to see attacks coming would make me dependent on that skill. So I just kind of...unfocused. Let myself completely relax and just take in information.

I winced as a hammer slammed into my ribs. "Sorry!" Shouted Callie, even as I reacted to an attack aimed at her back without even seeing it. My cane whirled up to smack into a metal ball at the end of a long chain before it could hit her skull, my instincts adding up all the little signs of the attack and reacting to them flawlessly. I shot my girlfriend a thumbs up, which she returned with a happy smile...at least until the end of a staff slammed into her eye, sending her stumbling back, cursing in pain.

I cursed alongside her, and followed after, knowing they would attack while she was distracted. "My bad honey. I'm having trouble sticking with this whole thing. After blocking the first attack my instincts are just turning off." I scowled over at Abel, shouting to my mentor. "How long is it going to take before we completely convert our instincts in to protective instead of survival?"

That got a laugh from the rabbit masked man. "What? No, that isn't what we're doing. You're learning to stay in that state for the duration of the fight. Completely abandoning your survival instincts would be crazy, and it would also take literally years to learn. That shit is hard coded into your body, it would take more than a few training session to get you to abandon that. Think of this more as a state of meditation you're learning to enter."

Blinking slowly, I nodded. That made much more sense. Thinking back, none of his speeches had mentioned abandoning that intuition completely. Just changing it. I probably should have figured that I'd be learning to do this for short periods of time. It made so much more sense, and it was much less daunting to think about too. I'd been worried deep down about the viability of doing something so drastic in such a short time. This seemed like a more feasible goal.

That was all the distraction I could manage before I took a blow to the side of the head. Abel laughed, calling over. "Do you really think holding a conversation right now is a good plan? You're having enough trouble with this as it is. Adding another person to take up your attention is bound to ruin the flow of battle. Not that you won't need to learn that eventually, but ignoring distractions is the next lesson. You have to walk before you can run kid."

Letting out a growl of annoyance I stepped closer to Callie. I couldn't defend myself, and if she didn't do it I'd be screwed, which meant I had to defend her and stop getting distracted by Abel's nonsense. I was distracting her too, which was just making all of this worse. My cane flashed out, knocking a pair of blows away from her and then whirled the other way, intercepting another blow from that damn chain ball.

I had to stop myself from freezing at that. I'd done it. Only for a second, but I'd been so distracted I hadn't had to focus at all on ignoring my survival instinct, just losing myself in the task of protection with no interruption. Callie's fist smashed into the hammer I'd been hit by earlier, defending me before I even noticed the attack, and I gave her a nod of thanks. That had been exactly what was supposed to happen here.

Which was frustrating because now I couldn't tell if Abel was fucking with me to see me get my ass kicked or if he was actively doing his job. I was beginning to regret this decision. Abel was an effective fighter, but as a teacher he was kind of an asshole. Alden was nowhere near this sadistic. Probably. Ok I still didn't know how many of those training techniques were real and how many were just him messing with us. But if he was as sadistic he was at least better at hiding it.

I lost myself in battle after that. The feel of the occasional painful strike enough to sometimes bring me back to myself enough to note when an hour passed here or there. I managed to fall into that meditative state he mentioned a few times, but every time it happened I noticed it and got excited, knocking me back out of it and usually causing me to freeze up and get hit. I really needed Jessie to patch me up, but Abel had forbidden us to use her ability, saying that the euphoria from the supercharge would unbalance us and skew the results of the training.

Finally he called a halt to the session. "Alright that's enough." His voice rang out over the Pavilion ring with authority. Mel wasn't here for this part, saying she had paperwork to do and that it wasn't necessary here anyway. As everyone filed away, Abel jumped down and strolled over to look down at where Callie and I were slumped, panting, on the ground. "Decent effort you two. I'd say at this rate you'll need three more days of this before we move onto the next phase. You have the rest of the day off, but be back here at dawn tomorrow."

He turned and walked away, missing my middle finger being aimed at his back. I probably could have told him what an asshole he was, but I was too tired to muster up a sentence, so I just let it go. I slumped against Callie, who groaned lightly but didn't push me away. Then I just lay there, sore and exhausted as my girlfriend reached up to play with my hair. I smiled slightly. I had to admit, this part was kind of nice. Still wasn't worth it though.