About a month after the group departed from the city, Elise and Nalia walked off to the side while Nina and Yura prepared the breakfast one morning. They were off to repeat something they had been doing once in a while during those days.

The girl unwrapped the bandages from her right arm and the fairy cast a very well controlled water spell to wash off the blood and pus that had accumulated. It was done so gently that Elise barely felt anything, and when it was done the duo was able to see the current state of the arm.

It was clearly recovering, but just as clearly still in a bad way. It looked noticeably thinner than the left arm due to all the muscle mass Elise had lost, some parts still had very noticeable veins covered only by the thinnest layer of skin, and the fingers were shorter than they should be, plus…

“Still can’t feel anything or move them.” Elise noted lightly.

Nalia nodded in response, she still felt a bit guilty about what happened, but there was only one thing she could do about it, so she barely blinked before using her magic to help Elise wrap a new set of bandages around her arm and setting fire to the old ones. Then the duo walked back to the others.

Elise found herself thinking of the training situation with the fairy. Nalia had already finished the process of optimizing her spells, as in they weren’t perfect but had reached the point of sharply diminishing returns. Nalia was also doing a lot of spars with both Nina and Yura, sometimes going all out and sometimes restraining herself to train her control.

And that was all well and good, but they were having trouble coming up with a new main battle spell. The dual wing magic had worked well up until Nalia evolved, but now it was simply far too rigid to be of use with the amount of power she had. The entire group got together to brainstorm ideas about which path to take next, but they were still at the stage of testing different things to figure out what would work best.

The duo sat down next to Nina and Yura, took the small (in Nalia’s case, really small) pots offered and began to eat the soup that was the lunch of the day.

“Hmmm, I wasn’t sure about it when you talked about using that lizard for the soup, Yura.” Nina spoke about swallowing a particularly large portion “But it really tastes good.”

“Yeah, I ate those lizards before, but not many times since they’re kinda rare.” The elf replied “And I already figured out how to adjust the seasoning based on your senses, so it was just a matter of being careful with the preparation.”

Hearing that, Elise felt herself blush slightly in embarrassment. She should have noticed that Nina’s tastes were changing because the physical training was steadily sharpening all her senses, including smell and taste, which made the usual amount of seasonings they used for meals a bit overwhelming to her palate.

The rabbit girl hadn’t said anything because she had a lot of other things in her mind, but Elise really should have know better since some of her sisters had similar problemss, but in the end it was Yura who noticed the issue.

At the very least there were currently no problems regarding Nina’s combat training. She had gotten the quickdrop technique up to a level where it was usable in combat and was still refining it further. She was also working on other combat techniques of her own invention, but most important was the fact that the continuous sparring with Nalia and Yura were steadily making her stronger, so there was no need to try anything fancy.

Elise was brought out of her thoughts upon hearing a snippet of conversation. Yura had just asked Nina why she wasn’t trying to learn about more techniques used by big sister Larina, the one who invented the training method she used.

“Well, she’s a dancer…” Was the rabbit girl’s response.

“Yeah, and a lot of her techniques don’t really fit Nina at all.” Elise entered the conversation “For example, ‘A dance for just the two of us’ was a skill that dragged her and the target into an out of phase world so she could dance with them without interference.”

“Sounds like a lot of work just for dancing with someone.” Nalia replied, already used to the weirdness of Elise’s big sisters.

“Well, a lot of them were part of groups trying to kill her.” Elise pointed out “So the technique usually ended when her partner died.”

“That sorta dance sounds way too intense for me.” Nina said, shaking her head with a smile.

“Then what kind of dance do you prefer?” Yura asked, grinning.

“Willow step. Or knockout in three steps.” Nina replied with a grin of her own.

Yura laughed and then said “Where did you find an oni to teach you that last one?”

Nalia noticed Elise’s confusion, so she used the mental connection to let her in on the joke: They were referencing a local folk tale about a super-strong oni who could knock anyone out in three steps.

The contractor nodded before looking back at Yura and smiling. Her newest little sister was doing quite well, and in fact, besides increasing her stamina and mental strength to keep up with the training, she hadn’t need to adapt at all to her new life as part of the group.

This was in contrast to Nalia and Nina, who had gone through bouts of homesickness in the past, plus some similar issues. Elise thought the difference lie in how she had taken the first two away from their normal lives and homes, while Yura had already been living without a home for quite a while beforehand.

Regardless, the elf had seemed like a fish in water during the previous month. She was getting along fabulously with her fellow little sisters (and had taken to calling Nalia and Nina “first sister” and “second sister” when talking about them), and seemed to be in a good mood even during the tougher training sessions.

In terms of combat skills, she already had fighting experience before joining Elise, another difference from the other two, so the initial training was mostly sharpening up the general skills that were harder to improve with just combat experience, as well as doing the preparations for the role of battlefield control Elise hoped she would fulfill.

In the contractor’s point of view, Yura already had the skills necessary, but things just hadn’t ‘clicked’ yet. Perhaps it would take another real fight to truly get the elf used to her new abilities.

Elise was currently in a reminiscing mood because she knew that they were almost reaching the next leg of the journey, and once the group finished eating and resumed traveling, it took less than an hour for them to go over a large hill and get their first glimpse of the Lotus Lake Zone:

In the distance, one could see two large lakes with a narrow path in between, and looking closely it was possible to see small islands on those lakes, but it was hard to tell just how big those lakes actually were due to the distance.

Yura’s earth platform took them down the hill and approaching the lakes before stopping at Elise’s request so she could let Nalia and Nina out to that a look at the area.

“So this is Lotus Lake zone…” Nina commented after taking a look around “Those two lakes are already pretty big, but I can see that there are tons more lakes further ahead, and some of them are much bigger.”

“Yeah, there’s quite a lot of lakes ahead, and if you don’t want to take massive detours, you need to switch between land and water travel over and over again in order to cross this area.” Elise said.

“... I can feel some disturbances in the flow of magic.” Nalia said, her hands shining with the glow of a diagnostic spell.

“Those disturbances are only going to get stronger as we head deeper inside.” Elise said “They are the reason why this area is so inconsistent. There can be really extreme differences in climate and bio-diversity even between neighboring islands.”

“Ah, now I understand why you wanted to come here, big sister.” Nina spoke with a smile “This is definitely a very interesting place.”

“It also serves as the border between the buffer zone and the country of Lordran, so once we get past it, we’ll be in a whole new land.” Yura noted before turning to Elise “But how exactly are we supposed to get past it? It would be tough to move with my earth platform over water.”

Elise shook her head “Tough but not impossible. This is gonna be part of your training, making underwater pillars connected to the solid ground beneath the water and using them as support for the platform. But we’ll use other methods to go over the deepest spots.”

Yura had began to look slightly sick as Elise talked, but got a bit better upon hearing that last line “Okay, I’ll do my best.” She promised.

“It might be better to practice for a little bit first.” Nalia pointed out.

“You’re right. Just give me a few minutes.” She said before creating a new earth platform and moving towards the lake on the left.

Elise watched her going before turning back to her other partners “I guess we could do some light training as well. Nina, practice some quickdrop drills. Nalia, you try practicing the myriad spells technique.”

They replied in acknowledgment and began doing what Elise asked. The contractor moved a bit to the side so she could keep both them and Yura in her sights at the same time and she watched.

The elf slowed down as she got closer to the lake, coming to an almost complete stop upon finally moving her platform onto the water’s surface. Then Yura took several more seconds to get used to manipulating the underwater support she had built before beginning to head into deeper waters at walking pace.

Meanwhile, Nina was repeatedly jumping up before forcing herself back down. To Elise’s discerning eyes her control of the technique was still flawed, given that it took almost half a second to actually begin falling upon triggering the quickdrop, not to mention how it took two entire seconds for her to reach her maximum falling speed, while a perfect quickdrop meant reaching terminal velocity in an instant.

Even with all of that, Elise was still satisfied with the rabbit’s progress thus far. Now she only needed repetitive practice like that in order to truly master the technique.

And then there was Nalia. Elise watched the whole process as the fairy extended her hand forward and manifested a ring as large as a (human) door made of brilliant blue light. All over the surface of the ring were small spell circles, all of which looked the same from a distance, but they were all different spells.

Half a second later, all of the spells triggered at once. There was a stone bullet, a fireball, a lightning bolt, a wind blade, a magic missile, a crystal spike, a sand rocket and more. They all flew forward, slowly coming closer together as they were all aimed at the same spot, but very shortly into their flight problems began to appear.

The lightning bolt was sucked into the crystal spike. The wind blade and magic missile suddenly slammed into each other, breaking both of them apart. The fireball somehow interacted with the sand rocket, making it accelerate out of control…

In the end, only a fraction of the spells actually hit the target (a nearby rock).

At that point, Elise’s attention was stolen by the sight of Yura falling into the water. It seemed like she had failed to properly manage the integrity of her underwater support as it grew. Still, she emerged a second later, already pushing herself out of the water with a rebuilt platform, and seemed determined to keep going.

It was a warm and sunny day, so that didn’t seem to be an issue. After seeing that, Elise turned her gaze back to Nalia and observed as the fairy tried that same technique over and over again. She was clearly improving at first, as the number of accidents kept going down with each try, but at a certain point she hit a plateau and her further attempts kept having roughly the same amount of mistakes, only different ones each time.

After a bit of that and another look at the other two to make sure they weren’t also having problems, Elise sent a message to Nalia in between her attempts:

‘It looks like you’re having trouble managing all those disparate spells at once, but how do you feel about the technique so far?’

The myriad spells technique was one of the ones they had theorized as possible replacements for her dual wing magic, but that was the first time Nalia was actually practicing it.

The fairy paused her practice to think for a few seconds before sending a reply ‘Hmm… I do think I want to practice this some more, since it’s good training for minute magic control, but as to actually making it my main battle skill… It just doesn’t feel right.’

‘Okay, I understand. Let’s hope one of the others fits you better.’

Nalia nodded in response before returning to her practice. Then Elise turned her gaze back to Yura at the lake and smiled before suddenly talking to her ‘How are you doing?’

‘Ah!’ The elf let out, her platform giving a lurch and almost dropping her before she managed to recover her balance.

‘That was mean…’ She complained to Elise.

‘I was just making sure you can handle sudden surprises when we’re actually on the move.’ The contractor justified herself ‘Also, you didn’t answer my question.’

‘I suppose that’s fair. And doing this is tougher than I expected. It’s mostly the issue of having to deal with the water mixing with the earth I’m using for the support.’ Yura said ‘It still wouldn’t be easy making such a large pillar move outside the water, but it would be far easier.’

‘I think you’re focusing too much on trying to make a solid support.’ Elise opined ‘The buoyancy of the water can help keep the platform on the surface, so you just need a small connection with the bottom to help it move rather than a complete support to keep it above water.’

‘… That sounds a bit scary, but I’ll think about it.’

‘Doing things this way will also help you improve your manipulation of portions of earth disconnected from the ground.’ Elise added before ending the conversation.

The contractor resumed watching her partners doing their own respective training for a bit after that.

+0+

After the practice was done the group resumed moving on Yura’s platform, first crossing the path between the two lakes and then straight into a larger lake that lay just beyond. Nina had returned to her Room, but Nalia remained out just in case.

Yura didn’t begrudge her for that, you never knew what accidents may happen, plus the fairy had even taken the time to dry her off. Still, no notable incidents happened before Elise asked for her to stop on an island in the lake that was about a hundred square meters wide.

The reason for the girl’s request was curiosity about the main feature of the island: A set of four large trees that looked like they were made of rock. And approaching the trees quickly made it clear that they weren’t merely rocks with a strange shape.

“They are… Alive.” Nalia pronounced after taking a moment to feel their energy “I’m not sure why they look like that, but they seem to work like normal trees.” That was a trustworthy analysis, considering the deep connection her tribe had with trees.

Yura, who knew about rocks, touched one of the trees and focused for a bit before speaking:

“Those trees really are made of mineral, metamorphic rock to be exact. I think they draw most of their energy from the magical energy running underground, and that energy also affected their growth to make them like this.” She paused for a moment “I’ve never been anywhere like this place despite all my travels. It’s really unusual.”

“Yeah.” Nalia agreed “It’s not just the fact that there’s so much magical energy running about this zone, I think there’s something special about the lakes as well that causes it to shift into strange effects like these.”

Nina had come outside to take a look out of curiosity, but she didn’t have anything relevant to add to the discussion, so she simply made a noise of understanding.

Elise was about to add in her own two cents with a possible theory, but then a sudden feeling of disturbance drew her gaze back to the lake, shortly followed by her partners looking the same way.

The reason behind that feeling became clear moments later, as a strange sight began to emerge from within the water: A rectangular concrete block.

It looked like something man-made, having a completely smooth surface and regular shape, like something used in construction, and as it emerged its size was revealed to be about double that of an adult human. But that wasn’t the only thing that was revealed, for it soon became clear that the block wasn’t merely emerging.

It was actually floating upwards, eventually rising all the way out of the water before stopping in place for a moment and then starting to turn. It turned until one of its sides was facing the group and then began to move in their direction, quickly picking up speed.

“Should I stop it?” Nina asked.

“Let’s make sure it’s actually a threat first. Everyone, split!” Elise ordered.

Nalia cast her usual boost on Elise and then the group split up, each one running off at an angle. Without missing a beat, the block seemed to choose Nina as the target, flying towards her at a very concerning speed for such a large object. The rabbit stopped in place and watched the block warily as it came closer, then jumped away as it spun in the air and tried to smash her.

“Okay, I think this qualifies as a threat.” Nina said with a grin, before dashing forward and unleashing a ferocious punch into the block.

Her move left a fist indentation on the surface of the enemy, along with some small cracks. Very little damage, all in all.

“Ow ow ow!” Nina complained, shaking her hand “This thing is waaay tougher than it looks!” Then she had to leap away as the block tried to smash her again.

“Let me handle it!” Yura shouted, quickly approaching on her earth platform.

Nina almost instinctively refused, but thought better of it after considering for a moment and wordlessly began to ran in the elf’s direction, drawing the block behind.

Then Yura’s platform erupted upwards, shooting her into the air in an assisted jump that landed right on top of the concrete block. It immediately realized something was wrong and tried to turn upside-down on order to drop her off, but the elf simply slid along its surface using her earth magic to avoid that.

As she was doing so, Yura’s expression was focused as she used her earth magic to examine the strange enemy, but then it shifted into a face of anger before she raised one foot before stomping down on the block.

Her stomp was much more earth magic manipulation than strength, so even that extremely resilient block could not endure. It shook violently as large cracks spread across its entire surface, then Yura stomped with her other foot and the whole thing essentially exploded downwards, splitting apart into countless chunks.

Yura jumped away from it at the last moment and landed on the ground, which shifted under her weight to receive the elf like a soft pillow.

The battle appeared to be over, so the four moved back together while still watching out for further danger.

“That thing was completely unnatural.” Yura said, her expression still somewhat angry “It was more or less a living being, but its only instinct was seeking out powerful energy sources to break apart and add to itself.”

“So it was trying to make me into scrambled eggs before eating me?” Nina asked with a serious expression.

“Pfft.” Yura couldn’t resist laughing at that, her expression clearing up “Yeah… Pretty much.”

The other two also smiled in response, but then all of them took on serious expressions upon noticing someone coming.

It was a young teenage boy, who appeared to be an elf and was rushing over to them at a pretty fast pace by ‘skating’ over the water, using wind magic.

The four were tense and prepared to fight, but that was defused by the boy shouting at them as he was getting close “Are all of you okay? Do you have any injuries?”

He also stopped at a reasonable distance away from there, obviously aware that they might be wary. So Elise decided that it was fine to reply:

“We’re all okay, but I have a question. Why do you know something happened here? Did you know that thing was going to appear?”

“Ah, not exactly.” The boy replied “But there have been several incidents lately of disturbances on the life flow creating dangerous entities, so we’ve found a way to track those disturbances magically in order to deal with them, and that’s why I came here.”

Hearing that, the group looked at each other for a moment.

‘Big sister, do you perhaps have some form of “interesting times” curse on you? Because this is getting ridiculous.’ Nalia spoke mentally.

‘No, my older sisters would have noticed it. I think they just rubbed off on me, since most of them had really storied lives too.’ Elise replied.

‘Well, regardless of that, we need to decide what to do next.’ Yura pointed out.

‘We’re gonna get ourselves involved in it, right?’ Nina asked in an impish tone.

‘Definitely. No way we’re missing out on something that interesting.’ Elise declared.

It was the start of a new adventure.