Teacher for a week(4)(corrected)

Arriving on the 18th floor, the two headed towards Rivira village to find a place to stay.

When the two entered the village, they immediately attracted the attention of the residents. It was a common area for adventurers, but when assessing the outward appearance of the two, it was normal for people's eyes to focus on them, plus the news of Mark's level advancement, again in record time, had already reached the village, making him a kind of celebrity.

"You attract enough attention." -Zoe told him.

'Aren't you the same?' -He thought to say.

If he was getting the attention of the female adventurers, then she was getting that of the male adventurers, and with more than good reason.

Ignoring everyone's gaze, they made their way to the first available inn and entered.

"Oh, Lost Prince and Titania, a strange combination I would say."

Greeting them at the bar was the rough, eye-patch-wearing figure of Bors, the self-proclaimed mayor of Rivira.

"We are looking for a place where we can rest." -Replied Mark.

"Hehehe, with a companion like that, of course, you're looking for a room where you can 'relax' properly." -Bors gave an understanding glance at Mark while peeking at Zoe.

"Two rooms."(x2)

The voices of the two overlapped upon hearing Bors' comment.

"Tch, how boring, I already had interesting news to tell the others."

He clicked his tongue displeased, but his mood quickly brightened as he realized he would gain more from having two rooms occupied.

Seeing how his mood changed when he received the money, both Mark and Zoe sighed but suffered more for what they had paid. One night cost three times as much as a good tavern in Orario and that was for just one room.

'Good thing we didn't come to make a profit, otherwise we'd be in the red.' -thought Mark sitting cross-legged on the bed.

With Zoe having used up most of her stamina to reach the 18th floor, they had opted for a 30-minute break, which Mark wanted to use to improve his mastery of the second stage of the aura.

He realized that with Infusion, he could improve both his defensive and attacking skills, although for defense it was more efficient to use Reinforcement, as it prevented attacks from having a direct effect on him, so he wanted to do more tests with Infusion.

'Inhale.'

Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and began to move his aura. It moved slowly but gradually began to move towards his eyes. Once he accumulated enough aura, he turned it into small filaments that began to connect to his eyeballs.

'Phew.'

Letting out a breath, he opened his eyes again and was pleasantly surprised by the results. It seemed that instead of eyes, he had magnifying glasses. From where he stood, he could see a small piece of raised wood on the floor or the dust marks left by poor cleaning.

'Let's try increasing.'

Squeezing even more aura, his sight began to magnify smaller and smaller objects and when he wanted to increase, even more, he heard the Guide's voice.

[The host should not exaggerate. Although Infusion increases the capabilities of objects connected to you, it does not consider their limit. The human eyes are an extremely sensitive organ, if you try to enhance them more than your body can handle, you risk losing your sight and that goes for the remaining body parts as well].

'Couldn't you have warned me earlier?' -Mark said, massaging his forehead as he deactivated the aura from his eyes.

[I didn't think the host would find it so easy to use Infusion.]

'Well, I have to thank you, and that day of torture you subjected me to, every movement of the aura was branded as hot iron in my brain.'

The otherworldly pain he felt that day was such that it gave him goosebumps just thinking about it.

'Knock knock.'

"Mark are you there?"

Hearing Zoe's voice, Mark didn't realize 30 minutes had already passed.

Quickly grabbing something to wipe off his sweat, he went to open the door where Zoe was waiting for him.

"Had enough rest?"

"Yes."

With that exchange, they walked out of the tavern and went into the woods on the floor. Although it didn't look like it, the 18th floor was very large and the village only covered a small part of it, and with the fact that monsters didn't attack unless disturbed, it wasn't hard to find a quiet place where they could train, in fact, they found a large area with no trees in between.

"Well, from what I've seen you do a good job as a mage, you keep your distance and think about the behavior your opponent will have, however, this is only limited against monsters. Against people, they won't be stupid enough to let you take the distance and against an opponent of the same level as you, who specializes in agility, you won't be able to escape."

"That's why you thought it was better that I fight you?" -Zoe asked him.

"Yes, I will put you under as much pressure as possible and it will be up to you to adapt to casting spells at the most opportune time. Do you feel ready?"

"Do your worst." -Zoe said, getting into position, her eyes full of determination.

"...I thought you were going to say go light, but even that, it's not bad."

With a small smile on his lips, he began to run toward Zoe. He wasn't using his full speed, but from Zoe's perspective, it was more than enough to take the situation more seriously.

"Earth bind."

Chains of earth landed under Mark's feet, who as soon as he saw them jumped to the side dodging and resumed running towards her.

"Multiple air slash."

Several blades of wind came out of Zoe's spear, all directed at Mark who dodged with ease. Since he could see the Falna thanks to his ability'Falna perception', dodging magics like wind, which were difficult to see, was not a problem for him, but he was once again impressed by the strength of these spells.

Seeing Mark getting closer and closer, Zoe began to pay even more attention.

"Earth wall."

A mound of earth generated beneath Mark lifting him up and as against the minotaurs, disappeared, dropping him.

"Multiple fireballs."

Balls of fire headed towards Mark, who watched calmly. He made the Falna flow on his sword, increasing its weight exponentially, forcing him to fall faster and dodging the incoming blows.

Zoe was momentarily frozen by the thing, she hadn't expected him to dodge in the air and when she recovered, Mark was already in front of her, ready to strike and having no time for casting another magic, she gritted her teeth to support the pain.

'tap.'

"Ouch."

"??"

Zoe rubbed her forehead in pain from Mark's tap, as the latter looked down at his hand more confused than ever.

'That wasn't what I wanted to do.'

He had intended to deliver a palm strike, restraining most of his strength, on Zoe's abdomen to get her used to the pain, but unconsciously his hand moved to her forehead.

[The host probably took pity on her.]

'Pity...'

If he thought about it, he had a point. He was so used to being with people stronger than him that now that he was facing someone who wasn't so used to fighting made it hard for him to overdo it.

'Well I think that's fine too.' -Seeing her still massaging her forehead, he thought there wouldn't be too much difference.

"You did fine, but you froze at the end, let's do it again."

Placing himself in the same spot as before, he waited for Zoe to get back into position before charging again.

"Sunlight."

A wave of light hit Mark who squinted his eyes in annoyance.

'Now I understand how my opponents feel.'

With that self-deprecating comment, he focused on Zoe's next move, who from the way her eyebrows were bent, still looked annoyed by the tap from earlier.

"Multiple stone spears."

Rains of stone spears flew towards Mark, who relied on his hearing to figure out where they were aiming and by making a few zigzagging movements, he managed to avoid getting hit and regain his sight.

"Sand storm."

A cloud of sand surrounded him blocking his view, all he could see was sand swirling fast.

"Can you fuse two elements?"

"Multiple earth spikes."

His words were met by her magic and even though he couldn't see out, he could still see the movement of the Falna so he ducked quickly dodging the three spikes that pierced the wall of sand.

Meanwhile, Zoe watched the cloud waiting for Mark to come out and when she saw something about to come out of the cloud, she threw a stone spear at him.

'Crack.'

The noise it made, however, was more like rock shattering and there was no sign of Mark's figure.

"Much better."

Hearing Mark's voice, she turned quickly, but what she received was another blow to the forehead.

"Ack! Why on the forehead!" -If she was being hit in any way she'd be fine with it, but this way it felt more like he was mocking her.

"...How did you do that?" -She asked him offended, as she held her reddened forehead.

"I imagined you were waiting for me, that's why I grabbed a large piece of dirt from the magic you cast at me and threw it towards the sand cloud making it look like me, meanwhile I went out the side and ran towards you." -Explained Mark in detail.

"...This time the victory is completely yours, but next time I will at least manage to make you sweat." -Indicating him, she moved back into position with a stare that said she would keep her word.

"Ptff." -Watching her momentarily, a laugh came out of Mark, but when he saw Zoe's gaze grow cold he tried to make up for it.

"Ah, I wasn't laughing at you, just remembering something from the past."

Unfortunately, his words seemed to have no effect, but it was true that he was not laughing at her. Looking at her figure, he remembered how Selene also hated to lose, once he had to play rock, paper, scissors with her for an hour until she won.

'It was something she already had as a child, when we played who could jump furthest from the swing, she would slam her foot on the ground angrily demanding a rematch if she had lost. Haaa I miss such moments.'

Remembering those moments he felt more serene, but it was better not to keep his opponent waiting as she seemed to explode with the desire to win.