Getting stronger

And so, the first week in the hybrid school was mostly over. For the last couple days, things went as usual, theoretical lessons with Mr. Black in the morning and practical ones with Lisa in the afternoon. We even continued training on the weekends but no theoretical lesson. There wasn't much to do, other than training anyways so nearly everyone joined. I had learned a lot in this week and could now see how weak I was before and how weak I still am compared to all the others and all the things out there in the world.

For the next couple weeks, training continued on and nothing too special happened. For some reason I was cursed with really bad luck and had to attend the detention class at least once per week. I actually thought I was cursed for a while. One time, for example, I got locked in the lunch room and couldn't get to class because of that and as I was finally freed from there, Mr. Black looked at me with an angrily glance and I already knew what was coming.

However, I got a lot stronger in these weeks and I even managed to get somewhat used to the detention classes. It wasn't just a punishment but also a great opportunity to grow stronger quickly. Thanks to all of this I wasn't the same small thin girl anymore. I grew quite a bit and looked way healthier or rather nourished than before. We couldn't eat to our hearts contend back in the orphanage after all. My fighting technique improved by leaps and bounds and I was getting confident, that no one else in the class could go up against me based solely on technique alone. However, because I couldn't use my celestial energy at will, I was still lacking behind. Lisa tried the awakening again every weekend and I could feel like I was getting closer and closer to grasping the dormant power lying within me, but in the end, nothing changed and I was stuck at the same level.

I could tell Lisa felt sorry for me but she also didn't seem to have a clue why I wasn't able to use it in the end. However, she was quite proud of my sword technique by now, as I was able to go up against her to a certain extend and even trade a couple blows before getting defeated by her. Instead of just swinging a sword, Lisa seemed to had taken a lesson out of the headmaster's book and gave me a long barbell with a weight fixed to the end. I trained with that thing for now rather than a regular sword. Whenever I held a normal sword again, it felt nearly weightless and I could apply more force than anyone could guess based on my physique. I certainly got a bit buffer but I still looked like a frail little girl and I didn't think that would change for a while.

Emilia saw even greater success than me. Her usage of celestial energy was on par with even her mentor and she was hailed as a prodigy. She also decided to give sword training a try but she clearly lacked talent in this area, so she kept training her celestial energy. By now she was also able to greatly buff herself and could even go up against someone like Ivan.

Talking of Ivan, he took Mr. Blacks words to heart and only focused on fighting technique. He certainly has a long was to go, but he would become a fearsome opponent one day, once he mastered his strength.

If I realized, if I really wanted to become the strongest of the class, I had to quicken my pace even more. It wasn't just Emilia and Ivan either. Everyone in class grew a lot in these weeks but one girl in particular stood out. She was called Iris and wasn't really talkative at first, but because of her amazing fighting skills she soon became something like a leader of our class. Some stronger students and she even created a team, which is something we would need after the next test in a couple months. Together with other students we would have to team up and take different missions from the military. The missions would be rather easy ones of course but they will be our first step into the military.

Iris was a tall slender demon hybrid girl with quite a muscular tone. She had blueish skin, a small horn on her head and a tail with a heart-shaped end. Her looks reminded one of a succubus but she was a very strong magical swordswomen, who fought quite straight forwardly. In these past couple weeks she mastered her magical sword and thanks to the training she had gotten by her parents since early on, her technique was very advanced compared to the rest of us. After a couple spares, nobody tried to fight her anymore as they all got humiliated by her overwhelming power.

The rest of her team consisted out of a healer called Althaia, who was an angel hybrid just like Emilia, however her abilities were subpar to those of Emilia. The last members were two strong angel hybrids called Julian and Lander, who had a similar fighting style to the one Ivan picked up. Together, they made a balanced party with the two boys at the front as sturdy fighters, Iris in the middle and Althaia in the back. They were looking for more members but nobody in our class was at their standard and for the first year we could only group with students of our own class. Later on, we could team with anyone we wanted but to create balance in the skill level of the parties, we couldn't for now. Teaming up with a senior student would make things quite easy after all.

Emilia was asked to join them but she declined and told them she had other plans. She probably planned to group up with me and maybe Ivan but I hadn't talked with her about this topic at that point in time.

That fact might have also been the reason why Iris was always staring at me with an angry face, she seemed jealous because Emilia hangs out all the time with me.

By now we also had some theoretical test but those weren't any problem for me. I easily managed to ace them with little learning because I was very interested in the different topics anyway. This put me at the top of the class in theoretical lessons but nobody really bat an eye on those.

After five weeks of nothing much happening, Iris decided to approach me after dinner and snapped at me a bit: "All your eating is for nothing, isn't it Yoru? You eat twice as much as anyone else and you still aren't able to keep up with the rest. So tell me why, why exactly did Lisa decide to pick someone like you as her direct disciple?"