Training Start!
After saying their farewells to Saudia, they headed outside the city gates on foot. After some time, trekking through the small forest, they make their way to the spot where Roth was testing his magic before. Mina looks slightly exhausted from walking that far on foot. However, Roth barely broke a sweat. She sits on the burnt broken tree slowly catching her breath. Soon was interrupted by Roth tossing a dagger that was sheath into her lap. She looked confused and holds the blade by its hilt.
" I want you to try and stab me with it." Saying it very blunt with his arms crossed.
She looks up and back down repeatedly, " Are...are you sure?"
"I said try and stab me with it." saying it with a louder tone. She puts her mage hat down on the grass and takes the blade off its cover. She is slightly nervous but then dawns a serious determined look. She runs at him with all her speed yelling and attempts to push the dagger into his stomach. He sidesteps quickly throwing her off balance. She turns quickly to strike again but misses. Her frustration is making her lose focus and swinging carelessly. One big yell and again charges at Roth but suddenly Roth slaps the knife out of her hands and slaps her across the face making her yelp and confused.
She looks at him with betrayal eyes and a stinging cheek. "What was that for?!"
"To see how you react. And as expected you sound like a banshee trying to attack me. You lost your cool when you couldn't strike me the first few times. And you didn't anticipate what will happen next which made it easy for me to land a single hit and disarm you." Roth's tone sounds like a disappointed father. She continues to rub her cheek as its still pinkish red from the slap. He sighs and sits on the grass. "Come here. I also want to check on something as well." She slowly walks towards him cautiously and kneels. He takes his glove off and picks up the knife and cuts his palm deep.
"Whoa! What are you doing?!" yelling as she grabs his arms. He grits his teeth quickly trying to ignore the pain. He puts his palm towards her, " I'm injured, and you have to heal me quickly."
She looks panicked and quickly puts her palms out over his palm and begins to heal. The gash quickly glows green. It takes a moment before the wound slowly begins to heal and close. The wound is now healed but what's left is a big scar across his palm. He takes a moment to inspect the scar and gives a chuckle. " Not bad you weren't kidding when you said you had light magic." His scar palm glows green from his magic and the scar begins to vanish instantaneously. Mina looks in complete disbelief.
"You have a lot of potential in your light magic, but your physical attack needs a lot more prep. We'll see how you progress in that, and I may come up with something to help you if I feel you may be capped in that aspect." said Roth in a reassuring tone. Mina looks down defeated and feels more admiration for him. "Brother, how are you so great. You have all this power in magic and healing. You know how to fight and best of all you are so kind."
"Well...I wouldn't go that far." Feeling the awkwardness of being praised.
"But it's true. I want to learn all that magic stuff you know I want to become better!" Said Mina with a deep determination.
Roth looks at her with a disappointment answer, "I'm sorry Mina but in my case I'm somewhat unique."
She looks down heartbroken of his answer, " Is that also why you have that yellow mist..."
"Yeah, it does. Every being has mana and some greater than others that goes into specific traits. Some develop affinity for one elemental trait, and they hone their skills on that. For your case your special trait is light magic."
"So I can only use light magic. I can only heal?" As she looks into both her hands. Roth nods in her correct answer.
She looks at him even more confused, " Then how come you have more than one? You can heal, use ice and even lighting! What even is that yellow mist when you...you know."
"To be honest... I'm not really sure myself. Every time I slay an enemy that mist comes out of them. It goes into my body and I feel slightly stronger because of that. Or maybe it just refreshes my lost stamina." Though that was a lie. He knows exactly what it is but it's best he doesn't say anything. Trying to put his best serious face on and not look suspicious. He looks over and sees Mina a bit disappointed. "Hey that doesn't mean you just heal. There's a lot of things you can do with light magic and maybe even new things no one's tried. We just got to harness that power, you're already on the right track. For someone so young who heals at a proficiency level there's no doubt in my mind you can be strong in light magic maybe better than me."
She looks up at him with that disheartening look pausing for a moment. Then a big smile comes over her and hugs Roth. "Thank you, brother. I'm so happy to have met you." He gives an uncomfortable look at first but then hugs her back. "Right, now let's get started, shall we?" As Roth stands up lending a hand to Mina. She smiles and accepts his hand. The next several days were both of them running back and forth from the city to their training spot to build stamina. Maneuvers to dodge attacks by means of hand combat and knife attacks.
Mina was scrapped up a lot in her training but refused to give up on the words of what Roth said. The days turn into weeks and slowly she was able to keep up with Roth only a slight faster than she was before. Her other training was exerting her mana out without actually casting it. It would strain her a lot, but Roth put her at ease. With this method she can cast healing at an instant rate. Roth figured if a muscle works by tearing and repairing itself to be stronger, then mana should work the same as well. The healing part of her training made her squeamish. Roth consistently kept cutting himself open for her to practice healing rapidly and leave no scar.
Now Mina and Roth are facing one on one with each other once again. Roth staring at her waiting for her to move. Mina slowly breathing with her knife in her hand suddenly charges towards him. He dodges her attack but suddenly she quickly turns around and slashes at his chest barely grazing his leather armor. Roth goes on the offensive and swings several times at her. She dodges each swing as she walks backwards. He kicks the dirt up with his feet and blinds her for a moment, but she quickly retreats not putting her back towards him.
She rubs her eyes quickly and when her vision returns Roth is in front ready to punch her. Mina reacts just in time avoiding his powerful punch. Roth is continuously throwing punches left and right not letting Mina react fast enough. She then Puts her hand out and blinds Roth with a burning bright light. He backs away but then feels Mina jump onto his back, but he reaches behind him and throws her off. She lands perfectly onto her feet and throws her knife at him as he is still rubbing his eyes. He swats away the knife as if he knew instinctively. Once he regains his vision he sees Mina with a serious look right in front of him with another dagger near his throat.
Roth was taken back how unexpected that move was but he chuckled. "Better kid, you really had me going for a bit." Saying with a proud grin.
"Hooray! I did It! I beat my brother! Who's the best? I'm the best!" Mina jumps up and down as she sings. She is overwhelmed with joy on how far her gruesome training has come. Roth uses his appraisal on Mina and her level jumped significantly. Starting at only level three she has now reached to level ten. Roth just watches her celebrate in joy feeling proud of her accomplishment.
[TWO PERKS UNLOCKED: INSPIRATIONAL LEADER-PEDAGOGUE]
Roth's face was startled on the sudden perks appearing in front of his vision. He turned around to use his appraisal perk on himself to see what the perks actually do.
[INSPIRATIONAL LEADER: ANY MEMBER IN YOUR PARTY OR LEADING ANY GROUP NOT AFFILIATED WITH YOUR PARTY WILL GAIN A 30% BOOST IN EXP]
[PEDAGOGUE: THANKS TO YOUR ROUGH DEDICATION ON YOUR STUDENTS, ANYONE WHO YOU TEACH WILL GAIN A 20% BOOST IN ALL STATS]
"Huh, well that's pretty neat." Roth finds these perks very useful for improving Mina's strengths. He shakes his head remembering that he only brought her along to help him get out of this game. He goes back to Mina still seeing her being cheerful on her success. "I say this deserves a well rewarded meal. What do you say?" As he tousle Mina's hair playfully.
"OH. Pork loin with sauce and vegetables sounds pretty-" Roth looks away quickly feeling something is off. "Mina watch out!" He pushes her away from him and he backs away seeing a dark purple ooze splat incredibly fast between them. The grass burns and gives off a sulphury smell blackening the tainted area. Roth quickly turns towards the direction the ooze came from. Standing on top of the tree on one leg was a small woman with a pink oversized sweater that drooped over her hands looking childish. With black cargo pants and military style boots. The porcelain mask that had a smiling cat face made Roth shiver for a moment. "My, my. You dodge that pretty quickly, good job! It's not often you see people dodge one of my attacks! You are a strange one I give you that sugar cube!" She giggles fiercely covering her mouth. Roth Is on guard and feels some overwhelming fear. This woman is extremely dangerous, and Roth is experiencing that same fear in that cave once again.