"Alright, boys! It's been a week! Demonstrate your progress!"

"Osu!" Gon and Killua cheered.

It was almost time, only two weeks until Gon would finally meet Ging! To say that his anxiety was on the highest possible setting would be an understatement. He'd been focusing all his nervous energy on his training, and now it was time to show Killua what he could do! After Killua went, of course.

Killua stepped up, giving Gon a wild grin. "I've got my ability completely hashed out, but that's all thanks to you, Gon."

"Me? What did I do?"

"Be here with me," he said softly. Gon's cheeks flushed. "But also," he declared, voice losing its sentimental tone, "You reminded me that Mother Spells are a thing, so I decided to steal a page from your book and take the same route!"

Bisky nodded. "Mother and Branch Spells are the most efficient method of spell crafting. They are considered to be a Sorcerer's greatest weapon. Show us what you have, Killua!"

"Right!"

The Valkyrie activated his Ren, and drew a vial of his own blood from a pouch on his belt. Gon's eyebrows raised. That was a whole lot of Ren. Whatever Killua's Mother Spell was, it took a hell of a lot to activate. The vial was huge too. This was going to be interesting.

"This is a little something I like to call Godspeed," Killua announced, crushing the vial in his palm. The blood sucked up into his Ren immediately, the reaction fast and secreting loads of Magical aura. In a burst of light, Killua's body was enveloped in electricity. His body glowed a wild blue, sparks licking off of him. His hair turned sharp with static, and his blue eyes buried with an electric blue light.

"Woah," Gon breathed. That was so… so incredibly awesome! Killua had turned himself into a living bolt of lightning! No wonder it had taken so much blood and Ren to activate.

"The Mother Spell is Godspeed," Killua explained. "It covers my entire body in electricity. I gave my Mother Spell a function, just like Kurapika's Heavenly Chains. Godspeed shifts my Ten, transforming my entire Energy reserve into Electrical Magic, on top of turning the flow of my Ten from Raw Energy to this refined Electrical Power."

Killua held two fingers up, and a tiny bolt of electricity jumped between them. "Like this. With Godspeed activated, Ten, Ren, Gyo, Ko, Ken, and Ryu all use my refined Magical Energy instead of Raw Power. In exchange for all that, I allow the electricity to consistently shock my body the entire time I have Godspeed activated, so I don't have to drain blood the entire time like with Chrollo's ability."

"Killua, doesn't that hurt?!" Gon exclaimed, suddenly very worried. He was completely covered in lightning! Was Killua okay?! Gon's protect-at-all-costs instincts were running wild.

"I'm trained to endure torture, so this is nothing," the Valkyrie said nonchalantly. "Now, for the Branch Spells. Lightning Palm and Thunderbolt can be used on their own without the activation of Godspeed, but once the Mother Spell is activated, I can use them in the form of Branch Spells and they become a whole lot stronger."

Killua demonstrated, pointing his finger at a nearby tree. An enormous bolt of lightning exploded from his fingertip, reducing the enormous organism to nothing more than ash. Gon's jaw dropped, his ears still ringing from the blast.

"But also, I made two new spells, that can only be used as Branch Spells of Godspeed."

There's more?! Well of course there is! This is KILLUA we're talking about!

"The first is Whirlwind, which makes my reaction time a hell of a lot faster. In short, my Magic sends sensory alerts directly to my brain instead of wasting time traveling through my nervous system."

"Wasting time traveling through his nervous system." Killua is so incredible.

"Bisky," Killua said, "Shoot a Magic fortified feather at me."

Biscuit quirked a brow. They all knew that Gon and Killua were nowhere near fast enough to dodge, or even follow, her feathers. The Angel encased her wings in aura, and then shot a feather directly for Killua's skull faster than a bullet.

One second Bisky had thrown the feather, and then not even a half a second later Killua was holding it up, caught right before it had penetrated his forehead.

Gon's jaw hit the ground.

"The other Branch Spell is Lightning Speed, which lets me move really–"

Killua suddenly appeared right behind Gon.

"-fast," he finished directly into Gon's ear, electricity tickling Gon's skin and making the hair rise on the back of his neck. The hybrid turned to face Killua, but he was gone. Gon faced forward again, finding Killua back where he was. What?! How had he moved that fast?!

Magic.

It was Killua's Magic.

Killua was… amazing. Looking at Killua right now? Covered head to toe in electricity? He looked like a literal God. Gon had never been attracted to someone so much in his entire life. If Killua looked at him then he was certain his knees would just give out.

Gon was so proud of Killua. Happy for him.

This incredible person, this was Gon's best friend. Killua!

Killua was Gon's best friend!

Gon loved him so much.

Why, why was he so scared… Why wasn't he strong enough to just tell Killua everything?

Gon needed to do it.

He needed to tell Killua.

"Gon! It's your turn!"

The hybrid shook his head, he'd zoned out for Bisky's entire speech to Killua about his progress! Whoops.

"Okay then," Gon said, taking Killua's place in the center of the clearing. When he passed by Killua, Gon's eyes were drawn to the Valkyrie's face. They brushed past each other, the tips of Killua's silvery hair tickling Gon's cheek.

Gon's ears turned red.

Crap.

What was this all about?

Gon shook his head of his messy thoughts again, and refocused on the task at hand. All of a sudden… Gon needed to impress Killua. He needed to do it more than anything else in the world.

"One thing I've noticed is that my spell has a whole lot of wind up time," Gon began. "It's a lot of power, and it takes a ton of time and concentration to build it all up in my fist. So I based my Mother Spell on rock paper scissors to stall for time while I'm activating. I have three different attacks, all of them branching out of the same Mother Spell: Jajanken."

Gon settled into his stance, one fist cranked back with his other hand cupped around it.

I have to do this, I have to go ALL out! That's the only way to show Killua I'm just as worthy of his attention as he is of mine… I have to prove myself. I feel like if I can't do this… then I don't deserve the privilege of loving Killua.

"Now, show me rock."

Gon bit his tongue, forcing a shit ton of Ren out of his body at the exact same time. His power immediately began to glow a wild orange, gathering in his fist and swirling about like a ball of fire.

"Jan!"

The air around Gon began shimmering with heat as his Magic burned hotter and hotter.

"Ken!"

Gon braced his muscles, reading for the blow. The wind up was complete.

"Rock!"

Gon swung his fist hard, slamming it into a tree. A hole was blown clean through the tree, the upper branches shuddering with the impact. Snow rained down around Gon from the force of his blow, and the friction from his Magical attack set the tree aflame.

The hybrid stepped back from the burning tree, turning to face Killua and Bisky. "That was just Firefist, leveled up with all that training I've been doing. I renamed it "Rock" to fit with the Jajanken chant. But on top of that I also have…"

Gon settled back into his stance, charging up his fist. He didn't say the chant this time, just waited for the Magic to climax.

"Paper!" Gon exclaimed, shoving his palm forward and blasting a flaming ball of orange colored Magic across the clearing, where it destroyed yet another tree.

"And then…" Gon charged up his attack again, a trail of blood slipping out the corner of his lips. He was draining a whole lot of blood from his mouth.

"Scissors!" he exclaimed, Magic extending from his two fingers into a sword of raging orange Energy. Gon swung the sword back and forth a couple of times for demonstration, before releasing the spell and straightening out of his stance.

"Rock, Paper, and Scissors are all pretty simplistic," Gon continued, "but I'll be able to adapt them to a whole lot of situations. They're all designed to help with fast and on the spot combat. The wind up time takes a while, but I've been practicing ways to incorporate that into my fighting style. So… how'd I do?"

"You did totally awesome, Gon!" Killua praised, pumping his fist in the air from his spot at Bisky's side.

"I agree! You're Hatsu has seen incredible progress! I am very proud of you, Gon! And you should be as well!" Bisky cheered. "For the remaining two weeks that I have you, we will be practicing the use of your Godspeed and Jajanken. I will have the two of you spar with both each other, and with me. We will work on getting the two of you completely versed in each other's techniques, and practice fighting side by side with these spells incorporated. On top of that, to be sure the two of you are completely ready for chasing down Zodiac Ging Freecss, there are a couple of things I'd like to try."

"Oh yeah? Like what?" Killua asked.

Bisky gave a wicked grin. "Well, we haven't done many exercises revolving around the two of you as Sorcerer Matches, now have we?"

Gon blinked, "Oh yeah! We haven't done anything for that in a long time."

"Correct!" Biscuit declared. "I want to test some things out with the two of you, such as sharing blood and spells in general. The Gods only know what trouble you'll get into with Ging entering into the picture, we must prepare you for every possible scenario! Are you ready?"

"Osu!"