"All right then, let's get this training session on."

His friends all looked at him a little oddly. Faris pegged it for the fact he got them up just before sunrise to do a mix of tai chi and the elven rimgar, Alanna and Dusan commented on how surprised they were at the flexibility of Faris, who had been able to stretch up to the third level, and applauded the efforts of the rest of the training first years, who had been able to reach the basics of the second level. Faris then taught everyone the sun salutation, which the elven children enjoyed thoroughly.

"So, what's with the odd faces?" He asked lightly.

"You just seem a bit grumpy." Morgan offered, smiling. "We hope you didn't force yourself awake for our sakes."

Faris shook his head. "No, that wasn't it, besides, a good bit of exercise will do us good, and help clear all our minds, mine included." He then proceeded to lead them into his daily exercises: push-ups, sit-ups, squats, pull-ups, and a lot of stretching. He was pleased to see Venka for the most part kept up with him, the first-years all were doing their best, but both Morgan and Nya cramped up after the sit-ups, and Katya almost fell doing pull ups. Faris remembered someone letting out a wicked fart, and watching as the area tensed up, before he calmly told everyone to relocate to a different section away from the smell. The twins were extremely competent at each exercise he introduced to them, their daily rimgar exercises, mixed with their enhanced strength as elves allowed them to take to each exercise easily, not even feeling winded after completing 5 times more repetitions than even he had.

After this came the training for mental battles, Faris would pair each person with someone else, in order for them to test their mental fighting abilities with each other. After explaining the purpose to the twins and confirming they already began receiving mental training, he decided he would test them. He knew that humans tended to lose themselves in an elf's mind, so he decided that that it would be safer for a more experienced mental duelist to face them. Faris found interestingly that while the two were excellent mental combatants, they weren't at the life or death levels he had faced before. Though even then while they never bashed through his defenses, he never managed to slip past or spear through theirs. He also gained a lot of insight from how the elves' dueled, unlike humans who normally didn't have the power to spare to risk their wards being used up, elves did not have that in the back of their mind, so their mental battles were more about the waiting game, a weak defense at first was merely a trap to lure one in, before they struck in a constricting grip, like a python around prey. If Faris wasn't already so cautious he would have lost right then and there, even then, he had to admit even if they didn't feel like the life and death level of mental combat he faced before, if push came to shove, he'd likely lose.

"So, which one of you is the better mental duelist?" He asked after breaking contact with Alanna for the umpteenth time.

"I believe my brother is." She replied.

"No, I'm better at setting the mental trap, you have better defenses." Dusan added.

Faris turned to look at his team mates, if he had to rate them on mental defense ability, Nya would be at first place, if Anya was a 100, she would be 65, which was generous considering Namor would be a 72, this was followed by Morgan, who was a respectable 60, Katya was further back at a 40, or a 50 if she merely concentrated on defense, and Venka was a 36. But even then, that much progress in two months was no joke. They had gotten into more duels since their last, and had won each and every one of them. Yet for some strange reason more students tried throwing themselves at his team. They would have back to back matches, as at this point defeating them would be like winning the lottery or finding the golden goose. In order to incorporate it into the training Faris had everyone limit the level of magic they could display, giving them trouble at first, they had nearly lost their second match because of this handicap, which likely got everyone galvanized to challenge them. His team had gotten a great deal of actual combat practice in, and Faris was appalled at the apparent level of Pearl ranked student mages, most of which were below Venka's ability now. But was even more surprised at how some of them compensated, two mages willing to share a mental attack could achieve feats greater than the sums of their parts, it was only barely greater, like if two 15's mixed their efforts, they may be able to achieve the level of a 40, but even then, that was something. But Faris had taught his friends how to not only block mental attacks, but avoid and redirect them, as powerful as a group melding their minds together to attack may be, all it took was a bit of forceful redirection on their weakest link to split them apart. When he had shared the scores with them Nya had inquired on his mental ability.

"Me? I'd say I'm around a 55."

"But you gave me a higher score?" Nya asked confused.

"Nya, have I ever fought in a straight forward way? I attack with physical blades alongside my mental ones, and a distracted duelist's score drops fast." He gets into a martial stance, "A mental duel requires as much preparation as fighting physically, if your opponent is stronger than you, beat out his strength with your tenacity and technique, I am not physically stronger than you, but after a bit I predicted your style and adjusted my own to meet it. I've fought plenty of people mentally, so I've devised the best attack patterns for each type. I'd put mental duelists in a few camps, the first would be the straight forward attack camp, they tend to strike as hard as they can, like a battering ram against castle gates, their defenses are equally straightforward, normally they are single images or thoughts or impressions, it is a very reliable and easy to learn mental ability, and while mastering may take a few years, the masters are very formidable, standing like mountains. To defeat them I employ a bait and switch tactic, while they strike at one section of my defenses I strike where they attacked, because those types tend to have difficulty immediately switching between attack and defense, necessity dictates then that they have to emphasize defense against me, and I take the opportunity to worm in and attack them from the inside." Nya's eyes opened wide. Faris smiled in response. "Yep, that's its biggest weakness, the straightforward types only create one layer of defense, so when it is shattered, they scramble to reform it instinctually instead of trying to push back or counterattack the opponent. But in so wasting the time the opponent wins the fight. That's how I beat you guys, you all utilize a variation of the straightforward type, I don't blame you as it's likely all you've been taught, and for people like Nya and Venka, it matches your personalities so it's natural you would be better at it than the other techniques."

"What's my technique Faris?" Morgan asked, Katya also looked at him quizzically.

"After fighting you guys, I realized that you Morgan, you seem better suited for the bait and switch, defense isn't your highest priority. You'd be better off creating weaker fake defenses to prepare counters. Imagine an army charging into a stone wall only to find that it was made of wet loose dirt, they crash into brambles afterwards, and after that confusion they are caught unawares as spearmen and archers strike at their now defenseless bodies. After this first assault a slightly stronger defense meets the crippled aggressor, cutting down whatever survived the first onslaught, then rinse and repeat if the enemy has time to regroup. You are a fast thinker, I noticed that whenever I made my way past a defense, you'd set another one up, it was weaker of course, but you still set it up, practice the idea of your mind surrounded by multiple walls, each layer slightly thicker than the first. Your goal is to frustrate the enemy."

Morgan smiled and thanked him for the insight, Katya looked at Faris expectantly.

"You have the counter style, your defenses are much better than your offense and your swordsmanship reflects a desire to use the enemy's strength against them, you are better off focusing on defense and deflection, forcing the enemy's mental strikes to stray too far off target, the mind is a fast thing, but focusing another mental attack is slower than hitting one home and retreating. This technique is best against multiple opponents because you can retreat into yourself to avoid the worst of their mental bombardments, and that they can risk accidentally hurting each other if there is a level of distrust, which unfortunately is a very human tendency. I need you to imagine that you are extremely armored, except for a fake weakness, when the enemy strikes, you punch out, not hitting them, but their weapon, as it glances away two more enemies strike at you, and you do the same as before, but this time bouncing the opponent's weapon into his ally, while you block their now weakened strike. Your goal is to lull the enemy into a feeling of victory and arrogance, only to finally strike when your counter leaves them shocked."

They spent the next two hours training, and Faris was thankful and annoyed that there would be no classes today or tomorrow. Faris was elated to see his friends had taken to his advice, to Venka and Nya he merely pointed out the biggest weaknesses of straight forward mentalists, and helped them learn to create secondary stronger defenses in case the first one failed. He also helped them with a technique he dubbed, 'mobile fortress', where instead of a single thought or image as the basis of their mental defense, they would concentrate on an easy to repeat phrase or song, this made their minds more flexible, and while they lost a few more times than before, they could also tell that the technique was many times better than their previous static defenses. Soon they started to give even him a run for his money, but he chalked it up to his exhaustion over the mental duels with Alanna and Dusan, who admitted they were going easy on him at first. Before this revelation he would have put Alanna at an 85, and Dusan at an 84, now he'd have to place Dusan at 120, and Alanna at a whopping 150. Even then Faris barely lost to them, who both were visibly impressed with his mental skills, stating he was severely undercutting his abilities.

"No no, I was only playing defense the entire time." Though he did admit to himself that he would have done better if he hadn't been hampering himself. He pushed that thought away, turning to his friends, who were now switching to the magical drills he had practiced with Bergan, the only difference being instead of fighting to train their stamina, they had to think up ways to solve complex puzzles within the limited frame work he gave them, such as taking a keeping the water in a cup and placing it in a bowl right above, all while facing off against each other martially."

Faris for the most part stuck to teaching each person the style he believed suited them the most. Nya took up Karate, Katya was surprisingly, or more honestly unsurprisingly, into the killing techniques of Muay Thai, and Morgan took up Taekwondo, he seemed to find keeping his hands free of utmost priority and Taekwondo's emphasis on kicks helped him out quite a bit. After spending a few more hours learning the basics of each move Nya joked that together they could finally beat Faris. After spending the next 30 minutes handling them all with ease, Faris allowed them to go and take a break.

"Faris, do you mind sparring with us?" Dusan asked.

Faris took the opportunity to fight against both Dusan and Alanna, Dusan was the better physical fighter, both due to puberty and being a boy, as well as due to his greater interest in physical combat, which he himself admitted. While the three of them were alone Alanna turned to Faris.

"Faris, you are extremely skilled, if not for your age I would have assumed only a master living for years would have this much knowledge and expertise."

Faris thought to the memories of Damien, he had stopped looking into that section of his mind for two months now, and had wanted to keep himself separated from it since the incident with Anya. Before then he had learned and revised all he knew of martial arts, Damien had been no master, but he had obtained access and had borne witness to several masters at work in their various masteries. Reaching Damien's skill level of first-degree black belt wasn't too difficult when he had a young flexible body and the ability to replay any demonstration as if he was watching in high definition.

"Thanks," He replied.

"Faris, I beg your pardon, my words still offend you today, it was not my place to question you on such matters." Dusan began.

"Dusan, it's alright, may we please not broach that topic?"

They sat in silence some more, before Alanna asked about human celebrations. Faris, eager to change the topic spoke of the harvest festival, and of the various religious and cultural festivities that littered the city. He also spoke of the honeyed ice, a delicacy served during the winter were snow and ice was gathered and sweet syrup was added to it to make a cold and refreshing treat. The talk continued until the rest of his friends returned. Training commenced for a short hour before they returned together to have supper and lollygag. It was an uneventful night, and Faris was thankful for it, tomorrow the training would be postponed, Lord Jaya had fulfilled his second promise and Faris was going to collect on it.

"Where are we going?" Venka asked as they walked in the slums of the city streets, towards one of the poorer districts, even then the streets weren't too dirty, but slums were slums and the people had that same look he had noticed when he accidentally got lost in the poorer section of his city: distrust, fear, envy, and an overriding feeling of exhaustion. Even then they had a pride as a people to hold on to. That didn't stop them from looking at the new faces with suspicious looks.

"The real question is why are we in these ridiculous rags?" Nya scowled as she wore one of the grey cloaks Lord Jaya had handed Faris, alongside a map of the city with a marker traced on a part of the slums.

"But you look lovely in anything Nya." Morgan smiled as he stated that, Nya only replied by rolling her eyes, Katya for her part laughed at their display.

Alanna and Dusan had tagged along, they themselves had felt some wariness about Faris, and when they learned he had made some requests in exchange for helping them through drilling Venka, they decided to discover what he wanted.

"Why are you all coming with me again?" Faris asked exasperated.

"Because one child in nondescript grey clothing screams, 'please kidnap me!'" Nya said annoyed. "I honestly wish you just tell us why you are here."

Faris didn't want to, because the reason they were here was because of a certain someone else close to him, even then it was promise that needed to be kept.

Faris led his friends past an alleyway, were two thuggish looking individuals slept. They had been awake and prepared to ambush the children they heard came from the upper districts, they had not been the only ones, 14 other men lay asleep. Faris didn't want any blood on his hands today, and wasn't in the mood to make a scene, so he had acted accordingly.

After passing through an almost maze-like set of twists and turns they ran into a group of small children playing and laughing, both Faris and Venka felt twinges of nostalgia as it reminded them of the children back in their home town. Nya looked away embarrassedly as she saw some of the children were running about in the nude. They seemed to be recreating the battle of Farthen Dûr. With one child wearing a light blue cape and toy horns made out of scrap, another two kids, one wearing a red hat, were fighting with play swords as the kid with the blue cape and a girl with fake elf ears made out of parchment leaped from a stack of boxes and the other child 'stabbed' his sword in-between the gap between the red-hatted boy's hands and torso.

"Augh! You beat me Shadeslayer!" The boy announced to the cheers of the entire group. Faris couldn't hide the cheesy smile that took his face over the cute display. The children began to notice the big kids and ran up to them, asking if they had any food or toys. Nya looked at herself self-consciously but Faris took out a huge bowl from his satchel, full of fried cakes he had been preparing the day prior, that was the extra request he had asked for, cooking supplies, but that was only after Lord Jaya questioned whether he really only wanted the magic books and his second request. The kids opened their eyes in delight as each of them stuffed their faces, then they grabbed the food and began to run back towards their homes, likely to share the spoils with their family. The boy with his red hat was about to run off when Faris called out. "Wait! Are you Dustin?"

The boy turned around cautiously. "What's it to you?"

Faris moved to one knee so he could speak to the boy on eyelevel. The boy looked at him with a mix of fear and defiance. "I need to talk to your mother please, it's very important." The boy's eyes widened as he tried to slip out of Faris's reach. Faris was faster, grabbing his arm lightly but firmly, with dismay he felt the child's bones easily, he was severely malnourished.

"I'm sorry but my ma is sick! Don't come take her away!"

"What do you mean little one?" Venka asked with concern.

"Aren't you the tax collectors!? Here to take mama away! Dad's been gone so we're out of gold to give! Please! Momma would work but she's sick!" He began to cry, the fried cakes almost dropped from his hands. Faris reached to grab them but it was Katya, Nya, and Morgan who reached them first, keeping the balls from hitting the ground with magic. The boy gasped in awe even through his tears.

"Take us to her." Faris began, smiling reassuringly. "We are here to help."

The boy led them further into the slums, until they reached a large set of huts, the second to last on the left was the dirtiest and most unkempt looking on the outside, but on the inside, it looked a decent bit neater. But even then, the floor was dirt except for cobbled stone for the kitchen and a bundle of torn blankets, rags, and pillows in a corner of the room, in that corner, next to a still burning fire lay an extremely sickly woman with dirty blond hair and pale skin. Her eyes were sunken in and her body was covered in sores. Faris turned to his friends and rapidly coached them on the correct phrasing of the ancient language to ward themselves and heal any infection already apparent. Faris immediately recognized it as murk, a disease similar to the chickenpox, only a good deal more painful, like chickenpox it was relatively safe if a child contracted it, but if an adult never got it as a child and received it later, they were guaranteed death without treatment. This was a disease that only really affected the poor, and it had decimated a few villages during the war.

Nya gasped in horror, and Katya held back puke as they saw the sorry sight the woman was in. She was still breathing faintly as she struggled to get up, only to have Dustin rush up to her, and offer her some of the food.

"Dustin!" She turned to look at her son. "Did you steal these!"

"No momma! They gave it to me! To all us kids! It's not poisons! It's really good!"

The woman's eyes were glazed and unfocused, but she visibly relaxed as everyone but the twins removed their hoods, revealing children.

"Thank you… I wish I could get you anything." She smiled weakly, "Please, why are you here?" The group turned to Faris, who swallowed uncomfortably.

"Are you Martha?" He began. After she nodded her head, he reached into his satchel and pulled out a brass locket and a bag of gold. The woman's eyes came to focus on the socket, they began to well up with tears.

The group was confused, all except Venka who had remembered when Faris pocketed that locket. Back when they had been ambushed.

"This belonged to your husband, and this was the pay he was owed, I would have come sooner if I could find you… I'm so sorry." He lay the gold down, the man had been paid 10 gold for his services, but Faris advocated they raise it to 100 gold, that much could take care of a family like his for more than a few decades if they were careful, but then he also knew the city was likely more expensive. Dustin was surprised by the sheer amount of gold, likely never seeing that much coinage in his entire life, but Martha was concentrated on her locket, holding it close.

"Was he, was he buried?"

Faris nodded, tearing up, "And the ones who killed him are long dead. He was a brave and loyal driver, I know this doesn't equal him in the slightest, but it was the best I could do."

She nodded, smiling, "Thank you," she whispered, begore slipping into a painful wheezing cough that made Faris wish to cover his ears and grit his teeth. He turned to Katya.

"Do the Protectors of Life know any ways to counter this disease?"

"No! All we can do is bolster the strength of the one who is afflicted, but she's so deep in! I'll try anyway!" Katya began chanting, her magic washed over Martha, soothing her somewhat as she relaxed, exhausted from the coughing. "This isn't good! We need a natural remedy to help her heal, magic can only do so much."

"What do you mean! It's magic!" Nya asked indignantly, she was now scared for the woman's life, the disease had taken her aunt.

Faris admitted that Katya was right, as opposed to chickenpox, which was a virus, murk was caused by bacteria that originated from the stomach, and while its symptoms were similar, Murk had a higher fatality rate and a surprising resistance to magical treatment. Angela had theorized it was a variation of another strain, that had grown this immunity due to years of experimentation by Galbatorix's pet magicians.

"Katya, do you know how to formulate the cure?" He asked.

Katya nodded seriously, but spoke. "I can't leave her though, she's on the critical stages, the stress of her husband's death had a negative impact on her illness." She sighed worriedly, "The training really came in handy, but I can't keep this up forever." Venka placed her hand on Katya's shoulder,

"But I can, please, let me help." Katya looked at Venka's determined expression and nodded, they both closed their eyes, Faris could tell that unlike his contact theirs was relatively shallow, which made sense as they only shared energy.

"Okay! We need these three ingredients, luckily, most can be found with the Protectors of Life, unluckily the last ingredient is only found in Du Weldenvarden or Farthen Dûr." The group groaned at her words.

"What is it?" Morgan asked.

"We need Tunivor's Nectar."

"Wait isn't that for curing the drug Skilna Bragh!" Faris replied with shock.

"A strain of highly contagious bad humors exist, which replicate the drug's effects and actually create it in the body, but in an infinitesimally smaller dosage." Katya spoke, sounding defeated,

Faris wracked his brain before opening them wide. "Wait! My master taught me a way to synthesize a replacement for Tunivor's nectar!"

Katya looked up surprised and hopeful. "How?!"

"We need raw Seithr oil, and Cardus weed, then…" Faris grew silent.

"What Faris?!" Nya demanded.

"We need Fire Weed."

Katya pondered, "we can get the Cardus weed easily, and the Seithr oil with some difficulty from a jeweler, but the Fire Weed is still a no go…."

"I noticed a bit of fire weed on Ventus." Faris turned in surprise as he looked at Alanna.

"When?" He asked.

"During our jaunt here, I saw Ventus in the middle of a hunt, the red plant's pungent smell was as clear as starlight to me."

"That does little to help us." Venka sighed. "We won't know where he got it."

"Actually, we could." Everyone turned to look at Faris. "Owls don't have the digestive systems we have, and they don't have the teeth to chew their food so they swallow it whole. So, they compress the stuff in their gizzard and puke it out as hard pellets." The group looked at him questioningly. "That day… he yarped out the remains of a rare bird that lives in the northern reaches of the forest, it's more common in Du Weldenvarden…" He stopped at the bewilderment on his friend's faces. "…Or so I've heard from my master, this bird has nests in black and white striped trees, and fire weed shares a symbiotic roll with its roots, preventing scavenging and parasites in exchange for the nutrients."

Morgan smiled, "Okay then, we have a plan, Katya and Venka stay to help keep Martha stable, I and Nya can collect the majority of the ingredients from the school, and Faris and the twins can go get the fire weed." Everyone nodded.

As they walked out the hut Alanna and Dusan raised their hands to halt the procession. Faris kept his face calm as he turned to Nya and Dusan, "New plan, we need you two to stay and guard the hut from the 'tax collectors'." They nodded, "No killing, but you can maim." Faris turned to Alanna and Morgan, "we need to hurry then."

They dashed into the open courtyard, Faris saw a hand reach out with a club only to spasm as a rock smashed into it, Dusan leaped into action, Nya at his flank, they went to town on the thugs who were surprised at the skill and ferocity on display. Dusan was untouchable it seemed, and Faris noted with pride that Nya had begun to incorporate a bit of the basics of Karate into her previously free-formed fighting style. Even with those two making the biggest distractions the three had to deal with some more goons attacking them. Alanna took the lead, knocking humans out with deft and quick blows to the back of the head, Faris struck them in sensitive nerve areas to bring them down hard, Morgan for his troubles kicked hard, aiming in between the legs of several of those men, Faris winced each time, yet also suppressed laughter as Morgan mumbled his apologies to each crippled victim in his path. Eventually they broke out, slowing to a walk as the men avoided them and backed off back into the alley.

"I hope they'll be alright; we aren't allowed to use magic in the city." Morgan said.

"That didn't stop you though."

"That was different, we were saving the delicious confectionaries you prepared for those children, how could we not!" He sighed. "That place! In this beautiful city, does our Queen even know?"

"I doubt she could do much to help it, we are at war, this holds less than 1% of the entire city's population, and there are only a few dozen of it. So maybe 9% poverty at most? Better than Galbatorix many would say." Faris looked at the people, all walking and doing business, unaware of the fight to save a woman's life just half a mile away. Faris turned to Morgan, "Are you sure you can procure the items?"

Morgan nodded, "I know a senior student researcher who's part of my guild, he's a gold rank but he's a good guy, if only overeager." Faris nodded, he turned to Alanna who nodded back, her eyes glittering in the gloom, the group separated, Morgan to their school, and Faris and Alanna out to the forest.