Faris entered the room, it was much warmer than before, which he was thankful for. "Good guys, I see you raised the temperature to combat the illness." He walked towards the group, and stopped.

"Hiiii-!"

Faris stared at Seya with a mix of rage and confusion. He began to storm towards her but Morgan stopped him.

"Wait! She saved my life."

Faris without skipping a beat brushed past and bowed. "I, don't particularly care for you, but thank you for saving my friend."

Seya raised one eyebrow quizzically, smiling as she noticed his clenched fists. "Did I piss you off in our earlier encounter?" She smiled at Venka, "Did your boyfriend tell you about his and my fun time?"

Venka looked at her blankly and turned to Faris, "Faris, is she making fun of us?"

"I think she is Venka…" Faris smiled as he began to chop up and clean the ingredients to create the synthesized nectar replacement.

"Oh? You haven't called me V since we met when you were 5." Venka smiled.

"I thought it was unfair to get rid of it, it's like an old friend."

Seya mock gagged at their display.

"Faris, can we get back to topic, are you almost done?" Katya groaned.

Faris walked over, handing Katya the synthesized mixture in a vial. "Just needed it to cool down."

She turned to Venka, who took over keeping the sickly woman alive. Her son, Dustin, kept a constant vigil over her, not leaving her side or paying attention to everyone else's actions. Martha for her part was asleep. Katya began to take the various ingredients and place them in a large bowl, mixing it while chanting healing and growth in the ancient language while mixing. Faris felt the magic going in and mixing in with the ingredients. Everyone held their breath as the concoction began to glow a warm blue light before it faded back in. When the brew finally finished Katya slumped over, exhausted. Morgan caught her before she fell.

"I'm fine, please wake her up, the sooner she gets it the better…"

Seven days had passed since then. Faris had a grand time explaining the attack by the Black Hand to the council of Thirteen. They had taken the news relatively well. Only two of them threatened to revoke his privileges as a student. But Alanna and Dusan's testimonies kept him in the clear. Vanir and the elves were upset at first, but the twin's glowing praise of Faris and the rest of their new friends eased the tension. As it was, they were barred from leaving the school grounds for a month.

In order to ease their worries, Alanna recommended sending Ventus over to keep an eye on Martha and her son. By placing a trinket with a tiny mirror on Ventus, Faris was able to see the goings on in the city whenever he flew around. He was thankful to find that his threats kept the goons away from that section of the slums. And was elated to see that in a few days the woman made a recovery. Faris spent the rest of the month quietly. He spent is nights reliving his life as Damien, he still somewhat had this odd partition between them, but it was no longer as apparent. This acceptance left Faris happier, and helped restore some of his skills in combat and mental dueling.

"Are you okay?" Venka asked Faris as they jogged across the track. The Pearl students normally skipped it but due to the hype of the grand games and Faris and his team's demonstration that increasing physical stamina helped out in magical combat, the students were inspired to begin to try. Unfortunately, they were all still quite terrible. As it was Nya was at the head of the pack, she had benefited the most from Faris's brutal bootcamps, and his body just beginning to start going through puberty so the First-Years began to overtake him, even Venka to his chagrin began to pull ahead in tests of speed and endurance.

"If you mean my head? I'm fine." Faris nearly lost his hand-to-hand combat session with Nya, and only won after headbutting her fist cutting of a punch. The others had begun to overtake him in the respective martial arts he had taught them, and the twins had already blown past him. This bothered him, but even more so he did his best to keep the others from treating him with pity. Even if they were more skilled than he was in the each of their respectively chosen skills, he was still an all-around better combatant. "I'm okay with the fact you guys got better than me in martial arts on an individual level. Besides, I'm a better mental duelist than all of you combined." He had even finally been able to best Alanna in mental combat, the twins were his best practice, and they improved all together. He had even learned elven swordsmanship, their attacks took full use of their flexible bodies and attacked at unorthodox angles. Faris slowly began to incorporate this into his martial skills. The difficulty of it is what let him excuse himself for the others surpassing him on the individual single skill level.

"As long as you are okay." She smiled, kissing him on the cheek.

Faris smiled goofily. The past month they had gotten closer. While he didn't think accepting 'Damien' changed him, he felt more confident talking to her and displaying tiny nuggets of his affection for her. She had accepted the incident with Seya with relative understanding and shared his distaste for the older girl. This acceptance of the incident visibly annoyed Seya, who pushed her way into their group. The rest of them accepted her easily, especially Morgan, who owed her his life alongside Bartholomew, who also grudgingly joined them due to rising classroom pressure to have groups.

"I still don't understand why you are all doing this." He huffed, chewing on a piece of mutton.

"I concur, though I don't need to attend this silly exercise." Seya was drinking tea, the two of them sat on a simple cloth, they had watched the Pearl Initiates struggling with the physical drills, and sarcastically clapped when the First-Years excelled. "I would have thought as much, seeing as how you all used to disappear into those woods." Seya smirked.

Faris for his part tolerated their insults, with them in his group challenges came less frequently, and he was able to focus on supplemental study. Today however Alanna spoke up. "Are you certain you two should relax like this? Even my brother and I partake in the exercises to the best of our ability."

"I'm not built for physical activity, and unlike you all my guild doesn't need its members to be able to fight." Bartholomew took a sip of his tea.

"Then what about you?" Alanna turned to Seya.

"Please, I'm stronger than any of them, you can ask Faris-boy over there, he's probably their most skilled fighter and he lost."

The others turned to look at Faris, who shrugged. "Yeah, I lost, she's kind of superhuman."

"And I don't believe any of you could take me on when I'm holding back."

"Oh no they could all take you if you haven't improved." Faris said dryly.

Seya smiled smugly, "I don't believe that. Could you beat me?"

Faris shook his head, "I'm not strong enough, but they could beat you."

"But you beat me Faris?" Nya looked at him confused, "How can we beat her, yet she can beat you, and you beat us?"

Faris smiled, "Cause unless she's got more than she showed me, she's not nearly impressive enough."

Seya's eye twitched, "I really do like you Faris, no other boy has infuriated me this much. You don't want to reconsider a… ahem, closer relationship?"

Faris turned around, "No thanks, I don't mess with psychos and besides, I find such a 'Daddy's girl' disappointing."

Faris counted to ten, turning around he kept his face calm as he saw his friends, pushing back Seya, who's fist had been closing in to striking him. She had her same excited smirk she had on when he first attacked him, looking at his friends, she finally spoke up.

"Fine, I admit they are all better than when I first met them." She winked at Venka, "Especially you Venka! You go girl! You've gotten better than the girl who fell for a simple sleep spell." She turned to Faris, "What are your rules?"

The first-years looked nervous as they faced down Seya.

"Are you sure we can beat her Faris?" Nya said nervously, "We literally fought you as a team a few days ago and lost."

"You noticed how you do better against me when you fight me one on one right?" He began.

"Well yes…" Morgan stated, "But you normally fight each of us one on one after the group fight, it should likely go differently if we started with the one on ones."

"Nope," Faris replied lightly, he looked over to Seya, who was looking at them with a lazy expression, she winked and blew him a kiss He waived back, causing her to cross her arms and look away. "If you remember, I stated my style of dueling mentally works best by turning the opponent's strength against them. You're all prodigies, so your understanding of your bodies has made it much more difficult for me to utilize that, but my greater experience is the only reason I still pull up ahead, in a few years I'll probably catch up again, but until then I'm okay with the way things are going, as the more skilled you get, the better we all improve." He looked at them again. "Martial arts were made for the weak to face down those stronger than them, but in the hands of the already strong it makes a powerful warrior. Seya is scary, and I believe she has martial skills similar, but she is sloppy, she overly relies on her strength and speed."

He pointed at Venka, "You remember the strengthening spell, right?" She nodded. "Good, you all should take the time to understand how she fights, be cautious and protect your vitals, spells targeting your opponent are not allowed, and this is purely a duel of physical skills, she's above your level in a mental fight."

Morgan, Nya, and Katya looked at Seya nervously.

"Don't worry guys! We've got this!" Venka smiled, patting them all on the back. She took up a martial stance, hands forward beckoning Seya, who merely rolled her eyes.

"I hope you don't completely bore me." She approached them causally, walking towards Nya, who had taken a stance of her own. "Come on then." She widened her eyes slightly as Nya's fist flew towards her faster than she had observed before, hitting her squarely in the jaw. She barely had enough time to block the second blow before Katya elbowed her in the middle of the back. She threw Nya towards Katya, and when they hit each other they tumbled in the dirt. She charged them only to be tripped up by Venka. Leaping back, she felt the back of her neck cool slightly as a large shadow came behind her, barely turning in time to block a flying kick from Morgan. "Oh! Aren't you supposed to be a gentleman?" She quipped, holding his foot with a shaking hand.

"I'm sorry madam, but my heart is closer tied to these lovely ladies, and my friend Faris." He used his grounded foot to jump towards her, pushing her back somewhat with his closed foot into Venka's kick.

Seya stumbled away, dodging their coordinated attacks with clumsy proficiency, their preliminary attacks catching her off guard and off tempo. Faris nodded in approval of his team's teamwork. Over the month the point of the group battle was to teach them how to fight as a cohesive unit and not get in the way of each other, his ability to redirect the flow of combat was the best training method, as their attempts to overcome his analytical and adaptive abilities served as the perfect catalyst to understand each other's tempo. He also had them spar with each other and sometimes with either of the elves to let loose. He narrowed his eyes at Seya's movements, she was fighting in a sloppy way, completely worse than when she fought him.

Is she really that bad at fighting groups? Then again, she is letting them surround her, though she's not displaying nearly the same speed she used against me in the beginning. Maybe they injured her?

His hope for that outcome was dashed when she caught a haymaker from Nya and blocked Katya's devastating low kick.

"Okay, maybe your little friend had a point." Seya smiles fiercely, her eyes taking on a more manic light. "You all are certainly are almost at what he was when he faced me, so fighting you four while holding back is stupid. To a point." She proceeded to punch Morgan hard in the face, he barely blocked it, being knocked back by the force of her punch. She went fully offensive at the group, who each individually didn't have the capability of stopping her. As it were whenever she began to concentrate on one person, another would employ a strike to distract her, either she took the blow or she dodged. She found to her annoyance that despite their proximity they never managed to hit another team member, almost as if they inherently knew where to space themselves.

That's prodigies for you. Faris had 5 years of experience in this world, coupled with another 10 from earth, mixed in with a photographic memory that could be instantaneously recalled at any moment. And yet they surpassed him in just a month and two weeks. Then again, they only concentrated on one martial art each, and Faris wasn't truly well disposed to any one of those martial arts, but his martial arts of choice weren't something necessary to teach them or accidentally expose them to, so he didn't use it when training them, it was by that nature unrefined then and dangerous to try and work on while actually fighting. He snapped out of his thoughts when he saw Venka get tossed into the air. Seya was going at the same level she went when she overwhelmed him, and beat them down almost handily. As it was, she could never take any one of them down as they were skilled enough to last long enough for at least two of them to recover and strike back.

Venka didn't like the look in Seya's eyes, and her lungs had begun to hurt, even with her breathing techniques Seya's speed was too much for her to keep up the natural flow and rhythm in Kung Fu. Whenever she was about to be overwhelmed though one of the others would leap in, she'd spend maybe a few seconds recovering while trying to get her bearings and position herself before leaping back into the fray. Eventually she raised her left hand, and stuck two fingers out.

Morgan's arms throbbed in pain, blocking Seya's punch was extremely difficult, she had almost broken it, even after all the strengthening he went through. I'll take care to leap with a blow like that, I observed Faris doing that to avoid the damage he couldn't block or dodge entirely. His concentration broke when he saw Venka raised her hand and made her signal. Seya caught on to his distraction and tackled him, but he had already seen the signal, smiling even as he hit the floor. He prepared his words.

Katya was exhausted and hitting Seya was like striking a marble wall, and she knew all about that. Faris had made her and Nya gather buckets of sand, carry them a few miles, then grip them, as well as punch the sand until their hands became ragged and exhausted, even after healing them they still remained somewhat callused. Nya had expressed annoyance over it but it grew to surprise and elation when she was able to break through hard wood tables. This excitement led to an attempt to break more things with mere punches, not the least of which was a marble wall in her dorm. She was lucky she had exemplary healing skills. As she punched and kicked, Seya tackled Morgan, looking around she spotted Venka's signal, charging towards Seya and Morgan she began gathering magic.

Nya focused on dodging, blocking, and countering Seya's attacks, she was the frontline defender and went down the least amount of times, much to Seya's anger and surprise. She favor's her left hand, but she's right-handed? Oh, it was a bait and switch, wow! Okay, she's understood low kicks, so perhaps a high kick followed by intermediate punch? Success! She punched Seya in the stomach just before she could overwhelm Nya, allowing her to rest for a bit. She widened her eyes when Nya raised her hand, then leaped in the air, coming down with a flying kick as she uttered, "Ramr edtha!" (strengthen me)

Seya widened her eyes as they all uttered the same phrase. Then looked in surprise as Morgan nearly overpowered her. Even then she barely blocked Nya and Katya's combined punches, having to leap back for fear of hurting herself. Venka was the fastest, pouring the most magic into maintaining the spell she used a leaping spinning kick, the first strike catching Seya on the chin, and the second connecting with her chest. As Seya flew back, she began leaping back, avoiding the team, who now were on the offensive.

"Try a taste of your own medicine." Faris smiled. Seya was strong and she had the second most magic of any human he'd ever had to connect minds to, Venka of course was the first. He immediately suspected she used magic to increase her strength and speed, even then to move as consistently as she did require patients and discipline, the tight bandages under her robes were likely to help hold her together over anything else, but given her personality it could be something more risqué. As it was Nya was already quite skilled in strengthening the body, it was a staple of the Wandering Blade, but the others weren't so skilled, so Nya would be the impotence, while Venka would provide some additional power and Katya would cast a concurrent spell to slightly increase their durability to handle this increased strength for a greater amount of time. This technique proved troublesome for even Dusan to take on, there was no way Seya could handle them, was his thought.

Seya leaped back further and faster than they attacked. Barely looking up in time to see Venka send a flying punch her way. Blocking it left her open to a leg strike from Katya, which nearly shattered her shin, Morgan's leg sweep finished the job causing her to yelp in pain. Nya unleashed a flurry of kicks and punches in tandem with Venka, covering Seya in awful bruises before kicking her away. As she flew back, they charged her to deal a finishing blow, and her hair turned white. Just as Seya hit the ground, she all of a sudden was far behind the group. She lifted her leg, watching disinterestedly as the limp thing cracked and snapped as the bone set into place then healed. She turned to the group, sending shiver's up their spines. She was smiling as if in ecstasy. Her facial expression of pure pleasure and bliss made Faris extremely uncomfortable and worried as she lowered her body, extending her hand and index finger, beckoning the group forward. They for the most part charged her. She now dodged them with ease, Faris noticed her dodges were much more wasteful, before when she would only try to side step and get behind them, she made large elaborate acrobatic leaps in the air. He then began to notice that with each leap in the air as she spun one of her hands loosely smacked one of the combatants.

She's playing with them! He thought panicked. They seemed to share the sentiment as the four attacked her with greater levels of ferocity, sparing more power into the spells. Soon their speed and strength almost began to reach the levels of elves, but it was too their detriment, it was too fast for their normal brains to react to, they weren't used to moving so fast, Seya though definitely was.

"She's incredibly strong." Alanna breathed.

"Yes, in fact, she could probably put a scratch on Vanir, of course, he would win." Dusan added.

Eventually One by one, they fell, first was Morgan, then Katya, then Nya, until Venka was left, looking visibly exhausted.

"She used too much magic to keep all of them moving at such unsustainable speeds while healing and maintaining their bodies." Dusan commented, "I don't think my sister and I could have kept that up for so long."

Venka continued to fight, taking huge blows from Seya, who was taking her time breaking down the younger fighter's foundation.

"She's toying with her." Faris began to run towards the fighting stage only to have Alanna stop her. "But she's going to get seriously hurt! It's over!"

"I don't think she's ready…"

Faris turned to see that Venka still had a fierce expression on her face even with the bloody nose Seya had just given her. He cursed angrily, folding his arms to watch the rest of the fight, ready to spring in when it got ugly.

Venka was hurting all over, her lungs were on fire, she had a headache, both from the concentration of keeping the magic going, but from her head pounding from taking those multiple blows. Her arms and legs even while moving so quickly threatened to rip apart every few seconds, and every strike Seya made huge divots into her vast supply of magical energy. She knew she was more powerful magically, but she hadn't been able to land a single blow since Seya's hair turned white. She remembered the times she sparred with Faris, he had by now after training them begun to lag behind them on a physical level. He was no longer first in races and exercises of endurance, even she had overtaken him. That didn't make him a slouch, he always tried harder than everyone else, even when he was comfortably ahead, he had just trained them as hard as he trained, and his body couldn't keep up like theirs could. This illuminated the true nature of his debilitating physique, he had always made comments that he would be stronger if not for it, and she didn't truly understand until seeing how after following his same regimen she had reached this level. Even then he won his fights because he knew his body, and he knew them inside out. It scared her to know that he could anticipate all her moves as if his mind was still connected to hers. And she had resented his ability to switch from an aggressive adaptive style to a more agile, freeform counter-and-retreat style of fighting, like he was two different people, but right now she really wished he had been with them. She had seen him approach and was thankful that Alanna stopped him, she needed to see this through, and it would be insulting to Faris if they who had overtaken him physically couldn't handle one person on their own.

"Are you sure you wish to keep going?" Seya's face was awash in pure ecstasy, shivering in the pleasure of beating down the annoyingly stubborn girl before her, she almost never used this technique, and the energy drain would leave her sluggish, but it was very much worth it to knock down the girl everyone seemed to gush over. Before Venka had come Seya was the special prodigy child, surviving the hurdles her father placed before her to reach this level, Venka deserved none of that, she had done nothing, simply being born with high magic." She spit on Venka's face, but was surprised to see the girl didn't rise to her bait, fighting more conservatively now, trading blow for blow and minimizing any strikes to vital areas. She still has more magic than I do even now… and my father would call me a monster? She began to concentrate energy into her right palm, preparing a strengthening spell, it was an all or nothing fight now.

Venka did her best to hold her temper as she wiped the spit from her face. Faris had taught her to fight smart, and she was determined to express the fruits of her labor. She's desperate, she's trying to rile me up, she's probably burning through a lot of magic to be moving that fast, I'm at least a dozen times stronger, as long as I wait it out, I can win.

Venka blinked as she looked at the sky. Wait why am I looking at the sky? She barely rolled out of the way as a leg broke through the ground besides her. She was on the floor. How! She scrabbled up, paying attention now to see that Seya was moving even faster than before, hitting her with multiple blows before knocking her down. Venka felt the huge dip in her wards, her concentration had lapsed before, she had blacked out mid fight to find herself in that position. As she leaped back Seya charged towards her at the speed of an elf, tackling her to the ground and beginning a vicious pummel. Venka for the most part attempted to block, until she screamed out. "Deloi Moi!" The earth under her shifted forward like she was on a high-speed conveyer belt, causing Seya to stumble off of her. Venka was ready for the next charge, keeping herself from tripping over, but not avoiding the black eye Seya gave her. The next attack broke her right leg, before she could heal it Seya hit her in the face hard enough to make her see stars. Her head exploded in pain as it snapped back, she stubbled, sustaining her weight on her good leg. Seya charged towards her for a knockout punch straight for her face.

"Venka!" Faris screamed.

"Venka!" Faris screamed. Venka jumped, startled, it had been the fifth day of her learning Kung Fu, she had started to get bored of the basics. "Pay attention." Faris chided her, shaking his head.

"Come on!" She groaned. "Teach me something cool!"

"That's what I've been trying to do, stop gawking at the forest, I know it's cool and all but you have to pay attention."

She frowned, Faris had been short-tempered as of late, maybe Nya's insult affected him more than he admitted. She had spoken to Morgan about it and he had promised to broach the topic to Nya, who promised to speak to him tomorrow.

"Okay, fine, what do I need you to do."

"I need you to punch-" Venka found her face on the dirt as Faris countered her punch and pinned her. "Thank you for the enthusiasm, but that was too early on the punch." He let her go and she got up red-faced. "How about you do it slowly so I can show you what I did?"

She complied, giving a straight punch, she watched in surprise as his arm got to the outside side of her arm, and corkscrewed around it, like he was wiping snow from a window, moving her arm to the side and taking her off balance, while she was off balance his other arm gently pressed down on her, and she despite her best efforts fell again.

"Woah! How'd you do that?"

Faris smiled, "This is why you needed to build the basics to understand the form and stance, you block it by letting it slide over your forearm, much like a sword or spear, it's easier to bat away the tip than the hilt, then you use your arm in conjunction with your hips to twist it away, grabbing and pulling your opponent forward, if they threw their weight into the punch, which they likely would have, this makes it easier to get them off balance, then simply press down with your opposing elbow to knock them down." He repeated his movements slowly, "Twist the arm so their palm is up, foot in front of theirs." Venka's face heated up as he got close. "Then," He continued, oblivious, "You use your forearm on their triceps, press down as they are imbalanced."

"Then?" She asked, facing away from him.

"Then, make sure your knee is in contact with the back of their leg as they go down, it keeps them from using their strength to get back up, once you do so, they'll likely be too surprised to react to your next move." He let her go.

"Okay then!" She got up.

"I'm glad you're excited, alright then I'll punch you slowly so you can get the hang of it…"

Seya's eyes widened as Venka's hand whipped past her own in a deliberate sweeping motion, then before she could do anything Venka pulled her in and twisted her punch painfully. Before she could process Venka brought her broken leg over hers and her other arm just under her shoulder, pushing her to the floor, she collapsed with Venka on top of her, who took the opportunity to then punch her hard in the face twice before aiming a precise blow to her chin. Seya's eyes glazed over and rolled to the back of her head.

Venka breathed hard over Seya's unmoving body, lowering her head she could hear the older girl still breathing, and she got up slowly. Just before she collapsed Faris was on her, holding her and healing the broken leg.

"Hey…"

He didn't respond, he was tending to her wounds.

"Hey."

Still nothing.

"Hey!" His head snapped up, the tears glistening. "People are watching… You're making a scene." She whispered, grinning.

"To hell with that!" He scowled. "You guys did fantastic." He rubbed the tears away.

The rest of the group could only raise their hands in exhausted comradery. When Venka had to stop supporting their ability they could only last a minute or so longer before collapsing. Nya could last a bit longer but she didn't have the stamina to keep going and sustain Seya's hits. She shook her head in amazement, "man, you're the real hero Venka."

Venka shook her head. "During that last charge she stumbled forward, she hadn't completely fixed up the leg Katya and Morgan broke, and the bruise you left on her forearm was still there. I wouldn't have been able to counter if she hadn't slowed down last minute."

They laughed a bit. The other students watched them with awe, envy, and hatred. Some began whispering to each other. "Hey… they're exhausted, they shouldn't be able to recover anytime soon, let's challenge them for tomorrow!"

Alanna shook her head. "Humans really are odd, some exemplify the worse aspects."

Dusan thought back to the incident with Martha, "Some do good when they can."

They smiled to each other, "And then some are in the middle."

Seya opened her eyes suddenly and leaped up. Her hair began reverting to its natural black coloration. She looked over the exhausted first-years, who flinched at her piercing gazes before she turned her eyes to Venka. She walked over. Faris stood to block her and barely blocked a fist to the side of the heads, stumbling to the side as she turned her attention back to Venka. She bowed, surprising almost everyone watching except Venka and the elves.

"Well, I lost to you four, looks like your boyfriend was right." Seya smiled.

"He's not my boyfriend, yet." Venka replied with an equally fierce smile. They shook hands.

Faris's head swam, but he was ultimately happy that Seya did not attempt to retaliate for her loss.

Yet!? He thought, face heating up.

"Oh?! Then He's still free, anyone capable of turning someone like you into a decent fighter is definitely useful, weak or not."

"Please, like you could entertain him, despite your age you lack the fruits of achievement." Venka added, eyes twinkling fiercely.

"Honey, as you get older you realize that those assets aren't as useful as you may think, people may pick a book for it's pretty cover, but its content is what drives them in."

Katya looked at them confused. "What are you talking about?"

Venka and Seya both looked at Katya bitterly, "blessed women like you should but out of our conversations!"

Morgan and Bartholomew broke into uproarious guffaws, Faris let out a polite but nervous chuckle. As he took bearing of the situation the elves began to approach. "What is going on?" Alanna asked quizzically. "What are these fruits? Have they taken up gardening?"

Nya waived her hand dismissively, "No, they're just being dumb…"