While their mother works to wear down Wonder's resistance, Chiffon is blossoming.
She can perfectly execute all the slices and slashes. She knows the right way to position the rest of her body. She can sever the head of a training dummy in one squeaky clean swing.
And, much to their mother's excitement, she listens to everyone's tips and advice for improvement without any sort of snarky remark.
She spends hours every day after school and on the weekends at the Academy, dicing, slicing and chopping dummies with a variety of swords. She's there for so long, in fact, that Wonder hardly ever sees her anymore.
He misses his big sister. He wants to run away to their secret hideout in the bushes, like they used to do as kids. He wants her to make him her special scrambled eggs.
Wonder doesn't want those days to be over yet.
So he tries to tell himself that they're not; they're just taking a hiatus of sorts. Once he and Chiffon win their Games and make their mother proud, they'll both get their own houses. There, they can hang out and goof around as much as they want, without either of their parents hovering around to tell them off for it.
Wonder smiles. It's something to look forward to. He tries to use it as motivation to do better in training. And although the actual results are negligible, he still feels as though he's improved.