Hard to Master

Hera jumped to the left, evading a large boulder that was tossed in her direction. Right after it, she flipped her left wrist, letting a few strands of the bladed gloves lash out almost like a whip. The strings moved away from her hand and wrapped around each other, but instead of making one larger string, they made three. The wire connected to the index and the middle finger joined, and so did the ones in the ring finger and the pinky while the thread attached to the thumb was still out of it on its own. Those three bladed wires snapped when they reached their limits, but instead of just continuing, they retracted back to the empress gloves. She tried to move her wrist away, but unfortunately, it was too late for her to do that. The bladed wire came back with the snap slashing her forearm.

Thankfully, the empress had bought armored vambraces to protect her from any unintentional movements of the new weapon. This wasn't the first time she was trying something new and there was some experience behind the types of things she might need. Unfortunately, that wasn't enough and the first few times she tried to use the weapon, it bounced off so violently that it hit her legs or shoulders. There was even a moment where the bladed wire got dangerously close to her face, but thankfully Clay was close by and jumped in to block the hits.

After that happened, the empress decided to stop trying to figure things out by herself and looked into some training manuals for that kind of weapon. The problem was that just like the chain whip, very few people actually used bladed wire gloves. It looked very cool, but it wasn't all that practical. Especially for active combat. Some assassins did use similar weapons, but it was more about creating traps and then moving your targets to the correct location instead of facing them head on.

In the end, the only thing that seemed to work was having Lurize use his Whisper of the Ancient skill to tap into the previous title blades, and even Court members to a lesser degree to organize and understand the ideas of how they function. He wasn't able to get any details on specific skills, but combat styles were something different. It seems like no previous owner of the court had ever had a title blade with a weapon like that. So bladed wire gloves were unique and very hard to come by in general.

However, one of the previous title blades had some knowledge of how to use that kind of weapon. From what the Royal tutor was able to understand, that particular title blade was very close to a set of pauldrons who could, in essence, eject bladed wires from its edges in order to fight. It was a good initial step, but many movements wouldn't be properly translated to the Empress. After all, unlike the original blade, she couldn't move the threads individually, as if they were part of her body. But she could at least have some idea of the type of attack that could work.

The most basic one was the one she was attempting to perform right now. Where she would simply wrap all the threads together and use them as a whip. But even after a week of constant practice, she was struggling to land the attack properly. Every attempt was a bit wrong or made the threads move in a different way than she was expecting. But at least there was progress. In addition, being able to practice in an active combat zone felt much better. Especially considering that her targets were so large that it was hard to miss, even if she was still able to do every so often. 

Currently, the familiarity was still at around 60%. From what she could understand, knowing how to fight with the weapon increase that rate much more than simply using it. And the empress was struggling to wield the weapon properly.

"Hera!" Nimbus called.

Without even looking, she jumped backwards, using her tail to give a bit of more impulse. A large wingless bird that somewhat resembled a mix of a chicken with an ostrich was attacking. It had a long neck and black feathers, along with the yellow beak and the crown present in roosters, jumped at the empress, trying to slam her with both of its feet. But the creature wasn't fast enough to catch up to Ophidianite. She landed, pulling her wrist again and trying to have the bladed gloves hitting it, but they only created a strange net in front of the empress herself. The creature was not the brightest, but it was also not stupid enough to fall for something like this, which gave it enough time to jump away and avoid the attacks completely.

Frustrated, Hera tried to pull the weapon threads again so they would wrap around it. But instead of the wire moving forward, it snapped back, about to reach the empress herself. With a groan, she activated magnetic rule so the metal on the gloves would be disrupted and allow her to escape her own attack.

"Hera, you are trying too many things. You don't know enough about uzing this weapon to be creative. Try the bazicz firzt, then you can add complexity," Lurize commanded from the back. 

The [Whisper of the Ancients] skill was active, and he was doing his best to coach not just Hera but Pandora, who also participated in the fight. The two of them had decided to continue running the dungeons together since, between the dwarf's experience and Ophidianite's power, they were able to complete it in just 2 hours. If they joined any of the other teams, the difference in time to run the dungeon would only amount to a few minutes. And with three groups instead of two, they increased the chances of getting the drop. 

"Pandora, you were too ztiff. Don't follow the moves of your combat ztyle to the letter. Be creative and go off zcript. You need to be comfortable uzing your hammer in wayz that don't follow the pattern you learned," Lurize continued.

"Yes sir," Pandora gasped. 

She was currently fighting with another creature. A smaller version of the one that was attacking Hera. The dwarf shifted her body, trying to go for a different attack. Instead of just the slam or an overhead strike, she was trying to go for a diagonal blow that focused more on hitting with the edge of the hammer instead of getting a clean strike with the center of it. She had come to understand that sometimes you could use different areas of the weapon to achieve different effects. And while the center of the hammer was great against things that were particularly sturdy and required a lot of blunt force, she had options. For instance, if she hit skin or a more soft tissue with just the edge of her weapon, she might be able to cause some cuts which could be more effective than just blunt strike.

It was something she was struggling a lot to learn. More specifically, she was struggling to allow her aim to be off after having the proper technique hammered down for so many years. The dwarf's attack was able to nick the skin of her target, letting a bit of blood flow out of it. That's when she triggered the second chamber on her weapon that had a spell inspired by Hera. 

Something that would cause anyone affected by it to start hemorrhaging blood from the wounds. The problem was that it required an actual wound for it to work. A cut, something that was dripping blood. And doing that with blunt strikes didn't really work. While focusing on her regular attacks, she could only make that happen in two situations. First, if she hit them over the head and made the target bleed from its mouth, eyes, or ears. But in that case, the spell wouldn't function properly as there was no exposed wound for it to target. The other option was when she crushed a part of her target's body so much that it burst open in a splattering of blood. However, if that were to happen, the creature would likely already be hemorrhaging. 

Hera jumped away again, trying to evade another of the giant chicken boulder throws. This time she used the bladed wire to create a net and toss the boulder back at the monster. Creating something like that lead a lot more into the crafter role and allowed with her to control the threats with much more ease. Especially since this was the kind of thing that Lurize had been able to teach her thanks to the [Whisper of the Ancients]. The creature she was fighting started to bleed, but it was far from being something that could be considered enough to kill it.

Pandora was thinking about her next move. What else she could that wasn't part of the basic and standard ways she had learned how to fight. At the same time that Hera was considering her options in the most fundamental forms of using a weapon like the bladed wire. But that's when Crimson yelled, "That's time. Wrap it up."

That was the indication they had finished the time they had for this fight. They were using that alarm system to avoid wasting too much time in this run. The main reason they were here for were the poison resistance items and if they spend too much time trying to practice something else, they might end up taking longer to find a solution to the problem in Deakoshara.

Hera let out a small sigh of both frustration and relief and jumped towards the monster she was attacking. With a punch, she caused it to collapse to the side and used her claws to pierce its neck, killing it almost instantly. Pandora, who was still fighting the smaller version, stopped trying to hold back. She swung at the creature after using a stone shape spell, a very common type of magic for people who levied in Boothudurn to create a small pitfall under the beast. Her attack simply smashed the monster's head in, squeezing it against the ground. And with that, the fight was over.

They had finished the second to last creature they had to hunt with just the Jarnak and the final boss left. Neither Pandora nor Hera was particularly happy about the situation. Both felt like they had failed yet again, but Lurize gave them some comforting words now that his skill had finished. 

Knowing the next step on their hunt, the group simply climbed onto Nimbus's griffon form and flew away, already moving towards the nest of the journey. Hera and Pandora had already decided not to go on lengthy reports about their situation or conversations about how they fought during the adventure. It was better to finish the dungeon and then try to analyze what they did wrong. Still, that didn't mean they were not talking during the small trip.

"Hey, Hera? Can I ask you something about being an Ophidianite?" Pandora said through their communicator. They were moving too fast to be able to hear things properly without it.

The empress held back a groan and replied, "Look. I know you were anxious and excited about this, but I still don't know what is the test or what are the requirements to be an Ophidianite. I'm working with Rutigan and Typhera to come up with a plan, but we're not having a single meeting. We're talking through text and they are only replying when they have some free time. I promise you that as soon as I figure that out, I will let you know, but I don't have anything else to say about that right now. Not since we woke up."

Pandora was a bit too eager to join the Ophidianites, which was nice. But her insistence in asking what she needed to do to be accepted as one of them was starting to get on Hera's nerves.

"Oh no, that's not what I was going to ask about. I understand that asking once a day is already annoying enough. It was something else," Pandora explained.

"Oh," Hera gasped. "Ok. What do you want to know?"

"When you became an Ophidianite, could you have made yourself a man? Or were you locked into being a woman?"

"Actually, I had a choice. There was a moment when it was asked if I wanted to stay as a woman or wanted to be a man. Because I was the first one to become an Ophidianite, I could even say if that was a question that I wanted to be asked or not. For the future ascensions."

"And what did you say?" Pandora asked, her voice cracking just a little bit.

"I said to keep the option open but not have that question being asked. I felt like if someone doesn't want to change their gender and get asked that question, it would just make the process more confusing," Hera replied still looking ahead to their destination, the jungle at the mouth of the valley.

Pandora tilted her head, "How so?"

"I mean, becoming an Ophidianite is already a massive change. If you say 'oh, you can also change genders, people could be confused and start having some questions that should be answered in a different situation."

"But the option is still there?" Pandora asked.

"It is. But if you have the intention of doing that, my advice is to talk to a psychiatrist for a while before confirming that kind of thing. During the process, all you have to do is ask."

"I already have," Pandora replied in a half mumble.

Hera glanced back, trying to see if Pandora was worried or upset about her confession. But she seemed to be fine with what she said. Or at least she didn't seem to be a complete accident. There was an obvious worry related to Hera's reaction, but considering this topic was, it was understandable.

"Well, yes, if you end up joining. You can probably do that. I say probably only because I didn't do it. So I don't know all the specifics. But it could be good if you started living as who you want to be first. Doing that as Ophidianite will be definite. It won't be like right now where other people can do something about who you are right now. Be it with medicine, surgery, or some powerful spells. It will take time for people to know how to do that kind of thing with us."

Pandora nodded. "Yeah. I've been doing that. Living as who I want to be. That's kind of why I had to leave Boothudurn for a while. Some people just didn't understand. At least I don't think that they would," Pandora added.

Hera didn't look back but felt that Pandora was holding a bit tighter on around her waist. The last time someone did that was Silah and the Empress did not enjoy the reminder. Still, she pushed those feelings away and answered.

"I'm sorry to hear about that. Let me ask you, are you happy now? Or happier. Just because you're not in the right body, that doesn't mean you need to be miserable. You know."

"I am. Much happier," Pandora replied.

"Then that's fine, girl," Hera's last word might have been a bit too much. "I'm happy if you're happy and if I managed to settle everything about becoming an Ophidianite. and you go through the ascension, you can ask to have the body of who you really are. Just, I hope you're not trying to ascend just because of that. I'm all for helping people who are in that situation, but I don't want that to make the Ophidianite end up being like a one stop shop for anyone who wants to transition."

"No, no, I want to join because being an Ophidianite seems amazing. And I'm really curious about Deakoshara. Maybe I can help if I am one of you. I guess you're the only one of you, but I hope I understand."

"Yes. I get it. And don't worry. That's a possibility," Hera added.

"And does that bother you? Who I am or do you just don't care?" Pandora asked, her face shifting away from Hera's back not to seem too clingy.

Hera paused for a moment, trying to find the right words, "I care. But not in a bad way. You can be whoever you want to be. As long as you're not hurting anyone. That's fine with me. But you're my friend. And like I said, if that makes you happy, I'm happy. So I do care. I care about you and I care about how you're feeling. And I'm glad you found yourself."

There was a long pause while they were traveling until the silence became a bit too much for the empress. "Look, I'm not going to make any jokes or anything to lighten the mood, but are you okay? I don't know what else to say here. You're my friend, I'm fine with who you are. But what's going on here?"

Pandora laughed and wiped off a tear. These last few moments the dwarf cried silently, thanking the wind for brushing her tears away and avoiding making them fall onto the empress's back.

"I'm fine. Thank you," she replied a few seconds before Nimbus shifted to land.