Snow Training

After the morning's affairs, we ate breakfast and got on with our day. We went sightseeing since we couldn't go out yesterday.

"Okay let's go, guys!" The over-spirited Seren encouraged us to get on with our movement. To be honest, I wanted to just laze around the house.

"Yup, we got to get moving." The modest Luke also hurried us to get up from the comfortable couches.

A groan was heard from across the room and what followed next was Sean "But I don't want to… I'm lazy."

I sighed "Yeah, me too Sean…" I comforted him only intending to make him think I was on his side till I continued with a raised tone, "Nah I'm messing with you, get your ass up! We got stuff to do today." I ended the sentence with a wink and a toothful grin.

"Man what, you're going to do me like this? I thought we were comrades…" Sean trailed off as he turned gloomy.

After that, we dragged him forcefully to come and hang out with us.

We went through the snowy streets and parks, went to restaurants, and of course, we went to coffee bars too.

The time was around four o'clock in the afternoon, Luke excused himself again, even though we were in a whole different place, hours away from our city.

"It's time." I notified Sean and Seren.

"Activate your mana cloaks!" I ordered both of them. I then continued and asked a question with an authoritative tone, "You didn't activate your mana runes while we were with Luke, right?"

"Of course, I wouldn't do such a mistake." Replied Sean with a strong-willed voice, while Seren continued to talk with her energetic tone as if fooling around.

"Yes sir, or else you would cry!"

"Ghu-!" Seren fell with her back on the snow.

"Stop fooling around, you blockhead!" I hit her with a snowball in the face and then I spread snow over her face so she could get cold.

"Hah, that doesn't work on me!" Seren scoffed as she rolled behind with a backflip and got up.

Yeah, that doesn't work, she already has her mana cloak activated.

"This one will," I said as I shot her with a cloaked snowball.

"Phu--!" I heard her stop her breath as she evaded the cloaked snowball with a jump to the left, skidding to make a fast stop.

Immediately the same type of snowball came my way, but all I had to do is just bend backwards.

"Heh," I smirked as I did that, and when I was about to say, "You're still too bad at this," another one came from the left side of my face, while I was still bent back like that.

It seems she actually improved and is now putting some priority into thinking about her course of action.

After she first evaded my snowball, she shot one back. While my focus was on the snowball, it seems she moved at a blind spot for me and made another one ready to hit me in the face.

But it was futile.

"Hmph!" I swung my fist onto the snowball and shattered it to pieces.

"Eh, it's not fair!" Seren argued that I destroyed her snowball.

"Were there any rules?" I bemusedly smirked.

"Huh? I was wondering why you were so motionless during this time, so that was it."

I commented on Sean's stillness during the time I was sparring with Seren.

"So you were gathering mana, huh? Quite the smart move for a place that has a low abundance of it." I praised Sean for his brains.

"Surprisingly there are no people here, and it's almost night-time. So let's get on with this, you dumb duo!"

***

As soon as I announced that, both of them came lashing out at me with punches and kicks, obviously, I evaded them and guided their attacks away from my body.

I jumped back to catch my breath after receiving hits constantly for 20 seconds. "Hoh, you're doing better than I expected!" I praised them. "Have you been practicing in secret?" I continued with a question.

"Of course!" said Sean with an energetic tone and a low huff as he swung a hammer punch to the top of my head. After sensing that, I pivoted to my right at the last moment his attack was about to connect.

From behind me, Seren sneaked up with a kick aiming for my ribs.

"Time to get serious," I said with a smirk. The next instant while Seren's foot was still in the air, I hit her ankle joint with my mana-clad elbow and flipped her midair.

While she was falling, I continued my attack by turning around with my heels and hitting Sean in his solar plexus with my outstretched hand. He tried to protect himself, but it was useless against my speed.

The next second I heard Seren's grunt after she landed head first on the ground. Since there was snow she didn't receive a lot of damage.

"Was that it you guys? After I thought this might turn out to be fun… I guess I got my hopes up for nothing…" I trailed off as I mocked them and acted disappointed.

"Shut up man, we've been doing our best here too!" Sean talked back more seriously than I expected while standing up.

"Seren, let's do 'That'." Sean barked in a loud voice towards the oh-so-delicate but deadly woman.

"Yeah!" she agreed to do "That" thing which I didn't know about.

The next instant both jumped from their positions and got closer to each other. I noticed mana swirling around them.

"Something interesting is going to happen," I said as I was waiting impatiently for their next crafty attack.

They both brought their hands close to each other's, almost touching them, and started to do something.

Mana started to accumulate in the empty space between their hands, and that accumulated mana started to take form.

The form was a circular ball of stuffed mana in it, the stuffed mana took a tinge of blue into white.

"Eat this, Duo Kamehamehaaa!" Sean yelled as he called out the spell's dumb name, their follow-up action was a swing of their hand toward me.

After that, the specially created spell started approaching me. There was a thing that confused me.

It was the nagging of my mind at how their spell didn't separate from their hands to get to me, instead, it stayed connected from start to end, which was my position.

The amount of mana it must have taken was probably massive… Maybe high enough that an ordinary mage might've gone into a 4-day coma.

The attack is almost reaching. 'Transcendental Magic-Super Augmentation!' I yelled that within myself as I received the attack with my arms crossed in front of me.

The multicolored mana that I had consumed went to my brain and became colorless, as I channeled the motes to my arm, green thundery ripples started to flash out of my body.

I took their combined spell head-on. I held my breath as the fiery magic started to burn through my skin while pushing me back.

"Haaghh!" I yelled as I parried the 'Duo Kamehameha' up the sky.

"No!" Seren's pleasant voice to the ear was heard as she lost all hope to beat me.

"Shit!" Sean's curse through his gritted teeth also reached me.

Their spell faded and now it was gone. Albeit it had such a small radius, its power could disintegrate a person within seconds.

Even though I managed to guide it away, its explosive power sent me flying headfirst into a tree.

"Ugh!" More snow came pouring on me.

"Damn it!" Sean started venting his frustration by kicking the snow up.

"Phew, you guys. You won't even check if I'm alive or not!" I sighed with a choked laugh.

Seren started first, "Oh, no! Our Elias is crying-ugh…Hey, why did you do that!?" She complained from the ground because of the cold augmented snow that blew her to the ground.

"Shut up!" I retorted and then continued my sentence with a proud tone.

"Seriously, haha, you guys are really cunning. To create that type of destruction spell even though it hasn't been a year since you got your runes."

"Sean, why didn't you tell me that you could make 'Blue Whirl?" I asked the so famous 'Brainiac Sean'.

"Huh, to be honest, I didn't think it was anything so special that I had to tell you--" He dropped down to the ground, unconscious.

"Eh, Sean! Sean what happened?!" Seren started got surprised by Sean's collapse.

"Man, this happens a lot to this guy, first when he got the potential rune, and now this!" I sighed as I got lazy, thinking that I had to carry him to the villa.

"Don't worry Seren, it is normal that he would get knocked out after using a 'Transcendental Spell' for that long when he is still a newbie. Man, this guy is a monster…"

I assured Seren that our housemate is alright through a lazed tone as I thought about his tremendous potential.

"Also using wind and fire to make the spell more fortified and last longer was a great idea! Who thought of that?" I praised Seren and then asked her the question.

"Oh, it was Sean. Ahaha, he truly made something out of an anime become true. I know he won't believe it when he wakes up." Seren smiled as she said that.

Ah, damn it… Does she like Sean, what's with that look in her eyes? No no, don't think negative stuff, Elias. I will make her fall head over heels for me one hundred percent.

I slapped myself lightly to clear up my mind and all of a sudden I thought of something.

"Uh Seren, have you ever wondered what Luke does when "excuses" himself?" I asked her a question I was curious about for quite a long time.

"Um, yes I have, for a long time now…" She trailed off while saying that as if she was feeling guilty for admitting it.

"Do you want to follow him with me?" I said with a mischievous grin.

"Eh, when you ask me like that how can I say no?" Seren also replied with a mischievous laugh.

"Good, let's take Sean to a shelter and go after Luke!" I suggested the obvious course of action we would take.

"Yeah let's get on with it!" The pleasant-to-the-eye girl agreed and so we moved on with the 'Uncovering Secret' plan.

***

To this day, I still regret making that choice.