A Sparring Session With Carin

"You were watching that whole time, weren't you, Carin?"

"Yes. And I have to say you handled the situation quite masterfully." This response seemed to trigger Luna.

"WHAT!? You mean to tell me you were watching the whole time and didn't even bother to help us?"

"Now, why would I do that? If you can't handle a little crowd, how will you ever make it as an adventurer? Did you think you wouldn't have to deal with people if you gained fame?" Luna did not have an answer to that and could only growl in defeat.

"As your mentor, It's my job to prepare you for the world and ensure you don't get yourselves killed. There is no point in being soft." None of us could refute her words. Whatever problems we currently struggle with could be considered insignificant compared to the life and death situations we will face in the outside world. Once we graduate, we're on our own.

"All right. Enough messing around. The headmaster will be making an address to all the new students in a moment."

Looking around, there were 50 mentors, each grouped with the four students assigned to them. I heard some groups next to us muttering things that caught my attention. "Is that who I think it is?" "Yeah, that's Carin!" "What is she doing here? I thought she doesn't take students." It seemed this teacher of ours had quite a reputation. We each gave her a questioning look, only to have her smirk and say not to let it go to our heads.

Vivienne came out shortly after that and began to give the speech she had prepared. Honestly, it wasn't too important and was just a drawn-out way of saying that we should strive to meet our goals and achieve greatness. When she finished, she said we could have a few minutes to talk with our mentors before heading to class. It seemed like there were some important topics to go over still.

"Alright, brats, listen up. Today you will start with a class on the study of monsters before moving over to adventurer regulations 101. Weapons training will be after and will happen every other day. All other classes will be daily. I took the liberty of filling up your schedules based on what I thought was best for your group."

I was getting a bad feeling about this, so I took out my holo-pad and reviewed the revised schedule. Simply put, It was packed. Weapons training, mental focus classes, swimming, yoga, and forging and cooking classes for electives.

"Carin, is all of this necessary?" I asked.

"Of course not. . ."

". . ."

"Unless you want to be killed by your ability." I collapsed to my knees in defeat at the thought of how I would be working my body to the bone.

"Stop messing around. We still have important matters to discuss and little time to talk. The first topic is graduation. There is no set graduation time, and whether or not you will depends on your performance. After passing the minimum amount of training, should your group feel you are ready, you can apply to take the advancement exam. This means that depending on your growth rate, it could take you a few months or years to graduate."

"Next, I want to talk about the school tournaments. Every year our school holds two tournaments, one for one-on-one combat and one for team battles. The winners have the right to have weapons crafted for them at no cost and will also benefit from attracting a base crew with their accomplishments."

"Base crew?" Fleur asked curiously.

"Yes, I was about to get to that."

Carin then went on to a lengthy explanation about base crews. To sum it up, Adventurer parties work a lot like managing a company. There are jobs you take directly from the guild and special requests. Base crews are members of your team that stay in the location of your parties, choosing where they want to base operations. A home base, if you will. Base crew members are responsible for managing supplies, managing finances, promoting the party, growing their brand, and accepting special requests.

"Upon graduation, the school will pair you with an alchemist and a student from the business course for your first base crew members. The selection process is done by request, meaning they must apply to join your group. Winning the tournaments will spread your name. Naturally, those from the business and alchemy courses who graduated quickly will also look for talented groups who finished at a similar rate."

We were all pretty excited about the prospects of winning the tournament, and adventurer parties were much more intricate than any of us thought. Carin seemed satisfied by our response and likely had no doubt about us entering the tournaments.

We were running out of time, so she cut the conversation off there and hurried us off to class. We would be taking our first two classes together, so there was no need to split up.

When we reached the classroom, most other students had already arrived. The room looked as you would expect from a fancy school like this and had long tables at various descending levels with a large holo-screen in the center of the ground floor.

We found we went to take the nearest available seats. Fleur sat on one of my sides, sticking as close as possible, while Raya took a seat on my other side. Luna sat on the other end of Raya, still keeping her distance from me. Once we got settled in, the teacher walked to and greeted the class before starting the lesson.

The class wasn't that engaging, but there was one point that caught my interest. It was about the monsters themselves. The teacher had pulled up a screen with an example of one. It was a shark-like creature called a horned devourer that had large bull horns on its head. The teacher compared monsters and beastmen, noting that both are a mixture of different animals. He said that due to this, most of them were safe to eat.

The next class was adventurer regulations. This one was probably the most boring as it was mostly just a bunch of rules set by the guild. They did talk a bit about ranks, though. Monsters were ranked by letter, with F being the weakest and S being the strongest. There is also one more rank above S reserved for special cases, called star rank. Only a few of these creatures exist, and any information regarding them is supposed to be reported to the guild immediately. One student tried asking what they were, but he was told it would be discussed during the study of monsters.

Our first two classes ended after that, and we moved on to practical lessons. I parted ways with Raya and Fleur and accompanied Luna to Carin's class. Well, it can't be called a class. She refused an official teaching position and will focus solely on us. I guess she took an interest in our group.

"There you are. Ready to get started?" Carin was standing in a courtyard waiting for the two of us. There were some strange-looking training dummies behind her, something I'm guessing we will get to later.

"I want to start things off by having you both come at me with everything you got. No weapons, strictly hand to hand."

"Just like that?"

"Yes, I want to see what I'm working with and gauge what level the two of you are at."

"If you say so."

"Hmph! you're asking for this, so I hope you don't regret taking us on simultaneously," Luna remarked.

"Hehe, I like your attitude, but let's see if you have the strength to back up your big talk. There is a mage on standby to heal you, so don't expect me to hold back." Carin then thrust a hand forward and mockingly gestured at herself for Luna to attack. It worked as intended, and the cat girl quickly rushed her, unleashing a flurry of blows.

Luna rushed at her with a series of punches while Carin slowly retreated, dodging each one along the way. Carin threw a kick at the girl's midsection, to which she ducked down on all fours to avoid it. Luna didn't have time to recover as the experienced instructor aimed to stomp down on her back. She rolled out of the way of the incoming attack before returning to her feet and retreating a couple of meters with a few quick hops.

"Why are you running? I thought you were going to teach me a lesson." Carin said smugly. Luna didn't take the bait this time and glared at Carin, watching her closely. Her chest was heaving up and down, a clear sign of being out of breath. She had speed, but it seemed she lacked stamina.

"Well, if you won't come to me, then ill just have to go to you!"

This caught the girl off guard, and she reflexively activated her enhancement magic. Her strength and speed increased exponentially. And while it didn't have the explosiveness of body activation, it was still impressive.

Luna dodged Carin's attacks with everything she had, but she still took a straight kick to the stomach, sending her flying backward. She quickly recovered and got back on her feet. Irritated at the one-sidedness of the battle, She dropped down on all fours taking on a more animalistic stance as she channeled more mana into her enhancement magic. As she was getting ready to attack, Carin disappeared from where she was standing. She was now behind the girl gripping her head in her palm as she lifted her off the ground.

"I said we were going to spar using hand-to-hand combat only. Did you think I wouldn't notice what you're doing?" Luna was helpless and struggled to get out of Carin's grasp as she was raised higher in the air by her head.

"You're not the only one who can enhance their physical capabilities, and my technique is much stronger than yours."

Realizing her focus was solely on Luna at the moment, I took the opportunity to join the fight in an attempt to take her by surprise.