CH28: Oddballs of the Elite Camp III
***
CH28: Oddballs of the Elite Camp III
My eyes shifted from the team members to the team leader herself, my first student, Zora Rowland.
Females really change a lot during puberty. The little lass had grown into a real beauty.
I had high hopes for when her beauty would bloom fully when she reached her twenties. She would be a real country toppling beauty.
She completed a real trifecta of beauty-types in the team.
Ella was a black-haired seductress, Ramla was a cold petite brown-haired goddess while Zora was an energetic, athletic tomboy who could warm her way into any man's heart.
Zora now stood at a height of 175cm. Her white skin tone really brought out her crimson red hair and eyes.
Within the last three years, Zora had changed almost completely.
Gone was the shy princess who enjoy drinking tea and playing dress up. In her place was a knight princess who could never sit still for too long.
She now rarely wore dresses, but was instead almost in training clothes which were effectively a black shirt and tailor-made trousers.
The obvious changes in the girl's character made Ingrid glare at me constantly. I couldn't blame her. Her daughter changed faster than she could keep up with.
And it was all because of a stranger who came into her life. A stranger whom she didn't think much of originally.
A part of me feels like I had committed a sin.
However, I rationalised the deed with the fact that my actions improved the girl's survivability in this world.
Zora pestered me to train her in Spearmanship and Archery after she awakened her Pangea.
I had a hunch the former was due to wanting to use the same weapon as her brother, as she announced this in front of the siscon, which brought so much happiness to his face.
The latter should be the weapon she thought would be most suited for her ability.
Her Pangea was an S-class Spatial-type Pangea called Dimensional Door.
The Pangea gave her the ability to open a passage between two points in space. Unfortunately, the Pangea had a high energy demand.
She couldn't yet open a passage large enough for a person to pass through without using up all her mana. Plus, no one was willing to take the risk to go through the passage yet.
It won't be funny to be caught within a spatial channel when her mana ran out.
For the most part, I limited her to opening small circular passages, no more than 10cm radius.
Through trial and error, we found out this was the optimum size of a passage she can comfortably bear and battle with.
Yes, we turn the spatial type ability into a competent combat technique.
Zora would open a small passage between herself and her opponent, through which she can send in an attack. This made distance somewhat of a non-issue to her.
The peculiarity of this Pangea was why I supported her using a Spear and an Arrow.
A spear could be thrust through the passage while an arrow could be fired. However, both weapons had a demand for physical fitness and skill to use effectively as moving through the passage imposed conditions which could deviate her aim.
Similarly, she could also receive attacks into the passage and send it elsewhere, thus creating a defence technique from her Pangea.
Archery, Spearmanship and even her Pangea had a high demand for stamina. The two weapons also introduce demand for footwork.
This led me to drill her intensely in roadwork and movement techniques.
In retrospect, I should have dialled down the intensity of the training a little. I only remembered a consequence of such training when it was too late.
Long distance roadwork improved stamina management quite appreciably, however, too much long distance roadwork can make the body too lean... borderline skinny.
But this wasn't the issue with Zora. It was something else.
I believe due to the intensive roadwork she did, her breast suffered!
Ah....
Her breast were a modest B-cup, however, I suspected that it was possible for it to have been bigger than that if I hadn't made her do all that intensive stamina training.
But it wasn't like it was all bad.
Her figure became lithe. Her long legs were well-developed. Her waists were narrow, hips wide while her thigh and gluteus muscles were well-defined, giving her a wonderful backside to appreciate.
Cough...
Due to her relatively late start to physical exercise, her training regimen was quite extensive for these three years which caused her to spend a lot of her time in the training attire I specially requested for her, as it wasn't ideal to be doing those physical regimen in a skirt.
Since that was the case, I made the black shirt and trouser the uniform training attire for the Elite Camp.
Anyway, it was safe to say that these three years were very eventful for every member of the Elite Camp.
At some point during the last three years, my studies at the academy reduced the amount of hands-on time I had with my trainees. However, I always made sure to leave them with a comprehensive training regimen which they followed to the tee after they returned from the academy.
By the way, the Guild sends most, if not all, of its recruits to study at the academy, so the members of the Elite Camp studied there too. However, they didn't spend as much time there as I did.
They were all in the Battle division which had a freer rein as it allowed their students generous time to train themselves, unlike the Lifestyle Departments like Herbology which worked hard to shove as much theoretic knowledge down our throats.
It has been a while since I tested their progress and now was a good time as any since I wanted to let off some steam.
-
I walked up to them and clapped my hands.
"Instructor!" They greeted.
"I'm going to be checking up on your progress today."
"What method are you using today?" Zora asked.
"I'll test you individually, after which I'll decide if I should test your cooperation as a team."
They nodded.
"Milos, you're first. Let's test the strength of your vines and your control over them."
The skinny teen nodded and approached me.
He tapped his staff on the floor and a small corona spread from it. From within the corona came ten stalks of vines.
"Move them on my mark. Ready? Go... left... up... left... right... down... northwest... southeast... downwards right..."
I randomly called out directions in different methods and Milos reacted to move the stalks in the direction I called.
Finally, after fifteen minutes of this, Milos finally began to show signs of fatigue.
To be fair to the boy, the practice put a lot of mental toll on him, not only did he have to control ten vine stalks, he also had to listen to the directions I called, make sense of it and act.
This took way more mental energy than he'd have used in a fight.
So, I was ok giving him a pass.
He did well, considering the limited mana available to a Beginner rank
"Now, let's test their strength."
I allowed Milos to use the vines to bind me.
I slowly used varying strength to try to get out of the bind.
It was only when I used my full strength, which corresponded to just above the Expert-rank that I broke through the bind.
-
Talking about my stats, the Physique stats in my status indicated my strength. However, it was also more than that. It affected everything concerning my body.
My defence, endurance, stamina, immunity (resistance to disease, poisons and ailments), bone strength and muscle build were all influenced by my physique stats.
In short, my health and body functions would continue to increase as my physique stats increased.
-
I gave Milos a pass.
His vines had the strength to bind up to a ring above him. Which pretty much meant he could hold an Expert-rank for a while before they broke free.
It was another matter if he could use the opportunity to kill one.
*
"Ramla, you're next."
The petite girl stepped forward with her bow.
"Your task is simple. You're to shoot from fifty metres away toward me. Your target will be five metres in front of me. The catch is that your arrow should release a discharge four metre radius of where the arrow lands. In other words-"
"My ability mustn't affect you." The girl completed my words.
"Exactly. This is a test of your archery and mana control. It is also to determine if you're ready to take part in a team exercise. Do you understand?"
"Sir, Yes, sir!"
The two of us moved onto the camp's field.
Honestly, as difficult as this sounded, my pass requirement was actually loose considering the fact that the distance between friend and foe in a large scale battle will most likely be less than one metre.
If she couldn't manage with this buffer, I would be reluctant to allow her use her Pangea during a team exercise as she could harm her team instead.
Although it would be a shame to side-line her Pangea, safety is always the top priority.
That said though, I had a lot of faith in her, and her teammates as well.
Most of them were at their lowest when I found them. They've tasted being written off. For this reason, they put in an immense effort to make the most out of themselves.
It was for this trust that I stood as her target.
In truth, I could have simply used a dummy as the target, we'd still be able to tell if she passed my requirement or not.
My standing as her target was my way of showing her I trusted that she could shoot around me without harming me.
Those who had never shot from behind a comrade would never know how much stress it imposed on you.
The possibility that if your shot missed the mark, you may end up harming your comrades.
While training Ramla, from time to time, I would stand as her target so that she could shoot towards me.
She hesitated at first but when she realised it was my way of showing I trusted her, she put her all into making sure she met my expectations.
I think it's part of the reasons that made her such a good archer in such a short span of time.
Ramla took an arrow from her quiver and placed it in her longbow. She pulled the bow back, then raised it at an upward angle.
I saw her fire the arrow.
It travelled in a beautiful arc and landed before me, releasing its payload of electric discharge.
A beautiful blue arc of electric mana spread out in a four metre radius of the arrow, stopping a safe distance from me.
But it seemed the girl wasn't done.
She prepared and fired another arrow.
This one landed closer than the previous one. It also discharge electric energy in a four metre radius. This edge of this discharge stopped just a foot distance away from me.
Then, I noticed the brown-haired girl firing another arrow.
Judging from the flight arc, I guessed it would land closer than the previous one.
And I was right.
The arrow landed just two metres away from me. Then it discharged its energy.
I smiled and didn't move away from my spot.
Ramla didn't disappoint me.
The area of effect of this discharge stopped half a foot away from me and I wasn't affected by its stun effects.
I saw that the girl was finally done with her demonstration, so I clapped.
She came running towards me and jumped into my embrace.
"Thank you for trusting me." She said.
I laughed then put her down.
"Don't do that. You're ruining your Ice queen persona."
She laughed as well.
The others joined us and congratulated her.
I smiled at the camaraderie of the team. I was sure that with my little display, the team would also willingly show their backs to her.
-
To be honest, I wasn't blindly trusting. I knew the arrow wouldn't hit me. Likewise, I could sense the mana infused in it so I was able to estimate the size of the discharge potential it had.
If it had been dangerous to me, my Dexterity stat wasn't for show.
Dexterity influenced my body's coordination and movement. This meant it affected things like speed, agility, sensitivity (reaction time and reflexes).
-
"I'm next, right?" Ella said as she saw me turn to her.
Her test wasn't to heal me. It was something else.
Her test was to examine an unorthodox ability we came up with for her Sylph, Essana.
Essana was a light Sylph, which essentially meant she was a natural at manipulating Light.
In that case, she could do more with light than just healing. We came up with a few methods to use light-attribute mana for attack purposes.
The one the mini-human took the most liking to was... illusions.
By controlling light attributed mana in the surrounding, Essana with Ella's help was able to trap a target within an illusion.
The only catch was that the illusion was a one-person attack. It didn't work on more than one target at a time.
Same as with Milos, I allowed myself to be put under an illusion to test its strength.
I found myself tied up in a white room. I was bare-chested on my knees and my hands were locked with chains from both side of the room, leaving me locked with my hand spread apart.
Ella appeared before me with a whip in hand.
She walked behind my exposed back while flicking the whip as she moved.
The scene was very realistic as I could feel the air of the whip caress my back.
I wasn't masochistic. I didn't intend to allow myself to get whipped.
I channelled my mind and tried to break away from the illusion.
I was successful and found that the illusion fell apart when I used a mental strength above that of a Beginner.
This meant the strength of the illusion was capped at the same level of strength as Ella. This was quite good.
I gave her a pass mark, but not before throwing her a glare.
The lass portrayed herself as an innocent, naive girl, but I knew she had a vindictive black heart.
As they say, 'Hell has no fury like an angry woman'.
-
By the way, Mind governed just that... my mind.
It influenced things like my mental strength, comprehension, memory and thinking faculties.
Basically, the Physique improved the state of my body; Dexterity allowed me to move my body while Mind managed the relationship between the two.
-
The test for the remaining three was a straightforward combat.
Hand-to-hand combat for Jaras, a swordfight for Fenton and a Spear battle for Zora.
The fights allowed me to synergise the influence of my three stats.
Of course I won but that wasn't the point.
I was able to gauge that Fenton's strength was just under the Expert level while Jaras and Zora displayed combat strength solidly within the Expert rank.
Considering that the team were at 3 rings, it meant they had a combat strength above their levels.
(P.S: It normally takes 4 rings to fight at Expert level).
"You all pass the individual assessment. I think it's time for us to have a proper team outing. Go prepare. We're going to raid a Beast nest!"
(To be continued...)