“Ice Magic: Eternal Frost.”

Upon completing this one sentence, a blizzard of frost erupted from all around Lucy’s body. It spiraled outward, firing tiny flakes of ice across the room in mere moments. Cole brought his arm up to protect his face, reflexively trying to avoid the magic Lucy unleashed.

He spent a moment in this position, waiting to feel a storm of cold wash over him. Moving his arm down, Cole looked around to see the blizzard remaining near Lucy, contained in a vortex around her. The flakes of ice continued to spread across the room, but each that reached Cole easily melted when coming into contact with his skin.

While this was true for him, everything encompassed within Lucy’s spell had already frozen solid. She now stood on a large sheet of ice that expanded as the blizzard intensified. Her arms were still pointed downward, indicating to Cole that her attack was being sent more into the lava than it was into the rest of the room.

Lucy’s hair flowed along with the blizzard, but remained more static than Cole would have imagined, especially with the initial burst she’d let out. Cole couldn’t help but take a moment to marvel at the sight of Lucy and her overwhelming magic.

Cole's bewilderment was interrupted by a sudden quake that rattled the entire room. This time, Cole was prepared, managing to remain on his feet as the platform beneath him swayed with the rippling waves of lava.

The gigantic golem rose back out from underneath the lava. It roared as flakes of ice berated its body. Swinging its massive arms from side to side, the golem tried to shoo away the ice to no avail.

The golem turned its attention back to Lucy. Even as a blizzard raged around her, the golem fiercely swung its arm at her. Its arm came down with a force far greater than Cole had seen so far. Turning back to Lucy, any doubt in Cole’s mind was immediately put to rest.

Lucy remained utterly focused as she locked in on her target. Raising her arms up towards the golem, Lucy placed her hands flat against each other. The spell she’d cast followed in suit, as if she was directing it with the arrow made by her arms.

The blizzard that surrounded Lucy began to spiral towards the golem. With its massive body and slow movement speed, the golem was helpless to dodge her icy barrage. It rumbled in agony as the blizzard collided with its chest. The lava that flowed freely over its body froze along with every inch of the golem that came in contact with the blizzard.

While this severely slowed the golem down, its fist was still coming down towards Lucy. In turn, Lucy moved her arms in a way that traced from the golem’s chest, up to its shoulder, and down to its fist. The golem’s arm was easily frozen as Lucy’s blizzard followed her every movement. In a way, it reminded Cole of the training he’d undergone when first learning to use his magic.

With its arm frozen, the golem tried once again to retreat back into the lava. Unfortunately for it, Lucy again redirected her attack, this time towards the part of the golem that was receding into the room’s massive pool of lava. A layer of ice rapidly formed around the golem’s “stomach”, easily halting its movement. The golem tried to use its other arm to free itself, but it was far too late. By the time its arm reached below its chest, the golem had been frozen over entirely.

Lucy’s blizzard raged on, as if intensifying from the commanding victory. The golem’s remains were now almost indiscernible among the layer of ice, making it appear as a statue that’d always been there. Lucy lowered her hands back to her side, and the blizzard around her slowly swirled to a stop.

There was still lava around a majority of the room, but it did little to retake the area lost to Lucy’s new platform of ice. In a way, the site was quite tranquil. Lava and ice mixing together so cohesively wasn’t something Cole got to see every day. He took a moment to take the events of their trial in, allowing silence to envelop the now stagnant room as he waited for Lucy to return to their rock platform.

“Looks like we’re done,” Lucy said, gesturing towards the frozen golem.

“Ah… awesome.”

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Cole wasn’t sure what else to say. He didn’t think “good job” would really convey what he thought of the situation. To Cole, freezing lava was cool enough. Add in freezing a gargantuan golem? That was icing on the cake.

“Like, really awesome.” Cole continued, trying to put his excitement into words. “So, that was a spell?”

“It was,” Lucy replied.

“How long do you think I’ll have to train until I can learn that?”

“I don’t know.”

“How long did it take you to learn?”

Lucy took a few steps back onto the platform, now standing face-to-face with an enthralled Cole.

“Longer than it should have.” She replied.

Cole was looking for more of an “X Days” kind of answer, but he didn’t want to be pushy. The platform seemed to detect Lucy’s stepping back onto it and returned to motion. Slowly yet surely, it made its way around the statue of ice between it and the inscription.

It’d been a hell of a trial for Cole, and he was glad to get back to safety for some rest. Looking down at his leg, he tried to look for any sign of damage. He hadn’t been able to see anything at a glance earlier, but he was confident there had to be some indication that he'd been so drastically injured. Unable to find any form of scarring or oddity, Cole put his arm back to his side. This is just too cool.

“Also, thanks for healing my leg,” Cole said. “It feels great. It’s hard to believe I was injured so badly in the first place.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Lucy said dismissively. “It was the least I could do.”

“No, you did way more than you had to. Saving me from Felix, then from Kate, and now this. It really means a lot. Thank you.”

Lucy nodded her head at Cole as their platform bumped into the surface before the inscription. They’d already made their way around the frozen golem, now confronted by a familiar purple portal.

“I guess we’re done,” Cole said, stepping onto the surface.

“Hmm,” Lucy said, following suit, “let’s not leave just yet.”

“Why?” Cole asked. “To be honest, I’m pretty drained right now. I could really go for some shut-eye.”

“You’re still standing, aren’t you?”

“Yeah…”

“Then let’s get back to training. Right now.”

Lucy flicked her hand up, firing a tiny shard of ice at Cole’s arm. While small in size, it still managed to penetrate his armor of ice. Small drops of purple blood seeped out, as if Cole had just received a shot at the doctor’s.

“Ow,” Cole said, kind of annoyed, “alright, alright. How long will we be training for? To be honest, I’m not sure how much I’ll be able to retain while I’m so tired.”

“Your future opponents won’t care about how tired you are,” Lucy explained, “so neither will I. We’ll finish when I say we’re finished. Besides, we’ll have twenty-four more hours to rest and train once we enter the portal, regardless of how long we spend here.”

While Cole wanted nothing more than to lie in bed, he was glad Lucy was willing to play such an active role in him learning magic.

“Does that mean you’re going to teach me a spell-like the one you used on that guy?” Cole asked, gesturing towards the frozen golem.

“I don’t know about that,” Lucy said. “There’s a lot more you need to learn first. Frankly, your fundamentals are still quite poor.”

“Fair enough, I guess.”

“For now, try to freeze some of the lava around us,” Lucy said. “Make a platform big enough for the two of us to stand on.”

“Alright- OW!” Cole shouted.

Lucy fired another miniature shard of ice, this time at his leg.

“Keeping up a strong shell of ice, at all times, will greatly reduce the chance of you being injured.” Lucy continued. “From now on, regardless of whether or not you are training, expect to be hit with one of those at any given time.”

“If you say so…”

While it was unpleasant, it was something Cole could handle. The agonizing pain of lava sinking into his flesh was something he’d only felt because of his lack of defense and perceptiveness. If this would help him avoid something similar in the future, then he was more than glad to accept the challenge.

Turning back to the lava behind them, Cole placed his hands outwards as Lucy had when forcing the massive golem out of the lava.

“Try not to overthink your magic,” Lucy said. “Let it flow from you naturally.”

“I’ll do my best.”

With all his remaining energy, Cole followed along with Lucy’s training. Even as his muscles ached, and his stomach churned, he did his best to live up to her expectations. No matter what, Cole was going to improve himself and learn to cast a spell as powerful as Lucy’s, regardless of how long it took.