Eian watched as Alex lined up in front of him.

He seemed a bit reserved, shielding himself perhaps more than necessary.

Eian held a rough a two handed wooden 'sword' they had carved out, it wouldn't do for him to accidentally behead Alex after-all.

After their first round Alex had put on his helmet, Eian actually still felt bad for that.

Sarah and Jessica were both sitting down watching them, though Jessica was glaring at him.

Suddenly Alex launched himself forward, stabbing at Eian.

Eian parried easily, he moved diagonally to Alex's right side to evade his shielded area.

Alex's desperately swung wildly on bad footing, with more speed than force.

Eian blocked and barreled shoulder-first into Alex, staggering him and putting him on the back foot.

Eian put the pressure, one hard swing after another had Alex retreating.

With a clear hit he landed a blow to Alex's leg, eliciting a yelp.

Taking advantage Eian swung at Alex's overextended sword and disarmed him.

He barreled shoulder-first into Alex's shield and sent him falling on his back, Alex lost his shield on the tumble.

A clear defeat to Alex, again.

"You're just too strong man." Alex gingerly got up, rubbing his back.

"That's what you're gonna tell the next monster you see? You're just too strong mister monster, please take it easy?" Eian smirked, it felt good to not be on the receiving side.

"No man, but still how will I learn like this?" Alex frowned slightly.

"Oh come on it's not so bad. You didn't break anything. Did you?" Eian quickly scanned Alex, nope nothing major.

Alex raised an eyebrow at him.

"Stop being a jerk! You're just hurting him on purpose!" Jessica got up and went to Alex, glaring at Eian the whole time.

"Never watched any martial arts movies? No pain, no gain." Eian frowned at her.

He was trying to help Alex.

Plus he hadn't done anything too out of the way yet.

The few accidents were just that, accidents, besides Alex could easily heal himself.

Eian looked at Sarah wondering what she thought.

"What?" Sarah lifted an eyebrow at him.

"What do you think?" Eian almost rolled his eyes.

".........Depends, are you actually trying to help him? Or, are you really just messing around?" Sarah looked bored.

"What kind of question is that? Of course I'm trying to help him!" Eian narrowed his eyes at her.

"Then it's fine. Maybe just explain your thoughts, and what you're trying to teach him." Sarah shrugged, then looked at the new couple.

"This is how I learned." Eian frowned.

"And what did you learn?.....I'm not trying to offend you Eian, I think Alex just doesn't understand what beating him is doing." Sarah shrugged.

Eian blinked a few times.

He looked at Alex, who was watching him questioningly.

When Ul was teaching him he hadn't asked much, he was too angry to really think back then.

All he was thinking was to kill the goat-fucker.

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"Oh. Right." Eian looked up as he gathered his thoughts.

He tried to piece together a way to explain.

He had already shown Alex more or less how to take an offensive stance and a basic defensive.

He even showed him how to stab and swing with the sword, now he just need practice

Right now Eian felt it was actually harder to hit Alex, due to his shield.

Eian was using only a single weapon after-all, that gave Alex an edge, since he could hunker down and take Eian's hits.

"You learn.....by defending or attacking. Over and over, you more or less just learn what not to do, and what to do, by trial and error. Make sense?" To Eian that made perfect sense.

It took a few questions more from Alex, but in the end he nodded and agreed to continue.

He never won, though he grazed his arm a few times, Eian thought it looked accidental though.

Still he didn't mention anything, it wouldn't help to dampen the little enthusiasm Alex had after-all.

He didn't seem to have the same rage that drove Eian, when Ul taunted and hurt him.

Eian whacked him through the helmet a few times, and took any openings he saw.

Even if he wanted to sometimes wanted murder Ul the goat-fucker, he knew going easy on Alex wouldn't be helping him in the end.

Several fights later Alex took a break and sat down.

He was visibly panting, Eian had him practice attacking instead.

He was much lousier at that, since Eain could dodge, block and parry on the defensive.

"Me next." Sarah put on her own medium helmet.

"Why? Aren't you a mage?" Eian tilted his head slightly.

"Yes, but I've since realized I may need to dodge sometimes." Sarah briefly turned to look at Alex with narrowed eyes.

"Right....You're not going to shoot fire and lightning at me are you?" Eian frowned.

"No. That would be unfair." Sarah rolled her eyes at him.

'Well. Not really. I could just use rock armor, but I leave that as a last resort.' Eian shrugged.

Eian felt a little weird trying to hit Sarah, she was a girl after-all, but he realized she had a point and tried his best.

As it turned out, Sarah was very lousy at dodging.

She was physically slow and Eian had little trouble hitting her.

She practiced healing herself with her new life bolts, which patched her up nicely.

She even tried to do a dodge-roll and landed on her face eliciting laughs from Jessica, though Eian chuckled out of reflex.

Alex was the first one who asked if she was okay, Eian asked a moment later.

Sarah took a break, and Eian finally realized why Sarah went in the first place.

"I think Jessica would benefit as well." Sarah grinned sadistically.

"WHAT?!" Jessica's eyes went wide, Alex was similarly startled.

A moment passed.

"What do you mean?" Alex frowned at her.

"You said she just recently learned to use her powers right?" Sarah rolled her eyes.

"Yeah and?" Alex was still frowning.

"Well. She hasn't practiced it outside that dream-place has she? This is the perfect time for her to learn. Especially since it's safe." Sarah was definitely enjoying this.

"......It's clear you just want her to get hurt." Alex's tone was getting dangerous.

"Sure. I also want her to be more useful and stronger though." Sarah shrugged and openly admitted it.

Eian's eyes widened, he'd never heard someone openly admit they want to see someone get hurt.

Suddenly he felt a little weird being used like this.

"You bitch!" Jessica got up and was stalking over to Sarah.

Sarah startled took a step back.

Things drastically escalated when Sarah summoned a lightning bolt.

Jessica froze then took several steps back, Alex shot up and got in front of Jessica.

Eian's eyes almost bulged out of his sockets.

'Like, what the fuck?' Eian was staring around dumbly.

"What're you doing!" Alex definitely looked pissed.

"Nothing!" Sarah frowned and held the lightning at bay.

"That is not nothing!" Alex pointed at the lightning bolt.

"Shut up Alex, she was stalking over to me. What, you expect me to just let her hit me or something?" Sarah lifted an eyebrow inquisitively.

Alex looked furious, but held his tongue.

Eian on the other hand sighed, at least it seemed she wouldn't use it.

Jessica was peeking over Alex's shoulder.

"I don't think you should use magic to cow people. You're strong-arming people." Alex frowned and was still visibly upset.

"Then she shouldn't try to get into my space so suddenly." Sarah glared daggers into Alex.

Everyone went quite again.

Eian begun to wonder what would happen, but daylight was already beginning to stream forth from the original opening.

The night had come to an end.