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Misty felt the steam start to fall away from her like fluttering festival streamers from a performer at the end of their performance as Smokey walked up to the plate.

Rhodney and Navy were scrambling with the water skin that Nike had provided.

She internally patted herself on the back from their plan to put the two imps together. Navy cursed as he fumbled the rustic bag of liquid. He struggled to drink about as much as Rhodney struggled to run.

Misty watched Smokey walk up with apprehension. He looked like he wanted to shrink away from the spotlight as quickly as possible.

“You got this Smo– HURGHH!” Torrent tried to support from the woods, raising both hands up in a big thumbs-up, but lost her lunch again. She keeled over, retching into the bushes.

Rhodney had messed her up. Despite being the member with the most mana, her body couldn’t metabolize mana within the air well. Navy had told them that she probably would grow out of it.

According to him, young creatures with the amass condition sometimes had this happen to them, but they lost it as they got older. Kind of like child allergies, but with crippling nausea.

Smokey looked at the pig he requested. He watched as the beast shuffled around and sniffed at the air. The other pigs thrashed against their ropes, even harder, squealing a screeching noise that hurt misty’s ears.

Smokey looked a little too apprehensive. The pig was one of the tamer of the bunch. It was even much smaller than most of the other ones in the bunch. What was the boy scared of?

This should’ve been easy. The thirty seconds fell away. The pig was spacey as hell, looking at a butterfly passing by with wonder in its eyes.

It was kind of cute. A shame it needed to go.

Smokey was someone who was reliable in her eyes and would get the job done.

He looked over to their instructor, “How long do I have to kill it?”

“One… wait, no, two minutes.” Flame slightly whistled like a tea kettle with rage as the giant minotaur changed his answer in Smokey’s favor.

“Breathe Smokey!” Rhodney yelled. Rhodney and Navy may fool a passing observer, but there was a reason the older monsters automatically called them lesser.

Rhodney and Navy were exceptional monsters blessed by the gods and given knowledge and power beyond themselves. They weren’t invincible, but you could make a solid argument that they were slightly below, or even close to Flame in terms of combat potential. Especially Rhodney.

The boy’s enhancing magic seemed to be unstoppable to the rest of the camp. And Navy’s knowledge and use of mana was something you’d only see in people far older than himself.

However, the boys were the exception, not the rule, given power beyond their station from the powers above.

She watched Smokey’s veins pulse as he tried to will the fire out of his hands. He gritted his teeth, struggling with the difficulty of turning his mana into fire. Small sparks of flame and sputters of smoke grudgingly sprayed from his hands.

Misty was at first confused, then quickly wanted to look away. It was embarrassing to see. Her fists clenched as he tried over and over. “Breathe Smokey! Concentrate!” Rhodney yelled.

Smokey didn’t respond, pushing harder, desperately trying to create any kind of fireball. Misty watched in pity as the boy’s veins in his head pulsed under the pressure.

He growled and screamed as he tried to pull it out of himself. But all he grabbed out of the stores of mana within him was just more smoke.

His cloud swirled around his body, as his frustration built like a volcano with no release. The cloud’s movements reflected his feelings of regret and shame. It tried to shield its master from the critical onlookers with… little success.

It just swirled in place, not quite big enough to cover the boy, as he fumed on the verge of tears.

Nike approached him, putting a big hand on the boy’s shoulder. “It’s alright lad, you don’t have to keep going…”

Smokey gritted his teeth and snapped at the man, “Do you want me to quit!” The boy snarled at the minotaur. The minotaur looked down at the boy and subtly motioned with his eyes to the group next to him. Smokey stopped, then slowly looked to the right.

He saw his chuckling cradle mates. The silent shakes of Navy’s head. And Misty’s looks of pity. Those were the worst of all. The boy’s smoke swirled and grew into a giant cloud that almost swallowed him whole.

He was angry and embarrassed. The animated boy couldn’t hide any of his emotions even from within the cloud.

Misty wanted to break through the clouds and comfort her friend, but she knew that would probably make him feel worse. No one wanted to be coddled.

Guess magic isn’t always what it’s cracked up to be.

Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

Smokey turned back and screamed at the pig in rage. A billowing jet of smoke streamed out of his mouth, a poor imitation of dragon’s breath, that seemed to only make the beast cough.

The animal simply moved out of the way of the smoke, hopping away with slight annoyance.

This wasn’t an enclosed space like the cradle, and the pig was far more agile than the minotaur. There was no way Smokey was winning this.

He collapsed into the ground.

Misty watched the teacher shake his head, and then walk back to where he had been standing before. He was disappointed, with what, who could tell?

This failure crushed his earlier ego bump. Misty steeled herself as she predicted that she was probably going to feel similar when she went up.

Torrent walked out of the woods, having missed the entire display, wiping her mouth and still looking a little nauseous.

She saw the pig slowly getting re-tied by Nike and brought back to its group. She looked around to see Smokey on the ground, and the snickering members of their community making his cloud become an even darker black.

A cold anger appeared on her face when she looked at Smokey. Her stomps slightly shook the ground as her unconscious magic started to move the air around her. She didn’t will it to happen nor did she even think about it.

Misty watched her body move on pure auto pilot, breaking the smokey barrier that had engulfed her friend. “Get. up.”

“...”

“I said, Get. up.”

“...I failed,”

“And?”

“We…I…The plan–”

*SMACK!*

Everyone winced, some even touching their cheeks in sympathy. That sounded incredibly painful.

“That doesn't matter. What matters is they are looking at you like this.” She said, looking critically over at the group, “What happened to the cool Smokey that almost defeated an adult? What happened to the Smokey that impressed me when he charged into battle? What happened to the boy who was the first to grab onto Rhodney’s waist and point him in the right direction?”

Smokey looked surprised, tilting his head up and looking at the girl. He stared at her with an expression that Misty didn’t recognize.

“Are you going to keep laying there in your cloud, or are you going to keep being cool?” she asked fiercely.

Cracks started to break in the boy’s unidentifiable expression as he looked at the girl.

He looked down in debate for a little bit, before a smile started to slowly creep in notches up his face, “I impressed you?”

Torrent’s eyes widened. That’s what he was focusing on? Her face got slightly red as she said, “No I… I… Ok… Just a little,” Torrent was trying to keep her cards to her chest, but was not doing it well.

Smokey rubbed his face and wiped the lingering tears and snot of his face. He heated up his face quickly in an attempt to get it all off as quickly as possible.

Glowing, he said, “Then I guess I have to keep up my reputation.” He said smiling. Torrent smiled, looking down on the boy that was slightly smaller than her.

A healthy glow in her cheeks that matched Smokey’s. Misty watched how they lingered for just a little too long before heading back to the group.

“You alright?” Rhondy asked.

Smokey smiled sadly in response and apologized to the group. He was supposed to be the one to defeat the pig because he was the only other person with fire magic.

With him losing, their team's quota of getting at least three people to succeed was shot. Navy sighed.

“You shouldn’t’ve told me you would “Figure it out,” next time, tell me when you can and can’t do something. You’re only a liability when you lie to your team,” Navy said firmly.

Smokey nodded.

They all stood in a circle, staring at the ground for a little bit.

Misty saw all their downtrodden faces before slumping down. Man. Torrent’s speech was good but it didn’t do anything for morale.

Torrent chuckled, joking, “Guess it’s time for me to fail now? Smokey, any suggestions?”

Smokey puffed out a laugh.

“Fail with style. Wouldn’t want to stop being cool right?” he cheered encouragingly, her light-hearted banter easing the sting of loss.

She smiled, and turned away from the group, requesting a javelin and a pig.

Torrent raised her javelin high in the sky, calling to the wind with an explosion of mana radiating out from her weapon like an expanding volcano’s eruption.

Torrent’s… torrent, spun violently around the javelin. The wind glowed as bright as her horns, which seemed to suck the light from the air around them. The spotlight was on her now. They watched the girl struggle to hold her lunch as she focused.

Misty felt slight pride, as well as jealousy, spin within herself as the girl spun the construct. Misty knew what the outcome of this was going to be, but still… damn.

She was really failing with style.

Torrent grit her teeth and dug in her heels.

Flame yelled “Don’t fuck up!” with a laugh.

Misty watched as Torrent blatantly angled her back toward the boy, completely disregarding him.

“Ignore him,” Navy ordered. “Feel the wind through your fingers and toes, you don’t need to aim it properly, let the mana do the job for you. Your green hand holds onto it tightly and knows how the mana moves, just push it out.”

Green hand? What in the world were toes? She looked back to Navy, who gave back his trademarked shrug.

Man… he was weird.

But Misty felt pride well up inside as she watched the girl spin her mana faster and faster.

It truly was something unique in her generation. There may only be one other with wind magic in the whole cradle. Torrent slightly floated as she focused.

Cmon… Cmon… Get it right… Misty hoped her friend would get it right. Torrent’s eyes glowed a slight blue, “Just, Push!!!” Torrent yelled as she threw her swirling javelin.

And… she pushed something.

Herself.

In the opposite direction.

The lesser children leaped out the way, knowing the routine from all the attempts they’d seen Torrent fail.

Flame however, didn’t know this routine. Shock hitting him as the girl spun insanely across the field. She exploded with a speed that looked painful. She barreled into the imps behind them in line and completely closed-lined Flame as well. The two got caught in a horrible tumble with plenty of javelins and horns that could easily cut them up.

Misty heard the cracks and pops and sounds of flesh breaking as the domino only got worse.

She cringed at the nasty scene that beheld her once the flight had ended.