Magnus returned to the crater where he crashed. Even though he slept in its center for about a year, he does not feel nostalgic as he returned. It is nothing more but a hole on the ground created by the impact of his entry in this world. It was a symbol of his fresh start.
As Magnus walked to the center of the crater, he began to look back on his days on Earth. He was not doing so because he missed his life; he was merely trying to remember what methods he used to measure the physical capabilities of his former students.
A physical test huh? Should this take me back this much? Magnus thought to himself as he was organizing within his mind the steps he will be taking for this “aptitude test”.
“Alright, Suzaku… first… physical strength.”
<“Eh? Why? We have lots of mana to enhance that…”>
“We need to know our physical strength. First, our physical strength will most likely determine how much mana we can use. Second, if ever we face an enemy capable of pushing us to deplete our mana reserves; we need to determine if we can still fight back even when relying on pure physical might.”
Suzaku did not argue further with Magnus. His reasons made sense. Though, Suzaku still doubted that they will fight against someone strong enough to push their limits. His partner’s foresight was amusing to him, to say the least.
Magnus found ten different sizes of stones, ranging from fist-sized to that of a boulder two times bigger than him. He started from the smallest and used all his might to throw the stones one at a time. The results somewhat surprised him, the weight of all ten stones made little to no difference for him. The stone with the size of a fist flew like a bullet shot out from a rifle. The speed of each stone traveled gradually slowed down with the increasing weight. The slowest of course was the largest boulder but it still traveled like a baseball thrown by a professional pitcher.
Magnus now had a rough idea of how strong he was physically. But he decided to not try to test it to the limits further. He was thinking that it will devastate the surrounding area if he did so.
Next, Magnus tried to test his speed. He climbed off from the crater and settled on a plain a few meters from it. He roughly measured a distance of one kilometer and placed a marker from one end to another.
“Alright Suzaku, you take over. Run as fast as you can from this starting point to the end. I will try to estimate how fast we can travel this distance.”
Magnus closed his eyes and when he opened them again they now clearly belonged to Suzaku. Then Suzaku nonchalantly stood from the starting point, not even getting ready to run. But when he heard Magnus say “go” within his mind, he dashed forth with all his might.
“A thousand and one, a thousand and two… a thousand and thirty… Huh? At the endpoint already?”
Magnus was amazed yet again; it only took thirty seconds to cover the distance of around one kilometer. That was at least four to five times faster than the record that was set on Earth.
So, at least one hundred twenty kilometers per hour, around ten percent of the speed of sound. Magnus calculated to himself.
“Amazing Suzaku, we are quite fast, at least in a straight line.”
<“Bah! That was pathetic… I was much faster before”>
Magnus ignored Suzaku, they already established that the abilities Suzaku had back then clearly degraded. But compared to a normal person, their performance so far was way better.
Next should be agility, but Magnus was not sure how to accurately measure it without equipment. He then decided to gather a number of stones and threw them straight up. He then asked Suzaku to dodge all the falling stones. To no surprise this time, Suzaku was able to easily avoid everything. Magnus then at least estimated that they were agile enough to avoid things accelerated by inertia.
“Well, what should come next is to measure how much punishment we can take. But we don’t have anyone to try and dole out the attacks. It will also be stupid to try hitting ourselves.”
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<“How about we try out more skills then?”>
Magnus smirked a little, it really seemed like Suzaku is taking an initiative to measure their capabilities.
“Let us see what we're able to use first… we did that flame shockwave that destroyed the ants if what remembered is correct, that is an area effect. And if we compare it to the size of this crater, it should have a range of at least one hundred meter radius. That should be its full strength as of the moment given that you were pretty pissed back then when you used it.
<“That should be correct… though I think I was still holding back a little back then”>
“Alright, let us say we can expand the range for around twenty meters more”, Magnus rolled his eyes as he gave in and gave a more generous estimate. “But, there is a weakness to the attack. It seems that the area around three meters from us isn’t affected. The proof of this is the fact that Braxt was not burnt along with the ants.”
Suzaku was silent; it was true that he did not intend to save Braxt. It just so happened he was near Suzaku during the attack. But what was more surprising was, Magnus was able to see this weakness.
“This means that if we are fighting close range, the flame shockwave will not be of use. It can be utilized more effectively if the opponents are a little far from us.”
Magnus was in deep thought while saying this. Their strongest attack so far has a fatal flaw. Not to mention the amount of mana needed for the skill. They will not able to spam the attack in case they encounter even more enemies than the ants they decimated.
<“We have the flame hand spear for close combat”>
“Hmmmm, I forgot about that… let us test it out against those two boulders… try cutting one with full speed, the other as if you are cutting meat.”
Suzaku approached the first boulder and activated the flame spear hand. He made a chopping motion at full speed. The boulder was cut in half in an instant. The surface of each half where the skill connected shined as if they are jewels.
The heat of this attack is on another level. Magnus deduced as he inspected both halves of the boulder.
Suzaku then proceeded to the next boulder then slowly cut it in two. His hand, despite the much lesser speed, was as if cutting butter with a heated knife. Some parts of the boulder also melted by the time the flame spear made contact on its surface.
<“Hahahaha, see that, we have it covered in close combat as well.”>
“Why didn’t this burned the wolf though?”
<“That was because I did not use the flame element then…”>
I see, so we can also adjust the potency of this attack. Magnus took a mental note of the information; he can probably use it in devising strategy in the future. The attack may also come in handy in daily life if the circumstances called for it.
“Well, we also have that healing flame and the fire beam from our fingers…”
<“I never had that fire beam fingers before… how did you come up with that?”>
“Oh? That was a new skill then?”
Seems like we have absolute control over mana with a fire attribute. Magnus’ eyes brightened with this discovery. This means the limits of the technique they can use was their imagination,
<“I also had that eye beam before… let us see if we can use it…”>
“No… that would be counterproductive…”
<“How so? That was very cool back then”>
“Most likely it will have the same principle behind the finger beam. Plus, it might limit our eyesight during fight…”
Suzaku tried to recall events when he used the eye beam. And he was able to conclude that Magnus had a point. It really did limit his sight. He was also not able to properly use his peripheral vision. It was also the reason why the seven princes of hell were able to land some attacks against him.
<“Then the last thing we can try out then is my hyper beam…”>
“I can sense pride behind that claim… do tell what that skill can do.”
<“That was my strongest attack. It was like what that wolf did, we concentrate mana in our mouth, then release it against the target…”>
Magnus was taken aback. That was indeed a potent attack, but…
“Wouldn’t that make us look ridiculous? Opening our mouth wide for a long time?”
<“Huh? Didn’t you see how cool that wolf looked?”>
“That was because it was a wolf. We have a body of a human remember?”
<“So we sacrifice our attack because of how we will look in using it? Isn’t that vastly illogical?”>
“True, but maybe we can find a way to release it other than using our mouth…”
Magnus and Suzaku racked their brain to solve the problem… Around five minutes passed by when Suzaku finally had an idea.
Suzaku bent his knees to establish a stable base for the attack. He then clasped his hands together and started gathering flame attribute mana. He slowly pulled his hands apart while slowly expanding the power in between. When he was satisfied with the mana gathered, he pushed both of his hands forward with full force with his thumbs and index fingers forming a triangle. This resulted in releasing a huge beam targeted at one of the biggest trees on the edge of the forest. This tree looked as if it was as tall as the Eifel Tower of Earth. Its trunk would probably need at least fifty people holding hand in hand just to surround it.
The resulting explosion pulverized the target. It was a finishing attack indeed. The downside was, Magnus felt it drained around sixty percent of their total mana. So at the moment, they can only use it once. And that was given if they haven’t utilized mana in other big skills.
After the test, one glaring problem confronted Magnus…
“Suzaku, our most powerful skills are inefficient. This may be fatal in long fights.”
<“… But…”>
Suzaku tried to find a way to rebut. Yet he cannot find the right words to refute Magnus. He did not encounter this problem before. He was able to easily use all his skills without minding mana cost.
“We really need to train… And we need to choose our battles carefully…”
<“So no monster extermination then?”>
“On the contrary… we need to proceed with that… let us start with the ants…”
<“Huh? Didn’t we just obliterate them???”>
“We might have killed most of them, but I doubt that was their entire population… we hunt the rest and use them as a training tool…”
<“hehehehe, looks like we will be having some fun…”>
Magnus was silent. But he was smiling from within. He admitted to himself that the excitement of battle was adrenaline-charged. He seemed can’t stop longing for it ever since he experience that fight against the wolf.
“Let us go back to the cave first… Braxt should be finish cooking by now. Let us ask him about the ants more while eating. Tomorrow, we hunt.
The sun was bidding its farewell as twilight conquers the sky. Magnus walked back to the direction of the cave. His eyes filled will life. Finally, he was able to live.