Training with an Ulterior Motive

In the morning, they were eating breakfast in the tavern (eggs and hash, or just eggs for Aurora). Damien was eating slowly, as he was distracted by what the Goddess had told him the previous night. And the conversation with Betty about Aurora. He looked sideways at Aurora, who seemed to notice his gaze, fixing an eye on him while she chomped up another egg.

Are you doing okay Aurora? he asked through Message.

Aurora replied back without stopping eating. 'I am, Master. Why do you ask?'

Damien hesitated a bit, but then decided he may as well get into it. He Messaged: You don't have a problem with Betty and I, or Bluey and I mating, do you?

Aurora seemed to stop for a moment, but then continued eating. 'No. Mating with your partners is only natural.'

Damien nodded. Wait, its...actually I guess it make sense from her perspective. He Messaged: Is that...something you're interested in?

'Of course.' was the immediate and nonchalant response, as if there was no question to the matter.

Damien, taken aback at the quick response, replied: Are you sure?

Aurora replied, 'Yes, we are partners, are we not? Frankly...' her voice seemed a bit irritated. 'I'm a bit upset I haven't become human like Bluey yet. Do I need to raise my level more?'

Damien sighed, Yes, you can 'customize' yourself at level 10.

'Let's please get me to level 10 then, Master.' she replied, jumping over into his lap and nuzzling against him.

Betty smiled, “Were you talking with her?”

Damien nodded. “Yes, about...” he blushed, “...about what we discussed last night.”

Betty blushed too and giggled, “I can guess the answer,” she patted Aurora's head. “Let's focus on raising her level, then!”

Bluey got excited. “More training! Let's go to the water elementals!”

Damien shook his head, “Those are good for you. I don't think it would be safe for a fire-fox like Aurora.”

Betty seemed to be thinking, “I think there's something Aurora could train against. But first, we need to run some errands.”

Damien raised an eyebrow, “Where at?”

Betty poked his cheek. “What do you mean!? We need to pick up your cloak from Madame Silvani.”

After they finished eating, they walked over to Madame Silvani's store. Since it was still fairly early, no one else was there, besides Madame Silvani, sitting behind her desk and sewing.

When they entered, she gave them a smile. “Right on time,” she said, before walking over to a rack and taking something off a hook. It was a brown cloak, matching his hair. She handed it over, and Damien tried it on.

Betty beamed while Madame Silvani nodded approvingly.

“That looks excellent on you. Do you need anything else?” Madame Silvani asked before going back to sewing.

Betty shook her head, “Not right now.”

After leaving, they met up with Bluey and Aurora, who were outside.

“Wow, Master, that's really cool!” Bluey said, feeling up the cloak. “I want one too.”

“I guess we could...actually, I was going to get your bracers, wasn't I...” Damien reminded himself.

Bluey nodded, so they went down the street to the nearest armorer, and got some simple leather bracers that fit her. Despite their simple nature, Bluey acted as if she'd been granted golden bracelets. “These are awesome! Now I can let things bite me and punch them easily.”

Damien sighed, grabbing her shoulder. “Bluey, promise me you won't let anything bite you. They're only there for protection.”

Bluey blushed a bit, then nodded.

Damien smiled, so Bluey smiled back and hugged him.

“Piyu, piiiiyy!” Aurora said, jumping on his shoulder.

Damien pet her head. “Don't worry, once you're human we can get you something too.”

After they finished their shopping, they went over to the guild, and made their way through the crowd to the Bronze-Rank request board. However, as they did, they ran into Kevander and Feya.

“You again!?” Kevander half-shouted at them.

“You again?” Feya asked, smirking at Damien and looking him up and down.

Betty instinctively grabbed Damien's arm. “Why are you bothering us? We're just trying to get requests.”

Kevander was about to reply, but then looked at where they were heading. “Bronze-Rank? Ha! We're not in your way, Feya and I are Iron-Rank. You two are way behind.”

Betty blushed a bit. “We're doing...just fine! We'll be Orichalum in no time!”

Isn't Orichalum level 40 minimum? Damien thought, not sure they'd be there anytime soon.

Before he could reply, he was suddenly grabbed from behind by who he assumed was Bluey, based on the feeling of her breasts in his back.

“Master!” she shouted, confirming his suspicion. “Who are you talking too?”

“What the...” Kevander said, staring at Bluey.

Bluey stared back, then looked at Feya. “Are they joining us?”

“No!” Kevander and Betty both replied instantly.

Kevander seemed irritated, looking back at Bluey. He quickly grabbed a request off the Iron-Rank board, before dragging Feya out.

“See you again!” Feya shouted and waved as she was drug away.

Betty got a smirk on her face. “Haha, he was super jealous of Bluey. He probably thinks your sleeping with both of us.”

Damien blushed, “Well...I sort of am.”

Aurora started crying, “Piyu! Piiiiyu!”

Damien didn't bother to Message, assuming he knew the issue. “Don't worry, we'll focus now and get a request.”

This calmed down Aurora, who jumped onto his shoulder.

Betty looked up and down the Bronze-Rank board, before grabbing a request. “Three wood elementals. I fought them with my old party, so I had them in my Bestiary. They're weak to fire.”

Damien took it and nodded. “Alright. Let's just grab two right away.”

Betty, however, grabbed a different one. “Bluey and I will take this,” she said, showing a water elemental.

Stolen novel; please report.

Damien raised an eyebrow. “That's fine, but why not just go together?”

Betty whispered in his ear, “Aurora probably wants to be alone with you a bit, especially once she transforms.”

Damien blushed, holding his forehead. I guess she's right, based on what Aurora was saying... He nodded.

Bluey seemed perfectly content with this. “Yay, I love training with Betty!” and gave her a hug.

Betty giggled, “See? Bluey likes the idea too.”

The two groups split up, and Damien and Aurora headed out of town. The map showed the wood elemental territory as several small pockets inside the forest, with the closest being not even an hour in.

Before they parted ways, Betty had explained, “They look like trees, so just use fire inside their territory and you'll figure out which is which.”

The journey was uneventful (besides Aurora occasionally breaking off to roast some rabbits) and they easily reached the first pocket before midday.

“Alright, cast just a bit of Fire Breath at each tree until we find one,” Damien explained.

“Piyu!” Aurora replied before she breathed a small amount of fire onto the nearest one.

Damien watched and...nothing happened. He stamped out the fire. It would be nice if we could just burn them out, but I don't think burning the forest down is a good idea.

They repeated this several more times, with the same result

On the fifth one, Damien went to stamp out the fire again, but the tree started moving underneath him, almost causing him to trip.

Damien jumped back, “That's it!”

Aurora started breathing Fire Breath at it constantly, setting it on fire.

Damien watched as it burned. He could see now, the tree's bark was darker than the surrounding ones, and instead of many branches it only had two large ones.

The wood elemental tried creeping towards them slowly, but he and Aurora just kept backing up, while Aurora kept using Fire Breath, slowly engulfing more and more of it in flames.

The tree started to lean over towards them, and twisting it's trunk.

What is it doing?

After a bit, it stopped, then with a whir it wound back around, slamming a branch into Damien's side, sending him flying onto the ground.

Damien grabbed his side. He had only taken less than 10% HP loss, but it hurt like it was much more than that. He looked at Aurora, who luckily was short enough that she hadn't been hit, and was now circling the tree elemental, trying to spread the flames around and engulf as much of the creature as possible.

After a bit, the tree elemental stopped being able to move, and a loud hiss of steam started escaping as it's bark started to peel. It's trunk contorted and twisted again, but this time it just broke and fell over, becoming embers on the ground.

Aurora ran over to Damien.

“Nice job, that was-” he stopped as Aurora wasn't looking at him, instead taking a defensive position in front of him.

“What's wrong?”

“Piyu! Piiiiyu!” she cried over the embers of the felled elemental.

Damien looked, and realized several of the trees were moving towards them. Of course, they weren't actually trees, but more wood elementals. Four of them, two on the far side and one on each of their other sides. He tried to think quickly, looking at her MP. “Cast Flame Wall in front of the two, and another in front of us. We just need to not get surrounded.”

Aurora did exactly that, before bounding up on Damien's shoulder, presumably to get a better view. “Piyu!”

What's wrong? Damien asked through Message.

'There are more. Many more. At least a dozen in total around us.'

Damien nodded. He saw the far two were walking straight through the Fire Wall, catching themselves on fire. He Messaged again, They seem to not be that smart. I'm going to carry you around and you cast Fire Wall. Don't waste any MP on your other spells, and I'll keep you safe while baiting them into your fire.

'Understood,' Aurora replied, casting Fire Wall again over the corpse of the first one.

Damien held Aurora in his arms, as the one to their left started to wind up. Anticipating the attack, he ran away from it, feeling the air fanned over from the swipe.

Ironically, the wood elemental caught itself on fire by having it's branch over one of the Flame Wall's, causing it to start hissing with steam.

Damien started dashing around, keeping himself out of range and getting the tree elementals to walk through the fire walls. He could see Aurora was right, as more kept coming out of the woods near them, using their roots to creep along the ground, over the ashes of their fellow elementals, and through the fires despite them catching on fire.

After a couple minutes, the Flame Wall's were dying down, and Aurora wasn't casting any more.

Did she... he checked, and she had almost run out of MP, seeming to be saving just a small amount. He quickly ran around the closest one, dashing away as it started to wind up. Once clear, he started in a dead sprint back towards town.

After a minute of sprinting as fast as he could (through a forest, that is) he leaned up against a tree, panting heavily.

Aurora jumped down and nuzzled against his leg.

Damien pulled up his status screen, but there was no level notification. He pulled up Aurora's, and saw that she was now almost half of the way to level 9. These are pretty good experience. He looked down at Aurora, and Message'd, What do you think?

'Let us go back once my MP is restored. I'll burn every one if it means I can get to level 10.'

Damien could feel the burning passion in her voice. Deciding to go along with her plan, he slumped against the tree.

They waited a while, until Damien was breathing regularly again and Aurora's MP had completely restored.

“Piyu,” Aurora said, staring at him.

Damien stood up, sending through Message Are you ready?

'Wait, Master, I have a plan'.

Damien nodded, Okay, what is it?

'Master should lure them together in an open area. Then, I'll cast Flame Wall repeatedly underneath them. That way I can take out more before I have wait for my MP again.

Damien clenched his teeth. That's...probably a good idea. I might get hit again, but, I can survive a couple hits. He looked at Aurora to Message Okay, but save enough for Speed Boost in case you need to escape. I'll shout if we need to bail.

Aurora simply replied with a 'Piyu!'.

They slowly made their way back to the clearing where they had fought previously, identifiable by a few small fires that were still going. As they approached, he could tell that there were now even more wood elementals. Instead of being still, they were all creeping around, as if looking for something.

Probably us Damien sighed. After looking at Aurora, he jumped out in the open. “Hey, you slow trees, over here!” he shouted.

The taunting worked, or maybe they were just reacting to the sound, but the elementals all started crawling towards him now.

Damien started kiting around them, trying to stay out of wind-up range so that they kept moving.

The plan seemed to be working. The elementals were crowding around each other, even tangling their roots slightly in their effort to get close to him. After a few minutes of weaving around them, almost all of them were closely bundled up together.

Aurora jumped out from hiding, repeatedly casting Flame Wall underneath, completely enveloping the group.

Some of the elementals tried to change direction towards Aurora, while some kept going at Damien, causing them to tangle more and be unable to move from the Flame Walls. In under a minute, the whole group was engulfed in flame. Damien was even able to feel the heat from a ways away, his face sweating from it.

Aurora ran around towards him.

Nice job he Message'd.

Aurora licked him. 'Let's keep going Master, I'll be able to hit level 10 before the end of the day!'

Damien pulled up the status screen, and she had hit level 9.

Aurora leveled up

Fire-Fox – Level 9

STR – 69

VIT – 81

MAG – 163

DEX – 96

Fire Breath

Speed Boost

MAG +20

All Abilities +5

Flame Wall

Fire Mastery

New Ability Available

MAG +15

Fire Attunement 2 – Boosts Fire Damage spells and adds skill 'Fire Enhancment'.

Fire Enhancement – Adds Fire Damage to physical attacks

Oh, it's like a better version of Bluey's Lightning Attunement! I guess because she was already Fire 'attuned' since she's a Fire-fox.

“Piyu!” Aurora said.

“That seems good, but maybe the MAG is better? You don't attack physically very often.”

Aurora shook her head, then selected Fire Attunement. “Piyu.”

Damien shrugged, then Message'd Well, it's your call.

'I need to be able to fight effectively even with no MP' Aurora explained.

I guess that's true, Damien replied.

'Come, let's go to the next group, Master,' Aurora said, starting to sniff around.

Damien shook his head, standing up. “I think we need to call it.”

“Piyu?” Aurora said, a bit disappointed.

“I know, but if we want to do this strategy, I need more energy, and I'm pretty sure I'm used up for the day.”

Aurora seemed disappointed, so Damien picked her up and hugged her gently. “Don't worry, I'm looking forward to it too. Just hold on a bit longer.”

This seemed to placate Aurora, who nuzzled into his chest.

Once Damien had his breath back (once again), they headed towards town. They had trained through midday and it was now mid-afternoon, so when they got back into town, they immediately grabbed some meat skewers from a stall and chowed down.

He thought of the meat-man from Silaro, hoping he was doing well.

As his mind wandered, he laid back against the bench he was sitting on, as Aurora napped in his lap.

“Master!” Damien heard called.

What...Aurora?

“Damien...” he heard as well.

Damien finally opened his eyes, to Bluey and Betty. Bluey was shaking him, probably harder than she needed too.

“Are you okay?” Betty asked.

Damien blinked a few times, then nodded. “Yeah, sorry, training was a bit tiresome...”

Aurora yawned, then jumped on Bluey's shoulder, licking her face.

Bluey giggled, “Haha, I missed you too sister,” then squashed Aurora into her breasts.

The four of them went and turned in their requests, before heading over to the tavern to eat.

“Do you think she'll be able to hit level 10 soon?” Betty asked.

Damien nodded. “A couple days of focusing and we should be able to get it.

Bluey gave a fist pump. “We should just train on elementals forever! They're really good XP.”

Betty giggled and shook her head. “They won't be for long. The falloff on XP for lower leveled enemies ramps down quickly. I bet you didn't get all that much today compared to the first times we trained on them.”

Bluey seemed disappointed, Damien pulled her her level. It's true, she got an okay amount, but it would take over a week on just water elementals to get another level. Not that that's awful, but it's way slower than what it was... “We just need to get Aurora to 10, then we can get another big request again.”

Betty nodded, doing her own fist pump. “If we get another high paying request, we might have enough saved to put a deposit on a small apartment.”

Damien blushed, understanding the implication “Even with only one bedroom? Are you sure?”

Betty's eyes glistened, “As long as it has a bathroom, we're fine!”