Roused by the smell of something sweet, Claire slowly opened her eyes. Her body was sore and her throat ached when she swallowed. It took a moment for her mind to catch up with the rest of the world, and when it did, she sat straight up and looked for her sister. How could she be so foolish as to fall asleep in the presence of a stranger? She was incredibly lucky to even be alive right now, not to mention the other terrible things he could have done to her while she was unconscious.

Claire took in the strange scene and ignored it until she found her sister. Sophia was fast asleep, snuggled up in her sleeping bag with rosy cheeks and a slight smile touching her lips. When she realised that there was nothing to worry about, Claire let out a shaking breath and turned to the oddity she'd noticed a few moments ago.

Leon, the damn brute, was hunched over a roaring flame with no shirt on, his muscular back covered in beads of sweat. His hand was dancing around the fire until he suddenly shoved the meaty digits straight into the orange haze.

She was about to scream when the flames shuddered and twisted. They became a perfectly controlled bulb of orange heat, curling around the blackened cauldron that was held above the fire. She watched in awe as Leon manipulated the blaze. It went from spinning around in a circle at the base to surging up over the lid when the water reached a boil. The flames expanded to cover the entire pot, even wrapping around the top like a ball for the next half an hour. The liquid simmered that entire time, never shifting from its rhythmic bubbling.

Claire blinked and found that the fire was receding back to the logs, appearing like a completely normal campfire after a few seconds.

Leon took a deep breath and stretched, letting out a fairly loud groan. He wiped his sweat off with a towel and put a fresh t-shirt on from his backpack. He winced as he stood but didn’t slow down, picking the cauldron up to carry it off somewhere.

That was also when he noticed Claire.

“Sorry,” He said, smiling, “did I wake you?”

“No, you’re alright,” She said, flusteredly waving her hands. Who knew that a muscular back could look so good? “I woke up a while ago and was just curious about what you were cooking. Is that supposed to be dinner?”

“Better!”

When he fell silent, Claire didn’t have the heart to ask again. It was obviously supposed to be a surprise. He put the cauldron on the ground and began to awkwardly tilt it, obviously unused to only having one hand.

There was a story there that she would ask about later. For now, Claire got up and helped him pour the red liquid into a big wooden bowl. They waited for it to cool in silence. Leon pulled out a stick of dried meat and a water bottle, holding both out to her.

She was polite and initially refused, but when her stomach rumbled, she was forced to remember that she wasn’t in the position to refuse free food. Once she was done eating, Leon handed her a different bowl that was also full of red liquid. It was lukewarm compared to the steaming cup that had just come out of the cauldron, but that didn’t make it any more appetising.

She stared at the glistening red liquid without drinking it, sparing Leon a few concerned glances.

“What?” He said, failing to hide a sly grin. “Drink it. I promise you’ll be surprised.”

Her parents had warned her to never leave her drink unattended, but they hadn’t said squat about not drinking blood in a magical forest. She guessed that one was up to her own discretion. Taking a deep breath, Claire did something that would have greatly disappointed her parents. She gulped the strange liquid down in a very unladylike manner, both of those facts more than enough to give her father a heart attack.

Then it hit her like a gentle tide at the beach. She leaned to the side, forced back by the power contained within the drink. It swirled around her stomach, pushing her as if she really was drifting around in the ocean. Claire looked over at Leon and found that his mouth was hanging open in shock.

Was that not supposed to happen?

What was going on?

Finally, the liquid settled down and the power began to seep into her flesh. As her wounds visibly stitched themselves together, she unconsciously let out a moan from how good it felt to be healed. Trained reflexes kicked in and Claire covered her mouth with the tips of her fingers. She glanced at Leon but he didn’t seem to care. He chuckled and asked if she was okay, explaining that the elixir was probably too powerful to consume in big doses.

Claire absently nodded until the elixir was all used, her injuries all gone.

“Surprised?” Leon said, looking pleased with himself. “I told you I can brew magical potions.”

Claire felt better than she had in weeks. Her scrapes and bruises were gone, her legs stopped aching, and even her exhaustion was almost entirely wiped away. What could this be called other than magic?

“I thought you were joking,” Claire said, feeling a lot better about the stranger before her. “How did you do it?”

“Why, how did I brew a magical potion? Magic berries, of course.” Leon said, pointing over at a bush with only a few unripe raspberries left on it. “I also used some magic.”

“But it wasn’t just with the berries, was it? You controlled the campfire. I assume you did that with a skill, right?”

“Of course. I’m not sure about you, but I couldn’t control any fires before I awakened my spirit.”

“You couldn’t?” Claire gasped, theatrically covering her mouth. “I’m embarrassed for you, truly. How did you survive until now?”

“Very funny. Anyway, did you like my elixir?”

“Like it? That one drink could do things that modern medicine can only dream of. And the trick you did with the fire was amazing, too. If you don’t mind… could you maybe teach me the skill?”

Leon shrugged. “I don’t see why not.”

Claire attempted to decipher the skill for what felt like an eternity. Attempted, and failed. Leon spoke of things connecting to his mind, what she should do with her Qi, and even the scenes he imagined while using the skill. None of them worked. She didn’t give up so much as she used up half of her Qi and was forced to stop.

It wasn’t her failure that bothered her.

It was the boy’s genuine confusion at why she was struggling so much, his tone so unintentionally condescending that it infuriated her to no end. He spoke as if learning the skill should take only a handful of minutes. With her experience, however, she knew that to be an impossibility. It took weeks or even months depending on the person.

Sighing, Claire sat on her sleeping bag and took a sip of water. While she didn’t stick her hands into the fire, the orange flames were still very hot, drying out her throat and eyes.

“Sorry,” Leon said, looking guilty. “I guess I’m a pretty bad teacher.”

Claire laughed. “Skills are hard to learn from someone else. Besides, I only wanted to learn it as a party trick. I don’t actually like cooking so I doubt I’ll enjoy the cultivator version of it.”

“Still, you used up a good chunk of your Qi for nothing when you could have used it to cultivate.”

Claire shrugged. “Doesn’t matter now. I’ll just consider it the fee for a lesson on not to overextend myself. I probably wouldn’t have bothered practising enough to get to your level, anyway. It was like the flames were dancing in the palm of your hand. It was so natural and flowing that I didn’t even realise I was staring until you stopped.”

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

“Really?” He said, sounding genuinely surprised. “I was more focused on not messing up again. Honestly, I didn’t really pay that much attention to how it looked.”

“Surely you must have noticed by now? It should have taken you weeks of daily practice to become so skilled at controlling your Qi.”

“Weeks?” Leon said, looking at her strangely. “I only figured out how to do that today.”

“T-Today?”

“Yeah, I started after you fell asleep. It took me like a million tries,” he said, and Claire felt herself relaxing, “and then I got the hang of it and gained a skill called Flame Control. What you just watched was my second attempt at using Flame Control to make an elixir.”

He gained a skill in less than an hour? Second attempt? The flame hadn’t flickered or trembled once in that extended brewing session. Claire had weeks of experience manipulating Qi and yet she couldn’t even exert that much control when her power was contained inside her, let alone merged with a lop-sided, raging campfire. The fact that he could do that at all meant that he was some kind of…

Claire let that thought die, her mind shifting. At first, she’d called Leon a monster because of his callous disregard for life. Next, because of his horrifying skill in a fight. She then thought him a murderous monster for obvious reasons, the phantom pain on her neck still fresh in her mind. But now, as she stared at the man sitting across from her, his smile genuine and his gaze impassioned, she realised what kind of monster he really was.

She just hoped that this monstrous genius wouldn’t get bored of her before he tore open a portal out of this place with his bare hands.

***

Leon grinned from ear to ear, incredibly impressed by his latest elixir. After asking Claire to go and fetch some more water, he added another log to the fire and opened up his notifications from the last few hours.

[Congratulations! You have learned the technique: Flame Control (Common).]

Every skill had a description along with it, but Leon had never bothered to pay attention to it. Qi Burst, Qi Eruption, and Qi Bullet were all very basic, simply stating how they worked and what they did. Leon intimately knew these things so he never bothered to look at them, but this skill was different. He had only a faint idea of how Flame Control worked.

[Flame Control (Common): This skill allows one to interface with the natural world via their sense of touch, making it perfect for young children and novice alchemists to gain experience. By infusing your Qi into a mortal flame, you become able to exert control over it for a short time. Level of control is dependent on the quantity of Qi infused, the user’s ability to manipulate their own Qi, and the user’s affinity to fire.]

Leon nodded his head. He tried infusing the cauldron, the boiling liquid, and the berries with his Qi, but none of those ideas had made a notable difference. Only infusing the flame did anything. Even then, it had been extremely limited. He could push the entire flame to lean in one direction or another, but that was it.

It wasn’t until he remembered the visualisation he used to create Qi Bullet that he tried to picture what he wanted his Qi to do. After a few more failures, he quickly figured out a good image to use, allowing his Qi to flow like a liquid into the fire. The flames suddenly came under his control after that.

An hour later, he figured out the fastest way to boil the liquid and the best patterns to simmer the Bloodroot berries. Spinning the flame around the cauldron and pushing his Qi into the top was by far the best he came up with, launching his latest elixir all the way up to nine percent refinement.

Three medicines, and each one was more effective than the last!

Of course, Leon had made two Bloodroot elixirs at three percent purity, the next at six, and the last, which was still cooling, at nine. The first he had drunk himself while the second went to Sophia, Claire’s little sister. He considered holding off but the little girl woke up and began weeping again.

He felt terrible making her wait, deciding that if she was still injured, he would just give her a sip of the next batch. It was lucky that Leon had empathy because Claire was almost thrown to the ground by the six percent elixir, and she was a cultivator.

He didn’t want to imagine what would’ve happened to a regular little girl who couldn’t even use Qi yet.

Finally, Claire came back with three bottles of water. One was Leon’s while the other two were her own. He had already mushed the berries up and tipped them in, leaving her to dump all three bottles into the cauldron as Leon began to expel a steady stream of Qi from the palm of his hand. Unlike Qi Bullet, which had altered the channels in his hand, this new skill made his head tingle for a few seconds.

All of his skills had changed something but to this day, Leon hadn’t really figured out what. Was his spirit being reshaped? Were his channels being streamlined? He simply didn’t know, and no matter how he inspected his spirit, no answers came forth. It seemed inconsequential for now so he continued on without thinking much about it.

Focusing on the task at hand, Leon continued infusing his Qi into the fire until something shifted in his mind. It felt like a piece clicking into place that he hadn’t realised was missing.

Leon rolled his shoulder and began moving his fingers. He didn’t think it was necessary, but the actions were like training wheels. The connection still felt out of place in his head, like new limbs had suddenly grown out of his fingers. He was simply taking advantage of that by using his hand to guide his intentions.

Moving his hand closer to the pot, Leon made a squeezing motion that was mimicked by the fire. It tightened up to gather entirely under the cauldron. In one fluid movement, Leon began to push and pull with his hand, getting the flame to spin around the cauldron.

He could’ve concentrated it into a single jet of flames, but while that was faster, he soon learned the efficiency would cost him in quality. Leon had already tried heating the cold water up as quickly as he could. He thought he was smart, but gradually heating the berries seemed to result in superior extracts. The essence just leaked out of the berries when he tried to heat it up fast, filling the air with the familiar scent that signalled failure.

Now he knew that patience was key.

Once the liquid started bubbling and frothing, Leon instantly pulled back, his timing even better than before. Only the faintest whiff of sweetness and blood appeared. He smiled at his rapidly improving skill and began the long process of simmering the liquid.

Leon slowed down the flow of his Qi as he inhaled, his breathing as calm as he could manage while fatigued. The flames danced for a moment, and then they spun around the pot, crashing into the bottom and sliding around the outside until they slithered up to the opening at the top.

After forty minutes, Leon began to lose control from the mental strain of it all. Sweat dripped down his forehead and into his eyes, his arm burned, and his vision swam as he cut off his Flame Control skill. Gasping for air, Leon read the notification.

[Congratulations! You have successfully refined: Bloodroot Extract (Inferior) - 10%.]