Two daggers of sharpened wood cut through the air, their shape was partially shadowed, just like their wielder. Motes of golden light drifted lazily through the greenhouse, each softly illuminating their surroundings, casting soft, slowly moving shadows throughout the large enclosed space. Leif brought up an arm to block, a short blade of amber having emerged from his closed fist.

It was the simplest construct [Gold Iron Physique] could create, and it was how Leif had first used the skill back when it had just been [Gilded Body], a year and thirty levels ago. Lucia’s wooden daggers met his conjured blade, chipping away two small grooves that were quickly healed over. Leif countered at a quarter speed, cutting for Lucia’s leg as she backpedalled. He pursued for five seconds, gradually increasing the speed and power of his probing attacks. Then he took a step and vanished, reappearing somewhere out of sight.

The scion pulled back his aura and retracted his senses, he dismissed his amber blade and began to casually stroll through the garden. The game was simple, Lucia would practise her stealth as she snuck around trying to locate him, keeping to the shadows [Amber Aegis] produced after Leif had used to skill on several of the tallest plants in the greenhouse. She would attack, assuming she could get close enough undetected. Leif would counter, then he would teleport away and things would start over.

He stopped, pretending to examine a flowering bush with bright blue petals. A minute passed and Lucia didn’t attack, so he casually walked off down a random path. He was fairly confident she was behind a wall covered in vines, but without extending his aura to check, he couldn’t be sure. He stopped just before passing the ambush site, pivoting to take a different direction. Something rustled softly behind him, and Leif mentally added to his ‘alertness tally’. Leif quickly turned around, pushing vitality into his fingertip until it started glowing gold. He waited ten breaths, then, seeing and hearing nothing, he continued his wandering.

The sound of a foot scuffing against a paving stone came from behind him and Leif froze, dramatically waiting a second before whirling around. In that time Lucia had dove in between two elevated garden beds. He knew she was there, but only because she had barely brushed up against the very edge of his aura. A few months ago he wouldn’t have noticed with his perception restrained as it was, but the aura training he had undergone had left his more esoteric senses sharp and well honed. Not that this was a realistic scenario in the first place, but the comparison was interesting.

Leif pretended to be more blind than he actually was as he stomped around, searching for Lucia. He decided to only ‘discover’ her if she actually made another sound, which to her credit she didn’t do. He did another lap of the greenhouse, occasionally freezing and turning around in accordance with his fake level of alertness. The greenhouse was an impressively sized structure, and a full lap around the perimeter took him just under three minutes. Right as he was reaching where he had started Lucia burst out from between two larger fern trees. She dashed towards him, daggers poised to strike.

To her credit, Leif hadn’t expected her to come from that direction. She must have quietly run around to get in position, and her plan had worked. Lucia rushed into his guard and stabbed towards his chest. Just before the attack made contact with his body a shimmering golden barrier flickered into place, but he would count that as a success.

“Good.” Leif said, back pedalling while blocking and defending.

Lucia tried to dart forward again to score another hit but he didn’t let her. Daggers were at a distinct disadvantage in melee combat due to their shorter reach, their main advantage was their light weight and significant penetration power when catching an opponent off guard. In a straight up fight they were less useful. Leif saw the realisation flicker to life within Lucia’s eyes as the girl quickly hopped back, then she threw her weapons.

One dagger went low, against an ordinary opponent it might wound the target’s leg, reducing their mobility or potentially ending the fight outright if the attack pierced an artery. However, that was only if the dagger’s aim was true, which Lucia’s throw was not. It missed by a foot, and the second, higher aimed throw missed by even more.

“Shit!” Lucia cursed as she threw herself back and to the ground. The motion allowed her to evade Leif’s first strike, and a desperate roll to the side allowed her to dodge the second. She tried to get to her feet but a golden blade pinned the hem of her shirt to the ground, and she aborted the attempt before the fabric tore.

“Decent attempt, though maybe don’t throw away your weapons. At least not without practising your aim first.” Leif said, letting the amber ‘limb’ he was holding her down with dissipate.

Lucia glared up at him, her breath heavy and brow beading with sweat. She blinked, then winced and tried to stand. “We go again.” She said, brushing dirt off her back and legs.

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah. I still have more in me.”

“It’s quite late, you know.”

“I’ve done nothing but stay in my room for days. I can keep going.”

“Fine.” Leif said, shrugging. He reached behind him mentally and pulled the wooden daggers over from where they had landed.

They each hovered over one shoulder. Lucia extended a hand out to grab one, but it bobbed out of her reach. “That’s cheating.” She scowled. “What's to stop you from pulling my attacks off target anyway?”

“Nothing.” Leif said, willing the other dagger to rise out of reach as Lucia tried to snatch it out of the air.

“Feels unfair. I should get metal weapons instead. Hey! Give them back!”

She was jumping to try and grab the daggers, diving forward when they dipped down within her reach. “Metal weapons wouldn’t help you win against me.” Leif said.

“They might help. It isn’t fair you can just hover them around!”

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“In my experience, the ability to manipulate metal is far more common than the ability to manipulate wood. At least for combatants. Hells, two Blades are at least partial metal mages, do you think you would have an easier time against them with steel weapons?”

“I’m not fighting them. I’m fighting you.” She growled, trying to grab his arm for more leverage.

“This is hardly a fight.” He pointed out, stepping to the side to avoid her attempted tackle. One of the daggers floated down to hover just before her eyes. Lucia swiped at it, but missed as it drifted back. “You’re too tired to continue. You’re half as quick as you were when we started.”

“Just because I’m tired doesn’t mean I have to stop.” Then the hilt of the second dagger impacted the back of her head. Lucia fell forward with a cry, sprawling onto the ground. She didn’t try to get back up.

“Well?”

“Heal me again. I want to keep going.” Lucia said into the grass.

“You’re as mentally exhausted as you are physically. You’ve already pushed yourself beyond what-”

“Wait!” She yelled, suddenly springing up to her knees, her eyes wide and unfocused. “I did it! I got the level!”

Leif plucked the daggers out of the air and stored them in his ring. The scion crossed his arms and watched as Lucia flailed wildly in the air for several seconds. “Congratulations. You almost certainly have an experience penalty due to your age, so getting a single level in one night of training is quite impressive.”

I wonder if monsters and beasts suffer from similar penalties, or if it changes on a species by species basis. Did I have an experience penalty? Maybe, it did take me around ten years to go from level one to ten in my monster class.

“Uh, I got stats. Um, hang on.”

“Was it a good level up?”

“Yeah. I mean, none of your business.”

Leif huffed in amusement.

“I should use my free point on [Alacrity], right? Or should I save it for later?”

“Don’t save them, they can’t benefit you unless you use them. You can adjust your attributes later with free points to make up for any deficiencies from your level up gains.”

“Okay… I got skills too! I get to pick skills!”

“You are level two now.” Leif said, not entirely sure why she was sounding so surprised. “I’d hope you got to pick skills. I’m assuming you’ve been given two choices?”

Lucia narrowed her eyes at him. “Yes.” She murmured, her tone suspicious.

“Are you going to tell me what they are?”

“If you know my skills you’ll have an easier time when we spar.”

Leif gave her his best incredulous look, he thought he managed it fine, despite the mask covering his face.

Lucia pressed her lips together, then sighed, relenting. “I have uhh, [Detect Notice] and… [Light Footwork]. Why is it only showing me the names?”

“You should be able to focus on each choice and get a general idea of what they will give you.” He explained.

After a few moments of concentration Lucia’s expression shifted from excited, to thoughtful. “Um, I think the first one will let me… feel, I guess, when people are nearby. I think. No, wait. It’s when they are looking at me. That’s pretty helpful if I want to avoid detection, right.”

“It would help.” Leif said, nodding. “Don’t pick that one.”

“Huh? Why not?”

“I have a friend from Ahle-ho, an adventurer from one of the prime guilds that operate in the city. He has that skill, or an evolved version of it. But it’s ultimately more hindrance than help. It’s a… crutch. Once you get an aura you can develop a similar sense, but without the constant reminder all day every day that you are visible to other people.”

Lucia sniffed, but her attention had clearly shifted to the second option. “[Light footwork] will make me… lighter, I guess. More quiet?.”

“It’s probably a stealth and combat comprehension skill.”

“Comprehension?”

“It means you can upgrade the skill the more you practise and gain experience with using it.” Leif explained.

“Can’t I learn to be sneaky without a skill?”

“You can. Anyone can, you don’t need a class for that either. But comprehension skills also grant a bonus to the actions they affect. It starts off fairly minor, but it can become a significant increase the higher the skill’s rank becomes.” Leif said.

Lucia frowned, shifting into a seated position as she considered. “You really don’t want me to pick the first one?”

“I would strongly advise against it.”

“And that's not because you think it would help me beat you?”

“I doubt it would work on me at all, actually, not with how strong my aura is.”

“You’re just saying that to show off.” Lucia said as she hugged her knees, her frown deepening. Then her gaze went unfocused.

Leif waited several minutes as he silently watched Lucia read words only she could see. She only spoke up to confirm that the skill indeed had a comprehension aspect, which confirmed which one she had picked. Eventually she stood and started tentatively walking around. She stepped down onto one of the wide flat stones used for the pathways, experimentally testing different ways to place her feet.

She hopped from stone to stone, gradually picking up speed as her confidence grew. Her thoughtful expression slowly shifted into a smirk, which in turn became a grin. Lucia’s smile only grew when she started sneaking around on the patches of grass and dirt. Before she would have made small noises as she scuffed loose earth or crunched grass underfoot.

Lucia finally seemed to remember Leif was there and turned, pointing at him with a triumphant look on her face. “We need to go again. Another round of training, I’m sure I can-” Her words were cut off as she yawned loudly.

If Leif could have raised an eyebrow he would have. Instead he tilted his head to the side ever so slightly. Lucia flushed, covering her mouth with an arm. She blustered for a few seconds, then yawned again.

“Okay, fine. But we do this again in the morning.”

“It’s already morning.” Leif pointed out. It was true, though darkness still shrouded the Academy and the mist would still hang heavily over the island for a few more hours.

“Fine, we’ll spar when I wake up!”

“As much as I admire your enthusiasm, I probably won’t be around when you get up. I do have things to do other than babysit you.” He said, letting his aura once again unspool as he walked towards the exit.

Lucia followed, and if it wasn’t for her quiet grumbling, he wouldn’t have heard her at all.