“Oh? Looks like they’re back.” Kiefer commented calmly, placing his teacup along with its saucer back on the glass table.

“Yes indeed. I must say, your help in their training is very much appreciated. It is so much more effective.” Eril replied cheerfully as he picked up his cup of tea for a sip.

The sight was quite unreal, watching 2 small figures drinking tea in a very immaculate manner on a table one can only describe as suitable for kindergarteners. Had it been a stranger looking upon this scene, they would have assumed it was 2 young children playing pretend tea time in the middle of the jungle on a very expensive glass table.

“Haaa… haaa…. Master… how… many… more… rounds?” Jielin wheezed as her jog quickly came to a slow walk, finally stopping as she tried to catch her breath, placing her 2 hands on her knees in a bent over position. Sweat continued to trickle down her forehead as the sight of her 2 relaxing masters started to turn irate.

“Where’s Kina?” Kiefer asked casually, getting off his short chair and casting a quick chilling wind spell to help Jielin freshen up. Despite Kina being his daughter, he had a much better impression of this hardworking young girl.

“She’s not far behind. She stopped to take a short break after climbing the hill.” Jielin explained, wiping the sweat soaked feathers on her face.

“Why don’t you go easy on her for now?” Eril suggested. “She hasn’t had training like Jielin.”

Kiefer sighed, and quickly undid both his void space spell and his gravity field around the mountain range. Had the mountain been on normal land, one could’ve described its peak being above the cloud lines. However, this was on Yurza, the floating continent. Kiefer has estimated that the summit of the mountain would probably be closer to the edges of space than the cloud line that existed below the continent.

As if having been reborn anew, Kina felt the surge of mana return inside her body and instantly disappeared from the small trail in the jungle, teleporting back to small clearing where Kiefer, Isana and Eril had set up a small dwelling home. Facing her were her father, her new trainer, and her training buddy. Her wrist free of the restricting shackles that she hated, Kina quickly tried to get back at her father by stopping time. However, within the split second before she activated her skill, the mana seemed to vanish once more, as a crushing sensation pummelled her to the ground.

“You really think I’m going to let you go without the restriction bracelets completely unsupervised?” Kiefer asked sternly as he slowly released the gravitational field.

“So Jielin tells me you stopped for a break halfway. You know the drills. Give me 20 push-ups, then you two can go take a short recess.” Eril instructed as he watched Kina struggle with her fatigue. She had, after all, just run 5km in an uneven terrain within an enhanced gravitational field that pulled one and a half times as strong. All this without a single wisp of mana to support her.

Grumbling inaudibly, Kina proceeded to do her push-ups, cursing Jielin silently for ratting her out even though she knew that her dad would have felt her presence resting back during her run. Just as she finished her set of push-ups, she instantly felt all the restrictions on her body disappear as Kiefer undid his void space once more. Isana had already begun walking out with a jug full of cooling fruit juice.

“Mum!” Kina quickly called out as she ran towards Isana. Isana embraced her child tightly, her heart aching a little at how hard her husband was pushing her baby. With but a thought, Isana let out her aura which gave a much needed relief from the scorching summer rays. Even though they were high up in the sky and the air was quite cooling, the sun’s ray were quite unforgiving. Where the sun’s rays hit, the temperature hovered around 30 degrees celcius. Where there was permanent shade, it would be quite refreshing at around 18 degrees. Natural heat radiated from within the floating continent like it was a planetary body on its own.

“Are you sure you are not going to regret your decision later? She will come to hate you, you know.” Eril asked quietly, watching both his students crowd around the icy lady who was pampering them like they were her own daughters.

“That’s just the dynamic of our relationship is. Isana’s pampered her throughout her whole life. And I don’t see it stopping anytime soon, so I’ve got to be the one who is strict with her. She may hate me now, but it’s for her own good. Besides, it’s not like she liked me to begin with, I’ve been missing from the majority of her life, so it’s just easier to play the villain.” Kiefer replied, smiling as he watched Isana’s happy smile as she stroked Kina’s hair.

“I see… Well, it’s great you are helping me with handling your daughter. But I’m going to have to take her away for a while. I doubt you will be able to follow us where we are going to go.” Eril replied.

“And where is that?”

“I’ll be taking her to the main city of Natiria. Some skills can be trained through hard work, others she can only learn through experience. I’ll be teaching her some cold reading skills and tricks to annoy others.” Eril answered as a mischievous smile erupted on his face.

“And how are you going to do that?” Kiefer inquired, a little interested in his methods.

“With these,” Eril smiled, pulling out 5 light blue crystals the size of beans. “These are the rewards that Jielin won from the tournament, despite your brat messing up things. These skyrite fragments would be sold at the auction house for gold coins, which we can then spend training Jielin and Kina’s ability to read and predict other people’s reactions, as well as annoy the hell out of them.”

“You know, I have to admit your teaching methods are quite unique. Can I take a look at those crystals? What is this skyrite fragments actually?” Kiefer asked, inspecting the small shards in his hands.

“Oh these are used to rapidly refill anybody’s mana. It goes a long way when trying to expand their mana capacity. They occur naturally, falling out of the sky when the sky lights come on once a year. These are about as small as they get. Fragments like these are no bigger than a fingernail. The next size up, skyrite shards as we call them are about as long as a finger. Then we have the skyrite crystals which are big enough to be held in our palms, about as thick as our wrists. Their value skyrockets with each type being worth at least a hundred times the previous size.” Eril explains enthusiastically.

“Sky lights huh? Auroras maybe? Could these be mana that crystallised due to the solar flares?” Kiefer wondered as he fiddled with one shard. With an idea in mind, he began pouring his mana into the tiny bean-sized shard. Almost immediately, he could sense that not only was his own mana particles slowly being converted into the crystal’s mana, it was also cascading and causing the surrounding mana to follow suit, crystallising layer upon layer of solid mana on the small bean sized shard.

Eril and Jielin watched with their jaws agape as something impossible happened before their eyes. The small bean sized azure shard grew in size quickly, reaching the size of a finger within minutes. However, it showed no signs of stopping as it continued to grow and enlarge. Soon, everyone is gathered around the glass table just watching Kiefer perform his magic.

An hour goes by, then two, and finally on the third hour, tiny cracks began appearing on the arm sized crystal. Kiefer was visibly sweating as the sun loomed directly overhead, seemingly wanting to burn a hole through the continent with its blazing beam. The forest was dead quiet as the tiniest sounds of cracking resounded clearly. Kiefer did not stop, now holding the 30 cm long, 10 cm wide blue crystal with his silvery mana ropes. Then in an instant, the spiderweb cracks on the surface of the crystal all joined together, and the crystal shattered into literally thousands upon thousands of tiny fragmented shards, all barely any bigger than what Kiefer started out with.

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“I believe you say these things were quite precious?” Kiefer asked, watching as Eril had his eyes peeled on the countless sparkling gems on the glass table. “Take these as payment for my daughter’s training. Use it however you like. If you need more, just come to me.”

Looking at the sea of blue fragments, then to Kiefer and finally at Jielin, a wide grin bloomed on Eril’s face. Abruptly standing up and pushing against the table, Eril caused some fragments to spill over the side. The heap of blue crystals started crumbling down the side as they jingled against each other. Eril, however, could not be bothered, but instead had grabbed Jielin by her shoulders and was already hugging her tightly.

“Jielin my disciple! I say, you have got to be the luckiest bird in the whole of Yurza! Of all the opponents to encounter, you actually had to meet the daughter of a gold mine! With this, think of how much we can hassle those snobby rich folks in the auction house! We can get you the best set of armour and weapons for the tournament!” Eril exclaimed, completely disregarding the fact that he had just called Kiefer a goldmine.

“Come Kina! If we hurry, we can still make it to the city in time for the midnight auction! They say the rarest and best items are for sale during that session, which means there are sure to be rich and shifty people there. It’ll be great for teaching you how to read people!” Eril yelled out, quickly dashing into the small house and returning with a large sack. He then began sweeping all the skyrite fragments into the sack, before suddenly pausing. “Oh crap. How am I going to sneak you in? You don’t have feathers or a beak. Any that will definitely stand out.”

“Will this help?” Isana interrupted his banter, pulling out a long sleeved Kimono. It had a white base, with blood red Sakura petals the size of a palm drizzled over. The red and white floral kimono extended to the ground, where it had a black lined hemmings near the ankles.

Quickly rushing the 2 girls into the house for a quick shower, Kina and Jielin returned. Jielin was dressed in a fresh set of her usual training garbs. Kina though, was shuffling about as Isana helped her tie a ribbon on her back waist.

She quickly dressed Kina with the Kimono, putting on a maroon coloured snowflake spotted Kimono herself. The 2 ladies looked like they just stepped out of a painting, their hair colours contrasting greatly with their respective kimonos. Kina’s white tipped black hair against her white and red kimono, and Isana with her silver hair against the maroon Kimono.

Kiefer smiled, as he took out some mithril and orihalcom ingots and began shaping them into masks with beaks. “There, this should suffice would it not?” He asked as Kina and Isana both put on the masks, making them seem like mysterious bird-ladies who came from an unknown village with an impeccable sense of fashion. Kiefer himself did not bother to dress up, but instead was busy grabbing a handful of skyrite fragments and disappearing instantly.

Within his own PD where time stood still, Kiefer leisurely pumped the 15 or so fragments with his mana, finally ending up with 15 large crystals that were on the verge of cracking. It had taken him almost 30 hours within the PD before he exited back outside. To Eril and the rest though, it had only seemed like Kiefer had disappeared for a second. He handed Isana the 15 large crystals , much to Eril’s astonishment, and smiled.

“Are… are you all following too?” Jielin asked, looking at how Isana was dressed in a similar fashion as Kina.

“Of course. She is our daughter after all.” Isana replied, “now let’s make haste. I wanna see this auction of yours.” Saying so, she quickly took to the skies, her maroon kimono fluttering behind her. Kiefer followed suit, carrying Kina with his mana ropes. Eril and Jielin started flapping their wings as they soared through the blinding afternoon sky towards the city.

Sure enough, supported by Eril’s wind spirit, they arrive at the edges of Natiria City by sunset. Kiefer had already cast the cloaking illusion spell around himself, turning virtually invisible to the naked eye. His small stature allowed him to stick closely to the group and not get in anyone’s way. The group met with some resistance at the gates, but a little bribery of a few gold coins and a flash of Eril’s medallion got them past the gates just fine.

Once past the gates, they took flight once again since there were barely any roads within the city. Flying in the dark was not easy for Kina. The birds had their excellent eyesight and geomagnetic bearing to guide them in the darkness, helping them orientate themselves and avoid colliding into each other in mid-air. Kina had to trust her mother’s eyesight since Kiefer had placed the bracelet back on her to avoid any chance of her running wild within the city.

Very soon, they arrived on the branch of a fairly large tree. The branch itself was as wide as a road, supporting the weight of everyone easily. They hopped down several branches and arrived at what seems to be a large entrance dug out from the side of the giant tree that spanned several tens of metres across.

“Hello fellow brother and sisters, the midnight auction will begin in an hour. I assume you lot are together?” the gatekeeper asked politely, scrutinising the 2 lavishly dressed masked ladies.

“Yes. I’ll take my usual booth.” Eril said, stepping forward and flashing his medallion once more. Kiefer began speculating just what powers of authority that medallion held as he watched Eril use it once more to get things going his way.

“Of course master Eril. The fee will be as per usual. 50 gold coins for yourself, and 10 for every party you bring in. That will be a total of 80 gold coins for the 3 ladies and yourself,” The gatekeeper replied as he stretched out his hands and held out a golden tray lined with various red and blue gems along the edges.

Sticking his hand into his pouch, Eril drew from within a single tiny fragment of skyrite. “Here. This skyrite fragment should be worth 100 gold coins at least. Keep the change, just remember to treat me well in future.”

The gatekeeper ushered them a few steps into the brightly lit tree trunk before returning to his post. Kiefer could tell just how rich this auction house must be. The architecture within was exquisitely done. The walls were smooth and oiled. The room was lit with crystals similar to those in the dungeon ceiling. God only knows how much this auction house must earn to be able to keep up with the expenses of running it, seeing as there was a flurry of attendants within catering to a multitude of guests, all of them from various bird tribes.

“Good evening Master Eril.” A young sparrowling girl greeted him. “Please follow me to the waiting room. The housemaster will be here to meet you shortly.” She said as she led them into a room with wooden chairs lined with feather filled cushions.

“This is the premium waiting room. The house master and I know each other. She’ll be here soon enough, so just take a seat.” Eril said proudly, pointing at the uncomfortable looking chairs.

“This is premium?” Kina asked, poking the cushion. “Mum… Can we sit on a sofa?”

“Sure thing honey. Hold on for a second,” Isana said as she stacked the chairs to one corner of the medium sized room. Opening her PD, she took out her sofa from Aioa and laid it down, onto which Kina jumped on and made herself comfortable. Eril could only sigh in defeat as his own common sense is flipped round and round by this foreign family.

As they waited, the door finally swung open and a swallow bird-woman similar to Eril dashed in and hugged him tightly. Everyone except Jielin seemed startled by her actions, which oddly resembled a little child.

“You’re finally back Dad! And sister Jielin you too!” She exclaimed in glee.