"You've got some explainin to do, Winal," said Flintlock. The monkey pointed his musket at Alwin, his tail twitching in anger right behind him.

Beside him, Gus waved around a half-eaten muffin, a sour expression marring his features. "Yeah, Mr. Winal. You've got some explaining to do."

Apparently when he had transformed into his Fire Soldier Ant form inside of that white void space thing—he should come up with a better name for it or at least learn what it's actually called—it had affected his body in the real world too. Maybe he should have put in more thought into his plan. Oh well, live and learn.

Although he should probably work on the living part first. As Flintlock aimed his firearm at him, Winal's mind raced desperately as he tried to come up with some kind of excuse that could get him out of this sticky situation. Maybe he could talk his way out of it again. If he managed to do it once he could probably do it again—emphasis on probably.

"I'm not Winal," said Winal.

"Wise guy aren't ya," said Flintlock. "Tell me, wise guy, how many monsters are there named 'Winal' who are also shaped like an obnoxious fire ant?"

"Um... Seven?"

“Wait, really?” asked Gus.

"Enough fooling around, pardner," said Flintlock, his finger against the trigger. "Now explain why you attacked me with that muffin."

Beside him, Gus puffed out his cheeks, arms crossed as he huffed, “Yeah! How could you waste my precious muffin? I gave you that muffin!”

Flintlock slowly turned his head toward Gus, eyebrows arched as he said, "That's why you're upset with him? Frankly, pardner, I don't think you're being mad at the right thing."

"Are you telling me my muffins aren't important?"

Flintlock shook his head, muttering under his breath, "Goodness gracious..."

When Flintlock turned back toward Winal, all he saw was a big fat puff of nothing. Winal the genius had snuck away during the confusion. He had performed his trademarked sidestep-while -Flintlock-and-Gus-bickered-amongst-themselves-and-hope-they-don't-notice-him-moving-step-by-step-out-of-the-way technique. It was a mouthful, but that just meant his technique was extra powerful. When he was out of sight, he booked it—pun most definitely intended—bringing the 'Spirit Bomb' book with him.

Alwin fled from the library, choosing the fastest option he could find, which was jumping off the second-floor railing. There was a short scream followed by a loud splat as Winal's ant body landed flat against the wooden flooring. A few drops of flaming sweat dripped off of him, leaving scorched trails on the wooden floorboard. After quickly making sure no one witnessed the incident—which was impossible because anyone with functional eyes and ears heard him crashing to the ground—he scuttled away. Good thing for him, the library's entrance doors weren't that far. A quick sprint later, and he was gone.

Where should he go? Where should he hide? Where was the best place to be right now? The answer was obvious—the training grounds classroom! Winal skedaddled his way down the corridors towards the classroom he hadn't been in for something number of days. Was it three days or four? Maybe even twelve? Doesn't matter. Time flies when you're locked in a white room refining Fire Essence and then immediately jumping into a Fire Tribulation with absolutely zero preparation while what could possibly be considered the embodiment of the Fire Tribulation itself decided to intervene. That was a mouthful or mandible-ful in Winal's case.

Winal had almost forgotten something crucial. It was a key factor that decided whether he lived or died. Failing to recognize it could mean the difference between life and death. Insert another dramatic line here about life and death because Winal was too lazy to come up with another one. So, what was it?

If they were looking for Winal, all he had to do was not be Winal—elementary my dear Alwin! Well, his name wasn't exactly Alwin right now, but that was easily remedied. A little flash of light here, a little restructuring his body at a cellular level there, and voila! Now Winal was Alwin!

With the book in his mouth—since he no longer had hands or legs—Alwin hopped on over to the training grounds classroom, where surprise surprise there were people in there training. Who would've thought, right? Probably everyone and their grandmother, but that was beside the point. All he had to do was play it cool and this whole thing would blow over just fine. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

"Hey, Uchronia. How's it hanging? I definitely did not just come from the library and I definitely am not running away from anyone," said Alwin. He was leaning against the doorframe with his Spirit Hands crossed and pretending that the 'Spirit Bomb' book held in his mouth was invisible.

Uchronia turned away from the wooden training dummy that she had been beating senseless—well deserved in his opinion—and glanced at Alwin, her smile instantly falling away. She fixed him with an incredulous look, leaf twitching as she frowned at him. Her bright green eyes glowed as she glared at him, piercing him with her gaze.

"What are you doing? Also, why is there a book in your mouth?"

"What book?" Alwin said as he spat out the book behind him.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Uchronia rolled her eyes at the display before resuming her interrogation of the Yin-Yang Slime. "Have you even been training or have you been slacking off with Minister Lapis?"

"Yes, I most indubitably have been training and practicing with Minister Lapis. There is nothing suspicious going on here," replied Alwin, his fake laughter filling the air, causing a couple of nearby students to glance his way.

"Right..." said Uchronia. "Prove it then."

Alwin stared at Uchronia for a moment, the only thing he had done with Lapis was create Fire Essence and achieve his new form. The latter was off the table. Okay, technically, he’d managed a Fire Blast once too, but it hadn’t even registered in his status yet and he had only done it once. What if it blew up in his face? Better to play it safe than sorry.

"No."

"What do you mean, ‘no’?" said Uchronia, scowling at Alwin.

"Your clearance isn't high enough," said Alwin.

Uchronia rolled her eyes again, this time turning back toward the wooden training dummy, muttering something under her breath. Alwin didn't exactly have the best hearing—in fact, he didn't even know if he had ear holes—but he did manage to catch something about her having to do everything herself.

Without warning, she began to assault the wooden training dummy with a series of kicks, using those thin root-like legs of hers to pound it senseless. Since Uchronia was part plant, would that mean she was beating up the corpse of her distant relative? An intriguing mystery, but too bad Alwin wasn't training to be a detective, he was training to be a Human Hunter! The best way to hunt humans? Bomb them into oblivion! Or at the very least, bomb them to next Tuesday.

But first, he had to actually figure out how to make a Spirit Bomb. Thus, begins the worst part about learning new things—reading. Alwin lay on the floor, commanding the Spirit Hands to flip the pages as he read through the text. Maybe reading a book in a training room where there were a dozen monsters yelling out their skill names or punching the splinters out of a wooden dummy wasn’t the brightest idea.

But, Alwin the genius had another brilliant solution. In fact, he was so brilliant he actually came up with two solutions! A second pair of Spirit Hands materialized themselves, hovering over the book. They traced along the page, guiding his gaze line by line to ensure he didn’t lose his place.

Then came a third pair of Spirit Hands. Alwin wasn't entirely sure where his ears—if he had any, but he probably did—were located on his round, squishy body. So he did the next best thing. They clamped down hard on the sides of his body, like makeshift earmuffs, squeezing him. Shifting and adjusting, they kneaded his body until they managed to muffle out the symphony of fighting around him. Not all of it, but hey it's better than nothing.

Now, he could sort of focus on the book in front of him. Here's a brief summary of what he gleaned from the pages:

Words, words, words. Boom. Pow. More words. Explosion. Spirit Bomb. Mana. Even more words. Big boom. Small boom. Ka-boom. Boom boom. And finally—BOOM!

When Alwin finished absorbing all of that information, he took a long minute to process the mountainous heap of word salad that the book had thrown at him. Needless to say, he was mind-blown. If someone asked him what he read in the book, he'd respond with the most appropriate sentence ever devised.

"BOOM!"

Now that he had read through the entire book, it was time to try out what he had learned. Deep into his Core, his consciousness went, revealing that good ole swirling mana pool. Maybe he should do some redecorating in the future. Some palm trees? A couple of lounge chairs and umbrellas? Yes, that would be amazing. But, he'd need an artificial sun... Oh well, that was for another day. Right now, he needed to get back to work.

The Spirit Bomb was similar to the Spirit Burst Blast in concept but with a crucial difference. Instead of unleashing a raw surge of unrefined Spirit Mana outward in all directions, the Spirit Bomb focused on compressing and concentrating the Spirit Mana into a dense, contained sphere. Upon release, this ball created a powerful explosive force. Simple enough, right? All he had to do was compress the mana to make a Spirit Bomb. No big deal. Piece of cake. Hopefully.

But, like his various Spirit Blasts, he still required a container to store the condensed Spirit Mana inside of. Although, something was telling him that using paper mache wouldn't cut it this time. If only he had some metals to work with. Maybe he could transform his mana into something metallic—or at least metal-adjacent—just like he’d once turned it into paper back when he was first figuring out how to create the Spirit Blast.

Alwin focused, commanding his mental hands to seize a chunk of mana and transform it into metal. A faint tearing sound filled the air. Paper. Again.

He tried once more. Tear. Still paper.

Another attempt. Rip. Paper, yet again.

And then another. Riiip. Paper, paper, and more paper. At this rate, he could open a stationery shop instead of building a Spirit Bomb.

Time for his handy dandy remote controller to swoop in and save the day. His mental hands fiddled about with the remote scrolling through setting after setting trying to figure out which one allowed him to convert his mana into a different material. Transmutations. Yup! That's the one.

There was only one option available to him—technically two, but the second one was more of an insult. 'Paper'… or 'do it yourself'. Well, that was just plain rude. But, if this was inside of his Core, would that mean he was being rude to himself? Enough philosophy. Back to creating explosives!

Okay, maybe a teensy-weensy bit of introspection. Lapis had mentioned that he could skip all of that fancy mumbo jumbo steps to create Dark and Light mana because of his brain being all squishy and absorby or something like that. What if his brain was metaphorically set in stone—technically set in paper—in the ways he could transmute his mana? Yup, that must be the only logical explanation. Case closed. Onto more important matters. Namely, explosions.

There was one other material he could work with, but Cor, the processing time alone would kill him of boredom. Still, he had no other choice.

He commanded his mental hands to dive down into his mana pool, scooping up clay, the same ones used to sculpt his Spirit Hands. That was the easy part. Next, he ordered them to shape the clay. Not in the form of hands—which they were no doubt experts in—but in the shape of a bowl. Two bowls, to be exact.

They molded, kneaded, squeezed, reshaped, and other action verbs related to shaping clay until they had formed two perfectly identical clay bowls. Then came the truly painful part. Drying. It was the scourge of his existence, a torture used to discipline his hyperactive mind. Good thing he had an oven on standby.

Alwin tossed the two clay bowls into the oven and set the temperature to its lowest setting—any higher and the clay would crack. Then he waited. And waited. And waited some more.

And just when it seemed like he couldn’t possibly wait any longer… he waited even more.

Until… Well, you’ll just have to wait and see.