"Alright, they should be working now." Outsider declared as he backed away after hovering his white-gloved hands over Yoshino's pink-gloved hands for a second.

Nozomi could be seen in the background training with Rudabaugh, practicing basic jabs and kicks. The latter used a blocking pad to stop her attacks. Although amateurish at best, these efforts motivated her to improve. The black shinguards and red boxing gloves Rudabaugh had brought for her were now white after she put them on. The strength Nozomi received as a magical girl was still manageable for Rudabaugh.

"Okaaaay...what now? Do I just...think about creating something with them?" Yoshino guessed. If she had to be honest, she didn't feel any different. Granted, Outsider hadn't told her that she would feel different, so it was probably just an assumption.

Outsider raised a finger to explain. "Now you see, that's the first lesson I want to get out of the way with you. You DON'T create things with it; you copy them. Care to guess what's the key difference here?"

Yoshino tried to ignore the pressure, intentional or not, that Outsider's voice put her under. She crossed her arms, closed her eyes, and thought briefly about the real differences between creating and copying something. "Would the difference be that you can't create something brand new when you're copying it?"

Outsider slowly nodded. "Correct. Even though I'm technically 'creating' something when I make a copy of it with my gloves, if I need something that doesn't exist or hasn't been created yet, like a cellphone model that will only exist two hundred years in the future, then I would need to make one from scratch. Only then would I be able to make as many copies of it as I like."

If Outsider's voice hadn't intimidated Yoshino, she would have felt proud of getting it right on her first attempt. However, thanks to it, she gave her mysterious teacher a slow, careful nod. "I see...then, how do I copy things with it?"

Outsider raised a hand to his chin. "Well...as of now, I can do it by instinct. But when I first started, I did it by thinking about the life of anything I wanted to copy."

Yoshino blinked at Outsider a few times as she silently stared at him, not knowing what to make of his answer. "Their...life?" Yoshino asked as she recovered just enough to inquire.

Outsider nodded as he raised his gloved hand, with its open palm clear for Yoshino to see. "Yes, when I want to copy something, let's say, for example, a kitchen knife, I try to think about the kind of life it led up until now—from before and then after its creation, to how it was when it was transported, to when it was put on sale, to when it was bought. Finally, if I want to copy one that has been used, I also think about the kinds of uses it has gone through to end up like that." As Outsider finished his explanation, a silvery liquid leaked out of the glove from the center of his open palm before it rose, taking the shape of a familiar kitchen knife Yoshino swore she had seen before.

Yoshino hesitantly raised her hand to point at the knife as she recognized the brand engraved on the blade. "Wait...is that?"

"Yep." Outsider took a swing at the air with the knife. "This is the same kitchen knife you used against Judai."

Outsider gave Yoshino a closer look at the knife. It was the same one she used against Judai. "But, wait...how can an inanimate object have a life? I mean, it IS inanimate...right?" Yoshino asked as she cautiously looked at the knife.

Thankfully, Outsider didn't beat around the bush as he cleared up the potential misunderstanding. "For the second question, yes, this is an inanimate object. As for the first...tell me, what's this kitchen knife made of?" Outsider tilted his head as he asked.

Yoshino raised a hand to her chin. "Well...I guess it would be...stainless steel?"

Outsider motioned with the knife for her to keep going. "Good, good. And from what materials is stainless steel made? And the materials after that?"

"From iron and...I guess carbon? Which would lead to...the planet..." Yoshino's eyes widened as she finally realized where Outsider was going with this.

Outsider gave her a thumbs up with his free hand. "Bingo. A planet that, just so happens, is full of life. A life that, although changed, isn't entirely lost when it gets touched by human hands! So...would this explanation be enough for you to try it yourself?" Outsider asked as he made the kitchen knife he wielded turn into liquid metal and return to his glove.

"I...guess?" Yoshino tilted her head. "Will I need to think about this whole process every time I use these gloves?" Yoshino wouldn't deny it; she was impressed, way more so than when she had first seen a demonstration of it yesterday. The possibilities of what she could copy filled her with excitement, but the thought that she would have to fight with it quickly pressed the brakes on that idea. As impressive as it is, she wasn't sure if she would be able to finish the step-by-step process before her opponent killed her.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Outsider chuckled...or at least Yoshino guessed it was a chuckle; it was difficult to tell with how tampered his voice was. "Not forever, obviously. With enough practice, you will be able to do this and more. But as for right now..."

With one hand raised, Outsider created, with the liquid metal of his gloves, a white plastic ball. He made sure to move it closer to Yoshino so she could have a better look at it. "Copy this plastic ball."

Yoshino stared at the plastic ball, which she swore was from a ball pit for kids, for a few seconds before she turned to Outsider with a confused look. "Why a ball?"

"Because this ball has one of the simplest and, personally, easiest shapes to copy, that being the sphere. In fact, it was the first shape I ever copied without any imperfections!" Outsider explained as hints of how proud he was of his accomplishment almost escaped the neutrality and tampering in his voice. "So yeah...give it a try." Outsider motioned with his free hand.

Yoshino slowly nodded before raising a hand like Outsider did, closed her eyes, and concentrated wholeheartedly on the task presented to her after taking a deep breath. 'White plastic ball, white, plastic, ball...' Yoshino mentally told herself.

After creating a concrete mental image of a white plastic ball, which took a surprising amount of effort from the girl, Yoshino began to think about the plastic ball's origins and how it was made of polyethylene terephthalate. Said polyethylene terephthalate was made from crude oil and natural gas, both materials coming from the planet itself, one that was full of life.

After Yoshino found the source of the imaginary plastic ball, she didn't waste time as she soon worked through the step-by-step process to get to the creation of the ball. The concentration needed so she wouldn't lose focus proved an ever-increasing challenge by the second.

As Yoshino was about to reach the final step of the process, she felt something in her hands—something wet and...sticky.

Opening her eyes slightly, she instinctively took a step back, her eyes widening in surprise as she stared at the pink glove of her raised hand, currently leaking the same silvery liquid metal as Outsider's. However, instead of taking the shape of the plastic ball she imagined, it was making a small pond below her hand made out of tiny, liquid metal droplets.

Yoshino was soon snapped out of her stare by Outsider's voice. The latter standing by Yoshino's side now. "Oh, yo—!" Yoshino didn't let Outsider finish what he was about to say. In her surprise at his voice, Yoshino suddenly turned to face him, her raised hand aimed at him, and accidentally sprayed a torrent of liquid metal on his face. The torrent thankfully only lasted as long as her surprise, and soon, the leaking from her hands stopped for good.

"Shit! I'm so sorry!" Yoshino deeply apologized to Outsider, who was covered from head to toe, mostly on his mask, which was entirely covered in sticky, silver metal liquid.

The commotion was enough to make Nozomi and Rudabaugh stop their training and turn their attention to them. Seiza also looked surprised at the mess Yoshino had made. "Uh...are you okay, Outsider?" Nozomi asked with a hint of worry in her voice, no doubt considering stopping her training altogether depending on his answer.

Outsider casually waved Nozomi's concerns off. "Eh, don't sweat it. Look!" Outsider snapped his fingers. At that moment, all of Yoshino's metal liquid that was either on Outsider or the ground jumped from where it was and returned to Yoshino's pink glove.

"See?" Outsider asked as he spun around the stunned group who had watched it all. "Not a hint of it!"

"B-but how...?" Nozomi, the first to recover, asked as she looked between Yoshino's gloved hand that had absorbed all the liquid metal back and Outsider.

"This is not my first time experiencing something like this. It was quite a common occurrence, in fact! A problem which existed since I first started experiments with these gloves." Outsider crossed his arms. "Thankfully, that soon became a non-issue the moment I got the hang of it. But juuust to be sure, I programmed a 'Return' feature in case I ever made a mess again. This feature is now shared with Yoshino's gloves since there is a considerable chance that something like this would happen."

"Oh," Yoshino muttered as she looked down at her hands, unsure how to feel about Outsider telling her she was expected to fail, and so messily.

"Anyway, congratulations on getting a reaction out of these gloves." Outsider congratulated Yoshino with a cheerful thumbs up, seemingly ignoring the conflicting emotions she felt at the moment.

Yoshino blinked a few times before she processed Outsider's words. "B-but didn't I fail?" she questioned Outsider as her expression turned confused.

Outsider straightened his posture as he raised a hand to his chin. "Hmm, did you? I mean, you went farther than I did on my first few attempts. Especially the 43rd one, that one..." His body visibly shuddered at the memory. Outsider shook his head to snap out of it. "A-anyway, don't worry about causing a mess here where you can afford to try, fail, and learn not to repeat it in a situation where you can't afford to fail," Outsider explained without elaborating on what kinds of situations Yoshino couldn't afford to fail in.

Yoshino didn't need him to; she's experienced firsthand how one mistake, one miscalculation, could've cost her and Nozomi their lives. "I see..." she muttered.

Outsider nodded before crossing his arms. "So...ready to try again?" he asked Yoshino, his artificial, neutral tone carrying a hint of confidence as if he already knew her answer.

If failure here meant success out there, then the answer was obvious to Yoshino. Giving Outsider a determined expression, she answered, "Yes."

Without wasting more time, Yoshino took a deep breath before closing her eyes and starting over. Inspired by what Outsider said, Nozomi soon followed her best friend's lead by resuming her training with increased enthusiasm.