Xopil examined the destruction wrought upon the building from the explosion and calmly stated, "Let's move to another building."

Instantly there was unanimous agreement, so they entered a worn old building on the slightly larger side. "Felicyta, how confident are you in your fire and air magic?"

"I'm slightly better with air," she admitted.

"This works out, I'm more confident with fire," replied Xopil, "help me with a demonstration."

Xopil explained what he wanted Felicyta to do, everyone listened intently and at the end of it he said, "There's a lot to consider when you're augmenting magic. For instance, which you start with and what you magic augment it with and finally the complexity level of the two. I'll be augmenting fire with air... my control of fire will make it easier to prevent an explosion...Felicyta will be augmenting air with fire. Make sure you only use the most simple manifestations you know... this will keep danger to a minimum."

Felicyta created a small whirlwind in her palm, which Xopil interrupted instantly, "That's a bit too advanced for this demonstration."

This confused everyone present, as this has always been considered introductory level. Xopil sighed, "Here, watch."

Xopil held open his palm and revealed a single razor thin blade hovering effortlessly, to which everyone said he wasn't using purely air magic.

"The only reason you can see the whirlwind is because you've solidified air, and that solidification is following a repeated course..." Xopil demonstrated this by sending the air blade into a set loop and increased the speed until he had a mini tornado on his hand, now it was very difficult to see any difference between Felicyta's and Xopil's magic. Felicyta looked at the whirlwind in her palm, as she slowed it down there were hundreds of blades of varying lengths and thickness, they also looked inferier to the blade Xopil had shown them just moments ago.

"But even this is a bit too complicated for what we're trying to do today." Xopil continued, and the blade on his hand literally disintegrated into thin air. "The premise of air magic has always been simple... as simple as the wind blowing." Xopil waved his hand sending a gentle breeze circulating through the enclosed building. "I can tell by your shocked faces that you've been learning magic the hard way. Even this breeze... can be broken into a less complicated form."

"You didn't know any elemental magic until recently, this is insane getting schooled by an actual novice when we've been practicing for centuries.

"I'm just going to blame it on what I know about spacial magic. But, what you consider to be my 'rapid progress' is mostly due to starting small, learning the building blocks and then putting them together instead of starting at an advanced stage. You can't get anywhere without that basic understanding though, so I needed you to teach me that."

"...Those glazed over eyes of yours scare me. Let's get back to what we're here for." Xopil turned to Felicyta, "Once more, but truly basic now okay?"

All eyes turned to Felicyta as she focused on her hand. As basic as air can get. Do I even need to use magic for that? There's already air all around my hand...

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She manifested her air magic, then she slowly fed fire into it, at this point she had a warm sensation in her palm that she sent circulating around the room.

"A warm breeze, that's a very nice demonstration of the basics coming together. I can also see you're coming to a new understanding of both air and fire magic individually." Xopil praised sincerely, "Now, let me show you something else."

Xopil manifested a tiny yellow flame that sat calmly on his palm, and then he added a bit of air magic, the sudden addition made the yellow flame dance, increase in size slightly and grow volatile.

"As you see, this is the same thing Felicyta did, but instead of a warm breeze..." Xopil threw the flame into the air, where it exploded releasing an overbearing wave of heat for a moment. "Now I'd say just imagine what you can do with more advanced combinations... but I'll give you one more example."

All eyes focused on Xopil's hand as he manifested an air blade, gave it a healthy coating of fire magic, the simple blade burst into a yellow flame, Xopil then sent the blade on a loop creating a mini flame whirlwind that threw heat in every direction. The heat seemed to continually increase, and the size of the whirlwind increased as well. "This is the most basic flame I can do at the moment, I'm sure I could break it down further...but consider instead if I used the purple flame you saw earlier? And more air blades like Felicyta did? I could create a swath of destruction for miles. And these are only intermediary... there's always room for improvement."

The five girls swallowed hard as they realized just how destructive magic could be.

"I'd like to say 'forget everything you know and start from scratch' but that's not appropriate either. Instead, take what you know and break it down until you're at the truly basic form of the magic you're wielding. You've all been at what you consider the pinnacle of your magic for a long time and you've even allowed yourselves to stagnate, well except for Felicyta, she used you four as a goal to work towards. But you'll find that you truly knew nothing about your respective magical 'expertise' in a relatively short time. How about one last demonstration?"

Xopil led them back to the inn, though instead of going inside, he led them around the back of the building. He used earth magic to create a large but shallow hole in the ground, then solidified, smoothed and hardened the walls. The girls watched in awe as he accomplished in minutes what would take at least a week of physical labor. "One advantage of earth magic is its unrivaled permanence."

They continued watching in silence as Xopil mixed water and fire magic together, then filled the makeshift basin. "It's just a glorified hot tub, but I'm sure you'll enjoy it all the same." Xopil was about to walk away, but his eye lingered at the pool and he decided to add a rock feature in the middle.

"Now, this is to give you an incentive to practice. I could have made it so the water stays hot permanently, but I didn't so you have something to work toward. Hop in before it gets cold."

Xopil walked away as he still had a lot of practicing ahead of him after all, leaving them alone in bewilderment. Xopil was sitting in his room at the inn, the pleasant sound of water splashing and women giggling wafted through the window.

Xopil smiled mischieviously. They are addicted now... they'll be practicing harder to be able to play more. Maybe I'll be able to focus now too?

The sound of multiple wet footsteps approaching burst that thought however. Xopil facepalmed at his own naivety. After the door burst open, he didn't even turn to look at them, he just stated flatly, "Ok ladies. Three rules about the hot tub. First: dry yourselves off when you get out. Second: put some clothes on! Lastly: you're in charge of maintaining it."

"First: we thought you'd like to join us to relax for a bit, surely it took a lot out of you to make it. Second: we're wearing swimsuits. Lastly: That's not fair."

"I'm fine. Go play, it really won't stay hot forever."

"It's already gone cold..." they admitted.

Xopil sighed. "At least tell me you didn't just toss fire into it to reheat it."

"I may or may not have..." Calypso said sheepishly.

"Well, that just means you get to figure out how to repair all the cracks in the foundation too." Xopil smirked. "I am feeling a bit fatigued, think I'll get some sleep after all."