Ezekiel’s charge was a surprise for Horace as he continued to bluster excuses regarding Ezekiel’s words. Taking advantage of this, Ezekiel swung his staff as hard as he could, knocking Horace’s weapon out of his hand and breaking at least a couple of bones as he did.
“Death number one. Now get your head in the fight.” Ezekiel said as he immediately jumped to the side, dodging an attack from Riley as she swung her sword down on him.
He was then forced to duck and roll under the weighted ball Yennifrey threw at him.
Swinging his staff upwards and to the side as he returned to his feet, Ezekiel hit the shaft of Drew’s morningstar, causing it to go off course, leading to Drew’s weapon slamming into the ground next to them. He was then taken out of the fight when Ezekiel kicked him in the face from where he had stumbled. Dazed and confused, Drew didn’t see the staff that was swung at his head similarly to what happened with Horace.
As Drew fell to the ground nursing a potential concussion, Ezekiel raised his staff above his head whilst he was kneeling to block Shari’s double downward swing with her batons. A loud ‘CRACK’ echoed through the room as the weapons impacted against each other.
“Hold him still!” Riley yelled as Ezekiel was being pushed down by Shari’s batons. Coming up from behind, Riley and Yennifrey swing their respective weapons as Ezekiel’s unguarded back.
Ezekiel loosens his grip on his staff but pushes his body forward, under Shari’s batons to push himself flush against her body. Shari is surprised by the close proximity, whilst Yennifrey and Riley barely miss Ezekiel as he moves out of line for their attacks.
“Hello.” Ezekiel says up close and personal with Shari, whose face is turning red from how close they are.
Ezekiel then turns around, bending over and pulling Shari’s head downward. Yennifrey and Riley are forced to back up to get their weapons away from Shari as Ezekiel throws her over his head. He then picks up his staff and dashes away, calling out a taunt as he does.
“So close, girls, maybe next time.” He yells as he gets some distance.
Looking over at Horace and Drew, he sees that Horace is looking angry, but hasn’t made a move yet. Drew, on the other hand, has been dragged off to the side by Stephen and is getting healed by Peni as she held his head between her hands as he rested on her lap.
As he saw this, Ezekiel noticed that Stephen seemed to be staring at Peni and Drew fairly intensely. Raising an eyebrow in disbelief, Ezekiel was somewhat surprised to see that there was any envy there, as he’d always assumed that Stephen didn’t think about people that way but given how long Stephen and Peni had known each other, it was something he got over quickly.
“Pay attention!” Shari yelled as she charged forward, causing Ezekiel to jump to the side, holding his staff out to that the ball and chain that were thrown at him to wrap around that instead of him.
Pulling the chain taught, Ezekiel held the chain between himself and Riley, who had run forward and attacked from the side, only to grunt in surprise as Riley shifted her shield to change her attack from a swing with her sword to a tackle with her shield, throwing her full body behind it and forcing Ezekiel to go off balance.
Riley immediately rolls off of Ezekiel as they fall to the ground, whilst Shari brings her batons down once again, this time Ezekiel barely has tome to protect his head and chest as he takes a blow to the stomach from one of the batons.
Grabbing one of Shari’s hands, he curls up to kick her in the head from his place on his back, making her stumble back and let go of one of her batons, as he rolls to his feet. Taking the baton and throwing it away as he does, in order to get it out of the fight.
With his staff still wrapped up by Yennifrey’s chain, he isn’t able to do much to attack the others with it. Seeing his options are limited, and Shari getting up from the foot to the face he gave her, Ezekiel braces himself whilst pulling the chain tight.
“Oh no-” Yennifrey lets out a small shriek as she is almost pulled off her feet as Ezekiel pulls the chain as hard as he can. Rather than be pulled across the ring, Yennifrey lets go of the weapon and allows herself to be taken out of the fight as Ezekiel whips the chain with the ball and the sickle around, unwrapping his staff as he does.
Holding Riley and Shari back, lest they take a heavy chain to the face, Ezekiel takes a moment to throw the chain as hard as he can at Yennifrey, wrapping her up as if the chains were a bola rather than a sickle and chain.
“Aaah!” Yennifrey screams in pain as the sickle digs into her shoulder, drawing blood, as Ezekiel winces at the potential damage he could’ve caused if the sickle had hit her in the face rather than the shoulder.
The practice weapons might be dulled, but the sickles and swords still had pointy tips.
Luckily, Stephen was quick to use his air manipulation to float her over to get healed by Peni.
“RAAAAGGGHH!!!” Horace screamed as he charged Ezekiel from behind in a tackle. Pinned to the ground, Ezekiel struggled to turn around as Horace started trying to beat his head into the ground from behind.
Taking a heavy blow to the back of the head, Ezekiel becomes dazed for a moment, and uses a bit of Void mana to push himself up, causing both him and Horace to push upwards as he knocks Horace backwards. The distance the go isn’t much, but it’s more than they would’ve gone had Ezekiel not used his mana.
Shaking his head to try and clear it, Ezekiel immediately regrets his actions as he exacerbates his headache. Blindly swinging to the side only for his staff to bounce off Riley’s shield.
He barely manages to duck out of the way of her swing, only to take a baton to the shoulder as dodges into an attack from Shari, but rather than go to the ground, Ezekiel braces himself as best he can and pushes into Shari to knock her into the way of another charge from Horace.
“Oof!” Shari grunts as she is tackled by Horace’s full weight. Going to the ground in a heap, Shari and Horace are sprawled out in a tangle of limbs when Riley tries to stab Ezekiel in the gut.
Ezekiel manages to deflect with his staff, pushing himself forward as Riley moves to pull back. Only to trip as Ezekiel slides his staff downward to her feet. She falls to the ground as Ezekiel launches him at her and punches her straight in the face as hard as he can without crushing her skull, the Void mana now expended and no longer enhancing his strength.
Riley’s head slams into the ground as she goes unconscious. Ezekiel uses his staff to push himself up, breathing heavily from the exertion and headache he is still suffering.
Seeing Shari and Horace getting to their feet as well, Shari stands in front of Horace, holding her weapon in front of her. Ezekiel runs forward, stumbling only slightly as he does, and using his momentum to put his full weight behind his swing. Shari moves her remaining baton to deflect the attack.
Ezekiel, seeing where their weapons were going to connect, moves his weapon slightly, changing the trajectory of his swing just enough to hit Shari’s hand instead of her baton.
However, as he does, Ezekiel can feel the ground beneath his feet slide backward, throwing his upper body forward, bringing his head directly in line with Shari’s baton.
The weighted stick was the last thing he saw before everything turned black and Ezekiel was knocked out.
----------------------------------------
Ezekiel came to consciousness to the sound of shrill yelling as Shari expressed her current mood.
“Why the hell do you think I would appreciate that!?” Shari screamed in response to someone’s words.
Opening his eyes, Ezekiel saw three sets of everything in front of him. Three rooms, three weapons, and three copies of his friend and her classmates.
Shari, in particular, was standing in front of him between himself and Horace, who looked frustrated and annoyed as Shari chewed him out.
At the same time, he saw that he had six sisters instead of two, all of which were crying as they held onto his shirt and buried their faces into his stomach and chest as he laid on his back, his head propped up on someone’s legs.
“Big bro!” Wendy and Ellen called out as they saw him open his eyes.
He tried to shift himself into a more upright position before he was gently pulled back down.
“Don’t move. I’m not finished just yet.” Peni’s voice whispered in Ezekiel’s ears as he noticed a green glow just outside of the corner of his eyes. A soothing coolness flooded his mind as he felt Peni’s magic repairing his skull and brain.
“You’re very lucky that I’m Tier two at this point. That, and the fact that you’ve got a Void mage’s toughness are the only reason that your skull didn’t split in half.” Peni said as the magic she was using finished running its course. “You know, I’d have thought that as you got older you’d get in less conflicts, and that what happened when we first met was a one-time event.”
Ezekiel can’t help but feel indignant at that comment. It wasn’t his fault that assholes seemed to have a bone to pick with him. He never did anything that was directly confrontational, and only ever taunted those that were taunting him, or as a weapon to distract others.
He couldn’t help it if Horace was a stupid kid with an unrequited crush. He wasn’t going to just take it if someone came after him, and if Horace didn’t want to have his crush used against him, then he shouldn’t be so obvious about it. Especially when Shari clearly showed no interest.
“All I did was treat the fight like it was real! How stupid do you have to be to think that an over run, or a party conflict won’t include magic!” Horace yelled as he tried to defend himself.
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“The fact that most guild parties are dead tired, or mana deprived during such situations for one thing!” Shari yelled right back, “And the fact that it was declared that there would be no magic beforehand for another thing!”
“Just because he said so beforehand doesn’t mean that it was agreed on!” Horace said as he pointed in Ezekiel’s direction.
“Yet no one else used their magic during the entire spar!” Shari’s voice had yet to quiet down, and as he looked around Ezekiel noticed that no one in the room seemed to be taking Horace’s side. “Not only did your magic nearly get Ezekiel killed because it was a head wound from a weighted baton, but you technically shouldn’t have been in the fight! You stayed out of it and nearly walked out of the ring when Ezekiel disarmed you. We all thought you had given up, when out of nowhere you attacked him from behind!”
“Shari-” Horace’s voice was quiet now, but Shari wasn’t about to let him speak.
“No! No excuses, and no apologies. The only reason Ezekiel is alive right now is because he’s a Void mage, and his body is tougher than any of ours, even though he’s a full Tier below us.” Shari’s voice had become a harsh whisper, and tears were starting to pool at the corners of her eyes. “You nearly made me kill my best friend, and all I can think of is that you did this because you have a problem with Ezekiel, either because he’s a Void mage, and you’re good at hiding your thoughts about them, or because you're jealous that I like him more than you.”
Horace’s eyes narrowed in anger at Shari’s words, but his attention turned to Ezekiel as he glared at him out of the corner of his eye.
“... Get out!” Shari said, her voice quiet and cold.
Horace turned to Shari in shock, as did everyone else in the room. Even Ezekiel was surprised at what Shari was apparently doing.
“What?” Horace asked, as if he hadn’t heard.
“I said get out! I don’t care how nice you were when we met. I don’t care how friendly you act towards me, and I don’t care how much your family once did for mine. If you can’t be friends with my friends, and if you can’t be trusted to follow simple rules, then you can’t be trusted to be here.” Shari stated before turning away from Horace and looking at Ezekiel.
“... You’re kidding me? You’re throwing me away for him!?” Horace screamed as he threw his hand out in anger.
“I’m telling you to leave, because you hurt my best friend.” Shari stated, her voice still cold.
Horace’s face twisted into an angry snarl as sand started swirling around his hands and feet. His anger was manifesting his element from the mana he was unconsciously channeling.
“YOU-”
“Guards!” Shari called out to interrupt Horace’s rant. The doors to the training room opened as the two Tier two guards meant to keep watch entered into the room. Their faces looked like they were carved from stone as they took in the scene.
They rightly assumed that Horace had done something stupid.
“Miss Shari.” Liam said as he and the other guard approached. “What do you need?”
“Please take mister Tresly out from the manor and remove him from the property. His actions have nearly caused the death of my closest friend.” Shari explained. “There is no need to accompany him to his home. I’m sure he can make it there himself.”
Liam and the other guard share a look before shrugging and approaching Horace, who has released his mana, letting the newly formed sand fall to the ground. Horace’s face no longer has the angry snarl it once did. Now, he just quietly glares at Ezekiel as Liam places a hand on his shoulder.
“Let’s go kid. Don’t try to make a scene.” Liam says as he starts pulling Horace away.
Horace doesn’t say anything, he just turns his attention to Shari and gives her a look of pity as he turns away, completely ignoring the fact that she apparently hated him now and was literally having him removed from her life. Liam and the other guard escort Horace from the room, taking him to remove him from the grounds.
A few moments after Liam and the other guard had left the room, four more guards stood at the entrance before moving to close the doors to the room and take up posts around the entrance in the hall.
“Shari... Are you sure that was the right thing to do?” Riley asks as she comes up to Shari to check on her. “You know his parents have connections to the nobility. Yours might have ties to the Guilds and Church, but you know they don’t hold much political clout.”
Shari just looked at Riley in confusion, sniffing and wiping her eyes as she turned to speak.
“We can deal with the politics later, but aren’t you angry I sent our friend away?” Shari asked as she looked at Riley in confusion.
“... While I can’t say there was anything bad about him before now, Horace really acted more like a tag along than an actual friend.” Riley said as she tried to explain herself. “Like, he never helped out when you asked if we'd be able to help with stuff here at the auction house, or if any of us needed help with our families or lives outside of school. He did the bare minimum of work for group projects. He usually mocked Drew about his dreams of joining a Top Tier Guild, made fun of Yennifrey’s lacking ability in enchanting, as well as her low-class station, and often told me that I needed to focus less on fighting so I could marry up so I could become someone important that way.”
Riley’s words were causing terror and disgust to form in Shari’s stomach.
“Also, whilst he never said anything disparaging himself, he never stood up when others decried Void Mages, even when you and the rest of us stood up for them. The fact of the matter is, Horace only acted at his ‘best’ when you were around. When you weren’t he was actually kinda mean.” Yennifrey jumped in after Riley said her piece.
“... Honestly, the only times I ever saw Horace was when we all came here to train. He seemed to otherwise avoid me whenever we weren’t here. But I did see him hanging out with people I’ve seen you try to avoid or have previously told off for things in the past. I also noticed him glaring at Ezekiel, like, a lot.” Drew also chimed in as he saw what was going on.
Shari was shocked to hear about these things. She had genuinely thought that all of her friends were just that, her friends. To hear that the one friend she had with the same element as her was apparently a jerk who was good at pretending to be nice to make her like him was something that she almost couldn’t believe.
Turning to Ezekiel, who was holding his sisters at his sides, Shari couldn’t help but ask him, “Ezekiel, did you know?”
Ezekiel was quiet for a second before giving off a sigh as he answered.
“Sigh... Yess, I knew, but you were so happy to have so many friends, and a friend from school that shared your element made you so excited when you first told me about him. I also didn’t get to meet him until nearly a year after you had become friends, so the only things I knew about him were the things you told me. Then I realized that he was just putting on an act for you, but I didn’t want to upset you, so I kept quiet.” Ezekiel explained, knowing that he’d messed up, and all the more sorry for it.
“It’s one of the reasons why I always teased him or gave him backhanded compliments. I knew he was just acting because he liked you, but there was always something about him that I didn’t like, but I didn’t want to make another big mistake like last time.” Ezekiel’s head hung low as he looked at the ground, unwilling to look Shari in the eye.
“What do you mean ‘like last time’?” Shari asked.
“... Horace... After I got to know him, I couldn’t help but be reminded of your brother.” Ezekiel clarified, knowing that what he was saying was certain to pick at some old wounds. ““He was never as directly confrontational as Aldor, but your brother was also apparently really well liked, and not even your parents knew about his attitude towards Void Mages until he was forced to interact with me.”
Shari didn’t say anything. Talking about her brother was a bit of an unspoken taboo, considering the last time she saw him was when he attempted to murder Ezekiel right in front of her. It was something that she never really got ove. Even now she still held a subconscious distaste towards her brother. In many ways, she truly saw him as a monster, and Ezekiel didn’t disagree with that opinion.
“... Thank you for telling me. I wish you’d told me earlier.” Shari said quietly.
“Did you ever notice anything?” Ezekiel asked. “I know you’re not stupid. You’re also quite aware of what happens around you, so I can’t help but feel like you must’ve noticed something.”
Shari took a moment before answering.
“I didn’t think there was anything wrong. I figured if there was a problem you would tell me. You’ve always known when something was wrong, so I thought I was just imagining things, or that they weren’t a big deal.” Shari explained.
“Shari, you know I’m not always going to be there to help you make those kinds of choices, right?” Ezekiel said. “I didn’t say anything because I was waiting for you to make your choice and had sort of assumed you had already made one.”
The room got really quiet as everyone took a couple of minutes to digest those words. This was clearly a matter of miscommunication, but it was brought about by assumptions that Ezekiel and Shari had made about one another.
“I think we need to take a break for the day. If you want, I can come by tomorrow and we can pick up where we left off. I’d love to help you guys with the Guild trials coming up. Y’know, since I can’t participate myself.” Ezekiel says as he pulls his sisters along to get them moving.
“... No need.” Shari says.
Ezekiel and everyone but Wendy and Ellen look at her in shock. This the first time Shari had ever said anything resembling her not wanting Ezekiel to be around.
“Shari...” Ezekiel didn’t know what to say.
“You said it yourself. You won’t always be there to help me. So maybe we need to do this without your help.” Shari clarified. “Besides, you’re spending so much time at the cathedral, we’ve barely spoken much anyways. So, it’s not like anything will have changed any more than it already has.”
Ezekiel was quiet as he heard this. He knew that she was more angry than she was anything else at this point, and he didn’t think that she really wanted to cut ties with him but didn’t think that it would be a good idea to dispute that right now.
The others in the room didn’t agree with that sentiment right now.
“What? C’mon Shari, you know that Ezekiel’s the best out of all of us when it comes to pure melee fighting. Other than the guards there’s no one better than him to spar with.” Drew exclaims as Ezekiel stays quiet.
“Drew!” Riley exclaims.
“What, you know it’s true!” Drew says, “It’s not like this fight is going to take long for them to get over anyway.”
“That’s not the point! Lots of stuff has happened today, and we don’t need you making things worse.” Riley stated.
“Enough!” Peni called out from where she had been watching her juniors about to begin arguing. “Look. There’s some stuff going on here, and you all need to calm down before someone says something they’ll regret.”
All the younger kids fell quiet as Peni told them off.
“For the moment, I think we all need to calm down. For now, Stephen and myself will still be available to oversee your sparring, and I’m sure mister and missus Alkena won’t have any issues with getting you all a couple of guards to spar with in order to push your limits.” Peni further explained. Stephen looked exasperated at his future responsibilities but didn’t say anything against it. “Ezekiel. Will you be heading out for now?”
Everyone turned to look at Ezekiel to see what he would say. Drew Looked hopeful that he would, Yennifrey looked sorry, Riley looked frustrated, Stephen looked indifferent, whilst Peni looked tired, and Shari had turned away and refused to look at him
Ezekiel wanted to stay. He really did, but he didn’t think that that was the best choice right now. He had just found out that the only reason Shari had stayed friends with someone she had mixed thoughts about was because he’d never said anything against him. Essentially, she had been waiting until Horace either majorly screwed up, like he had today, or for Ezekiel to tell her what he thought.
Whilst he appreciated Shari’s high regard for his opinions, he also didn’t think that he would always be around to help her. He didn’t even think he’d necessarily be staying in the city for more than a couple of years. Now that his meditation and mana accumulation had been making such great progress, he knew that it wouldn’t be long before he left to figure out what the Ancient Void had in store for him.
He knew that he was here in this world for a reason, and he had to find out what that reason was.
“I think I’ll head out for now. I have the rest of the week off, so whilst I don’t think I’ll see you tomorrow, or maybe even the day after, I’ll be sure to stop by before I have to go back to the Cathedral.” Ezekiel said. “Wendy and Ellen might still come by, but I might be asked to watch over them myself instead. We’ll see how it goes, and maybe I’ll get to see you guys around the city.”
Ezekiel tried to lighten things up by saying that he’d maybe see them again, but they all knew that that wasn’t especially likely. Most of the group looked disappointed, but other than Drew, they all seemed to accept this just fine.
Wendy and Ellen looked confused, but understood that things had gotten bad, but didn’t want to say anything since Ezekiel had been hurt and it seemed like they were about to leave.
Peni looked at Shari, who still hadn’t turned around. Looking at the ground near Shari’s feet, she sighed in frustration.
Sigh “Alright. Thanks for coming by today. It was good to see you again, kid, and hopefully we’ll see you again soon.” Peni told Ezekiel before he turned to leave the training room, taking his sisters with him as he went home for the day. Ignoring the guilt he felt when he saw the wet spots on the ground near Shari’s feet. Obviously made from tears.