Levi shifted his stance nervously as he eyed Paige across from him. Her stance has settled into something he'd become familiar with. Part of him wanted to scream at her, 'That's wrong. That's not Tai Chi.' Another part of him knew it was a losing argument, plus Paige had already proven him wrong by gaining her skill. Mostly it was just awesome to see in a way he was certain she didn't even realize.

Paige reminded him of a wild animal in human form, crouched low, eyes focus, claws extended in a tense, yet calm anticipation. Honestly, he hoped he looked half a cool as she did, yet seriously doubted it, in his own stance.

Yet, that wasn't what made him nervous.

"Are you sure you aren't still mad?" Levi asked again as his feet shifted once again. "Maybe we shouldn't spar if you're still mad."

Paige growled, and somehow managed to sink her stance even lower. "I. Am. Not. Mad. Let's spar."

Levi relaxed, straightening a bit. "See, and that make you sound like you're still mad. I don't want to spar with you if you're already mad."

Paige glared at Levi before finally straightening and throwing her hands up. "Okay. Fine. I'm still mad. But that's not why I want to spar. I don't want to just beat you up and punish you. I have a good reason."

Levi stared back for a few seconds before answering. "Okay. So you are mad. Want to talk about it before we spar?"

Paige's eyes squinted closed and she pinched the bridge of her nose in irritation. "Nope. I want to spar."

"Okay..." Levi continued cautiously. "Can we maybe talk about it after we spar?" Levi ventured.

Paige looked at Levi and cocked her head to the side before rolling her eyes and sinking back into her stance. "As much as I hope we don't need to, sure. IF you spar with me."

Levi stared into her eyes for a few long seconds before responding. He wasn't sure exactly what it was he saw in them. It wasn't really hate or anger, despite her admission that she was mad. Yet something in the way she set herself told Levi she needed the fight. He had no idea why.

But Paige needed it.

So, he gave her a nod and settled into his own stance. "On three then, I guess?"

Paige nodded in return.

"If I get seriously hurt, you heal me with the horns. If you get seriously hurt, I'll blow every last bit of Go to make sure you get a healing potion?"

Paige's face softened for a moment before she answered. "You know that's always the deal, Levi."

"I know. But just making sure. On three then."

Both noticably tensed as Levi began the countdown. But both found their way to a calm resolve as the numbers ticked down. Levi used the countdown like a cadence, using each number as a reason to take a deep breath. As he did so, his tension eased and he settled into a relaxed stance. Paige just seemed to settle into a lower and lower predatory stance in response to Levi. Her eyes became both unfocused in that they no longer focused on Levi's face, and more focus as they formed into tight slitted pupils and her gaze settled into the center of Levi's body rather than his face.

Levi's focus broke for a moment as he recognized that and smiled. He'd taught Paige to keep her focus one the center mass and read the body with her peripheral vision. She really was listening. Unfortunately, that was also the moment that he'd reached the end of the countdown, and as he said 'one,' Paige moved like lightening.

Levi barely had time to react to Paige as she came at him aggressively. It reminded Levi of how reckless and primal she'd been when they had first sparred. Sure, she had better technique and she'd already used her Ability to take a cat form, but it was basically exactly how she'd began the first spar they'd ever had. And it disappointed him. Somehow, he'd failed to teach her better.

Flooding his body with Go, Levi responded defensively to Paige's wild assault and waited for when she left an easy opening. Flooding his body with Go wasn't as efficient or as effective as his former flow Skills, but it was more effective and efficient than if he was using mana and stamina without those skills. And, it also didn't require the same amount of focus to send separate energy to his mind and his body. It simply went where he willed and provided benefits accordingly. Levi was topped up from meditation, so he had plenty to burn.

Levi felt somewhat frustrated at Paige's relentless assault. He'd worked hard with her, but she was fighting like he'd never taught her a thing. He decided to turn up the pressure and break her assault.

As she slashed, Levi avoided the attack by millimeters. He watched as her cat claws slashed past him and struck, aiming for a clean strike to her ribs. In one second, his fist was about to take the wind from Paige's lungs, and in the next he was seeing white and throwing himself into a recovery roll 30 yards away.

They'd chosen a nice, mostly open space to spar in, but Levi found his back to a small cliff. It wouldn't kill him if he fell, but it would be the end to their fight. As he refocused on Paige and his vision and mind cleared, he saw subtle shifts in her form, from something he didn't recognize back to a more cat-like form. Her eyes were locked on him, and Levi had the feeling she'd held back and could have sent him over the cliff if she'd wanted. She'd allowed him to recover.

Levi immediately moved away from the cliff's edge, even boosting his movement with Go. Paige simply watched him, allowing the recovery, but as soon as he was settled back into a stance, her primal assault resumed.

Levi didn't understand it. He saw some small principals of the Tai Chi he'd taught her, but for the most part her movements seemed like a mindless barrage of overly aggressive attacks. Yet, he hadn't even seen the attack, or rather the counter to his own counter attack, that had sent him reeling. He pushed more Go into boosting himself to watch her moves more intently.

Again, he took the defensive role as she pressed in with flurry after flurry of strikes.

Again, Levi waited for the opening.

And then, the moment he saw it, Levi flooded himself with Go and struck at her ribs again. Unfortunately, it wasn't quite fast enough, and Paige backflipped out of the attack and created distance. He'd seen it before. Yet, for the briefest second, he was sure her form has slightly changed as she'd avoided his attack.

Realizing he faced a harder fight than he'd anticipated, he quickly drew his dagger and threw it. Before it left contact with his fingertips, Levi was already flooding himself with more Go. It no longer damaged his body the way using too much mana or stamina had before, which was a major plus, but he could feel his new resource burning away at the back of his mind. It was like punching the accelerator on a fast car; he was burning fuel fast.

As he followed the dagger's trajectory, his eyes focused on nothing but Paige. For a nano second, Levi was sure he saw her eyes meet his and a hint of a small smirk play at her lips, but that didn't make sense. Even flooded with Go, even at the insane speed he was moving, he was hard pressed to focus on anything but the fight.

Pushing the thought from his mind, Levi pushed harder, determined to allow as little time between his dagger's flight and his own strike. And yet Paige stood composed and waiting. It unnerved Levi slightly.

Levi was relieved when she swatted the blade aside like he'd expected. This time, he didn't have any time to be disappointed. In the milliseconds between the blade's arrival and Levi arriving with his own assault, Paige was suddenly changing before his eyes, even as his enhanced mind slowed time to a crawl for him.

He actually had never seen the form before, only noting how her torso seemed to lengthen and her snout grew just slightly longer, before Paige was evading his strike.

Levi was already too committed to the attack to stop himself, but his intuition told him he was about to get his shit rocked if he didn't move. So, rather than directly respond to the attack he knew was coming, Levi pushed his Go higher than he wanted, noting how quickly it drained the resource.

It was the thing Levi absolutely hated about the new resource. He'd initially been disappointed that he hadn't been able to outright skirt his Parched Soul debuff. Yet, as he'd explored the resource and realized how intuitive it felt, he came to understand that even without a Skill it was easily accessible, and even with his debuff maxed out he could still refill it with meditation. Levi had really grown to love his new resource pool. Then he had finally faced the downside.

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When Levi augmented his body and speed of thought, the usage did not increase in the same linear way as it had before, rather consumption of the resource seemed to grow almost exponentially. If he wanted to increase his base capabilities, or stats to make it simpler, by 25% he'd only use around 1% of his Go every second, give or take. If he wanted to increase his stats by 50%, it burned about 5% of his Go per second. When he reached an increase of about 100% of his base stats, he was burning 25% of his resource pool per second. That meant if he doubled his speed, strength, and cognition, he had only four really good seconds before he ran dry.

After his first core upgrade, his stats definitely counted for more than normal, which was probably the only way he'd been able to stay competitive with Paige in growth.

As Levi pushed his Go to bring himself to around 200% of his base, he decided he really had to do something to fix that problem. The woosh of air above his head as he threw himself forward, continuing his momentum in a roll, told him he'd made the right call. Knowing he only had about 15% of his Go left informed Levi that he was still very, very screwed.

Rolling into a recovery and facing Paige, Levi realized he'd put a fair amount of distance between the two of them. He was barely able to face her before having to prepare for her next assault. He saw her form shift as she jumped toward him, the wings spreading in an instant to give Paige more height and speed, then disappearing immediately as she rocketed toward him, her body already shifting again.

Levi wanted to understand what she was doing. The truth was, he wanted to be mesmerized. Whatever she was doing was incredible. But that was a hard ask when you had a devastating, potentially lethal kick headed your direction. He recognized the flying back kick. It was one of Paige's favorites. She'd used it in their first spar. Thankfully, it was something Levi knew how to shut down.

Levi let the calm settle in. Flooding himself with just enough Go to do the job, which still left him mostly depleted, Levi turned her attack aside and kicked her landing foot just before it reached the ground, as he had the first time they had sparred.

The feeling of his foot making contact with hers immediately told Levi he'd made a huge miscalculation. It felt...too ready... too responsive. He flooded himself with Go, just trying to avoid whatever was coming. He was able to see as Paige's body took another form, even as she seemed to travel through the air without control.

Suddenly Paige's more elongated body twisted in a way that he couldn't quite process, and Levi was barely able to register and brace himself as the foot he'd tried to kick out from under Paige was suddenly above him, descending from an angle he could have never predicted.

Levi was only able to manage a quick block, and then he found himself gasping for air and staring at the sky. This time, he hadn't even registered the white from taking a hard blow or when exactly he'd been knocked out entirely.

But as Paige's healing took effect, and the fog and pain eased, Levi wondered how far and how many times he'd bounced. Because that last kick had definitely sent him bouncing.

----

"When did you learn...whatever that was?" Levi had a huge smile on his face as he placed his hands on Paige's shoulders.

"Earlier tonight. I have been working on it for a while." Paige tried not to pull away from Levi. She didn't want him to get the wrong idea, she was glad he was excited, but it irked her that he seemed so genuinely happy when she knew he hadn't even really gotten the point.

"That's awesome. You really kicked ass. Is it a Skill or Ability?" Levi asked.

"A Skill. It's actually a flow skill based off of your own ideas. I just took that and made it my own thing." Paige's voice was flat as she answered.

"What's it called? How does it work? Do you just shift between forms fluidly?" Levi continued, still beaming.

"It's called Feral Flow - Made Menagerie. I'm not sure why the Made Menagerie part is listed as a subset of the Skill, but it is. Maybe that means it is only one of a whole set that I can learn... But yeah." Paige wanted to be excited with Levi. Hell, she wanted to be excited about her Skill herself. But she couldn't.

"Cool, so how does it work? Are the shifts in form automatic? How does that work when you gain new beast friends? And why didn't you tell me?" Levi pressed.

Paige started to feel frustrated. It wasn't just his questions, but him being oblivious. "I mean... Yes I switch forms automatically. At least for stuff I have already practiced enough. And I don't know exactly how that works in the future with new friends..."

"Okay, we'll figure that out. But again why didn't you tell me you were working on something like th-"

"I tried to tell you!" Paige yelled in Levi's face. She'd finally hit her boiling point. "So many times, Levi, I have tried to tell you. 'Hey, I can't do things like you Levi,' 'Hey, I have an idea, Levi,' 'Hey, can I try something, Levi?' I HAVE been telling you. You don't listen to me. You think you have it figured out, so why listen to me? I'm just a young, dumb girl, right?" Paige realized she'd said more than she'd wanted to say, and a lot meaner than she'd meant to say it, but it felt good to get it all out there. "I have been telling you! It isn't my fault you have your head shoved up your own ass!"

Paige was breathing hard as she finished going off on Levi about what had been bothering her. She braced herself for his reply, expecting him to yell back. She waited for him to tell her he was done, that he was tired of her anger issues, and that even though she'd created her own skills and beaten him in the spar, she wouldn't have ever done it without him teaching her.

Instead, a confused and hurt expression crossed Levi's face as he stepped away from her.

It looked like the life was sucked out of him as he croaked out, "I'm sorry."

He didn't look away, but instead he met her eyes as tears formed in his. For a long moment, he just stood staring back at Paige, his arms limp at at his side, confusion and concern written on his face. "I made you feel like that?" He finally asked.

"Yeah. You-" Paige heard her voice already getting loader again and calmed herself before continuing. "Yeah, that's how you made me feel. A lot of times, and it doesn't feel like you respect me. You want me to do things exactly your way. You don't listen when I try to tell you what works for me. And you lecture me. I fucking hate when you lecture me."

Levi nodded, never breaking eye contact. Tears still fought to escape his eyes, but none fell. "I'm sorry. Will you sit down and talk to me about it?"

For a second, Paige wanted to tell him no. Part of her wanted to make him suffer more, work harder, feel the way he'd made her feel...anything to make them even. But, she loved him. And most of her hated that she'd just made him feel bad, even if it was his own fault, even if he deserved it, and even if it needed to be said. So she just nodded.

Levi nodded back at Paige and then walked to the edge of the cliff he'd nearly tumbled down in their spar. He sank down and sat with his legs crossed, looking over the view. The sun was well beyond the horizon, but the full moon and a clear sky illuminated the scene below them.

Evergreens fought for space in a valley between two small peaks, and a river, almost no more than a stream really, flowed through the landscape beneath them. Snow hadn't quite stuck in the lower parts of the valley, but as the elevation increased, so did the lingering snow. It seemed the seasons were definitely out of synch between the real world and the Realms, and it was still only early fall.

Levi didn't say anything as he waited for Paige to join him. He simply waited.

After a moment of debating whether or not the conversation would even go anywhere, if he'd listen to her, if it was even worth her time... She sat down.

She heard him inhale deeply as she crossed her legs next to him. She knew it was a breath of relief. She didn't even need her enhanced hearing to recognize that. Still, she decided to wait for him to speak.

After another long moment, he let out another sigh, but she couldn't tell exactly what kind of sigh it was.

"Look," Levi started, staring into his lap and wringing his hands. Silence stretched long enough for Paige to wonder if that's all he'd say before Levi finally continued. "I have no idea what I am doing. I'm sorry I made you feel that way. I didn't mean to. But I really don't know what the hell I am doing when it comes to relationships."

"And now that you've pointed it out... Yeah I can see how I didn't listen to you. I'm sorry. But... That's not..." Levi looked over at Paige and met her eyes again. "You said I thought of you as just some young, dumb girl. That's not how I think of you at all. And I'm sorry I wasn't listening to you. I promise I'll be better about that." Levi's eyebrows furrowed as he looked at Paige. "But I honestly have no clue what you mean about lecturing. I have no idea how to fix that... so can you please point that out when I do it?"

When Paige didn't answer Levi looked back down. "If you still want to stay together, I mean."

Paige tried hard to hold out. She really wanted to drag things out a little longer. But Levi was genuine. She could tell he really meant what he was saying... so she threw him a bone. She leaned over and bumped his shoulder with her own. "Obviously, I want to stay together. I'm sitting next to you with my ass on this ice cold rock, right?"

Levi looked up at Paige and gave her an appreciative smile. "Thanks. I didn't ever mean to make you feel that way. I hate that I did."

"Levi... You know..." Paige struggled to check her anger as she thought of what she wanted to say. "You have to start treating me like an equal. You have to start respecting me more. I know what I'm doing, at least when it comes to my class. You completely dismissing what I say... You have to stop doing that. Or this isn't going to work."

"I understand. I really didn't realize I was doing it. But I will work on it. I'll try to listen to you, and to trust you about things more," Levi answered.

"Thank you." Paige said. It seemed too simple to her. She'd been worried, but the entire conversation had been short... easy. Then Levi kind of messed that up.

"But... I still don't quite know what you mean by lecturing." He added.

"Really?" Paige asked, raising an eyebrow.

Levi gave her a slight shake of his head and a shrug, "Let me know when I am doing it, I guess?"

"You really don't know? Seriously?" Paige gaped at Levi in disbelief. "You know what... You're lucky you're pretty." Paige pushed herself to her feet. "I'm just going to let that one go for now. I thought this was going to be a huge nasty fight and it wasn't, so I'm pretty happy about that, but it also kind of feels weird to me. So... can we just let it go and do the normal thing now?"

"The normal thing?" Levi asked.

"Yeah, the normal thing... Crawl into the bedroll, pretend we're actually going to snuggle up to each other, then participate in some far more intense cuddling, before we both roll over and touch our butts together for the rest of the night."

Levi jumped to his feet with a smile. "Sure. But you want to skip the 'pretend we're going to snuggle up' part this time?"

Paige grinned back. "Definitely."

"I do need to eat real quick though," Levi said seriously. "I don't think I really ate today... at all, actually."

"Ooh. Well... I covered the food for you. It's by the fire," Paige said.

"Thank you. I'll eat fast."

"Okay. I guess I'll just go ahead and lay down then," Paige answered stiffly.

Levi's head cocked to the side as his eyes followed Paige to their bedrolls. Something felt weird about the way she'd said it, but he couldn't put her finger on it. After a second he shook his head and shrugged it off.

As Paige settled in and pulled the wool blanket over her head, she heard Levi call out.

"Paige... Why's all the skin gone on the dino chicken?"

"Well... You said you weren't hungry," Paige answered from beneath the blanket.