“Aw come on, stop moping already. It's not that bad.”

Sera ignored the way Sophia spun around her. She didn’t want to talk to anyone right now.

“I mean sure, you got beat by a human child, but he was a future champion or something. You deal with the normal kids that annoy us well enough.”

“It doesn't matter if I can deal with ‘normal kids’.” She nearly growled out. “I’m a soul beast. I have to at least be able to at least beat a few adult humans.” That was the deal. Humans would provide soulbeasts with intelligence and knowledge, and the soulbeasts would give the humans their strength and protection. If she couldn’t even hold up her end of the deal, then why did she even exist?

Sophia sighed, sending a stream of water that gently pushed her outwards.

“It's not the dark ages anymore. Humans these days are better trained and more numerous than ever before. Making a few kids laugh every now and then more than earns your keep.”

“Easy for you to say. Nobody tries throwing stones at you for fun.” She would have bled anyone who tried. Even dumbest kids wern’t stupid enough to annoy a Liberion. A Magikoi though? They were easy targets.

And that was the problem, wasn’t it? Yesterday had simply showed her the reality of things. No matter how well her father or the other soulbeasts treated her, she would always be second class. Somebody that needs to be protected, somebody that depends on others. Sophia would never understand, no matter how much she tried to help.

“Look, at least talk to your father ok? He’s been pacing around for hours now. He might jump in himself if you avoid him anymore.”

Father. Just thinking about him sent a spike of guilt through her heart. The only thing worse than ignoring someone who only wanted the best for you was having to go back and tell them that they were right.

The coming confrontation was inevitable, regardless of how much she would like to avoid it.

Forcing herself to move her tail, Sera recrutantly swam over to where she saw her father waiting. As she entered his range, she felt him reaching out to form a connection. The formally comforting familiarity of his mind only exacerbated her feelings of guilt. If he had been angry or disappointed at her, she might have felt better, but the outpouring of worry and affection from him felt like an insult. As if she was too fragile to even handle criticism.

Sera tried to prevent the strand of hatred that arose, but seeing him look away, she knew that she had failed. Why did she have to be such a horrible person?

“Sorry.” He sent as she floated up to the glass.

“Why are you saying sorry?” She should be the one that's sorry. She was the one that messed up, so why was he apologizing?

“I should have tried to be more accommodating. I knew that you wanted combat training, and I should have facilitated that instead of preventing it. You wouldn’t have approached somebody so dangerous if I had let you vent before.”

“Venting? Is that what you thought I wanted?”

Feeling the offence and anger in her thoughts, Alan sighed and forced himself to make eye contact.

“Look,” He reluctantly began, “I know how useless and helpless you feel. The lack of control, having to leave your fate in the hands of others. It hurts, knowing that you’re a cog at best, or a burden at worst.”

“The thing is, the majority of people are like that. You, me, even Sophia. She might be strong enough to take on a few humans and the occasional pest, but compared to the monsters that destroy cities, that make us hide behind walls in barren mountains and wastelands? She’s nothing. We’re nothing.”

“And you’re ok with that?” She accused, angry at his acceptance of helplessness.

“It's just a part of life. Some people are strong enough to carve a path through the world, and some people can only follow along. It's sad, but not everyone can be trainers or fighters. Those that try to force it… they don’t live long.”

Sera slammed herself into the glass, shaking it and forcing her father to recoil back.

“And this is living?! Trapped in this tank, eating the same things everyday, pulling off tricks on command?”

“It is. Some people don’t even have that.”

She turned around and swam to the other end of the tank. The worst part was that even now, he wasn’t angry at her. Patient acceptance was the only thing she felt, all the way until the connection faded.

Sera turned to look at the other Magikoi as they amused themselves, chasing each other's tails and playing little games. Uncaring or unaware of their situation. Were they not sentient, like her? Or was everyone beasts still, enslaved by their instincts despite their intelligence?

***

“Welcome to the preliminary rounds of the 21st annual Silverrod Newcomers Tournament!”

Six ignored the senseless babbling of the human prancing around the stage. Why they insisted on making such a large show out of this, it would never understand. Six was no stranger to people watching it fight; the institute had dozens of researches that monered its growth, but the thousands here? With more than half of them too far for their human eyes to see clearly? What was the point?

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“For the first round, we have a real treat for you folks! Introducing our local prodigy, three time winner of the Secret Keeper festival, Carmine Triston!”

“Come on.”

Six followed its trainer up to the stage. Even now, the human child was radiating a sense of arrogance and superiority, quietly awaiting someone to prove him wrong. As was only appropriate for its trainer. Six welcomed the challenges to prove its strength.

The crowd of humans and soulbeasts roared as they stepped under the spotlights. Their cries for violence were loud enough to shake the earth.

“And the other contestants of the first round, Lucille Wamboldt, Darrian Urben, Darlene Ravo, Jami Yoshimori, and Bryan Feltt!”

Five other trainers walked onto the stage, mental auras unrestrained.

Carmine turned towards them, smiling in amusement.

“You guys sure are confident. Did you think that things have changed now that we’re trainers?”

He formed a connection and shared his hearing, so Six could actually understand them.

“Shut up you arrogant bastard.” One of them growled out through gritted teeth. “There's five of us today. We’re not just going to let you walk over us.”

His eyes swept over them, casually dismissing their impotent anger.

“Really? Looking at you, it certainly doesn't seem like I’ll need to jump. What do you think, Six?”

It’s glance passed over their soulbeasts, assessing them with a trained eye. A Silverarm, a small Rustacean, a Shellrat, a near feral Warphound, and a Bushtrap. All of them were either nervous or uncontrollably eager. None of them had the cold, hard focus that drove the truly strong.

“Chaff.” It stated, needing no other words. For these kinds of opponents, no matter how many you gathered, it would only result in a pile of loose sand. They were unfit to stand beside it. Six would show them where they truly belonged.

Carmine laughed at its words. “You heard it. Chaff. I look forward to blowing you away.”

The announcer told them to get into position, forcing them to turn and walk away. “Enjoy acting big while you can.” One of them said as they walked past. “You’ll be eating your words soon enough.”

“I’ll be waiting patiently for that day.” Carmine responded with a grin.

As they turned away from their opponents, its trainer’s smile faded, replaced by a blank expression.

“The Shellrat is over trained. I’ll send it false orders to try and mess up what little coordination they might have. The Waphound is a fresh feralborn, probably barely even knows how to speak. Taunt it a bit and maneuver it into the others. It might even fight them for us. Kick the Bushtrap away early and try to fight around it. Those things are ridiculously slow at the early levels.”

Six nodded, accepting the orders without complaint.

As the trainers stepped off the stage and left their soulbeasts in a circle, Six stretched and felt the new carapace on its back bend. Still a little soft, but it should be more than enough for these opponents.

The connection with its trainer had already exploded inside its mind, feeding it a constant stream of information about its opponents. Unlikely to be necessary in this case, but it would build good habits and grow their affinity.

The match started with the blare of a horn, a sound that even Six understood.

Six kicked off the ground, racing towards the Bushtrap. The Warphound teleported in front of it, but the thing wasn’t even trained enough to bleed off its inertia. Six clawed into the ground with its talons, breaking and clawing into its side as it flew past. The delay wasn’t enough for the others to reach it, letting it hit the Bushtrap with a spinning kick. Six felt its wooden branches break against carapace before impacting its soft inner body.

The walking shrub was surprisingly heavy, and it barely flew half the arena before hitting the ground. The cloud of poison that exploded on contact might have been debilitating to a lesser creature, but Six had literally been born for this. Even as it breathed in the cloud, it could already feel its body and soul break apart the hostile substance before it could do any harm.

Sensing the Rustacean attack it with a stream of Grapeshots, Six zigzagged towards the metal crab, only occasionally feeling the weak attacks splash against its carapace. There were a few flashes of pain as some of the attacks drew blood, but nothing that would affect its performance.

The Shellrat jumped to engage it, fur shining with a metallic glow. It might have been a problem, but through its trainer, Six already knew that the Warphound was gearing up for another teleport rush. Its second attempt was better than its first, having spread out its limbs to keep Six from simply slipping through its sides. Unfortunately, the Shellrat was already on a collision course, and Six left them behind in a tangle of limbs.

The Silverarm and Rustacean had decent coordination. The larger soulbeast would keep Six away with wide sweeping swings, while the crab launched razer thin Waterjets with whatever water it could draw from the air. It would have been an effective tactic on nearly any other soulbeast in their weight class, but Six wasn’t just any other soulbeast, and its trainer wasn’t just any other trainer.

“Revolving Heaven the next time it reaches out.” An image of it clawing its way up its opponent’s arm. “Force, air, metal, electric. Cripple it.” Quad elemental manipulation was a tall order, even for it, but Six made a habit of surpassing expectations. Anything less would sully its heritage.

Pulling a quarter of its energy up to the surface, Six gathered a cloak of air around it as it charged. Feeling its commitment, the Silverarm’s hand began to glow with unstable force energy as it charged up a Power Fist.

Jumping into a spin, Six pushed out its energy in a weave so complex that it strained even its prodigious control. Aerial energy spun its cloak of air into a tornado. A wall of revolving force pushed it outward, and metal energy turned his cloak of air into a wall of spinning blades.

The Silverarm swung its oversized arm, and the explosion of force energy nearly blew it away. Curved claws dug into the ape’s arm, barely enough to keep Six in range.

The Zan’s Revolving Heaven expanded out, shredding its opponent’s arm in a spray of blood. In truth, the Silverarm’s thick hide and dense muscles ment Six could barely cut the surface, but it was enough to send a series of electrical shocks into its system, along with a special surprise.

Six flew over its shoulder, the force of its spin letting it roll up and out along the Silverarm’s limb. The creature screamed in pain, at first from the electric shocks, then from poison energy flowing through its bloodstream. It would get broken down in a few seconds, but that was more than enough.

“Oh, impressive. Force and Air are a Zan’s highest affinities, but even low level quint elemental manipulation is still usually the domain of Veterans.”

“A minor matter.” It claimed, though not hiding its small feelings of pride. “But perhaps this is not the best time for small talk.”

“I suppose it isn’t.” Carmine replied with a laugh.

Taking care of the Rustacean was fairly simple. Though one might have thought it a challenge with its thick metal shell and large claws, Six was the worst possible matchup for it. The Zan was just too fast for the slow and heavy bruiser to react to. Dashing behind it, Six kicked its vulnerable underbelly and sent a stream of electricity into its vital organs. It collapsed to the ground, heart seizing up, and sent out a message of surrender.

An instance after, the Warphound once again came up to fight, this time actually saving its teleport for positioning instead of a useless ambush attempt. He wouldn’t be able to just brush past or redirect it. Annoying. And it could see the ape getting back up too, though one of its arms was still a bit twitchy.

“Having a bit of trouble?” Its trainer asked in an amused tone.

If there was one thing Six would ask for, it was for its trainer to take things more seriously. The whims of fate were ever fickle, and despite his skill, even weaklings might get in a lucky strike.

“No. They might be performing better than expected, but still within my ability.” Though its stamina might be an issue. Six could already tell that its body was reaching the safe limit, but its trainer should already know that. It didn’t think that it would lose, but the accumulated damage might not be recoverable by the main tournament tomorrow.

“Well, we can’t have that can we? Guess it’s time for me to pull my weight in this partnership. Don’t want people to think that I’m just a kid getting carried.”

Six felt the connection with its trainer expand out, covering its mind. It felt the world slow down as its mind raced forward with unnatural speed. The Warphound that clawed at it seemed to be moving underwater, giving it plenty of time to step back just out of reach.

“Mental acceleration?” It asked in surprise.

“Yep. I can only do about 15% for 3 minutes, so you better finish it fast.”

Six stared at the opponents that seemed to be moving at half speed, leaving numerous openings that it was previously too slow to take. “I’ll finish it in 2.”