I didn’t really know what to think about all this……

“If I can master this, I basically won’t have to worry about getting hit at all right sir?” Professor Vylen looked at me and nodded. We had been training for about 3 weeks now and I had pretty much died at every single drill he had given me. My physical abilities weren't on par with any of my fellow classmates so I needed to sort that situation out first. I also found out that it was Professor Vylen who was going to be teaching me at my supplemental classes. Which was…….not good. Well, he wasn’t bad, but his training regiment was…

“Yes, so let’s get started then, come on now no stalling,” I sighed and faced the Professor. Yeah, not like we just did training an hour ago…The Professor was a good man just not good at realizing humans need to like….breath during exercise.

“First we need to figure out how you’re going to turn off your blueprint. Thankfully, this is the easy part,” I looked at him–ready to obtain the information which would save my life.

“Just loosen up your core muscles,” he said it so nonchalantly that I thought he was joking. He kept staring at me and I looked at him with doubt.

“Yeah it’s that easy. Don’t overthink it,” I relaxed my core and tried to make it so that it felt like I was floating on an open pond. Now that I thought about it, ever since the festival I’d been feeling kind of on edge. Was this that?

Suddenly I felt my body relax. It was like a wave of cool water had just washed over me on a scorching hot day. My arms, legs, and face seemed to all simultaneously loosen and that nagging burden that was constantly on my shoulders was gone. I felt much better for the first time in a month. “You see, the easy part,” Professor Vylen looked and he handed me some water—which I took a sip of. “Your body was constantly tense and that was probably because you had your blueprint up all the time. You should relax once in a while, don’t act like danger is at every corner.” I sighed silently in relief. Nice, I’m not going to die.

“But that was the easy part. Now comes you getting better at this whole gig. Firstly we need to beef you up a bit more so start by giving me 200 push-ups,” I spit out my water and looked at him with crazy eyes. “Yeah your body needs more work than I thought. So we’ll do that then do special training. Come on, don’t slack,” I sighed and started to do the push-ups.

This sucks…..a lot.

I nearly died as I dropped to the floor. We had gone through Professor Vylen’s physical training and my body felt like it was going to stop existing. I wanted to throw up but I was too tired to do that. The push-ups were pretty much a warm up since we did another 500 sit-ups, another fifteen kilometer run, and log squats—which involved me doing squats with a log on my shoulders. Apparently this was a pretty easy routine for all the students at this school and surprisingly, that didn’t shock me. I nearly inhaled an entire barrel of water and sprawled onto the floor. “Alright take ten minutes, come back and we work on that blueprint of yours,” I laid there for the entire ten minutes and didn’t say a word.

The Professor walked off and I continued to stay down–trying to cling to life. The sun shone in my eyes and tiny bugs started to swarm around my face–sensing the heat and sweat coming off my body. I stood up–with difficulty–and limped towards the Professor’s cabin. I need more water, give me water please, please, please…..

I peered into the tiny wooden shack that the Professor used as his living quarters. He was sitting down–with his back facing me–as he burned some incense in a black stone pot. In front of the pot was a picture of a group of people. Two of the people in the picture looked to be young children and the person in the middle also looked to be young–maybe a teenager. The teenager in the middle looked like Professor Vylen–who had his arms around the two younger children in the picture. I couldn’t see his expression and his body language didn’t change in the slightest, but I could sense that he wasn’t his usual stern self. He sighed and stood up. He made his way towards the door when I tripped over a rock. He opened the door and looked at me–sprawled on the floor.

“Stand up, let’s get you some skills in your bag.” I faced the Professor and he pondered for a moment before putting his hands in his pockets. The other Professors gave off a gentle and endearing aura, but Professor Vylen gave off a sort of……icy feeling. He was cold and calculated, never too expressive but not psychotic. He wasn’t the best at feelings but he was also someone that I had actually grown to trust. But even so I didn’t really know what to expect from this at all. He suddenly threw a fast right hand straight at my face. It was so quick I didn’t even have time to react and I just tensed up—waiting for the impact. An impact that never came.

I looked up and a shimmering golden barrier was put up between me and the Professor’s fist. My jaw dropped and I stumbled backwards. “Hold on, why haven’t I always been able to do that?” I looked in utter shock towards Professor Vylen who gave me a shrug.

“Your defenses are related to your reflexes—that’s my best guess. Your blueprint isn’t an extremely rare one for no reason.. I mean automatic defense means that you're pretty much…..invincible.” I looked at him and laughed a little. But he didn’t laugh at all.

“Wait you're being serious,” he nodded and waved his hand—resulting in a chair being teleported into the room. He sat down and crossed his legs.

“Well if you can’t get hit that’s pretty invincible right? I doubt that this is all your blueprint is good for either so you’ve got some serious firepower in your hands Evay. You want to make the tournament roster right?” I looked at him with a slightly surprised look but I nodded.

“Listen, it’s not a surprise to you or me really, but I can almost guarantee you that Geon is going to get a spot on the team. That Aurora girl is also a very high candidate. We’ve also never had a healer before in a team, and neither has any team from any other school ever. Fairheart is also in very high regard because of her gift.” Huh well that gives me a clue to what Lila’s skills are…..

“What I’m trying to tell you is that you can use this as motivation to work towards a spot. Your friends are waiting for you right? There’s nothing more motivating than fighting for the people you’ve lived and laughed with. So each time you fall, remember them,” the Professor gave me a nod and he started to walk out.

“Evay”, I looked at him and he gave me a kind look. “Your friends say they miss you by the way. Aurora and Geon are on a 20 match win streak. Lila’s on her third.” He walked out and I smiled. Even if my body felt like it was going to crumble at any second………

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I smiled.

That smile didn’t last long when training started the next day.

Redirecting, I hate redirecting, this redirecting thing is really fu—

“Evay concentrate. This is the only thing we can give you that can actually do damage. So unless you want to just be a team-player, get your head out of the gutter.” I sighed and took a deep breath. I had told the Professor that I figured out how to redirect damage thrown at me. I had done it at the house a long time ago when I had redirected the gentle breeze to increase the flames on the stove. However, redirecting things such as boulders was a lot harder.

We were outside amidst the trees, and a bright blue stream ran under our feet. I felt the cool water calm my body as I looked at the beautiful green scenery. Such a nice place for such a bad moment…..The Professor raised his hands and teleported a rock above my head. It came flying down and I tried my hardest to redirect it. Push it back, push it back, push it back……I didn’t just tense up my body to activate my barrier, I actively shifted my weight up–towards the falling rock–and tired with every fiber of my being to somehow force my shield to reflect the damage it was about to receive. I looked above me and the rock nearly landed on my head but it stopped right above it.

It was like the giant boulder had just hit an invisible ceiling on top of my face. This is my chance.

I raised my arms and jumped slightly to shift my weight towards the rock above me, and it launched itself forward—into the depths of the forest. I threw myself onto the ground and panted loudly in exhaustion as Professor Vylen caught me mid-fall. I looked at him and smiled a little. “Well look at that, I’m not such a terrible student after all,” the Professor smirked at my sarcastic comment before giving me some water.

“Yes, except that was your forty-seventh try,” he smiled at me and I sighed a little bit.

“Yeah but that’s got to count for something right? Like full marks for effort?” I looked at him hopefully and he just turned around with a slight laugh.

“Honestly you’re not doing that bad. We’ve been at this for two hours and for you to even get it somewhat is a miracle.” He looked at me with a slightly worried expression. I wondered what was up, but then realized I had blood running down my nose. I also looked at myself in the river and saw a ghost looking back at me. I had gained some muscle and weight but I looked pretty terrible otherwise. My hair was a mess, my eyes were bloodshot and red, my lips were cut and extremely dry, my face was pale, and I had two large bags under my eyes.

“You were given enough food, water, and time to sleep and recover. You’ve also gotten stronger since we first did these drills so you’re not critically exhausted,” he sounded like he was thinking more than talking to me. He came to a point of realization, “Have you been sleeping well lately? We’ve given you enough time to sleep but have you actually been sleeping, and not staying awake for nine hours?” I thought for a second and realized that was why I was probably feeling so tired from this training.

Ah so this is what Lila meant by saying sleep deprivation is harmful to your training….

“Yeah, I haven’t been able to sleep a lot lately. I think it’s because of the weird adjustment between classes and this,”I lied but I knew I couldn’t hide it from him. He gave me a stare before sitting down on a log, “You haven’t seen your friends or any other people besides the staff here for nearly four weeks. Your initial recovery time wasn’t ideal so it had to be extended, but seeing the same people for a month straight has to be a bit taxing. You miss your regular life, I don’t blame you,” I gave him a nod and he stood up. “Well maybe I can arrange something. I’m pretty sure you’ll be out of here in a week and a half so you can go see your friends in class then,” I smiled brightly and gave the Professor a very excited and slightly aggressive handshake.

“Thank you sir! I’m kind of missing regular life, you know?” I laughed slightly and he sighed.

“Well you still need to focus for these couple of weeks so I think I need to find a way for you to do that…Let’s see…..Oh I’ll bring you Aurora and you two can talk for a bit.” I spit out the water that I had been drinking.

The Professor raised his eyebrows and stared at me. “No? I thought that would make you the happiest?”

“No, yes, no….No. Sir, please don’t do that. I will focus and do everything you want for these few days no problem.”

“Hm. Well don’t you really like this Aurora girl? I noticed that you purposely tried to sit next to her in class, you still have her flowers and note card, and you always ask about her matches before any other of your classmates,” I felt my face then red and I sat down on a rock with my hands in my face.

The Professor laughed a little and sighed, “Young love, huh? You are still young, with many things to do and places to see, people to meet, and a life to live. Focus on your training so you can become who you want to be,” I nodded. I could tell he really meant those words but he also spoke with a hint of sadness and regret in his voice. It was almost like he had never gotten to be young, or do all the things he said I should do…He motioned for me to move.

“Come on, get washed and get some rest. We will do more tomorrow,” I nodded gratefully and went back to my room–passing out on my bed.

Shit.

I dodged another right hook narrowly as I almost got hit with another massive tree that was thrown right at my face. The Professor finally incorporated sparring into our training on top of endurance workouts, and I struggled to move my limbs after every training day.

We had been sparring a lot these past few days and it really sucked…..Like a lot.

Professor Vylen never told me what his skills were but I deduced that it was something to do with teleporting objects. Whether that be humans or giant trees…He flashed in a burst of purple light and teleported behind me. I tensed my body and activated my shield just in time to block a devastating side kick. The air generated from the kick tore up the ground beneath us. I flipped backwards and landed on my feet before activating my shield again as I blocked a boulder the size of an elephant. I needed to attack and not just defend. I had learned that your blueprint could be used to not just grant you abilities, but boost your overall physical strength as well. Everyone that was a warrior knew how to do this and it was pretty easy to figure out–even for someone like me. But it didn’t really matter since the Professor was stronger than me anyway.

A blast of sharp rocks came swirling at me from a distance and I redirected them towards the Professor. I jumped and rapidly dashed forward in the chaos to catch him, but he teleported away. I preemptively used my shield and his punch bounced away harmlessly. I jumped behind him and tossed a giant log toward his back. He teleported behind me, but I knew it was coming. I turned around before he had teleported and threw a back kick to his torso. The strike grazed his shirt before he teleported away. That was my chance…..

I felt the ground open up and a huge patch of earth was teleported away from under my feet. I felt myself fall and reached out to grab onto the remaining ledge of earth. I felt my hand slip and my body rocket towards the ground.

I closed my eyes–ready to accept another loss. So 0-4 it is, huh.

Suddenly I felt my body lift. I opened my eyes and saw myself suspended in the air. My face filled with shock as my feet were dangling underneath me. I felt light and majestic as my body had suddenly defied gravity. The Professor looked down with a surprised expression and I knew I had been gifted another chance. I soared up to the Professor and activated my shield. He instinctively threw a destructive straight right to my head which I redirected into his face. The full force of the shockwave generated from his punch hit him in the head as he recoiled. I flew straight into him and tackled him in a bear-hug. He tried to teleport away but I encased both of us in my shield. His face filled with confusion as he slowly began to realize what was happening.

“If you’re in my barrier sir, you play by my rules,” I smirked as we were still tumbling in the air and wrestling to get the upper hand. I began to fly higher, and higher, and higher until I reached well above the tree line of the forest we were dueling in.

I saw the luscious green canopy and the river which we previously trained in. The water level is low so the rocks will take the full force of our dive….

I flew up even higher than took a deep breath. Here we go…..

I took a nose dive into the river. The Professor was still trying to free himself but I held on with my life. I kept falling, and falling, and falling. We were picking up speed at an extremely fast pace, and I could see the water getting closer. I closed my eyes and used the last bit of my power to accelerate. Not now, not now, not now, not now. Finally I was close enough so that I could reach out and touch the water. Now.

I deactivated my shield and followed through. I felt the full force of my body slam into the hard rocks, and I felt my insides jumble. My vision went dark and pain flared all around my body. Alright, please give me this one.