“Why haven’t you used magic?” I asked Silvia, who was still trying to hit me.

“What type of question is that? I’m a warrior.” Of course she would say that. Traditional teachings taught everyone to only focus on one of the three combat arts.

“You’ll never catch me off guard if you only use your spear. Every form of combat compliments the others. You don’t learn them because the academy told you it’s wrong.” She got angrier, trying to stab again and again, but kept missing. “Look what the academy's teachings have brought you. You can’t even hit me.” She kept getting faster, as her anger amplified her will to defeat me.

She was beginning to freestyle her attacks, not being able to concentrate enough to remember the academic attacks, which ironically made her better. Academic attacks were good at one thing and one thing only, getting as much power from a strike as possible, but it was meaningless if you couldn’t hit the enemy. It was a shame she was facing me, as her strikes would’ve defeated most adventurers.

“Stop.” I grab her spear, completely stopping her. “This isn’t practice, this is just pointless sparring. Sparring is useless if you don’t even know the fundamentals. You don’t know how to predict.” She was still trying to push the spear forward this entire time. If she had one thing, it was determination.

“Prediction? Why would I need to predict your attacks? Reaction is what matters.” She yanked the spear back, as I barely managed to let go before the metal slit my hand.

“Reaction can only take you so far. You are open to gambits from your opponent. You will act predictably, and play into their plans.” I let her stab at me again, dodging a couple times before punching her spear into the ground as she lunged at me. The spear dug itself into the ground, practically unmovable.

“Plan this, plan that, but none of you martial artists understand you’re inflexible. You have a plan, and deviating from it takes too much concentration.” Instead of yanking it back, she pulled it up. I jump away as the icy mud explodes everywhere.

“You can only reach so high with reaction. The only limit a predictor has is their mind.” I ready myself to punch her, and as she goes to block it, I use my other arm to hit below her guard, which was also blocked.

“Was that your–” I keep going, hitting her in different areas, slowing myself down so she can block all of them. She’s fully focused on blocking my attacks, so her reaction has hit its limit. I trip her up with a small explosion, and land a punch, ending the battle.

“How did I lose to a fool like you? You shouldn’t be that powerful with martial arts if you’re dividing your attention between it and magic.” She fell to the ground, as she dropped her spear and layed down.

“It’s better to be a jack of all trades than a master of one. You’ll be more versatile if you learn all three.” Blair groaned, as she looked at me and Silvia.

“There aren’t only three arts you idiot. Haven’t you heard of alchemy?” I stare right into her soul again.

“Alchemy isn’t real. It’s a desecration of the combat arts. You are not skilled in combat if you can make a potion that increases your speed. You’re just cheating.” Everyone else was wrong, and I knew it. There was no way cooking magic soup counts as a combat art.

“Whatever you say old man.” Oh, she was gonna get it for that. I’ll break her ego twice as fast just because of that. I’m barely thirty-nine!

“Boy, you listen to this too.” I turned to face both Silvia and Ethan, as this advice would apply to both of them. “Both of you will be learning magic, so you better choose what you’ll be learning. Certain elements come in pairs, but this doesn’t mean all of them do. Just ask the princess which ones do and don’t.” An example of this would’ve been the four common elements: fire, water, air and earth, and my magic ability.

“Oh! I already chose telepathy.” Oh… he messed up.

“And the academy recommended energy manipulation to their wizards, so I’ll just learn that.” That was even worse!

“Ok… so… boy… you are travelling with a noble who controls the strongest chinese noble house. She has enough power to be called a princess, and you choose telepathy? You wanna know why none of them are left? It’s because telepaths completely stomp assassins and were overworked to death to stop royalty from getting assassinated.”

“Why would telepathy defeat assassins?” He wanted to be a telepath without knowing one of its main uses. Typical.

“You’ll find out. Silvia is gonna learn from Blair while I train you, since teaching is the best way of learning.” Blair wouldn’t teach Silvia about how bad of an idea energy manipulation was, but they would both learn this way.

“Alright! How do I use magic?” The boy hasn’t used any magic in his life, so his questions are forgivable.

“Just listen to my instructions. Feel the air around you. Start breathing deeply. Focus on your body and my voice.” I stayed quiet for half a minute, making sure he wasn't focusing on the passage of time, as he would’ve already asked me what to do next if he was focusing on it. "Do you feel anything?”

“The air moving around me?”

“There is no wind. Try again.”

“Ah! Is this magic?”

“Close, but not quite. It’s your willpower, and the source of your magic. Try thinking about it moving a certain way, and it will do so. Your job is to turn it from something only you feel, to something physical.” I said, partially lying as willpower is magic, so the boy was technically right.

“And how do I do that?”

“By shaping it. Create an image in your mind. It will be more difficult as you’re trying to be a telepath, but imagine what your power looks like, and forge the willpower into something that could do what that power could.” He immediately made a rookie mistake, and tried making an actual tool, like an axe or shovel. “Stop. I’m talking about tools in the broad sense, as in something that helps you accomplish the task. The task is to move an object, and you don’t need a hand held tool for that. You can make your tool levitate.”

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He continued making mistakes, or struggling to even create something to simulate telepathy. He tried having a floating box push things around, but he couldn’t lift things off the ground with it. He then tried a flexible sheet, but it broke too easily, and I finally decided to help him.

“You can make your tools more durable if you believe they are more durable. That’s the whole point of calling it willpower and not magic.” It finally seemed to click for him, as I saw him lifting a pebble up. He was still using his hands to direct the magic, which he’s gonna have to fix, but it was an ok start.

“Look! I’m doing it.” He was jumping after lifting the rock, arm high in the air.

“Calm down, the lesson isn’t over. It’s time I show you why telepaths make assassins worthless.” I toss him a rock, and grab a rock for myself. “Try holding the rock in my hand. Wrap your tool around my rock. Now, can you feel the texture of the rock as well as the one in your hand?”

“I think so? I can feel its shape.” The boy said, sweating profusely. It’s clear he’s lying to me. He can probably feel a rough outline of the rock, but nothing more than a simple sphere.

“How finely?”

“I can feel that it’s a sphere, three dents, surprisingly smooth.” Of course it would feel smooth to him! He can’t feel its texture. If you felt its shape finely enough, you could feel every little dent and bump on the rock, and its texture by proxy.

“Good. Now, expand it to my arm. It should be easy enough as you aren’t moving anything, just encompassing it.” He struggled to find a way to surround the rock and me, as he struggled with the concept that his will could do anything again. “Your sheet can pass through itself if you will it to.” He finally got it, and began increasing his telepathic area.

“When do I stop?” he asked.

“When I tell you to.” The boy kept going, first my arm, then my body, then the ground around me. “That’s enough. You can now feel everything around me. This also applies to invisible things.” A lightbulb went off in his head, as he finally realised why telepathy made assassins irrelevant.

“I’m so dumb. Well… what now?”

“You keep practising. It’s quite simple for telepathy. It’s like lifting weights, but instead of using your body, you use your telepathy.” I looked back at Silvia and Blair to see them reading a magic book, as Silvia follows the steps written within, and fails to summon even a bit of energy. “I’m guessing it isn’t going well?”

“Who asked? Go away, peasant.” She waved me away as she went back to trying to help Silvia. I already saw their flaw, Silvia used her own power incorrectly, and drew out too little. They followed the book to the letter, so they didn't just draw out more energy.

“Fine, If that’s what you want.” I guess I have some time to sleep. Maybe she’ll be merciful enough to not put me in the nightmare.

“Why are you always so early?” She fully materialised herself again, her body entirely made from smoke. I actually felt a hard floor this time. Is she actually building out the void? No, it’s my mental space too.

“I had nothing to do. They’re all training by themselves, and I can’t be bothered arguing with Blair.”

“Why don’t you train? It was the only thing you ever did.”

“It’s pointless, I’ve reached the peak of strength.” I could’ve marginally improved if I tried, but what’s the point? I’ll still be just as powerful by the time we reach the warlord.

“I think I broke you.” I was lucky to even be sane. The best way I could describe how the nightmares felt was by comparing that day to a wound. The wound healed and was reopened by her again, and again, and again, forever.

“I’ve had worse, we both know that.” Being stuck in a time loop must’ve also messed me up.

“Not like you didn’t enjoy killing-” I interrupted her, I could not let this devolve into another argument about Japan.

“Shut up about that. Nobody cares anymore. They were beyond redemption, and your stupid attempts to defend their ‘culture’ will always fall flat.” It didn’t seem like she liked my interruption and attempted to change the subject. Her shadowy body expanded to a wall around me, several heads popping out of it.

“I won’t let you move on.” Said the head on my right, her twisted smile showed how truly far she had fallen.

“We must not, for you’ll destroy anything that doesn’t fit with your worldview.” Said another head, her soft blush and smile showed how heroic she thought she was.

“We didn’t do a good enough job! We should’ve just killed him while we had the chance.” Another head spoke, with a determined look. She was gonna make sure I lose, no matter the cost.

“No need. I predict that the warlord will take him out. With how much he’s been weakened by us and by how powerful the warlord should’ve grown, he stands no chance.” I looked at the analytical face, as several shadowy clipboards surrounded her, her glasses being the only thing that shined in this whole void.

“Maybe he needs worse memories. He’s becoming desensitised. How uncaring, getting over your son’s death so soon.” It’s been twenty years. Did she expect me to never move on?!

“Enough!” I reshaped her, separating the shadows. “This is my head, and you’ve made the foolish decision to separate your consciousness. You will hold sway over me no longer!” And just like that, I was back in reality, and near a campfire too. I got it, this was her new torture. She was trying to make me believe I could win against her.