Without remembering a single dream, I wake up to the sun shining down onto me. Feeling fully recovered from my mana deficit, I stretch as Sif gives me morning wishes, “Good morning Master, I have felt that you are now mostly recovered from your exertion. If you would wait with me for a few moments, Lyn and Claire went hunting for lunch.” She smiles wryly, “Well, I should say good evening, you slept straight through the morning.”

Wow, I know I felt bad but I haven’t slept in this much in years. Discounting my state of limbo of course, if that even counts as sleep. The last time I slept straight through the morning was when I was so engrossed in finishing a project, a special custom plate set with a hodgepodge of specific modifications, that I ended up staying up all night into the next day applying the finishing touches. I did finish it to my satisfaction, but I was unable to start anything the rest of the day I was so tired. 

“So, since we are going to be waiting anyways, how about we start practicing combat magic now.” I grin sadly, continuing, “I don’t want to end up collapsing after using only one spell after all.” 

Sif smiles kindly at me, “As you wish Master. I cannot teach you how to use fire magic as I think Miss Claire would like to teach you, but I can teach you how to form earth bullets, and how to fire them.”

kneeling down onto one knee, she draws a circle into the dirt with a diameter about three hands wide. “Depending on the hardness of the earth, you will need to compress a greater amount of it to get the denseness needed to be a weapon. You need to compress it much like we compress ore when prepping ingots, except here we don’t need to remove impurities. The amount I drew should be enough for forest soil like we have here. It’s pretty soft, so it should be a good base, as in this case its always better to overestimate the amount you need.”

I nod. This part I knew. “I know this part Sif, I did use that specific type of magic for years after all.”

She nods with laughter in her eyes, “Of course Master, but I needed to explain how you don’t need to make it a perfect specimen since it's a use and discard magic. Knowing you, you would stress too much about the perfection of the compressed earth and end up taking too long to form it, completely defeating the purpose of using this in combat.”

I see her mana enter the earth, and in an instant it compresses into an arrowhead shape, leaving a significant hole in the ground. She continues, “Of course we want it to be an arrowhead shape for it's practical destructive power. We can just throw boulders at people, and with our powers it would be simpler.” She pauses, seriously stating, “But our issue here is control. You need practice controlling your mana, and if we just practice throwing boulders you will probably just throw a meteor at something next time your life gets put under pressure. So we will practice making these precise earth arrows and shooting them.”

Her mana still present in the arrowhead, I see it gather and condense at the base of the arrowhead, which then promptly shoots forward, piercing right through a tree and sticking onto the next tree behind it.

“The trick is to gather your mana onto the base of the arrowhead using the amount gathered to shoot the arrow forward.” She forms three layers of earth walls. “Try shooting these, so I can gauge how powerful your shots are. You want to be able to pierce straight through the first wall, which simulates typical non enchanted armor. Your magic sticking to the second wall simulates the arrow successfully wounding the target, needing to be extracted later should it not finish them off.”

Nodding, I form my own earth arrowhead. Though it pains me, I forcefully stop my first instinct to purify and refine the material, focusing intently on just compressing it into an arrowhead. Now the tricky part, I normally don’t need to shoot things with mana. Trying to imitate how much mana Sif used, I fill the arrow base with my mana, using it to shoot it as fast as possible. It shoots off, impaling itself on the first of the three earth walls, failing to pierce through.

Sighing at my failure, I hear Claire declare her judgment, her and Lyn emerging from the forest. “You didn’t gather enough mana before shooting it. You’re probably too scared to waste too much like you did yesterday and are holding back more than you need to unconsciously.”

Turning around I exclaim, “Claire! I am so sorry about yesterday!”

Raising an eyebrow, she replies, “Sorry? There’s no reason for you to apologize to me. Once you made the decision to fight the bandits, we had resolved to kill them. If anything, be sorry to yourself for overexerting your mana. Anyways, we brought lunch.” She gestures to Lyn who grins and holds up two decently sized rabbits. 

Pleasantly surprised at her complete dismissal of my overreaction yesterday, I skeptically ask her, “You’re really fine with it? I have a ton of mana, but I don’t really know how to apply it to combat.”

She sighs, “I mean your overreaction was a lot, but you forget, you and your spirits are living legends, so you can basically pull off anything outrageous and I can accept it. What is worrying is that your overexertion can harm you.” I notice her cheeks gain a faint red hue as she continues, “And I should mention I am extremely honored to be able to accompany you for this time. I will admit I didn’t take into account how easily it is to overdue fire magic in a hurry, so I have to take some of the blame. Really, we shouldn’t have made you engage them yet, as it is best to start from weak monsters to train your skills. I still think it was necessary for you to see the reality of this time before determining to head on a journey, but we didn’t need to be this hasty.”

Speaking of that fight, I turn to Lyn who is still smiling proudly while holding up the hares, “So what did you do to the bandits that surrendered?”

Her smile falters for a split second as she glances in Claire’s direction before answering coldly, “I did nothing to them, I left them where they fell before guiding Claire to you and Sif.” Hmmm, maybe she shocked them hard enough to erase their memory of us, she showed me it's possible for her before after all. But I can’t shake the feeling she is leaving something out. 

Sif calls to us, breaking me free of my thoughts, “Well, let me skin and cook the hares, then we can set out. Claire, please help Master shoot a correct Earth Arrow while I cook.”

Remembering to grab my sword for its learning enhancement, I catch up to Claire as she begins showing me how she uses Earth Magic. She chants, “Earth, compress into arrows and rise to my call. Pierce through my foe, Earth Arrow!” In union with her chant, multiple spots of dirt compress into arrows. (Not arrowheads like Sif created, but actual full length arrows made of earth. It has to do with her chant using the term arrow instead of arrowhead changing the perceived image of the phenomena she wishes to create.) They all rise and float around her in an arch over her head. When she finished the last part of her chant, only one arrow shot through, and it passed straight through the first wall to embed itself into the second.

Turning to me she explains, “I find it easier to compress and create multiple arrows at once, so I can have them ready to shoot at multiple targets. I believe you can do it as well, but we want to practice shooting just one at a time until you get the strength right.”

I focus and create one arrow, following her example. Maybe thinking of imitating an arrow like Claire does will make it easier for me to control the magic. After all, I am not a certain Earth Spirit King who can manipulate her element at will. Though still not completely passing through the first wall, I do better, the arrow stuck in the middle of it. 

Claire nods, “Better. It is easier forming an arrow isn’t it? I know some earth spirits form just the arrowheads like you were trying to do, and I have even seen some just use highly compressed round stones, but it’s just easier to shape the shooting magic using a bow and arrow as reference. Anyways, again, you’re close! Much better than me from when I was learning this.”

Losing myself to the rhythm of practice, we soon eat our fill before heading off. To the Theocracy!