John looked at the twins. “The party consisting of your two gets a B+ as well. I am not going to fight the two of you if I can not even defeat you one on one. The three of you guys are up.”

Rickerd stood to the left of Kiyoshi and behind them stood Leona.

John charged at them. Leona started to chant and twist mana around her into a speed buff for the boys. Rickerd took the first hit on his shield and tried to retaliate with his axe. Kiyoshi made an attack with his sword as well.

John went full out, the first hit was just a faint and he used his shield to angle the attack from Kiyoshi into that of Rickerd, showing fighting prowess he had not been able to show previously.

Leona’s buff landed on the boys and she continued into a chant for a perception buff. Rickerd used his extra speed to make quicker but lighter attacks while keeping his shield ready. Kiyoshi used his speed buff to circle around John and attack him from behind while also utilizing quicker attacks.

John boosted his power by circulating some mana inside of his body. Strangely without causing some twisted mana. He used his shield to block all Kiyoshi’s attacks and used his sword to deflect Rickerds’ attacks. Hereby once again utilizing the inexperience from the two boys.

Leona finished her perception buff and started on the speed buff again.

The two boys used the perception buff with the speed buff to pressure John into a loss. John had none of it and kept holding them off. A few moments later the speed buff wore out. Throwing both Rickerd and Kiyoshi off for a moment. That was all that John needed. John went past the left side of Rickerd making sure he staggered into the direction of Kiyoshi and prevented a follow up. John put his blade on Leona’s neck. “Stop! Your party combination gets a D. You are working together enough that it makes a difference. But the moment you get ambushed from behind you are all dead. Now for all five of you. Four tails do not battle alone, as a team. In a party or normal fight they can’t be dead weight. Understood?

Glacia and Vulcania stood straight and with a salute shouted, “sir, yes sir!”

John ignored it. “Now are the three of you ready to fight again?”

Kiyoshi could see in the joke of the twins and with the same military salute shouted, “sir, yes sir!”

John said, “that joke has already become old, now get ready.”

They used the same formation but Vulcania and Glacia stood next to Leona to the right and left respectively.

This time John charged up before the fight. Circling mana through his body in much greater quantities, although his efficiency could be debated as Glacia and Vulcania could reach the same power with about a tenth of the mana he used.

Vulcania used her mana to buff Kiyoshi directly in front of her and Glacia did the same for Rickerd. Vulcania used her mana to make Kiyoshi’s sword stronger, sharper and for the fun of it burst out in flames. Glacia strengthened Rickerds shield and axe and gave them a nice icy pattern. They both also strengthened their muscles with an exoskeleton of mana and pushed their internal mana to boost their perceptions.

Leona got thrown off her groove. Only able to cast some simple buff and healing spells and only one attack spell. She just now realized that when the legend where true when they declared kitsunes to be the best mages.

Rickerd and Kiyoshi charged John, unable to keep up with their enhanced bodies and perception they stumbled quite a bit. After finally stabilizing a bit they began to swing at John. Kiyoshi’s blade threw out flaming arcs and Rickerd threw out arcs of ice and coldness.

They exchanged many hits with John and at the end still lost because of overconfidence and once again over commitment and because of unfamiliarity with the power..

John did not even approach the back line and called it off. “Stop! I can see that you guys have never worked together as a group. Because of those two I am willing to give you a C- rating. But you better train and strengthen yourselves in D rank quests before actually moving on to higher quests. The healer girl did not even do anything in this last fight. The two boys need to learn how to use their weapons and four tails… four tails needs to make sure these rookies do not come dependent on them.”

The five people and the three people that watched all went back into the tavern part of the guild. They would get their guild cards shortly.

Kiyoshi sighed “well, that went about as well as expected.” He added much more enthusiastically. “The two of you were great. That looked like some high level spell shit.”

Glacia smiled and responded, “thank you for the compliment. However that was low level shit in kitsune terms. That was also probably what John was referring to when he said we could be rank A or A+.”

Leona asked while despairing, “are the two of you willing to teach me magic?”

Vulcania cheerfully answered, “sure, but only if you stop looking that gloomy.”

Leona gathered herself up from the table. Vulcania got in the mood and started teaching right away. “There are two main methods to magic, do you know which ones?”

Leona was unsure, “the kitsune way and the human way?”

“Wrong, those are the people who use it. It has to do with how you treat mana. Do you force the mana to follow your commands or do you guide the mana to do what you want?”

Leona knew this one, “I force. So you meant the normal magic and gamble magic types. But you can only force mana into magic and gamble magic is mostly way too unreliable.”

Vulcania agreed, “yes that is true for humans. But not for kitsunes, we even dislike using your ‘normal’ magic. Dragons might even go and kill you because of it. It is the only magic type we know and can teach.”

CosmicDragon

I got in a mood today.
So here is a second chap.