A month had already passed, and the Misfits, those who were in their 3rd and 4th years, already felt that the pressure was on and their lessons were harsher and more demanding than ever before. Even the new 1st year students had to choose some extra activities, made mandatory by the Institute, that usually either included learning battle tactics or dueling.

Inside a training arena, in a virtual battlefield littered with dead bodies and broken weapons, and under a heavy blizzard, the Misfits were having a group battle with only one opponent, Rinzen. The leading figures were Aurora, Koadriana, and Raufon, while Ceiline, along with a few of her plants, played the supporting role, using glowing, white peashooters to heal those who were injured.

Raufon and his group were responsible for defending against the icy, sharp spikes trying to impale them, raining from the skies randomly. They were erecting walls and protective shields around the others, deflecting the unpredictable attacks. Koadriana and her men were pushing back against the wild, raging blizzard, against its cold and disorienting winds, while Aurora led the others in trying to break through and reach Rinzen to deal a fatal blow against her.

With a wave of Aurora's hand, Keily jumped forward, following her orders without hesitation. Shishi and two others followed him from the Misfits of Fire, fanning out and casting the same magic, blasting differently colored fires from their hands, melting the snow before them, and creating a heavy fog that obstructed Rinzen's vision as it swept over her, fanned forward by the Misfits of Air. She immediately closed her eyes, feeling the change in the snow and ice around her, but this was different from back home. She couldn't scan or control the ice as well, and with Raufon's and his lieutenants' interference, she was denied from being able to sense the vibrations traveling through the earth below her feet.

Still, Rinzen's mind adapted in a fraction of a second, and she was redrawing the snowstorm, concentrating it around herself as a protective bubble, making it possible for her to perceive the incoming attack just at the last moment. From the fog, Aurora and two others appeared next to her, wielding dark, curved daggers, trying to slash her apart and finish her off for good. This time, all the others who followed Aurora would not stop their attacks, not even if Lucian himself appeared and ordered them to do so.

For them, time seemed to slow down. Rinzen's cold face never flinched once as she moved gracefully, dodging Aurora's men with enough time to tap their backs and turn them into ice statues that, before shattering, were teleported out by the System. Whirling around like flowing water, she avoided Aurora's blade next and the follow-up kick of hers, grabbing her ankle and starting to freeze her body. Aurora didn't hesitate and slashed down at her own leg, intending to sever it before Rinzen could send the ice further up on her body.

"...!" Knowing that the System would not eject Aurora until it was a fatal blow, she quickly let go, stopping Aurora's downward slash that transitioned smoothly to a stab, going straight for the point between Rinzen's eyebrows.

When the tip of the blade connected, a loud clanking noise flung it out of Aurora's hand as the rebounding force shattered the bones in her arm. The blue, diamond-hard ice before Rinzen's face melted away as quickly as it appeared, and she punched out mercilessly, hitting Aurora square in the chest; she felt as if sharp needles pierced her heart before being teleported out with a painful smile on her face.

Outside, sitting up on the grass, she couldn't help but sigh, rubbing her chest, gulping down potions to reconnect the many broken bones in her body. By the time she emptied two vials, more Misfits had appeared, one by one, until Ceiline, Raufon, and Koadriana all showed up too. Surprisingly, Keily was ejected last, surrounded by fire and yellowish electricity, startling everyone.

"Damn it!" He groaned, unable to sit up as his magic slowly dispersed. "I almost had her!"

"No, you didn't!" Raufon grinned, wiping blood from the corner of his lips. "But hell, when did you manage to learn how to switch between the two elements so quickly? You just started learning about it! It was as if you wielded fire and metal at the same time!"

"Hehe…" He giggled sheepishly, looking proud and shy at the same time.

"The kiddo learns fast!" Koadriana laughed, rubbing Keily's head, making a mess out of his black hair.

"I am already counted as an adult!"

"Yeah, yeah!" She hugged him from behind, "If you are, come, join my harem! I am in need of a beast, folk! I heard bunnies can hump for hours!"

"Ugh…" He flinched, now truly turning as red as his spells.

"They do?" Asked Rinzen, who walked out of the training field's energy field, looking at them curiously, but when she didn't receive any answer, she quickly looked at Aurora. "Are you okay?"

"Yes." She signed with her now-healing hands without grimacing. "You are strong. Are you sure you call yourself more of a support-oriented warrior?"

"Yes." She nodded back and blew out cold, bluish air that made their pain and fatigue quickly evaporate when washing over them all, leaving them in a rejuvenated shape."

"It even affects the little ones!" Ceiline exclaimed, watching the four peashooters around her return to their bubbling, happy moods as they were out of mana just a moment ago.

"They are good." Rinzen looked at her. "They helped relieve those who were weaker and hit by my spells. They would be good in large-scale battles as personal first aid minions."

"Um!" Ceiline agreed, already thinking of developing some more varied healer variants.

"Lia would have loved this training session!" Raufon sighed, making Keily turn to him.

"By the way, where did Boss go? I didn't see her for days!"

"She was taken away by the Headmaster." Rinzen explained to them, "She is being trained in the sword and whip. To prepare her for when Opparu comes back."

"Isn't that preferential treatment?" Koadriana giggled, "She doesn't need to attend classes or provide tangible results for the teachers of mandatory tasks! Also… She is skipping her responsibilities as the leader of the Misfits!"

"Ugh…" Everyone flinched hearing it. That sentence reminded them they had to oversee the recruitment of new students and were forced to think about naming their successors. The four years of school were going way faster than anyone thought, and even with their 4th still a year away, somehow, it seemed closer than ever.

…
….
……

"Your stance is bad!" Lucian said, hitting Lia's shins with a wooden stick, making her almost buckle before fixing her posture, holding a slightly curved longsword in her hands. "Forward slash." He ordered, and Lia followed suit precisely as Lucian told her. "Again. Sweep to the left. Diagonally up. Block high. Slash down again. Faster!" He commented, sometimes hitting her, correcting her posture without holding back.

They were far away from the Academy, at the highest point on the island, atop the mountain ranges in the north. Lia was learning from him the primary sword-fighting forms, the different stances, and the most common moves known to men. He was especially strict, forcing Lia to perform them perfectly, only then letting her rest. What surprised him was that Lia never complained, not even when he hit her to make her body remember its mistakes the hard way. She corrected her errors and worked on them without noise.

"You can stop for now." He said, letting her slowly lower her arm and place the heavy, training sword on her hips before rubbing her aching wrists. She was sweating hard, wearing nothing but a skintight suit, while her long hair was tied up in a bun.

"How far have I improved?" She asked, picking out a bottle of water from her holding bag and drinking all of its content in one go.

"Coming along nicely." Lucian nodded with satisfaction. "You have already mastered the basics; your only problem is stringing the moves together seamlessly and returning to default after I make you stop. You can do it one by one but not in quick succession."

"I'll work harder!"

"Mhm. I expect you to do so." He nodded, watching her wipe the sweat from her forehead. "I am only making sure your foundation is solid. I bet your brother will teach you the rest."

"Solren?" She asked, knowing it was not Lauron because he was a healer and not Razael, as he was more of a brawler. Solren was the one who used a two-handed blade that was an artifact passed down in their branch of the family, forged in the 1st Era after the Dark Ages.

"Yes. He is a master swordsman."

"Is he?" She asked, feeling unsure, but Lucian just shrugged.

"You are too used to it, I assume… but I met many people who say they are masters of the blade. They can be called… professionals, yes, but not masters. That title has a meaning behind it, and your brother earned it! I am just trying to prepare you for his lessons to the best of my abilities."

"Are you a master swordsman, Headmaster?" She asked, getting curious.

"No." He answered simply, without shame. "I am good, but I am not a master. My choice of weapons was claws." He flexed his right arm, and reddish electricity jumped forward from under his skin, forming three buzzing claws around his hand. "Anyway," He dispersed it quickly, "After you can work with the sword, I am also going to teach you the basic handling of a whip!"

"Um." She nodded as she already told everything to Lucian, showing her the plans for her artifact and even getting some feedback from the Headmaster on where she should make small changes.

"Although, I must say, you, first and foremost, have to rely on your own strength and your spells. Your artifact will only serve as a tool so you can learn faster! Try not to overly rely on it!"

"Where is yours, Headmaster?" She asked happily, already looking like she was back to full energy.

"Destroyed."

"Eeeh? What happened?"

"Lost it in a sub-realm. We…” He trailed off a little, his eyes flashing with pain before cutting it short. "We lost a lot of men that day. It broke off in the body of the Undead by the end of the expedition. I scrapped the rest afterward."

"Oh… okay." Lia nodded, not asking more questions. Her mother had the same eyes when she was asked about what happened on the day she decided to retire from adventuring with Kawu and be a mother instead. She knew that look too well.

"After you finish mastering every aspect of the basics, we are going to try and repeat it while you infuse your mana into the weapons."

"Oooh, okay! Will that be… different? That is why you said I can't use magic while practicing?"

"Yes." Lucian nodded, explaining it to her more deeply, "Using mana and spells elevates your performance. If you learn moves using it, you won't notice the mistakes. The fact that the sheer power behind spells makes up for all the faults in your form is bad enough! With that, your foundation would be littered with mistakes and bad habits! Fighting against someone who has it down to perfection would land you amongst the dead."

"Really?" Lia asked and not because she didn't believe him, but because she was surprised to hear that. "Are the Intelligent Undead that dangerous?"

"They are worse… they are like masters of different styles. I fought against six in my life, and killing them was always a life-and-death battle where I was a hair away from dying. When I met the first one, I couldn't defeat her, and she escaped. Sorry… I lied now… She did not escape. I did." He quickly corrected himself, looking away momentarily before continuing, "When I met my second Intelligent Undead, it was a different person… or body. He countered my initial attacks easily, as if he already knew my habits and style. That is why you can't let Intelligent Undead go. If you don't finish them, all the others will know about you and your styles!"

"No Undead will go if I come across one!"

"Good. Because after our training and when you get your artifact, you are going to face one while the rest will watch. I want you to show them how this year will go for your Misfits."

"You will pit everyone against one?" She asked, part excited, part nervous.

"Yes… and I will choose nine people out of your group."

"For what? Are we getting rewards?"

"Aha! Kinda!" Lucian grinned, telling her something whisperingly that made Lia squeal loudly, even hugging Lucian out of the blue.

"That is great! I am in! Ahahaha! This is going to be even better than last year!"

Corty

I hope that I am not boring you; Dear Readers! The following few chappies will also be training sessions and the creation of Lia's and the others' artifacts. I just don't want to rush it, so please bear with me here! Also... Artifact... Artefact... As a non-English speaker, sorry if sometimes it is spelled this way and that way... somehow not even Grammarly can make up its mind about what to correct it to.