After Quin learnt the basics of Jolt, his instructor started him teaching the other spell, Flash Jump. It was quite similar to Jolt: first you have to gather qi in your foot but for a bit longer and then shoot it out, however this time a bit more focused.

Learning it took only a couple of tries for Quin again, though actually using it for its intended purpose was somewhat harder. Usually it would be used while sprinting, to give the user a quick boost in speed, however he has never experienced this kind of acceleration before, so it threw him out of his balance several times.

After he got the hang of it, his teacher told him to go home and that they would continue tomorrow.

“Hey!” Quin was going home, when he met Leyn, who seemed to have just finished her training.

“Hey, haven’t seen you these day, what happened?” she asked him a bit concerned.

“Haha! Guess what! I’ve broken through to the Qi Foundation, yesterday,” he replied proudly.

“That’s great!” Her mouth turned upwards to a smile and she embraced him for a short hug. “And what’s your element? You have checked it, haven’t you?”

“It’s lightning!” he said with the same pride as before, while also laughing.

“Really? You sure aren’t just boasting?” It was not that she did not trust him, it was just simply too unbelievable.

“Nope, the Instructor checked it yesterday, and what’s more, I even learnt two lightning spells! You know, I could show if you’re interested... and not afraid.” He grinned at the last part, which he obviously added only to annoy her a bit.

“Me, afraid of you?” She laughed lightly. “You still needs years to catch up, don’t get too conceited! But I do want to see those spells!” She playfully ruffled his hair.

“Alright, then let’s search for an empty place, I learnt the base of the spells, but honestly if anything happens, I don’t want to embarrass myself in front of everybody.” He scratched his head laughing and then started to walk towards an area, filled with a couple of hills.

“Okay,” she answered and followed him.

“Here we are.” After they arrived, he looked around for a moment. “It looks like there isn’t anyone here. So first, I’ll use my movement spell, you just stand there.”

Quin began demonstrating his two newly learnt skills to her and also explained what both of them did.

“So, what do you think?” Quin asked smirking.

“You’re quite talented,” Leyn replied with a smile, “And I have to say that what they’ve been saying about the lightning element was true. Although these were just starting spells, their strength was significantly higher than what I’ve seen from the other elements.”

“I’ve told you, haven’t I?” Quin said, filled with happiness. Just like father told me, it’ll be me who’ll be at the top from now and no longer will I have to feel inferior! What’s more, if somebody has to feel inferior it’ll be them!

After a while of playing around a bit more they sat down on the top of the hill and started talking about various things.

“You know, I’ve known you for a couple of years now, but somehow I’ve never gotten around to ask you about why are you so determined on your training. I mean, I know a lot of people who spend much time on their training, -- like me -- but you are definitely on a different level. Since I’ve started to see you going to the tracks after school I’ve never seen you rest or slack off, except the days you spend recovering or letting your body catch on,” the girl asked him.

“I-” Quin started talking but got stuck for a moment and looked up to the sky. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes for a second and continued, “You remember what happened on the annual Spring Test on my first year at the school?” He was no longer looking upwards, but turned his head down slightly.

“Yeah, that was when that attack happened, wasn’t it?” she replied

“To be honest, I’ve never spoken about the whole thing to anyone and tried my best to forget it, but guess it’s time to put it behind me already... Looking back, it’s a bit funny to remember how different I was at that time.” He snorted. “I hated training, I hated exercises and I hated everything that was tiring. In the morning classes I was always among the last groups, and it was the same during the Spring Test as well.” He sighed and stopped to gather his thoughts as well as his strength to continue. “It’s even more funny or maybe just sad, that I’m still alive because I was even lazier than the the kids at the last group.

“In the middle of running, I noticed that the Instructor was nowhere to be found, so I decided to stop for a few minutes to rest with a couple others. But then I heard that terrible shrieking and then saw the monster.” He shuddered and without recognizing it, he gripped his arms so hard that his nails dug into his flesh, letting his blood to drip. “I... The next thing I saw was how it killed and ate my friend, Pharren, in just a moment. I couldn’t do anything, I tried to shout, to scream at him to look out, but I was powerless and I couldn’t even move.” His voice became shaky and even a couple of tears dropped from his eyes. “And I didn’t even have any time to react, in an instant nearly everyone was dead in that group and even around me. God, there was so much blood and gore everywhere, and then I was face to face with it. I felt terror and helplessness as I barely saw its tongue shooting towards me.”

“It’ alright.” Noticing Quin’s state, the girl pulled him into a hug and tried to calm him, stroking his head. Quin let these bottled up emotions flood out and started to cry in her embrace. This lasted for minutes before he was calm enough and could continue.

“So... It was at the last moment, when the Instructor arrived and killed it. The following days and weeks were horrible: I could hardly sleep and when I managed to finally fall asleep, then I always had nightmares. Honestly, I can’t even remember much from that time, only the feelings. Before this whole thing I thought that I was so smart and that the adults were stupid for always preaching about strength and training, because I’ll never need those thing since we’ve got all those soldiers protecting us. Then one day after the attack they told us about that creature, how weak it was and even their evolved form doesn’t match up to an adult human. This and realizing that while I was busy, lost in my emotions during running I haven’t even noticed fatigue or tiredness, got me into thinking... That maybe I was the stupid one and not everyone else.” He laughed lightly but there was no joy in it. “The other reason why I was so adamant with my training was that I fell really behind the others, so I had to put more effort into it obviously. Since then... I don’t know, the whole thing probably had a very big impact on me. It may sound strange but somehow I feel myself somehow compelled to train each day. I mean, it’s like... Maybe like a survival instinct for me?”

After finishing his talk Quin had mixed feelings: he was happy to be able to finally tell it to someone, on the other hand sharing his secret, he felt a bit embarrassed and awkward, even his face had a red tone to it.

She smiled at him and ruffled his hair. “What’s with that face? I think there’s nothing you should be ashamed about, in contrast you should be proud about your accomplishments! Everyone makes mistakes, a six years old kid even more. You know, my mother has a saying which she tells me often: it is not the mistake what matters, but what you have learnt from it. And I don’t think there are many other kids who’d have done so much to change.”

“Thanks,” he answered quietly and they stayed like that, next to each other for some more time.

Although it was difficult to open up to somebody, even harder to actually tell the whole story and remember all those frightening details, afterwards he felt better and refreshed. He considered Leyn truly one of his best friends and the only one except his mother who he can rely on anytime.

Author's Note: I decided to add titles to chapters from now on, but be warned that my naming sense is crap (many names in the story was made up by my friend), so don't expect much regarding that. I also dislike when the title of a chapter spoils too much of the content of the chapter itself, thus I'll try to make them somewhat ambiguous, while making them so that they'll still have some connection to the chapter.

Also, I'm going to put the Author's Notes to the end of the chapters.

Edited on 2016. 09. 25.