“Oh? My parents are here!” Kina suddenly interrupted the quiet breakfast as she suddenly put her fork down. She sent out another mana pulse to confirm, enveloping the entire city. Rose simply smiled and continued eating his breakfast as if it was expected. It’s been almost 3 weeks since they arrived and he was just about to start his morning training session. The plan was for Kina to bring out the new archery recruits to the outskirts once more before issuing them their new weapons from the supercarrier.

“Do you want to go meet them?” Rose asked after gulping down his honeyed mead.

“No. That’s probably not a good idea. With how much attention we have on us right now, I think it’ll be better to meet them discreetly outside the city. I’m sure they already know where we are. My parents would probably be tracking my movement regularly and find the right time to meet us.” Kina rejected his suggestion.

Having finished breakfast, they quickly proceeded to the expansive courtyard behind the mansion where the new recruits were already assembling and waiting for their employers. The warriors and archers quickly greeted Rose as they picked up their weapons. The archers were given cheap scrap swords to use as they began their physical training. The 2 mages followed Kina to the other end of the courtyard to begin their ‘magic lessons’, which in their opinion would be pointless.

They were the best in their respective academies and countries. People approached them to learn and seek help in understanding magic from them, never the other way around. Hence, both of them were incomparably arrogant and confident in their own abilities.

“So, Arina, you are from the fox tribe and specialise in offensive and illusory magic?” Kina confirmed, to which the foxgirl dressed in a thick enchanted robe nodded, before lightly scoffing. “And Ryuga, you specialise in defensive and healing magic?” Kina asked once again, addressing the male elf, to which he nodded as well, a proud look on his face.

“Well then. I would like to see the full extent of your capabilities. I hired you because you are the only 2 who barely passed the minimum required mana capacity to study under me. At peak level 10, you have barely enough mana for the spells that are actually useful. I want you to fight each other. I want to see just how powerful your offensive and defensive abilities are,” Kina ordered as she leapt back to give them space.

The 2 looked at each other and smirked. They’ve been itching to establish who is the stronger mage since they’ve been hired. The past week had been boring since they only had to watch the warriors train all week. Arina took a step back before looking at Kina and asking, “Are you sure you want to see my spells? It might destroy your courtyard.”

“Just go ahead. I doubt your spells are anything useful. Just in case, I don’t want to have to spend money repairing my home, so I’ll just take some precautions. ” Kina cast a spell. Immediately, a large transparent dome materialised around them, isolating them within a radius of 10m. The moment the spell finished forming, the original optical distortion caused by the dome seemed to disappear, as if the dome wasn’t there at all.

“Oh fire spirits lend me your power, torch my enemy to cinders! FoxFire!” Arina yelled out after chanting a quick spell. From her outstretched arm with her palm facing the elf, a small flame ignited, before quickly expanding into a cone shaped flamethrower and burning everything in front of her.

“One with Nature, fusing two neighbours, I summon thee to protect me, Mud wall!” Ryuga chanted quickly after hearing the beginning of Arina’s chant. A semi-circular wall of mud rose from the ground, taller than the caster himself, shielding him from the incoming flames.

The commotion attracted the attention of the other recruits, who for the first time are seeing the mages in their group cast spells. From their point of view, all they could see were the domineering flames coming out of the foxgirl’s palm enveloping the elf. However, the flames seemed to be stopped by an invisible wall after they blasted past where the elf stood.

By the time the flames died down, all that’s left was a charred ground with cinders burning where the grass used to be. There, in front of her, was a dirt wall, crumbling after being toasted by the fire spell. As the dirt wall crumbled, it revealed a frowning Ryuga, who seemed unscathed at first look. However, the back of his robes were charred and his hair was singed from the back where the flames had made their way past the mudwall. Arina smiled, before turning to face Kina.

Ryuga quickly chanted a healing spell and his hair quickly returned to their former gleaming lustre. He too looked at Kina. In his opinion, his defensive spell was stronger than Arina’s offensive spell since her attack did not manage to penetrate his wall. Arina though seemed to think otherwise, seeing as her spell still managed to hurt her opponent, which in the end, was the main point of an offensive spell. However, their faces which were originally a smug smile quickly changed into a confused look as they looked at Kina. Kina was yawning, as if what they had just shown her had failed to impress her.

“Is that all you got? Weak. Truly very weak. Looks like im going to have to start from the basics with the both of you,” Kina muttered in disappointment. “Arina, why don’t you attack me with your full strength? Ryuga, watch carefully, I’ll show you what true defence is.”

Arina could not take the humiliation any longer. She was determined to put this brat in her place, if that was the last thing she did. Fuming with anger and embarrassment, Arina raised her arm and pointed it at her employer. Money was one thing, but her pride was another. Even if she was fired for injuring her employer, she could always get another job given her skills. She could not bear to have her pride injured, even if it’s a casual comment from a young girl who didn’t know any better.

“Spirits of my ancestors, spirits of the dragons, I command you to give me your strength, decimate my enemies, Flame Dragon!” Arina yelled at the top of her lungs. Her entire body became enveloped in flames as her 3 fluffy tails turned from light orange to flaming red. Then, a flaming twister picked up from around her before circling her outstretched arm and shooting towards Kina, the tip of the spell taking the form of a dragon’s head.

“”

With a loud rumble, a tower of stone, dirt and metal rose from the ground around Kina, completely surrounding her. The tower continued to rise to the skies, easily becoming the tallest structure within Mayheir city. Arina’s flaming dragon clashed with the tower head on, quickly wrapping itself arounf the tower as if trying to constrict and break it. It burned from a bright orange colour to a bright blue colour, before dissipating.

Nothing. Not a single scratch, burn mark or even char existed on the tower of rock and dirt. Then, as if time reversed itself, the tower descended into the ground as quickly as it rose, revealing a completely unharmed Kina within. She shook her head in disappointment, looking at Arina’s spell.

“Sigh.. it’s not even that powerful, and yet your chant is too long. A skilled warrior would have taken you out before you completed your chant. The activation process was too long as well. As showy as it was, your spell has little to no practical use in real life unless you have the element of surprise. No opponent in real life is going to sit back and let you finish you chant.” Kina evaluated her spell. “Ryuga, were you watching carefully? That is what I would call a good defensive spell. Although it is not the best, it would suffice against weak mages. Its downside though is that it blocks your vision, which means you won’t be able to prepare for any incoming attack after the spell is released.”

“Arina, watch carefully. This is what a real offensive spell is. Since you seem to favour the fire class of spells, I’ll show you a basic spell. ” Kina boasted, pointing her finger at the ground. A small but quick flaming arrow shot out from her fingertip, landing on the ground. The arrow itself was no larger than her finger, although it flew really fast.

Arina watched as the small flaming arrow penetrated the ground. She secretly thought to herself, “What? How is that an offensive spell.. it barely even – “

*OOOOoommmmmmm*

A loud humming sound suddenly rang out as the spot where the arrow landed, a tall pillar of fire descended from the skies, lasting barely a second before dissipating. The pillar was as thick as an arm, its heat radiating out so fast and so ferociously that even the other recruits training on the other end of the field felt it, despite the spell lasting only less than a second. The blast of heatwave caught both Arina and Ryuga off guard, as they were pushed back and off their feet. By the time the spell ended, there, where the arrow had originally landed, was a hole so deep they could not see the bottom. The spell had atomised the ground where it had struck.

“So now do you see just how limited your views on Magic are? The most imnportant aspects to magic are imagination, comprehension and of course, your mana capacity. You need to be able to think of new ways to perform spells, understand how spells work on the fundamental level, and have enough mana to execute the spells. The rest, is purely hard work and practice. For the rest of the day, I want you to keep firing spells to deplete your mana. I want to raise your puny mana caps. Once you are almost out of mana, come see me, I’ll give you mana elixirs to replenish your mana,” Kina instructed, before heading back into the house and returning moments later with 2 large mithril plates.

These plates were about half a metre on each side, and were specially made by her uncle Rashael and her mother Isana back on Aioa to help her train her magic. It was a mithril and orihalcom alloy with runes carved to the back to store the absorbed mana into a large moon crystal on the back. She hung the plates on 2 straw dummies used for sword practice before instructing Ryuga and Arina to aim their offensive spells at the plates. Having left the mages to their assignments, Kina returned to the house, only to teleport to the ship.

Immediately, she began transporting the gauss rifles from on board the ship to a storage shed in the mansion in secret. Along with the rifles were crates of ammunitions and vests. Finally, she spent a good 6 hours dismantling the gauss cannon from one of the harriers. The cannon itself was larger than her giant sword. The each round for the cannon was as large as one of the rifles itself. Her only problem now was figuring out how to design a power source to operate the gauss cannon, since it did not come with a solar charger and a battery pack like the rifles.

Just as she returned to the shed with the cannon, she quickly began making preparations by sorting out the shed. No one in the mansion knew what was in the shed, nor had anyone seen anybody enter the shed, so Kina was pretty sure it was the most secure location since she had been teleporting directly into the interior.

*Gong!*

*Gong!*

*Gong!*

*Gong!*

*Gong!*

*Gong!*

The city’s bells began ringing as everyone stopped whatever they were doing.

“What’s that?” Rose asked one of the recruits.

“It’s the warning system for a demon horde attack. We need to get to the walls now to defend the city!” one of the warriors explained in a hurry as he quickly began putting on the rest of his armour. The archers were left in a state of loss as they did not have their weapons.

“Everyone stay in the mansion. You are not to leave unless I tell you to,” kina quickly came out and bellowed, to which everyone had surprised looks.

Stay and hide? Them? Proud warriors and mages? Although they were reluctant, they knew they were under contractual obligation to follow their employer’s orders. Reluctantly, they hesitated before returning to the mansion.

“Shall we go then?” Rose asked as Kina gripped her sword tightly. “Let’s go make a name for ourselves.”