“Raise, strike, turn and move,” Carmine's instructions came as rapidly as I could move my body. Every word brought forth a sloppy motion, it was my poor attempt at imitating Carmine's grace. “Spin, slash, thrust!”

  I clenched my teeth down tight while I tried to heed the commands, my foot hit the ground to give support before my entire body twisted. The spiraling motion I entered was barely controlled, the speed was so intense that my head spun with a dizzying intensity—But when my other foot landed I had to halt all of that momentum at once, and with that much speed the stick in my hands that couldn't have been more than a few pounds felt like hundreds.

  That perceived weight was almost too much for me to handle, it was so much that when Carmine's next orders came I couldn't hope to keep up with them. It was just when my balance steadied enough to shove the stick forwards and turn it into a thrusting motion that those words reached me.

  “Parry, counter, slash!” Carmine’s commands barked out—And I knew what was coming just from the word “parry” being uttered.

  Carmine leapt in front of me, coming down with a massive overhead strike using the blunt side of a blade. I barely brought the stick up in time, catching the full force of the strike head on. But before I could throw the weight to the side, let alone begin the motions of a counter I was thrown back. A sharp flash of pain filled my abdomen, I didn’t see what had happened but I knew what it was thanks to how many times it already struck me.

  “Oww…” I whimpered out, resting my hand over top of the bruised section of my stomach from Carmine’s kick.

  “You still need to find your tempo.” Carmine stated with a delicate sigh. She stepped off to the side, her expression subtly grim in the way she looked at me.

  “I still don’t know what that means…” I whined as I shakily stood. It was already well into the afternoon, hours after the rest of my classes had ended for the day—And yet I was desperate to go back to them. For three hours straight Carmine had been running this drill with me, she would instruct the next motion right up until I couldn’t keep up and then she’d jump in and pummel me.

  “You’ll know it when you find it,” Carmine answered vaguely as she offered a hand out to me. With a pained grunt I reached my hand out, gladly accepting her offered help. “You should rest up for today, you’re starting to slow down.” Carmine suggested as her free arm again ruffled my hair. My own free arm moved to try and bat her away, but I had no hope in moving faster or being strong enough to shove her arm away.

  “Why do you have to do that…” I groaned out while ducking backwards. I felt my face narrowing into a soft frown—One which grew deeper when Carmine answered it with a joyous giggle.

  “Because your reactions are adorable!” She answered jovially, flashing a grin before she continued. “Besides, you deserve to have some affection every once in a while. Especially when you haven’t gotten to feel any for so long.” As she finished speaking she stepped back, raising both arms clear over her head, interlocking her fingers before she leant side to side in a soft stretch.

  I opened my mouth to try and reply, but no words would come out of it. Stifling back the sigh I could feel forming I instead turned, leaning down to grab the staff I was using to practice with.

  “Why do you care about that?...” I finally asked as I stood back up.

  “Why shouldn’t I?” Carmine asked in return, a smug grin sitting on her face now. “But, seriously Kirin, go and get some rest. You’ve earned it today.” She insisted once more.

  “I’d rather practice more—If I only have two weeks then I need to learn as much as I can in those two weeks!” I insisted with weary determination to my tone. I was exhausted, I knew I only looked half as bad as I currently felt, but I wanted to keep trying.

  “Kirin, finding a tempo—Learning the Thunderdance, it isn’t something you’re going to do in one day,” Carmine paused to flash a reassuring smile at me as she turned away. “I had to learn it too, I felt the same, and I wish I listened to those instructions back then.” With a soft sigh she began to walk away, pausing only for a heartbeat to call back a few more words.

  “But it is your body.” She stated before walking away entirely.

  I was left in silence, or, the relative silence that was simply the wind gently bristling across the grass. Even Akemi was dead silent, only raising her muzzle skyward to let the breeze ruffle her fur.

  Turning my gaze back to the staff I held in my hands I had to wonder what I should do. But Carmine’s words hadn’t fallen on deaf ears, my arms ached, my body was crying out for respite—And I reluctantly listened to its demand.

  With only a slight pulse of my mana the staff disappeared, fading away into the spatial ring as I began walking away.

  “Come on Akemi… it’s getting late anyways.” The sun was falling out of the sky now, fading away into the horizon with the last few hours of daylight still remaining in the air.

  Akemi gave a soft yip of recognition when she stood up, turning as she padded alongside me while we made our way back to the school.

  By the time I made it back to the dorm the sky had already darkened, with the night sky drinking away the last fringes of daylight just to replace it with the grace of twilight. The starry sky cast ample light into the bedroom, gracing Tulip’s resting head with ample reflections off of her silver hair.

  It was strange honestly—Or at least it seemed a little strange to me—The way that Tulip was always asleep when I arrived back in the dorm. A part of me wondered if she was avoiding me on purpose, while another part had to point out that she seemed exceptionally exhausted lately.

  “I’ll have to ask her…” I told myself in a quiet whisper, warranting an annoyed gaze from the Owl above Tulip’s bed and a curious one from Akemi.

  I made sure to raise my hands to Topaz, affirming my surrender to it while I moved to change. It was refreshing to finally pull off the clothes I had been stuck in all day, the sweat and grime stuck to my uniform would be a nightmare to clean out—One which I didn’t envy the cleaning staff at the school for having to handle.

  Without much grace or waiting I threw myself onto my bed. My body quickly began to let go of its pent up tension, softening as the soft and silky embrace of the bed rolled across me.

  I wasn’t sure how long I had been laying there. It was definitely more than half an hour, I was probably only a few moments away from drifting off into complete slumber—But a distinct sound halted that.

  The sound originated from only a few feet away, it was Tulip getting out of bed. I had no idea what she was doing, I only heard the soft flapping of Topaz’s wings and the exceptionally soft opening and closing of the door to our room.

  While a part of me was curious, I figured it was just something simple like her needing the bathroom—And with that assumption I fell entirely into slumber.

  Finally, the next day came, heralded by the late evening moon sending gracious light into the room. By the time morning had arrived Tulip was already back in her bed, resting only a few feet away from me.

  And… the days continued on like that. I woke up at the crack of dawn, training with an increasingly exhausted Tulip and Levi.

  “Press harder!” Levi’s words boomed in my ears as I ran. I felt my stamina getting better the longer these sprints went on, Levi’s belittlement even began to almost feel reassuring—Especially when he didn’t belittle me after I finished, only during the exercises.

  The continued training with Carmine however didn’t go as well.

  “Parry, strike, turn, advance!” Carmine’s commands continued getting harder, and all the while I couldn’t find any sense of the ‘Tempo’ she kept talking about. And every single day, she kept pounding me into the ground.

  Whether it was a leg sweep, her brutally powerful yet still halfhearted swings, or just the difference in raw skill—I couldn’t do a single thing whenever she jumped in.

  And yet, strangest of all was the consistency of nearly every night. Only a short while after I collapsed into the embrace of my bed, running almost on an exact clockwork cycle, Tulip would get up and leave. However she was always back by the time morning came, it left an itch of curiosity that was growing by the day.

  Over a week and a half had passed in that same, almost monotonous schedule before curiosity finally got the better of me. It was probably one of the worst days for it to have happened as well—Tomorrow was the last day of training I had before the first trial would begin.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  That knowledge alone weighed like a boulder in my stomach, holding me in bed while the curiosity gnawed away at me like acid when Tulip left. It was a brutal tug-of-war that was physically painful thanks to how battered, bruised and sore my body was from all of the training.

  It was a battle of “Should I?” or “Should I not?” that prevented any hope of getting rest. It felt like half an hour had passed, and when Tulip still wasn’t back by then the curiosity finally won out.

  With a soft sigh escaping my body I got up. A quick shiver ran its length across my body, the cold night air relentlessly washed into the bedroom thanks to the glassless window.

  “If I’m partnered with her… then I should at least try and figure out what she’s doing, right?” I asked no one in particular—I certainly hadn’t asked the still unconscious Kitsune who was resting next to my pillow.

  I debated for a solemn moment if I should wake her, however I soon decided against it once I stood up. I did not want to deal with a grumpy Kitsune on top of the stress of what was to come.

  Without even bothering to change into a full uniform I just grabbed my overcoat, pulling it over my shoulders while I pulled the door shut behind me.

  It was only once I left the dorm room that I realized; I had no idea where Tulip was—Nor did I really have any good ideas of how I could track her down either.

  Blowing out a low breath I began forwards, with no real destination in my mind I settled on just wandering. Whether I found Tulip or not, I was out here and I was going to use the time to clear my mind.

  My steps echoed through the empty halls, it was almost to an unnerving degree. Each click of my heels against the ground boomed in the silence, but they didn’t boom as much as the other noise I heard.

  There was a screaming crash in the distance, frankly, it was the only sound other than my own steps that could be heard in the entire school—And it gave me an exact direction to start heading in.

  It was a direction that also gave me some faint levels of hope, mostly because it was a very familiar one. It was the same place where Tulip and I went every morning to train with Levi.

  When I rounded the last corner, settling my gaze on the open field I was rather confused.

  I saw Tulip on her own, her face was visibly contorted into anger, pain and exhaustion—So intensely with all three of those emotions that I could have sworn I felt them myself. But I was rather confused, it looked like nothing was happening in the entire field. There was only Tulip the same massive boulder Levi set her in front of every day and Topaz sitting atop that boulder.

  Or, at least it did until I felt the mana start pulsing away from Tulip. It was a trickle at first, pressing outwards before spiraling around the boulder. It was massive, easily over twice the size of even Levi and three times that in width. And yet Tulip’s mana was trying to press its way into that boulder, trying to… move it?

  I wasn’t sure at first, I couldn’t see anything physically changing. It honestly made the nightly silence almost oppressive with how little was happening. Yet, despite that nothingness there was a booming crash, one which originated directly from the boulder.

  “DAMMIT!” Tulip screamed out, her voice cracked into a painfully high pitch that startled Topaz as he rested atop the boulder. “Dammit…” She whimpered out a second time in a much lower tone. She slumped forwards where she was sitting, staring at the ground in presumed defeat.

  The weight of that defeat, of that pain that I couldn’t understand was overwhelming—It was like I felt the same emotions Tulip was feeling, those very feelings spurred me forwards carefully.

  “Tulip?” I asked cautiously while I approached. Tulip’s gaze was brought up to me, her red eyes sparkling with unshed tears that threatened to be released.

  “K-Kirin?...” Tulip asked while frantically trying to wipe away her tears. “W-Why are you here?...” She inquired in a timid tone.

  “I… wanted to see where you’ve been going for the last week,” I answered simply, stopping a few paces in front of Tulip where I fell down onto my rear and crossed my legs. I offered the kindest smile I could muster before asking; “Why are you here? Let alone why you’ve been out here every night…”

  “I… I’m trying to practice,” Tulip forced the words out. “And I’m worthless at this stupid challenge Levi gave me…” She muttered further as her head lowered to the ground.

  “And… what exactly is this task then?” I inquired with a raised eyebrow.

  “He wants me to crush this boulder… with my base attunement…” Tulip’s eyes shifted around, trying to focus on the barren soil beneath her while tears finally escaped her. “I can’t even do this with my innate element! Let alone trying to do it with an attunement I still can’t use!” She cried out as if screaming into the skies for an answer.

  “What do you mean you can’t use your base attunement?” I was curious now—As far as I knew, at least as far as I had been told, people didn’t get their innate elements until their attunement was nearly mastered.

  “It’s just what it sounds like…” Tulip muttered, shaking her head. “They say I’m a ‘prodigy,’ but I’m just a freak. A freak who can’t use their attunement element no matter how hard they try—But all anyone ever, ever sees is just the fact that I can use an innate element already!” Tulip sobbed out.

  I couldn’t bring up any words to try and reassure her—What could I say? It was… difficult. It was an issue that I sort of understood, but it wasn’t in the same way whatsoever.

  “If it makes you feel any better, Carmine keeps saying I’m the best prodigy she’s seen other than you,” I offered to Tulip, forcing a smile when her tear filled eyes met mine. “But I feel like I’m failing at everything too. Guess we’re just two disappointments being declared as prodigies, huh?” I forced my tone to be as jovial as could be. And, surprisingly it worked a little, bringing out a soft, defeated smirk from Tulip.

  “You’re terrible at pep talks…” Tulip chuckled out dryly.

  “In my defence, I don’t have much practice. Especially when someone doesn’t tell me about their problems,” I replied with a soft grin. “At least you’re failing at a stupidly hard task, not something so stupid as being incapable of learning how to do a dance.” I offered out while scooting a little closer to Tulip.

  “A dance?” Tulip asked with a clearer voice. She brought the sleeve of her arm up, wiping away the tears that still coated her eyes as best she could.

  “Yeah… it’s related to her training me with a halberd now,” I exhaled slowly, shaking my head. “All she says is that I need to ‘Find my tempo,’ but no matter how hard I try, I can’t figure out what that even means.” I leaned forwards, letting my shoulders sag as the words escaped me.

  “Well, that’s simple,” Tulip said with a confident grin on her face. “Get up.” She commanded, taking me by surprise.

  “Alright?” I obliged, standing up with a feeling of bewilderment overwhelming me—It was a feeling that turned violently intense when Tulip grabbed one of my hands, planting her other on my shoulder. “Wh-What are you doing?” I asked, feeling my face growing extremely hot.

  “Lead me in a dance, just find a pace that's comfortable for you. That’s all a ‘tempo’ really is Kirin, it's just a pace, a beat to keep up with. Start moving and I’ll follow, as simple as that.” Tulip answered with a smirk—One which spoke of her immensely enjoying the embarrassment I felt in this moment.

  “I… I don’t even know how to dance!” I cried out, trying my best to worm away from Tulip’s grip.

  “Just start moving, it’s really not that hard Kirin,” Tulip reaffirmed, tightening her grip on my hand a little more. She forced her fingers to intertwine with mine while grabbing my free hand to place it at her side. “Go ahead.” She said with a nod.

  I felt frozen in place—Absolutely nothing could have prepared me for what just happened. My face felt like it was on fire, my heart was pounding like a drum in my chest, but when Tulip gently tugged my arm I found myself starting into a motion almost naturally.

  I took a small step forwards, one which Tulip mirrored with a step backwards, I took a step back, Tulip mirrored it with a step forwards. It was a simple motion, yet it was timed to a beat that I could almost feel.

  Another step, and another, mirrored with each other—I honestly couldn’t tell if I was leading, or if Tulip was guiding me, but I could feel the motions. The starts and stops, the beats of movements like the drums of a march.

  Even with no audience, the stars stood in place to watch us. Even with no instruments, the wind blew its continual whistle to guide my steps. The motions sped up and slowed down, keeping pace with the imagined beat of a drum that wasn’t really there.

  “I… think I feel it?...” I asked uncertainly while trying desperately to avoid eye contact with Tulip.

  “Remember, the tempo can change—But you just need to feel it, it’s really not that hard. It’s just about taking a leap and—” Tulip cut herself off, stopping so suddenly that she yanked me to a stop with her. “—Taking a leap and remembering that it’s easier than it seems.”

  “Is… everything alright?” I asked cautiously. Once again I tried freeing my hand from Tulip’s grasp, but her grip was impossibly strong.

  “You might have been exactly what I needed, Kirin,” Tulip answered with a sigh. “God… I’ve been a total idiot…” She muttered with a shake of her head.

  “You’re… welcome?” I offered before pleading; “Can I have my hand back now?…”

  “O-Oh! Yeah, there…” Tulip answered, finally releasing her vice-like grip of my hand. Albeit, that vice-like grip was almost immediately replaced by a tight hug from the much taller, not to mention stronger girl. “Thank you, Kirin.” Tulip said in a soft whisper.

  “I have no idea what I even did…” I whimpered out a little. I had never liked the feeling of being touched—The crushing pressure of someone hugging me was absolutely no exception to that, so as soon as Tulip loosened up even a little I jumped backwards.

  “You might have just taught me something that was right in front of my nose for years,” Tulip sighed out, shaking her head. “But I’ll find out in the morning—Let’s head back to the dorm.” She continued with a deep yawn.

  “I… hope that you taught me something… and didn’t just embarrass me for no reason.” I shivered a little, already worrying that Tulip might try hugging me out of the blue again.

  “I hope so as well.” She answered with a smug grin. I could still tell, and even somewhat feel the previous emotions from Tulip. But now they were muted, controlled maybe? I wasn’t sure, I didn’t even know if it was all in my head or not.

  All I did know is that I wanted, no, needed to sleep.

  Patreon

  Discord

  LoneStar,