Aether Engineering

Chapter 25

Maston Academy

The Town of Maston in the Candis East District

It had been a week since they had gotten back to the academy. In that time, Silas had been cleared to leave the infirmary, Myles and Jane had almost finished the pieces needed to build their design, and Kate had been busy working with Reah and trying to find a group of monsters nearby that were weak enough to defeat without too much risk.

The entire group had almost completely mastered commuting their mana now. A week of constant practice had made keeping the armor up almost second nature. The only time one of them would drop it now was if they were suddenly surprised. Of course, Primrose had deemed that would be unacceptable and had instructed them to start trying to startle each other whenever possible.

The idea had quickly become a sort of game between them. Now, it was more common than not to walk into the dorm room with the lights turned off only to have someone jump out shouting. On one memorable occasion, Myles had walked into the room where creepy music was being played on a flute. After searching the whole place and finding no one, Mercy had tapped him gently between his shoulder blades. Myles had lost his armor that time, leaving it behind as he leapt into the air in fright. Seth had come out a few moments later, holding a flute with a slight smile. Apparently, Mercy had learned he could play and come up with the whole idea.

There were other memorable moments as well. Silas had managed to recruit another student to help him scare Kate. In retaliation, she had asked Reah to help her get him back. The result was both hilarious and a little terrifying. The illusions Reah had made were a little too real for anyone to be completely unfazed.

For the entire week, Primrose had held back from pushing them in their physical combat class. Instead, she had them do light exercises while she talked them through various combat scenarios. Today though, everyone could tell things would be different. The entire group had recovered from their injuries. Even Silas who had been the worst off had bounced back thanks to the incredible skill of the doctors who had attended him.

Primrose put her cup of tea down and the room fell silent. She made such a habit of keeping it around while teaching, the mere act of putting it down was noteworthy. It meant that she had something serious to teach.

“You have all learned to use the first four steps of the core arcaner’s way of the fist to a point of sufficient mastery, so, we will be moving on to the next four steps.” Primrose eyed them all as she took up a neutral stance. “When in combat, you will be naturally more attentive. This is normally a very good thing. It will often be what keeps you alive. That said, a clever fighter can use their opponent’s heightened awareness to their advantage. Seth, could I get you to volunteer?”

Seth nodded and stepped up to the front of the class, facing off with Primrose. As he did so, the thin layer of pure mana that he kept active at all times rapidly began to bulk up.

Primrose nodded to him and had him take a defensive stance. He complied, looking watchful. The sparring match started off with a few blows exchanged. Seth made no move to attack, and Primrose only made use of the first step, a simple palm thrust. Even when she varied her approach or attempted multiple strikes, she didn’t break through his guard.

As they continued lightly sparring, Primrose began talking in a calm voice, seemingly unbothered as she continued to send blows in Seth’s direction. “Notice how his defense is difficult to break. There are a few ways that you can get around such a defense. The most obvious ways are to either overwhelm him with enough speed that he can’t block all of your blows or use enough force so that even if he were to block, he would be injured. These can be effective tactics, but when you are facing an opponent who is both faster and stronger than you, they are useless.”

Primrose attacked at the same speed she had been the entire time. She sent two blows at Seth, both of which were blocked, before stepping wide to the right, trying to get around him. Seth reacted easily, rotating his guard to protect against a renewed attack. The only problem was that when Primrose had stepped wide to the right, she hadn’t gone to the right. Instead, the step had almost impossibly taken her straightforward. Primrose delivered a soft blow to Seth’s side.

The sparring match continued. Primrose had long since drilled into them the idea that the fight wasn’t over until either she said it was, or someone gave in. The blow that Primrose delivered used no mana, so, Seth had taken no real damage from the blow.

Seth tried to go on the offensive for the first time in the spar, but Primrose simply took a step backwards. When she made to retreat another step, Seth eagerly pursued, but instead of taking her backward, Primrose’s step took her around to Seth’s left side. She delivered another palm thrust.

The fight continued in this way. Seth would try to make a move, but every time, Primrose would somehow end up somewhere different than where she had appeared to be moving the moment before.

Eventually, Primrose called an end to the fight. “Did anyone figure out how I managed to get around his defense and offense?”

No one had a good answer. They could all tell that there was a trick somewhere in her footwork, but they didn’t know how it worked.

When no one was able to answer, Primrose nodded. “The trick is relatively simple, but that is also what makes it so difficult to fight against. The move is called the snake step. It works by evoking a small amount of pure mana to block the direction you are stepping in. The result is that your step ends up being redirected in another direction. This is an effective tactic for outmaneuvering an opponent that can work even if they are faster and stronger than you are.”

Myles watched as Primrose executed the snake step slowly so they could watch the execution. Even knowing what to look for, the amount of mana used was small enough to make it difficult to see. Pure mana was semi-translucent by nature, so, it was a challenge to spot in small quantities.

After she finished demonstrating the technique, she proceeded to demonstrate three other variations. Calling them variations may have been a bit of a stretch though. The movement of the body and the evocation of mana were completely different with each variation.

Primrose grinned at the frightened looks she had earned. “The snake step is more than a single step. It is actually the fifth through eighth steps.”

The sighs of relief that echoed through the room were noticeable. They were already busy this month. None of them were confident that they would have been able to master another three steps on top of the snake step.

“The fifth step is called the advancing tiger snake step.” Primrose executed the move again. The move had her stepping to the side only for her to end up going straight. “This step will cause an opponent to react, allowing for an opening.”

“The sixth step is the advancing turtle snake step.” Primrose stepped forward but ended up moving backwards. “This is a useful movement option when an opponent is moving to counterattack. It can also be used to create space against an opponent who has an advantage in close quarters.”

Primrose showed off the seventh and eighth steps as well. They were respectively called the retreating tiger and retreating turtle snake steps. They proved to serve similar purposes with the retreating tiger step allowing for a flanking movement and the retreating turtle step allowing for a movement backwards. The different starting direction meant that each step would require the use of a significantly different set of movements.

As they started out, the results were pitiful. Primrose insisted that they commute their armor in its thickest state while practicing the four steps. The result was a far increased challenge. With the armor creating a buffer between the evoked mana needed to redirect their movement and their own body, finding the right spacing was difficult. Even more so since they weren’t able to look down towards the mana when evoking it.

The group ended up tripping over themselves more often than they managed to stay upright. All in all, it was a poor start to learning the steps. By the time the combat class ended, Myles had sworn to never again feel relief prematurely. When Primrose had told them that they would only need to learn the snake step this month, Myles had thought she was going easy on them. It was becoming clear that was far from the case. Learning their four steps this month would be an even greater challenge than it had been last month, and they had been complete novices then.