Rise of the Omnimage

Team Aegis formerly known as Team 5 reconvened early the next morning in the training court where they fought time and time against the mach team comprised of servants of house Aegis including as they found out, Euryale's weapon trainer. They were battered and went to bed exhausted at least this time they had actual mattresses. Thinner but at least mattresses and showers.... blessed showers with hot water they could just enjoy.

Euryale came out in plain robes today and looked at everyone. "Good morning conscripts. Your efforts are pleasing to me and my family. Keep it up." She said.

Sorin, after showering and changing, had a meeting with Euryale going over progress of the day. To Sorin's delight she was absorbing information and giving guidance as a young lieutenant would in the army back home.

They hammered out today's plan of literally turning up the heat. They were going to bottom out aether pools and work on techniques including codes to call for different things. Sorin was nervous about today because she wanted to see his final skill. She said she had a location designed for massive skills like that.

He spent the last bit of last night going over what he and Euryale discussed and there was a good amount of hope in the team. They were buying in and following Sorin's lead.

"Behind you are metal dummies that are extremely heat resistant. Our goal today is to melt them down. There are five of them. They are all peak tier 2 and the center one is a tier 4. The tier 4 is for other testing. I was informed each of you have a fire conjuring skill that we are going to refine. I require the hottest flames you can muster, and we will need to bring them about quickly for one our team's trump cards. We each have skills that are devastating if able to be applied, but we do have a team ability that you were briefed on."

She looked at each of them explaining.

"For now, each of you line up on a dummy and your objective is to melt your dummy before mid-day."

Sorin walked up to his. He needed to temper his flames. His power exceeded tier 2 and would destroy this target extremely fast if it were truly peak tier 2. He unleashed his firestream skill at a less than compacted level. The dummy was engulfed in flames. The drain on his aether was nonexistent like this as his absorption skill brought in aether as soon as it left his body with this little drain.

An hour and a half dragged by, and he was noticing the others on his team began making progress, so he ramped up the fury of his flames and his target began to glow.

"Push harder Sorin! More aether!" Came the command from Euryale.

She was watching. He grits his teeth as if in great effort and then ramped his flames up further and the steel dummy began dripping metal.

"Good! Recover your aether. Based on your skill set I expected you to finish this quickly. When you are recovered enough assist the others."

"Yes ma'am!" He said pretending to be a little winded. After a few moments he went over to his teammates.

"Showoff..." links said gritting his teeth with effort.

"Yeah...yeah. I know. Take your aether motes and compress them. It takes a little more aether but it intensifies the heat." Sorin instructed.

He watched the dummy as Linx's flames grew more intense and brighter. After a moment the target began to glow. He moved to Cain and told him the same. After a little while longer his target began to glow as well. They kept compressing and after a break to allow their aether to recharge they went at it again and achieved meltdown shortly before mid-day.

Once they achieved it, Euryale looked at Sorin and gave him a nod.

"It would seem she is beginning to have some confidence in me already." Sorin mumbled to himself.

"School circle around me, move!" Euryale said as the conscripts made their way over to her.

"I have a passive that amplifies my power the more I am in flames and the hotter they are. There may be times we need to use this ability to overcome obstacles. Compared to all my peers save for the prince I am even about with them and this skill will push me passed them when we need to be should we find ourselves in trouble. The code we will use will be "Burn it." In combat or in the field if you hear that, I want as much focused fire on me as you can manage without getting yourself killed. Don't worry, I'm immune to fire. Make sense?"

"Yes ma'am."

"Our target is the final of the tier 2s in order to show the power in comparison to your own. Ready?" Euryale asked.

"Ready ma'am!" Came the expected response. As they moved back off of her position and prepared for the code.

"Burn it!"

In a moment three torrents of white hot flames slammed into Euryale. She vanished. The flames began to swirl around and sunk lower revealing a brilliantly burning Euryale with flaming serpents for hair and burning red eyes.

She grinned menacingly and flicked her hand as a torrent of flames from her slammed into the target and in a moment, it was reduced to nothing.

"Cease fire!" Sorin shouted and they stopped burning her.

She walked out of the flames allowing the flames on her to go out and her skin, hair, and eyes returned to normal. The robes she wore were gone replaced by small coverings over her to protect her dignity. Sorin looked away but saw the others not.

Turning to them Euryale noticed Sorin averting his gaze and the usual expected response from the others. She frowned a bit at Sorin but let it go. Going to the edge of the training court grabbing another robe and put it on.

"Now you see the strength we can have as a team." She said. Sorin and the others looked at her and nodded.

"Now I'd like to see the other skills you possess Sorin." Euryale said backing away from the final target.

Sorin also moved back as his teammates moved even further back causing Euryale to smirk in amusement.

Sorin did one last check of the area. He extended his aether range and summoned orb after orb after orb raising his arms as they just kept appearing. With a flex of his hands as a trigger of his will, he compressed the orbs into motes of blinding white light and then they went blue. Euryale immediately moved back as Sorin moved his arms forward. Each mote of blue fire shot forward one after the other as a barrage of around 50 and slammed into the target.

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

The flames and detonation were non-stop, and the target vanished in smoke and fire. When the final mote detonated, the team relaxes. They smoke cleared and the target had been damaged with flecks missing out of the metal and it sat in a glowing crater.

Sorin glanced to Euryale who had a contemplative look. He had hoped he didn't go overboard. It was a tier 4 target, so he upped the power more than he had before.

Sorin flicked his hand and Serpent of white flame lashed out grabbing the target. He ripped his will, and it came up out of the crater and stopped at his feet. He let the binding vanish.

He turned to Euryale at this point. "Good! Come with me you three. I need to see this last skill."

They followed her as Linx and Cain looked at Sorin in concern. "Does she know what happened with this skill last time?" Cain asked quietly. Sorin nodded. "I told her, and she said she had a place."

They nodded and followed. They were led under ground to a bunker with a balcony with what appeared to be a jumping board of stone as a ledge to work from.

"That is a tier 5 target with that level of fire resistance. Collect your aether and when you are ready, let's see it. I don't want you weakening your body stat this close to the exam."

Sorin nodded and sat down. He pulled his AP up.

AP: 1720/2300

He had enough but wanted to up it a bit. He sat there and absorbed aether until be reached 2000.

He stood and walked out to the ledge. He saw the target 50 meters below. He pooled the aether in his hands by his side he kept his HUD watching his aether level plummet. He kept pressing and condensing. 20 seconds later it compressed into a blinding orb of white light causing the lights in the bunker to seem dim. At 1000 AP left Sorin fired it.

It left his hands instantly slamming down into the target down below with such violence shaking the ground. The explosion and the Shockwave wrapped up the walls down below and whipped the superheated air upward where a circuit stopped it and cooled it. The target vanished under the explosion, fire, smoke, and dust. Sorin staggard backwards a bit then caught himself. Euryale ran forward to the railing like a kid on Christmas. His grin painted across her face. Linx and Cain looked on with the look of shock.

The dust cleared and they could see below.

The target was gone and in its place was a crater made of green glass.