11th of Season of Air, 57th year of the 32nd imperial era

"Attack me."

"Shouldn't we start with stances, thrust practice, and such?" Newt asked, but Dandelion shook his head.

"You already know those things, but you learned them for a very long sword. Once I show you your inadequacies, you should correct most of them yourself."

Dandelion motioned Newt to attack, and the youth stabbed at the arrogant man. Dandelion took a minimal half a step back, moving outside Newt's reach. Newt stepped forward, and Dandelion grabbed his wrist and pulled him forward, knocking him off balance and nearly onto the ground.

"For heaven's sake, never chase after your enemies with your spear. It has reach, they need to come to you. But even if you wish to keep the initiative, never follow without a proper stance, you are opening yourself to a world of pain. If you miss, you miss, prepare for another opportunity instead of forcing a failed one. Alternatively, you can advance slowly, aware of your weapon's weakness."

Newt continued slashing and stabbing, never landing a strike, but even without Dandelion's pointers, he could feel himself getting better for the first half an hour as he got used to the new weapon.

Then, after he settled into a routine, Dandelion started correcting him.

"Watch your balance.

"An attack comes from your legs.

"Move your hips. What are you, a geriatric case?"

For the better part of an hour, Dandelion dodged, first by taking half-steps, then full steps, his back always as straight as a log until he finally started twisting his body to avoid Newt's spear.

"All right! We are getting somewhere." Newt wasn't sure whether Dandelion mocked or praised him, but the man kept talking. "Now, use your fire techniques. When you were fighting the frostworm, your strikes were all over the place, but now that you can aim at the same spot instead of blindly hacking away, we need to add properly timed fire. Once we incorporate that, we just need to keep your power from dispersing on contact. Let's see if you can achieve some mastery over the technique."

Half an hour later, Newt managed the proper timing, but failed to concentrate the flames.

"You must be running low on mana." Dandelion's voice was friendly as he gestured towards the scorched ground. "Sit and recover. Try to develop the technique inside your realm while your mana recovers. I will instruct the ladies in the meantime."

Newt wanted to argue that he could keep going, and he really could, for about ten more minutes. But he had made no progress since Dandelion had told him to focus on Magmin Flame, and reducing the complexity by shedding the mana circulation through the body might make the breakthrough possible.

Newt appeared in his realm, near the flow of lava running through a series of channels, forming a balance rune before continuing its journey to his realm barrier.

Second realm, I'd better go into the third, just in case I mess something up. Newt dashed downhill until the runes of fire and earth disappeared, replaced with straight lava flows and a vast, empty expanse of solid rock.

There, Newt bent, placing his hand on the granite ground, and with the faintest exertion of his will, he sank his fingers into the sturdy rock. Ground rippled as he drew a spear identical to his weapon in the real world.

He stabbed, activating Magmin Flames and protecting his hand with Magmin Scales. The flames flowed up the haft, but as soon as they left the spear's tip they flickered, dispersing. A mere foot away, the cone's base was several inches in diameter. Two feet away, the fiery blast dispersed in all directions, looking like a drunken fire-breather's performance.

Newt repeated the process over and over again, increasing or decreasing the amount of flames he conjured. For reasons beyond Newt's comprehension, the more powerful flames seemed to disperse quicker, while the weaker ones formed a nice tear shape, but Newt suspected their flame was too weak to deal significant damage.

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Is there anything useful in Salamandra's Touch? Newt considered the technique. He had already incorporated its best parts with Magmin Flames while traveling, but it might hold the answer he needed.

"Watcha doing?" Magmin's giant form sailed above Newt's head.

"I'm trying to figure out how to concentrate flames in one spot. Do you have any suggestions?"

Magmin flew in silence, making a full circle around Newt.

"Sink your fangs into the enemy and deliver all your energy into their flesh? It's pretty concentrated when it erupts inside their body." Newt could tell Magmin knew his advice was useless, but the serpent's pride wouldn't let it remain silent or worse, admit ignorance.

"Yeah, I don't think that's happening." Newt tried to sound polite, but if he had reached the point where he could deliver his technique inside the enemy's body, he had already won, and Magmin's suggestion only made Newt's victory messier.

Instead, Newt experimented with his own ideas, and when they bore no fruit, he took a walk around his realm, seeking inspiration in the runes and lava flows. While he appreciated the utility of rock formations and runes glowing red, searing his realm with their heat, there was a distinct lack of esthetics in his second realm.

There was a sort of majesty to Magmin Pines, the giant calcified plants dominating the region with unshakeable regality. Meanwhile, the second realm was just bumps and holes, effective, yet depressing.

"Watcha thinking?" Magmin asked from above, and Newt wondered whether the serpent had followed him all along. Spending all his days alone in his realm must have been depressing.

"I'm thinking how my second realm looks ugly."

"No, it doesn't. It looks great," Magmin protested, sounding insulted. "It's so brilliant, I decided to follow a similar pattern in sculpting my realm."

Newt froze, several thoughts fighting for his attention simultaneously. Magmin still shaped his realm, meaning he was probably absorbing some mana from Newt's realm, and Newt wasn't sure how to react. After all, most of Newt's realm was built from mana he drained from Magmin's secret realm. Morally, Newt's mana was Magmin's and Magmin's was Newt's, but reality was a lot more complex.

The next implication was that Magmin was growing, but as Newt checked his aura, the soaring titanoboa's mana hadn't changed a bit since his last inspection.

Newt had a feeling the serpent was keeping secrets from him, but Magmin freely admitted he was expanding and sculpting his realm, which he wouldn't do if he was holding secrets.

"Magmin," Newt decided to voice his worries, "are you drawing mana from my realm?"

"Well, I have no way not to." The titanoboa said matter-of-factly, and Newt realized how silly the question was. He had designed his realm mirroring Magmin's, passive mana generation included.

"Yeah, you're right." Newt smiled awkwardly, realizing he was keeping a leech inside his realm the whole time, and there was no way to get rid of it, and even if there was, he wasn't sure he would root out his dangerous friend. "So, do you have any ideas on how to design the third realm?"

Magmin had some ideas. Bad ones. The one he liked the most involved letting Newt come up with an excellent realm blueprint and copying it. The next brightest idea was to use the same runes in different variations to achieve the results he liked and avoid the ones which seemed pointless or amphibian-specific.

Newt's mana finally returned to its full capacity, something easy to tell by the atmosphere in his realm, and he bid Magmin goodbye before resuming his training with Dandelion.

"I couldn't figure out how to concentrate the fire."

"Well," Dandelion chuckled. "Developing such a technique would take moons or years. I never expected you would figure it out in one sitting. Let us focus on the spear for another three or four hours, then we can try adding flames again. We have two days and other than trying to find inspiration, polishing the base skill is the most important thing you can achieve right now."

Dandelion took a wide stance, holding his staff like a mock spear, waiting for Newt. As their spar began, Dandelion had plenty of advice, from bearing and the way Newt held his arms to the lack of the unwavering intent to pierce him, whatever that was.

The advice grew more pedantic and more frequent as time passed, and if not for the fact that exchanges kept lasting longer and longer, Newt would have thought he was getting worse.

"Excellent." Dandelion stepped away abruptly, knocking Newt's spear to the side. "Do you wish to practice with flames? I would advise you to go and take a nap, think about what you were doing and what you think went wrong."

The proposition seemed silly, but Newt nodded, and went to the base of a tree and sat.

"Lay down," Dandelion commanded. "On your back. Trust me."

Newt did as told and when he closed his eyes, his legs and arms started twitching, Dandelion stabbing at him.

"What?" He jumped.

"Relax. When you focus on something physical for extended periods of time, your brain will replay them when you rest. You can learn from those experiences nearly as much from the real thing, so rest, and you can spar with me even while you are resting."

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