The moment he uttered those words, Vaeloria's lips curved into a smile that held nothing gentle and everything predatory.
'So sexy…'
The thought slipped through her mind unbidden, vivid, violent. She saw them side by side on blood-soaked battlefields, her claws ripping through ancient enemies while Ash burned the rest to cinders. A shiver raced down all nine of her tails before she crushed the image and snapped her gaze back to cold focus.
'Seriously, what's going on...' She asked herself as she couldn't understand how she kept getting sidetracked. Then aloud she spoke
"Good," her voice was like velvet over steel. "We begin with your body and close combat. No weapons, nothing external. Only fists, knees, and the will to break or be broken."
And they began.
The next three months were war.
Every dawn inside the Lesser Chamber began the same way: Vaeloria's foot slamming into Ash's guard hard enough to crack ribs, his counter ripping air as she danced away on tails of starlight. They fought across violet meadows that bled silver when trampled, beneath golden trees that rained molten leaves with every shockwave. Blood, silver and pink, painted the grass more often than not.
She never held back.
She started at peak C-rank, then low B-rank, then mid B-rank, climbing every time he adapted. His Eyes of First Dawn drank in her movements like wine: the serpentine twist of her hips before a tail sweep, the micro-twitch in her shoulder that signaled a claw strike to the throat. One glimpse and the motion was his.
By the end of the third month, Ash met her full-force palm strike with an identical one. The collision detonated the air between them, carved a fifty-meter crater, and sent both of them tumbling in opposite directions.
He lay on his back, chest heaving, every bone singing with pain and triumph.
Vaeloria stood over him, hair wild, nine tails fanned like war banners, golden eyes gleaming with something far too warm for a teacher. Over this time Vaeloria's affection had reached a staggering 75%, it seemed the higher it went the slower it would become.
'Or she's resisting it...' He thought seeing her standing over him.
"Not bad," she purred. "But not nearly good enough. Get up. We're moving to Mana Control."
"What's your mana pool?" She asked
Ash pushed himself to his feet, wiping blood from his split lip. "Two million, five hundred thousand."
Hearing this Vaeloria had no surprise, it was common for most people to have high MPs especially if they come from important families. 'Since he's a prince, it makes sense." She thought, but little did she know this was all gained in just a few hours.
Four more months of hell followed.
She taught him to weave mana like thread through every cell, every pore, every heartbeat. A paper-thin layer that turned aside blades and claws yet weighed nothing. A second skin that could harden to mountain density or flow like mist. She made him stand beneath a waterfall of molten starlight while keeping exactly 0.01 % of his pool circulating perfectly, no more, no less. When he failed, the starlight burned. When he succeeded, she rewarded him with a smile that felt more dangerous than the fire.
She forced him to juggle a thousand individual threads of mana while sparring blindfolded. When one thread wavered, her tails lashed across his back hard enough to flay skin. By the end, a faint, almost invisible ripple of power cloaked him at all times, perfect, seamless, deadly.
They sat now in the violet grass, devouring a mountain of mana beast meat and honeyed fruits.
Around Ash shimmered the thinnest veil of mana, so refined it looked like heat haze on a summer day. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and glanced at her.
"Hey. Before we start the next round… I'm going to bathe."
Vaeloria's tails flicked once. Her golden eyes narrowed with lazy amusement.
"Finally," she murmured. "I was starting to think you enjoyed smelling like blood and sweat."
Ash stood, rolled his shoulders, and started toward the crystal-clear lake at the edge of the meadow, already peeling off his torn training robes.
Behind him, Vaeloria watched every movement with the hunger of a fox who'd just realized the prey had grown fangs of his own.