Weaving through the piles of stone that hurtled toward me, I boosted my physical abilities as I lunged forward with my arm reeled back.
A heartbeat later, I launched a lightning-fast lariat with my forearm.
Before my strike could land, Toph reacted instantly by sinking her feet deeper into the ground. The earth shifted beneath her heels, lowering her body just enough for my forearm to slice through empty air a few centimeters above her head.
As my body whipped forward at the loss of my target, the ground beneath me trembled. Throwing her left arm up and then her right, newly formed spikes exploded outward from the earth in a violent volley.
I twisted my torso in midair, narrowly avoiding the first spike. Another shot up beside it. Then another. I tucked my legs and spun, letting one spike pass beneath my boots before kicking off the side of another as it rose, using the momentum to vault backward.
Landing lightly a few meters away, I slid into a low stance as the young lady got into an open stance with her palms raised.
She began her offense with a sharp kick into the earth. Jagged boulders burst from the soil in a straight line, racing toward me at high speeds. I rolled to the side just in time as it shot past where my torso had been a moment earlier.
The instant my shoulder touched the ground, I twisted and sprang back to my feet, pivoting on my heel. In a spinning motion, I threw a roundhouse kick into the air.
A streak of fire erupted from my foot, roaring forward in an arc of concentrated fire. Without halting my momentum, I spun again—and again—firing consecutive blazing arcs that sliced through the air.
Toph reacted the moment the first wave left my foot. Tucking her arms in, she thrust both her arms out while her heel struck the ground; chunks of earth ripped themselves free from the ground and surged upward like a tidal wave in front of her, forming a line of boulders that barreled toward my attacks.
The elements collided. An explosion of dust and sparks unfolded where fire met stone; flames burst apart against the wave of boulders, shattering rock and creating a cloud of dust and debris that covered the makeshift arena.
The sharp grinding of stone to my right caught my attention. I quickly glanced at the source before throwing my body sideways to get clear of the danger. Toph—midair after leaping from a raised platform that she Bent—punched the air with her closed palm.
A pillar of stone rose from the ground at an angle, barely grazing my clothes as it speared upward through the smoke-filled air.
My hand shot out and caught the rough surface as it passed. Using the momentum, I swung my body around the rising column and flipped, landing on it on all fours.
Pushing off immediately, I sprinted along the slanted surface and raced upward at the descending Toph from her leap from her platform.
Toph readied her arms at the sound of my boots scraping stone, her instincts kicking in with her arms ready to strike the moment she felt the earth beneath her feet again.
But without contact between herself and the ground, her 'sight' was crippled.
Before she could react, I had already jumped from the slanted pillar, catching her body midair. My arm wrapped around her as gravity immediately dragged us both downward.
"And that's the match." I landed a moment later, falling back onto the ground with bent knees.
Toph stiffened in surprise at first before the tension left her body, relaxing completely against me and blowing a loud raspberry in frustration.
"Dangit, I thought I had you there!"
The dust-filled arena slowly began to drift away as if a gentle breeze had passed through the cavern, clearly the work of one of the older badgermoles. From the surrounding tunnels, the badgermoles began to emerge, hidden to give us space for our training.
Toph lightly hopped from my hands and landed on the uneven ground, moving towards her friends with ease.
It had been more than a year since she began her Earth Bending training with the badgermoles, and the progress she had made was nothing short of miraculous. My theories were proven right when I asked them how they could "see" without traditional sight.
Surprisingly, they showed a higher level of intelligence than I'd expected; they seemed to understand the human language and were even capable of responding in kind through gestures and nods.
They did a form of detection unlike anything most benders encountered, sensing motion through the earth almost like an echolocation-esque system. I relayed the newly found skill to Toph in hopes that she could attempt to learn it.
She did. Within less than a month, nonetheless. As a start, she could barely feel the vibrations in the ground.
Two months later, her mastery of the skill had advanced significantly—with her being able to "see" a good ten feet from her position clearly before her 'sight' muddles down in accuracy.
And now, her range was well over fifty feet, with her 'sight' refined enough to differentiate and distinguish shapes with decent clarity.
The only limitation of the skill was the requirement of physical contact with the ground. If she hovered in the air, as she did earlier, her 'sight' was practically rendered useless.
I shook my head as I watched her roll on the ground, playing rough with her friends, getting dirt and debris all over her body. "I keep telling you, Toph, you shouldn't fight in midair at all. Seismic Sense doesn't work if you can't touch the ground."
I opted for the name "Echolocation," but it was instantly shot down. Toph had to spend a whole afternoon combing through a dictionary before finding a proper name for the skill since I have bad taste in names—her words, not mine.
(And I disagree with that, by the way. I was great at naming things!)
(... Stop laughing, you dang brats!)
She acknowledged my remark with a low hum.
"It's just this one time; I wanted to see how you always fight when we spar... Being like a monkey and all."
…A monkey? I could technically see it. My style was always mobile, moving between obstacles and leaping from platforms that Toph herself Bent during our sparring sessions. Huh. Now that I thought about it, I did move like a monkey.
I chuckled before tousling her hair, earning a punch to the side as a response.
The sparring started once Toph had a solid grasp of her Earth Bending skills, and she requested it outright. At first, I was horrified at the thought of hitting a kid—even so, a kid I'd been taking care of since she was a baby. But after one too many tussles that left me with more bruises than I ever would have liked, I had no choice but to give in and let her have what she wanted.
And boy, was it worth it. Training all day let her burn off excess energy; sparring sharpened her fighting skills in case of emergencies; and best of all, her mood after each session was far brighter, reducing her usual back-and-forth with Lord Beifong by nearly half. They still argue at times on decisions about her parents' overprotectiveness, but the point stands.
Plus, it wasn't just her who benefited.
My Fire Bending has improved drastically over the year, with the single crucial realization that I learned while training with the badgermoles.
I discovered that the more motion I put into performing my Fire Bending, the more it amplified. Circular motions, in particular, seemed to boost it even further. Spinning kicks, sweeping arm arcs, full-body turns—whenever I overexaggerated my movements, my fire output practically tripled.
Plus, having to spar with actual Fire Bending helps with my mastery, instead of having to keep it reined in to avoid being shunned.
Still, I try making a conscious effort to fight at barely full power; risking injuring the young lady is downright idiotic. Imagine if Lord Beifong noticed a slight burn on her skin or a bruise... Brrr, I shudder to think what would happen to me.
Speaking of Lord Beifong... I turned my gaze toward the hourglasses I'd brought along to keep track of time. It had been... about an hour and a quarter.
We should get going.
The Lord had an announcement of sorts, and I didn't want to be late.
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NEXT UPDATE: 15 April, Wednesday
A/N: Ahem, sorry for the wait. It's becoming apparent that I can't do anything from Fridays to Sundays.
So, the update schedule for both of my fics will be: Wednesdays and Thursdays
And give me a few more weeks to cook up more chapters; I have a new fic that I'll be releasing real soon.
Hint: It's a ONE PIECE X ? fanfic
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Advanced Mastery Tier - 3 Advanced Chapters and more (Almost Fully Implemented)
Ultimate One Tier - 5 Advanced Chapters and much, much more (Almost Fully Implemented)
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