(LIAM'S POV)
It's been a couple of days since my father left for his adventure. It didn't feel the same without him being here, without him being in my life. But I knew he would return eventually and my birthday was coming right around the corner.
Now since I didn't have my father to train me and that grandpa was training Arthur and Tessia I decided to train with my mother and the girls.
And I instantly regretted it.
I would've thought that the teasing would've stopped when I had returned home but no it continued just like old times. Both of them constantly teased me. Alea and Aya were certainly a dynamic duo I remember.
During our training session, they kept talking and talking as if there was no tomorrow. But I was glad to see this side of Alea. Aya really did brighten up the mood a lot when she wasn't serious about missions. From an outside perspective, people might have been a little bit scared of Aya but when you got to know her you got to see this.
"Liam why are you always so serious all the time relax have fun!" Aya chirped looking over at Alea who was beside me sitting as well. "Alea is Liam always like this? Ever since he's gotten back he's been no fun all he could think about is training." Aya scoffed at me.
"Well, I wouldn't say that." Alea giggled wrapping her arms around my neck. "He has some amazing features to him." She said as the words tickled my ear to how close she was to me. I looked over at my mother who was in front of the three of us and I pleaded with her with my eyes to stop this teasing from both of but my mother just let out a faint smile.
I had been betrayed by the one closest to me.
"That's enough the both of you. . . I think my son has enough teasing for now don't you think?"
"I guess we can tone down the teasing what do you think Alea?" Aya asked.
Alea rested her head on my shoulder smiling at me. "I don't see why not."
My mother stood up from the ground ready to tell us the next things we were going to do for our training. "It's time for some little sparring for the three of you." My mother looked over at the girls gesturing for them to stand up as well as me.
"Alea and Aya why don't you teach Liam here what I've been teaching you both the past three years." My mother smiled at them as Alea and Aya both looked at each other with a grin and then at me.
"With pleasure," Aya said excitedly. We went to our respective sides of the training grounds. It would be my first time seeing how much they had improved with my mother's training these past three years.
They worked as a duo so it would be interesting. Let's hope they don't disappoint me too much.
"Begin." My mother said calmly stepping to the sidelines.
With that Aya rushed over to me forming wind blades in both of her hands while Alea stood back sitting on the ground in an almost meditative state. I was curious to know what she was doing but I was too busy with Aya attacks for me to see. I formed my blade made purely out of the wind as well.
I didn't want this to be an unfair duel between the two of us but instead, I just made one blade against two blades. It was a pretty good match if I said so myself.
The way she used her two blades was amazing, to say the least. She had excellent control of her Mana moving ever so gracefully like the wind with her two blades slashing my blade.
But it wouldn't be enough to stop me. I combined wind and fire on my blade and this time I knew I had a better chance. As I slashed Aya's blades the fire from my blade would consume hers killing the oxygen out of her blade. She thrusted her blade to my neck but I caught her by the arm having enough of her antics that were never going to work.
"You've improved I'll give you that but you're still lacking finesse." I gripped her arm tighter stopping her from attacking me.
"Finesse? I'm all about finesse watch?" Aya waved her other hand at me and like that screeching pain had entered my ears it almost felt as if my eardrums were about to burst as I looked at the ground covering my ears. It was exactly like the Director's Goodsky attack. I was amazed at how similar the magic was.
Aya's magic was on the same level if not even better than hers. I almost dropped to the ground at how painful her attack was this was a different type of pain. I had to use a lot of Mana just to keep up on our feet as I looked up from the ground everything had changed.
My breathing had become heavy. My eyes had become startled. My feet trembled.
My mother, Alduin, Merial, Arthur and Tessia were all dead on the ground. Blood splattered all over them like a canvas of paint would.
Their eyes gauged out, their limbs cut into pieces. It only took me a couple of seconds to realise that it was an illusion.
"Very funny Aya you got me in one of your damn illusions," I said looking everywhere to see if Aya was somewhere here but I figured she had used magic to hide her presence and her Mana from me.
'Spot on it's one of my illusions but I can make it even more real. . . Sorry for what's about to happen Liam." She muttered.
What was about to happen that would cause her to say sorry? But then it happened in a flash. I could hear shrieks of screaming everywhere as their lifeless bodies reformed back to normal but this time I was going to watch them die in front of me.
Their heads got chopped off over and over again rolling onto the ground and touching my feet. It didn't matter if this was an illusion it felt like I had been watching this for its entirety and I couldn't do anything about it. Not because I couldn't exactly but it was because I was frozen in genuine fright.
I knew it wasn't real but just watching it disgusted me. She was trying to break me mentally but no that wouldn't stop me only momentarily. I've seen far worse in my past life.
Nice try Aya.
VROOM!
A squirm from Aya could be heard as she dropped to the ground the illusion had disappeared but something else had taken its place. Plant magic. Vines and plants wrapped around my body as I was lifted in the air. I couldn't move or budge one bit.
Aya did her best to look up at me fighting back the gravity pull as my gravity had weakened because of this trap I was in. "Since you love using that gravity magic so much I and Alea came up with a plan it looks familiar, doesn't it? I'm quite proud of it." Aya smiled forming wind blades once more.
They had used my trap against me. Very impressive. The trap that we had used on Grandpa to beat him was now used on me. I could see in the far distance that Alea was using her plant magic in the far distance controlling the plants and vines. So that was her purpose in all of this. While Aya was distracting me making me think that she was the biggest threat out of the two of them it turned out to be Alea.
If I took her down I'd win. Aya flew up trying to land a blow off of me but I knew what to do in this situation. I ignited my whole body in lightning exploding out of the plant trap causing Aya to fly away. Now was my chance I rushed over to Alea who was still sitting and that's when I heard it. The whole ground had erupted and opened. Everywhere I looked plants were towering over me like I was in some kind of maze.
It reminded me of the Elderwood Guardian but far worse.
WHOOSH!
All the plants came rushing over at me in every direction I made a light blade trying to take them all done but they were just too much as the plants had scratched my face blood spilt out. The tentacles of the plants wrapped around me holding me in place I was about to explode out of it but Alea was smart and quick enough to slam onto the ground time and time again wearing me down.
As I exploded out of the plant trap using more Mana than usual I had cleared all the plants she was using on me. Alea had finally stood up from the glad forming blades made out of plants and Aya with wind blades.
WHOOSH!
They both clashed with me with their swords I caught Alea's sword by the hand while blocking Aya's blade with my blade. From Alea's face, I knew that she was worried about my hand as it was currently bleeding.
I had to admit they had pushed me so far in this battle. It was even harder than Grandpa's fight. They continued to put more pressure on their blades as my cut had gotten deeper by the second.
I could see it in both Alea and Aya's that they didn't want to do what they were doing to me. It would be their downfall their big weakness. I stomped the ground allowing two pillars of the earth to rise from underneath Alea and Aya. Alea had sensed this but wasn't quick enough to react as they had both been set flying in their air.
My fingers were directed at the two of them in the air.
ZAP!
I shot lightning beams at them with enough Mana that I knew that they wouldn't be able to fight me anymore. As they came falling to the ground I used my wind magic to cushion their falls.
The victory was mine but barely. I had just scraped it. I went over to check up on both of them.
"We were so close!" Aya whined kicking her legs. "I thought we were going to beat you." She sighed to herself.
I couldn't help but laugh but I knew deep down that they had a good chance of beating me if they had a little bit more fight in them. I checked over on Alea with a gentle smile on her face.
"How are you doing?" I asked as I placed my hand around her.
"I'm doing fine." She said in a low whiskey voice. "How's your hand?" She asked in concern.
I showed her my bleeding hand. "I'm doing alright." I joked as we both chuckled together.
Alea looked at me once more in the eyes she had something that she wanted to say to me. "Liam move closer."
Confused I did what she said as I leaned in closer to her face. Her hands cupped my face as she kissed me. But not just anything type of kiss. Not a kiss on the cheek. Not a kiss on the forehead. But a kiss on my lips. Her soft lips connected with my own it felt like heaven. What felt like only a couple of seconds felt like an eternity to me.
As we broke out of the kiss she immediately wrapped her hands around my body digging her head onto my chest.
"Are you feeling better than alright?" Her voice was muffled but I got the message.
"Y-Yeah I'm feeling more than just alright." I stroked her hair. It was my first genuine kiss and I was glad that Alea was the one who gave it to me. In that very moment, I was honestly going to. . .
Fold.