Bellator: Heat and Motion

A short intermission filled with yelling, drying, and some slight smacking later, Vivran and Ton-Ire sat back down in their seats, both wearing mixed expressions of sheepish guilt and slight annoyance.

Vivran propped his chin up with his left hand and glanced down at the sleeping boy who had miraculously came out unscathed from that skirmish- is what he'd like to say, but the scars and bruises were really hard to tell apart by when they were made. Then again, his body hadn't shifted at all, so it was safe to say that no harm had come to him- at least in the healing room.

"Hey Spinner, I thought you said that this would be over quick, but none of his wounds have disappeared and its already been 15 minutes," said Vivran. The image of his master-soon-to-be laughing at his confidence still stuck out in his brain. The only reason he hadn't punched the old man (over that) was because he'd been curious about the implications of a faster recovery rate. "At the speed he's going, he'll never be able to beat my time."

"Bah, do you hear yourself?!" Ton-Ire spat. "How'd you be able to judge his condition 10 hours from now just from 15 minutes of interrupted healing?"

"I'm just saying that by now- what do you mean by 'interrupted'?"

The boy wasn't sure what that implied. Neither of the two had laid so much as a hand nor spit take on Red-Hair; he was just as healthy, or rather unhealthy, as when he had been brought in.

"Just because he wasn't the one who was hurt doesn't mean that he didn't take any of the repercussions for it," replied Ton-Ire. "Take a look at that right arm of yours."

Vivran tweaked an eyebrow as he raised his arm for closer inspection.

"-? Looks perfectly fine to me."

"Bwehehehe! You really are an odd one. That's the point, ya brick! I'm honestly surprised you managed to forget such a wound, but a few minutes prior, there was a giant red blotch of a burn sitting pretty right there, ain't that so?"

"--! That's right! That stupid Red-Hair blasted me with some kind of insane heat beam move! I gotta remember to ask him about that when wakes up."

The Spinner let out a sigh at the youngsters incapability at picking up what he was putting down.

"Always focused on the wrong things, eh?"

"Hm?"

"What I'm tryna to say here is, this room was too busy healing you to focus on Mr. Concussion over there."

Taking another thoughtful sip of his tea, he added:

"Probably didn't help with that short little scuffle earlier."

"..."

Vivran honestly wasn't sure he'd ever be able to get a read on The Spinner's personality. His words seemed to airy and his speech would range from those of the wise old wizards he used to do chores for back at the village, to the playfully annoying brats he was often at the mercy of back in the city. The best part was that the old man didn't even seem aware of these abrupt changes in his personality, and indeed would switch in the middle of his own sentences. Not that Vivran minded. It was a new experience after all.

"Just to let you know before Ondo wakes up and all, 15 hours of recovery isn't as impressive as you think it is."

"-Eh?"

In the middle of Vivran's mental assessment, Ton-Ire suddenly stared at the boy with a serious expression. It looked as though he'd been wanting to say this for a while, but had been forced put it off until now due to everything that had occurred upon the boy's arrival.

"Csen is the Essence of all of humanity. It is a collective by the All given to the One in order for the One to serve the All. Due to the fact that you were a secluded One, the All grew more attached to your One, but not as fluidly or stabilized. As such you are bright One, but not accustomed to the All."

"... You have no idea what you just said, do you?"

"The last two sentences were iffy."

"Hrm."

Vivran wrinkled his nose.

"Then what does Csen mean?"

"You don't even know that? I said no questions, but I guess I can at least answer this."

Ton-Ire set down his empty tea cup and shuffled around to face Vivran, his hair points wobbling around with him.

"Now then," he said while clearing his throat. "Essence is the collective energy of all of humanity that can be used by anyone to power an Art. Many call it Csen for short."

"..."

"..."

"That's it?!"

"That's the jist of it, yep!"

The Spinner merrily concluded his explanation with a grin and another cup of tea. Vivran was left in a state of shock at the audacity of this geezer. Mouth agape, eye twitching, the boy watched in wonder as the old man carelessly continued sipping his drink while ignoring his student's bewilderment. Wait, where did that other cup even come from? Does he have some sort of tea storage hidden in his robes? There's no lid on those cups, wouldn't it just spill everywhere?!

"Wait, forget that, what do you mean by collective energy? No one else at the village knew how to use an Art. There were a few people in the city, but they were all small-timers that only wanted some magic tricks to brag about."

Vivran vaguely recalled the sight of a floating kettle before shaking his head to clear his thoughts.

"BRAAAaaaaAAAAaaaAAAaaagh! I go out of my way to explain things nice and simple, and your still not satisfied!? Youngsters these days, can't rub two brain cells together but sure know how to nit and pick all day long."

"I wasn't nitpicking though?!?"

"He's always like this, stop trying to fight the uphill battle."

"I'm not stopping until he finally spouts out something worth- WHA?!"

Vivran gestured at the new voice to try and complain about Ton-Ire's behavior- only to realize that it belonged to unconscious boy laying on moss bed. Or rather, unconscious until a few seconds ago.

"YOU'RE AWAKE?!?" Vivran shouted out in startled disbelief.

"And growing deafer by the second," replied Red-Hair wryly. The young man groaned a tiny bit as he sat up from his grassy layering, opening and closing his right hand, seemingly testing for any permanent damage. "Seems like the healing is working as intended, Master."

"Bwehehe, indeed! In fact, you healed in record time! 24 minutes, eh? Not bad, not bad at all!"

"It was because of my attempts at using the flow circulation to heal during the fight. It must have helped speed up the process."

Ton-Ire sung his praises, but the boy didn't look very much pleased. In fact, the only thing he looked was pissed. He eyed Vivran with a glare that was near identical to the one he had when they first met, only this time it had much more intensity packed into it.

"Master," he called out coolly, yet still keeping his eyes trained on the silver-haired boy. "Was what you said before true?"

"I've said a lot of things, most of them ambiguously, you've gotta be more specific."

A still silence followed that comment. Nothing moved within the room, apart from the occasional leaf brushed along by the breeze coming from the little crevices between the wooden plank walls. Ondo remained seated on the moss, glowering at Vivran who simply stared back with a blank, yet slightly defiant expression. Ton-Ire calmly observed both boys, evidently not worried about elaborating or further probing.

Vivran didn't understand what was currently transpiring, but he felt that speaking out now would result in some sort of loss on his part, so he kept his mouth clamped shut. But it wasn't easy.

"AHHHH, I WANNA KNOW HOW HE MANAGED TO HEAL THAT FAAAAAST!"

Internally, the young man was screaming for answers. Sitting still wasn't one his hobbies, and he certainly didn't to make this whole awkward silence shtick a recurring bit.

Fortunately, Red-Hair's composure broke faster.

"About this intruder being appointed as another student of yours. Was that true?"

"Eh-?"

Vivran mentally quirked an eyebrow at the question. Or rather, the tone it had been delivered in.

It sounded familiar.

It sounded... beaten.

Like the other boy had just lost something he'd been desperately clinging too before. Actually, now that Vivran had the chance to properly internalize the events of his arrival, he realized that this tone, while not being directly used, had also been threatening to crack through during the climax of his and Red-Hair's fight. Right around when Red-Hair had started slinging his empty insults.

Vivran shot a glance at the old man. The question on the table was also one that he had wanted to ask himself, and now that the two boys were present in mind and body, Ton-Ire had no more excuses for delay.

The Spinner didn't say anything at first. His calm, but serious gaze drilled into Ondo, and despite the latter not returning eye contact, they could definitely feel the pressure that was being directed at them. To an ordinary outside onlooker, Ton-Ire may have seemed calculating, thoughtful, and maybe even a little annoyed. But to Vivran, he just looked regretful and somber. As if the question wasn't the one he had been hoping for.

However, the old man's expression vanished as fast as the tea in his cup.

"Yep! As of today, you two will training together under my wing! I hope we all get along! Bwahahahahahaha!"

With a bark to start it and a laugh to end it, Ton-Ire's most outrageous statement shook the room and all the residents inside.

"-Grk! You're lying! I have to work with this moron!? After he displayed such boorish behavior?!"

"-Grk! You're joking! I gotta train with this jerk!? After he attacked me for no reason?!"

The two boys shouted out their complaints simultaneously, their voices echoing and overlapping. The tense atmosphere from before had now been replaced by a childish storm of vocals aimed at The Spinner, who had abandoned his warm beverage in favor of plugging both is ears with his index fingers.

"You talked with him yourself, he knows nothing about Csen!"

"-Hrk! Oh yeah, well this slow dumbass couldn't even react to my Vibrio Bell in time!"

"You little-! That was just because you took me by surprise!"

"So did you, and I managed to get out perfectly unscathed!"

"'Unscathed' my foot! Everyone here saw that giant burn I gave you! And don't try to say it didn't hurt, I saw your eyes tearing up from the pain!"

"That was just some dust in my eye! And it couldn't have hurt that bad if I still managed to punch you in the face with the same arm!"

"Tch!"

"And besides, what burn? Look, no sign of any damage here!"

"That's because the room healed you, you moron! If we were going based off that, then you didn't leave any damage on me either!"

"Then about how I fix that real quick?!"

"You won't get the chance!"

"ENOOOOOOOUGH!"

The boys had reactivated their Arts prepared to go at each other throats for a second round, but were promptly stopped by Ton-Ire. And by stopped, I mean the two were smacked so hard they went flying through the B.A.T.H room's walls, leaving a gaping hole in the wooden screen.

"All you boys have done so far is fight! Its about to time you two properly look each in the eye and introduce yourselves like men and stop destroying my property with your violent outbursts!"

The old man yelled down at the teens currently lying back on the dirt that they had previously fought on. While both had eyes going around in stunned spirals, only Vivran managed to groan out a reply.

"But you're ... the only one... who's destroyed stuff... so far..."

"Potato, tomato! Besides, you two will have plenty of opportunity to wail on each other in the future. Sparring is one of best ways for Pathfinders to grow and improve."

"...Sparring, huh...?"

This time, it was Ondo who squeaked out a response. It seemed that even though

"Yes, indeedy. And do try to get along. You two will be living in the same room after all!"

""--WHAT!?!""

For the second time that day, both boys cried out in the same distressed tone at the same moment. Forget the green room, they seemed to perk up instantly when being threatened with forced comradery between the each other. They had gone from lying on the ground in pain to standing on proud feet in protest in the matter of milliseconds. You'd get whiplash just from watching them.

""YOU WANT US TO LIVE TOGETHER!? HELL N-!""

*CRASH*

The two tried to get back into their complaining stride, but Ton-Ire had learned from his past mistake. With a single step, the elder completely crushed the floorboards beneath him into a fine sawdust that blew out in every which way from the impact causing a massive brown cloud to form. The adolescents were forced to back away to avoid breathing in too much of the substance, and in that instance, the particles began to swirl.

It started off meekly, but began to gain speed over time, until a rapid tornado was born from the fresh debris. And from the eye of that tornado emerged its creator.

He gave off the appearance of a God, there was just simply no other way to describe it. A mighty figure who could trample mountains and drain oceans. What other description could be given to that of a man who, without so much as a wave of his hand, conjured a raging tempest that continued to grow and roar from a few simple planks of wood.

A devil may have been able to. But devils are made to die. And the look that The Spinner gave to his two students didn't suggest that he'd be doing that any time soon.

"You two made your decisions to come here and train, to grow, to be strong!" thunderously boomed Ton-Ire's voice above the sound of the whipping wind. "And strong you will become, but only if you follow my instructions. Complaints are a product of time, time that can be spent better into properly molding you. You may groan, you may cry, you may barf, you may even die, so long as you continue your pursuit of growth. That it is the resolve that I am willing to teach."

Before and during that entire speech, he had been taking one sturdy step after another, steadily advancing before now stopping in front of the boys who could only stand frozen like statues before this awesome display.

"Now then," he said while the dust devil behind him started to dissipate along with the shrieking wind. "Make your choices. Will you stay and study here? Or give up and seek a more... comfy environment?"

He spat out the "comfy" in a mocking tone, as if the very idea of them becoming Pathfinders with the second option was a joke, a possibility that never existed.

"Ah," they both realized. "That's exactly what this is. It's not a matter of training here or somewhere else. It's either here, or no where."

With the tornado finally gone, all that was left was the three humans, two students and one master, once again standing there in silence. And once again, the students were the ones to break that silence.

""I'll train here.""

Their answers in unison, they faced their new master with determined looks in their eyes.

Ton-Ire broke out into a smile.

"Good. Now let's make it official. Face each other, state your names, and shake hands."

""-Grk!""

Despite the simultaneous grunts of displeasure, the two turned to look each other in the eye.

Repulsed, yet troubled brown eyes met irritated, yet excited blue ones.

Their hands clapped together, both squeezing as if trying to break the other's entire skeleton, they stated their names through gritted teeth.

"Calor Rho Ondo."

"Vivran Upsilon Yutta."

...

It should have been the end there, but neither of them budged an inch. Both were apparently too invested in the winning their weird form of arm wrestling they had started.

"BWAHAHAHA! Ah, youth, you can never contain it!"

At least their childish antics didn't seem to spoil The Spinner's mood, with it actually amusing him into full on laughter.

"Alright, I know we had a bit excitement with all this declaration stuff all of a sudden, but I'm calling lights out. Training will only officially begin for you two when Yutta learns the basics, so Ondo, I'm assigning you to be his personal teacher until he's all caught up with... everything I guess. Alright? Alright! Cya tomorrow!"

As Ton-Ire walked off merrily, the two boys continued to be locked in their contest. It wasn't until a few seconds later that their master's words fully sunk in. Their eyes, which had slowly drifted down to focus on their clenching hands, suddenly shot up to look at each other in horror.

"Wait, did he just say-?"

"S-surely not..."

"But if both of us heard it, then-"

"No way..."

...

"I HAVE TO TRAIN YOU?!?"

"I HAVE TO LEARN FROM YOU?!?"