Leon fou Bartfort
Grace: Eclipse
Grade: Mythical
Rank: D
Rank F → D = Thermal Resistance (Passive)
Resistance to heat and cold. Potency increases based on current Rank.
Rank F → D = Thermal Vision (Active)
Allows the user to perceive temperatures. Range increases based on current Rank.
Rank E → D = Celestial Grace (Passive)
Healing factor while beneath the light of a celestial body. Healing rate scales with Rank.
Rank E → D = Celestial Grace (Active)
Allows the user to heal others through the light of celestial bodies. Effectiveness remains one Rank below the Passive version.
Rank D = Heat Manipulation (Passive)
Able to shape the heat or the cold released by the user.
Rank D = Heatwave (Active)
Able to create a domain of heat or coldness, weakening targets. The effect is based on Rank.
Daniel fou Durland
Grace: Terrain
Grade: B
Rank: D
Rank F → D = Terrain Resistance (Passive)
Resistance to Earth-based effects. Potency increases based on current Rank.
Rank F → D = Seismic Vision (Active)
Allows the user to perceive surroundings through vibrations. Range increases based on current Rank.
Rank E → D = Bronze Body (Passive)
A small increase to strength with a large increase to durability and defense. Increase scales with Rank.
Rank E → D = Heavy Metal (Active)
An active increase to strength, defense, durability, and resistance. Can stack upon Bronze Body. After use, the body suffers adverse effects.
Rank D = Grounded (Passive)
When Daniel is in direct contact with a solid surface, his body naturally roots itself, unconsciously redistributing his weight and center of gravity to make him exponentially harder to move, knock back, or topple. The effect scales with Rank.
Rank D = Momentum (Active)
Stores kinetic force generated through movement, impacts, and attacks. The accumulated force can be released through a strike, charge, or stomp, dramatically increasing its power. The amount stored and released scales with Rank.
Raymond fou Arkin
Grace: Stream
Grade: A
Rank: D
Rank F → D = Current Resistance (Passive)
Resistance to water-based effects and pressure. Potency scales with Rank.
Rank F → D = Water Sense (Active)
Through contact with any water source—including moisture in the air or ground—the user can extend perception outward. Range and sensitivity increase with Rank.
Rank E → D = Fluid Body (Passive)
Movement naturally flows around incoming force rather than absorbing it directly.
Rank E → D = Pressure Point (Active)
Focuses mana into a concentrated burst at a precise location—a joint, nerve cluster, or weak point. It doesn't hit hard in the conventional sense; it hits where it needs to. Critical hit.
Rank D = Undercurrent (Passive)
Passively generates a subtle water-pressure field around himself in combat. It slightly disrupts the footing and balance of nearby opponents, making it feel as though they're fighting on a riverbed rather than solid ground.
Rank D = Surge Current (Active)
Releases stored water mana in a single directed current—a focused high-pressure stream narrow enough to cut.
Martha
Grace: Blaze
Grade: A
Rank: D
Rank F → D = Heat Resistance (Passive)
Resistance to fire and heat-based effects. Potency scales with Rank.
Rank F → D = Flame Sight (Active)
Can perceive heat signatures, living bodies, active mana sources, and residual burn marks.
Rank E → D = Ember Focus (Passive)
Mana output naturally concentrates rather than disperses.
Rank E → D = Blaze Script (Active)
Can inscribe temporary fire runes onto surfaces or objects. The runes activate according to a predetermined condition such as contact, delay, proximity, or a spoken word.
At Rank D, she may maintain up to three active inscriptions simultaneously.
Rank D = Sustained Burn (Passive)
Established spells passively feed on ambient mana to maintain themselves rather than continuously draining her own reserves.
Rank D = Focused Ignition (Active)
Compresses mana\flame output into a single precise point—a needle rather than a wave.
Erica
Grace: Torrents
Grade: S
Rank: D
Rank F → D = Wind and Sound Resistance (Passive)
Resistance to Wind and Sound effects. Potency scales with Rank.
Rank F → D = Sonar Sense (Active)
Can perceive through wind and sound. Range scales with Rank.
Rank E → D = Resonant Body (Passive)
The body naturally synchronizes with surrounding vibrations and airflow, increasing agility, balance, reaction speed, and coordination. Enhancement scales with Rank.
Rank E → D = Echo Step (Active)
Manipulates sound and air currents to reduce movement noise and greatly enhance mobility. At Rank D, she can perform short bursts of movement that seem almost instantaneous.
Rank D = Atmospheric Domain (Passive)
A subtle field of air currents constantly surrounds Erica, influencing projectiles, debris, smoke, dust, and sound waves while providing superior battlefield awareness.
Rank D = Tempest Pulse (Active)
Releases a concentrated burst of compressed wind and sound. The attack combines physical force and disruptive vibrations, capable of knocking enemies off balance, breaking concentration, and briefly disorienting targets. Potency scales with Rank.
Chapter 42: Fast Forward - 5.
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Location: Training Ground.
Omni POV (Leon Based.)
The sun was directly overhead and entirely uninterested in mercy and its rays bared on the field.
Leon and Daniel stood facing each other in the team's private training ground, stripped down to their combat trousers, wooden weapons in hand. Leon held his practice wood poleaxe, but weighted to match. Daniel held a shield that covered most of his body and a short sword to go with it.
"Come on, Leon." Daniel rolled his shoulders. "How'd you let her talk you into this? Now I'm in it too."
"Sorry," Leon said, not sounding sorry at all. "But I need to know where I actually stand. Now that the array's finished and my mana's under control."
"Fiiiiine." Daniel as he settled into his stance.
"Thanks, Daniel."
Leon mirrored him.
Erica walked between them, unhurried. She looked at each of them once,
"Remember, this is just a mock battle," she said. "So all spells and skills will be capped at Rank E Energy output. Understood?"
"Yes," they said, together.
She raised her hand. Looked between them. "Hajime."
Leon didn't wait.
He closed the distance fast, weapon already coiled back, and swung the hammer end in a wide arc at Daniel's side.
Iron Pendulum.
Daniel dropped his shield into the ground and took it head-on. "Haaaa—!" The shout carried real force behind it, shoving the strike off-line before it could land clean.
They separated for half a heartbeat.
Daniel didn't give it longer than that. His shield swept Leon's weapon aside and his sword was already moving into the lane it cleared.
+Three, two, one, now+ Luxion's countdown blinked through the neural link, and when the sword arrived Leon was already gone, the blade only cutting air where he'd been.
+Thanks.+
He drove back in, poleaxe leading.
Like that they stayed in that rhythm for a while — strike, guard, reposition, strike again. Neither of them fighting at their limits much yet. Just finding range. Getting a feel for who the other person was now, after six months of different training tracks.
Yeah our base strength can't compare, Leon noted. Guess it's time to test these babies out.
"Let's take it up a notch," Leon said.
His runes caught the light — a faint orange warmth moving through the lines on his arms and back.
Let's start out small, and see how it feels.
"If that's what you want." Daniel's own mana answered, the air around him subtly thickening.
Leon shifted to Needle Strikes — rapid, short-range thrusts with the spear part of his poleaxe. Speed over power. Finding and striking the gaps before Daniel could settle into full defensive form.
Daniel felt the pressure building behind each strike. Speed wasn't exactly his forte. He didn't try to make it one. Instead he planted his feet and cast —
<ᛃᛇᚦ — Earth Shake.>
The ground between them trembled. Leon's footing buckled mid-chain, the rapid thrusts breaking apart as the ground shifted under him. Meanwhile Daniel stayed rooted through [Grounded] the instant the spell landed, didn't sway. He used the gap to activate [Momentum] — storing all the force he generated as he moved towards Leon.
One
Two
Three, on the third step he used all that force to hit Leon in the face with the shield, sending him flying.
Landing on the ground as he slid on the ground to a stop.
Then Leon answered.
[Heatwave.]
The air around Daniel turned viscously, suddenly hot — Leon's Grace bleeding heat outward in a small dome, sapping strength from Daniel's already tired muscles.
"Real funny dude, as if it wasn't already hot enough." Daniel muttered, already feeling it in his legs.
He activated [Heavy Metal]. A dull Silver metallic sheen crawled across his whole body. He rushed forward, —
Leon timed the rush, waited for the gap, and swung down.
Heat Strike,
A crescent of hot compressed air sliced out ahead of the poleaxe. Daniel walked through it. The heat registered on his face, but he endured on.
He closed the gap as he charged Leon, while Leon in return swung, hammer first, as hard as he could.
The impact was enormous as both weapons shattered.
Leon, thinking fast, quickly stepped back, making room between them. Across the field, Daniel still had his sword. Leon looked at the broken shaft in his hands. Set it down.
"Let's get close and personal," he said, dropping into stance — knees bent, right arm forward with a half-closed fist turned inward, left arm bent at his side, palm open.
Okay, I'm used to it now, time to push Level 3.
Daniel threw his sword aside and raised his fists. Settled his weight back onto his rear leg. "It's your funeral." with a large smile on his face.
Daniel moved first — a jab, short and sharp, just to find range.
Leon rolled his lead shoulder and let it graze past his ear, already stepping in.
Hidden Needle.
Three strikes in the time it took to throw one, fingers rigid, motion from the hips. Daniel caught the first on his forearm, took the second on the shoulder with a grunt, but evaded the third by twisting at the waist.
"Tch — fast." He didn't give Leon room to run a fourth. He stepped in low and threw a heavy cross,
Leon ducked — barely — and felt the wind of it move his hair.
He rolled his shoulder and wrist inward, bringing a hammer fist up and across into Daniel's ribs. It connected, the impact rattling through him anyway despite his defences.
"That's gonna bruise," Daniel said, and answered with a body hook.
Leon caught it on his forearm and rode the force sideways rather than straight through — let it carry him half a step back, absorbing instead of stopping.
Daniel pressed. Jab, cross, hook — three seconds of boxing's full vocabulary, each punch carrying heavy density. Leon evaded some, thanks to Luxion reading the rhythm, his guard taking what he couldn't slip.
Then Daniel loaded the overhand, big and meant to come down on top of a guard rather than through it.
Leon didn't retreat, instead he raised his forearm, angled to catch bone rather than joint. The impact rang all the way up his arm — but Daniel's fist skidded off the angle instead of driving through, deflected wide.
Daniel's foot hit the ground and locked in immediately, metaphorical roots growing into the earth through his sole, using every muscle in his body to punch.
Leon saw it half a second too late to dodge clean.
So he didn't dodge, his hand curved into a claw, seized Daniel's wrist mid-punch, yanked it down and past him in the same motion — pull and strike, one continuous loop — while his other hand drove forward into Daniel's exposed collarbone.
Daniel's feet stayed planted. It couldn't keep his upper body from folding around the pull. The strike landed.
"*Hah—!*" Daniel staggered half a step, rolled his shoulders. Grinned. "Okay. That one actually hurt."
"Yet you're still standing," Leon said, resetting.
"For now." Daniel threw a straight. No setup, no flourish. Just weight and intent.
Leon met it with the heel of his palm, absorbing what he could through his wrist and shoulder.
He felt it in his teeth anyway.
Both of them staggered back. Breathing hard now. Sweat cutting through the dust on their arms.
"One more?," Daniel asked.
"One more," Leon agreed.
They came together at the same instant — Daniel's fist loaded with everything he had left, Leon's hand already an open palm as he drove it forward.
Neither finished the motion.
The two strikes met dead center between them. The force detonated outward — a small, violent burst of pressure that threw them both off their feet and left them flat on their backs on opposite ends of the field, the dust settling slowly over both of them.
Leon stared at the sky.
"Hahaha." He didn't try to sit up. "That was a good fight."
"Yeah." Daniel let out a long breath, his arm twitching faintly with overuse. "Hope that was enough, because I've got nothing left."
"Same." Leon raised one hand toward the sun, fingers closing loosely around nothing in particular.
"But with this," he said quietly, mostly to himself, "I'm not falling behind anymore."
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