This time, Tia faced off against Vason, and their familiarity with each other’s styles became immediately obvious.
Tia would predict Vason’s actions, and Vason would predict Tia’s. Their duel became less and less violent until slight movements from each other would cause the other to reposition in turn. To an untrained observer, it would’ve looked as though they stood still, but each was focused on the minutia of each other’s body language.
Tia finally broke the stalemate when she lunged at Vason.
Leaping at her from behind, Vir fired off one attack after another—this time without Prana Blade to avoid injuring her.
Against the deadly onslaught, Tia aborted her attack to defend, only for Vason to Leap into her, hurling her back… right at Vir. Right into the Aprabomb.
His thrusts contacted with her gambeson armor, slicing through the thick fabric.
Tia twisted her body, avoiding the brunt of the force, but then Vason swept her legs, sending her crashing onto the sand.
“Stop!” Tia shouted, panting heavily, but grinning despite the exertion. “Good! That was good! Nice teamwork there. Gotta admit, I got too preoccupied with Vason, there. Good usage of the Aprabomb.”
Vir rolled his eyes. “That’s such a terrible name for it, Tia. All I’m doing is attacking really fast.”
“But Vason was right, it just sounds so seric, doesn’t it?” Tia said with a grin. “I mean, Aprabomb! It’d be tragic to waste such a great name.”
“Uh, huh.”
“As much as I agree with Tia, I’m pooped,” Vason said, removing his helmet to reveal a sweat-covered face. “What say we head back, get cleaned up, then hit the pubs?”
“You all head back,” Vir replied. “Think I want to work on some stuff on my own. I’ll join up with you later.”
“Suit yourself, overachiever!” Vason said. “C’mon, Haymi. Let’s head home. You too, Neel! You’ve been such a good boy. How about some treats for the good bandy?”
Neel wagged his tail excitedly. Awoo awoooo!
“Tia?” Vir asked.
“I’m gonna stay back with you. Curious to see what you’ll get up to.”
Vir shrugged. “Suit yourself, but it’s gonna be pretty boring for you.”
“Oh, don’t you worry about me. Pretend like I’m not even here!” Tia said, kicking off her boots and digging her feet into the sand.
Vir glanced at the horizon—only a couple of hours of daylight remained. Time enough to work on Prana Blade.
He’d wanted to experiment with it more upon learning it during the mission in the mine, but with all the squad training, he’d just been too exhausted.
Plus, he needed appropriate targets. The Talent was far too dangerous to practice in his room. An errant swing could easily slice furniture in two.
Vir trudged up to the edge of the forest where it met the sandy beach and began. His first strike was as normal—leveraging the prana density in his body, he released a small burst of prana, spinning it so it clung to his katar’s blade as he slashed into the tree trunk.
Tia sauntered up to look at the damage.
“This is… odd,” she said.
“What do you mean?”
“Prana Blade isn’t supposed to leave such a… rough wound. Every time I’ve seen it used, it’s more like a scalpel, razor-sharp and great for slicing. Yours seems… I dunno, blunt? You’re doing quite a lot of damage with it. It’s just not concentrated.”
Interesting, he thought. If she hadn’t pointed it out, he’d never have known. Vir didn’t fail to notice how she called it Prana Blade.
“What’s so funny?” Tia asked, drawing close to Vir’s face. Too close. He took a step back.
“Oh, nothing. Just that it’s called Prana Blade, even though Talents don’t use prana.”
“Oh, that. Yeah, couldn’t tell you why.”
Was it a holdover from an age when people had more knowledge? Or was it simply a misnomer, because it gave the blade a similar effect to that of an Enhance Sharpness orb? Either way, it was just a curiosity for Vir.
Flaring Prana Vision to its max, he sliced again, paying careful attention to the prana that coated his blade.
Once, twice… he kept his eyes peeled for anything abnormal.
By the twentieth slash—and after felling two large trees—he finally noticed it. Prana was dissipating from his blade. Compared to the total amount, it wasn’t significant, which was why Vir hadn’t noticed until now, but it almost looked like excess prana, bleeding off the blade.
Am I using too much? Vir had been so obsessed with making the ability as powerful as possible, he’d always poured in as much prana as he could, but perhaps that strategy worked against him here.
With each subsequent slash, he lessened the amount of prana used bit by bit, until the ability failed to function entirely.
The results were surprising. Instead of a weaker attack as he’d anticipated, his slices penetrated deeper and deeper, leaving less of a visible wound behind.
“That’s more like it!” Tia exclaimed. “That’s now looking a lot closer to the Prana Blade I’m familiar with. What did you do?”
“Just uh, allowed things to flow. You were right, there was too much effort before.”
It was a lie, of course, though Vir couldn’t say he’d adjusted the prana.
“Hmmm. Curious. I’m not aware of anyone who can modulate Prana Blade like that. That’s a pretty unique ability, y’know?”
“Is it? I don’t know why I’d ever use the old version, though.”
Not only was his new variant deadlier, it consumed nearly a third less prana. With Ash prana always being in such short supply, that was an advantage he couldn’t ignore.
“Hmm. I dunno about that. Go back to your original version. I wanna see something.”
Vir complied, pouring more prana into the attack than necessary. As expected, the blade’s penetration was far shallower than his optimized strike.
“Okay, now put even more force into it, if you can.”
“Sure… but I don’t think that’ll help.”
Vir sliced again, pouring more prana, spiraling it faster so that it clung to the blade. Even then, much was wasted… but the result surprised him.
The attack was even shallower than normal, but his swipe took a chunk of the tree with it. Almost as if vaporizing the area around the blade, the wound looked like it had been caused by a far thicker, heaver weapon.
“This is amazing,” Tia said, inspecting the results. “The sharp version’s great for piercing flesh, but you could easily use this blunter version against armor. See how wide the wound is? It’s almost like you’re hitting it with a maul or something. Slashing attacks are nearly useless against tough armor, but blunt force works really well. It’s why most polearms have hammers on them.”
She’s right, Vir thought. In fact, this discovery allowed him to overcome one of his primary weaknesses—dealing with armor. Mundane armor was rarely ever a problem, but against Vason and his Bulwark, Vir had little recourse. But this augmented, blunt Prana Blade might very well be exactly what he needed.
“Thanks, Tia. I… don’t know if I’d have discovered this without your help. This is seriously useful.”
Tia clapped his shoulder. “Hey, what are friends for? Just glad I could help.”
“It’s not just that, though. I’ve never really been able to bounce ideas with anyone before.”
Even with Maiya, their discussions were one-sided, with Vir explaining his breakthroughs, and Maiya listening. With Tia, things were far more equal… and constructive.