"Huh… neat!"

Janet said with a mildly pleased tone after Zeke was done creating a rune field for their magic training.

Mikella watched on the sidelines, currently on break or as Zeke liked to put it–time out. She knew he was kidding, but even she admitted that she might have gone too far on training them.

She kept forgetting that she was no longer a normal fighter. She's a Journeyman now. She hadn't helped train someone after reaching the next stage before they came to Arcelot, and she got too excited on training another otherworlder to be the same.

But even then, the light in Janet's eyes just seemed to grow brighter as each moment passed. Lyle just stood on the side, his eyes fixed on the runic scriptures Zeke drew with his floating pens.

"So that's how Runists work," Lyle said. "I only ever see them throw their weight around. Now that I think about it, this looks cleaner than any runes I've seen. A little messy, but it's functional."

"Hey, I'm a bit sensitive about that," Zeke said half-jokingly. He still couldn't' get over how Clara called out that his writing was like chicken scratch sometimes. "I'm trying hard to fix it."

Honestly, Mikella didn't give a hoot about how the runes looked. Sure, some of the official runes looked really pretty, almost like embroidery done by an artist. On the other hand, the runes Zeke drew sometimes looked messy, or just all over the place. They may not look so pretty, but the looks don't matter at all as long as the runes themselves work properly.

"So what are you making here?" Lyle said as soon as Zeke pulled his pens back into his storage, finishing his work.

"A resistant rune field. I want to make sure nothing breaks here while we're training."

"Whoa, what kind of hellish training are you gonna put us through now?" Lyle raised his hands, clearly not on board to this next part. "Isn't it enough to break Janet's ribs? Now you're gonna burn us medium-well?"

"We're not training your Pain Resistance… partly," Zeke tilted his head, wincing when he saw Lyle's face paling again. "But this is important. What I'm about to do is use my attunement, and we can further up the training to get some nice stat boosts."

"You mean from our activites?" Janet called up. She was more interested in gaining more power, which Mikella approved. "How so? Also, it's not like having higher stats makes us better instantly, right? I mean, we keep hearing that stats are important at first, but as you level, you start focusing more on skills and synergy."

"You're right on both counts," Zeke stated, then he noticed Mikella's eagerness to continue for him, making him nod before handing the torch to her.

"Having higher stats doesn't make you super strong. But there's a good difference between having a lot of points and having the right amount of points. Did you notice anything when any of your stats reached over a hundred?"

Janet and Lyle looked back at each other, now looking rather curious as Lyle shook his head.

"I don't… think so? It feels the same every time I get stat points. I just feel stronger–better, I guess."

"Actually, I think I do," Janet pointed out. "When my Spirit reached 100, I felt like my mana pool just got a whole lot bigger. I regenerate a lot more mana, which made me notice when I stopped using mana potions as often during long missions."

Mikella nodded in agreement. "That happens to all the stats, and I'm not surprised if you didn't notice it at first. After breaking boulders and jumping as high as buildings, it's hard to find out the small differences with just a few stat points. But we realized throughout our training before Journeymen is that reaching milestones in your attribute gives them a big increase. Just like with Janet's, reaching 100 Spirit gives you a lot more mana than just reaching, say, 96 or 97 Spirit.

"So we decided that if one of our stats gets close enough to reach a threshold, we push past it to get that nice boost. You're right that it doesn't make too big of a difference, but little is still better than nothing."

Mikella patted herself on the back for giving a clear, concise explanation without sounding bored at the end. She watched Janet's eyes glisten at the news while Lyle looked like he just learned something new today, nodding slowly.

"So this is…" Lyle gestured at the small field, reaching about half the size of the entire hall they rented out for today.

"I'm about to use something powerful to up our training," Zeke answered. "Think 'increased gravity training' from DragonBall."

"So, like a hyperbolic time chamber?" Janet asked.

"I wish! It's more the training pod."

"Ooh, that's neat. I always wanted to try that. Then I remember what happened to that second guy."

"Yeah, I just hope we don't end up like him."

"Guys, chill. Let's stick to this current world we're in, yeah?"

Lyle apparently had enough of the nerds' geeking out, having no clue on what they were talking about. Janet just pouted at him while Zeke gave a genuine chuckle.

It made Mikella happy to see that. She wasn't into the games and shows he was, so she's glad he has someone else to talk to about stuff like this. Janet seems like the kind of girl that lives in Zeke's world, strangely enough as it is.

"Alright, I'm finished. Now come on over."

Zeke called out to the two, getting them to hesitantly step over to the field. There wasn't much of a difference for them, but they stared at Zeke who stood at the opposite side.

"So, what are we gonna do, exactly?" Lyle asked, but he noticed Janet readying with her practice dagger in hand.

"I'm gonna call out my attunement," Zeke explained, rolling his shoulders in preparation. He wore a simple shirt and pants, just like Lyle does, and it showed more of his exposed muscles than with his jacket. The impressive runic tattoos carved into his skin showed, almost shimmering with power. "Then I'll use its power to make a pressure field. It's gonna be a bit tough, but bear with it."

"Your attunement?" Janet asked, her posture turning slack as she kept speaking. "What is it?"

"It's… complicated. It's called The World, and it's from the higher realms. It's pretty powerful, but kinda a pain in the ass to handle if I'm being honest. Don't worry–I got enough practice to at least make sure nobody gets harmed during training, so you can trust in this exercise."

That immediately got the otherworlders opposite of Zeke to stand still. While Zeke closed his eyes, not noticing this change to get ready for his attunement, Lyle looked over at Janet who she herself started to look nervous all of a sudden.

Mikella saw this shift in mood and asked. "What's wrong?"

"He said his attunement is called 'The' World?" Lyle emphasized the first word, making Mikella nod in curiosity. "How did he get that?"

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"Uuh…"

Before Mikella could answer, a bit baffled at the sudden question and tone behind it, Zeke's eyes opened up and started to glow a burning turquoise color.

Lyle and Janet's eyes widened, their bodies tensing up before eventually getting down on their knees, their teeth gritting and their faces straining from the invisible pressure hitting them specifically.

Zeke didn't notice, but Mikella saw how Janet herself was taking it badly somehow. Lyle looked fine, if a little under duress, but the frantic look on Janet's eyes proved too much for Mikella to leave it be.

"Zeke! Stop it!" She called out. "Just hold on for a second!"

"What?"

Zeke asked, unable to hear the outside thanks to the pressure of his own field. Mikella only just realized another downside to this field, making the user unable to respond just as well as the recipients.

So when the field started to shake more than usual, including the very hall they were in, Mikella knew something was going very wrong.

She looked over to see Janet straining, but not from the heavy pressure. Her eyes were starting to glow a bright blue in intervals, shifting from oceanic blue to the deepest black and the clearest white. Her arms shook as they covered her body, ignoring the pressure completely before letting out a shrill scream.

"Aaagh!"

"J-Janet! Hold on!" Lyle screamed, but he was the one under the pressure now before Zeke eventually stopped when he saw the change.

Zeke looked horrified at what he done, and was about to lend out a hand before the entire hall flashed into a surge of blinding light, with Janet being at the epicenter.

A large form of incandescent black and white light slowly rose from the center of the flash. The black and white coloring seemed to be having issues mixing, with the white form taking over the entirety of the ethereal body with the black form covering her hands. The hands, being different from the rest, were formed into demonic-looking claws that were sharply tapered to pinpoints.

Mikella watched in awe and horror as the giant form of Janet appeared in front of them. Just like what happened at the biodome, the appearance of a large figure made entirely out of mana showed up. This time, the form appeared like a woman, the curves of her body apparent but showing nothing else. It also looked off in some cases, not particularly where the claws were.

The eyes of the head that even had Janet's short hair reaching her neck opened up, revealing both white and black colors that shimmered when they shouldn't. She looked down, no mouth or nose forming on her face as she faced the one who put her through that. At Zeke.

"Zeke! Get out of here!" Lyle shouted, his voice hoarse from the strain of the pressure field. "Janet's going crazy with her attunement! She's gonna blow everything up!"

It was clear on Lyle's end that they went through this before, and unlike their time at the biodome, theirs wasn't a pleasant experience. Mikella readied her weapon, but she knew from past experience that doing anything to her in her current state was impossible. Not even an established Journeyman can handle this form, and if she even tried to break that standard, she worried for Janet's life getting cut out in return.

Looking at that tall stature, her black claws raised as a wail escaped her form before swinging her claws straight at him, Zeke stood resolute.

"Janet… I'm sorry," He spoke softly, pain and sympathy flashing in his glowing eyes. "I'll have to be a little rough."

Mana swelled around Zeke as a burst of energy flared all around him. In an instant, a form overtook Zeke's presence as two giant hands blocked the incoming claw strike, stopping Giant Janet in her tracks.

It was hard to discern, but Mikella saw the Giant Janet's eyes widening as another giant form appeared in front of her. Unlike her full form, it was only at half its height, but the size still dwarfed as Giant Zeke's head formed, revealing a more detailed face, but still has no nose or mouth.

Only his giant eyes formed, and they glowed a translucent turquoise color with a heavy oceanic tint.

Giant Janet roared and tried to strike again, but the twin giant hands that blocked her before did so again, but there was a heavy metallic twang that could've made her eardrums explode from the impact. Upon closer look, Zeke's hands were covered not in their liquid-like mana form, but entirely metal, rigid against the flowing black claws that tried to cut them apart.

It was Zeke's newly gained skill Mithril Skin that encased his arms and hands into hard metal, blocking and deflecting the now enraged Janet's claws constantly swiping at the perpetrator. Mikella could only watch in awe at the scene, unable to do a thing, but also surprised at one other thing.

Zeke was actually capable of controlling his giant form, but she knew more than anyone that there's a limit. There was always a limit. She was already dashing in and grabbing Lyle away, who was too stunned to even form a response after Zeke revealed his own giant form. She wondered if she should just go ahead and warn everybody in the gym of what was happening, thinking about the consequences of the battle between these giants.

More than anything, she hoped that the expenditure of mana wouldn't somehow kill Janet in her still weakened form as an Expert. As another roar escaped Janet, she looked back with Lyle by her side to see Zeke's hands trapping Janet's claws up in the air, almost lifting her up like a child throwing a tantrum.

Roars kept spilling out of her, furious at being treated in such a way. But the Giant Zeke kept holding her, being still for a solid moment before finally opening his formerly non-existent mouth.

He opened his mouth wide and began… sucking at the air. Torrents started swirling around his mouth as he tried to suck in whatever it was that he was taking. To everyone's shock, it was none other than Janet herself. Or at least, the form made of mana as her body began to dissolve in certain parts, the white and black coloring getting sucked into his mouth like a vacuum in some cartoon.

This time, Janet screamed not in fury, but in a panic as her form started to dissolve quickly, the sounds dying slowly as her form finally dissipated, absorbed directly into Zeke's mouth and into whatever it was that carried all that mana.

The hall was breaking at the seams, metal debris and parts of the structure getting sucked into the giant mouth as well before eventually everything calmed. The debris and parts of the hall fell out of the air into the ground, and all of the mana Janet conjured disappeared into Giant Zeke.

There, the now normal Janet fell to the ground, hitting hard against the floor and lying there, smoke trailing from her limp body. Mikella's heart almost paused before her arms were thrown aside by Lyle who rushed in after her.

"Janet! Janet, are you okay?! Speak to me!"

Lyle reached her side, picking up her upper body and shaking her softly, almost wincing at the burns that scalded his skin. He looked like he was about to lose it when he turned to Zeke whose giant form finally started to dissipate.

Her panic was finally disappearing when Zeke willingly returned to his normal size, his eyes closed shut from the expense of mana as Lyle glared.

"Zeke! What the fuck did you do to Janet?! I swear to god, if you–"

"Easy, Lyle!"

Mikella stepped in, getting in between Zeke and Lyle. She wasn't worried at all that Lyle could attack Zeke in his rage. It was the opposite. She was worried that Lyle might do something crazy and end up harming himself and Janet on top of that. She tried to ease him in, keeping her facial expression calm and composed. The last thing she wanted to do was antagonize the situation even more.

"This happened before. Zeke has no intention of hurting her," Taking a deep breath, she hoped that Zeke had a good answer as she turned to him. "Zeke, what did you do?"

"...I…" Zeke still had his eyes closed, his head probably splitting apart from the way his hands were held firm on his temples. However, he knew the situation and still answered. "I absorbed her mana… somehow."

"Somehow?" Lyle asked incredulously. "What the hell does that mean?"

"Exactly like I said," Zeke growled, though it sounded more like frustration from his headache than from Lyle's tone. "I absorbed her mana so she won't keep going all out in her attunement. Because of that, I feel like I'm about to burn from all this excess mana. Just… give me a second."

Zeke fell to his knees and rather than making his pens float, he just took a single pen from his pack and drew a simple rune on his constructed ethereal panel. Once he was done, and from Mikella's guess, it was a pretty simple rune array, Zeke's hand slammed onto the top of the panel and exhaled slowly.

Vapor of what looked like bluish smoke sizzled out of the panel, creating what looked like some campfire with all the smoke just trailing into the air like that. The entire hall fell submerged in powerful mana thanks to her perception, making her understand that Zeke made an array to disperse the mana from his body as quickly as possible. He didn't care about the efficiency, he just wanted it to be gone.

She turned back to Lyle who now turned to Janet, noticing that her head was moving somewhat. She groaned in pain, the burns on her skin apparent as Mikella can easily tell that she was inflicted with mana burnout, the same as when Zeke went through it.

"She needs mana, but not naturally. Lyle, do you have any mana potions? Any good ones?" Mikella turned to Zeke, and as though he read her mind, took off his glasses and gave it to her. "Make her wear these–these will recover her mana artificially."

Lyle stayed quiet, gladly accepting any help he could get to have Janet recover safely. It was a horrid ordeal, but in the end, everything turned out fine.

Now, as the only one who had experience in all of this and not currently in any panic, Mikella found herself to be the only one to explain what the fuck happened in this hall to the recipients of the gym who so desperately wanted to know what happened for themselves. Somehow, she felt she got the worst of the duties.

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