Chapter 108: Training

By seven that evening, Leon had eaten, washed off the last of the dungeon dust and changed into clothes he could train in.

He and Mira had agreed on a time during the ride back. One of the smaller practice rooms still had mats available, so Leon took his water bottle and went there to meet her.

Perhaps not so surprisingly, Linda was already inside.

She stood at the opposite end of the room, facing a shallow tray on the floor covered by a thin layer of ice.

"Are you going to need the whole room?" Leon asked from the doorway.

"No, just this end." She said, turning to see that it was Leon before she spoke. She hadn’t noticed him.

"Here to train?" She asked, mostly because she was so surprised to see him. The only time she had seen him outside in the evening was when he was beating Raul and Dustin when they trained with their summons. It wasn’t quite consistent with his lazy persona.

"Yeah. Mira and I arranged to practise on the mats, tryna learn a few. Would that bother you?"

"Not at all. Go ahead."

Linda usually preferred practising alone. Nobody would watch her failed attempts or ask questions about what she was doing, or disturb in anyway. Leon however, felt familiar enough that she didn’t mind and could ignore him and continue with her own work.

Mira arrived a few minutes later. After exchanging greetings with Linda, introducing herself as the new girl in class, she returned to where Leon was and placed her bag beside the mats and asked him to lie on his back as they began without any time wasted.

"Since you kept trying to push me off with your arms, we’ll start with how to move your hips."

"Well, when someone’s sitting on me, pushing them off seems reasonable."

"It does until your arms get tired and they’re still there."

Mira demonstrated the movement adequately, before kneeling beside him to watch.

Leon planted one foot against the mat and shifted his hips, but his shoulders turned with the movement and he almost rolled onto his stomach.

"That’s too far. You only need enough space to bring your knee between us."

She showed him again, and this time, Leon paid more attention to where she placed her foot.

"Go ahead and defend me." She said.

They started without much resistance. Once he could repeat the movement properly, Mira added some weight and made him try again.

It immediately became more difficult.

’Of course.’ He thought to himself.

After his third attempt, Mira sat back and gave him time to catch his breath.

"I can help you with the basics. Just keep in mind that this takes years to get good at. A few sessions won’t be enough, and even after a few months, you’ll still be learning."

"I know, I know, I won’t try to become a master or anything crazy like that."

"That much I can teach you."

Leon took a drink before lying down again and Mira getting on top him as she demonstrated.

He wasn’t expecting to beat Mira by the following week. Knowing why he had lost before she finished bending his arm would already be an improvement.

Across the room, Linda lowered one hand towards the tray.

Her Yeti wasn’t manifested, but faint white fur covered the back of her forearm and faded before reaching her elbow. The partial change gave her more strength through her fingers and shoulders, though controlling the ice while maintaining it required more concentration than she wanted.

She continued trying with the ice, making it rise along one edge of the tray.

She tried shaping it into a narrow ridge, but the entire corner thickened instead.

’Too much again.’ She thought to herself.

She stopped and allowed the ice to settle.

Her Yeti rarely needed to create anything that small. Linda still wanted better control over the ability when she used it herself, especially before she tried doing the same thing while moving.

She rested her arma to catch a short break for some seconds, and glanced towards the mats.

To her surprise, Leon was lying on his back with Mira on top of him in a rather suggesting way... of course that wasn’t exactly the case, but it could look like that if one wanted it to.

It looked strange from where she stood, though she had seen enough grappling to understand what they were doing. Even then, it felt kind of wrong to be watching them.

She immediately turned back to the tray, a very faint blush on her cheeks.

The next time Linda looked over, their positions had changed, but Leon still hadn’t managed to stand up, but he was holding Mira’s head into his chest... They were certainly still wrestling, right?

Once again, s turned to what she was doing and flexed her hand, waited for the fur to spread evenly over her forearm and tried again.

...

Mira ended their practice around half past eight.

Leon remained on the mat for a while before sitting up. His shirt stuck to his back, and he was beginning to understand how someone could look comfortable on the ground while exhausting the person trapped beneath them.

"You managed to get your knee in a few times at the end," Mira said as she collected her bag.

"How many of those did you let me have?"

"I was actually giving you less room than when we started."

"Then I suppose that’s progress." He said, laying cake down.

They agreed to practise again whenever they were both free. Mira reminded him of one movement he could work on alone before saying goodnight to Linda and leaving.

Leon stayed on the mat and finished most of his water. About five minutes later, he finally stood and walked over to Linda.

"I’m heading back." He said. "Goodnight." He had met her there, it was only reasonable he told her he was leaving.

"Goodnight." Linda lowered her arm and glanced towards the mats. "What made you want to learn grappling? Or, that?"

Leon opened his mouth to answer, then stopped.

’That’s true, what made me want to learn?’

He had wanted to understand how Mira kept putting him on the ground. That had seemed like a good enough reason when he asked her to teach him.

Now, he had spent an hour and a half learning how to put his knee between himself and another person... He was a Summoner.

"I was just curious," Linda said when he didn’t answer. "Did you have something in mind for it?"

"Nothing specific."

’What am I going to do? Make a monster tap?’ He reasoned.

His training was supposed to help him escape long enough for one of his summons to intervene. Somehow, he had become more interested in understanding how Mira kept getting the better of him.

"After sparring with her, I wanted to know how she did it, I guess." Leon said with a shrug.

He had enjoyed the practice. That was enough, even if he spent most of the evening failing to move someone much smaller than himself.

’Now, if kung-fu worked like it did in films...’

He would have learnt that for no practical reason at all, also. Plenty of men from his old world would have done the same, he was sure of it.

"Anyway, see you tomorrow." He said.

Linda nodded and returned to her ice as Leon left.