Saki

  “Water and Earth, Mistress Tama,” she said quietly. Tama beamed at her, before freezing. She looked over at me questioningly.

  “You should stick to training Tristy for now, Tama,” was all I said. She nodded slowly, looked back at Paige, then dropped her hand.

  “Sorry, Tama just got excited,” Tama said as she turned and reappeared suddenly next to Tristy. “Tama is very excited to teach you how to blink! Tama will teach you the way she learned.”

  Tama then looked around the city and out into the distance. She pointed at a very tall building, at least twenty stories tall, and said, “That should be a perfect starting point!”

  I froze as I looked at the massive building. “Um, Tama, maybe…” Before I could finish, Tama grabbed Tristy, and they both disappeared. A few seconds passed in silence, then in the distance, I heard a quiet scream as Tristy was thrown from a twenty-story building.

  I winced as I imagined how terrifying that must feel. I knew Tama would not actually let her die. But as expected, just like when she trained me, Tama was brutal in her training, like her sensei before her.

  Instead, I looked over to Paige and asked, “I am guessing you do not share Tristy’s enthusiasm for servitude?”

  Paige looked at me fearfully, and I continued. “Please do not worry, I am trying to do what is best for everyone, and to do that, I need to know what you want or need. Tama is not an evil person. The worst thing you have to fear is her being over-excited about…” As I spoke, the screams in the distance as Tristy was once again thrown off the twenty-story building made me wince. Tama was not helping me make my point right now.

  Paige was also clearly not buying it as she paled, looking past me at the building Tristy was being repeatedly thrown off of. I sighed heavily and just turned to watch with her.

  Forty-six minutes, it took Tristy forty-six minutes or two hundred and seventeen throws off the building until she figured out how to blink back up to the roof. To say I was impressed was an understatement. What would have taken most people years to master, Tama taught in forty-six damn minutes.

  After which, Tama brought Tristy back. Tristy was not able to blink super far, but she was able to blink now, and she loved it. She blinked to the cooking pan, she blinked to the wall, she blinked to her bed. She was like a kid in a candy shop with teleport powers. But the sweetest part, in a twisted sense, was that she kept blinking over to Tama, who kept congratulating her and telling her tomorrow would be tougher.

  I did not want to know what could be harder than being thrown off a building two hundred and seventeen times. But I was scared to find out for Tristy, even if she herself seemed eager.

  I remember Tama’s training for me was to throw me alone, naked, in a forest surrounded by goblins, and then disable my arm with a damn dagger to the shoulder. That had been the day after she did the same thing, but with a pack of wolves. And that was nothing compared to the time she had personally trained me with just a stick. I rubbed my body, the lingering memories still brought nightmares.

  But I was a much better fighter for it, Tama was brutal, there was no ifs, ands, or buts. But her training worked, and it worked faster. I would not be shocked if Tristy was powerful enough to take out a small goblin army by the end of the month at this rate.

  Eventually, we all went to bed, sort of. Tama made Tristy stay up until she did one hundred push-ups, sit-ups, and a run, not a blink, around the perimeter of the block. It took her over three hours, and when she finally was able to go to sleep, she just collapsed on the ground and passed out.

  Tama, of course, did all of this with her to keep her amped up. And even gently carried Tristy to her sleeping bag after she passed out.

  It was a long night, but eventually , I managed to fall asleep. When I woke up, I noticed three things. Tristy was being healed from severe burns by Tama. Paige was hiding behind a burnt wall, looking horrified, and our blue fire was finally snuffed out.

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  “What the void happened!” I snapped at Tama.

  Tama looked at me with a wide grin, instead of responding, she tapped on Tristy’s now-healed shoulder and said, “Show her!”

  Tristy’s collar lit up, but Tristy herself was already turned around, excited to show me. She focused hard, and after a moment, her whole body caught on fire. She smiled gleefully at me as bits of her skin began to burn. But only bits, most of her was unscathed from the fire coursing all over her body. I stared in shock at that, I had never seen a fire user literally set their whole body on fire like that.

  Then it got more insane. Tristy blinked with the fire on her, directly in front of me, and grabbed me! But I did not burn, at first. “Burn her a little to show your control!” Tama said. I panicked and tried to pull away, but it was too late, Tristy’s collar did not even have time to light up before I felt an intense burn where Tristy was holding my arm, but only for a moment. She pulled it away, and I looked in shock at the burn mark she had made on me, it looked like a bunny?

  Tama walked over and looked at the mark. Then she smacked Tristy hard! “What the void, Tama!” I said in horror. Tristy, for her part, only flinched like the hit barely hurt.

  “Sorry, sensei, please forgive my weakness,” Tristy said as she fell to her knees and bowed. Tama looked furious and turned to face Tristy.

  “Nya! That bunny only has three legs, Tristy, bunnies should have four legs!” Tama said indignantly. And I looked back down at the bunny, sure enough, the right hind leg was missing. I was so lost for words.

  “Tama, please, she is an eight-year-old girl! What she has done would put her above most C-ranked adventurers already!” I said defensively. They may have been Tama’s slaves, but watching a child be subjected to this harsh of training was hard to watch and say nothing.

  “Nya! She is already eight and is not able to use her flames fully yet! She is behind as a ninja, and she must train twice as hard to make up for it! When Tama was bad, sensei would let the goblins take me!”

  I felt a tug and looked down. Tristy had grabbed me, her flames still on but not burning me. She looked at me with cold, angry eyes and asked, “Sensei, may I punish Saki for upsetting you!” She not only sounded sincere but hopeful.

  Tama looked down at Tristy and said simply, “No, for your mistake, you do one-hundred extra push-ups, sit-ups, and an extra lap around the block now!”

  Before I could say anything, Tristy stood, almost stumbled forward, then fell forward. She then began to do push-ups. She managed to get to fifty before she just passed out. I was genuinely worried Tama would punish her again. But Tama smiled. She gently picked up the no-longer-on-fire Tristy and, after healing her, gently brought her to her bed and laid her down. Anna jumped off Tama and attached to Tristy, and Tristy relaxed further as the spirit healed her even more.

  Tama then stood, walked over, and sat down in front of a plate of fish. She picked up an extra burnt one and held it up to me. “Hungry?”

  I shook my head at the burnt fish and said, “I will make my own, Tama.” She grabbed another raw fish out of her bag, and I shook my head, how big was that bag?

  “Nya, Tama thought Anna was eighty-four, but she must have gotten the numbers wrong again!” Tama said, causing me to freeze and look over at her.

  She looked back at me as she slowly took a bite of the blackened fish. Seriously, how could a literal cat girl eat burnt fish like it was tasty. Tama was a different breed of crazy sometimes.

  “What do you mean you thought she was eighty-four, Tama!” I snapped at her in shock. I had not meant to, but between her eating literal blackened fish like it was gourmet and dropping that she thought Tristy was that old.

  In all fairness, eighty-four for an elf was still considered exceptionally young. Around twelve in elf years. But that is still a far cry from eight! “Nya! Her profile says she is eight-something,” Tama said weakly.

  I sighed and almost fearfully asked, “What profile, Tama?” Tama frowned at me like she was confused. I was confused.

  “The profile!” Tama repeated. She took another bite of her charcoal fish before looking over at Tristy. She stared for what felt like an eternity, then nodded to herself. “Nya, the first number is definitely an eight! But it has a weird symbol at the end and more stuff after,” Tama said.