Extra's POV: I am the Sixteenth Son

A whole week had crawled by since Lysandra's messy but victorious fight with the Zibrax echo. After watching her struggle and eventually win, both Ares and Maelia had taken their turns in the ring and managed to scrape out their own victories, though neither fight had been what you'd call pretty.

Ares had faced the Aqua Dribblet, and thanks to watching Sylas fight the same creature earlier, he hadn't been caught completely off guard. Still, "not completely off guard" and "actually knowing what you're doing" were two very different things, and his fight had come down to the wire.

Now Ares sat cross-legged on his dorm room floor, eyes closed in his usual morning meditation. The familiar calm settled over him like a warm blanket as he focused on the steady flow of mana through his body. Ever since their first brutal run with Jareth, they'd all been getting stronger. What used to leave them gasping and stumbling after thirty minutes now barely winded them after two full hours. Jareth still pushed them to their limits, but at least those limits kept getting further away.

"Phew!" Ares opened his eyes and stretched as he got to his feet. "That was good. Today's run should feel like a breeze."

He could sense something shifting in his mana core, a warmth building up like water about to boil. He was close to reaching the intermediate mid-level, and it felt like it could happen any day now. The thought made him grin.

The morning bell clanged through the dorms right on schedule. Ares grabbed his training clothes while Roul did the same on the other side of their shared room, and together they headed out for what they expected to be another punishing morning run.

---

When they reached the usual training field, something was different. Jareth was there earlier than normal, which was already suspicious since the man was usually punctual to the second. But what really caught their attention was the woman standing beside him.

Ares, Sylas, Maelia, and Lysandra all gathered in their usual loose formation, but their eyes kept drifting to the stranger.

Once he saw that his entire class was present, Jareth clapped his hands together with a grin that looked just a little too pleased with himself.

"Change of plans today, everyone! You won't be running yourselves into the ground like usual. Instead, we're starting something new, combat training classes."

A few surprised murmurs rippled through the group. Lysandra perked up immediately, while Sylas just raised an eyebrow with his typical calm curiosity.

Jareth turned to the woman beside him and gestured like he was introducing royalty. "This lovely lady is Instructor Sinclair. She'll be your deputy class guardian, which means she gets to help me torture, I mean, 'train' you all."

Sinclair was definitely what you'd call striking. She had the kind of proportions that made people do double-takes, with long white hair that caught the morning light and bright green eyes that seemed to see everything at once. Her black trench coat hung open over a fitted black and white shirt and pants that showed she was built for action, not just show.

She cleared her throat and stepped forward, scanning the four trainees with those sharp green eyes.

"Hello, everyone. I'm Sinclair, just like Sir Jareth said." Her voice was crisp and professional, but there was a hint of warmth underneath it. "From today forward, your morning runs will be replaced with combat lessons. Your bodies are finally strong enough to handle proper martial arts training without falling apart, so there's no point in holding back anymore."

'Finally,' Ares thought. He'd been wondering when they'd get to move beyond just running until they wanted to die.

Without another word, Sinclair and Jareth turned and started walking in a direction none of the trainees had been before. Curious and a little nervous, the four of them followed.

"Where are we going?" Maelia whispered.

"Somewhere we haven't been yet," Sylas replied helpfully, which earned him a small elbow to the ribs.

After a few minutes of walking through parts of the Cradle they'd never seen, they emerged into what could only be described as a bustling market square. The place was alive with activity, older students browsing stalls, instructors examining merchandise, and vendors calling out their wares in voices that carried across the entire area.

There were weapon shops everywhere, their windows and outdoor displays packed with swords, spears, bows, and things Ares couldn't even name. Most of them looked like training weapons, dulled edges and reinforced construction, but they were still real weapons, not the borrowed practice swords they'd been using in the Echovault.

Potion shops lined another section, their windows glowing with bottles of every color imaginable. Some bubbled, some glowed, and some seemed to move on their own like they had tiny creatures swimming inside.

But what really caught everyone's attention were the bluecores. They sat in special display cases, pulsing with steady light like giant glowing hearts. Each pulse sent waves of energy through the air that made the hair on Ares's arms stand up.

The instructors stopped in the middle of the market and turned to face their wide-eyed students.

Jareth's grin was back in full force. "Today, you get to pick out your very own weapons. No more borrowing rusty old swords from the Echo Vault every time you need to fight something. You're officially certified to own personal training weapons."

The trainees had definitely noticed that all the older students carried their own gear. It had been one of those things that made them feel like little kids playing dress-up whenever they had to borrow weapons for their echo fights.

Sinclair stepped forward, clapping her hands once to get their attention. "You can choose any weapon you want and start training to master it. But don't take forever, you have exactly ten minutes to make your decision and complete your purchase."

'Ten minutes to choose a weapon that might save my life someday,' Ares thought. 'No pressure at all.'

The four trainees scattered immediately, each drawn to different sections of the market like iron filings to magnets.

Maelia was the first to make her choice, and it surprised exactly no one who'd been paying attention. During her fight with the echo, she'd been forced to use a sword that felt completely wrong in her hands. Every swing had been awkward, every block a struggle. She'd known right then that close combat wasn't her style.

She headed straight for the archery shop and spent about thirty seconds testing the draw weight on different bows before selecting a sleek recurve bow with a quiver of practice arrows. When she drew the string back experimentally, her whole posture changed, suddenly she looked confident, natural, like she'd found something that actually fit.

"Archer it is," she murmured to herself, grinning.

Sylas, ever the analytical one, had been thinking about this decision for probably longer than the others realized. He'd never felt quite right with a sword either, but for different reasons than Maelia. Swords required you to get close to your enemy, but they also didn't give you the reach advantage of truly long-range weapons. He wanted something that would let him control the distance of a fight.

He chose a spear, not one of the massive, unwieldy ones, but a sleek weapon with perfect balance and a sharp point that gleamed even under the cloudy sky. When he gave it a few experimental thrusts and spins, it moved through the air like it was meant to be there.

"Mid-range combat," he said with satisfaction. "I can work with this."

Lysandra had always known what she wanted. During her fight with the Zibrax, the borrowed sword had felt too heavy, too clunky for her fighting style. She needed something that could move as fast as her lightning, something that wouldn't slow her down when she needed to be quick and precise.

She picked up a rapier and immediately knew it was right. The blade was thin and light, but the balance was perfect. When she gave it a few test thrusts, it moved like an extension of her arm. Fast, precise, deadly in the right hands.

"Perfect," she breathed, twirling the blade experimentally.

That left Ares standing in the middle of the market, looking around at all the options and feeling more lost than he cared to admit.

'This is still so weird,' he thought, watching his friends make their choices with confidence he didn't feel. 'I'm really here, in this world, about to pick a weapon I'll use to fight and maybe kill things. This is my life now.'

The thought hit him harder than he expected. Even though he'd been living in this world for weeks now, even though he had a loving mother and friends and a life here, part of him still felt like he was playing some elaborate game. But weapons made it real. Weapons meant he was planning to fight, and fighting meant...

'I'm going to have to hurt people eventually,' he realized. 'Maybe even kill them.'

But then he thought about his mother's smile, about Junia's worried fussing, about the way Sylas always had his back and how Maelia and Lysandra had become like sisters to him. If they could all live in this world and find happiness, why couldn't he?

'I don't feel comfortable with anything except a sword,' he decided, remembering his fight with the Aqua Dribblet. 'With better physical conditioning and mana control, I can handle enemies at the intermediate mid-level. I just need something that feels right.'

He walked over to a weapon shop that had a barrel full of short swords, nothing fancy, just solid, reliable blades that looked like they could take a beating and keep working. He picked one up and immediately liked the weight of it. Not too heavy, not too light, with a grip that fit his hand like it was made for him.

The shop owner, a grizzled man with arms like tree trunks, took the sword and fitted it with a leather sheath before handing it back. Then he gave Ares a small cube of black stone covered in glowing runes, with a tiny circular indent in the center.

Ares placed the gem from his student ring into the circle, and the familiar holographic message appeared in the air in front of him:

[Ares Eisenklinge has been deducted 50 points for basic short sword]

'Fifty points for a training sword,' he thought as he tucked the weapon through his belt. 'I really hope this thing is worth it.'

He jogged back to the center of the market where Jareth and Sinclair were waiting. The other three had already returned, each looking pleased with their choices.

Maelia had her bow slung over her shoulder and was already fingering the fletching on her arrows. Sylas held his spear with casual expertise, like he'd been born to carry it. Lysandra was practically bouncing on her toes, her rapier hanging elegantly at her side.

"Excellent choices, all of you," Sinclair said, nodding approvingly. "Now, let's go see what you can actually do with those weapons."

Jareth's grin turned predatory. "Oh, this is going to be fun."

The instructors turned and started walking toward yet another section of the Cradle the trainees had never seen before. This time, though, Ares noticed they were heading toward what looked like training grounds, open spaces with practice dummies, sparring circles, and obstacle courses.

'Here we go,' he thought, gripping the handle of his new sword. 'Time to find out if I'm actually cut out for this warrior life.'

Behind him, he could hear Lysandra muttering something about finally getting to use a proper weapon, while Maelia was already planning out shooting positions and Sylas was discussing the reach advantage of spears with himself.

For the first time since arriving in this world, Ares felt like they were all moving forward instead of just trying to survive. It was a good feeling.

Even if he was still terrified about what came next.

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A/N – Was it fire or mid? Don't just vanish—powerstone, comment, review. Let me feel your presence.