[Zorolo] Mahalia's training

Mahalia closed her eyes for a second as she passed through the odd door. She came into a room beyond it, but it didn’t look like one. It was another forest; gray sand covered the floor while a scraggily mass of black trees lined paths with their branches going every which way, but mostly blocking the faintly glowing, dark blue sky that was the ceiling.

She instantly looked worried, Why am I here…?

The man in armor spoke up, possibly noticing her expression, “ Are you all right, miss?”

The shapeshifter just nodded yes, while the man spoke again “Let me help you down…” She took the hand he offered to her and helped her climb down from the horse, which he gently calmed down after it whinnied slightly. Besides his voice and the horse’s sudden snort, there was no other sound--or people for that matter.

“I better put Mannie into one of the stalls,” he looked at her again, “Why don’t you come with me? I could tell you about the Dome along the way.” The solider smiled at her, while the teen just looked around at the dark hallways, noticing fog on the horizon and what appeared to be chained doors sticking out of the trees.

Mahalia nodded and began to follow them, as he walked down a hallway, but slowed down to let her keep up with him. “This is the Dome, like I said earlier. It… connects places together, like a home does, but with many rooms. Some rooms here however, move around, while a few others do not. The ones that do not move are… a healing area and a garden room. Does this make any sense to you, Miss Mahalia?”

She broke her glance from the dark shadows around them, “I… think so…”

The armored man nodded and continued, “Some rooms in the Dome are where teachers and students live… Here we are, the stables.” She looked over to see a pair of large, gray, wooden doors with iron ring handles on them. There were also two large rectangles cut out of the top part of the door, forming windows, which more wood in the form of an odd structure stood. “I’ll come back in a moment,” he stated as he opened one door and lead Mannie through it.

The teen stayed outside, looking at the gnarled trees, with their claw like branches. It wasn’t very dark in the halls, due to the glowing dark blue sky above, but it mimicked nighttime. She didn’t have to wait long, a creaking of the door made her look up as the soldier came out finally. “Now, I need to find someone… Why don’t you come along, miss?”

The shapeshifter just nodded, and followed him as he walked down the hallway, not seeming to notice how the corridor was. She still felt skittish though, not knowing where she was going, but thankful that the villagers weren‘t able to find her. I hope the other man is ok…

Well, I've finally returned to teaching, and it's great to have you as my first student back, Wispy. :3 Let's get started--

An issue with sentence structure here:

It was another forest, gray sand covered the floor while a scraggily mass of black trees lined paths with their branches going every which way, but mostly blocking the faintly glowing, dark blue sky that was the ceiling.

You have two independent clauses (essentially, parts of a sentence that could stand on their own) here, with not much to connect them together. The two separate ideas need something more to make them flow into one complete sentence--if you read it aloud, that may help you notice that it sounds a little awkward. I'd suggest sticking a semicolon where I've bolded the comma to fix the problem. If you have any questions about why this needs to be changed, let me know. I may be a little rusty in my explanations. ^^;;

The sentence overall is also a bit wordy, but we'll leave it be for now, and see if the same problem comes up later. I don't want to overwhelm you with too much all at once.

Another little grammatical thing:

Besides his voice and the horse’s sudden snort, there was no other sound or people for that matter.

This sentence could be structured a little better as well. The "or people" part is a new idea, not a sound, like Hunter's voice or Mannie's snort. It's a realization Mahalia's making, and should stand out from the rest, and be set off from it a little. I'd suggest changing it to read like this:

Besides his voice and the horse’s sudden snort, there was no other sound--or people, for that matter.

Capitalization error here:

“I better put Mannie into one of the stalls,” He looked at her again, “Why don’t you come with me? I could tell you about the Dome along the way.”

This is a very common mistake. If your dialogue ends in a comma, and/or if the sentence continues on outside of the quotation marks, you should not capitalize the first letter of the first word outside the quotes, unless it is a name or other proper noun. It's still all part of one sentence, quotes or not, so capitalizing that letter there would just be like randomly capitalizing a letter in the middle of a sentence like: "Jimmy went to the store and He bought some bread."

Here are some more examples to help you with this idea--

Correct sentences:

"What are you doing?" she asked Tom.

"Let's go to the movies!" he yelled.

"I think so," the woman said.

Incorrect sentences:

"Do you want to get lunch?" He asked.

"Come on, hurry up!" The boy yelled.

Applying this rule, your sentence should be changed to:

“I better put Mannie into one of the stalls,” he looked at her again, “Why don’t you come with me? I could tell you about the Dome along the way.”

A problem similar to the first one I pointed out shows up here:

The ones that do not move are… a healing area, a garden room. Does this make any sense to you, Miss Mahalia?”

You need the word "and" between these two bolded places here to connect them properly.

That's all I'll point out for now. :] In general, you did okay with portraying Hunter, even though he was a little bit off. His answers would be more long-winded and descriptive, and he would have mentioned more about the teaching that goes on in the Dome, and how he used to teach, but... understandably, it will take more practice and getting to know him before I could really expect you to get all that down, so don't worry yourself over that. ^^;;

Fix the couple of errors I've pointed out, and then post here to let me know you're ready for your next assignment. ^__^

I fixed all of the problems in my post.

Green door, green door, Sir Zorlo would most certainly be behind a green door...

Hunter's armored boots thumped along the hall, as if with a mind of their own. Walking the halls of the Dome was still habit--it was still routine, and he barely had to pay the slightest attention to know where he was headed. It had... felt like so long since he was last teaching, as Cadenza's substitute, and later, her assistant... would it be any different now, under a different teacher?

He will surely run his class in a different manner... Lady Cadenza and Sir Zorlo disagree on so many things, but... he will be a good person to work under, without a doubt.

With an optimistic spring in his step, the prince turned the corner, finding the very door he'd been searching for. This building always has ways of rewarding you... making certain things easy, others hard. Shifting the halls.

Reminiscing coming to an end, he politely knocked on the green slab, smiling back at Mahalia as they waited. The door swung open moments later--but there was no one at eye-level. Hunter glanced down, out of habit, to see that it was not Zorlo, but his monkey friend Armond who answered the door, squeaking out a series of noises and presenting Hunter with a piece of parchment.

When Mahalia gave the prince a puzzled look, he just laughed a little and explained, "This creature is far more intelligent than he looks--he must have recognized me immediately. He is a companion of a teacher here named Zorlo, and... since he is greeting us, I imagine that means the good fellow is out at this time."

The girl seemed a little disheartened that they couldn't find who they were looking for. Hunter's smile, however, remained.

"This parchment here that he has left tells me he has been expecting me! He looks forward to having me work as an assistant teacher here once again, and says that I may take whomever I please as a student. He will consult with me about them later. Do you know what this means, milady?"

Mahalia shook her head, still distracted by all the new sights in the hall. It was hard to listen to everything Hunter rattled off at one time.

"It means I may instruct you in some self-defense! And, in the meanwhile, we can also find you someone who's well-versed in the ways of shapeshifting... and methinks perhaps some research about the topic in the library couldn't hurt too, am I right? First though, we should find you some living quarters. Sir Zorlo has left me a map here showing me the way to a room I may give a student..."

OoC: And there's your lesson. Have Mahalia and Hunter find Mahalia's Dome room, and describe it in detail. Be sure to cover any of the girl's thoughts and opinions about it, and remember to make it highly-customized to her personal tastes, needs, etc.! No word minimum--just be creative and have fun. :3

Hunter looked down the hall, into the fog, “This way, milady.” He then walked past four dark stained and chained, wooden doors. Mahalia followed slowly behind him, before looking down another corridor as they went past it. The halls were still the same as when she had entered the Dome; a dead forest with gray sand as its floor.

She heard muttering of some kind, but it was too faint to make out, before she looked at the armored man again. He was talking to himself, or maybe her, but she wasn’t paying attention enough to catch it.

Eventually, after going down four other hallways and only seeing chained door after chained door, the solider stopped and looked over to his right. “This is your room, Miss Mahalia.” The shapeshifter looked also, but wished that she hadn’t.

A mirror was hung on a door in the shape of a tree; its branches could be seen behind the dark, almost black stained, wooden door. She heard Hunter finally, “That’s interesting.”

Mahalia lowered her head, No it’s not… It’s my clan’s symbol… I‘ve been exiled from it, yet it‘s there anyway…

The teen didn’t even want to open the door now, but the man looked back at her for a moment, and seemed concerned. “Are you alright, Miss?”

She just nodded slightly. She felt tired now, and reluctantly moved towards the door and opened it.

The cursed shapeshifter winced at the sudden light in the ‘room’, since she was now used to the darkness of the halls. Her room was a potion of forest, minus the single structure off to the left. The forest was still aglow, despite the gradual approach of evening. Most of the trees had a slight orange tint to them now, before a breeze blew past as she walked into the room more, awestruck. The breeze made a piece of fabric flail in it, which was attached to a pole that was stuck in the ground. A pale gray image of a tree, exactly like the mirrored one on the door was present, surrounded by an orange circle.

Why…? Mahalia stopped looking at it, since she was getting more upset, but not showing it as she moved towards the structure on her left. The building seemed to be made out of logs, but it had a flat, mud like surface for each of the walls, with wooden beams at the corners. The roof was made out of woven leaves and sticks, which stayed in place, despite the wind. There was only one window, which was above the door, which was just a hole in the wall. The building on the outside was twelve feet long by ten feet wide

The whole structure stood underneath a large oak tree, with a dull orange fabric pulled away from the opening that served as the entrance. With the wind blowing outside, it was a bit warmer within. There was just one room inside. A bed, made out of grass and wrapped in cloth, just stood about three inches off of the ground. It had a thick fabric draped over it, as well as a smaller bundle of grass acting as a pillow. The bed was against the right wall, upon entering. On the opposite side was a area that was ringed by stones, possibly to build a fire on. The room wasn’t very wide, being only nine feet wide by eleven feet long. There was only a medium wooden box against the back wall, with the same fabric emblem as the one outside, hanging above the box by some rope. The box was stained a medium, almost dark red color, and was three feet long by a foot wide with a foot and a half as it‘s depth. The entire ground was mostly dirt, minus the area where the bed was, a rug of sorts was made out of large leaves stitched together.

The teen walked into the room of the building, before sitting on the leaf rug and leaned against the wall. She stared at the fabric, it was almost glowing in the evening light, that was on the back wall. It’s like… the Dome doesn’t want me to forget what happened… back at my clan‘s home… She pulled up her legs and buried her head in her arms, wanting to cry as the memory came back. Why am I here…?

Let's get this going!

An error with an apostrophe here:

The halls were still the same as when she had entered the Dome; a dead forest with gray sand as it’s floor.

The bolded word you've used here is the wrong form of "it"--it's actually a contraction that means "it is". This is a widely-made error. What you want is the possessive form, "its", which is written without the apostrophe, as in "the dog wagged its tail."

This error repeats itself in at least one other place in the post, so skim through to find any instances of it, and fix them.

Small capitalization error here:

“This is your room, miss Mahalia.”

When using a title in a direct address, you should capitalize the first letter. You always capitalize the titles "Mr." and "Mrs.", don't you? Miss is the same kind of thing. Any title coming before a name should always be capitalized.

This error also repeats itself elsewhere, so find those mistakes and fix them too.

A problem with clarity here:

The teen didn’t even want to open the door now, but he looked back at her for a moment, and seemed concerned. “Are you alright, miss?” She just nodded slightly. She felt tired now, and reluctantly moved towards the door and opened it.

You change to a pronoun here to refer to Hunter, but the last person to be referred to by a proper, more informative noun ("the teen") is Mahalia, the subject of the sentence. This may make the reader think the pronoun "he" that follows after is referring to her, and not Hunter. I would change the bolded he to a noun like "the man" to help make things clearer.

Also, split her reaction into a new paragraph, so that it reads like this, also for the sake of making who is doing what clearer:

The teen didn’t even want to open the door now, but the man looked back at her for a moment, and seemed concerned. “Are you alright, Miss?”

She just nodded slightly. She felt tired now, and reluctantly moved towards the door and opened it.

Awkward phrasing here:

The forest was still aglow, despite evening was starting to come.

The bolded part sounds a little strange/too wordy. Try reading it aloud to see if you can get what I mean. I'd rephrase it as:

The forest was still aglow, despite the gradual approach of evening.

Another similar case here:

Why…? Mahalia stopped looking at it, since she was getting more upset, despite not showing it and moved towards the structure on her left.

I think you've used the word despite a little too much, and a little too close to the last time you did. Why not opt for the simpler word "but"? It fits nicely here, and lets the sentence flow a bit smoother.

I'd also change the underlined "and" to "as she", for the sake of better flow as well.

I'll pause here to let you fix the errors I've pointed out so far. ^^;; I don't want to overwhelm you with too much at one time. Post here to let me know when you're ready to go on, and I'll continue grading your post. :]

I fixed the errors that you pointed out.

Sorry for such a long day. <____<;; My memory is awful. But I see no other errors in the rest of your post, so we can move on. ^^

Time for your next lesson~

IC:
There were the jerking, gasping sounds of someone quietly sobbing, muffled by a pillow. Those sounds tugged at Hunter's heart--he couldn't bear to stand outside the room and listen to them any longer. A girl's crying was one of those things that softened anyone's heart, he always thought.

He stood in the doorway, looking down at his boots, and in a soft voice, called out, "May I enter, Miss Mahalia...?"

There was no answer, the sounds of sobbing just became more muffled by the pillow, as if the girl were trying to hide them from him. Hunter kept his head bowed low, and strode slowly in, over the soft dirt and crunchy leaf rug. He came to a stop a respectful distance from the crying girl on the bed, frowning a little, but still looking away. He needed to find the right words here... ones that would comfort her, even though he didn't know what was wrong... words that would stop the tears. Oh, what perfect words those would be, he thought. He couldn't find them.

"If... there is something troubling you, milady... perhaps... you could tell me about it...?" was the best he could think of, trying to put on a reassuring smile. He sat down in the dirt, on his princely cape without a care for sullying it, and for the first time, looked up at her with his earnest, hazel eyes. And he waited.

OoC: Here, I'd like you to have a conversation take place between Mahalia and Hunter--she'll explain what about the room bothers or, or will just evade his questions, whichever you feel she would more likely do. Either way, this exercise should help you earn to portray another's characters a little better. Try your best and don't worry if it's not perfect. ^^ After the conversation, Hunter will bid her good night and tell her they will start her physical training in the morning.

"If... there is something troubling you, milady... perhaps... you could tell me about it...?"

Her sobs came to a stop, like a brief calm during a storm, as she slowly got up, still leaving the burden of the weight on her arms, then shifted around so that she could kneel down to sit and try to compose herself. Mahalia's face had some dark pink streaks coming down from her eyes, while another pink blotch began to fade, the side that rested on the pillow. The teen's voice came out hushed, “I could... but...” She held onto her right arm and looked away from him, before lowering her head.

“Miss Mahalia, I'm your teacher now... you're going to have to trust me.” Hunter looked at the spot she had focused on for a moment, “At least let me know what's bothering you, so maybe I can help with it...?” He looked back at her and smiled.

The gray and red-eyed female glanced back at him, silently, before lowering her head down. I've heard that so many times before... but maybe... “I...guess I could... It's the symbol on the wall mostly... it's the icon of my clan... Mirror Yggdrasil.”

The prince nodded, “That's a nice name and makes some sense too. Now, what about the symbol is making you cry, milady?”

“It's...” She suddenly choked up and shook as she sobbed again, a couple of drops darkening the cloth of her pants.

The man seemed to jump up in a way and gently put his arm around her shoulders, “...Don't cry Miss Mahalia, I might not...know what's wrong...but it can't be that bad...?”

The shapeshifter spoke through the sobbing, choking on the words every now and then, “I...I killed someone...couldn't control my form...their arm...blood...” Her crying wails quickly stopped her from speaking again.

Hunter stayed quiet during this, still trying to comfort her. “There, there. It was an accident, as far as I can tell... like you said, you had no control over what you did. I've killed people in my fair share...but mine was a different sort, I had to.”

The teen's crying began to slow down and stopped shaking, “I was exiled possibly for that reason though...”

He smiled faintly, “I've sort of chose to be exiled from a place on my own, it's not an common thing exile is...but it let us meet, correct?”

She glanced over at him out of the corner of her eyes, “Yes...” before raising her head back up.

An owl hooted from outside, as the light from the door and window almost vanished. Hunter looked out of the square window above the hut's door, “It's night already,” and turned back to Mahalia, “Why don't you try and get some rest...? I hope...you don't linger on that memory. It's in the past." With that, the solider slowly got up and walked towards the doorway, before looking back at her and smiling, “We can start your training tomorrow... I hope you feel better in the morning.” He drew the fabric across the opening, and his footsteps faded away, as her actual room door opened and closed.

The shapeshifter shifted her body again, this time lying down on the bed, and looked at the dark blue sky from the window as she quickly fell asleep.

Here we go~!

First here, just a stylistic thing I want to talk about:

Her sobbing stopped momentarily as she slowly got up, still leaning on her arms, then shifted around so that her legs were underneath the shapeshifter as she sat on the back of them. Mahalia's face had some dark pink streaks coming down from her eyes, while another pink blotch began to fade, the side that rested on the pillow. The teen's voice came out hushed, “I could... but...” She held onto her right arm and looked away from him, before lowering her head.

You do a very good job of showing here instead of telling, with Mahalia's body language. But I still feel like the description's a little flat... a little too much stating of the plain facts, "she did this, her arm moved like that" without any more feeling or description to them. One way to go about helping this is to choose more specific action words, ones that carry more of a meaning and weight to them:

Her sobbing stopped momentarily as she slowly got up, still leaning on her arms, then shifted around so that her legs were underneath the shapeshifter as she sat on the back of them.

Here, maybe instead you could say:

Her sobs came to a stop, like a brief calm during a storm, as she slowly got up, still leaving the burden of the weight on her arms, then shifted around so that she could kneel down to sit and try to compose herself.

Words like "slump", "kneel", and "huddle" carry more of a feeling with them then words like "sit" or "lean". Kneeling can show respect, or a more composed outward appearance than someone laying down and crying, for example. Try editing a few of the sentences in that paragraph I quoted to see if you can apply what I said.

A comma splice here:

She suddenly choked up and shook as she sobbed again, a couple of drops darkened the cloth of her pants.

Read this sentence aloud to yourself--do you notice that it doesn't quite flow? You have two independent sentences here that could stand alone, one beginning with "She suddenly" and the other at "A couple of", without any sort of proper connector between them. To correct this, there are many solutions. I'll show you a few:

She suddenly choked up and shook as she sobbed again, a couple of drops darkening the cloth of her pants.

You could change the word I bolded, "darkened", to "darkening", and that will make it so that the second sentence can no longer stand on its own. It's now dependent--it needs to be attached to a independent clause/sentence, like the part before the comma. This is the best solution in this situation, I'd say.

She suddenly choked up and shook as she sobbed again, and a couple of drops darkened the cloth of her pants.

...but you could also fix it this way. A comma + a conjunction allows you to stick two independent sentences together like this without an issue.

She suddenly choked up and shook as she sobbed again; a couple of drops darkened the cloth of her pants.

Another option is a semicolon, for when you don't want to make things too wordy with a conjunction, but perhaps you don't want to change your wording either for some reason. Another solution I tend to use, although I can't guarantee you that it's 100% grammatically correct, is using a dash (like this "--") in place of the semicolon.

Just a nitpick here:

The man seemed to jump up in a way and gently put his right arm around her shoulders, “...Don't cry Miss Mahalia, I might not...know what's wrong...but it can't be that bad...?”

Putting details are good, but sometimes they're not necessary and can just detract from a sentence or make it needlessly wordy. Here, it's not really important which arm Hunter put around Mahalia, just that he put one around her. So the specification that it was his "right" arm isn't really needed. ^^;;

And that's all the errors I see in this post. Great job! ^___^ You did very well with Hunter's personality, I was impressed. : D His medieval speech is kind of hard to pin down just right, but I feel like you did well enough with making him speak more politely and formally than most. And he was comforting and positive, as he should be. Very nice job. :]

Once you finish fixing up the few errors I pointed out, we'll move on to your next lesson. Let me know if you have any questions while you're making your edits.

Ok. I've fixed all the errors that you pointed out.

Okie dokey then, now for your next lesson. :3 As said before, Hunter will wake Mahalia up, and lead her to a training room to begin teaching her how to defend herself. Be sure to continue portraying him as best you can--he should ask her how she slept, and generally be gentle and show concern as always.

When they arrive, you may make the training room any way you wish--it can be a forest, a desert, a city, a room up in the clouds--anything. ^^ Hunter will begin by presenting Mahalia with a shield to use to block his attacks as he shoots slingshot bullets, arrows, and various other long-range weapons stored in the room for her to practice against. She doesn't have to shield/block necessarily--she can dodge or roll out of the way, anything you want. You have freedom to decide what she does. After some practice with blocking against long-range, Hunter will draw his spear and announce it's time to begin close-range practice. We'll stop there for now. No word minimum.

Mahalia woke with a start in the middle of the night, due to her memory of her exile. Sitting up in the bed, she slowly calmed down after panicking and not knowing where she was. I know I have to stop thinking about it, but it just keeps coming back… The cursed shapeshifter stood up and looked into the wooden trunk. She was unable to see anything inside, but felt around cautiously, and pulled out two gray leather strips. “Hm… interesting.”

The teen then walked outside, to where she could see, and looked around where the hut was at. “I‘m going to have to look around a bit.” Gathering a bit of her hair, she then tied the rest of her hair back into the original two pigtails. Well… since I’m going to be training tomorrow, might a well make sure it doesn’t get in my face, like I was taught. Recalling what she knew, as she looked at the banner as it flailed in the night wind.

The shapeshifter yawned, and slipped back into the hut to sleep for the rest of the night.

------

A single sound caused her to bolt upright, and looked around cautiously, until she heard Hunter come into her room. She stood up as he entered the hut, “You’re a light sleeper I would guess. Well, we’ll be heading out for your training today, Miss Mahalia.” Nodding, she watched him walk off, but the solider waited for her outside of her room’s door.

Mahalia noticed that the halls were the same seemingly dead and sandy forest. “You’ve changed your hair, milady. Why is that? “

“…It’s something from when I was learning with my clan.”

Hunter blinked for a moment, “So, you’ve trained before?”

After they turned a corner, she spoke up again, “ No, I just observed. I’m… to scared and skittish to actually fight, so the teachers let me just watch.”

He nodded, “How was your night?”

It looked like they were walking along a tunnel through the forest, with no doors anywhere in sight. The teen looked back to her teacher again, “Good… except that I woke up once. Recalled what happened when I was exiled…” she lowered her head for a moment.

The armored man smiled gently, and placed a hand on her shoulder, “Everything’s fine. There’s no need to think about what happened, milady. It seems we‘re here too.” He was looking over at a large, gray tree and pulled part of the trunk aside. She just watched, as he entered the room inside of it, motioning for her to follow.

Setting foot into the room kind of shocked her, it appeared to be nighttime here. That was mostly due to how choked up the overhead trees were. Torches lined a path deeper into the dense woods, which Hunter was already moved along, but looked back and waited for her, “There’s nothing wrong, Miss Mahalia. Come along now.” The teen quickly walked into the room, and heard the door shut behind her, following her teacher into the forest.

They came out into an overgrown clearing, which also had a worn and run-down ruins of a shack standing to the end of it, off to their left. There was a rack of various weapons, which easily stood out, due to they looked brand new. The solider moved over to the shack, and vanished from her view after he moved away from the rack, a bow and a long bag slung over his shoulders.

He then walked back near her, and motioned her to enter the clearing as well, “We’ll start with long ranged training first, milady. I would like to see how well you can dodge, but you’ll be needing this,” he held out a small round shield for Mahalia to take. After she waded into the clearing, having a bit of difficulty since the grass was almost past her waist. The teen took the shield and then moved away from Hunter, as he has motioned her to. “Now, I want you to hold the shield up with your left arm, just put your arm through the slings on the back.” The shapeshifter nodded and did as she was told. “Good. To block, you raise the shield up in front of you. I will be firing some shots at you from my slingshot,” He then showed her a Y-shaped piece of wood, with some sort of band going across it, “or this bow I have. I may also shift into using a throwing spear or a random knife. Do not worry though, miss. I will not be trying to hurt you, unless you are unable to dodge, which I hope does not happen.”

She nodded again, and took a slight stance, as she recalled watching the other shapeshifter students do. Hunter started out with his slingshot, and fired a pellet at her, which clinked off of the metal center of her shield, “Mahalia, don’t just stand still, you may get hurt if you don’t move.”

The teen nodded again, and closed her eyes for a moment, seeming to be calming herself down since she was a bit nervous. Opening her eyes again, the cursed shapeshifter seemed different, mostly looking a bit serious. As her teacher fired the next shot, she leapt away, and he quickly followed her with multiple shots now. She weaved around them easily, as if they weren’t there. More pellets flew towards her, but they always hit air, due to her jumping away.

The armored man then put the sling shot away, and removed the bow from his shoulder, and placed what looked like a stick into the crescent moon-shaped weapon. “These arrows are blunt, but they can injure you, so be careful.” With that, he fired the first arrow at her, and she responded by doing something strange. She threw the shield at the arrow, which stopped both in midair.

He looked shocked for a moment, before he nodded and drew another arrow back and fired it towards her. She back-flipped clear over the arrow, and another sailed over her head as she landed. More arrows sailed towards her again and again, which always failed to hit her as she weaved around them fluidly. “Very interesting, Mahalia. You seem to be doing just fine.” Hunter then bent down, and came back up without the bow in hand. Instead, he held a spear, “Let’s try some close range now. Close combat, if you will.”

She nodded, and spoke without any worry in her voice now, “That’s fine with me, sir.”