"It's not like I don't appreciate the tough love, but aside from a clean head, I don't feel this is getting me anywhere. I learned to control the elements before my bladder, yet no matter how hard I try, all I see is water." Morok said.
"Would you like an explanation as well?" Faluel asked Lith and Solus. They knew that her favorite teaching method consisted of throwing them in deep waters until they learned how to d.o.g.g.y paddle rather than spoon-feed them knowledge.
"No, but I could use a few hints." Lith replied. "I can feel the flow of mana but not the surges. Even filling my eyes to the brim with the darkness element is pointless. It only darkens my vision.
"On top of that, every time I get stung, the pain makes it hard to keep my survival instinct under control."
"Very good." Faluel clapped her hands. "You've already given yourself all the hints you need. Just remember what I said during my explanation and piece it together with your own words."
Solus and Lith exchanged a quick look before staring at the Hydra as if she was insane.
"Can we at least use our link? I remember your words and he seems to be onto something. Together we could make it." Solus asked.
"Absolutely not." Faluel said with a firm voice. "You two are more than partners, you are co-dependent. Think with your own head and walk with your own legs or you won't get far in life."
"One last question. Are you sure that the colored streaks in a human's hair work the same as a Hydra's head? Because I don't feel like I have Domination." Solus said.
"Damn sure. Now get back to work. As for you, Moron, do you still want an explanation?" Faluel asked.
Maybe it was because of the constant stream of insults or maybe because, having the same number of opened eyes as Lith, Morok felt some sort of rivalry with him. Whatever the reason, he answered "Glub" even though the open bubble allowed him to speak.
"I'll take that as a no." Faluel sealed it shut again and used Lifestream to recover her dwindling strength.
'Okay, what would Solus say if she was in my head?' Lith thought while trying to remember Faluel's words along with what he had just blurted out in frustration.
'She would tell me to calm down and remind me that this is just an exercise, not a matter of life or death. Then, she would probably repeat both speeches word by word and we would solve this mystery together.'
He took a deep breath, letting the mana acc.u.mulated in his eyes fade as he focused on the riddle. Lith was so lost in his thoughts that when the spell stung him again, he snapped.
Instinct and annoyance turned his eyes black again, releasing a pulse of darkness magic that took control of Faluel's wisp and made it crumble.
"Again." The Hydra conjured another black dot that started to circle around Lith like a shark following its prey.
'Wait a minute. I really am a moron as well. Faluel told us that the faulty techniques are taught to not accidentally reveal Domination when in danger. Which means that we're naturally able to use it at tier zero.
'My black eye is a symptom, not the cause of Domination. I got it the other way around the entire time!' Lith let go of the mana in his eyes and waited for the next attack.
'We are supposed to fail a lot before succeeding!' Solus thought. 'The attacks are supposed to trigger our instinct just like we are supposed to control them rather than blindly repress them.
'Domination must become second nature to us, otherwise it will be pointless in battle. The meditation technique she taught us is too slow to be useful because our enemies are bound to use fast spells that we can't analyze safely.'
She let go of the orange mana in her eyes as well, fighting the pain rather than ignoring it. Solus let herself feel fear, becoming tenser each time the rock cut her stone form.
'Domination isn't about keeping about thinking, it's about reacting the moment you perceive a threat.' They thought in unison as if their mind link was active. 'We must leash out until we manage to recognize the feeling of Domination biting its leash and then learn how to control the amount of mana the ability uses.'
They had gained a solid grasp of the theory but unfortunately for them, putting it into practice required a lot of time and pain. They needed to empty their mind to feel the fleeting moment when fear sparked Domination into action.
Then, they had to learn how to control their impulses in a split second. Too relaxed and the threat would be annihilated by spending twice the mana necessary to cast Faluel's cantrip.
Too tense and they would snuff out Domination before it could do anything, receiving another sting as punishment.
The lesson ended sooner than usual because Faluel had ran out of mana and Lifestream had become useless to her. By the time that happened, Lith and Solus had managed to counter up to three attacks in a row before having to start over.
Morok, instead, sometimes arrived up to six.
"Thank you, master." He gave the exhausted, stinky, and covered in sweat Hydra a deep bow. "You were right. I didn't need an explanation, only to trust myself. You might not be hot, but you sure are an incredible teacher."
Something like grace and elegance was lost on the Tyrant's eyes who by comparing Faluel with Friya, saw the former as an ugly duckling. To make the Hydra's mood even worse, she had meant Dominance as a lesson of humility yet it had ended up nurturing Morok's already overgrown attitude.
Luckily for the Tyrant, she was too tired and too old to care about such small details.
"Seriously, how did you do that?" Lith asked without bothering to hide either his surprise or envy.
"Dude, I'm ashamed of myself for failing to complete the exercise already. Keeping my mind empty and following my gut is something I've done my whole life. Thinking is for the weak." Morok said.
"And yet it's exactly what I've been doing my whole life." Lith nodded.
Due to his paranoia, he would always overthink things and his mind was rarely empty. Even while talking with the Tyrant, he was circulating Fusion Magic and training his vortexes by casting tier one spells.
"Seriously, you should rest a bit." Solus said, yet she didn't fare much better.
Between their mind link and her tower half, Solus's mind was always filled with countless plans. Lith's worries were her own and she constantly searched for a way to relieve his endless to-do list
On top of that, her tower side flooded her brain with information about how to improve each of its floors and abilities that she had to constantly update.
