**Platina's POV**
Kaius, seeing how I suddenly became silent, peered at the paper in my hands.
"Wow, I would be careful if I were you. Looks like they hold a grudge," he said nonchalantly, as though it had nothing to do with him.
"Well, I can understand why those girls would be afraid of my getting too close to their handsome Elfin Prince," I pinched his cheek teasingly and felt him pout (that was definitely a pout!). However, I sensed someone glaring at me the moment I did so. I quickly turned around to check, but couldn't pinpoint the source from the hallway full of people. Shrugging it off as my imagination, I walked with Kaius to the classroom.
------
"Finally!" Kaius stretched in his seat as the professor and students walked out the door. It was the last class of the day, and two hours before dinner would be served. We walked back to the dorm in comfortable silence, occasionally punctuated by my teasing about the fan letter he got.
"Well, we have some free time, so maybe I should take a nap," Kaius wondered aloud, but I had other plans for him.
"Oh no you don't. Get changed into something comfortable. You're coming with me to the school ground," I ordered. This must look strange to an outsider, a familiar ordering a master. I chuckled inwardly at the irony, but still maintained a stern appearance.
"Why?"
"You will see." He was reluctant, but he obeyed. I patted him on the head once done as reward, but he stuck out his tongue at me in retort.
"Alright, we will now start our training!" I enthusiastically said. I was eager to do some exercises, since all I've done the past two days was following Kaius around and getting shot in the leg.
"What do you mean 'training'? Why do we need to?" Were his unenthusiastic questions. Couldn't he figure out the answer for himself?
"Kaius, let me ask you, why did we lose yesterday?"
"Because you didn't do your job?" I hit him upside the head, ignoring the slight electric sensation I felt the moment I did so.
"Ow! Stop hitting me, you violent woman!"
"I'll ignore that. Also, I didn't do anything because you told me not to! The reason we lost yesterday was because you were a squishy wizard! Do you know what that means?" I didn't wait for him to answer, "It means all you can do is standing there, throwing out spells and at the same time making yourself completely vulnerable for attacks. Many mages make the mistake of neglecting their defensive and physical offensive ability, and so become completely useless without anyone protecting them." I launched into full lecture mode.
"Question: why couldn't you protect me while I cast spell instead?"
"Jeez, isn't it obvious? How could you ask a mage to protect a mage? That just doesn't make any sense."
"Wait… you're a mage?" He raised an eyebrow questioningly.
"Couldn't you tell?" I thought I looked like a mage. What with the whole long hair and frail figure. My appearance just screamed "MAGE."
"Well, you're pretty violent, so I thought you must be a warrior or a barbarian." I resisted the urge to punch him, I didn't want to prove his point.
"Shut up and start training! First, run around the school ground three times, then do 50 sit-ups and 50 push-ups!"
With some 'persuasions' (aka threatening to beat him to a pulp), Kaius complied under the condition that I was subjected to the same training. I, of course, agreed because this type of training was nothing compared to what I was used to. We trained until dinner time, our bodies exhausted and sweaty. Kaius could only managed to do 30 push-ups and sit-ups, and he complained so much after the second lap around the school that I had no choice but to stop there. Kaius looked like he was about to collapse (he really was too weak!) but still had the energy to wolf down his dinner and stole some from mine.
We fought over the bed like usual and I let him take it this time (he was going to feel so sore tomorrow. Take that!). We fell asleep after an exhausting day and, for the first time in a long while, I actually looked forward to what tomorrow would bring.