"Um..." Ais tried to say something but she couldn't think of anything. She didn't think that they thought so lowly of her fight to the death with the Monster Rex. She also felt a little bit angry since even though she's unfeeling most of the time, she still had pride as a First-Class Adventurer that she had cultivated over the years as an Adventurer.
So when the trio, who couldn't even defeat her, harshly commented, she didn't like it and that includes Riveria too as she asked with a frown, "What do you mean?"
The three of them immediately noticed their mood and Sona immediately stepped forward, "I'm sorry if that offended you. However, that's what we truly think. Do you want to hear the rest?"
Ais and Riveria looked at each other and calmed down a little before facing them, "Please..." Ais muttered. If it was something that could help her improve, then she didn't really care about the mild rudeness.
Sona nodded and started, "Let me ask first. Is that your main weapon?" Sona pointed at her rapier.
Ais, in response, nodded.
"About your wind magic, can you control its shape?"
Ais nodded again.
"I see." Sona thought for a moment before continuing, "Then I won't take back my words that I felt frustrated seeing you fight. Even with untrained eyes, I can tell how incompatible your wind is with your fighting style."
Ais's and Riveria's eyes widened but the two of them didn't speak and just waited for Sona to finish her words.
Seeing that they are ready and willing to listen, Sona continued, "First of all, on the magic side, it seems that you don't understand your 'wind'..." Sona then stopped for a moment before taking it back, "Wait... That's not it. What I mean to say is that you don't want to change your 'wind'."
"...My 'wind'? What's wrong with it?" Ais muttered a question with a little concern appearing over her face. Riveria also became worried as she knew the origin of Ais's wind magic.
"The way you move is sharp and forceful yet your wind is blunt and gentle. Instead of frontal and rushing attacks, I think it would be better for you to stay behind and support the rest with that kind of wind. Your weapon doesn't help either. It seems like a very durable blade, but since your wind is blunt, it doesn't help that much and only works when you don't use your magic."
Aika nodded at Sona words as she added, "That's right. Even your swordsmanship was also almost fully thrown out the window as you just kept throwing yourself at the enemy using your magic by shaping it like a cone. With a rare instance that you used your wind to slash, it still just a blunt attack, just narrower. Even if our Koneko here can't match your wind magic, she can still use it better than you."
After hearing Aika's sudden cue, Koneko hurriedly put up her finger and conjured a small magic circle above it before green light and a slight disturbance was felt all around. A few seconds later, the magic circle disappeared while leaving behind the green light around her index finger. Koneko then swung her finger downwards and a small wind blade shot out from it, grazing Aika's cheeks, nicking her skin, and drawing blood from it.
"Hey! What was that for!?" Aika immediately protested.
"...You suddenly called me out. I was not prepared." Koneko replied with a deadpan face and monotone voice.
"But that doesn't mean that you should aim at me!" Aika took out a bit of her potion and wiped some of it on her face and the small wound disappeared and sighed before going back to the topic, "As you can see, Koneko here can make sharper wind blades than you. You can cut monsters with your 'wind blade' because of the amount of force you put behind your wind, but I think that's just a waste of mana or Mind."
Still not satisfied, Aika added an example, "I even know someone who could use it so well that the Barbarians that spawn en masse around here could be instantly annihilated by just using single wind magic spell that he can cast for a few seconds and he wouldn't have even used half of Mana or Mind that Riveria-san used to annihilate the very same hoard." While saying this, Aika was thinking of Kisuke, 'He can pull that off, right?'
"B-but my magic is enchanting magic. I can only use it around my body and my weapon." Ais tried to defend herself from the scathing criticisms. However, the three of them noticed that Ais didn't argue back what they thought is the most important, the fact that her wind is too 'gentle'. But since it seems that Ais didn't want to talk about it, the trio also chose not to mind it and just focused on her defense.
"Enchantment Magic? Is that what your Falna says?" Sona asked.
Ais became hesitant but still nodded at her question, 'She also has something to say about my magic being enchantment magic?' She thought. Ais is nervous as if she was standing nervously in front of a master. She didn't know why she's getting this feeling from a Level 2, but she couldn't deny this was how she's feeling right now.
"And you stopped yourself from using it in other ways than just being enchantment magic?" Sona gave a follow-up question.
"B-but it's enchantment magic..."
Sona sighed at her answer, "I can't call myself an expert in magic but I can at least tell you one thing about it." She then put on a very serious face and continued, "Magic is a phenomenon where you manipulate mana, either by yourself or with the help of outside forces, to change reality according to your will. Enchantment, Attacking, Defending or any other categories are only there to help you classify your magic and not to lock your magic in that particular classification. That's just a second-rate's mistake of misunderstanding magic. Magic is magic. It can be anything!"
Not just Ais, but also Riveria was affected by her words which essentially called them second-rate magic users. They wonder what would happen if this incident of a Level 2 telling two of the top Adventurers of Orario that they're second-rates with magic, one of them is even the so-called 'Sage of Orario.'
Seeing the weird expression Ais and Riveria were making, Aika feigned a cough to try and dispel the increasingly bizarre atmosphere, "Ahem. Although she said a lot of things, what she's simply saying is that you don't need to limit yourself because of some labels. Only those who're just familiarizing themselves with something are using labels to get started and would sometimes even use it for entirely different purposes once they've achieved mastery."
Although she was trying to lighten the atmosphere, that wasn't happening. Ais and Riveria could only maintain a blank stare with both of them thinking, 'So does that mean Enchantment Magic isn't really Enchantment Magic if you use it differently?' They only became more confused. Kisuke didn't tell Riveria anything about Magic yet despite having some chances to do so because he wanted her to hear it from someone they thought was a lot weaker than them like the trio and laugh at their struggle to understand the new outlook regarding magic.
Editors
28th00
Garan Mayers
Editors and Author's Corner:
28th00: Oh man, that's a smackdown for these system fanatic fools! How terrifying do you think Healing magic is when it's used offensively? It's pretty much Destruction Magic that the Baal's got in Dxd at that point! It sure as hell ain't support magic anymore!
Goyya: It's one of the problems of this world if compared to other worlds. They're too dependent on their stats.