"Today will be used to see what all of you can do separately, and what I need to work with you on," Captain Zeis says, walking down the line until he stopped in front of Indra, "You will go first, I want you to pierce that targets chest with a lightning spear, without damaging the rest of it,"
The target Captain Zeis was talking about was a bobbing straw golem at the end of the courtyard. It had a red circle drawn on its chest, but the circle was only as large as a baseball. Seeing the size of the circle, Indra was unsure if he could hit it.
"Yes, sir. I'll do my best!" Indra shouts as he steps forward. Raising his hands, Indra condenses his lightning into the shape of a spear, which is then covered in a layer of flames that gives the yellow spear a red hue. Pulling back his arm, Indra tosses the spear with all his might, the flames adding speed to his throw.
"Woah! It's flying so fast," Jason says while everyone's eyes follow the spear as it races across the courtyard. However, Indra begins to lose his control of the spear when it reaches the halfway mark, causing the condensed lightning to lose its shape. When it finally does hit the straw golem, the lightning has lost all of its previous form which causes it to explode upon impact.
"That was... disappointing," Captain Zeis says as burning pieces of the straw golem fall from the sky, "The only good thing about it was the fact that you managed to hit the golem at all,"
Over the next few minutes, Captain Zeis has each of the members attempt the same thing, but only Jason manages to complete the task. Finally, Captain Zeis stands in front of Sydra, not even saying anything to him and just motioning for Sydra to hit the target.
Stepping forward, Sydra activates the lightning aura within his body, feeling the divine lightning fighting with the vortex lightning. Doing his best to separate the two, Sydra creates a mostly golden spear, but it still has a faint trace of darkness.
'Interesting, it seems this is the boy my brother wrote about, the one with an affinity for divine lightning,' Captain Zeis thinks, but his face keeps the serious appearance, revealing none of his true emotions.
Making his way to the same spot everyone else threw their lightning spears from, Sydra aims his spear towards the moving straw golem. Watching its movements, Sydra whips his hand forward, the lightning spear spiraling in the direction of where the straw golem will be next.
'Boom!' The crack of thunder shakes the ground like a golden flash of light zips its way across the courtyard, followed by a trail of black crackling lightning. The spear moves so fast that only Captain Zeis and Jason can watch it fly, the others just knowing that one second a lightning spear was in Sydra's hands, and the next second there was a gaping hole in the middle of the straw golems chest.
"That was crazy!" Jason exclaims, jumping up and down at the sight of the golem falling to the ground, "What was that black lightning that was intertwined with the Divine one?"
'Don't tell me... He can use vortex lightning as well?' Captain Zeis thinks, his eyes still focused on the straw golem, 'At the moment it seems to be hindering his ability to use the divine lightning at its full capacity, but if he trained it, then he very well may be able to match people ranks above him,'
"I'm not sure what the black lightning is, exactly," Sydra says, his face becoming dark, "But I do know that it's a dangerous ability I can't fully control,"
"Alright, now that everyone has gone, I'll be dividing you up to work on different things," Captain Zeis says he motions for several guards that had been watching from the side to come over, "Each one of these men is someone I have trained personally, and they will teaching you one on one in what you need to work the most on,"
"Indra, you'll be working on your distance. Although your spear had good form while close to you, it became unstable the farther it went, most likely caused by the fire added to it," Captain Zeis says, "For that reason, you'll be training with Thomas, who can condense flames to the point they become sturdier than Diomondic Steele,"
Raising his eyebrows, Indra looks over at Thomas, who is creating a wall of flames in front of him. Adding more flames to the wall, Thomas condenses them together, to the point that it becomes impossible to see through them. He then pulls his sword out of its sheath and swings it towards the wall, the sword shattering into pieces as it connects with the wall.
Moving on, Captain Zeis tells everyone else who they will be partnering up with, and the reason why leaving only Jason and Sydra left. Once everyone else has left, Captain Zeis turns to Sydra and Jason, pondering something for a few seconds.
"Jason, your control over lightning is one of the best I have seen in a while, but that's all you have," Captain Zeis says as he pulls out a spatial pouch. Reaching his hand into the pouch, Captain Zeis pulls out seven crystals, each one a different color, "These are aura crystals, which can introduce a new aura into your body,"
Spreading the crystals out, Captain Zeis holds them out to Jason, "Considering your plan to join the Royal Guard after graduating the Academy, I believe offering you this chance will be worth it,"
Looking at the crystals in Captain Zeis's hands, Sydra could feel the aura revolving within them calling out to him. There were few ways a person could acquire a new aura, and those crystals were one of the more reliable ways to do so.
"How do I choose one?" Jason asks, his hand hovering above the crystals. As he waves his hand back and forth, Jason feels one of the crystal calling out to him more than the others, "This one,"
As Jason picks up a green crystal, a gust of wind begins swirling around him, lifting him off the ground. After a few seconds, the wind dies down, and Jason lands back on his feet, a bright smile on his face as the wind aura swirls around his body.
"It seems that you made the right choice," Captain Zeis says, nodding his head in approval, "Now I want you to test your limits with your new ability, and when I come back I want to see something new,"
Sending Jason away, Captain Zeis puts the remaining crystals away before turning to Sydra, "During your turn, I saw you trying to suppress your Vortex Lightning, which caused your spear to be weaker than it could have been. I'm not sure why you're doing this, but I'm willing to teach you a way to control that dangerous ability of yours, that way you can use it to enhance the Divinity Lightning,"
'Should I take him up on his offer? I don't want to always worry about having to limit myself so I don't lose control again,' Sydra thinks, his mind going back to Robert's missing arm. With the opportunity to make sure something like that doesn't happen again, Sydra doesn't hesitate for long before accepting.
"Alright, tell me what I have to do," Sydra says, prepared to complete even the most grueling of tasks in order to improve. Seeing Sydra's look of determination, Captain Zeis feels his respect for the boy growing, and decides to get to work straight away.
"The first thing you have to understand is that the Vortex Lightning and Divinity Lightning are opposing forces, like fire and water," Captain Zeis explains, "But if you manage to fully combine the two, your power will increase ten-fold,"
"What I want you to do is to create to spheres of lightning in each hand, one being of the Vortex attribute, and the other being of the Divinity attribute. Once you have to pure spheres of those attributes, and only those attributes, I want you to fuse them together," Captain Zeis says, mimicking the actions Sydra would have to take.
Following Captain Zeis's orders, Sydra raises both his hands up, with the palms facing the sky. Focusing all his attention on the lightning aura within his body, Sydra directs the Vortex lightning to one hand, and the Divinity lightning to the other, creating two spheres above his palms.
"Very good, now to combine them together," Captain Zeis says, while secretly covering his body with a thin layer of lightning armor.
Bringing his two palms closer together, Sydra feels the devouring power of the Vortex lightning attempting to consume the expanding power of the Divinity lightning, 'Here goes nothing,'
Closing the remaining distance between his palms, Sydra pushes the two spheres together and watches as they swirl around one another, both fighting for dominance. Suddenly, the spheres stop moving for a second, giving Sydra the impression that they had combined.
"It wor..." Before Sydra can finish speaking, the sphere in his hand explodes, sending him flying through the air.