Piere already knew about the fact that there was no pure magic for Ango to absorb but he had thought that maybe his unique body would do something about it and they did not want to use the last pure magic crystal, since that wouldn't solve the problem only delay it. the situation seemed severe; Ango now barely had any magic in his body, hence his extreme exhaustion after training with the weapons.
He was swinging the large hammer, trying to mimic what Hawkwood had shown him but he could feel his spine creak when he was doing so.
"No you're doing it wrong boy, you have eyes so use them, see what I'm doing and repeat them" Hawkwood yelled
"You keep say- *Huff huff* saying that teacher, but what am I doing wrong *huff"
"You should go with the weight, now GET ON IT and DON'T STOP"
'Aghh you should get on it, your whole family should get on it, fuck'
…
10 minutes later
Ango was on the ground trying to rest his sore back, and muscles and catch his breath with little snow also beside him, all four toward the sky and her tongue out, imitating Ango.
'This little girl, you making fun of me or are you sympathizing'
He took a few minutes to recover and stood up afterward. He grabbed the heavy hammer, which Hawkwood repeatedly had told him was called a mace, lifted it and put it on his shoulder.
He moved his right foot forward and threw the mace diagonally, syncing the two movements; he was putting his weight behind it and when it nearly reached the ground, he twisted his back and tried to turn his body so he could continue the move set but
"Boy, the wolf could do better than you? How do you not understand it yet? It's so simple, just GO WITH THE FLOW"
Ango's mind suddenly snapped, He let go of the mace mid swing, not caring where it might end up and yelled out loud while spinning
"Then tell me for FUCK'S SAKE, what's the point of this O teacher? I don't get what you mean when you go with the flow, what fucking flow? Why don't you just spit it out? HUH?"
Hawkwood was surprised by the sudden outburst, yes Ango became Angry every now and then but this one came out of nowhere. Then it made Hawkwood think about what the boy was going through, every day he was under high physical pressure, mental pressure in the afternoons and at nights, the dreams when he was asleep and worst of all he had just found out that he might not be able to recover magic hence turning back to an ordinary human.
"HUH? Go on then, tell me if it's so simple, why aren't yo-"
"Alright then grab the mace and listen" Hawkwood calmly said after he realized he was pushing the boy too far.
"What?"
"Grab the mace and listen, I'm about to explain it to you"
"ahhh" Ango made an awkward sound and became aware of his sudden outburst, so he felt ashamed.
'What's wrong with me, he's doing me a favor by teaching me and I just yelled at him? fuck'
"Look, Hawkwo-"
"Grab your mace boy"
"Al- Alright" he looked around and saw his mace a few meters away, lying on the ground.
A few dozens of seconds later he was standing in the same spot, listening to Hawkwood explain
"-So you see you are constantly putting more power into your swing but what when you're about to turn you should relax your muscles and just let the weight of the weapon guide you"
"Just use your triceps a bit to adjust the direction if you feel it's a bit off. The truth is that move sets are not very important"
"Hm? What do you mean teacher?"
"In a battle, you don't get to do most of those moves unless your opponent is unconscious of course. You'll have to dodge, parry, run, change directions and so many other actions that you'll be lucky if you get an attack in, especially in your case. You're physically weaker than other races so you'll probably get overwhelmed"
"I understand"
Hawkwood then moved his shoulders a bit and continued "So for now, try to do the moves and remember to relax your muscles when turning" He was about to tell him to start training again when he suddenly remembered "oh almost forgot, keep in mind that when you're about to hit something or when the weapon is about to connect to something in general, always contract your muscles otherwise the rebound will wrestle the weapon out of your hand or mess your insides"
Ango moved his head a bit to the right and asked "The rebound?"
"You've never felt the rebound when hitting something?" Hawkwood asked with surprise
"Well…I've never attacked anything with a weapon so I don't know"
"Oh I see, then swing the mace and attack the tree over there and see what happens"
"Ahh my arms are not going to break right?"
"Hitting a tree? No. Just do it and see"
Ango walked toward the tree and swung the mace toward it without overthinking the matter.
*Bam
The tree shook but so did Ango's arms and a soft grunt escaped his mouth.
"Agh"
"See? That's called rebound. Piere will probably tell you a bit later about it but let me give you a brief explanation"
"When you push something, hit something or anything similar, there will be a reaction in the exact opposite direction and since this happens instantaneously, you'll feel it traveling through your body. The force of your swing, though a bit dampened will be absorbed by your body, it's like you're hitting yourself and feeling the hit"
"Huh" Ango's mind froze for an instant hearing those words
Hawkwood didn't give it much thought and started explaining again but Ango wasn't listening. The words that Hawwood had just said clicked inside his mind and kept repeating in his head.
'Force .. opposite direction… dampen…absorb'
'Force .. opposite direction… dampen…absorb'
'Force .. opposite direction…absorb'
And then he muttered "I got it"
"What? I didn't hear you"
"I GOT IT, This should work, I might be able to absorb magic" and he bolted toward the wooden house with little snow following him.
Hawkwood was surprised at first but his expression changed to one of elation the next instant and he ran after Ango a
…
"Professor, PROFESSOR I GOT IT I GOT IT" Ango yelled as he kicked the door open
*Boom
"FUCK..WHAT? CAN'T YOU KNOCK" Piere's face looked contorted and his voice carried a tone of anger, another one of his experiments had failed but this time because he was interrupted.
"I got it I might be able to do it" Ango repeated without caring for Piere's anger
"GOT WHAT THIS BETTER BE-"
"I might be able to absorb magic"
"What???" It took a moment for Piere to process that, but when he did, his contorted face changed once more now looking like someone who had found water in the desert.
"Tell me what you found out lad, out with it fast"
Ango started explaining "Since there is no pure magic around us, I can use the elemental magics to do it"
Piere looked at him like he was dumb "If you could absorb elemental magic like that, you would have done it before, did you hit him too hard Hawkwood?"
"No no no professor, look, since elemental magic is pure magic that has changed to fit the environment, I might be able to change it back to pure magic"
"Huh?... hm.. what do you have in mind lad"
"Lightning energy,. Remember how I created lightning? If I can visualize a way for the balls that are carrying the magic to stop then only the magic will remain it won't be lightning energy anymore, it will be pure magic, I'LL BE ABLE TO ABSORB THAT" Ango excitedly said
Piere's eyes opened wide and he started to think about the possibility, stroking his beard unconsciously. After a few seconds he muttered "It might be possible, it really might but first we need to check something"
He quickly walked to a pouch on a desk a few meters away and took out the remaining pure magic crystal then walked back to Ango and held it apart from him.
"What is it professor? What do we need to check?"
"For your idea to be possible, you'll need to be able to control pure magic outside of your own body which shouldn't be possible for you, that's something exclusive to people born with tier 3 mana and above, so we need to check it first, otherwise how would you even be able to do it?"
"Ah.. professor? Won't the body naturally draw the magic in? I mean I didn't visualize the crystal's magic entering me and I don't think you draw magic in consciously"
Pier froze for a second and then clawed at his beard "Hahaha I forgot, yes you're probably right, and we won't be able to test with the crystal that was my mistake"
"Why can't we do it with the crystal?" Ango knew he was probably right so he wanted to know why they couldn't test it on the crystal
"Well.. magic crystals are not crystals that hold magic inside them, they are entirely made up of that particular magical energy and a little bit of impurity; that's why the one you absorbed when you arrived here turned to dust and didn't break into pieces"
"Ohhh"
"Enough talk, get to it, I'm not letting my experiment's sacrifice be for nothing"
…
It took Ango a few minutes to think of what to do, but he reached a conclusion and was trying to see if it would work at that moment.
He had decided to send the little bit of mana that he had inside him toward an area of the house that was filled with lightning energy, he could feel it. to be safe he sat near that spot and stretched his hand toward that faint cloud of magic, his palm less than a meter away from the mass.
The strand of mana moved from his palm according to his vision and reached the cloud, that was still connected to him. He then closed his eyes and tried to visualize the process.
Seconds passed
Minutes passed
After ten minutes Ango completed the visualization. In his mind he was imagining his mana like a wire with small balls inside it that was trying to connect with the balls that were pushing against each other in the cloud.
When the tip of his 'wire' made contact with the cloud, a ball suddenly hit the it's tip, the energy was transferred to the strand of mana causing a small bit of the cloud to dissipate. He knew the process will be instantaneous so he had already prepared the rest.
The balls pushed each other with such a speed that Ango would not have been able to react or do anything if Piere had not warned him about the speed of lightning, but when the energy passed into the last one it did not move; The last one was firmly held into place in Ango's mind.
The energy that was using the balls as a vehicle was thrown out of the ball, a bluish mist moving forward toward Ango's palm and then it was sucked into it.
Ango immediately felt it, the small gaseous energy fitting itself into his mana veins, traveling toward his nape and then he couldn't distinguish it anymore, it was now his mana.
"I did it, it's possible, my mana increased"
Piere who had been staring intently at Ango yelled out loud while jumping
"YESS" the excitement and pure passion on his face were contagious, causing Hawkwood to laugh like a child and Little snow to stand on her hind legs and jump.
After a few seconds of jumping around Piere looked at Ango and told him "Don't stop now lad, continue, do it as much as you can"
After his exclamation, a thought appeared in Ango's head and he wanted to do it.
"Actually professor, why don't I do it with you instead?"