"Last time, I just kind of stood out here and... BOOM! New skill."
"Yeah, and that was incredibly ridiculous!"
"Also, your 'new skill' was just you failing spectacularly."
Rika and Cersei were quick to call Leon out on his confusion. Leon himself knew he'd only gotten lucky with Bloodless.
"Well then, what am I supposed to do? Even if Tsukihi's memory consumption is mana based, there's no incantation for me to intentionally trigger a failure. Not to mention, normal chants don't do anything for me."
"You should just spend more time with me! Yeah! That's it! Just the two of us! I'll try to eat twice a day, but even if I can't, we should still touch each OUCH!"
"Tsukihi!"
Celestine was even quicker to scold Tsukihi, grabbing her by the ears.
"Why must you always make everything so obscene?"
"Don't act like you don't want to do the same!"
"That doesn't matter. There are things reserved for marriage and private life."
"Yeah, but I have to wait for him to marry eight other girls first! He's only at two!"
"You made yourself ninth!"
Tsukihi pouted.
"Duh. I'm a Kitsune."
"Hmmm that might help though..."
Tsukihi shot up.
"Ha!"
"Wait! I'm just saying that when I first learned Bloodless, I was thinking about when Valeria attacked me with Blood Arts."
"Porcupine hug."
"No!"
Valeria interrupted Rika's teasing.
"Hey! Don't say it like that. You told me to hit you with everything!"
"You didn't do anything wrong. I'm just saying that I experienced feeding and the skill before I learned Bloodless. With Tuskihi I only experienced the feeding."
"So we need Tsukihi to attack you with her memory consumption?"
The whole group looked at Tsukihi.
"Besides memory consumption, Kitsune all have a high Mana attribute. There is no way for me to attack you besides eating your memories..."
Another dead end...
"Why don't you focus on your close quarters combat, Farm boy? Bloodless on its own is too slow and relies on its surprise factor."
"Yeah I guess you got a point. Damn I was excited to get a new move. Mind flare, Mind burst, Mana Flux?!"
"You haven't even done anything yet and you're thinking of names!?"
Rika jumped off the bend and walked over to Leon, her short blade at the ready.
"Might as well call it Mindless if you think you can name it with any idea what it would do. Now, come at me, Farm boy!"
"But I don't want to hurt you, Bloodless will seriously..."
One of Rika's metal spikes pierced into Leon's shoulder before slowly getting pushed out by his healing.
"You're getting really full of yourself, Farm boy. You think you can hurt me but you can't even react to a simple bosu."
"Alright, here I come!"
What followed was Rika effortlessly dodging Leon. Ducking, sidestepping or flipping right over him, all while repeatedly throwing her bosus into him.
"You're enjoying this. Also how many of these do you have?!"
Rika threw another one into his gut.
"A lot."
Leon pulled it out and tossed it back to her.
"All right all right. I get your point. I need to improve my fundamentals. Even without Chi to enhance myself, I guess learning some Martial arts would be useful."
"You should focus on grappling to compensate for your lack of Chi and strength. Not every enemy is going to relentlessly rush you down like Estakocra. If you get your hands on them though, Bloodless becomes terrifying."
Like those big dudes in fighting games?
Leon hadn't played much fighting games but he knew of the four archetypes. All rounders, Zoners, Rush down, and lastly: Grapplers.
Bloodless can deal massive damage if I can grab someone. My healing is better than a big health bar and... I guess I'm slow too since no Chi.
"Yeah! I'm surprised I didn't think of that earlier!"
"You're Bloodless and Healing are still good surprise factors but once used or against an informed opponent, you're going to need to fight properly."
Cersei interrupted Rika and Leon's future training schedule.
"That's all fine and dandy, But Rika, you don't know any grappling techniques."
"I know that, I didn't say I was going to teach him. Just that he should learn."
"Do you two know anyone who fights with grappling?"
"Nope."
"Not really."
This is like the 3rd dead end today…
Celestine spoke up through the silence.
"Isn't the Guild Master a Monk? Shouldn't you two know this!"
"Roselyn handles most of our guild papers."
"You're right though, Monks are more generalist but that old man should be able to teach a grapple or two."
Generalist? I mean sticking with fighting games if Nadu's an All Rounder, he should have a grapple button too... What am I saying!?
"If we are going to the guild, I would like to come too! You all fought together against the Imp while all I could do was track Leon."
"Celestine, you being able to track me was a big help."
"I know but still. I have the Essence attribute now like all demons. I want to learn to be an Essence caster without using any succubus skills."
"I don't think your mother is going to be okay with that, but if it's what you want, then we'll train together!"
"Yes!"
"Hey me too! We're both registered as trainees of Rose Thorns and I'm not done teaching you Blood arts. We made a pack and I still believe you can do it!"
"Oh and me too! I'll uhh… learn a 4th class to keep this balanced!"
Leon could hear something die inside of Cersei as Tsuhiki casually mentioned learning a 4th Mana based class.
"But I already know blood arts, so that puts me ahead of everyone."
"You'll have to impose some self restriction. We're going to be a newbie party after all! With Leon being a Tier 5 hunter, we'll take on a weak quest and get stronger! What should we call ourselves? Rose buds? Saplings? Leon's Wives?"
"We're not going to be called my Wives."
"What?! Why not? It's accurate!"
"Not happening!"