A date was soon set for Anthony’s match with Ivan. Svetlana had called him to inform him of when it would take place, and she had also warned him that the next time he decided to have sex in public in her country, she would personally castrate him. He didn’t know how she knew. No one had taken videos of it. The fact that she found out was what really scared him. That woman was scary.
The date for the match was set two weeks out. There was a lot of preparation needed for this match. Not only did they need to find a good location for it take place, but they needed to set up cameras and other equipment to properly record the event. Since it had been a very long time since Ivan had a match with anyone, the event was being highly publicized.
Anthony used the free time to take his women on dates. Sometimes, he took them out together, while other times, he spent time with them one-on-one.
It was nice.
Anthony had never really done the dating scene. Before becoming an incubus, Lilith was the only person he had been intimately involved in, and they spent more time having sex or going out as a group than they did going on individual dates. After becoming an incubus, Anthony had avoided people until Brianna came along, and then they were moving from one disaster to another, so they’d never had a free moment to just relax.
Of course, they also had several lazy days. The Academy Island Embassy had all kinds of amenities, including an indoor pool with a sunroof that managed to collect UV rays and project them in such a way that you got all the benefits of being in the sun without all the downsides. Secilia spent quite a bit of time there when she wasn’t gaming or building something. She seemed to enjoy lounging about while sipping on a pina colada.
At the moment, Anthony was standing in an indoor training courtyard with Trinity, who was teaching him more about nature magic.
“Lots of people think nature magic is simply the act of controlling nature. I know that’s what you think of it, but nature is a lot more than just trees and plants.”
“It sounds like you are saying nature magic is more all-encompassing,” Anthony said.
Trinity was standing before him, dressed in a sexy school teacher outfit of all things. Her tight pencil skirt showed off her panties every time she moved, and her jacket revealed a more than generous portion of cleavage. She also wore glasses, which she would occasionally push up the bridge of her nose.
“That’s exactly what I am saying. Yes, you can control plants of all kinds, but what is nature?”
Anthony had to really ponder that question. He wanted to say that nature was a natural environment like a forest, or a jungle, but he didn’t think that was the answer she wanted.
“Erm…”
Trinity grinned. “Nature is all living things, ranging from microscopic organisms to massive ecosystems. Of course, this includes flora and fauna. But it also includes things the human eyes cannot see.”
“And you can manipulate that?” asked Anthony.
She nodded. “It’s harder to manipulate something microscopic because a lot of magic relies on visualization, but I’ve had a lot of practice, so I can manipulate just about everything.”
“What can you do with microscopic organisms?” asked Anthony, curious.
“Weeeeeell,” she stretched out the word. “I can give you really bad gas by manipulating the microorganisms inside of your microbiome. I can disrupt your immune system to make you susceptible to diseases. I can do all kinds of things.”
Anthony whistled. “That does sound incredible. Why didn’t you do that during our battle with Hendricks and Chloe?”
“Because it’s not practical,” she said. “It actually takes a lot more time, effort, and mana to affect the inside of someone’s body, and it is a lot harder to affect someone who has a high resistance to magic like you, Hendricks, and Chloe.”
“Got it. So it’s possible, but it takes more effort than it’s worth.” Anthony paused. “But that’s interesting. I didn’t realize you could affect so much with nature magic.”
“Most people don’t. The human imagination is wild, but there are some things humans simply can’t imagine since they can’t see it. You can’t see inside the body, so it’s hard to imagine what would happen if you tried to manipulate someone’s insides.”
Anthony nodded along.
He had come to Trinity early this morning to ask for help with his magic. He had realized that during his time battling against the ghouls that he hadn’t used nature magic much at all, which was a shame. He figured he could do some amazing things with it if he worked hard.
“So what would be the best ways to use nature magic?” he asked.
“That depends on what you want to do,” Trinity answered. “I have two different methods for nature magic. Big magic and small magic. Big magic is like… turning trees into massive magical monsters that rampage across the battlefield. Small magic is manipulating little plants around someone’s feet to trip them up.”
“It’s almost like creating a distraction,” Anthony muttered.
“Exactly. Given your current abilities, I think using it to distract and trip up your opponents is the best strategy for you, so that’s what we’re going to practice.”
Anthony skipped to his feet and dusted himself off as Trinity walked just a few feet from him and spread her legs a bit like she was getting ready to attack.
“This is how it’s going to work. We are going to spar, and I am going to try and trip you up with nature magic. You are going to resist and try to counterattack with your own nature magic. Are you ready?”
Anthony nodded and Trinity smiled as she darted forward. Her punch was quite fast, but he was able to avoid it. However, vines quickly sprouted from her arm and tried to latch onto him. He stumbled backward in surprise--only to trip as something became entangled around his leg. He fell onto his backside, somehow turning his fall into a roll, or so he tried. His leg wouldn’t move. He discovered very quickly that it had become wrapped in vines that certainly hadn’t been there before.
Trinity came over with a swift stomp, but Anthony tore the vines with spatial magic and scrambled out of the way. The ground rippled when she stomped down. It was not like an earthquake. Grass quickly grew into long stocks and attempted to wrap around him. Anthony got to his feet and tore the grass apart, but it was surprisingly sturdy.
He grimaced as Trinity came in and launched several punches in quick succession. The grass was latching onto him and that made it hard to move. Trinity was also quite good at hand-to-hand. Her fighting style was almost elegant in its deadly efficiency. One of her shots hit him in the throat, and he gagged before a vine wrapped around his shoulder and yanked him down. He tried to cut it with space, but more vines sprang up and began wrapping around him faster than he could cut them.
Before he could even think of cutting through them again, Trinity was there, straddling his waist and holding her hand to his throat. He eyed her warily as she grinned.
“You see how useful nature magic can be? You don’t need to make it flashy and destructive. Of course, you can. Nature magic can do everything from controlling plants to creating storms, but even something as simple as using vines to trip up your opponent can be highly effective.”
“And that’s why I should learn how to use nature magic properly,” he said with a nod. “Let’s go again.”
“Of course.”
Trinity got off Anthony and the vines retracted as he stood up. Then they started again. And he got his butt handed to him. Again.
Anthony had learned early on that just because he understood how to use a magic did not mean he was good at using it. In order to master the magic his cores granted him, he needed to practice until he had perfected it.
Some magics were also easier to use than others. Space, for example, was something he could wield quite efficiently simply because he could visualize its effects more easily. As weird as it sounded, creating a blade that severed through space was a lot easier than making a plant wrap around an opponent’s limbs.
He dug deep as he and Trinity continued to fight. He reached into his mana and spread it along the ground, attempting to take control of the plants. This required more concentration than making spatial blades. Trinity constantly used his lack of focus to whip his ass. He was beginning to realize the only reason Chloe and Hendricks had won against this woman was because they had fought inside of the base, where the plants were sparse. They wouldn’t have stood a chance if they had left their headquarters even if they fought two-on-one.
Anthony did eventually begin to get the hang of using nature, but he couldn’t do a whole lot with it yet. He could make the grass grow and try to trip Trinity. Sadly, she had much greater knowledge of nature magic than he and was able to override his control over the grass and use it to attack him instead. It was essentially a battle of wills and imagination. Unfortunately for Anthony, Trinity had at least several hundred years to master this power, while he had only just started today.
The hours passed and Anthony eventually found himself lying on his back, gasping for breath as sweat ran down his body, Trinity standing over him with an amused smile.
“That wasn’t bad for a first attempt,” she said.
“Th-thanks…”
He didn’t feel like he did that great, but he understood that he was an amateur fighting a master in her field of expertise. Elves had a natural affinity for nature magic as well, so she not only had more experience than him, but she also had a greater affinity for it than he did. He consoled himself like that until Trinity crawled on top of him and laid down on his chest.
“Aren’t you worried about getting my sweat on you?” asked Anthony.
Trinity griggled. “No. I like the scent of your body. Your stench.”
“Don’t tell me you have a smell fetish,” Anthony muttered.
“I have many fetishes. Smell is just one of them. But it’s not like I just go after any old smell. You just happen to smell very good after you’ve worked up a sweat.”
“Hmmm. It must be my incubus physiology at work.”
“Could be. Either way, I do not intend to remove myself until I’ve had my fill.”
As if to punctuate her words, Trinity began deeply inhaling her scent, the sound echoing around him. It was so loud that he felt a little self-conscious. He almost wanted to lift his head and look around to make sure no one was there to hear the woman sniffing his chest.
“Really, you’re such a pervert,” he muttered.
“Takes one. Sniff sniff. To know one. Sniff sniff. I really do like this scent. It might be my new favorite smell. Sniff sniff.”
Anthony wanted to play the straight man, but he found himself getting amorous. It didn’t help that Trinity was extremely horny right now. He could feel her intense arousal through the bond, and it caused him to reach up and clench her buttcheeks, squeezing them like he was kneading dough.
“Mmm. Yes, just like that. Be rough with me,” Trinity moaned into his ear. “Anthony, are you going to continue? Are you going to get rough with me? Stick that big, fat cock into this wanton elf pussy?”
“You have quite the mouth on you. Maybe I should plug that up first,” Anthony growled.
“You’ll have to plug it deep if you want me to stop talking,” Trinity murmured.
Anthony was already halfway to slipping his hand into her pants--
“ANTHONY!”
--when someone shouted his name. He jerked like he’d been scolded and quickly pushed Trinity off him, attempting to rearrange his clothing and adjust his pants to hide the pitch tent in them. He looked up to find Sasha coming over to them. What did she want?
“Sasha, is something wrong?”
“You are taking me out today! Get showered and get dressed!” Sasha demanded.
“... Huh?”
Anthony’s reply was as verbose as a child with too much brainrot.