Side Story: Amy/Jake/Yuzu

“Jake, you are still my boyfriend, right?” Amy asked through narrowed eyes, her arms comfortably wrapped around Yuzu while she addressed the other with them.

“I mean, unless I’ve been demoted and nobody mentioned it to me, yeah.”

“Yeah, of course,” Amy went on. “We’re intimate, we go on dates when we have time, and occasionally, you even try to be a little romantic, even if me and Yuzu are both mainly filling our desires on that front together-”

“I’m sorry I suck at being romantic, I’ll try harder-”

“Not actually the point where this is going,” Amy sighed. “Why is it that, despite being your girlfriend, I’m constantly put in charge of babysitting you?”

“Oh, because you’re the responsible one, obviously.”

“And trustworthy,” Yuzu added, both of them leaving Amy to sigh.

“And yet, despite those facts, you’re still trying to slack off.”

With both Uliel and Vasta having their own responsibilities taking up their time that day in a way that meant they wouldn’t be able to oversee Jake’s training themselves, Amy had been placed in charge of making sure he would actually practice his skills in lieu of them with already disappointing results, Jake not exactly doing nothing yet certainly less than he normally would under his teachers threatening gazes, already sitting down to have a break after only an hour of practice.

“I mean, I do need to let my mana regenerate a bit,” He tried, leaving Amy to rub at her eyes in frustration.

“An excuse, and one that’s not only affecting you, but me and Yuzu too. This was supposed to be our day off.”

One Jake had lost for a similarly overly casual attitude with training with his teachers, dragging the other two in as collateral for the need to have Amy watching him and Yuzu as a result wanting to join them as well, making the most of it at least by trying to help Jake grow under the benefits of her magic yet still had the man unmotivated.

“I mean, if you guys want then you could head off, I won’t tell.”

“Which means you’ll also get basically no practice done,” Amy sighed before letting go of Yuzu and standing up. “Meaning there’s really only one way to make sure you get anything out of today.”

“Mmh, don’t think I like where this is going.”

“You shouldn’t, because I’m about to kick your ass for some stress relief.”

“I think this is called being in an abusive relationship.”

“Sure, except what’s happening here is that you and I are going to spar. We came to the world at the same time with the same skill levels and as similar as some of our abilities are, yours are way more flexible than mine so, if you can show you’ve been training properly enough that you can at least beat me then I’ll be happy to consider this day of training done and let you enjoy the rest of it off to do what you want.”

“Uh, then what was that about kicking my ass?”

“The fact that I know you won’t actually be able to beat me. It makes what’s going to happen here pretty decidedly one-sided.”

“Alright, looks like I’m going to have to surprise you then,” He said as he jumped to his feet, already envisioning getting the rest of the day off. “I haven’t put up with some of the worst lessons in the world to still be taken down so easily.”

“I see how you’re taught, it’s not nearly as bad as you make it out to be.”

“I was more talking about being pulled into our insane buddy’s head. Those months of torment weren’t for nothing.”

“Then you better prove it. Yuzu, cast your spells on me too in case I can get anything out of this and then call us to start, please.”

“Can do, just try not to hurt him too badly, okay?”

“Wait, Yuzu,” Jake yelled. “Have a bit of faith in your husband, would you?”

“I do, it’s just that when it comes to something like this I have more faith in my girlfriend. Anyway, both of you, start!”

Amy could see Jake thinking of what to do, needing only a split second to consider which was still more than her. In one movement with no wasted thought or time behind it, Amy raised her hand, pulled forth the gun stored within her ring and pulled the trigger before her boyfriend could process any of it, only understanding what had happened when he felt its sting.

“You shot me!”

“I skimmed you.”

“You shot me in the arm! With a bullet!”

“More like on the arm, it literally only got close enough to graze your upper layer of flesh. Didn’t even hit any muscle. You should be able to heal it in seconds and more importantly, if you know anything about the twenty-one-foot rule, you should be able to tell that I pulled out the gun as a handicap.”

“I actually can’t tell that because I’m too focused on the fact that my beloved girlfriend, once again, decided to pull a gun on me!”

“Well, the spar doesn’t end just because you don’t believe it,” Amy told him, even if she changed her weapon, putting the gun back into her ring and changing it for a quarterstaff since dealing too much of a psychological blow wasn’t exactly the goal there and even gave him a second to heal the small wound she’d left before speaking again. “But fine then. No range to hit you from afar, no points to stick you with, but I’m still sure you’re not going to like facing me with this either.”

“Still better than facing you with a gun!” Jake yelled back, prepared to take things more seriously now that he was seeing how intense Amy was being about it as he threw up a barrier around himself while she rushed forward, her speed far above his own yet failing in the face of his magic as her strike was met with the earth rising up to meet it, adding an extra layer of protection on top of his barrier that managed to slow her blow, even if it passed through that second spell in the end.

Her augmentations, magic adjacent skills that applied only to her weapons and body, made short work of his stone defense but was left deflected by his barrier, the force of the blow managing to knock him back without breaking through, leaving him unharmed, even if on poor footing as he fell back, letting it happen to be caught by the portal he opened behind himself, the hole closing when he passed through.

Failing to surprise her for the effort. As he reappeared at her back, ready to bury her up to the neck in dirt, she was already swinging her staff behind her, getting him in the ribs and, even though he was still protected, managed to disrupt him enough to interfere with his casting.

“Predictable.”

“Only because you know me, that would have worked on someone else.”

“And you know me, you should have expected I’d know you’d do that.”

No retort to that, instead he changed his spells, lighting a fire beneath her feet that she had to dodge but she risked the burn to throw herself at him, striking again before he could cast to push him back and kept swinging till she was safe from the flames, the flurry of her blows and the strength behind them enough to keep him from anchoring himself to the ground, throwing out spells where he could but nothing she didn’t deflect or avoid, all the while she focused on one thing alone. Breaking through his barrier.

With each strike testing different combinations of her augmentations against it, looking for one that would work. No matter how limited in scope it might have been, she had the world’s affinities and non-affinities at her fingertips, painting her weapon in her power until she finally found one that broke through.

With that ending things the moment it did. Snapping through his barrier, she hadn’t been prepared for it to end like that and while she tried to stop herself as soon as she made contact, she still felt it as she hit his ribs, at least two breaks coming to them and bringing him to the ground, holding up a hand as he did.

“Okay, you win, I see what you mean about needing to practice,” He said as he started healing himself, Amy hiding her grimace for the scale of the injury she’d just inflicted to instead sit down next to him, looking Jake in the eye as she did.

“Jake, I know you don’t do well with this sort of practice but you know it’s important,” She told him, trying to look and sound as sincere as she felt. “I almost died in the non-affinitied tower and you probably would have come pretty close too if you didn’t use your mana bracelet. Forget becoming a third tier and forget whatever other ambitions the world has for us, I just want all of us; you, me, and Yuzu, to see the end of this war together. If either of you died… Well, let’s be real, the option is really only you or me dying with how protected Yuzu is but… Even if we win, if you weren’t there because you couldn’t make yourself put in enough effort now, I wouldn’t be able to deal with it.”

“I’m sorry,” He said, knowing she was right and not meeting her eyes. “I hear you, I do, it’s just… I’m so bad at this and making myself change.”

It was a poor excuse but still the truth, an inescapable one. He kept trying to make himself work harder, he understood the need for it but in the end it wasn’t who he was and it left him slipping back to his more casual attitude any time things calmed down. He wanted to change but it was no easy thing.

“But can you do it for us?”

“I’m trying.”

“Then it's a start,” She said, leaning in to kiss him as he finished treating his wounds. “If you really mean it, can I trust you to do your best with your practicing today without me having to hound you?”

“Yeah, yeah I’ll do my best for you guys.”

“Good, in that case, to show I trust you, me and Yuzu are going to go and leave you to it. We’ll be back later so until then, do your best, okay?”

Getting a nod, she left his side to take Yuzu’s arm in her own, pulling her with her while paying no mind to the feeling of mana moving behind them, the other girl’s focus instead on Amy.

“Was that really okay? Uliel and Vasta might not be happy about leaving him like that.”

“They left me in charge and I decided it was for the best. Jake may not be a serious person but if you can get it into his head then he can work hard for at least a few days and, well, his focus has been improving. I’d say he should be motivated for at least four so don’t worry about it and instead, let’s enjoy a little date to ourselves while he’s working.”

“A date does sound nice,” Yuzu smiled, leaving in closer. “What were you thinking?”

“How about lunch first? Even if he doesn’t practice much, his magic’s still a pain, I've worked up an appetite. And I guess we can bring him some food back later.”

Smiling back at Yuzu, the two went off and with Jake finding his motivation for the time, it let them reclaim at least a bit of their day off to enjoy together.

Author's note

The next poll will be coming out either late tonight or sometime tomorrow as I do my best to try and think of one more good option for it