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Kazu tilted his head a few centimetres. Mest's fist cut through empty air.
Before Mest could process it, Kazu shifted his weight and redirected the second punch with the back of his wrist—minimal effort, aimed for maximum humiliation.
Mest vanished again. Reappeared at Kazu's left. Then his right. Then high above.
Every blow was fast, sharp, and aimed to test reactions rather than harm. And every blow missed.
Kazu parried without looking hurried, letting his instincts guide him through the rhythm. A foot swept toward his ankle—Kazu stepped over it. A palm strike aimed at his back—he leaned just enough that Mest's hand brushed cloth instead of bone.
Frustration leaked into Mest's breathing.
He teleported again—this time three steps ahead, swinging downward.
Kazu raised a small, transparent barrier. However, this time Mest's strike slammed into it with a dull thud just as he teleported.
He recoiled, shaking out his hand. "What—how did you—?"
"Your teleportation has a pattern," Kazu said calmly. "You move based on line-of-sight aggressiveness. You look before you jump."
Mest blinked. "Most people can't follow it."
"I'm not most people."
Kazu stepped back once, giving him room. "Again."
Mest gritted his teeth and disappeared. His approach changed—less predictable, angling around Kazu's blind spots.
It didn't matter.
Kazu redirected two strikes, blocked a third with a narrow barrier, then lightly tapped Mest's wrist to ruin the angle of his fourth.
Mest landed clumsily a few feet away, out of breath. He wiped sweat from his forehead. "You're not even attacking."
"I said I wouldn't."
Mest clenched his jaw. He teleported high into the air, gathering magic for a downward burst.
Kazu sighed—just a little—and raised another barrier.
Mest dropped, palm forward.
He hit the barrier, magic dispersing harmlessly. The impact knocked the wind from him, and he slid down the curved surface to the ground, landing on his back.
He stared up at the sky, dazed.
Kazu approached and crouched beside him. "You're not weak. But you rely too much on your magic to create openings. Your close combat is pretty good, but it collapses the moment someone breaks your tempo."
Mest blinked in surprise. "I… didn't think you'd give actual feedback."
"You wanted to see the gap," Kazu said. "Now you've seen it."
Gray whistled from the sidelines. Cana crossed her arms. "Well, at least the guy's persistent."
Mira stood near the fence, arms still crossed, eyes narrowed—not at Mest, but at Kazu. She didn't say anything.
Kazu stood and offered Mest a hand. After a moment, Mest took it and pulled himself up.
"Welcome to Fairy Tail," Kazu said. "Try not to die before your first mission."
Mest gave a shaky nod. "I'll… do my best."
"Don't do your best," Kazu said. "Do better."
Mest wasn't sure if it was encouragement or an insult. Probably both.
The guild members drifted back inside, buzzing about the fight. Mira approached Kazu. "It would have been better for me to deal with him. You don't really need to fight just anybody."
Mira's words were reasonable. If any random mage started asking him for a fight, Kazu would be busy fighting all day.
"I just wanted to test him. He seems promising."
"And? Did you find anything promising in him?" Though the boy was a few years older than them, to her, apart from his good combat experience and teleporting spell, he didn't really seem exceptional.
Mira wasn't underestimating him, but rather stating facts. Spatial magic was one if not the rarest, magic in the entire Ishgar. Teleport spell in the hands of someone like Kazu or Gildarts, who relied on close combat, was a deadly combination.
However, Mest didn't have any spells that boosted his offensive power. His hits were slightly stronger than average human due to Ethernano passively boosting them. With all that, Mira didn't look at him as strong.
"If we talk about support, then yeah, he is pretty promising if he can train his reaction speed to deal with high-ranking mages," Mira said as an afterthought.
Kazu nodded. "Yup. He would be a pretty good support. Though I think even individually, he would be pretty good if he got a good offensive artefact."
'This guy is a protagonist material. Not only did he have a broken magic like teleport, but his memory magic is arguably the same or even more broken than that. If he hadn't infiltrated the council, then I bet that his peak in anime would have been much higher.
Like, there's so much potential in both of those magics. With my presence, I will make sure that potential is realised.' Kazu was pretty excited on that front.
He turned back toward the tavern.
Break time was almost over. He dusted off his hands and sighed.
"Back to training."
***
Kazu sat in his seat, looking at the table. He closed his eyes.
'It's about time I do analyse my current skills and see where some gaps and redundancy exist in my skill set.
First of all, let's look at my Instinct magic.
I mainly use it for its passive effect, which enhances my instincts by a large degree. This becomes very prominent in combat and learning something. With enough experience, I was able to also figure out when my instincts could be unreliable and when not to rely on them too much. Though there's still significant room for improvement in that direction, it would naturally come with time. So, I don't need to invest any additional time there.
Now, let's talk about Active Instincts. I could predict how a person would move, think or take any action as long as I have enough information on them and energy to analyse them in real time. I rarely use it in battle, because most of this is already adapted in my passive instincts subconsciously.
Though if I do use it, my reliability of instincts does increase. Tradeoff is my focus and energy.
Another application of Active Instincts I recently found out was to think in broken and short statements or sometimes in digits. The contents of my thoughts don't matter anymore. I could instinctively guess what I mean, which increases my thinking process several times.
This is pretty useful if I am fighting with enemies with unknown or abnormal abilities, as with this, my analysis speed of their spells would increase drastically.
Last thing related to my Instinct magic is a detached state I get into, which kind of increases my analysis speed, Ethernano manipulation and basically everything by a significant degree. I don't know really how exactly to get into it, as I tried multiple times, but failed.
My instincts are telling me that as long as I continue developing my Instinct magic, I will be able to use that mode at will soon.'
He quickly jotted down a few notes. 'I don't have any clear direction to develop it. Though one thing I want to experiment on is precognition-- the ability to see the future.' He glanced at Cana.
'I could already do it in battle, though I think there's still room for improvement for people I am familiar with and for those I am not familiar with. So, I would invest my time in that direction.' After deciding on that, he moved on to his next major magic.
'For my Ethernano manipulation magic. I could enhance something both internally and externally. I could also make magic bullets in an area around me and launch them. I could also shape it any way I want. For some time, I thought that my Barrier magic was actually an affinity due to the presence of this magic, and I am still not sure if that's the case or not, as this one does really affect the strength of barrier magic.
Other than that, there's One Hit Ko, which is just an advanced version of enhancement. Then there's my speciality, Interference: Both Constructive and Destructive.
I could also tag objects or his opponents with any of the spells in this category, which would take effect after a specific time or after triggering a condition.
This category is where my major combat strength comes from. My Instinct magic is more of a support skill, though its importance overshadows this one by a significant degree.' Most of the people in the world think that this is his main affinity. In fact, nobody other than Gray knows that his main speciality is Instinct magic.
'To be honest, I have reached Wanderer level, but there are still so many ways I could develop this magic. Like, with this, things like Advanced Arnament Haki: Internal Destruction or Red, blue or overpowered purple might be possible if I invest time in it. Though I am getting carried away. I will explore a bit more on this side, before deciding what I want to develop.'
***
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