Fishing On Troubled Waters

After that moment of tender feelings, the two went silent for a long moment, trying to calm down and hide their beet-red faces from one another. It took them several minutes before they stood up, both of them thoroughly checked their conditions, injuries and mana levels, and after confirming that they were as good as they could possibly be right now, the pair then began discussing their next move.

"So" Luna spoke now fully focused, "What's the plan?"

"On my own, the plan was to throw the beasts against one another by using the terrain with my terra control magi art and cause miniature earthquakes as well as raise several spikes, pillars and other dangers so that the beasts would get wounded and also forced to face one another in combat" he explained, "but now that you appeared, if we were to factor in your abilities, perhaps we might find a better alternative"

At that moment Luna looked down slightly dispirited, which obviously did not go unnoticed by Ventus that quickly asked.

"What's wrong Luna?" he asked slightly worried.

"Your plan is quite effective considering your abilities and we might as well just go with it, my abilities are not really worthy of mention when compared to your powerful magi art" she sighed.

"Why do you say that?" he asked confused.

"I only know a simple water creation and manipulation art, I can't be of much help at this battle, if it were a single beast I could do more, but when faced against this many, I don't have enough mana nor precise control to strike and protect against so many beasts" she explained, "compared to your earth control art that has all of the land below us to use as a weapon, how exactly can I help you?"

"You can create and manipulate water?" he asked excited, "like, out of thin air?"

"Yes, somewhat. My water art condenses the world mana and the water particles in the air into a more substantial quantity of water that I can freely manipulate, and later on when my mastery of the art reaches a higher level, I can even alter the water states into steam and ice and control it as well"

she replied, "Why do you ask?"

"I'll explain, but before I do that, how much water can you create and easily control at once? And what is the maximum range of your control over the water?" he fired another question.

"About ten litres is my limit and the range of control is about a hundred meters, now can you explain?" she inquired annoyed.

"Excellent!" he grinned widely.

He then proceeded to explain his idea. He figured that his original plan wouldn't change by much, he would still quake the earth and cause mayhem so that the beasts would be distracted, wounded and enraged against their peers, however, the major change was that with the addition of Luna's water magi art they could now obtain a certain degree of safety within the operation. His idea was to use the range of Luna's water art control to snatch the soul pearl from afar whilst he operated his earth control art to keep the path open and the beasts busy with harassment.

"See? With your help, things get easier and we have a higher chance of not getting wounded by any beasts!" he smiled gently towards her.

Luna just silently nodded as a bright smile bloomed on her pretty face, triggering a beat to be skipped Ventus's heart. He knew that the girl before him was beautiful, but he had never before actually noticed how truly captivating were her looks and how charming was her demeanour, although she had a somewhat fiery temper sometimes, in general, she was a sweet girl that exuded gentleness and demanded care from the world. He blanked out for a few seconds as these thoughts crossed his minds, Luna, of course, noticed this and didn't lose the opportunity to tease as her mood was sky high right now.

"Oh look at you just staring at me for so long, devouring me with your eyes! What are you? A perv?"

Ventus then replied as if he hadn't even noticed the tease and spoke somewhat absent-minded.

"No, it's just that your smile was so beautiful I kind of lost myself on it"

Luna's face flared and instantly went crimson as she punched his shoulder in response.

"Oh shut up you!"

"Ow! Why'd you do that for?" Ventus exclaimed.

His brain then returned to function and he noticed what he just said, his face grew a slight shade of red which made him turn away.

"L-let's focus now, we have little time to grab this treasure and then proceed to hunt another flower for you" he suggested giving her a chance to calm down.

"R-right…let's just go" she replied hurriedly.

Although she spoke no thanks or showed gratitude, his actions had moved her heart and cause the mysterious unknown emotions to grow bit by bit. Eventually, she found herself thinking about him from time to time as they prepared, and those thoughts were not exactly related to the plan.

Ventus kneeled down after positioning himself once more whilst he rebuilt the mana threads and prepare his strike, Luna, on the other hand, stood right behind him operating her water art and condensing the element so that the moment they struck, she would be ready to act and fish on troubled waters. After a few minutes, several dozens of threads were condensed in Ventus's hands, he quickly signalled Luna to be ready with his eyes and the slapped the ground with his hands, infusing the dozens of mana threads on it.

He did not know if it was due to the massive amount of blood that drenched this land, but he managed to connect to the earth far quicker than before. He felt a grip form on the land allowing him to quickly to manipulate it. First, he sent a rumbling wave of stone straight at the beasts ahead, shaking them and putting them into an enraged and confused state.

However, before they could even react properly and angrily lash out, Ventus acted once more and made large platforms of stone rise and move, forcefully colliding the beasts against one another, making them roar in fury. His work was quite easy when one would look at, the size of the platforms was about the size of the arena his master had previously built for them, but his manipulation was far cruder. His task was to simply pull stones and move them, whilst in his master case, it was pulling the stones, shaping them, moving them, and add several fine details to it, all in one go, that is why it was so much harder for Richard to make the arena even though the things master and apprentice made were at the same size scale.

The beasts clashed against themselves giving rise to a plethora of supernatural abilities and earth-shattering strikes to take place as this forced battle ensued. Ventus, however, was still not satisfied with only this bit of mayhem, so he sent another wave of stone their way that made many beasts get thrown into the air, and as they fell, despair took over as Ventus acted a last time and conjured several sharp, solid stone spikes that pierced the beasts the instant they touched the ground. Many of the beasts escaped uninjured, but many more were injured and even were disabled in one go, though none died.

"NOW!" Ventus shouted.

His hands still connected to the ground an outline of a platform rose into existence right beneath the two, a cloud of dust rose as the platform rose from the ground and lifted the pair up, Ventus then tilted the stone tile and willed it to move forward at the maximum speed he could muster.

In instants they found themselves weaving and dodging beast attacks whilst manoeuvring the chaotic land he made moments ago. Above them flew all kinds of colourful elemental and poisonous attacks, as well as spikes and stone shards that zoomed and threatened to kill them in one move if they were no careful.

Ventus was originally kneeling already, so he did not move, Luna on the other hand shrieked and ducked trying to protect her head as she controlled her water to make a liquid shield for any emergency right above their heads. Ventus did no let this slip as he scolded.

"No panic now Luna, we only have one chance whilst the beasts are confused, if we let them recover, them our chance of getting that soul pearl is gone!"

"O-okay! I'm sorry" she apologized.

She stood back up and reinforced her resolve as she took off her water shield and completely trusted Ventus's navigating as they dashed through the hectic landscape. In a mere matter of seconds they had reached the two hundred meter mark, they were only so far from the soul pearl and they could already feel its pressure.

Since most of the beasts were down and the rest was clashing, they had the opportunity to actually see the treasure they were looking for. Two hundred meters away from them they saw a bright crimson light shining that signalled where the treasure was, and through the use of mana reinforcement in their eyes, they could see in detail its features. It was a round and smooth glowing crimson sphere the size of a common egg that radiated a profound aura filled with vitality that made one feel filled with energy the closer one got to it, Ventus was not sure if this was related to the aura's effects, but he felt as if something deep down in his essence, perhaps his soul he figured, squirmed and trembled in excitement at the prospect of acquiring that object.

At this moment he knew how precious it was and focused his all on acquiring the crimson sphere as he began counting the remaining distance so that he could warn Luna when to act with the best possible timing.

One Hundred Seventy Five…

One Hundred Fifty…

One Hundred Twenty Five…

One Hundred!

The pairs heart sped up as Ventus gave the signal. Luna congealed all of the water she had conjured into a rotating water sphere the size of a watermelon, but at this moment, some beasts finally noticed the pair and began rushing towards them, roaring with rage as they saw the humans trying to snatch the treasure they fought so hard to get.

"No! Not now stupid beasts!" Ventus roared in his heart.

Ventus knew that at his current mana expenditure rate he would have enough mana to return to the dimensional portal, and that's why he was trying to conserve his energy even at this moment, otherwise they would not be able to escape since he could no longer refine world mana due to the fact that he did not have any technique to do so any longer.

"Argh screw this, Luna, grab the pearl, we're going all out now" he commanded.

"What? What do you mean?" she replied confused.

"Just grab the pearl already and hold strong, I'm going full speed" he roared.

The beasts speed in a rage was nothing the current speed they were on could compare, so Ventus did no longer bother to conserve his strength and pumped almost all of his remaining mana into the earth slate making it glow. Their bodies bent slightly backwards as the speed they were travelling tripled in an instant, almost making them fall off if Ventus did not use his earth art to hold them in place.

"Are you trying to flee them or just feed us to the beasts that much faster you idiot!?" Luna shouted.

Ventus did not reply, they were fifty meters away from the pearl. The rotating water sphere in Lunas's hands compressed and tightened from the previous size of a watermelon to the size of a football, the contents of it were so pressurized that minuscule air bubbles began to form threatening to explode, but they were forcefully suppressed by the girl's mana, making the whole sphere glow with a blue light.

"WHAT ARE YOU STILL WAITING FOR LUNA! GRAB THE PEARL!" Ventus shouted desperately.

He needed time to manoeuvre and flee, but if she did not grab the pearl quickly, he was going to lose his chance of escape. Luna didn't reply and simply acted. The condensed water ball furiously rotated and as if all the other sounds of the world were drawn and swallowed by it, the world went silent for an instant, the tension in the pair's heart made their throat lock and they hearts seemed to wish to explode out of their chest whilst the world around them seemed to slow down.

All of a sudden the water ball exploded releasing a deafening sound whilst a single water hand attached to a long, thin water arm fired off at blinding speed at in less than the time it took to blink arrived before the soul pearl and enveloped it as the hand grabbed the crimson sphere tight. Luna moved her arm backwards, pulling the treasure towards herself and securing the object.

Soul Pearl Acquired!