Dirin was lying on the sofa by the time Markus and Keith came back. They were separate but met up before returning to the Dorm. It was already late at night with the moon being high in the sky. The TV was on with a random channel, and the soft sounds of Dirin's snores filled the room.
Shaking his head, Keith walked over and turned off the TV while putting his finger to his mouth to tell Markus to keep silent. It was already past eleven, and a lot of their neighbors were already asleep or returning to go to sleep as well. Keith fetched a spare blanket and tossed it over Dirin and turned off the TV, making the room quiet with the exception of their own footsteps and the ceiling fan that made the occasional sound.
They both went to their own rooms and found rest quickly as well.
In the morning, Dirin woke up with an ache in his neck that made him uncomfortable as he stretched. He didn't mind the blanket on him as he figured that he had put it on himself, even though he had no intention of sleeping on the sofa. He wanted to wait till Markus and Keith got back, but it seemed that sleep took him before that.
He checked the time and groaned as he realized that he was already an hour-and-a-half past when he was supposed to be in the training field. He was debating whether he needed to take a shower since he was practically going to get one anyway. He shook his head and applied some deodorant before going until he heard Keith's door open.
Keith had a messy case of bedhead, and his clothes looked like they were just tossed on. His eyes were half open until he stepped into the shadow of the hallway, and his figure immediately straightened with his eyes opening a bit. He walked into the kitchen and started to throw whatever he could together to make a sandwich. He waved his hand towards Dirin as if he had the ability to dismiss him from the place, but Dirin listened and made his way over to the training ground.
Once he was out of the dorm, Dirin started a light sprint to the training field. Thankfully, over the past couple of weeks, he has gotten a lot more stamina, and this type of distance wasn't hard for him to cross, with him only breaking a small sweat by the time he got there.
In the middle of the field, Ritchard and Mr. Till were going at it. Ritchard was swinging a longsword as he tried to make his aura cover the distance that he couldn't reach, but it seemed like he was delaying in detaching it. This caused the aura to slow down before it hit him, giving Mr. Till plenty of time to dodge and counterattack.
Dirin didn't let his presence be known, or at least he didn't shout it to them, before he sprinted towards Mr. Till. He was intercepted by a whip made of water, but he was used to this by now and jumped while tucking his feet in and landed easily. He expected that Mr. Till was aware of him, but at this point, it wasn't that hard to dodge the simple things.
He made it within ten feet of him, but he didn't start to reach out in case that whip was going to grab another appendage of his, and he didn't want the options to be extended by his own doing. Mr. Till turned one of his feet towards him, which Dirin took as a sign that some form of attack was going to happen, whether it was physical or with water. He braced himself and kept his eyes focused on everything that he could.
The whip was behind him, but he kept it in mind as he got closer. Ritchard saw this and started to apply more pressure, which caused Mr. Till to respond more urgently, taking his eyes away from Dirin for a brief second. This is a trap! Dirin reached three feet and immediately stopped. A huge surge of water erupted from the ground in front of him.
With a sidestep, he got past the water wall and reached out to touch Mr. Till. He knew that the water was already closing in on him, but he was so close that at this point it didn't matter. He saw a dark blue aura cover Mr. Till as he was about to step away, but Ritchard threw caution to the wind himself and swung his blade from the direction that he was retreating, making that option of escape impossible if he wanted to keep holding back.
Mr. Till finally gave up. Dirin's hand made contact with his wrist, but he still made water intercept Ritchard at speeds that neither of them had seen before. Once the contact was made, Dirin didn't know what to do. He finally did it. All of those weeks of putting up with this, and now he had succeeded.
He took a step back and looked over at Ritchard. They both were confused, with Ritchard mainly being confused at the water blocking his sword so quickly, but confused nonetheless. Dirin looked over at where Vale was, but she looked uninterested as she slowly put her pens away and left the training field immediately.
"Does that mean...?" Dirin was met with a nod from Mr. Till, and his excitement started to build up. Now both he and Ritchard were getting more excited. "So, when can I-"
"Now. But calm yourself for Flame's sake." Mr. Till shook his head as he shook his head. "Breathe deeply and clear your head. This takes a toll on most people. You'll experience immense stress and pleasure as you do this."
Dirin nodded and quickly started to slow his breathing until he deemed himself calmer. He cleared his head slowly to clear away his excitement. He needed a calm mind before he was going to proceed with this.