Immortal Kingdoms

Leonardo was afforded some time before the food supplies and other necessities were rounded up in a chain of carriages for delivery. Until then, he decided to draft a training regime for himself, Juvia, and Pandora.

The three of them stood together in a deserted open field not too far from Valdmor. Leona and Kieran sat on a protruding slab of rock in the distance, watching curiously as Leonardo explained the details of the training.

"My cultivation has increased significantly in such a short amount of time that I honestly have no clue how to understand the concept of this strength. As for you two, starting from Winter Soldier, your control over your energy is lacking to the point that even children with high enough instincts could sense its attributes."

"As for White Specter, what you lack is simply refined technique for close proximity combat in hand to hand. As far as I can tell, you're not used to prolonged combat, you're essentially an assassin."

"Thus, our training will include a session of hand to hand combat where we will limit our cultivation to level 1, and then fight. Each fight will conclude after ten exchanges, and these are the rules…"

"If I win six out of ten exchanges by the end of each cycle, both sides will increase their cultivation by 1 level accordingly towards the eleventh exchange. We will keep going until I can win six out of ten exchanges at level 30."

"In case O exhausted my stamina, after a short break to comprehend our gains and losses, I will start again with my second training partner, Winter Soldier."

"This will be the first part of the training for the next few days. As for the second part," Leonardo thought about how to drive this one home as he spoke, "That would be dual cultivation to supplement your innate talents. However, if you don't want to, I won't force the matter."

"I don't mind!"

"I don't mind!"

Both Pandora and Juvia spoke at the same time. Then, they glared at one another with death states. Leonardo felt a headache and wash over him as he didn't expect their enthusiasm to be so high they almost fought then and there.

"Let's be straight with our training, then." Leonardo ignored their little contest and spoke up, calling for Pandora to step forward.

Leonardo's foundations in armless combat with human limited strength could be described as off the charts as both his experience and technique were derived from high divinities and immortals. Hence, he completely trounced Pandora by winning all ten exchanges for every cycle from the first level to the tenth level.

His timing, muscle memory, power distribution, judgement of battle dynamics, and reflexes were superb. However, when adding the curious element of internal energy into the ever so complicated alchemy of combat, Leonardo began displaying glaring flaws.

Everything that seemed like a perfectly flowing river of water now looked like a blurred piece of art. The sudden change caught the two women so off guard, Pandora almost lost control over her internal energy and slapped Leonardo to death.

Leonardo's foundations of energy control weren't just bad, they were practically nonexistent! By the time Leonardo was out of stamina after a training session from early morning till high noon, he was at a bottleneck with the cycle of level 13.

After much needed rest and food, Leonardo restarted the training with Juvia while Pandora stood to the sidelines, either silently watching or talking with the two children about where they came from, how they've met Leonardo, and whatnot.

She was surprised to know that Leonardo adopted them as his Godchildren, her first instinct was to ask if that elf temptress took them in as their Godmother as well.

Luckily for her, Juvia didn't dare take them as her adopted children after Leonardo laid claim to them as his own. She knew her place and value, thus she presented herself as a kind big sister.

By the time Leonardo and Juvia reached level 13, Juvia gained enough understanding of her strength and death energy to balance out five wins of the ten exchanges. Thus, the two would repeat the level 13 cycle over and over in an ever increasing pace, speed, and momentum.

Juvia was a smart woman driven by a sense of competition with her human counterpart ranger. As a mage, her hand to hand basics were on the same level as Pandora, perhaps even significantly lower.

However, her control over energy and her innate affinity to its elements allowed her to catch up in her own ways, thus not falling behind.

Although Leonardo trounced Pandora only to be utterly demolished near the cycle of level 13, his contest with Juvia was more like a tug of war between them as neither could gain a significant advantage.

One can say that introducing death energy to Juvia's nature energy ruined her foundations to a stage similar to Leonardo's, while introducing the concealment affinity of the desolate martial intent to Pandora's foundations was an undeniable buff.

Soon, it was time for the sun to set and dusk to colour the sky in a scarlet hue.

Leonardo sat in a lotus position on the ground, drenched in sweat with his silver hair plastered over his damp forehead. At the end of the day, he managed to stabilise his foundations up to level 19 for the day, which was in itself good progress.

The moment he opened his eyes, Pandora and Juvia were standing in front of him. Juvia had a brilliant smile on her face, while Pandora simply stood there with a stoic expression, yet her eyes betrayed her anxiety and eagerness.

This was the part for Leonardo to choose his dual cultivation partner for the night. According to logic, he should choose Juvia as she was the one in dire need to complement her energy and martial intent.

On the other hand, she was also the one that could be partially held responsible for Mordred's death, not to mention he spent almost a month at her side while Pandora remained behind doing all sorts of tasks.

After giving it some thought, he looked at Juvia.

"Juvia," They were far enough from Leona and Kieran they didn't need to hide their real identities. Thus, Leonardo continued, "Take Leona and Kieran back to the inn and come back tomorrow morning, I'll spend the night with Pandora."

Juvia's brilliant smile faltered as it crumbled away. She looked at her leader with pleading eyes that seemed to complain about how her mature figure would trounce over that human brat any day of the week.

However, she knew better than to disregard a direct command and thus she could only knead her forehead and reply, "Consider it done!"

Knowing that she should be feeling frustrated, Leonardo could only shake his head and say, "You accompanied me for an entire month while she was locked up by her lonesome all this time, not to mention I had her run some errands for my future plans. This could be considered her reward for the hard work."

Juvia nodded her head in understanding as she cheered up, thinking that this makes the score even between herself and Pandora.

All this time, Pandora was petrified on the spot, her face flushed red and her mind blank, not knowing how to respond after realising she would accompany her leader to a session of intimate love making.

Although it was essentially just a session of cultivation, she didn't care about that detail at all.

Leonardo felt amused by Pandora's behaviour. He stood there, overshadowing her petite figure, but she was oblivious to it all in her daze. Leonardo would be lying to himself if he said he wasn't biassed towards Pandora due to the similarities between her figure and Nier's.

If there was a difference, that would be Nier's chest that wasn't as flat as Pandora's, but beggars can't be choosers now can they?

Leonardo propped up Pandora's stiff chin before sealing her lips into his, pumping some life into her dazed eyes that quickly transmitted like a wave of hot fire, igniting her body from head to toes in preparation for what to come.

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