Nick ducked as a sword nearly took off his head, taking full advantage of his enhanced ability to learn, Iron Fist decided to continue teaching him more in the art of combat while he studied magic from midnight. The way of the sword had almost become second nature to him at this point, soon he would master it completely. Unfortunately Nick failed to see the follow up elbow heading his way and got to see the stars early today.

“Try not to damage that part of him to much, he needs it if he is going to learn.” Midnight said as she flipped the page of the book she was reading.

“Oh he’s fine, right lad?” Iron said confidently.

“I don wanna go to school today ma…” Nick said as he lay there in a daze.

“....ok maybe a quick break.” Iron admitted. As he walked over to the caravan, Silk fluttered over and took a look at Nick’s head.

“Must be neat having a silk weaver with you, couldn’t tell you how many times I had to have my robes repaired by one.” Midnight said glancing at Silk.

“You have no idea, little Silk has been a tremendous help. It’s good to see Nick finally giving her a chance, though given his nature, I knew he wouldn’t be able to just stand by while she was in that state. Perfect opportunity to get them together finally” Iron said.

“So you flipping the damned caravan was deliberate?!” Trixie said popping her head out the window.

“Nope.” He replied simply. Giving a heavy sigh she ducked back inside.

“Uuhg… can someone please tell me why I have a silk ribbon on my head?” Nick said pulling off the bandages that had been tied in a bow of his head.

“I thought you might like it… and you were bleeding so I needed to make you a bandage.” Silk said poking the tips of her fingers together and looking down. Nick wasn’t sure how to feel about her anymore, should he continue his grudge against her? After last night it would be a bit more difficult, she had been trying to make up for it for weeks now, at this point he was lying to himself if he said he didn’t have some feelings for her, and while Trixie was picky with whom she would let into their herd, she still wanted one. Nick made the decision to give her a chance, he would talk with her later about it, but he was willing to give her a chance.

“It’s fine Silk, it’s just unnecessary, I can heal on my own.” Nick sighed handing her back the bandage as his wound healed.

“Ok..” She said standing up, and was surprised as he placed his hand on her head ruffling her hair.

“Don’t be so down, you had good intentions and I thank you for that.” Nick said and walked over to the others leaving Silk with a faint smile and blush on her face.

“Alright, I think we should be good on combat training for today, Midnight, could we continue on our magic training?” Nick asked.

“Sure, first off let’s see how well you are doing with your aura.” Midnight said floating over to the field motioning for him to follow. Nick activated his aura like instructed yesterday, he had practiced throughout the night and had managed to get it down rather easily. The magic was not to different from a basic levitation spell, but had some slight differences, like unlike a levitation spell that just felt like an invisible force of sorts was moving the object, this felt more… tangible. Like if he made a wall of this energy it could act as a barrier.

“Good, you have gained an astounding level of control, are you sure you have never done this before?” midnight asked, she legitimately was having trouble that he didn’t know the spell before they met.

“Yeah, I just practiced all night, and with my abilities, I can learn much faster than normal, and while this magic is certainly different from what I am used to, it wasn’t all that hard to get down. Though at the moment I’m still only able to hover around. Give me a few more days and I should be able to get this down pretty solidly.” Nick said as he landed next to her.

“Wait… you were up all night..? How are you not exhausted then?! You just got done with combat training and are acting like you just got up from bed!” Midnight said not believing him.

“Ah, it’s sort of one of my abilities. Long story short I constantly have the effect of sleep going for me even when I am awake, actually sleeping is more of a leisure thing for me.” Nick chuckled while rubbing the back of his neck.

“Bullshit.” Midnight said crossing her arms and refusing to believe him.

“Hay! You don’t need to announce it to the world you know. “ Iron said from the tall grass nearby.

“.....Anywaays, yeah it’s true. You don’t have to believe me or not, but just believe that I am ready for our training.” Nick said.

“...Alright then.now you more or less have you're aura down in the flight department, now all that’s left in that regard is practice. Next I’m going to teach you what else it is used for.” Midnight said.

“Wait, it does other things? Thought so.” Nick asked.

“Yes, as you may have figured out by now the spell you're using isn’t like a levitation spell, it’s more solid to a point where it almost feels tangible. That’s because if done properly it is. This particular spell is the basis for much of kirin magic, you aren’t lacking in magical reserves, that’s for sure, so the issue now is magic control. Now the spell i’m going to show you will take some time to fully get down, and may take years to actually master. Now then, i want you to throw everything you have at me, hold nothing back.” midnight sait spreading her arms wide and casting the spell.

“Umm… I don’t know if I should do that, with what you taught me on magic efficiency I might end up obliterating you..” Nick said doubtful that she would be able to withstand his attacks without him holding back.

“Trust me, I’ll be fine.” She said.

“Alright….” Nick shrugged. He still didn’t have access to a large portion of his magic capabilities thanks to the mark but with Silk and Trixie’s input he at least had access to a very small percentage. He could only cast as much as Trixie and Silk’s combined mana pools. Thankfully together their magic was a good amount, and with his horns to focus magic through with the addition of his training with midnight he could make good use of what he had, but at most he had maybe 3% of his full power.

Nick focused a large amount of magic into a strength and speed magnitude spells while tightening the magic channels to one third their normal level. He launched himself forward and launched a flurry of punches as fast as bullets at her, but it felt like hitting a wall of diamond and she didn’t even flinch as if every punch was little more than a light breeze.

“Come on is that the best you got?” Midnight taunted. Nick responded by pouring as much magic as he could into the spells and tightening the channels to one tenth their normal size. His punches speed up dramatically each one traveling at several times the speed of sound and impacting like meteors. Midnight began to sweat as her spell began to fualter, just how strong was he? With as much magic he was using he should not be able to use this much power, even if he tightened up his magic channels to level five! Finally she teleported behind him holding up her hand.

“Okay!! Okay!!! Stop! I guess you’re stronger than I thought. Anyway, do you get the jist of the spell?” Midnight asked.

“Sort of, you harden the aura to act like armor, right?” Nick asked.

“Close, what you need to do is fuse it with your skin, then you're skin will act like armor as strong as how much magic you put into it, once you do this you can activate a second aura above it, but we’ll get into that later, for now I just want you to practice these two spells for now.” Midnight said walking away with a little sweat trickling down her neck. This might not have been the best decision she could have made, she had spent five years training to tighten her magic channels to a fifth of their natural size, and he goes and tightens them to level ten in a day?! How!?!?!

Meanwhile Nick was practicing what he had learned, it wasn’t all that hard to do, and within a week or two he would likely master them so long as he trained through the night. He was lucky that he could take a few shortcuts, if it hadn’t been for his ability to morph his body at will learning to tighten his magic channels would have been a pickle. Since he technically didn’t have natural magic channels, he relied on what he he was able to grow thanks to Trixie, her DNA had given him the perfect blueprint for constructing magic channels, before when he followed her instructions on how to make his horns.

The instructions had left him having to make them larger than he would have preferred, it gave him an excuse to keep the vasto lord horns, but with what he learned from Midnight he could improve on their design greatly. In fact if he were to put small channels in his fingers he could easily replace the horns, but he would need to learn to control his magic to a much greater degree beforehand since at that point they would be at one one hundredth the size of his vasto lord horns and subsequently have a magic channel just as tight… and with magic channels that tight all it would take to literally nuke a town would be to use half of just Trixie’s magic in a single magic blast, though it would likely kill him in the process.

One thing that came with this technique was added magic burn. After casting those spells yesterday it felt like hours of continuous casting with high level magic. While he could now cast higher level magic with little magical burn, if he used higher amounts of magic with tight channels it dramatically increased the magic burn of the spells. At his current level of efficiency he would have to max out at channels one tenth the size of a unicorn’s horn. For lower level spells he would utilize the magic channels in his forearms.

He would have to be careful to only use the tiniest bits of magic with the tightened channels, otherwise simply trying to levitate a cup to someone might send it through them…. And the wall… and the moon… He made the magic channels in his index and middle fingers on either hand for emergencies and made poles of what his horns were made of for larger magic channels in his forearms, they still ended in sharp tips, he simply covered them with bones While he did enjoy having his vasto lord horns, they were big, bulky, and had gotten caught on more than a few blankets, much to Silk’s irritation, and shrinking and growing the internal channels within the horns would take to long in combat. As he formed the ner magic channels he absorbed the old ones.

“Nick?” Silk called him through the hive mind. Nick sighed as the intruding voice called for him. He was still getting used to having more than a few voices in his head. Zangetsu notwithstanding.

“Yees?” Nick asked a little irritated.

“Do you need anything to eat or drink?” Silk asked.

“No Silk, I’m fine.” Nick mentally sighed. Having this hive mind had it’s perks, but boy did it get annoying sometimes. It allowed for everyone connected to the mark to share experience, knowledge learned, and an instant form of communication no one could tap into. Casting his magic aura he covered his entire body with it before merging it with his skin. He casts the spell again and leaves the second aura around him. Replicating the spell was fairly easy, his magic senses had improved greatly since coming to this place, allowing him to get a better feel for magic.

Before magic felt like a sort of… invisible force that he could add more energy to in relation to his stone reserves and the only differences were that each type of spell simply casted differently, like how you're arms function the same no matter what you do, but one spell might be drawing a rose, while another might be driving a car. But here? Here there was so much magic, with so many different textures, and feelings behind them. Each magic signature felt different.

Silk’s magic felt warm and comforting, like a soft blanket. Trixie’s magic felt like what he would describe as a thick fog, always shifting and keeping things hidden, he surmised that it was due to her expertise in illusion magic. Iron Fist’s magic felt like a giant pillar of steal, unmovable yet malleable so it could not be broken. Midnight’s magic felt like the calm before the storm, like it was calm now, but in a moments notice could turn into a massive storm. Finally Twilight’s magic, while she had tried to keep her magic usage hidden from him for the most part he had already gotten a good feel for it, it was like a massive maelstrom of magic. He was glad he was learning these techniques, otherwise with his limit on his magic he would be almost useless in a battle of magic with her.

As he floated there he tested his auras his skin felt no different than before, but then again this wouldn’t be the first time a spell was more than he initially thought it to be. He focused and formed a weak magic blast near him before launching it himself. As the blast made contact with his skin it exploded charing the grass beneath him, it barely felt like a light breeze of wind to him.

“Oh the things I could do with this.” He muttered to himself.

Silk ducked under a swing from Iron and fluttered behind him and throwing a punch at him that he caught without looking and threw her back in front of him. Now that the hive mind with Nick had been officially set up they had been learning at an exponential rate. Without even realizing it Silk had gone from a small town, meek seamstress to a still meek and timid seamstress, but one who could fight against the average royal guard. The combined learning capabilities of all three had allowed her to learn much faster, and any gain in skill that Trixie or Nick obtained, she did as well. She side stepped a punch from Iron only for his elbow to shoot towards her tapping her on the forehead.

Iron may have been a tough old bull, but he wasn’t brutal, and was gentle with Silk unlike with Nick whom he knew could take a beating and keep going, and recover quickly.

“Alright now I want you to infuse your magic with your fists and forearms, harden the chitin so that it’s as hard as steel.” Iron said, doing as he said Silk did so. Her chitin, unlike a warrior drone, was a soft and gave just a little, it was still much sturdier than any mammal’s skin, but would barely qualify as leather armor.

“Now, I want you to hold that spell as long as you can while punching this slab of steel.” Iron instructed. He wished he had magic like this at times, sure his training experience and internal magic made him a force to be reckoned with, but having the ability to turn your own skin into armor as strong as steel had always fascinated him. Silk had been making great progress in the past couple of weeks when they had time to train, each week seemed to be equal to a month worth of training from before they set up the hive mind.

“So, how are things going with Nick?” Iron asked making the her blush a bit.

“Fine, he’s seemed to warm up to me after you're stunt with the caravan.” Silk said as she continued to strike the iron slab while keeping up the spell.

“Yeah, that was fun, I hope we get to-” Iron began, but stopped from the cute little pout/glare Silk gave him. “Never mind.” He chuckled.

“That was not fun, I’m still a bit shaken up a bit from that.” silk said with a slight whimper as she struck the metal again.

“I don’t blame you, that seemed like one crazy ride.” Midnight said walking up to them.

“Aren’t you supposed to be teaching Nick magic right now?” Iron asked with a raised brow.

“This is going to take time, it isn't like learning martial arts, each spell takes a while to learn, and giving him to many at once would simply overload him. So I’m having him work on just the three for now. He just needs some practice. I’ll check in on him in about an hour or so.” Midnight shrugged.

“Alrighty then. Tea?” Iron asked offering her a cup.

“Certainly!” Midnight said happily taking the cup in her magic.

“So, how much does Nick have to learn about Kirin magic? He has some strange and powerful magics at his disposal, but how much of it pertains to Kirin magic I wonder.” Iron wondered.

“From what I have seen, he still has many years worth of training if he is to master my kind’s arts. He has magic blasts down pack fairly well from what I saw, and a contained gravity spell is nothing to laugh at. For now I’m teaching him the basics.” Midnight said and took a sip of her tea.

“If I have learned anything with him, it’s to expect the unexpected. He learned how to fight and adapt through his training even faster than I could at his age. Within a few years he may even be on my level if not surpass me one day.” Iron said taking a sip of his tea.

Twilight shivered as she watched her familiar absorb his horns into his head. Him learning from that kirin had made him even more dangerous than before. She somehow taught him to use high level spells with so little magic it barely even scratched her reserves, yet what he was now able to do with it left him on almost equal footing with her, and that’s just on the first day!! Who knows what he would be capable of within a week! She sat back at her desk after closing the shutter to the window and returned to her work. It had taken most of their journey through the black forest, but with just a single ruby she had managed to form a sealing crystal capable of capturing her familiar for a short time. She had no doubt that he would break out of it sooner or later, she didn’t have the resources for a proper container. The hard part would be getting back to equestria with him, she could handle the others just fine, Trixie’s and that Changeling’s magic was nothing compared to hers, and that brute Iron Fist only had muscle on his side, he wouldn’t even be able to touch her.

She wondered how her friends and family were taking her disappearance, Celestia would have sent in some agents by now to look for her, Shining Armor and Cadence would have likely done the same, her father would probably gotten in contact with any contacts he had outside of Equestria to find her. All she had to do is wait for an opportunity to get back to equestria.

She listened as the minotaur and changeling fought just outside, just having that thing near her kept her on constant guard, it may have everypony else fooled but Celestia had warned her plenty about what those things did, they lured unsuspecting victims into a false sense of security or disguise themselves as a loved one, and then they slowly eat away at the love of everypony around them, slowly turning them into emotionless husks. It didn’t ease her mind that she was now semi permanently bonded to it through her familiar.

She had tried to warn Nick of the dangers of having that thing around, but he had just refused to listen!!! Actually saying that her feeding off of them had no ill effects! If she didn’t hurry he would end up like her brother, they were luck that Celestia’s magic was able to purge him of that evil queen’s magic and reverse the effects of her feeding off of him. To this day he still has migraines.

By the end of tomorrow they would be in one of the outskirt towns of Griffonia, Omskbeak if she remembered correctly. All she would need to do there is a seal Nick in the gem, get train ticket to the capital go to the Equestrian embassy and she would be home free!!! The only one that would be a problem would be that kirin, but if she remembered correctly kirin one very peculiar weakness due to their natural ability to create lightning… all she would have to do is zap her with a quick shock spell to get her going and one splash spell would incapacitate her within moments.

She finished the decoy scroll last night, and there was little else to do with the gem other than to feed magic into it for the trip, she had already filled it with three times her maximum magic reserves, but with magic like Nick had, plus the time she would need to get him there she needed to double it, hopefully they will stay in Omskbeak for at least a few days.

“And you can go suck a quasar you damned mannequin!! You cheated and you know it!!!! …. Last time I play poker with anything outside of time.” Bill muttered as Slender man walked away chuckling. One would think he would learn that even though he could literally see all different points in time in every timeline, and which one was going to occur with a high degree of accuracy, that his mastery over time wouldn’t apply to an entity that literally existed out of time. He still owed 20k to a certain skeleton with a tendency to speak in wing dings.

“Now then, should be any minute now... “ Bill said as he waited for a certain white mare to arrive. And right on time Faust arrived.

“Why is it that you called me here Bill?” Faust demanded.

“Simply collecting on what you owe me, remember you said anything for not spilling the beans on your mistake.” Bill said pulling out the contract making Faust flinch in both rage and fear, in her panic to keep knowledge of that monster under wraps in hopes of preventing his escape, she signed a deal so that he couldn’t tell anyone anything about him or his kind.

“So, what is it that you want?” Faust asked.

“Oh it’s not really for me, I still got quite some time before I could ever make any use of it, but my little student will likely have great use of it, seeing as he is going to need to clean up your mess. I simply want you to bring these to Nick.” Bill said holding a tome with his trade mark all seeing eye on it, a bag with a subtle glow to it, a bastard sword with such a high polish to it that it looked like a mirror, a spear with a large blade on the end that hat a slight glow to it, and finally a dagger with a dark aura that seemed to dim the light around it. Faust's eyes bulged at the sight of the latter four items.

“Yo-you can’t be serious!!!!! Just any one of those items could have dire consequences.” Faust screamed, “just that dagger alone would kill him if he touched it!”

“Relax, I didn’t mean all at once. First I want you give him these, the tome will act as both a form of direct communication with him, and has everything he needs to use these and he will need this etherealite soon. I’ll hold onto the sword, spear and dagger for now, but when it’s time you're to bring them to him as per the deal.” Bill said handing her the items, she wanted to refuse, but the golden bands around her wrists wouldn’t let her let go of the items.

“When do you want them delivered.” She asked begrudgingly.

“Once they get to Omskbeak, he’s going to need it once your daughter's student start trouble, I always like these unstable points in time, not even I don’t quite know how things are going to go. He might get sealed into her little cage, or it might backfire and seal her, she might miss and seal someone’s dog, hell it might just blow up in her hand blowing off an arm. It’s all so delightful,And one last thing, remember these are part of the deal two, so you will be showing up to bring them to him when I ask. Now then, get your fat flank outta here, I have too little to do and too much time...” Bill said grabbing a phone and dialing for a pizza.

Vinyl checked over their equipment one more time, Celestia had gone all out this time. Magic suppressing cuffs, magic reserve batteries, shock bracers, magic nullifying armor, flashbang grenades, anti magic projectors, the wrist mounted mini base cannons she had been begging for, she would have built them herself, but she couldn’t quite afford some of the materials, and last but not least, a sigma level sealing orb.

“Tavi you done playing around with those things?” Vinyl asked looking over her shoulder, on the ground were about two dozen or so dead or knocked out caribou, only five were still standing.

"One moment, and we can go, the trail they left down the hill shouldn’t be hard to follow.” Octavia said as she side stepped one that lunged at her with a flick of her wrist he lost his left antler and began screaming in agony, the one behind her attempted to grab her but that his hand crushed by hers as she grabbed him and tossed him over her shoulder impaling him on the one in front of her’s antlers, the resulting weight pulling down on his neck snapping it at an odd angle.

One of them tried to sneak up and nab Vinyl, but was met with a mix of a magic blast and a concussive sound blast without her even looking, the one that lost an antler earlier tried throwing a tomahawk at octavia but she daftly caught it with her wrist and changed its direction without taking any of it’s momentum and with a flick of her wrist sent it back at the now dead caribou. Only one remained, and this one was big.

“I’m going to enjoy making you cry for mercy as me and every one of my brothers pounds your tight little ass into oblivion.” The behemoth of a caribou said as he stomped towards the unassuming mare. Taking the oversized war hammer that was as big as any of the other caribou, he swung it right where she was standing. Octavia jumped over and onto the hammer and used its momentum to launch herself high into a tree.

The caribou swing his hammer at the base of the tree knocking it down. Octavia jumped at another nearby tree and pulled out her knife. She jumped off the tree and to one next to the caribou, and in a spinning motion she jumped off of it and directly down at the caribou slicing the back of his neck before the bulky and slow monster had time to react. As octavia landed the behemoth tipped over and with a massive thud brock the tree it had knocked down in half.

“I was starting to think you might need help for a moment.” Vinyl jabed.

“Oh hush, you and I both know this was barely minor exercise for me.” Octavis said booping Vinyl on the nose making her scrunch it a bit.