A huge smile appeared on the chief scientist’s face as he felt his completely healed forearm. The sponsor was shocked to see that the wound was healed so quickly because even the nurses that he had on standby who had the healing ability couldn’t heal a wound that big so fast.

“You did amazing, dear. You are a natural! Not only you healed my arm perfectly, but you also did it in record time. I was right to entrust such an important ability to you,” the chief scientist praised.

***************

After the meeting with the sponsor and the chief scientist, Iris was beyond happy as she was now given permission to activate her Healing ability at will now that they had confirmed that it was safe for her to do so.

As soon as she left the main office, she activated the ability again and continued to keep it active. She restricted the aura from leaking out which would emit uneasy pressure on weaker beings and cause unrest. She continued to walk around the building in complete awe as with the Healing ability active, Iris could more clearly see all the small intricate parts of every living thing including plants.

As soon as she touched a plant, she could visualize all the different parts of the plant including the roots. She could feel the water flowing through the plant and the roots absorbing nutrients from the soil.

It was an addicting feeling and Iris didn’t want to ever turn off her ability. She continued through the entire day keeping her ability active, but by the end of the day, she was so tired that she could even walk back home and collapsed during her medical lecture.

It was later explained that Iris had suffered exhaustion from malnutrition and that was why she had collapsed. It turned out that the Healing ability ate away Iris’ energy pool and deprived her of all energy. Once her energy had been depleted, the ability started to eat away the food that she had eaten and the stored fats inside her body in order to keep herself active.

Iris was completely oblivious to what the healing ability was doing to her own body as she was just too caught up in the addicted feeling of keeping the ability active.

***************

It took some time for Iris to get her habit under control but she was able to control her urges and make sure to only activate the ability when necessary. In the coming months, Iris continued to train hard and study in order to push her Healing ability to the maximum.

She had improved so much that she was even offered the next level of Healing ability by the sponsor. In the coming days, Iris obtained the Level 2 Healing ability book which increased the amount of aura she had within her body, and also learned a brand new skill called “Regeneration”.

Regeneration was a passive ability that would automatically heal Iris’ body whenever she suffered from any kind of damage. This was the reason why Iris was able to heal her arm so quickly after getting injured by the Silver Wolves when the group was ambushed.

During this time, Erin also received her second ability which was the Level 3 Wind ability and now that both of them were on the same level in terms of abilities, they began sparring with one another.

Even though Iris was stronger than Erin physically, she didn’t have the agility or perception to boost her strength and help her fight which was why even though her punches hit hard, she had awful combat sense and couldn’t defeat Erin even once who was quick and nimble and could easily dodge and counter Iris’ attacks.

This was the area where Iris didn’t excel at. Even though she had the strength to fight, she didn’t have agility or perception which help complement many fighting styles and create versatile options for the user to fight with. She also had a terrible battle sense as she couldn’t read the enemy’s moves or create quick decisions which were crucial in fights.

After constantly failing to try and match Erin’s fighting style and technique, Iris hit a roadblock and gave up on learning how to fight properly.

The sponsors had told them that there will be three more boys who will be participating in the test alongside them and she had hoped to just be a hard worker and healer and leave the fighting to Erin and the rest.

Iris spent most of her time training her new ability while also maintaining her medical lessons and strength training routine while Erin would spend most of her time in the training room trying to perfect her fighting style and master her abilities even more.

***************

Moments Earlier

After Bill had launched the boy straight back into the mist he landed back down on the ground and quickly tried to catch his breath. He was already a bit tired after fighting Natasha and then sprinting after the rest of the group so his energy wasn’t completely replenished.

Bill still believed that he could beat them in one on one fight but if all of them attacked at once, he would be in some serious trouble.

“Iris, I’m going to need your help if we are going to beat these guys,” Bill said as he started to raise multiple small sand spikes from the ground.

“Okay, I’ll help out with my water in any way I can!” Iris replied with determination.

“No, that won’t work. Your water could bind the sand together and make it clumpy which will render my attack useless. Listen, I want you to use the mist as cover and sneak up on them and launch an attack. While you distract them, I will flank them from the other side with my sand spikes.” Bill said.

“What… m..m.me? Bill, I can’t.” Iris said with a quivering voice.

Bill was confused by this but as soon as he turned to face Iris and could see her quivering and shaking, he knew that something was definitely up.

“What do you mean, Iris?” Bill asked.

“I… I… don’t know how to fight well. They will notice me from a mile away if I try to sneak up on them and I will be very liable to you that way.” Iris said with her head down full of shame and embarrassment.

Iris remembered the first time she shared her fighting experience with Andrew, Sven, and Finn. She remembered how they laughed and fun of her for being strong yet weak at the same time. If it wasn’t for Erin, the boys wouldn’t have even apologized to her.

Iris was expecting a similar type of response from Bill where he would ridicule her or say that she was useless but to her surprise, Bill said no such thing.

“Calm down… Losing your nerve during a battle is the best way to lose a battle.” Bill said in a serious yet polite manner as he quickly got in front of Iris and took a stance and stared at the mist with his sand spikes ready.

These were the exact same words Bill’s father had used to teach him during his training sessions with him. Bill’s words instantly brought hope to Iris’ heart and her serious tone combined with his sudden stance said that he had sensed something and Bill had indeed sensed something, it was an intense aura.

“That’s it!” A shout resounded from the mist in the direction that Bill was facing and it was followed by a huge gust of wind that started blowing all the mist away.

“Look Iris, we don’t have much time. Erin told me that you were quite strong. Even if you lack skill, you can still be useful. I want you to trust me and follow my lead and on my signal just run forward and attack.” Bill said quickly as the mist continued to clear.

Iris understood that there was no benefit to just sitting around and sulking about her weakness. She quickly nodded yes to Bill and got into position behind ready to run forward and strike as soon as Bill gave her the signal.

***************

Present Time

The boy was sent tumbling back and he crashed straight into the body of the first boy and both of them were now completely knocked out.

The leader stared with sharp menacing eyes as she watched a huge smile appear on Iris’ face who had just defeated her first real opponent. She could bear the smile on Iris’ face as it was ticking her off.

All the while Iris was rejoicing in her first takedown, but suddenly she had a realization as she stared at her own extended fist.

‘That was what I was missing. Everyone was trying to show me moves and expecting me to learn and sparring with me to try and get me to develop a fighting sense, but the truth was…’ Iris thought as she turned back to look around at Bill. 𝒃𝙚𝙙𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝒍．𝒆𝒕

‘I just needed some guidance and the opportunity to shine,’ Iris thought.