Chapter 109: 107 – Rising Heat

Zel continued to make full use of the pavilion, moving from dummy to dummy and quickly developing a cycle of training punches, kicks, bladework, and testing what she could do with the Essentia Crucible. She couldn’t quite get larger ball lightning right, but with each attempt that destabilized into a continuous, barely-controllable lightning tendril, she felt herself coming closer to getting it right. It was just a matter of practice. 

Zef was much the same, about an hour in putting Pentacle away in favor of practicing with her Philosopher’s Eye and bayonet against the articulated dummies, or even just returning to the shooting range and letting rip Fog missile after Fog missile downrange, pounding away at the target plates. It was a constant percussive symphony, whether the markswoman went for bullets or magic: Pang. Pang. Pang. Pang. Pang. Pang.

Over and over, until it became background noise. 

Just like Zef’s constant glances. Counting the number of shots painted an entirely expected picture - at least, one Zelsys had fully expected. Whenever the blonde ran out of ammo or had to do anything that took any amount of time, she used that time to stare, nearly without fail. So much so that it became sensory background noise, but unlike the incessant pinging of lead against steel, it was an element Zelsys was more than happy to acknowledge and play into. They were small things - when she needed to stretch or rest, she just made sure Zef got a good view. 

Growing a little tired of pounding away at targets herself, Zelsys looked around the pavilion for something to imply the presence of weights. Obviously they wouldn’t just be sitting outside left to rust, and the barrier had to let water through to some degree lest the trees here would have shown signs of drought by now, so there was only one reasonable assumption - one that soon proved correct. 

She looked and looked, peeking into both the smaller buildings and finding them to unsurprisingly be full of plants, just as the signs above their doors suggested with plant symbols. However, as she left the left-hand building, she saw another door, behind it, on the wall, and on the door was a clear symbol of a dumbbell. Past the door were stairs, leading to an extremely dry-aired basement, one with an impressive collection of lifting equipment arrayed all around the room. In fact, just the room itself was easily large enough to be compared with the lab under Riverside Remedies, and there was just enough space to walk amongst the rows of weights.

One thing that really showed the bespoke quality of these weights was the everpresent horse imagery. Thick metal plates with holes in the center, equally thick rods for holding them, black-dyed braided silk rope, solid dumbbells - all emblazoned with horse imagery in some way or another. Instead of numbered weight indicators, each weight had a subtly different horse’s head with a different number of hair tufts. For the time being, Zel took a pair of three-tuft dumbbells and went on her way, switching to the weights for exercise but not really moving from her spot next to that one striking block. She wagered they were probably somewhere in the realm of thirty kilos each.

Minutes passed. Zelsys did what exercises came to her naturally at the moment - chiefly a variety of lifting methods that focused on the arms, shoulders, chest and back - muscles writhing beneath her skin with exertion and tiny sparks jumping despite the fact she made no effort to use Fog-breathing, or burn any Fog for Fulgur. It simply occurred instinctively on this small scale, an act no more conscious than a normal person channeling more force than usual to lift a heavy object. Her muscles burned and sweat began to coat her skin.

Just as the sun rose into the heavens so did the temperature rise alongside it, to the point of visible heat haze - to where Zel couldn’t even sit atop the metal block anymore, for as readily as it absorbed heat, this property did nothing to assuage the egg-frying temperature of its top side.

Three thought-trains ran parallel in her mind at this point. 

The first - beneficial though it was, lifting bored her when compared to other forms of exercise. She would buy or borrow pulps to pass the time in the future. 

The second - the hope that there was a place to bathe or shower nearby, as she wasn’t exactly eager to walk half the city’s length just to wash the sweat off.

The third - the very heat that was causing her to sweat like this. Exertion alone had never made it feel like her skin was constantly drenched, and therefore, it had to be the heat and air humidity.

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Realistically, she could tolerate a bit of heat and sweat just fine.

Physically, she wanted to at least cool off a little bit, maybe take off her boots and arm-harness.

Egotistically, this was about as good an excuse as conceivable to display her physique in its full glory.

Before that, however, she had a question to ask of that old guardsman, or really any passersby that knew the area. She walked to the gate, stepping just outside the barrier. Nobody on the street paid her any mind up until the moment she passed the bubble, at which point she felt no fewer than four gazes and herself saw two heads whip around to look at her. The old man was one of them.

Ignoring the others, she asked him a question.

“Say, is there any place to take a bath nearby? Outside the property, I mean.”

He looked confused for a moment, blinking a few times before pointing to his left and uttering, “Y-yes, just down the street. You’ll be able to tell it apart when you see it, seein’ as it’s the same style as the sect building.”

“Same style as the sect building? Why?” Zel asked. She had seen this architectural style nowhere else in Willowdale, not even in this wealthier district.

Visibly glad to have the opportunity to speak on something he was knowledgeable in, the old man continued: “The Black Horses used to own the bathhouse too, but they auctioned it off at some point. Myself, I think it was to show that they weren’t just a glorified mafia like the other branches were at the time.”

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