My Plunderer System

After learning about the changes to in-field experiences for this year, Milo had already begun writing up a training regimen for his friends. It was very similar to the training regimen he had during his internship, involving a lot of simulated gate training, he chose to include some weight training in as well, mainly for Zach, as he could use some bulking up, but also because it would allow them to be more physically fit which would help them even more in the gates they'd be closing.

After class had ended, Milo and his friends had a sort of strategy meeting for lunch. Milo led the charge as he was a member of a strike squad for the entire summer, which gave him the most experience when it came to gatecrashing. During the meeting, Milo had drawn up formations, assigned roles, he even told them his ideas for training to better prepare them. All of the members that he had chosen had already experienced either gates or combat with beasts aside from Allana, but with her brother being a guild master, he was sure she had already used a simulation to practice.

For their formation, Milo had both Allana and Mark as tanks, as their abilities allowed them to dramatically increase their durability. Mark by changing the substance he was made of, and Allana by hardening her bones and turning them into armor like her brother. Milo chose to do a similar role to what he had done previously, a combined ranged and melee dealer, Chris would also do this as he could launch fireballs at beasts from range and also was pretty good at close combat as well. Maria and Zach would be close range dealers, Zach because when partnered with Waki he could use his weapon to a good level while his tame supported him, and Maria because her choice to use two short swords while using her lightning to enhance her speed would make her more powerful up close than at range. This was her own advice to Milo as she could see the gears turning in his mind when the in-field experiences were first announced.

The rest of the team thought Milo's formation was perfect as it took advantage of all of their strong suits. The only thing they were missing was a healer but there were a few in the X rated class that Milo thought he could try proposing the idea to. His friends also looked over his training regimen for them, while it would certainly be tiring, until they were actually sent out to gates it would allow them to learn how to be most efficient when closing the gates and also train them to be as prepared as possible.

According to Mr. O'Neal's information he had given, the highest gates they'd be sent to were D rank, they wanted to send students to gates that wouldn't be ranked higher than they could handle. Because of this, the recommended squad size was smaller than what was needed for the gates he was closing as an intern. For D ranked gates, the association recommended at least 6 members. Currently they had 6 but were missing a crucial piece, being a healer. Like he told his friends, Milo had some ideas for who could be their healer, now he just had to convince them to join the team.

After lunch, Milo had a few more classes, including practical training which was his last of the day. During practical training, Milo was the center of attention for the class. After seeing the Disaster ability, the other students were all trying to get Milo to join a team with them for the in-field experiences. Milo politely declined them all as he had already decided on who he wanted for his team. He felt that putting together 6 super strong abilities wasn't the best way to close gates, but gathering a team of people who were of a similar mindset was best. This was the driving factor for why he wanted a team made up of his friends, plus they'd already have some chemistry and knew how each other thought and behaved.

During the training, he kept track of the students who had healing abilities. The most notable one was a student named Courtney. Her ability would be an extremely useful one, even if it was a simple one. The main reason for this, came from the idea that students who had simple abilities that were common in lower ranked classes required an extremely high test score in other areas in order to be placed in the X ranked class, meaning that she had to have tested highly in other areas. Her ability was Healing Aura, it was one of the most common wide area healing abilities and allowed the user to heal people that were within a certain radius of them when the ability was activated.

Milo approached her, she had long hair the color of cotton candy and bright blue eyes. She had a very girly appearance and when she opened her mouth, it fit her appearance like a glove.

"Hiii Milo, what'd you need?" she asked with a smile. When he first approached her, Courtney wasn't really practicing and was instead looking in a handheld mirror and touching up her makeup. Like Chris, Mark and Allana, Courtney had tested into the X ranked class this year, and his performance in the challenge had left an impression on her. Milo asked her if she had a team yet for the in-field experience, and when she said no, he asked if she wanted to join him and his group. She agreed as quickly as Milo had asked her, causing Milo to be flustered a bit, but he was glad that they now had their healer. He told her he'd set up a meeting for the team and let her know when they'd be meeting and went to continue his practice of using other elements he wasn't versed in yet.

Courtney then went over to another student and began talking to him, it was the student Milo had beaten in the challenge. "Sorry I can't be on your team anymore, I joined a different one," she said to the student before she pranced off back to where she was "practicing."

Chris was practicing with the fire ability, shooting targets with streams of flame, Milo noticed that his flames had returned to their usual orange color which made Milo wonder what the blue flame he produced the day before was all about. Milo approached him and asked what the difference was and Chris explained it as him condensing his Magic Power fueling the flame into one small point, rather than spreading it out. Milo thought that the explanation made enough sense.

"It took me half the summer to get it to work, so don't feel too discouraged if you can't get it to work today," Chris said. Milo then tried it for himself, he began to produce a flame from his hand. The flame he produced was orange, he closed his eyes and began to concentrate, soon the color of the flame began to change, going from orange, to yellow, to blue until it eventually turned white. Chris could feel the immense heat coming from the flame Milo now held in his hand, rather than flickering like a campfire, it looked like a blowtorch one might see in a machine shop.

"I forgot that I can't treat you like a normal person," Chris said feeling a bit defeated from how fast Milo figured it out. Milo looked at Chris feeling puzzled about his comment, but then turned his attention to the white flame shooting from his palm. Milo began to wonder if he could do something similar with the other elements by condensing the magic power as much as he could.

Chris also explained that by condensing the flame the power behind the small fireball in his hand would also be higher. He showed this by forming a normal fireball and throwing it at a dummy, a small explosion occurred when the fireball made contact and the dummy was now charred black. He did the same thing, this time with a condensed flame, the explosion from the condensed flame was much more violent and caused part of the dummy to be destroyed. Milo nodded in understanding before throwing the white hot flame at a dummy of his own. The explosion that occurred was even bigger than Chris's blue fireball, and the dummy was completely vaporized from the attack.

Milo then went off on his own, receiving looks of surprise from the other students. The only thing on his mind was still whether or not he could condense the other elements like Chris had shown him with his fire. Milo started by going through each element one by one, he started by using air, forming a small tornado in his hand. It began to shrink in size, spinning faster and faster as he focused his magic power to a smaller point. When he couldn't make it spin any faster he threw it at a dummy causing the dummy to burst apart. Milo tested it with the other elements, while it didn't change their appearance much it definitely increased attack power. The last element he tested was the earth element, this one had a more visible change, like the fire element. As he condensed it down, the rock ball he had pulled out of the ground began to condense itself down, until it became smaller and smoothed out, no longer having the rough appearance it originally did. The ball itself had a metal sheen to it after he condensed it as much as he could, and once he let go of the ball, it fell to the ground and caused cracks in the concrete. By condensing the earth enough, it had become extremely dense, dense enough to damage the floor they were practicing on when it fell. Overall, using Chris's advice, Milo could do even more using the Disaster ability now.

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