By the time I got to the training grounds, five of them were already there.
Julien was polishing his sword like it owed him money. Garrick stood off to the side, arms folded, silently judging the wind. Felix had tripped three times before I even finished my first yawn. Leo was pacing like a condemned man. And Wallace… was standing next to a suspiciously humming contraption.
I stared at it.
He smiled.
I stared harder.
He started sweating.
"Wallace," I said, tone flat. "What. Is. That."
He perked up like a happy inventor goblin. "A mana-assisted grappling hook launcher! I call it the Spider-Latch!"
"Spider-Latch?"
"It's meant to help scale terrain—"
BOOM.
A puff of smoke. A metal bolt shot ten feet into the air and lodged itself into a tree branch. The rope snapped. The tree groaned. And then it collapsed. Onto Felix.
"AAAAAGH—WHY ALWAYS ME?!"
