Eclipse stood gracefully in the snow, brown leaves in perfect halves scattered all around him. His grey hair which had grown shoulder length over the past year fluttered in the wind. His face was extremely focused, and he was neither surprised, nor did he expect to do it in his first try.

  Chael looked at him then smiled, before kicking at the tree. Just as the leaves left the tree, he thrusted his long wooden sword up with thunderous power. This very motion nearly split the wooden blade in half, and whipped the air with a crisp sound. All the floating leaves above him soon split into messy halves.

  Celestia was absolutely flabbergasted, "C-chael you too?!"

  Chael smiled at his work, "You underestimate us granny."

  "T-these kids..." Celestia said before appearing in their line of sight once again.

  "Kahaha...ha!" She laughed awkwardly while scratching her head, "Looks like you two have already completed this task... I- uhhhh suppose it was a bit too easy. Kaha...ha."

  Eclipse said monotonously, "Of course granny, come on, give us something more difficult."

  Celestia looked sheepish. She had expected them to take another few weeks at the very least but they had actually managed it on their first try. They were no longer the whiny little runts that they were a year ago, "O-of course... Come with me!"

  The two followed Celestia into her house. She then led them into her messy bedroom and pushed her bed away to the other side of the room.

  To the duo’s surprise, there was a small doorway leading down underground.

  "I didn’t know you had a basement."

  "Well, now you do." She said, before going down to the bottom. Eclipse and Chael followed her.

  The basement was a small room with dust collected everywhere. There were scrolls scrolls and other items scattered on the floor but what caught their attention was a very long chest sat next to a wall on the other end of the basement.

  It looked antique and gave an aura of ancient relics. Celestia walked up to the chest and flung the lid open. Strangely, this one chest occupied the entity of the back of the room. If Celestia hadn’t opened it just now, the duo would have assumed it was a part of the architecture.

  "This is...?" Chael asked, surprised at what was inside.

  Celestia lifted an odachi from the chest, keeping it within its golden-beige scabbard. The weapon was long and curved, and looked impossibly heavy to be used in a fight. It was nearly three metres!

  "You giving us real weapons now?" Eclipse asked.

  "Mhm. This is for you, Chael."

  Chael stepped forward and clutched the almost faint-golden hilt of the weapon into his hands and looked at it with fascination. His hands trembled in excitement as he unsheathed the blade from it’s scabbard, revealing a dark green metal that that glistened ominously in the dim light. "Woa..."

  He tried to swing the sword down but it was obviously too long to be used properly in this small room. Simply assuming a stance caused Chael to loose his centre of gravity, and he had to take a few steps forward to regain balance.

  “It’s almost as big as you.” Eclipse said, slightly surprised.

  “Which is why it suits him.” Celestia smiled, “With Chael’s stupid levels of power, he’d cleave his enemies in half if he used a stupidly heavy weapon like this. Not to mention the insane reach that it has.”

  “I can’t wait to try this out.” Chael said, trying his best to suppress his delight.

  Seeing that he was pleased with his new weapon, Celestia smiled then reached into the chest again and pulled out a pair of dual katanas.

  "This is for you, Eclipse."

  Eclipse’s eyes widened and he stepped forward and accepted the two katana. The handles were shaped like a crescent moon which not only looked appealing, but it felt very comfortable to hold. He unsheathed a katana from its scabbard and stared at the blade in awe. It was very thin, yet strangely felt heavy for its size.

  “They are the Mooncrest Katana.” Celestia explained, “I came across it buried deep within the ruins of an ancient shrine. I’m not sure who used to wield them or how they were made, but they can cut through metal and stone like paper.”

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  “That’s so sick.” Chael commented, “where is mine from and what’s it called?”

  “Uhhhhh…” Celestia looked as though she was thinking very hard, “That’s… the Colossal Wavemaker Wobbly Whopper Odachi. I found it on the floor uhhhh… in an age-old battle ground, kahaha!”

  Eclipse was lost for words. She definitely made all that up just now.

  “Woah, that’s so cool.” Chael grinned and pointed his blade to the door in fervour and started swinging it around randomly. Because the weapon was so heavy and long, Chael's centre of balance was off, and he wobbled slightly with its motion, “Eclipse, no one’s gonna mess with us now, especially since I have the Colossal Wavemaker Wobbly Whopper Odachi.”

  Eclipse's eyebrows twitched at him. He decided not to say anything, though.

  “Now, now kids.” Celestia clapped, “Come to the tree we were at before. It’s time to start the next stage of your swordsmanship training. You guys are definitely going to like this one.”

  With that, she simply dissolved into thin air and was no longer in the room with them.

  Eclipse and Chael finally got there and as expected Celestia stood there. She had her back turned to them, and when she noticed their presence she turned around. Her posture and expression seemed serious, completely different than it had been before.

  The wind blew past them and they subconsciously got in position as a wave of unease swept past them. Chael smiled gutsily, "I think I already know what the next part of the training is..."

  Eclipse got his guard up and clutched the hilt of both of his katana from their sheath, "This is going to be tough..."

  "Kahahaha!" Celestia laughed, "That's right! The next part of your sword training is to fight me!"

  The instant that these words left her mouth, Eclipse vanished from sight and appeared behind her, both of his katana unsheathed in the blink of an eye.

  "But I didn’t say..." Celestia effortlessly dodged his attack then flicked his forehead which sent him flying back and he crashed against a tree. "You can start yet."

  "Eclipse!" Chael shouted.

  "It begins... now!"

  Chael thrusted his feet off the ground, leaving miniature ruptures on the earth and rampaged towards Celestia with his sea green pupils glowing with determination. Once she was within his range, he clutched the hilt of his odachi with both hands and swung the blade down with astronomical might.

  As the attack preceded her, she tilted her body to the side. Chael's eyes widened. Not yet having learnt how to control his strength, his sword sliced at the tree behind her with force enough to crush boulders and the tree split into two halves.

  “Woah, woah, woah…!” Chaels eyes widened a little as he fell forward, not yet being used to the balance.

  Celestia smiled bitterly, "This monstrous power of yours will be something I'll never get used-"

  Just then, a sudden bloodlust washed over her. Eclipse emerged behind her like a grim reaper and with speed that defied common sense, he arced both of his katana at her. Celestia merely glanced to the side before she sidestepped him. Eclipse front flipped to Chael's side.

  "Is that all you've got?" Celestia teased.

  The duo gritted their teeth and charged again, keeping at each other’s pace. Eclipse threw one of his katana at her but she once again simply side stepped. However, before the sword landed, Eclipse's speed increased several-fold and he zoomed behind Celestia and caught the katana. Before Celestia could even turn around, Eclipse was already thrusting both katana towards her.

  Meanwhile, Chael’s veins bulged out of his arms as he gripped his odachi with all his might and arced his sword in front of Celestia, sending a slice of gust straight towards her face.

  Celestia sneered, "Not bad at all!"

  She vanished from sight and appeared in front of Chael, who instantly lost his balance trying to control his pace. Meanwhile, the slice of wind Chael had launched at her struck Eclipse right at the centre of his body. Taken completely off guard, he flew several metres back.

  Celestia twisted her body and threw a jab at Chael, who just about blocked her blow lifting his sword up. He bounced backward upon impact.

  "Surely you two must have more to show than this after all the training, right?!"

  Without responding, the duo who were at an equal distance away from her charged once again. Celestia's lips curled up, "That's the spirit."

  The trio continued to exchange the blows again and again. Dancing with swordplay as the pendulum continued swinging.

  Soon, a week passed.

  Then a month.

  About now, Eclipse was a lot more proficient with using the Mooncrest Katana, and it was a deadly weapon to be wielded in the hands of someone so swift and nimble. His blade would cut through trees like butter, but more dangerous than that was his insane precision. He got close to severing a few stands of her hair more than Celestia liked to admit it.

  Chael, on the other hand, struggled to adapt to his Odachi for the first half of the month, but during the latter half, he would use this strange dynamic between him and his weapon’s balance to his own advantage. The insane range of the weapon, coupled by Chael learning to use the environment when it suited the situation, caused him to develop his own, unique style of fighting with this impossibly heavy weapon.

  All the while Celestia continued to toy with them daily, occasionally giving them pointers on how they could improve.

  For some reason, the two learned very fast. If they made a mistake that Celestia had called out, they’d never make that mistake again.

  Months more passed of this persistent, gruelling training.

  Before long, the white snow melted and the cherry blossoms blemished. And not long after, they had started falling again, and the weather grew cold.

  Winter had started again. Eclipse and Chael were now fourteen years old. In the past year, they spent almost all of their time during the day fighting Celestia, and at night, they would gaze up at the moon and stars while basking in the cool breeze reminiscing the past or making strategies against Celestia for the next days spar.

  About now their hair had grown even longer, reaching about half way down their back. During this period they had gotten exponentially proficient at using their weapons. Although they were still unable to land as much as a scratch on Celestia, she was having to move around a lot more than when they first started.