Fair.

The four students lined up in the dojo in front of their master.

“Ok before each of you is a solid boulder, I want you to shatter your respective boulders, with some limitations,” Udo was glad his students were finally prepared for testes like this, “Cadence, you must shatter it by dancing to the same resonance as the boulder, the correct frequency will make it crumble. Mavis, I don’t want you to just lift the boulder and drop it. Ignis, I don’t want you to just torch the boulder until it explodes, besides I don’t know how well this old dojo could take another fire. Doll, you must shatter yours by using strength alone, no external Qi in this test. Begin”

Cadence started to find a rhythm and the boulder crumbled pretty quickly, Mavis pushed at hard as she can against the block, imagining she was throwing birds at it like how she threw birds at the air to fly, but it took her a few goes before she hit with enough force to break the boulder. Ignis was just pissed off, he knew he should be able to master lava attacks and destroy the boulder that way but he could never figure out how.

Doll thought of what she could do to destroy the boulder physically, and she remembered seeing a really strong looking warrior from before she came to the dojo, so she shape-shifted into him and punched right through the boulder.

Mavis looked over at Doll’s new form and was white as a sheet, she screamed and ran out of the dojo and down the steps as fast as she could.

Doll quickly changed back and ran after her, “Don’t go after her!” Udo called out, “She must cope with it on her own.”

‘yeah right’ Doll thought, she wasn’t about to let her friend deal with whatever scared her that much on her own.

–

Doll ran after Mavis for about half an hour until the two were totally out of breath, standing on am empty path that cut through wide fields.

Doll, gasping for breath asked “Are you ok Mavis?”

Mavis for now seemed very calm.

“Where did you see that man. The one you transformed into?”

“Cadence and I saw him on the way here before we met you, he was helping a load of men build a city gateway… who is he?”

“…my stepfather, the man who killed my mother. Where was this city?”

Doll looked at Mavis, “why do you want to know Mavis?”

Mavis turned around, eyes red with tears, it was clear to doll there was only one reason she would want to know where he is.

“…Mavis, I don’t want to tell you if it’s that.”

“If you don’t tell me I will leave you all and go looking for him anyway!”

Doll could see there was no turning back for her, if she was going to do this, she needed a friend close by.

“I’m coming with you.”

–

Udo looked out over the setting sun, it was too late now, he had a very bad feeling.

“Ignis, Cadence… please could you go out and look for them, you can cover more ground if you split up.”

“yes master” they said in unison, and dashed off in the direction Mavis and Doll went.

–

The bar was full at this time of night, men exchanged stories and cheer between swigs of beer, and two young girls walked into the bar, just a little too young to be in a bar like this alone. The first girl shouted above the noise in the bar;

“We’re looking for Berk!” the bar went quiet, “Where is he?”

there were hushed whispers among the patrons of the bar, why were the two girls looking for-

“Everyone out. Now.” came a voice from the back of the bar, and after seeing who it was the bar was empty within a minute.

“I have to say I wasn’t expecting to see you again kid, I thought you would be too afraid to ever look for me.” Berk stood up. “You should have stayed afraid girl.”

“sh-shut up! I… I came here… to…”

Berk walked up to Mavis “I see you’re still a thing of fear, what did you think you would do when you came here? Did you think you could actually kill me? I’ll teach you a lesson for disrespecting me like that.”

Berk grabbed Mavis hair and threw her through a table at a wall before Doll could even react, but before she hit the wall, Mavis righted herself in the air and flew at Berk full speed, her arms hit his chest and out the other side flew a flock of dying birds and lots of blood.

Mavis, shocked stepped back and fell over, Berk looked down at his chest. “…bitch.” he fell over.

Doll rushed over to Mavis to make sure she was ok, and then looked over at Berk’s corpse, a light moved from his bracelet into Mavis’, though Mavis didn’t notice, she was crying too much.

But what happened next doll noticed all too well, Berk’s shadow, started to move.

It pulled away from Berk and what appeared to be an exact copy of Berk climbed from the shadow, and stood looking down on the two girls. Doll could tell that it was really a shapeshifter, different to her though somehow.

“Well isn’t that an interesting turn,” said the copy, and Mavis looked up more scared than she had ever been before, “I wanted his light and waited in his shadow so I could claim two at once when he met another… but it seems I get to take three. I really am going to get an early lead. Now then… you.”

The copy jumped at Doll, forcing her through two walls into the next house, by the time he landed on her he looked exactly like her.

“This way,” Doll’s reflection said, “Your friend wont know which of us to kill!”

“Dickhead,” Doll was really pissed “You assume I need her to help me.”

A burst of Qi shot straight through the neck of her reflection and the copies head rolled along the floor, spilling blood all over doll.

“Doll!” Mavis came running, but what she saw made her fall against the wall in shock.

The blood spilling onto Doll had caused some kind of reaction and Doll looked just like Berk.

“change back! Change back DAMNIT!” Doll shouted. She looked over at Mavis, who was muttering to herself, wide eyed and pale, curled up as tight as she could be in the corner looking at the image of Doll beheaded.

“Mavis, its me…” as doll walked closer to Mavis, Mavis screamed.

“I- …I’m sorry Mavis” Doll ran out into the night, she couldn’t help her friend from here, and it was all too much for her to take, she would hide for as long as she could.