Here he is!

"I have-- something to run by you, though I do not know enough about the diplomatic situation to be sure it is possible."

“Yeah, sure, what’s up?”

"While training with people of a similar or lesser skill level can still improve your skill, there is a ceiling to what you can achieve without facing someone better than you. If there were no diplomatic issues, I'd suggest approaching Technoblade to spar with us, but-- I am aware there may be issues I do not know about with that plan."

"...Ah. Yeah." The nervous laugh is back! Tubbo takes a couple bites of pufferfish (not enough to make him twitchy, let alone high) before continuing. "I would... I would say there are diplomatic issues with that, yeah. Last time I saw him he was shooting me with fireworks and telling me that he was going to burn L'Manberg to the ground and kill anyone involved in its government? And we have wanted posters up because he helped Wilbur explode it? I mean, he's in retirement now but, uh, I'd rather not remind him we exist unless we're ready to fight him.

...Which, I mean--oh, you weren't part of the Cabinet when--well this is awkward. Um." Time for whispering! "We're targeting Dream now, right? But after we get Dream, he's next on the hit list. Because he's--he's opposed to everything we stand for, and--anytime he wanted, he could do the same thing Dream did, right? As long as Techno and Dream are--on this server, really--any power we have, it doesn't really matter. Like, look at the wanted posters! Unless they, y'know, unless they respect us as powerful, unless we show them that we have power too, they can just kind of do whatever they want and not, um, not have any consequences for it. So we need to, we need to make there be consequences. But I think it would go... extremely poorly for us, if we got him to train us and then tried to use that against him once we were strong enough. Like, even worse than... Whatever he'll do anyway. And that's the best case scenario, where he does agree to train us and doesn't just, like, kill us for being a government where he can see it. So."

"Ah. Yes. That would be. A problem.

I was confused about what the actual situation was, I was getting mixed messages, but in hindsight those messages were from Ghostbur and Philza--" (It's almost impressive that Philza can still go down in his estimation!)

"He's been--I mean, he's been friends with them since before either of them even joined the Dream SMP. It makes sense. And Ghostbur is--I mean, I can't, like, blame him? Not the most reliable source though, I will--I will give you that."

"If you were going to get accidental mixed messages from anyone it would from him."

"Yeah, he's good at that. He should sell it. Monetize the mixed messages. You know, I think he's less confusing for me? But I guess that makes sense, I know him a lot better."

"You also have a better idea of-- what is going on in the gaps."

"Yeah, that's true. But that's what you have me for, to fill in the gaps.

He tries some, I think. He has, like, a library."

"...does he consistently remember what is in it?"

"I mean. No."

"--It's a nice idea, anyway.

...I would suggest seeing if any of the mercenaries would be up for sparring, but I doubt we could trust them to keep their mouths shut. Different problems, but still a problem."

"Yeahhhh. And Quackity's close with Sapnap, but--so's Dream, y'know?"

"There's potentially too much risk."

“It was a good thought, though. And we can probably spar with Sapnap occasionally, just, like, not so much that it look like training instead of just having fun, you know?”

"Is sparring something you do recreationally?"

“…Yes? I guess not, like, all the time, it’d be kinda rude to just start killing somebody, but like, if he dies I might take his stuff and then we would fight until we’re bored. Or if he pranked me, I could kill him about that. Or, like, um, at the festival! There was a game there based around fighting. I guess I don’t remember if Sapnap participated, but it wouldn’t be rude to ask.”

"We did something similar, though not as-- lightly."

“Oh, cool. What’d you do? I know Purpled used to play, like, bedwars and stuff before he moved here.”

He has the mental image of people picking up beds and hitting each other with them. He is reasonably sure that that is an inaccurate image.

...Reasonably sure.

"We competed in who could hit the most targets accurately, sparred with wooden blades-- sparred with live blades, on occasion, though injury was a greater concern there than it was here." He sounds wistful.

“Oooh, yeah, that sounds fun. …We should set up targets too, we could do something with redstone with them and everything. Make a game out of it.”

"We could, yes. I could probably add some space to the arena for it."

"Oh, I just meant, like, in random places. The arena works too though."