The first 24 hours after the battle against Mr. Freeze were spent mostly getting over the shock of what he managed to do. After that, though, Archer replayed in the event in his head, but did so with a critical eye. If he could manage to last as long as he did against Freeze, then surely that meant he was capable of actually defeating him, but only if Archer could figure out where he went wrong in the fight. And there was one specific detail he couldn't get out his head the more he thought it over. [b]Zero's ice was too weak[/b]. Nowhere was that more evident than his failed hammer attack, where the hammer itself broke on Freeze's armor upon impact.

"If I could just make my ice tougher, I can win next time..." he muttered to himself. His encounter with Freeze left him feeling better about himself, but not so much that he shirked on training. In fact, if anything he trained harder than ever now. Most of his training time he spent conjuring ice weapons, only to break them against target dummies in order to test their durability. Archer's working theory was that he could perhaps increase the water's density as it froze, which would make the weapons a bit heavier but also tougher to break, at least in theory. So far he couldn't feel any difference in his ice weapons, which likely meant he still needed practice with his own powers. The target dummies he used were made of bamboo mostly, in fact they were inspired by the same kind of practice dummies used to test the sharpness of swords in kendo. So far, though, the swords he tried sculpting either broke against the bamboo or snapped it without actually cutting it.

"Hyaaah!" he grunted, bringing down what felt like the millionth ice sword against the millionth dummy. The sword's blade lodged into the dummy, but then snapped in the middle, leaving Archer with a handle and blade-stub while the sword's tip stayed lodged in the dummy, "Argh! Come on! How long do I have to keep doing this before I get it right?" grumbled to himself in frustration. Combat skills, no matter what they were, took time to perfect, years even. But this wasn't necessarily about fighting, it was about conjuring a usable sword or other weapon on the fly so he could be better prepared for combat, turns out even [i]that[/i] is a difficult skill to master.

He heard talking from lobby area, something about the El Camino that El Sasquatcho drove. Archer came out of the gym proper, still in his training clothes, and went to grab a water bottle out of the refrigerator. He'd been given congratulations by just about everyone on his bout with Mr. Freeze, but he still seemed as driven and serious as the day they first set up shop in Wildcat's gym. As he was grabbing the water, Archer was still muttering to himself about enhancing the durability of his ice weapons, seeming to have a one-track mind even when on break.