Wizard Tournament: Chapter 125 (Patreon)

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          The bolt of hellfire flew through the air. It hit some brief resistance for a moment, then Elder Jaelyn vanished in a pop of displaced air. Draevin saw him reappear only a short distance away. A fracture of white light was now suspended in the air in front of him with a suspicious hole at the center. It looked like he’d had magical protections in place. They just hadn’t done any good.

          “On your right, thirty degrees,” Peter’s voice called out from somewhere unseen. Istven adjusted his aim as instructed without any hesitation and fired off another shot. Elder Jaelyn disappeared once more.

          Draevin tried to take advantage of the distraction to escape his captor. Unfortunately the ice golem still suspending him off the ground didn’t seem to care that Jaelyn was preoccupied at the moment. It held Draevin’s wrists tight against all his useless flailing. Struggling physically wasn’t going to be the answer here. Draevin knew that. He closed his eyes and tuned out the sounds of the battle: the crackling bolts of hellfire, the pops of vocomancy.

          Cold. The sound of Aelaniss’s voice. A sound he would never hear again. Tenna’s life winking out with barely a warning. He assured her it would be safe. His fault. He needed to fix it. To try. It was all coming to a close and here he was, taken out of the fight by his own ice! How could that be when the golem was made of his own cryomancy?

          Draevin opened his eyes once more. He held firm to the unshakable belief that the golem holding him was his. That it was only holding his wrists because he wanted it to. Now he wanted it to let him go.

          It let him go.

          “Better,” Draevin said aloud. He looked back at the battle before him. A bright red line was suspended in the air next to Istven. He turned his bow down that line and fired down it. Draevin could see that on the other end of it was Elder Jaelyn. The yellow-haired Tel’Andrid leader popped away in another burst of vocomancy as Istven’s bolt of hellfire shot straight for him. He reappeared almost directly behind Istven and as he did the glowing red line switched positions.

          “Left, a hundred and fifty degrees,” Peter’s voice called out. Istven flipped around and lined up the shot. He was already releasing another bolt from Dred’Slynt before Jaelyn had a chance to throw out an offensive spell. He popped away again. The arrow brightly indicated his exact position and Istven whipped around and fired off another shot.

          “We’ve got him on the defensive,” Peter’s voice echoed in Draevin’s ears. “Help the others get out of here. It’s only a matter of time before Istven slips up.”

          “Right,” Draevin nodded. Peter didn’t even comment on how impressive it was that Draevin had been able to overpower the archmage’s control. Perhaps it just wasn’t that surprising to him. Either way, there was no time. Draevin scanned the battlefield. Sylnya, Kot and Wix were all being held fast in the air by an invisible force. He hadn’t even seen when that had happened.

          Wix was closest, so Draevin sent his new golem out to pull her out of the air. There was a considerable amount of resistance. The golem had to lean into Wix’s body and Draevin even joined in by pulling on one of her legs. Wix’s eyes twisted down at Draevin. Her mouth twitched. He couldn’t tell what she was trying to say. After a moment of struggling she finally came loose.

          Wix collapsed onto the ground, gasping for breath. “My wind. Against me,” she panted.

          “Me too,” Draevin said. “Now give me a hand with Grrbraa.”

          A bolt of hellfire rushed right past Draevin’s head. He hadn’t even seen it coming. All at once Istven just twisted around and had nearly taken his head clean off. “What the hell! Are you trying to kill me?” Draevin shouted.

          “Ignore that. He’s fine,” Peter’s voice echoed from some unseen location. Istven didn’t even comment on the near miss and quickly twisted around to fire off another shot.

          Draevin focused on pulling Grrbraa loose.

          “Why doesn’t he just leave,” Wix asked while the two of them pulled on one of Grrbraa’s arms.

          “Elder Jaelyn?” Draevin asked.

          “Yeah,” she said. “He pops around the battlefield like a maniac. He isn’t even trying to hide either. Couldn’t he just move to the top floor of one of those golden spires and be done with all this? He just keeps staying clos—”

          All at once Grrbraa came loose and the three of them fell onto the ground in a pile. Istven fired off another shot. Pop. It barely missed.

          “Grrbraa, check on our new friend. I think she got herself embedded in a wall,” Peter’s voice directed immediately. A yellow arrow appeared over Grrbraa’s head and trailed off in the direction the shapeshifter Andrea had been thrown. Grrbraa shook himself off and ran after it without any hesitation.

          When they got to Sylnya, Kot was already there. He was pacing around at Sylnya’s feet anxiously with his tail twitching and his head darting around to follow the sound of every clash between Istven and Jaelyn. There were the blackened marks of Dred’Slynt’s many attacks peppered on the sides of the golden buildings around them.

          “One, two, three,” Draevin counted off for Wix. They heaved together on Sylnya’s legs. Draevin was pretty sure his new golem did most of the work, but it still felt nice to be helpful. Sylnya was freed from her invisible restraints and fell onto the ground. Kot leapt on top of her right away and tried to lick her face.

          Sylnya pushed Kot’s face away from hers. “You have to stop him!” she shouted urgently as soon as she was freed.

          “Uh, he’s your pet. Isn’t that—”

          “Not Kot. Istven!”

          “What?”

          “Dred’Slynt isn’t going to last forever,” Sylnya explained. “That elder isn’t even trying to hide from it. He’s letting them get just close enough to encourage them to keep trying. Just look!” Sylnya pointed insistently at Istven. He let off another bolt of hellfire as Jaelyn reappeared. Draevin saw what she was referring to. The bolt was barely a sliver of the original brightness. She was right. Even the God Killer needed fuel.

          “I’m well aware of all that,” Peter’s voice called out. “We don’t have a choice. He’s shown he can take each of us out with barely any effort. If we let up for even a moment he’ll be on top of us. At least this way he’s using up his own mana reserves.”

          “What do we do then?” Wix asked.

          “Same plan as before,” Peter’s voice said. “Make a break for the tower. Seal the door. I already have a distraction lined up for the guards.”

          Just then, Istven pulled back with his fingers, and Dred’Slynt’s fire winked out.

          The eldrin leader appeared right in the midst of their group. Invisible force grabbed Draevin in a bear hug and pulled him up into the air. He lashed out instinctively with the golem of ice at his side. It struck an invisible barrier. Jaelyn turned to face the golem, frowned, then held out a hand. A jet of fire exploded out of his hand and melted the golem into a flash of steam. Draevin was just glad his own spell hadn’t been used against him a second time.

          Jaelyn scanned the group with narrowed eyes. There was a soft white glow on his forehead. He pointed to a nondescript patch of cobblestones with a single finger. Peter appeared and floated up into the air beside the rest of the group, Istven soon joined him, despite trying to escape into shadows.

          “You see?” Jaelyn said. “Wasn’t that just a waste of everyone’s time?”

          While Jaelyn spoke, Peter snuck up behind him with a dagger in hand. Draevin’s eyes darted between the Peter behind Jaelyn and the Peter that was apparently restrained in front of Jaelyn.

          “Don’t even bother,” Jaelyn said in a dry, nearly bored tone. It looked like he was speaking to Peter directly. “Your little tricks can’t fool me. I’m more connected to the magic of this world than you can possibly know.”

          The Peter behind Elder Jaelyn faded away, then a massive red dragon appeared over Peter’s shoulder instead. It was as tall as a two-story building, covered head-to-toe in shimmery red scales. It let out a chest-shaking roar and swung at Elder Jaelyn with a mighty claw.

          “What did I just say?” Jaelyn said as the dragon threatened him. He shook his head as though disappointed. “Humans. They never—” The dragon’s claw hit the already-cracked barrier that surrounded him and he went flying in the opposite direction. A loud impact sounded a few moments later from where he slammed into a nearby building.

          “That’s what I was counting on,” Peter said.

          “What just…” Draevin trailed off. He was trying to figure out if Peter had just conjured an actual dragon or if everything he was seeing was made up.

          “Real dragon,” Peter said. “Cloaked in an illusion so he’d let it get close.”

          “What dragon?” Draevin demanded. “We don’t have a dragon!”

          “That would be me,” a familiar female voice issued forth from the dragon’s maw. It sounded like Andrea, or at least a much deeper version of Andrea’s voice anyway. Grrbraa hopped down from the dragon’s neck.

          “I got to ride a dragon!” he said excitedly.

          “Don’t wait up for me,” the dragon said. It spread its wings wide and took off into the air in a blur of red scales. A blast of dragonfire exploded out of its mouth as it flew off in the direction Jaelyn had been thrown.

          The group was still suspended in the air where Jaelyn had trapped them. “Get us down!” Peter ordered Grrbraa.

          “I can do that!” the werebeast said excitedly. He ran from person to person and yanked them down with barely an effort. Draevin tried to struggle himself but it felt like he was wrapped in iron. Grrbraa just ran up to Peter and pulled him down with one arm. Then Wix, Sylnya, and Istven.

          “I did not need your assistance,” Istven insisted as Grrbraa yanked him to the ground.

          “Yeah, yeah,” Sylnya said dismissively. “You don’t need anybody. Can we just get the fuck out of here already?”

          Grrbraa pulled Draevin down next. It felt like having his face forced through a brick wall, but after a certain point the brick wall gave way and he fell to the ground. “Please,” Draevin said. “If I have to get restrained by that cocky bastard one more time…” Draevin trailed off intentionally. He didn’t actually know what he was going to say to finish that sentence, it just felt like the right sort of vague threat to say.

          Wix coughed out a breath of air as she climbed to her feet. “That’s rich, coming from you.”

          “What’s that supposed to mean?” Draevin asked.

          “Not now!” Peter interrupted the little back and forth. “Let’s get out of here before Jaelyn gets back.” He ran off around the side of the large domed building next to them.

          “What makes you think he’s coming back?” Sylnya asked, running after Peter. The rest of the group followed.

          Peter’s eyes scanned up towards the towering gold buildings in the distance as another burst of dragonfire lit up the skyline. “Our shapeshifting friend never said she was an archmage. I don’t think she really stands a chance in a drawn out battle.”

          The seven of them, Kot included, sprinted around the outside of the gold dome. A crowd of people waited for them at the base of the giant stone tower. Fortunately, everyone’s attention was directed upward. It seemed even in the fantastical city of Tel’Andrid a literal dragon fighting in the sky was unusual enough to draw their attention. Before anyone could notice their little group, they faded away behind an invisibility spell.

          “Stay together,” Peter’s voice instructed them. “And try not to trip on each other.”

          “Easy for you to say,” someone said.

          “Shhh!” said another.

          Draevin tried to keep up the pace while he bumped into invisible shoulders. At one point he felt Grrbraa’s tail brush his nose. He tried not to think about how close he must be to the werebeast’s butthole. He smelled… something! They managed to go several dozen paces before a guard in golden armor pointed directly at them and shouted, “We’re under attack!”

          A golden-colored flare was launched at them. Draevin conjured a small shield of ice and tried to hold it up to intercept the attack. He couldn’t tell if he’d done it or not though, since his own body and the ice he’d conjured was all invisible. The gold light splashed over the group and stuck to them. Draevin’s body was suddenly outlined in a stark yellow glow. At least it hadn’t been an attack.

          At least two dozen combat-ready guards in gold armor turned to face the new intruders.

          “Just get inside that doorway!” Peter’s voice called out. A red dragon swooped over the crowd of guards and unleashed a wave of fire. Draevin erected a wall of ice at the last moment to protect his friends.

          He felt no resistance against his defenses.

          “That was me, you idiot!” Peter’s voice echoed in Draevin’s ears. “Keep running!”

          Draevin nodded to no one in particular and gathered up the ice he’d just conjured. He turned the ground beneath him into an ice slick and began to power slide towards the tower doors. Most of the guards cowered and raised defenses at the sight of the dragon overhead, but not all of them.

          A spear of gold hurled through the air at Draevin. Before it got too close it veered off to the right and stuck into the ground behind him. Wix darted in front of Draevin with one hand outstretched and wind blowing through her short dark hair.

          “Thanks,” Draevin hollered at her. He looked over and saw a bolt of green energy shoot out from an enemy wizard right at Wixerna’s back. He returned the favor and threw a thick Icicle Spear to intercept the attack.

          They were getting close. Draevin could see the doorway. Istven was already there. He emerged from behind a gold armored guard and impaled them on a spike of black shadows. “Duck!” he heard Sylnya shout. Draevin instinctively did as instructed and heard the whizz of a projectile fly through the air. A grunt of pain indicated she had struck her target.

          “I’ll never see that knife again,” Sylnya complained as she came up behind Draevin riding Kot’s back.

          Draevin looked backwards and spotted Peter’s glowing yellow outline taking up the rear. There were so many spells being flung their way by the guards they’d slid past that Draevin didn’t even bother trying to understand what any of them were. He just threw the ice he was already using into a wall, right behind Peter’s back. A moment later flashes of light struck the wall from the other side. A few cracks immediately formed.

          Before them only two guards remained that weren’t already on the ground. Grrbraa leapt on one of them and Istven on the other. Istven made his hand into a black blade and sliced into the guard’s neck, spilling golden blood onto the ground. Grrbraa yelled, “You’re it!” and pushed the guard backwards where he tumbled ass-over-teakettle in a pile of limbs. Just to be safe, Draevin covered the man in a layer of ice. He looked uncomfortable, but considering the fate of the two guards Istven had dealt with Draevin supposed he was actually pretty fortunate.

          “Through. The door!” Peter huffed out.

          “How do we close this thing?” Wix called out from the doorway. She was partway inside. One of the two massive doors was swung inward partly and Wix was leaning her weight against it. Unsurprisingly, it didn’t budge. Draevin slid to a stop beside her and added his weight to hers.

          “Don’t. Bother,” Peter panted as he caught up. “That won’t work. We need the password.”

          “Then what do we do?” Draevin demanded. Back the way they’d come he heard the crash of his ice wall as it came down in a pile of snowy debris. The golden-armored guards came charging over it.

          “Porta Periculum!” Peter shouted. The massive golden doors began to swing shut of their own accord. Peter smirked at the look of surprise Draevin leveled his way. “What?” he said. “Andrea told it to me.”

          The doors slammed shut with a great thunder of finality. The large chamber was deadly silent.

          Draevin finally looked back at the chamber they were in. He hoped to whatever gods were out there that the Mana Converter had been fixed. Or maybe that the story of it being broken had all just been a fabrication in the first place.

          Half a dozen men in green garb with gold stripes along their shoulders were standing in front of the mass of machinery that Draevin had last seen when he’d first entered the city. They had to be the engineers he’d heard of. Whatever work they’d been doing before had stopped and all of them stared back towards the chambers doors where the newcomers had just arrived. Their faces were painted with various levels of shock and fear.

          At the center of the room were a few people Draevin recognized. Dag, Srazux, Fonia, Haenor and Lavidia. All five Guild judges.

          “Well,” Haenor said into the silence that followed. “Isn’t this interesting.”

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