Wizard Tournament: Chapter 141 (Patreon)

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Thirty Eight Minutes Before the Conflux

          Draevin wasn’t going to take any chances with Peter. He stepped out of his fighter’s box and immediately blasted out a Subzero Freeze larger than any he’d done in… at least a half hour. Okay, so technically it wasn’t as powerful as the waves of cold he’d used to keep the horde of zombies at bay but it was the most he could manage without an external mana source. And it was more than enough to cover the entire field.

          With the recent rain, there was already a layer of moisture on the ground. Draevin’s attack rushed across the field, raising a wave of ice crystals out of the wet earth as it moved. Peter didn’t even try to dodge it. He held both hands up to the sky and looked up. “You don’t stand a chance!” he shouted. "It's time for you to meet my ultimate technique!” Draevin’s ice was nearly upon him. No section of the field was untouched by it. When it reached Peter at the far edge of the field, he simply disappeared.

          Peter disappearing was far from unexpected. It was practically his go-to move. The only slight variation on the established pattern was that this time his clothes dropped to the ground where he’d been standing. Two well-worn leather boots, some pants and his brown robe. They collapsed to the ground and were covered in a layer of frost, like everything else.

          Draevin just rolled his eyes. If Peter felt like doing some silly theatrics, that was on him. Wherever he really was on the battlefield, he was certainly frozen. With the first part of Draevin’s plan complete, he moved onto the last and final part. Cast True Sight. “Occus at lumin cerbei,” he intoned. Draevin’s third eye opened to the magic of the world. Peter’s illusions would be revealed as a soft red glow and… nothing. Draevin looked around. Peter wasn’t anywhere. He wasn’t at the spot where his clothes had been left, but he wasn’t anywhere else either. Draevin actually turned around to check behind him just in case. It seemed silly, but he wasn’t about to take any chances. No Peter.

          Draevin turned back around. He gave the field one last cursory search and noticed something he hadn’t the first time. Peter’s clothes: they were real. The pile of clothes where Peter had disappeared was perfectly mundane. Even that wasn’t without precedent though, so Draevin wasn’t too worried. He remembered that in his match against Grrbraa, Peter had taken his robe off to trick the werebeast’s nose. “Very funny, Peter,” Draevin called out. “I know you’re just hiding behind one of those boulders.” He started to crunch his way across the icy field.

          Peter appeared before him in the center of the field. Not the real Peter, of course, just an illusion that was illuminated with the soft red glow of sensomancy. At least this version of him was wearing his clothes. “No I’m not,” he insisted. “But if you need to check for yourself to believe me I totally understand."

          “What happened to your clothes?” Draevin asked as he continued forward. “I thought they fell on the ground or something when you used that ‘ultimate technique’ of yours.”

          The Peter-illusion chuckled. “Very funny. I am in a new form now and I couldn’t take my clothes with me. I thought it would help you out to see me in the way you were used to.”

          “Yeah, yeah, new form,” Draevin agreed. “I’m totally believing every word you say. You know, it’s going to be pretty awkward for you when I throw you out-of-bounds in just your underwear.” He reached a midway point across the field and looked left and right behind the first set of boulders. Still no Peter. The ice on the field now would leave a clear record if the sneaky human had ever walked over it. He could try to cover his footsteps with illusions, but with True Sight active, Draevin would notice immediately. It didn’t look like Peter had ever stood on the backside of the first two boulders. He would have needed to at some point if he’d ever hid behind either of them. There was also no trail of broken ice crystals connecting from them to the boulders on the far side of the field. “There’s only so much field for you to hide in and I’m not taking any chances,” Draevin told the Peter-illusion. “If you come out now I’ll let you put your clothes back on before I throw you out.”

          “I told you already,” the Peter-illusion insisted, “I don’t need clothes anymore. I couldn’t wear them even if I wanted to. But go ahead. Keep searching.” He waved his arm out to the last two boulders. “I know you’ll need to look over there before you believe me.”

          Draevin rolled his eyes and continued forward. “I’m never going to believe you. What even is your story this time? That your real body dissolved into mist or something? You know I can see magic, right?”

          “Oh, Draevin, Draevin, Draevin. So old, yet still so naïve.” The Peter-illusion pursed its lips and tapped its chin. “Do you know what an elemental is, Draevin?”

          “Don’t be so condescending. Of course I do. I’ve even fought one here in this very arena. You do remember Geeyu-Gi-Gearyou, right?” Draevin tripped over the impossible-to-pronounce name of the swamp elemental that always made an appearance in the tournament.

          “Okay, well…” The Peter-illusion bowed. “Now you’ve fought two.”

          Draevin barked out a short laugh. “Really? You expect me to believe that? I can see that I’m talking to an illusion.”

          “Yes, but that’s what I am now! A sensomancy elemental.”

          “I’m… pretty sure those don’t exist. And even if they did it would take a lot more than waving your arms in the air to become one.” Draevin reached the other side of the arena and came to a stop. He looked left, then right. He didn’t see any sign of footsteps behind either of the last two boulders. He studied the ground in every direction… no trail of footstep anywhere. “People can’t turn into elementals,” Draevin muttered under his breath. “Can they?”

          The Peter illusion leaned in close and whispered in Draevin’s ear, “And that’s where monsters come from,” in a perfect imitation of Sylnya’s voice.

          Draevin stopped. Was that what Sylnya had been talking about? She had been babbling seeming nonsense in a mana-fever back in Hell. No. Draevin shook his head. “Nice try,” he told Peter. “I see where you got the idea, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to fall for it.”

          Peter shrugged. “That’s the great thing about this technique. I don’t need you to believe me, because it’s not a trick. But go ahead and keep looking.” He waved an arm towards one of the nearby boulders and a trail of footsteps leading from the pile of clothes appeared. They were just illusions, of course. “Is that what you were hoping to find?”

          Wait! Peter? Draevin realized with a start he was beginning to think of the illusion as the real Peter. That’s just what the tricky human wanted. “Very funny. Just because I haven’t figured out what your trick is yet, doesn’t mean I don’t know what’s going on.”

          Peter dismissed the false footsteps. No! The Peter-illusion dismissed the false footsteps. “I already told you what’s going on,” the Peter-illusion said. “I’m an illusion now. Like this?” He pinched his own cheek. “This is all I am now. I didn’t want to do this, Draevin, but I knew it was the only way to beat you. Throw ice at me all you want. It’s literally impossible for you to defeat me now.” He pointed to the sky. “But don’t forget, the clock’s ticking. We’ve probably only got a half hour before the Conflux reaches alignment. If the match isn’t over by then nobody gets a wish.”

          A tickle went down Draevin’s spine. Peter was right. He couldn’t dilly-dally. He remembered Tenna’s warning about not granting a wish. If the Conflux wasn’t focused by a champion there was a real chance Leyline Collapse would trigger early. “You know you’re really playing with fire here,” Draevin warned. “Or well, ice. But you know what I mean. We can’t risk neither of us getting a wish.”

          Peter shook his head. “Of course not! Which is why you should just concede!”

          Draevin decided to inspect the last spot where Peter had stood for clues. “I know this is just some stupid trick. I’m not conceding.” He crunched over to the clothes and kicked them with one foot to see what was in the pile. It was just as they appeared: boots, pants, robe… “Aha! I knew it was a trick,” Draevin shouted. He held up the pile of clothes to the illusion. “Where are your glasses? They should be here with everything else, right?” He nudged the remaining pile on the ground with his foot. “And I don’t see any underwear either.”

          The Peter-illusion let out a heavy sigh. “I was afraid you’d notice those things,” he said.

          “So you’re not—”

          “Afraid you’d get the wrong idea!” Peter finished. “Those glasses were made from a sensomancy enchantment. As an elemental, I consumed them. Tell me, Draevin, do you know what happens to a physical object when the enchantment on it breaks?”

          He knew only too well. The same thing was happening on a much larger scale to the entire planet. “Yeah, it burns up,” Draevin said glumly. “But that still doesn’t explain the underwear! Did you have magic underwear too?”

          The Peter-illusion coughed into its hand. “Can we not talk about that part?” he asked quietly. “It’s kind of embarrassing.”

          “Really? You expect me to believe you weren’t wearing any?”

          Peter shrugged. “Believe what you want. But…” He pointed again to the sky. It was still too overcast to make out precisely where the moon was in the sky, but Draevin could see pieces of it through the clouds and it looked like it was getting close to blocking the sun. “Clock’s ticking,” Peter said. “Don’t take too long coming to the correct conclusion.”

          “You’re right,” Draevin agreed. “I’m wasting time.” He threw his hands down to his sides and summoned jets of mist to take him into the air. It was time to figure out where that damn human was hiding. Draevin flew over to first one boulder, then the next. He made a slow rotation around them from above. There was no chance a sneaky Peter would be able to run around them and keep him out of sight. There was nothing. At either of them. He returned to the boulders on his side of the field even though they were less likely to be hiding the human and did another rotation. Still nothing.

          The Peter-illusion flew up beside Draevin in the sky. “Give up yet?” he asked. “I told you I’m not hiding anywhere.”

          Draevin ignored him and flew up even higher. He could see the entire battlefield from up here. In fact, he could even see outside the arena where Tarrish’s wall were still surrounding them on all sides. Of the field below? There was no sign of Peter either in the magical spectrum or the non-magical. Draevin flew over to the edge of the arena’s boundary near the judge’s stand. “Istven!” he shouted. “Did Peter go out-of-bounds? Do you guys have the ability to tell that?”

          Istven had the pink dot of True Sight on his forehead. He nodded. “I will not provide information about an ongoing match, but I can confirm Peter has not left the boundary. We would be able to tell and would have announced it.”

          “Damn! Where is he?”

          “I will not answer any further questions,” Istven said firmly.

          “I’m right here,” Peter said next to Draevin. The illusion had flown up into the air with him. “Look at me. I’m still Peter. I just only exist as a network of self-perpetuating sensomancy mana now.”

          “Peter, this is serious,” Draevin pleaded. “We can’t just let the Conflux pass without one of us making a wish.”

          “I know,” Peter agreed, “which is exactly why you should stop wasting time and concede.”

          “No, you’re down there somewhere and I’m going to figure this out.” Draevin raised his hand and summoned a ball of ice. He threw it down and it exploded into a shower of tiny crystals that rained down onto the field. He was sure to hit every span of ground with enough force to injure. The Peter-illusion didn’t react.

          “What did I just say about wasting time?” Peter said. He settled his illusion to the ground in the center of the arena. “I didn’t want to do this, Draevin, but you’re forcing my hand. We have to get this match finished while there’s still time to prepare for the Conflux.” The Peter-illusion made a flourish of its wrist and summoned a long dagger. With no hesitation, it jammed the dagger into one of its wrists, then dragged the knife down. Blood began to weep from the wound.

          “And what is that supposed to accomplish?” Draevin asked him.

          “Oriander’s first law of blood conversion,” Peter said with a wry grin. “It doesn’t matter what form the blood takes. Since I’m an illusion now, I make as much blood as I want and it will still work for blood magic.”

          “You’re just making that up!” Draevin shouted. “There’s no such thing as a law about blood conversion. Do you think I’m stupid?”

          “Oh, I don’t think you’re stupid. I know you are,” Peter said. He held up his bloody dagger and started chanting. “Tagz ki thu xark, tagz ki thu xark, tagz ki thu xark.” It actually sounded like real demonic this time, not the nonsense he’d used when trying to fool Caelnaste way back on the first day of the tournament.

          Draevin wasn’t going to fall for it. The human could chant all he wanted. Illusory blood couldn’t be used in blood magic rites, and Peter didn’t know enough about blood magic to actually summon demons... Did he? No. Draevin shook his head. It was a trick. He ignored Peter and focused on trying to figure out where he was hiding.

          Draevin focused on his breath. In. Out. Feel the cold. His senses expanded. He was ice. He was cold. He was a layer of frost covering every surface of the arena. He felt for the slightest inconsistency in the ice.

          The blood on Peter’s dagger bubbled and spat. A shimmery rift of hellfire opened before him. Draevin could see the thick waves of sensomancy mana coming off of it. He ignored it and focused on the task before him. Feel the ice. Feel the—

          Footsteps touched down. Draevin snapped his head in the direction he felt the footsteps. They were right at the center of Peter’s illusory Hell rift. “So that’swhere you’re hiding!” Draevin said. “Thought I wouldn’t notice if you covered yourself with enough illusions, eh?”

          “A new contestant has entered the battlefield!” Istven called out in a strong, clear voice.

          The footsteps were attached to a saber demon with swords for arms. Draevin wasn’t fooled though. He could see the illusion magic surrounding the demon. The footsteps advanced. They took off at a breakneck pace straight for Draevin. It was far faster than a human could run.

          “That’s not…” Draevin trailed off.

          The saber demon lunged. Draevin blasted it with ice, freezing it solid. It was a real demon.

          “Nice,” Peter said. “I got a saber demon already. Those are strong.”

          “What is this?” Draevin demanded. “Since when can you summon demons? And without blood?”

          “Okay,” Peter said. “I admit it. I don’t know how to summon demons.”

          Draevin touched the frozen saber demon. It was real enough, and he could feel it struggle beneath his ice. “Then how did—”

          “I didn’t summon it,” Peter clarified. “I just opened the door and it wandered in. With this technique there’s not really any limit to how many demons I can summon.”

          Two more footsteps hit the ground. Then a third. And a fourth.

          Draevin looked over. It was an invasion force, and all the demons looked directly at him. One of the demons howled, then they charged.

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