48. Duel (Patreon)

My eyes flew around the training grounds, steps full of people. An unsettling amount of people had gathered for the duel. By the looks of the uniforms and the empty spaces at the terraces, both commoners and nobles were present. A woman approached me with a stiff posture.

“I was surprised when I heard the news, I couldn’t believe it. I thought people were joking.” The woman told with a fit of lingering anger. “Then I see you now here! What were you thinking, Edrie!”

“Hello to you too, Olivia.” I bowed to her.

“Oh, yes, hell- no! It’s no time for greetings.” It seemed I wasn’t able to dissuade her. “Why did you challenge a noble to a duel?”

“What are you talking about, I accepted HIS duel, you know?” I replied.

“Eh? What? But everyone is saying you challenged Saphar?” Olivia added in confusion.

“Fuck that bastard.” I sighed. “Did he really spread rumors that I am the aggressor here? How can someone be this pathetic?”

Huh, now that I thought about it, this was the first time I cursed aloud. I could only hope this didn’t become a habit. I tried really hard to hold myself from using such wording.

“So, this is a set-up?” She asked rhetorically.

“Basically.” I renewed my intent to drive the little bastard to the ground. “How is it that you are here, and you know his name?”

“You could say we are acquaintances.” Olivia avoided my gaze.

I rose my eyebrows as it clicked to me. “Olivia, are you a noble?”

“Olivia of House Nay.” The noble said as she realized an elegant bow. “A minor noble, of a secondary family branch, no different than a commoner, or at least that’s the case for the rest of the nobility.”

“Can you make me a briefing about what this ‘duel’ is about? It seems all information I have is incorrect, and I fear they are going to use technicalities that weren’t specified against me.”

“According to rumors, you challenged Saphar Nay after he defied your ‘honor’.” Olivia made air quotes.

“What do you mean by ‘my honor’?” I repeated the gesture.

“Marissa.” She replied with a deadpan.

My mind went on overdrive and restarted before I could even make a coherent thought. “Perfect, classist, and sexist. More reasons on the endless bucket to break his nose. How dares he?”

“You shouldn’t do that. Especially to a high-ranking noble like him.”

“One of the specified conditions of the duel was that we weren’t responsible for the damage caused to ourselves.” I justified my bloodlust.

“Wait? I thought those were nonsensical rumors. Have you lost your sanity?” Olivia’s eyes were wide open. “He’s a high noble! He can literally kill you with those conditions and none would be allowed to complain!”

“Likewise,” I replied. “Don’t worry, I know what I’m doing. Just to clarify, this is a duel against him?”

“Hmm… yeah? At least that’s what everyone’s talking about.” Oliva responded rather distractedly as she didn’t buy my words.

“Well, there goes the chosen champion and war against the world strategy.” I reorganized my thoughts. “I expected him to cheat his way out of a duel, but he could maintain some part of his word.” I said venomously.

“Shouldn’t you go to the arena?” Olivia had become fidgety by this point, totally uncertain of what was going to happen.

“On my way,” I said my goodbyes. “Thanks for the information.”

“No problem, break a leg!” She wished me luck.

“Oh, don’t worry. I am going to break A leg.” The muscles on my face tensed. Bloodthirst wasn’t doing any good to my person.

The spectators looked at me as I put my foot on the training ground, though my attention was on the purple pyromancer’s face. He wore a red tunic with golden borders, clearly enchanted, that matched his blond hair.

“Look who’s here. I thought you were going to run away after declaring me into a challenge.” The brick-minded child talked. I stood silently looking at him. “What happened? Are you too scared to talk?”

The other nobles at the steps began to laugh aloud, though the commoners were satisfied just looking at the unfolding events.

“No, I just was asking myself how someone can be such a pathetic person.” I was done with sweet words and pretense. This guy didn’t deserve even basic etiquette on my part.

“Excuse me?” His eyes shot open, and the noble’s laugh died.

“You are excused.” I know, I know, I childish comeback, but this was what he deserved.

Now the whole training ground was filled with crackles, not only limited to the privileged classes, but everyone enjoyed themselves in the exchange of words.

“You dare make fun of me!” Saphar shouted with bloodshot eyes.

“Well, you dared to lie to hundreds of people, to insult me and my friend, to physically and verbally attack me, and then have the nerve to act superior when you are nothing more than a clueless child. So, yeah. I am not overstepping my rights here.” I wouldn’t ever lose an argument against such a short-minded person.

My rambling had put a stop to the laughs of the audience. My objective wasn’t to make them laugh but to laugh myself. I owed nothing to the public. Saphar, the pyromancer, looked at me with dormant rage. A chasm of fire ready to burst at any second now.

I could already feel the mana flowing through his body. He wasn’t very subtle about those outbursts of fire mana. Normally invisible, undetectable, but mana-weaving and perception of what couldn’t normally be seen were my specialties.

“You will pay for your insults.” For once, he managed to control himself, not raising his voice and just focusing on what he had in front. Maintaining the noble charade he was playing before the people.

“If telling the truth is an insult, then you should work on stop being a walking joke.” I could hear a muffled cacophony from the audience. Trying to hold their laughs as they felt the battle was going to begin any second now. “Where’s the referee, by the way.”

Not only social etiquette dictated that duels were supervised by a referee, but it was the most sensible approach as the blood was breathable in the air. And besides, duels at academy grounds were obliged to be supervised per academy rules.

“Here!” An upbeat voice appeared and situated on the side of the arena. “My name’s Sylvia Algor and I will be the academy staff that will judge the duel of Edrie Nightfallen against Saphar Nay!”

One of my teachers came to supervise the duel, huh. Well, better than having a biased and corrupted referee manipulated by the noble in front of me. Nothing confirmed to me Sylvia wasn’t biased, to begin with, though she didn’t strike me as that kind of person.

“This is a magic duel where both parties are allowed to use their full magical extent.” Sylvia began explaining the rules. “Surrender or incapacitation of a party is the main win condition. As per concrete rules of this duel, established by both parties, lasting damage to any participant will be no motif of repercussion once the duel finishes.”

It was a bit macabre hearing a such melodious and happy tone announcing a duel. At least, she tried to sound serious and professional, but her merry-go-happy personality betrayed her.

“Do I need to give you some advantage? I fear you are in dire need of it.” I taunted him, his brows twitching severely. Props to him, he managed to refrain himself.

Sylvia Algor looked at both sides of the fields. One stoic look towards Saphar and a sympathetic look towards me accompanied by a greeting with her hand.

“Without any further ado…” Sylvia lifted her hand as every spectator held their breaths. “Start!” Her hand fell down instantly.

“Die!” Saphar didn’t hesitate, to attack, and to cheat. It wasn’t something notable, he just began spellcasting before the duel even began.

I was not exactly sure if that counted as cheating, but at the very least, it was poor etiquette and of poor taste.

But to his surprise, only a spark of fire came from him. A spark that dissipated after a blink. Well, during Sylvia’s explanation I had become acquainted with his manaflows, and though by the extreme difficulty of the weaving which marked the spell at six-star, I was able to dispel it at prodigious speeds. Judging by the intricacy of the woven mana, he tried to cast a true Fireball spell.

“What?” He said unconsciously in surprise. Not more than a whisper escaped his lips.

“So, are you going to attack me or not?” I readied my spells as he had yet to recover from his surprise. “I know I said I was going to give you a handicap because you really needed it, you better use it before the opportunity goes away.”

This was my intention behind the taunting before Sylvia declared the beginning of the duel. A mentally unstable target, though more chaotic and erratic in behavior, was easier to manage and undo their magic.

Firstly, I spellcasted a Mana Reservoir to my side. This way not only I would have extra mana to tap on, but it could be used as a distraction if needed. A magical construct could always be exploited in more ways than intended.

“I’m waiting~” I chanted melodiously as I crafted the mana-regenerating spell.

As a thoughtless outburst, Saphar quickly spellcasted what seemed to be three-star fire projectiles according to the density and tightness of the woven spell. I was currently spellcasting a six-star spell, so I couldn’t afford to dispel others.

I just dodged to the side as they were poorly aimed. I wasn’t fazed by them as Marissa’s Air projectiles were far faster, so I could maintain my cool even when dodging them. If he continued to play like this he would run out of mana, which was fine by me.

With Mana Reservoir already spellcasted and deployed, I prepared some barriers of arcane mana in order to defend myself. A Mana Void would be appreciated, but there wasn’t the best action.

The pyromancer unleashed more bolts toward me. These felt like they were five-star. I managed to disable the first one nearby him, and another in the middle of the arena, but one ended up impacting my barriers.

Surprisingly it didn’t cause a lot of damage. Then I noticed the amber sparks around me occluding my vision. A smokescreen, huh?

Yet no additional attacks came towards me. As my line of sight cleared I saw a small smile appear on Saphar’s face, and while it could mean a multitude of things, I could only see idiocy incarnated on his face. For an unknown reason, he was now gathering mana around him, preparing for a great spell.

Just to be sure, I spellcasted both Arcane and Wind Slow Fall to make the pseudo-Levitation magical synergy. This was almost instantaneous to spellcast, tens of times faster to spellcast than Levitation, but it would give me a sizeable speed boost.

I infiltrated once again on the flow of his mana. This time, however, it was easier than before. Saphar hadn’t learned from his errors. As the spell he was currently conjuring required to gather outside mana to sustain its tremendous consumption, it was left open to alteration to other foreign sources of mana.

It was a seven-star spell without a shed of doubt. And not a normal one at that. It was a high seven-star spell. Even though I wasn’t at this level yet, the nobility knew how to teach even the dumbest kids, huh.

The spellcast was so long and complicated that I could have just walked towards Saphar as if I had all time in the world and punched him in the face and I could’ve dispelled it better this way.

And while that would have been funny, pretty funny indeed, it wasn’t exactly humiliating. I wanted to drive him to the ground, not physically, but psychologically.

As I had done a few days ago when I usurped Marissa’s spell and transformed it into a chimera of wind and arcane, I moved my mana through tethers, infiltrating myself into the porous mess that was his tangle of fire mana.

I couldn’t control the spell as I did with Marissa (if one considered that I had managed to control it in the first place) because I had no previous understanding of the fire element. Either way, it was a seven-star spell, it wouldn’t be as easy to manipulate as Marissa’s passive winds.

It was chaotic and makeshift, not something you would exactly expect from a high-level spell. It felt more like a sorcery than a wizardry. Strong currents of mana threatened my tethers of mana to break with every moment. I infused more mana as I took advantage of my Mana Reservoir. Its outstanding regeneration was enough that I could spellcast Arcane Chips indefinitely.

My mind went through the thought of how stupid this was looking to the spectators. Saphar was intensely spellcasting an enormous spell and I just stood still.

That might be true, but while my body was motionless, my mind worked in overdrive. It may not seem like it, but dispelling a spell was harder than conjuring one. I was supporting myself on my overinflated Arcane affinity to be able to destroy this spell.

I noticed I could have done this task far easier for me if I had planted an Astral Projection next to him. This would have worked as a relay to my mana tethers, and they would have been stronger and wouldn’t have snapped as much as they did. Oh, well.

Mana began cycling faster and faster, it was ready to be unleashed. “Perish, you fool!” Saphar declared in certain victory.

An exorbitant amount of mana gathered around his hand, glowing brighter than the dome-occluded sun. What he didn’t know, is that wasn’t his spell, but mine.

The corners of my mouth elevated to unprecedented limits as I undid the seven-star spell from the inside just as he was preparing to launch it against me. I could have blown the spell, I could have ended this and straight up killed him because of his stupidity and ego, but that wasn’t my style.

“What fool are you talking about? Yourself?” I shrugged my arms and snapped my fingers.

My mana tethers sawed Saphar’s connection to the spell, and I lifted the flaming ball by sheer willpower. Instead of dispelling the spell, which would have ended in an explosion of fire mana, I unleashed it in a controlled manner.

Saphar was in front of the flamethrower-turned spell, but that didn’t matter to me. I heard his cries of agony as I regulated the flow of mana, so it didn’t end with his life. And then I was the bad one, ha.

As the fire curtain dissipated, Saphar became visible once again. As expected from a somewhat experimented pyromancer, he didn’t receive that much damage or burnings, just as I wouldn’t get poisoned easily from mana overexposure or soul attacks. The enchanted red tunic helped provide extra defense as it now shone brightly. A defensive mana-storing enchantment.

“So why did you immolate yourself? A bit counterproductive, don’t you think?” I taunted him even further beyond. “I thought the duel was against me, not against yourself. Maybe I heard the rules wrongly?”

His eyes squinted; his teeth gritted. “You’ll pay for this!” He shouted in an ear-breaking battle cry.

This was what I wanted, inconsolable rage, mindless thinking. You, poor clueless bastard.

Suddenly, he threw a fan of fire projectiles at me. All three-star spells as before. Though the third tier was currently the highest one where we could just spam spells, that wasn’t the best idea against an arcanist that had laid the battlefield with his mana.

One by one the arrows began exploding in the air like fireworks in a festival. There were too many projectiles to fully dispel them, so I sufficed with sabotaging them.

“What’s wrong? You have yet to land a spell on me. Where has gone all the ‘die’ and ‘I’ll teach you a lesson’ gone?” I didn’t stop with my derisions. “Pathetic.”

This was the last straw as he lost all sanity and run toward me. “I’m going to fucking kill you, commoner!”

I was beginning to feel sympathy for him, so I distracted myself by casting a totally unnecessary enhanced Astral Projection. Sure, I wouldn’t have enough time to conjure it as he was rushing towards me with a fire mobility spell, leaving trails of fire behind. I didn’t care, though.

As only three meters remained between Saphar and me, less than a second thanks to his enhanced mobility, he suddenly fell to the ground.

Saphar rolled to the sides as he grabbed his heart, his face contorted in pain. What a moron.

“This is it? This is your try at killing me? By throwing yourself to the ground?” I looked at the spoiled brat on the ground. “If I didn’t know any better, who you are trying to kill is yourself. Truly, truly pathetic.” My words contained an insane amount of poison, but this man took the worst out of me.

He ignored me as he concentrated on his cries alone. After a few seconds of pain-filled rolls, Saphar gathered enough strength to get up and approach me once more.

This time, there wasn’t uncontrollable fury and aggressive movement, just a guy limping towards me. I focused myself on the casting.

I was momentarily distracted as I heard another cry, but I returned to finish my spell. Saphar had collided, yet again, with another mine. He failed to notice that my surroundings were filled with soul bombs. Far more powerful than the mine I used against Marissa.

I had to gravely severed my soul to use them, it would take days to heal this self-imposed damage. Yet I couldn’t care anymore.

These soul bombs were only a punch for people used to soul attacks, a breeze to those protected against the soul. For someone who had yet to experience his first attacks on his soul? I couldn’t imagine what he was undergoing.

When I finished casting Astral Projection, I noticed that Saphar was standing still. He was breathing and his eyes were open, so he was alive. I think he was just having a bad time tolerating the soul damage.

I took a quick look at his soulspace with my Astral Projection while it remained in the spiritual world. The damage was minimal, I had damaged more myself laying this extensive minefield with chips of my soul. He just was weak and unprepared against soul attacks. I suspected he was currently undergoing a spiritual concussion of sorts.

“Do you surrender?” I told to the adversary who looked like he had experienced a thousand wars before his eyes.

“N-never…” Saphar responded between ragged breaths.

“I see.” I looked at him with a defeated gaze.

A copy of myself spawned to his side, invisible to everyone else. This wasn’t the six-star version, but the seven. It was more powerful and more deadly. More connected to the spiritual plane, less detectable. If he wanted to get hurt, I won’t deny my position.

My avatar readied a punch for a few seconds, and as it unleashed it, the projection fully went through the pyromancer. Phasing through his body as a ghost. That didn’t mean he wasn’t physically hurt, the complete opposite, to be exact.

A deafening cry of agony filled the arena, reminding me of the good old times at the River of the Damned. I could recognize it, the scream didn’t come from his body, but from his soul.

Saphar passed out, his body was rigid, and stood perfectly still in the same upright position as before. His eyes were white and bloodshot. Though he hadn’t experienced a physical attack on my part during the whole encounter, he would never forget the pain.

The training grounds remained silent for a minute. No one dared to make a sound after my magical display. The few drops of mana I had wasted on the fight were already refilled when I heard the first sound.

“Emm…” Sylvia made a sound as he observed the unconscious student. “The opposing party is unconscious, Edrie Nightfallen is the winner!”

While I had won the duel, no congratulations waited for me. They just looked at me with an expression I could only categorize as fear. Well, at least there weren’t booing at me.

I left the arena in a slow walk; I had pushed myself too far with this act. I didn’t even bother to look at the fallen duelist. I was sure he has his share fair of bootlickers to help him.

“What was that?” Marissa asked me after we left the training grounds. There were too many people there to be comfortable. “He suddenly stopped dead still. I didn’t even know if he even passed out.”

Hmm? But he did scream loudly before collapsing. Or did he? It was his soul who cried in pain, so maybe I was the only one who heard it.

“I hit his soul with Astral Projection.” I told her in a deadbeat manner. I was tired. Not physically, but mentally and spiritually. My mind was made of a liquified mess at the moment after dispelling a spell far beyond my capabilities, and my soul cried as I did the equivalent of tearing myself out an arm. I may have been ruthlessly efficient with my tactics during the duel, but it did take hijacking a seven-star spell I had no previous knowledge about.

“The same you had hit me with multiple times?” She asked in disbelief. ‘How could you use such a dangerous spell against me?’ her expression told.

I shook my head slightly to deny it. “It was the upgraded version. And I had put an extra oomph to it.”

“But he reacted badly even if it was a better one.” I remember the so familiar screams I had grown used to.

“Saphar didn’t have a soul tolerance like you do, Marissa.” My thoughts and words were sluggish, my every word was a slow race. “Constant unnoticeable attacks on your soul have built a tolerance for you. Saphar, meanwhile, was virgin to soul intrusions.”

I tried to take a step forward, but my mind, soul, and body felt like two totally disconnected matters. My body tumbled as my brain couldn’t process it.

Thankfully, there was an attentive Marissa ready to catch me. “Are you feeling well?”

“Dispelling a high seven-star spell took a lot from me. Look at me, dispelling one when I can’t even conjure them with ease if at all.” I said between crackles.

“I think that’s something to take pride in.” Marissa told me as she carried me while I deposited my weight onto her. She got down and let me lay on a nearby tree.

“Thanks.” I taciturnly said. I felt like losing consciousness at any moment. My mind wondered about those times in my infancy I almost knocked myself out by experimenting with magic while unsupervised.

I just noticed that neither Monica nor Adrian were here. Well, I could use some peace. I heard the crackles of the grass as a mockery to me. Someone was approaching. My vision was too blurry to identify.

“What a spectacle you have brought.” I heard the feminine voice talking to me.

“Well, I am a bit of a showman myself.” I joked as I recognized the voice.

“Can you tell me what you did to Saphar?” She asked about the well-being of my opponent. “The boy had collapsed at the end of the duel and is yet to awaken.”

“He’s fine, miss Algor,” I told the referee and my teacher. “Saphar is just overdramatic.”

“Do you call passing out an overreaction?” Sylvia rose her eyebrows.

“I hit his soul,” I explained to her. “I didn’t attack it with any soul-tearing spells to him. I just punched him.”

“You punched his soul?” She reiterated in confusion.

I nodded. “Soul attacks were uncharted territories for him, that’s why he reacted so badly. But truth be told, his soul was perfectly intact when I left him, although he has experienced a great deal of pain.” Enough pain to make someone pass out immediately.

“I’m not knowledgeable on soul attacks, and to be honest, I wasn’t sure which element were you using against him until you explained to me,” Sylvia said. “I’ll make a soul expert check on him just in case though.”

“He’s totally fine,” I told her. “But I can’t know when he will wake up as it’s the first time, I see someone react so badly to soul magic besides me.”

“Soul magic can affect its conjurer?” It seems there was a misunderstanding.

“Bad choice of words,” I replied. “Soul magic can inflict damage on the conjurer, but that’s true for every element. I just had a small problem with my soul, and it was soul magic that helped me mend it.”

“I see.” It was weird seeing Sylvia act so seriously she normally was so free-spirited and unmolested by the world. “Could I convince you to help him?”

I cringed at her suggestion. “You could, but do you really want him to wake up to the face of who inflicted such torment in the first place?”

“I guess not.” She shook her head, putting her hand against it.

“Is that all? I am dead tired, and I want to rest as soon as possible.” I communicated to her in the politest tone I was capable to do in my state.

“One more question.” She added. “What did you do to that spell?”

I knew which one she was referring to. “I dispelled it.”

“I can guess so far.” Sylvia snorted. “What I mean is how?”

“Well, the spell weaving was makeshift and chaotic.” I began explaining. “Because it needed to absorb mana to fuel itself, it was easier to infiltrate mine in order to usurp his control.”

“And you took control of the Scorch Ray.” She added.

“Scorch Ray?” My mind was spinning. That second sun definitely didn’t look like a ray-type spell to me.

“The name of the spell you stole from him. Acquired knowledge by being a combat teacher for years, you know?” Sylvia answered with the last part being unnecessary. “I still have one doubt about your dispelling exercise. How did your mana reach him when you were twenty meters apart?”

“Oh, that.” I weakly elevated the corners of my eyes. “I had infested the whole training grounds with my soul.”

The soul mines worked as a far weaker relay than Astral Projection. This head-splitting ache would not be here if I just casted it. Even the six-star version would have been far better than what I did!

Sylvia looked at me in confusion with squinted eyes. “You did what?”

“I have a spell that it lets bisect my soul and use it as a weapon. That’s the reason why Saphar collapsed when he charged at me in the first place.” I spoke, a bit of clarity returning to my mind. “It just so happens that I can use my soul fragments as a medium to move the mana.”

“That’s definitely a problematic ability,” Sylvia added with a whisper. “Well, that’s everything I needed. Thanks for your cooperation.”

“Likewise,” I replied. “Thank you for offering to be the referee of the match.”

Miss Algor said her goodbyes and Marissa and I were left alone under the canopy of the tree.

“What are we going to do now?” Marissa expressed seriously.

“There shouldn’t be repercussions from the duel, everyone heard the disclaimer about not being responsible for damages caused.” I let my back sink from the trunk to the ground, laying completely on the earth. “So, we only have to do what we came here for in the first place, study.”

I heard a subtle groan coming from Marissa, but more than anything, it put a smile on my face. It was worth the reaction as my consciousness faded away.