Sumr hit hard and fast, with almost no transition between the seasons. Even the spring showers seed to have been caught by surprise. The usual spring showers were almost entirely skipped, and instead they were replaced with thunderstorms through the first months of sumr. Each day started clear and hot, sweltering under a bright blue do. Then the skies grew dark in the afternoon, before unleashing a cooling downpour while ominous clouds flashed and rumbled, only to disappear once again, leaving nothing but the damp earth and dripping leaves as evidence of the thunderstorm that had only just barreled past.
Yaric enjoyed the thunderstorms. A faint haze settled over the baked stones after the rain ended, leaving a lingering sll of rain hanging in the air. Unbearably hot weather settled into bearably hot weather, giving everyone a welco respite when rushing between classes.
“Co on, we have to run!”
Lauren was far ahead of Yaric. They were racing to get to their archery lesson in ti, after getting caught in the crowds of people cramming in the corridors to avoid the rain. He was just lucky that the rain had suddenly stopped, or they would still be stuck there.
Both Lauren and Yaric were looking forward to this particular lesson. Mage Fletcher was teaching Yaric a new spell using his space affinity, while Lauren was going to learn how to part the air in front of her arrow and build up pressure behind.
“I expected you to be late,” Ivan remarked.
“So did we,” Yaric panted.
“You were. I was talking to Novice Silver.”
Lauren smiled sympathetically while they strung their bows.
“Right, you’ve managed to get a decent grip on your first space spell. You still need practice, a lot of practice, but you can shorten the distance to your target whenever you want. We’re no longer going to dedicate our ti here to that spell. Use the range in your own ti, and I suggest you start trying to use the spell on other things as well. Throw things, push things, whatever you want.
“Today we’re going to start with your first true transference spell. This spell doesn’t compress or fold space, it tears through it. You will be learning to transport your arrow from one place to another, instantly, without crossing the intervening space. Do you understand?”
“Yes, instructor.”
“Good. Pass your lesson plan, and I’ll transfer the spell.”
Yaric and Lauren both watched in silence while Ivan added the spell form to the crystal. He was nowhere near as fast as Emil, but it was impressive to watch nonetheless.
“Here you are. I’ve added the components you didn’t have together with the complete spell form. Let know when you start getting comfortable with the whole thing so we can go over the conceptual aspects. For now I want you to start practicing, so you can ask questions, then get yourself onto the range. I want to see a seven-seventy. A seven-centiter grouping at seventy ters.”
Yaric sat down and started going through the spell components. He was shocked. There were individual components that were as complicated as so entire spells. Space magic was said to be complicated, but this was far more than Yaric had expected. Still, he went through each component one by one, and other than a question about stacking pieces and connecting them to the sa component, Yaric felt pretty confident. It would just take ti.
‘This is the best way to relax.’
Yaric nocked an arrow and took a couple of slow, deep breaths, then raised his bow.
‘Complete draw, hold, sight, release!’ Yaric released his breath at the sa ti as he released the arrow, watching it streak down the range to embed itself in his target.
‘I love this bow!’
The far greater power of his bow made his arrows practically whistle on their way down range, while his bowstring sang in counterpoint. The satisfying thwack of the arrow coming to a stop always made him feel good.
He was halfway through his first quiver when Lauren joined him.
“I have to practice my new spell in my own ti,” Yaric inford her. “You?”
“Sa. It’s a wind spell that will make my arrows fly further. But for now I need to try for a five-fifty.”
Yaric glanced back at Ivan.
“Is there a problem, Novice?”
“No Instructor.”
“Do you think Novice Silver has as much archery experience as you, or a bow that can reach seventy ters on such a flat trajectory?”
Lauren smiled teasingly without turning to face Yaric.
“No instructor.”
“Good. Because we are going to count each arrow that lands outside your grouping. Whoever has the highest number will owe the other… hmmm… let’s go with lunch for now.”
Lauren stilled beside Yaric and stared intently at her target. He knew the signs; she was hyper-focused on the task. Then she raised her bow, drew, and released, in a single, flowing motion.
“Good shot Novice. Focus on the position of your elbows, you were out of alignnt. Not by much, I admit, but do you want to be adequate, or excellent?”
“Excellent, Instructor.”
Yaric hurried to nock another arrow.
“I want to go to the Burning Barrel, they have the best pies,” Lauren insisted, practically glowing.
“But it wasn’t fair, I had a much harder target.”
“So you’re not buying lunch?”
“I didn’t say that. Just… you can buy a drink then.”
“No no, it doesn’t work that way. You buy lunch, which is a given, and then you have to play on stage. You can’t keep hiding away to practice.”
“How is that fair? And I can’t play anything good enough for the stage, I’ve just started.”
“A dance then.”
“So if I buy lunch, then I have to dance as well?”
“Lunch and a dance, and then I buy you a drink.”
“… Okay. Deal.”
“Wait until I learn this spell, I won’t need a bow like yours.”
“And I’ll just be teleporting my arrows in front of the bullseye, I’ll never miss.”
They were still discussing their lunch when they walked into the dorm building, where Sven and Li Na were waiting so they could get dinner.
Why do so many things revolve around food?’
Still, Yaric was looking forward to being able to sit down and eat.
“Where’s Chelsea?” Lauren asked. “I promised she could see my new air spell when I got back.”
“Gone,” Kaylin said from the couch they were standing next to.
Yaric turned to see Kaylin, Anton, and Kaedan sitting together.
Kaylin looked extrely happy. “She was given her first appeal, with Cormac and Delmar. They’ve already left to settle so issue about water.”
“That’s great,” Lauren exclaid.
“It’s not even everything,” Kaylin replied, her grin growing even wider. “A bunch of us were told we’d also be starting. We’re going to go out as a team as well.”
“You’ve earned it,” Sven remarked.
“Thanks! We’re going to be on probation to begin with, but if we do well, we’ll start getting more important jobs like you guys.”
“We also started on probation,” Yaric pointed out. “Our first job was moving stones for a construction crew.”
“I don’t mind what we get!”
“As long as I don’t wind up like Cormac,” Kaeden laughed. “The others made him carry all their law books. He played knockouts and he lost, now he’s their pack mule - those books are heavy!”
“We’d just share the load,” Kaylin imdiately replied. “It’s going to be so aweso going out and actually doing sothing. I hope we get to go to faraway villages like you did!”
Those two groups weren’t the only ones. Chris had a group of his own, as did Vanno. Most of them were key figures during the last Competition.
“That’s exactly what I was told,” Kaylin explained, after Yaric had pointed out how they were all people who’d played a big role during the capture the flag competition. “It was part of our assessnt, we just needed to advance enough in our studies. My sponsor even told that our year had more people approved than the next two years combined!”
With all the excitent in the room, dinner ended up being very late.
“This is your last class before the Sumr Solstice Tournant,” Emil announced. “I’m sure you’re all aware that you will have five days off after the Solstice, so I’ll be walking around and answering any questions you might have. There’s no reason you can’t improve over the next week.”
“Are you going to ask him about the lightning spell?” Lauren asked him.
“No, I think I’ve got it. It will be a long ti until I can cast it, but I think I understand how all the sinks work together.”
“Really? I’m still struggling with that.”
“It’s actually not that different from that stupid transference spell. They both use so much arcana that they stack multiple sinks, but they feed into the sa exit. I found that the hard part is keeping the distance from each sink the sa. If it’s off by too much then they dump their reserves at intervals instead of all at once.”
“Oh, I didn’t notice. I’ll give that a try,”
Li Na and Sven were currently shaping rocks, which kept manifesting as small spikes that broke after a sharp impact. Their issue is they were struggling to make the rocks homogenous. Every spike contained so many flaws that they created fault lines, fault lines that cracked whenever they tested the strength of the spike. They could still use them as they were, but they wouldn’t be much more than rocks if they couldn’t withstand any impact. Rocks would even be better, since the spikes lost so impact energy when the energy was absorbed by the breaking rock.
Yaric and Lauren were both skipping the proper augntation spells until they could get at least one lightning spell under their belts. Li Na was torn, so she was alternating her practice between both, though she had to fix the problem with creating stone first. Sven had exactly the sa problem with the earth spell, so it was likely that there was sothing they were both missing.
“Yes!” Lauren exclaid, only just catching herself in ti to keep her voice low. She looked embarrassed when she turned to Yaric, but she was still smiling happily. “It worked; you were right. I tested it with a trickly and the arcana flowed in one big surge.”
“And it only took you one try,” Yaric teased.
Lauren nudged his shoulder playfully. “It’s still far from perfect… Hey, do you think the accuracy of the flow could affect the power of the spell?”
“Maybe. I guess we have our first question.”
It turned out that the flow did affect the power of the spell, and its stability well. Emil was very excited when they asked the question.
“You figured that out by yourselves?” he asked excitedly.
“Lauren did,” Yaric replied.
“He showed why they need to flow together in the first,” she objected.
Emil just chuckled. “Well, keep helping each other out. You just discovered one of the most fundantal thods for improving almost any spell. Everyone knows that the arcana needs to flow through each component correctly to properly program the spell, but the accuracy of the flow can have a major impact on how well it works. Efficiency, strength, power – virtually everything is impacted by how you feed arcana through the component structures.
“If you can get this one thing right, you’ll take a great big leap ahead of your peers. This is Apprentice level work. Even full Wizards will work on flows, from their oldest spells to their newest. Keep it up!”
Emil went to help Sven and Li Na next, where he showed them how the spell was breaking down prematurely, but Lauren and Yaric explained their breakthrough as soon as Emil had left.
“That’s all it is?” Sven asked curiously. “He’s sure it will have such a big effect?”
“Yes, I even tried it on the first air spells we learned,” Yaric said.
Lauren turned around excitedly. “Already, what happened?”
“I ran through both very slowly and tried to adjust anything that affected the flow. I even made the feed for the anchor components longer, so everything arrived at once. The wind blade felt much better, like I’d been doing sothing wrong all this ti before now. But the other spell didn’t really change much. It might blow harder with less power, or be more efficient, but it didn’t feel anywhere near as good as the wind blade.”
“Probably because it’s a channel spell, so arcana is flowing constantly anyway,” Li Na inford them sagely.
Yaric and Lauren stared.
“Lina, that… makes a lot of sense,” Lauren stamred.
“‘Course it does, I said it, didn’t I?”
Li Na and Sven went back to trying to get their earth spikes right, using the adjustnts Emil had suggested, while Yaric and Lauren stopped working on their lightning spell and started testing every other spell they knew.
Both earth mages made big improvents to creations over the next fifteen minutes, but their biggest improvent ca when they decided to try and improve the flow of arcana as Lauren had shown them. Two near-simultaneous exclamations almost made Yaric jump in his seat.
Unbelievably, it made a drastic improvent to the formulation of the rock. It couldn’t have worked without the adjustnts Emil had suggested, but now that they had the spell working correctly, proper timing in the flow of each component ensured that every elent was exactly where it should be, when it should be.
Their rocks were now proper weapons.
All four were excited to test their discoveries, so they joined the next group going to the range. The earth spell was still very new for both Sven and Li Na, so it took them quite a while to get the spell ready, but their spikes were driven deeply into the wooden posts every ti. Even glancing shots were able to gouge out divots in the wood.
Yaric and Lauren were both testing out their older spells while the stone spikes were flying around.
Fireballs burnt hotter, lasted longer, and flew faster. Air blades streaked across the range before digging more deeply into their targets than ever before. Yaric even managed to hit a barrel with a stone he gently threw, completely unaugnted, from fifty ters away. His space spell warped the distance sufficiently all on its own.
That’s not to say that the spells were super powered, they weren’t. But even a 10% improvent was imdiately noticeable and made a significant difference. So aspects of their spells were improved by as much as 20%. Lauren was over the moon.
Sven also made an accidental discovery while they were testing. Everyone knew that they were casting spells faster, and they did try timing themselves, but up till now the only visible sign of improvent was the number of spells they successfully got off when sparing. Sven wanted to see how much the adjustnts improved his fireball, so he fired one after another, as quickly as he could. The line of consecutive fireballs was very impressive to see, and certainly drove ho just how much their casting speed had improved.
They were very excited for the Tournant, even if their nervousness threatened to smother it. For the first ti, they would be fighting against students who were far ahead of them in both age and experience. People who had been using proper augntation spells for more than two years, while they hadn’t even begun practicing those spells yet.
But all four agreed that it would be okay no matter how the fights went. What better way to push yourself than to take down the best fighters in the classes ahead of you?
The day of the Sumr Solstice Tournant dawned over another clear sky. It was already getting warm by the ti Yaric and his friends took their seats to watch the 2nd years kick everything off. This Tournant was going to be sweltering.
Every year had seen them move a little further along the arena, and now they were far enough that it was hard to see exactly what was happening during the initial fights. A constant stream of 2nd years ca and went, celebrating when they won and commiserating with friends when they lost.
The 1st years were far more chaotic, even from a distance. Yaric had learned long ago that they weren’t really worth watching.
Sweat was dripping off everyone’s brow when the 3rd years took their turn on the field. A light breeze drifted through the stands, but it was far from enough to bring relief to the closely packed students.
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Even without the heat, Yaric still would have been suspicious when he saw Li Na’s smug grin.
She looked up the second he narrowed his eyes, as if she’d been waiting for him to notice.
“Yes?”
“What are you doing?”
“Whatever do you an?” Li Na replied, acting offended but in an overly dramatic way.
“Wait, how co you’re just sitting there while we’re all sweating?”
Lauren and Sven were watching the interaction with interest, and no small amount of suspicion of their own.
“Oh, that’s just because I’m aweso. Here, I’ll share so with you.”
Li Na leaned over and took hold of Yaric’s top. It started stiffening almost instantly as it gradually began freezing over.
“Boots are the best,” Li Na declared, lying across Lauren’s lap so she could reach Yaric’s boots as well. “See? I told you ice was useful.”
Li Na turned to Lauren as if waiting for her to say sothing, but Lauren just glared right back, never blinking or breaking eye contact, until Li Na sighed and froze her clothes too. Sven didn’t even have to ask.
“You gotta do it every fifteen minutes, it doesn’t last,” Li Na explained. “Actually the boots last longer, but clothes don’t.”
The four of them sat through the rest of the fights in a much better mood. It still took half an hour to cool down properly, even with the constant refreezing, but no one was damp anymore, and their clothes soon dried out. That did make the freezing slightly less effective later on, not that anyone complained.
Lunch ca and went, followed by two more classes, and it was finally their turn to see how they stacked up against 9th and 10th-year students. Yaric could feel the butterflies in his stomach as he started putting on his armor.
Sven helped him tighten everything properly, before turning for Yaric to do the sa, and Li Na ca past for one more round of cooling, and then it was ti to go out for their first fight.
Yaric imdiately realized things were different. He’d forgotten that he’d be fighting in the larger squares from here on out. Sven went with him and took up position in an adjacent square, waiting for a challenger. Neither had to wait long.
Edward and Grant were walking quickly toward their squares, looking to challenge them in the first round. They were 10th years, and both had been among the more antagonistic of the new classmates.
Grant strode into Sven’s square with his longsword ready, but Edward was too slow. Soone else had made it in ti to challenge Yaric first.
Kayden. Again.
He’d made it a habit to challenge Yaric during every tournant, and Yaric couldn’t help but smile while he shook his head. Kayden was grinning like a loon, waving his shield back and forth while making a show of stretching before the fight.
Edward stalked off in disappointnt.
“Begin!”
Yaric tried a new idea that Sven had given him the day before. He raised his hand and fired off a fireball while running forward with his sword in one hand. Then he fired another, and another, each aid at Kayden’s head. Kayden was forced to raise his shield to defend himself against the onslaught of flaming fireballs that flew at his face.
It didn’t take long for Yaric to close the distance against his stationary opponent. He had his sword held out to the side while forcing Kayden to keep his shield held high, making his waist and upper leg a very obvious target. Kayden knew it too, and he peeked over his shield between each fireball, watching as Yaric closed in so he could ti his counter.
At just three ters away Yaric raised his hand for one final fireball, the fireball that would force Kayden to keep his shield up so he could strike at the waist with his next step.
Kayden raised his shield, but also jumped back, creating space and breaking Yaric’s timing for the fireball – that never ca.
Yaric dropped his hand instead, launching the wind blade he’d prepared for his final strike. The blade cracked harmlessly against a mage shield that manifested in front of Kayden’s knees.
“Match! Crippling blow!”
So spectators probably thought Kayden had won because of how he was laughing.
Yaric turned to watch Sven’s fight, hoping to catch a glimpse of what it was like fighting a 10th-year.
It didn’t look good.
Sven was holding on, but just barely. It was blatantly obvious that he was the better fighter. His footwork was immaculate, his positioning perfect, but still he could barely fend off Grant’s assault.
Grant’s speed and power were far superior to Sven’s, so much so that Sven was forced to block each strike directly, and he had to do so from right beside his own body. Grant was striking rapidly from different angles, pulling the longsword around and down, then all the way back and over again so he could strike at Sven’s shoulders. Sven had to pivot his body wildly just to get his sword and shield between himself and Grant’s blade.
A devastating swing was powerful enough to send Sven staggering back, but it bought him enough room to launch a fireball of his own.
Yaric watched it splash around a small shield Grant had anchored to his palm. The shield seed like a regular pane, but it was turned ninety degrees, and the fireball broke harmlessly around it. A second fireball t the sa fate while Grant closed the gap, and Yaric watched in shock as he simply gripped his sword with both hands and continued to fight.
‘How can he hold his sword with a shield anchored to his palm?’
Sven was sent stumbling out of bounds by another powerful blow, and it finally dawned on Yaric.
‘Of course! It’s not a physical connection! There’s no reason we can’t have sothing between the spell and the anchor point!’
Yaric rushed to help Sven get back to his feet. He seed shaken by the battering he’d taken, and if the way he kept shaking his hands was anything to go by, even blocking those strikes would take a serious toll.
Li Na was waiting for them on the sidelines.
“I saw what that asshole did, he was targeting you!”
“He’s allowed to,” Sven admitted.
“Was he really that strong?” Lauren asked, running up from her own fight.
“It was like trying to stop a horse with one hand,” Sven replied, still panting from the fight.
“Then I’ll just have to introduce his face to my mace!”
“Hold back Lina,” Sven requested. “I think they’re targeting and Yaric first.”
“They are. Edward tried to fight at the sa ti, but Kayden beat him to it.”
“Then Edward will challenge next, and Grant will switch to you.”
“I’ll challenge you,” Li Na offered.
Sven pulled her in for a one-ard hug. “Thanks, but they’ll just keep targeting us. It’s better to get this over with.”
“What’s their problem anyway?” Yaric asked angrily.
Lauren opened her mouth to respond, but she never got the chance. Everyone was called back out for the second round.
Yaric and Sven rushed out to reclaim the sa squares, and this ti Lauren and Li Na took up the squares behind them.
Grant strolled up to Yaric, just as predicted. Yaric felt himself get really annoyed when Grant looked across at where Sven stood and derisively shook his head with a snort, as if Sven hadn’t been worth his ti. Grant hadn’t landed a single blow, even with his advantages. Sven had been forced out of bounds.
Seeing Grant’s fight with Sven had been worth it, however, and Yaric had a plan.
“Begin!”
Yaric’s plan fell apart.
Grant sprinted forward so quickly that Yaric was still midway through casting his spell, and then blades started raining down. Yaric had no idea what style Grant fought with, but it was the worst possible match-up for him. Whereas Yaric focused on keeping blades in contact and predominantly using deflections and thrusts, Grant focused on cutting and chopping, attacking from the sides instead of from the front. Yaric was forced to block directly just as Sven had been, and he struggled to pull his sword from one side to the other in ti.
Several blows were so strong that they blew right through his defense, pushing his own sword back and scoring thin lines in his armor. His was a hair's breadth from being called by the umpire.
Instead of watching the blade, Yaric focused on Grant’s body. He watched the twist of his hips, the position of his shoulder, the movent of his wrists. Yaric knew where Grant was going to strike from the mont he started moving, and it was just barely enough.
Blow after blow sent shockwaves through his hands and arms, strike after strike knocked him back. Then Grant attacked high, and Yaric was able to combine a slight crouch with a jump to the side to evade. The blade whistled over his head and Grant imdiately jumped back to avoid a counterattack.
Spell complete, Yaric raised his hand and fired off his fireball.
Grant flicked his hand up contemptuously, his side on shield cutting the fireball in two like it was nothing.
Flaming liquid burst free and continued on the sa trajectory, spraying all over Grant and drenching him from head to foot. The human torch was only able to keep standing due to the mage shield that flickered into existence across his entire body.
“Match!”
Lauren was still fighting behind him, but Yaric saw Sven mouth a silent ‘yes’ from the ground outside his square. Edward had not been subtle when he used his shield to smash Sven out of bounds.
Li Na wasn’t known for her subtly either.
“Suck it, loser! I thought you were two years ahead of us?”
Grant apparently wasn’t in the mood, because he imdiately flad off the field, followed closely by Edward.
Lauren won her fight with a 9th-year student, barely, and rushed to join them.
“He’s going to shield bash,” Sven warned, even more out of breath than he’d been before.
“You should switch to a shield as well,” Lauren suggested.
“No, we can’t play their ga. They want to use powerful augnting spells... fine. Let’s see them using shaping magic like we do.”
Lauren looked dubious, but she didn’t contradict him.
“Did you see what he did to Sven? Smash him! Here, you can use my mace,” Li Na offered, holding it up for Yaric to take.
“Thanks Lina, but I think I’m going to stick with magic for now.”
The field dropped into shadow just as he spoke, with thick dark thunderclouds crawling across the sky above them.
“Ominous,” Sven mused.
“Why?” Yaric grinned. “We’re Team Shadow.”
“Yeah!”
Yaric took his place again, but this ti Edward was already waiting.
“Your tricks won’t work twice,” he taunted.
Yaric shrugged in response.
‘They don’t need to work twice. I was saving this one for Sven, so this will be once. It’s even got an upgrade that will blow you away.’
Yaric took his place and looked at the ref.
“Begin!”
Edward shuffled forward quickly, his shield and armor making an all-out sprint impractical. Which suited Yaric just fine. Yaric stood his ground, waiting, his first spell already cast. Then his second spell was ready, and Yaric raised his hand and took aim. In front of and to the left of Edward.
A massive blast of air surged across the field just as thunder began to rumble overhead. The stream of wind struck the shield Yaric had placed with his first cast and deflected to the side, straight into Edward. It ca from his right side, which held his sword, blasted across his body, and carried on to his left.
His shield hand. Holding his nice, large, concave shield, with its bowl-like inner surface beautifully positioned to catch the hurricane-force wind.
Edward’s left arm was whipped out to the side by the straps that kept him secured to the shield. The force of the wind was enough to start dragging him, but every little change in angle changed how the wind pulled on the shield.
When the bottom was angled slightly away, the shield would pull up, lifting Edward onto his toes. When it angled left or right, Edward found his arm being violently wrenched from side to side. All the while Yaric walked steadily forward, careful to keep adjusting the angle as he did.
Edward desperately tried to free his arm, but he also refused to drop his sword, making his attempts futile. Yaric was now too close to get a good angle for deflection, but he could see the rear of the shield from where he stood, so he quickly panned his arm across to strike Edward directly.
Yet again Edward found himself wrenched around by his arm, his shield arm now facing away from Yaric as it whipped from side to side, his sword arm raised to point directly at Yaric, forming a straight line. Even better, the original angle of attack was over a longer distance, so Edward was still being struck from the side when the head-on attack arrived.
Another rumble of thunder, and now Yaric noticed the cheering from the stands.
This ti Yaric ran forward and jumped, intent on putting every bit of force into his one-handed strike that he could.
CLANG!
Edward’s sword barely budged. Yaric swung several tis, but he wasn’t to co close to disarming Edward. His augnted grip was just too powerful.
So Yaric created a second shield, this ti on the other side. The wind deflected and twisted Edward around for the last ti, leaving him with his back to Yaric and his sword arm stretching as far behind him as it would go, yet still falling short.
Yaric walked up to him casually from behind, carefully adjusting the angle of his spell as he did. Lifting his sword lazily, Yaric dropped it onto Edward’s neck with barely any force at all.
“Match!”
Edward furiously ripped off his shield the very mont Yaric dropped his spell. He looked like he was about to start a fight, but he was interrupted just as he stepped forward.
“OHHH! Two for two!”
Edward froze, glaring at Li Na, then turned on his heel and stalked off.
This ti Lauren had lost her fight, and she stood nursing her bruised shoulder with a grin.
“Are you okay?” Yaric asked.
“My shoulder is better than Edward’s,” she laughed.
The four of them walked off together, complaining about how they were being unjustly targeted and laughing at their escapes.
The next round saw Edward walking into Li Na’s square, intent on revenge, while Grant challenged Yaric once again.
It wasn’t in any way against the rules, you could challenge whoever you wanted so long as it wasn’t consecutively and you had another option available, but all the students kept to an unwritten rule that you simply didn’t do it.
Another one of their friends, Jai, walked into Sven’s square.
Yaric wasn’t sure what he could do this ti. There was no chance Grant would allow him to cast a proper fireball again, and the shield he kept ready could block almost anything else. He hated being forced to do what he could, instead of what he should.
“Begin!”
Grant charged again, and Yaric found himself unable to get off the simple fireball he had tried to throw as a distraction. His opponent was just too quick.
A deafening thunk echoed out behind him, but Yaric was forced to ignore it.
Lightning slashed across the sky as blow after blow rained down on Yaric, his arms vibrating in ti with the thunder. His hands were already stinging and starting to turn numb from the repeated impacts they were forced to endure.
Disaster almost struck early when Yaric tried to shift one hand to cast his fireball, but the slashing blows were coming so quickly that all he did was take a strike with a weakened grip. His sword was driven back into his own chest, thankfully without enough force to be considered a winning blow.
Yaric’s mind spun furiously, looking for a way to use his only advantage over the older student, his shaping skills. Longsword vs longsword put Grant out of range of tricks like a shield anchored to his foot, and with no chance of using his hands, Yaric’s advantage wasn’t an advantage at all.
‘Wait, I anchored the shield spell to my foot!’
Lightning lit up the field once again as scattered raindrops began to fall, reflecting the flashes that rippled across the sky. There was another brilliant flash, and a loud crack shook the ground as Yaric blocked a low strike aid at his knee, the shock of the impact vibrating its way up his arms.
Yaric reared his head back, then lunged forward from the waist, looking exactly like he was about to spit in Grant’s face, his mouth opening wide.
A fireball shot from Yaric’s mouth, crossing the gap between him and his opponent faster than the flashes above them. Grant’s eyes grew wide, and he just barely managed to dodge even with his superior augntation.
Yaric heard a distant roar around him as he lunged forward again, unleashing a second fireball right after the first. Caught even more off guard, Grant’s eyes grew comically wide at the sight of a second fireball being spat at him so soon after the first. Grant stumbled backward, and the distant roar instantly swelled, just as the fireball splashed harmlessly against the armor covering Grant’s shoulder.
Grant looked down in shock. His eyes narrowed, the surprise he’d felt turning to rage when he realized they were just basic balls of fla.
The rain began to pour down as Grant turned to face Yaric, his sword raised and his eyes blazing.
Yaric leaned back and lunged forward for a third ti, but Grant ignored him, fully aware of Yaric’s inability to cast a persistent fireball in such a short ti.
But Yaric didn’t cast a persistent fireball, nor did he cast a regular one.
Another blast of wind caught Grant head-on. To everyone watching from the stands, it looked exactly as if Yaric was blowing hurricane-force winds into Grant’s face. Wind and rain whipped at his face, forcing him back. The skin on Grant’s face was rippling in the wind, his lips pulled back in a rictus of rage.
But it was impossible for Grant to see anything, not with the wind and water driving into eyes he could no longer close. Grant dropped to his knees to keep from being blown off his feet.
Yaric stepped forward, walking casually just as he had before. Stepping to the left of Grant’s raised blade, Yaric leaned right, slightly changing the direction the wind was coming from. At the sa ti, he slipped his blade under Grant’s, moving under from the left but lifting to make contact on the right.
Blinded, Grant swung wildly in the wrong direction. Yaric dropped his blade under the wild swing and took one more step forward, cutting off the wind and thrusting for Grant’s exposed neck.
“Match!”
Grant wiped his face, only to find himself on his knees before Yaric and blinking tears out of his eyes. The spectators were going wild at the unusually entertaining display of magic.
Then an unfortunate gap in the thunder opened up just as a loud voice echoed across the arena.
“Go dragon puppy!”
Yaric was still looking down at Grant when the chant started being taken up across the stands, particularly with the younger years.
“DRAGON! DRAGON! DRAGON!”
Turning, Yaric hurried off the field before the shouts could get any louder.
Lauren was bouncing up and down on her feet when he arrived and imdiately pulled him into a hug.
“You spat fire!”
“I just changed the anchor point.”
“Now you’re the dragon puppy,” Li Na exclaid. “Oh, and look what happened to Edward!”
Yaric looked over to where she was pointing. Edward was wrestling with a twisted piece of tal strapped to his arm. The distorted ss had created a tangle that he was struggling to get undone.
“They have proper augntation spells, but they still can’t augnt other objects like Lina can,” Lauren explained happily.
Edward had tried to block Li Na’s mace just like he would with any other strike, only to find that it had far, far more mass than sothing its size had any right to possess.
Sven had also managed to beat Jai. He was stronger and faster, but the weather hampered Jai’s ability to leverage that advantage, which combined with Sven’s skill to give him his first win against a 10th-year student.
“You better get another sword,” Li Na said, tapping it with her mace.
Yaric looked down and paused in shock. The edge had rolled in multiple places, and there were several chips on both sides. It wasn’t like the sword was low quality either, it had just been put through far more abuse than it should have been. You weren’t supposed to directly oppose such powerful strikes after all, Yaric just hadn’t had any other choice.
The four of them walked back out into the arena after making a quick observation, soaked to the bone, and Yaric with a new sword in hand.
Edward had given up on his shield, and this ti he faced Yaric with his short sword and an axe.
It was obvious to everyone watching that Grant, Edward, and Jai were trying to take down Yaric and his friends. And with tenth year students deliberately targeting eighth year students, it was also very obvious who they wanted to see get taken down in the fights.
The four squares Yaric and the others stood in beca the center of attention, even in the driving rain.
Yaric faced Edward, Li Na faced Grant, and Lauren faced Jai. Jai had just lost to Sven, and the other two were looking for an easy win after two losses, which they thought Lauren and Li Na would be able to give to them.
“Begin!”
Edward advanced at a trot, nervously watching Yaric for any sign of magic. He didn’t need to fear any wind spells without his shield, and his two lee weapons would be far too fast for Yaric to defend against. He only needed a second, just one second within range, and the fight would be over.
Yaric disagreed. It was raining, and raining hard. Yaric had just seen what raindrops traveling at over 150km/h could do. In weather like this, the wind was very much to be feared. Whoever controlled this weather would control the fight.
With two shields anchored in place, Yaric retreated slightly to gain the angle he needed, then raised his palm. Edward crouched, ready to dodge.
You can’t dodge a hurricane, especially one that constantly changes the angle it ca from.
The first blast made him stumble back a couple of steps, but then he crouched low. Then the wind angled slightly to the left, then directly ahead again, then to the right. Each ti Edward would be pelted by raindrops that struck like stones from a slingshot.
Within seconds the three different angles had a confusing mass of wind join them.
Yaric watched as the wind coming in at an angle would strike the side of the blast from directly ahead, twisting into whirlwinds as it did. Three different winds struck Edward where he crouched, interspersed with impacts from two miniature tornadoes that rotated in opposite directions.
To his credit, Edward did try to retaliate with magic of his own. A wind blade flew through a tornado and got ripped apart. A spear of fla hissed as it flew through the rain, until it got distorted by the roaring wind and tore apart, popping and disappearing as it did. Nothing Edward did had any effect.
anwhile, the blasts of wind whipped the rain into a frenzy, creating vicious swirls of dancing rain.
His friends were doing exactly the sa thing, only without the shields to deflect the rain, and they had already blinded and dispatched their opponents. Yaric kept staring at his attack, watching the beautiful dancing and twirling of the water that moved to a rhythm and beat that he alone controlled.
Then he jogged forward and ended it, just as his friends had.
Two of the three 10th-year students took their 3rd and final losses, taken out of the Tournant in the knockout stages by 8th years who continued on without them.
The stupid first years had just watched Yaric use wind to turn water into a weapon, yet they were still chanting ‘dragon’ over and over as Yaric left the field with his friends by his side.
In less than five seconds the rain slowed and stopped, bringing a sudden quiet to the arena that was only broken when thunder rumbled once again. Yaric noticed Jai eying him while talking to another 10th-year, and he knew who his next opponent would be.
An absolute giant, the largest student in any of their years. He was just over two ters tall and looked like he was the creature that horses rode on. A large round shield with a central handle was in one hand, looking almost like a buckler compared to his fra, and a massive maul was in the other. A massive maul that he wielded with just one hand.
Yaric scoured the weapons rack, looking for anything that would work. Just when he was about to give up, he found a row of different options that would be perfect for his needs.
This ti Yaric started the fight with his longsword in his left hand, held awkwardly by the bottom of the grip so he could grab it with his right hand the second it was available. Because his right hand held his secret weapon.
A small dagger.
“Begin.”
Yaric’s opponent ambled forward, occasionally jinking left or right to throw off any potential spells. He got two-thirds of the way before Yaric finally finished his preparations and jogged forward to et him. Yaric let his dagger hand move up and down as he ran forward, then, with no training whatsoever to guide him, Yaric lifted his dagger for the last ti in an underhand throw.
His opponent swiped his shield out to knock it away, but the dagger flickered and disappeared, only to bounce off the mage shield on his neck an instant later. Even the referee looked shocked. He’d missed the space magic cast by a student just starting his eighth year and almost been too late to block the dagger.
“Match!”
Yaric tried to block out the 1st years as he went back to the sidelines, especially with so many of the 2nd year class joining them as well.
Jai left him alone after that. Still, it wasn’t a clear run by any ans.
Yaric was fighting one spear wielder when she stepped back and his feet were suddenly ripped out from under him. Her spear struck before he even realized he was kissing the floor. Sothing had tugged on him, almost like air magic, but there had been nothing physically pushing him.
Lauren suspected that it was a force spell, but she couldn’t be sure. Yaric wasn't used to being on the receiving end of spells that no one saw coming, particularly when he was so close to winning through physical skill.
Then Yaric faced an opponent who used his guard to montarily lock Yaric’s sword in place. The surprise move opened Yaric up to a counter-attack and he took his second loss. This one had him kicking himself, as he was simply outplayed.
Lauren, Sven, and Li Na were all knocked out in the last fights before the semifinals, leaving Yaric to represent their year by himself.
He was facing another 10th year, and this ti he had a plan. Yaric started casting as soon as the fight began. His opponent didn’t move forward either, for which he was grateful, as he now had the ti he needed to cast his spells - until he realized that his opponent was likely doing exactly the sa thing.
That was his last thought before a brilliant flash blinded him with a deafening crack. The lightning spell was effectively impossible to dodge, and Yaric hadn’t even seen it coming. It was his 3rd and final loss, so he walked off to join his waiting friends.
For once he didn’t walk off to the usual claps, cheers, or boos. Not even silence. No, he walked off to chanting.
“DRAGON! DRAGON! DRAGON!”
‘Stupid first years!’
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