by Aaron Oster
Sarah looked thoughtful for a few seconds as she digested all the new information.
“So what you’re saying, is that the golem isn’t any more powerful than it was previously, but that it’s attributes are skewed towards strength and agility. It’s constitution has been drastically lowered as a result, meaning that a single hit would finish it.”
“Exactly!” Morgan said, nodding excitedly.
“What I think you should do is watch how the golem moves. Everyone has a pattern, so watch it carefully, then aim your attacks for where it’s going to be rather than where it is right now.”
“That’s a great idea,” she said with a grin.
“I’m sure I’ll be able to nail that thing this time!”
Morgan looked up to the wall, noting the time on the clock.
“We’ve only got two minutes left, so tell me what I’ve been doing wrong. I know now that the golems can be destroyed if hit; but that doesn’t stop the fact that I’m just not fast enough to hit it.”
“Well, I’ve noticed that you’ve been moving a lot less during your most recent fights,” Sarah began. “You used to move around a lot more rather than stand still and attacking head on. I think I heard Gold mention something about staying light on your feet, so that may have been a hint that you’re not moving around enough. Another thing that I noticed is that you don’t really use your skills, or at least not your super skills anyway.”
“You seem to prefer using your tailwind skill over your heavy handed and you almost never use fly during a fight. Since Gold forbade you from using any mage skills at all, that leaves you at a severe disadvantage when facing opponents who do.”
Morgan though about what she said.
He always used tailwind because out of the two skills, it had always seemed more useful. He had used heavy handed during fights where power was required, but since he was limited to using either one or the other, he always picked speed over power.
He also never used fly in a fight, since it took him a few seconds to build up speed and he didn’t have the fast twitch reflexes he did on the ground; but maybe there was a way to utilize both in a fight.
“Thank you for that,” he said, getting to his feet and offering her a hand up. “You’ve definitely given me a lot to think about.”
“What are friends for?” she replied, taking his proffered hand and getting to her feet.
“Time’s up!” Gold’s voice rang out. “Have you made your decision?”
“Yes,” Morgan answered for the both of them.
“We’ll fight the golems without taking any of your advice.”
“Very well then. Better get back into position, because they’ll be attacking in ten seconds.”
Morgan rushed back to face his opponent, his mind alight with new ideas and possibilities.
As the countdown ended, the golem rushed him, almost as if it were eager to break something new, but Morgan was already on the move. As the golem ran at him, he began moving to the side, forcing it to change direction and slowing it down a bit. The golem closed in on him and threw a kick designed to crack his shin, but he threw himself to the side and used fly.
This was an idea he’d come up with, after Sarah had mentioned his lack of movement in a fight, as well as his lack of skill usage. He might not be able to move very quickly in the air, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t us his skill in short bursts while staying low to the ground. If anything, using it this way would actually aid his movement rather than impede it. That was assuming that it would function in the way he hoped it would.
As soon as his feet left the ground, Morgan knew that his idea had worked. He rocketed to the side as his feet glided a few inches off the ground; the force of his momentum, along with the decreased gravity more than enough to outmaneuver the golem.
He laughed as he deactivated fly feeling his feet touch the ground; then dashed forward and used fly again to launch himself at the golem. The golem, to its credit, actually managed to get mostly out of the way, but it was just a hair too slow to completely avoid the attack. Morgan’s fist clipped it in the side and the construct shattered into a thousand pieces.
He let out a whoop of triumph, turning just in time to watch Sarah send an accurately aimed ball of ice right into the path of her charging golem. He saw Sarah pump her fist in the air, making a very rude gesture to the now inanimate pile of rubble and laughing hysterically.
“That was well done.”
They both stopped their cheering as Gold approached along with Eric, the former clapping slowly and the latter looking amazed.
“You managed to figure out how to beat the golems all on your own; excellent work,” Gold said, continuing his clapping.
They both glared at his mocking applause, but even he couldn’t dampen their good mood.
“Did you see the way we destroyed those things, Eric?” Sarah asked excitedly.
“I did indeed,” the healer replied with a grin. “That was most impressive.”
“Makes you wonder if we even need an instructor like Gold. All he does is beat us bloody, then takes all the credit when we figure out his latest lesson,” Sarah said, making air quotes when she said the word ‘lesson’.
“I’m hurt!” Gold said, placing a hand on his chest and adopting a wounded look.
“And then he does this,” Morgan said with a sigh.
Gold’s expression then changed to indignation and the three of them just nodded sagely.
“Yes, he does seem to go through the same process each time,” Eric said, rubbing his chin. “You’d think he would come up with something new, after all this time.”
“Alright, enough of that,” Gold said, this time with a little heat in his voice. “None of you appreciate all the hard work that goes into teaching a bunch of upstart brats. Maybe the golems weren’t challenging enough; I think we aught to remedy that, don’t you?”
He smiled now, an evil grin that both Sarah and Morgan knew quite well.
The next two hours were not going to be pleasant.
38
It was finally the day of the tournament and Morgan could not remember ever feeling so nervous in his entire life. He was currently sitting next to Sarah in a private booth on the ground level of the arena.
Apparently all competitors got their own booths, but since the two of them shared an instructor, they decided to share a booth as well.
“How many people do you think are out there?” Morgan asked, tugging at the straps on the side of his new shirt.
“My best guess is around eighty thousand,” Gold replied cheerily, as he entered.
Morgan visibly paled at that number.
Eighty thousand people would be watching him fight?!
“How is there even room for that many people?”
“In case you haven’t noticed, the area at the center of the arena had shrunk by quite a bit,” Gold said, sitting down in one of the plush chairs. “Care to guess where all that extra room went?”
Morgan sighed as the truth sank in.
They must have sunk a good portion of the seats into the ground when the arena was being used during the semester. Now they’d raised it so people could watch the fights.
He voiced his thoughts out loud and Gold grinned.
“Good to see that you can still think clearly, despite your nerves.”
Morgan just scowled and surveyed the open area in front of them once more. They, along with all the other competitors, had seats right near the fighting area.
It had been drastically reduced and was now only fifty feet across. The ground underfoot had been changed to sand in place of the usual stone and a white line had been painted across the center.
Three figures were currently out on the arena grounds; the headmistress, the referee and Eric, their healer. There were also two large transparent boards floating above their heads; one red and one blue; each displaying the competitor’s names.
“How will this work?” Sarah asked. “Will all the students
in one class fight, then all the students from the other; or will they switch in between matches?”
“It will go by round,” Gold replied, seemingly distracted. “The super class will have their first round, then the mage class will have theirs. It’ll keep going like that until the tournament is over. This will give all the competitors a chance to rest in between matches.”
“What about tournaments for the other years?” Morgan asked.
“The second year tournament will be held two days from now and the third year’s will be next week. All the others will be held in two weeks from now, as foreign dignitaries will want to come watch the top students compete.”
“Why would they want to do that?” Morgan asked.
“To try and make them offers to come work for them,” Sarah answered before Gold could. “You have to remember that the students who made it into the tournament are the best of the best, which means that they get scholarships. Consequently, their kingdoms don’t have to pay their tuition, which means that they don’t have to fight in their military.”
“That was very well put, Sarah,” Gold said, patting her on the shoulder.
“When will the first fight begin?” Sarah asked, looking out at the open space where they would soon be fighting.
“Probably in around thirty or so minutes. Until then, why don’t you just sit back and relax.” Gold replied.
∞
Arnold entered the packed arena looking around at the massive gathering of people. He’d been in a foul mood over the last week, as he’d had absolutely no luck in locating either Sarah or Morgan.
Weasel had contacted him the previous night to let him know that the preparations were complete and that their plan would be carried out shortly. That gave him only twenty four hours to find Sarah and get her out of the academy.
Someone bumped him from behind and he very nearly turned to attack the person out of reflex, but managed to stop himself just in time.
He was way too jumpy, but that was perfectly understandable, considering what they were about to do.
He glanced at his wrist where his timepiece displayed that it was just past noon. He really didn’t have a lot of time at all, but if there was any chance of finding those two, it would be here.
Walking further in, he looked around for a place to sit, that would also give him the best vantage point. His eyes traveled up to the seats near the top of the bleachers.
Perfect. Some of those seats were still open.
It took him nearly five minutes of climbing and shoving to make it to the top and find a seat. Slumping down on the stone bench, he allowed his eyes to roam over the gathered crowd, taking note of the various entrances and exits throughout the arena.
As he was looking, his eyes inevitably fell upon the two floating boards displaying the names of the competitors. His eyes widened in disbelief and he rubbed them a few times to make sure he wasn’t imagining things; then a wide smile spread across his face and he had to restrain himself from leaping out of his seat right then and there.
It looked like lady luck had finally shined down upon him; and not a moment too soon. He could of course be wrong, but what were the chances that the Sarah and Morgan competing were not the two he was after?
Arnold slumped back in his seat and let a content sigh escape his lips.
There was no way he could get to either of them right now, because he didn’t know where they were. Plus, they were also likely to be surrounded by a whole lot of people. Once the tournament began, he would see from where they emerged, and once he was given the signal, he could easily make it down to them in the confusion and he would finally be able to complete this damn mission.
∞
Morgan, who had been concentrating on combining the last bit of his mana and chi, opened his eyes as Sarah shook him. He allowed his hold over the two spheres to slip and felt the two energies retract into their separate spheres.
He’d done it. All but five percent of both had been converted into reiki, and soon as the tournament was over, he would combine the last bit and finally become a supermage.
“Why do you have that creepy smile on your face?”
Morgan, who had been off in his own world, realized that he was indeed smiling.
“I did it,” he said in an excited tone.
He was careful to keep his voice lowered, as they were out in public and he didn’t want anyone to overhear them.
“Did what?” Sarah asked.
“I managed to combine all but the last bit!”
“That is excellent news,” Gold cut in; “but now is not the time to discuss this. The Headmistress is about to begin the tournament.”
Sarah, who’d wanted to ask him more, glared at Gold for interrupting her.
It was then that Loquin’s voice rang out over the arena.
“Welcome all, to the first year quarterly tournament!”
Morgan was shocked at how loud her voice was and how well it carried.
It could be clearly heard, even above the voices of eighty thousand people.
“Now I don’t want to make you wait any further, so allow me to explain the rules and how the bracket system will work. The rules are simple; to win you must render your opponent unconscious, or unable to continue fighting. Hypothetical deathblows will not count as a victory here. Killing an opponent is allowed, as stated in chapter 24; section 6, under the laws of an official, kingdom sponsored tournament.”
“People can be killed?!” Morgan and Sarah said at the same time, turning to stare at Gold.
“It’s not against the rules,” Gold said with a shrug. “But it’s only happened a handful of times in all the years I’ve been here, so you have nothing to worry about.”
Morgan was about to ask who had been killed, but stopped himself as Loquin continued her speech.
“We will however, strongly discourage you from taking that course of action. The referee can and will stop a fight if he believes that a competitor is no longer able to fight. If the fighter believes they still can fight, the matter will be brought to our panel of judges.”
Here she gestured behind her to a booth where four people sat behind a stone desk. Morgan noticed that more than a few academy guards were standing there as well.
With a crowd this large, that was hardly a surprise.
“The tournament will be as follows,” Loquin continued. “The first fight will be a bout between two students in the super class. The next one will be from the mage class and we’ll continue switching off between the two.”
She stopped for a moment as the referee walked toward her and whispered in her ear, then walked back to the side of the arena.
Morgan didn’t like the look of the man. He was tall, dressed in fine clothes and had an impetuous look about him.
“I almost forgot to mention,” Loquin said after the man had walked back to his post. “That we have a special guest who will be acting as the referee in place of our Deputy Headmaster Gold this semester. As Gold has two students who are competing, we believed that it wouldn’t be fair to have him oversee the tournament.”
“In his place, we have the esteemed Keldor, second in command of the merchant guild in the South Kingdom. He has graciously come all the way from the city of Dunmere to oversee this tournament.”
There was a smattering of polite applause as the man bowed, looking very smug for some reason.
Something about what Loquin had just said tickled the back of Morgan’s mind, but he couldn’t quite place what. It was only when Sarah started yelling that he finally understood who this man was.
“How can a man from the merchant guild in the South Kingdom be allowed to referee this match?” she practically exploded.
“Both Grub and that toad Frush are from the South Kingdom and from a wealthy merchant family. If they’re not letting you referee the tournament, they shouldn’t allow this man to either!”
Gold just sighed and placed a calming hand on her shoulder, guiding her gently back down into
her seat.
“I didn’t have a say in this, so there’s no need to yell at me. Yes, the man is most likely going to be playing favorites, but he can’t be too obvious about it; otherwise the judges will overrule him. Eric is also going to be down there and he will call Keldor out if he doesn’t make the correct decisions.”
This seemed to mollify Sarah somewhat, but Morgan felt distinctly uneasy.
If killing was allowed and Keldor was the one in charge, then this could only be one thing- a setup.
“Now, there is one last thing before we announce our first fighters,” Loquin’s voice rang out once more. “Unfortunately, our esteemed ruler, King Herald was unable to make it to the first tournament of the year, as he is currently away on a diplomatic mission. His Majesty apologizes to the competitors for his absence and hopes to see them all in the next tournament. Now, without further ado, let’s get this tournament started. All fights will be chosen at random, so please look up at the screen for our first two fighters!”
The names on the boards disappeared and a bunch of names started scrolling quickly in the first two open brackets of the red one.
Morgan felt his heart thumping as the names began slowing down. He groaned, placing his head into his hands as the names stopped, revealing the first two lucky fighters.
“Guess you’re up first,” Gold said with a grin, as he patted Morgan on the back. “Best of luck out there!”
39
Morgan felt his heart practically beating out of his chest as he slowly walked out onto the arena sands. He could hear the roar of the crowd as he approached the white line in the center, where the referee, Keldor, stood waiting for him.
On the other side, he could see a girl approaching. She was tall and slim, with tan skin, bright golden eyes and long brown hair tied in a braid down her back. She was dressed similarly to him; in a tight fitting canvas uniform, and walked with the confidence of a trained combatant.
Morgan knew this girl’s name even without it being written on the board. Hilda, the only person aside from Sarah who hadn’t had to fight her way into the tournament. The number one in the super class.