Sixth Realm

by Michael Chatfield

  Gu Chen let out a sigh.

  “I didn’t expect the fighting to be as intense as it has been, with the prizes everyone is willing to put down their lives. It seems that the Battle Arena is truly a holy ground for fighters to train in,” he said to Blaze who was sitting beside him.

  “Well, there is always next year and I hear that the arena might be opening up more training rooms to fit in more people. There’s such a large demand.”

  “I wish that I was able to secure a few of them for my team.”

  “Just get a guildhall and you can train in there,” Blaze said.

  “If I only had that kind of ability, maybe we will be able to in the future. I heard that you are getting some new neighbors?”

  “Yeah, looks like there are some other guilds that are interested in the area. There’s an auction being held after the finals for people to buy a place in Vuzgal; I have a feeling that the auction house is going to take away a large chunk of money again!”

  The two of them had become closer and to show that they didn’t fight one another, they had spent their time talking and sitting together.

  Gu Chen looked around the stands as the other fights were still continuing. Even though only a few people had made it into the top fifty, his gains had been great.

  “This competition will bring Vuzgal to new heights.”

  “And it will raise up the competitors to a new stage, I heard that there are no fewer than fifteen of them who have already agreed to join the Fighter’s Association!”

  “More guilds are coming every day to train in Vuzgal. As a crafter I thought of it as a holy land long before, but now I see that it is a holy land for fighters as well. I wonder what will happen in the future!”

  “Looks like Lin Lei is up next,” someone said to Blaze.

  Blaze looked to the screen that was showing Lin Lei. She was up against an archer.

  There are just four of the branch leaders left, Joan, Stephan, Derrick and Lin Lei. Only Lin Lei has a match left today.

  Lin Lei was in her assassin garb while she was up against a mage.

  “Begin!”

  Lin Lei shot forward. The mage released a curse, striking and slowing down Lin Lei, another life sense spell lit her up, making it impossible for her to sneak up on the mage.

  “Dual casting, impressive,” Blaze said.

  “It is hard to cast one spell at that speed, but two of them without a backlash, there are few able to do that even with simple spells,” Gu Chen agreed.

  The mage cast a spell on the ground that made it hard to keep one’s footing. Lin Lei was startled but then as she started to skate across the surface, the mage started to cast a spell and Lin Lei threw out a weapon. The mage dodged, stomped her foot and a wall of ice shot up in front of her, protecting her from two more daggers that hit its surface, leaving impacts.

  Lin Lei jumped and used her blades as she scrambled over the five-meter tall wall. She flashed, using a movement technique and icicles shot out from the mage’s hands, she had been ready for Lin Lei.

  Lin Lei dropped to the ground, she flashed around, dodging the icicles the woman was throwing out with each hand.

  Lin Lei got into range and spun around the woman, her blade descended as a magic circle appeared on the mage’s back.

  A spear of ice shot out, hitting Lin Lei in the stomach and sent her flying.

  “The mage used herself as bait, making her enemy think that she could only double cast, but she could triple cast,” Blaze said.

  “Triple casting is as rare as a phoenix’s feather,” Gu Chen commiserated with Blaze.

  Blaze forced himself to nod. Casting more than one spell relied on one’s control over mana. Among Alvans, there were many that could dual cast, a great number of people that dealt with crafting could double cast with high-level skills. The ranged mages of the Alvan Army were all taught to triple cast and there were some that were able to cast quadruple spells; Roska was one of those people. She could cast high-level spells that usually required a group effort by herself.

  Though none of them compare to Tanya who can instantaneously cast ten spells at once. With her theories on pure magic, her spells are incredibly destructive.

  Blaze’s eyes moved to Stephan, the young man had his head buried in a book and was jotting down notes.

  When he had gone to Alva and had met up with Tanya, he rarely used his spells, but Blaze was interested to see just how strong this ‘tested and refined, pure magic’ was.

  ***

  The fighting continued the next day, Joan was defeated by another ranger. The ranger had greater techniques and more combat experience, defeating her in less than ten moves. Derrick had revealed most of his trump cards and the other fighters could counteract him, defeating him and kicking him out of the competition.

  Joan, while she lost the match, still had enough points to stay in the top twenty.

  Stephen’s match started with him facing a man wearing minimal armor and wielding a massive two-handed broadsword.

  He looked savage with cuts and markings across his armor and skin.

  “Really you want me to face this scholar? You think that he’s able to shave yet?” The man said, laughing. Blaze watched the man’s eyes, he didn’t feel any malice in them, it looked like he was instead trying to play mental games and throw Stephen off by being boisterous and loud.

  Blaze didn’t think that he was bad, he was older and in the previous fights he knew when to attack and when to retreat, a man like that had plenty of combat experience.

  “Meeting the Iron Berserker, you know it is said that he has reached Iron level in his body cultivation. He really is one of the dark horses of the tournament. No one knew who he was before.” one of the spectators said.

  “Looking at them aren’t they mismatched, a scholar that spends his time in his books and the other that fights for his life? I think that this match will be over soon.”

  They don’t know Stephen, out of all the branch leaders he has the most combat experience, when I found him he was covered in scars and cuts, with proper healing he was able to recover quickly. He trains more than anyone else and because he’s a mage, he needs to rely on positioning and needs time between casting to have the greatest effect while managing a battle. It is a lot harder than charging forward with a blade. As a result, he is the strongest among the heads and the most willing to learn new ways to increase his strength.

  “Hah, are you so scared that you can’t speak? Don’t worry Uncle Iron will go easy on you!” The berserker let out a loud laugh that could be heard across the arena.

  The referee sensing the atmosphere didn’t make them greet one another and instead started the match right away.

  The berserker charged forward.

  Stephen looked around wildly and the berserker closed the distance in a moment. Stephen smirked and his nervous appearance disappeared as he put his hands behind his back. The berserker’s blade stopped in mid-air just in front of Stephen, the berserker was sweating and his eyes were opened wide in fear.

  Then Blaze saw it, there was a string of mana from behind Stephen that had grabbed the sword and curses were covering his body while three different spell circles rotated around the man. A pointed metal spear appeared in the middle, ready to launch at any moment.

  “The winner is Stephen!” The referee said, recovering.

  The berserker lowered his blade with a sour smile.

  “Well played,” He laughed and held out his hand, Stephen took it and they shook. The man’s robust appearance falling away.

  “Smart play, but he rushed in, thinking that he was able to confuse his opponent!”

  “Instead he was the one that was confused, that Stephen, which team is he from?”

  “Adventurer’s Guild, it looks like they have some real strength behind them. I wonder how far they will go!”

  “They will surely use this to launch their guild to new heights, the Fighter’s Association has already talked to them, I believe.”<
br />
  “Creating strong fighters shows one’s ability, but raising skilled fighters and mages, the Adventurer’s Guild’s background must not be small.”

  “I wish that it lasted longer, a match that ended so quickly at this stage, is he even taking this fight seriously?”

  “What was that spell? It was like the mana he used to hold the blade was sentient? It was still attached to him, like a scorpion.”

  “Probably a secret spell, one of his trump cards. It happened so fast I didn’t see him casting it.”

  The stands were filled with admiration and others that were complaining that the match had ended too quickly. In their eyes, they had to re-evaluate the Adventurer’s Guild once again.

  The day came to an end, the city didn’t sleep. Crafting workshops worked around the clock and people were in the Battle Arena training rooms. Others were attending auctions, buying and selling their goods or frequenting the restaurants and bars that dotted Vuzgal.

  Chapter: Fight for the top

  Joan reached her limit, unable to get past the top twenty.

  Stephen defeated his opponents in just a few moves. With his control over mana he was able to cast multiple simple spells, stacking them on top of one another so that people on the outside thought that he was casting just a few spells but he was layering them over one another. He used mana ‘whips’ which were the greatest thing he had learned from Tanya, using the mana to combine together, creating secondary limbs allowing him as a mage to fight in close quarters. He used curses to slow and distract and then his ‘limbs’ to secure the attacking weapons.

  People keep on specializing in just one kind of magic, they don’t realize just how powerful the right spells are. The purer one’s mana, the more options one has. Spells are just a way to refine the control over the mana and give them orders. Once one figures that out, high-level spells are just combining the right kind of affinity mana together into something useful. Spells are like the recipe for cooking: a bit of earth, fire, wood, metal, and water can make anything. Mana manipulation reduces the need for the spells and decreases how complex they need to be.

  Even now he was using his opponents to refine his mana manipulation and test out the theories that he and Tanya had been working on.

  While the power of the spells is higher, the cost to cast them is less and the mental strain is less as I’m casting simple spells but giving them more power. Stephen was using the tournament as a way to hone his new found ‘pure magic’ that Tanya had taught him.

  Stephen entered the top ten, his first match was against the ranger that had defeated Joan in the last round.

  The match started, the ranger dodged his spells that appeared around him and started to fire arrows, a few missed, going past Stephen and exploding. Stephen was thrown to the side but he sent out a blast of air to his side, missing the arrow that was aimed at his head.

  He was making me confident, leading me into his secondary arrows.

  Stephen smacked his hands together creating spells for water, earth and a little metal. The three elemental manas mixed together created clouds above the stage. With thunder rolling through the rapidly forming dark clouds, the winds pulled on the two fighters’ clothes.

  A storm appeared where the spells met and the arrows were thrown off by the changes in the air.

  Stephen created wood and water around a core of metal and stomped on the ground, the three manas combined in the ground, in a straight line, tearing up the floor.

  It split like branches of a tree.

  The ranger dodged and rolled to the side the area using a movement technique to get more distance as the floor exploded upwards, barnacles of sharpened stone jutting out of the ground.

  Metal, more fire, Wood.

  The manas combined together created fireballs that shot out of his hand in rapid succession. The ranger fired arrows faster than Stephen’s spells, his arrows cutting through the fireballs while Stephen reached his hand up to the sky, three spell formations appeared around his hand, blue and red shot out of his hand, adding more Water and Fire mana. The clouds ballooned and the air threw the arrows back, the wind around Stephen shimmered, the air surrounding him a column of wind blades that were moving so fast that they were barely visible.

  The ranger dodged into the area of the stone barnacles.

  Spell formations appeared in the midst of the barnacles, as Stephen added Fire mana. It reacted with the Water mana that he had used to create the area-of-effect spell. The water evaporated with the earth and the metal enhanced barnacles exploded. The Ranger was in a prison of explosions, his arrows hitting on the column of wind blades without getting close to the calm Stephen.

  The Ranger was tossed from the stage as medics ran over to check on him, the barrier had done the job but the man had lost the match.

  Stephen closed his eyes and then drew in the mana of the area, his spells collapsed and dust blew across the stage.

  “He’s a mage? He should be called the storm god. He didn’t look panicked at all. I thought he had a few tricks but have you ever seen spells like that?”

  “Storm God, that’s accurate, a scholarly appearance but powerful control over mana. I truly underestimated him!”

  “You underestimated him? I put my month’s wages on his opponent!”

  ***

  “Your Branch manager’s power could very well get him into the top five!” Chonglu said in the VIP section.

  “He has been studying hard, even I’m impressed with his performance,” Blaze said, laughing.

  Gu Chen smiled at their words, pleased that he had picked to talk instead of allowing a misunderstanding to grow.

  Chonglu moved to the front of the box. The last match of the day had finished some time ago, but now it was time to hand out the awards.

  “We now have your ten champions! Let us see who will make it to first!”

  The last ten were rested, healed and given stamina potions to make sure that they were in their best condition. The crowds were cheering on their champions. Five matches started, Stephen cleared his first match in just a few minutes, directly creating the wind tunnel to protect himself and then attacking his enemy at range, changing the environment to corner them before landing the final blow.

  Vuzgal’s bars were filled with people as they were cheering and yelling, watching the match on the different viewing screens as if they were actually in the arena.

  The arena was filled with noise as the matches continued.

  People were wrapped up in the fighting. Slowly Stephen advanced. People were knocked out and the rankings were established.

  Stephen made it to the quarter-finals, easily defeating another mage that wasn’t able to cast as fast as he and he directly threw him off the stage.

  In the Semi-Finals he was up against an assassin, the bane of magicians.

  Stephen was having a hard time pinning them down and was having to react to their throwing daggers and their magical attacks. Poison and curses covered the ground.

  The assassin used the spells as markers, showing where Stephen was casting a spell, allowing them to know of his attacks in advance.

  A smoke bomb went off, obstructing Stephen’s view, a blade tore through his wind tunnel, breaking the spell. Stephen’s ‘limbs’ shot out faster than he could move, but the blade cut through them. Stephen ignited Water and Fire mana behind his back, using Metal and Earth around him, an explosion went off, and the smoke was cleared.

  The assassin landed and rolled up, their special blade that could cut through spells held in their hand, the mana barrier flashing around them.

  Everyone held their breaths looking at where Stephen was.

  The mage looked back around, a wall of stone crumbled, it had taken the brunt of the explosion and defended Stephen, blasting the assassin away.

  Stephen frowned as the assassin charged forward.

  Spell formations appeared on the ground as limbs of different mana shot out, striking at the assassin who showed off the power
of their footwork, closing on Stephen slowly.

  Mana curled around Stephen’s hands into spell formations.

  Mana shot out of his hand looking like a snake as it roared and attacked the assassin, the different mana limbs showed heads as they attacked the assassin, striking him.

  Dodging limbs was one thing, dodging limbs that could anticipate one’s moves and change directions mid-movement was another.

  The referee yelled out and a suppressing field was created, stopping the spells and restraining the fighters.

  “Hah, he made it into the finals!” Emilia said, slapping Kim Cheol on the back and then waving her hand from the pain of doing so.

  “Looks like he’s still the strongest among us,” Joan sighed.

  “I’ll beat him eventually, I just need to learn more techniques,” Derrick said, tapping his swords with a frown.

  “Stephen is awesome,” Lin Lei said.

  “Are you a branch leader too or a secret fan girl?” Derrick looked over with narrowed eyes.

  She scowled at him and threw a blade at his head in a split second, he caught it with a grin on his face, flipping it around in his hand.

  Her scowl only deepened.

  “Don’t stab Derrick, Lin Lei,” Kim said. “Stephen wouldn’t be pleased with you.”

  This seemed to do the trick as she turned her focus back onto the stage.

  Stephen came over to the group and pulled out a book, noting down something.

  “Well done!” Emilia said with her boisterous attitude on display as she put him in a headlock.

  “You did well Stephen,” Kim nodded with a big grin.

  “You best keep on training or I’ll catch up to you,” Derrick said.

  “Fighting!” Lin Lei said in support, holding up two thumbs.

  “You are supposed to be branch leaders but as soon as there is fighting then you turn into a bunch of kids!” Joan pouted.

  “And you don’t?” Stephen said, still putting down notes in the book.