Chapter 6 (part 2) - End of tournament arc

The upgraded Dragon Slayer now stood across from me. His eyes were pure white as if his pupils disappeared or his iris lightened which either way felt inhuman. And all that came out of his mouth were unintelligible noises, growls and froth. The combined effect of these characteristics made him look like he lost all reason, like a wild, rabies infected dog. His body was terribly deformed with very large muscles. His skin even took the color of his presumed mood – an angry red.

Now if he could only grow fur then he’d take the form of an angry gorilla!

I crouched really low, shifting my center of gravity to improve my agility, and then surged forward. I stayed close to the ground as I gave him a low horizontal slash, cutting his abdomen. He acted like he didn’t even feel the gash or even knew he was attacked; and rightfully so because the wound closed right before my eyes.

What a handy ability. I want one of that!

My opponent realized my opening and seized the opportunity to deal me a blow. He missed me and hit the ground instead, creating a massive crater. With his pupils vanishing and all that, I don’t blame him for missing. But the shockwave of the blow threw me away until my back met a boulder, painfully stopping my flight. I winced not in pain but at the thought of a large bruise on my back blemishing my beautiful skin.

 Even in battle, a woman has the right to worry about her complexion!

Then the Slayer did a peculiar action. He plunged both his swords into two boulders twice his size. If you must know, the transformed slayer is about nine feet tall so the boulders are twice that and there are two of them! He lifted his makeshift maces with ease and began swinging them towards me.

I managed to dodge the first hammer but because the boulders were so big, it blocked my view so much so that I couldn’t see the next one coming from the side. I blocked it but I didn’t bother holding my ground or else I risk breaking my sword even if I reinforce it with a lot of rion. The impact was so great that I flew again but this time further out into the town. If it could be compared to a game of baseball, I was a ball, he was the batter, and he scored a homerun!

A tree half across the town became my landing area. I gracefully descended on a branch and admired my distance from the coliseum. I can’t let the battle arena expand to the whole town because that would put innocent people in between the crossfire. So I crossed the distance with a single leap. Apparently my gorilla slayer came after me using the same method of movement so it can’t be helped that we collided in midair.

The townspeople below were thrown in a state of panic. And unfortunately, sometimes panic takes away all the reason in a person. Some were even petrified in shock the way a deer freezes in fear right on our landing area. Luckily some kind hearted person would tackle the stupid deers out of our way and run for their lives.

The situation was getting out of hand. I can’t let innocent people be put in harm’s way because of my profession. That would taint my reputation. So then I started casting a wind barrier spell around the slayer and me which would keep all debris, noise, shockwaves and other dangerous things from reaching the rest of the town.  

A magician is terribly vulnerable when chanting a spell as I said before but that is not so in my case. My Master taught me how to sharpen my concentration so that I could chant while fighting at the same time. I hated that lesson so much because I felt like I was dividing my brain it two but it paid off today. Even while chanting, I left no openings to the slayer.

 The slayer slyly tried to bludgeon me while I was busy finishing the spell but all he managed to hit was my after image like before. He only noticed that I stood on one of his maces because I was chanting noisily. When I finally finished, a large dome shaped tornado isolated me and the slayer from the rest of the town. The dome occupied a street and a couple of houses, leaving a pretty small battlefield. I promised to myself to restore any damaged property within the barrier with magic after the battle.

My attention shifted to the slayer as he tried to hit me again with his other boulder sandwiching me like how one would sandwich a mosquito with two hands. I raised my sword and pierced the rock, slowing it to a stop. If I’m a mosquito then let me be a rebellious one.

I crouched down and launched myself in a way that forced the slayer to open his arms in a one-eighty degree fashion. But he slapped me to the ground with a punch, creating another crater, before I could cut one of his arms.

I feel that my back would seriously be black and blue after this. That’s so annoying!

The slayer jumped poising his hammers to an overhead attack, ready to deal the final blow. Since he felt like ending the battle already, I complied by bringing out a bit more of my power. I increased my rion usage and distributed them equally across my body thus increasing my speed and power. Now he seemed like moving in slow motion compared to me.

I moved in front of him and pushed him to the ground. I quickly grabbed the hilt of his sword, threw the annoying rock away, and pinned his forearm to the ground by stabbing it right between the bones. I did the same to the other arm, firmly fastening him to the ground.

“Time’s up,” I whispered as I poised my blade above his head. And then I waited.

I was waiting for Noirxus to reverse the spell but I couldn’t wait for more than five seconds. Someone was dying right in front of me and I felt the urge to do something. So I let my blade fall… a few inches from his face.

I knelt down and placed a hand on his heart then began supplying him with rion. But the spell was eating my rion as fast as I could provide it. Determined, I gave out more.

“Stop!” Noirxus said appearing out of nowhere and tackling me away from the slayer. “You are simply prolonging his suffering.”

I looked at him with a dazed expression but a piercing scream brought me to my senses. It was the dying scream of the berserk slayer as the spell consumed the last of his life. All that was left of the slayer was shriveled, bloody corpse. It was so horrible to the point of indescribable that I had to look away out of pity for the guy.

“I’m so sorry.” Noirxus said solemnly. “I was too late.”

I could only look at Noirxus with questioning eyes. My mouth seemed useless at the moment.

 “The spell caster was a dark dragon mage.” he continued.

I was stunned. Now I felt like saying something. “Are you sure? Are you sure it’s not just some evil mage wearing a dark cloak or something that you stupidly assumed he’s a dark dragon mage?”

He looked at me strangely as if offended but nodded anyway.

“No. It can’t be…”

“We’re the same. I could hardly believe it either,” he replied gravely.

“Did you kill him?” I asked severely.

He shook his head. “He got away with a teleportation spell.”

 “I see…” I uttered dryly. I was a bit relieved he got away but gravely disappointed. Dragon mages are the only type of humans I respect simply because I was raised by one. Master, whom I always thought a father, was a light dragon mage who happens to be the embodiment of a pure and innocent fairy tale princess. So I felt like all dragon mages were like princess-like. To suddenly find out that a dragon mage could be so cruel as to cast that kind of lethal spell on a person… I felt like I the child in me died.

“Do we bury him?” Noirxus asked.

I didn’t answer him. Instead I went around and fixed the damaged property within my barrier. “If you want to bury him, do it here before I take my barrier down.” I said, looking at everything except the corpse. “I don’t want anyone to see what the slayer had become.”

Noirxus nodded. He searched for a suitable place for a grave and began chanting a spell. It was an earth spell that created a six foot deep hole in the ground. He gingerly took the swords from his arms and carried the corpse to the hole. He even crossed the slayer’s arms across his chest and arranged his sword in the same fashion, then used another spell to cover the hole. Finally as a grave marker, he sliced up one of the boulders the slayer used as weapons against me into a neat slab and etched the name ‘Rizfel’ on it before planting it firmly on the ground.

“How did you know his name?” I asked admiring his work.

“His name was posted everywhere, Chryisle.”

Oh right. I never did bother knowing his name thinking it’s a waste of brain cells.

And with that, I let my barrier down.

“Gather our stuff, Noirxus and claim our prize from whoever managed this tournament. I’ll wait for you outside the gates.” I instructed as I walked away.

Next stop, Etherion City.  

Author's message: So here's the end of the introductory tournament arc~ I hope you enjoyed it! The next arc will start with the next chapter!