The Archmage: Chapter Forty-Two (Patreon)

If I had been Willow, I would have attempted to draw out the fight. Use less burners than my enemy cast spells, and rely on the fact that I had two charges of force armor – one of which was hyper-efficient – to hold out. 

Willow, apparently, thought differently, as she whipped three of her leather cords off her wrist and threw them into the air, releasing a quite powerful fireball, force lance, and air slash, all three stronger than she should have been able to fit onto the cord as a burner, especially if she was continuing her strategy of only releasing half the power immediately, and having the other half stored for a secret attack. 

I squinted, opening my third eye to confirm if my hunch was true. 

Sure enough, the three spells that burned out of the cords weren’t burners, they were artifacts. I couldn't help but grin at that – she’d done well, learning and applying the lessons. 

Tessa was a skilled sorcerer, though, and she erected a force dome around her. The attacks landed and cracked the sphere, but didn’t break it. 

Willow whipped more cords off, activating her force armor again as Tessa transformed the dome into a series of spikes that forced her to take several steps. 

I didn’t think she actually needed to step back – her armor was strong enough to stop the thin spikes – but Willow’s weakest point by far was her combat instincts, rather than her enchantment. 

Willow tossed the cords she’d pulled off into the air, and two smaller flame orbs struck the spiky shield, alongside a force bolt. 

Tessa cupped her hands together, and poor combat instincts or not, Willow could figure out that wasn’t a good sign. Throwing caution to the wind, she tossed a handful of cords up, and released her aura at Tessa. 

I let out a bark of laughter as I figured out what she was doing. 

By tossing so many cords into the air, it was hard to tell that she’d just revealed her trump card, her secondary firing of her burners. It would cost her, since she’d not have those for future fights, but she also hadn’t revealed the artifact that she’d gotten from the vaults, so there was definitely a tradeoff.

The air crackled with over a dozen spells, as the spiked shield shattered, overloaded, and the spells pulled Tara into the air and out of the way. 

The next up was Olive and Faye, and I wasn’t sure exactly who would win. Faye had the ability to flood the arena with fire, and heer tournament reward might have been picked with Olive in mind, but the light and sound mage was clearly clever, and hadn’t shown their own reward yet.

Faye began the fight predictably, holding up the crystal and unleashing a ring of fire around her in all directions. For all that it was predictable, I also couldn’t hold it against her – it was a good tactic for fighting an illusionist.

Olive flickered as they threw a veil over themselves, and I opened my third eye to track the fight, then amended my earlier thought. 

Faye had released a ring of fire in all of the horizontal directions. She hadn’t, however, released fire above her head. 

It was an understandable mistake. I wasn’t even entirely used to aerial fighting, and I could fly with my cloak. 

But it cost her, as Olive gently floated down next to Faye and swiped at her with their sword. If she’d had the talent to cast a heat detection spell, or a heat detection arch-star, she might have stood a chance, but Osheen had only developed those in his second year. The young fire mage was good, but she wasn’t that good. 

It only took a moment for Faye to be pulled from the fight. 

That victory caused the people around us to murmur speculations – had Olive gotten some sort of fire-deflection spell? Perhaps a powerful earth armor that let them resist the heat long enough to close the distance? Or ice armor. 

I had to bite my tongue to stop myself from blurting the answer out. 

Donovan and Willow trudged out to the battle next, and I bit my lip. This one would be a difficult one. Willow was down her artifacts, unless her recharge was something truly absurd, and Donovan’s wards made him quite tough to take down. At the same time, Donovan wouldn’t have the strongest method to take Willow down, since his offense seemed to be limited to his force knives…

Either one had a fair shot against Olive, but Olive also had a fair shot against either one of them in turn. 

The moment Justin called for the fight to begin, Donovan activated his dome ward, and Willow vanished from sight. 

I raised my eyebrow. When I’d talked about defenses that wouldn’t interfere with her armor, hadn’t been thinking of veils, but it was a good mix of both indirect defense, and utility. 

There was a clink as a knife appeared from nowhere, soaring through the air to strike at the ward, causing a slight ripple on its surface.

I let out a laugh. I didn’t know if she’d mimicked my first tournament strategy intentionally, but it was effective. 

Donovan released a burst of force knives in that direction, but hit nothing. A moment later, another knife hit the shield from somewhere else. 

It was a slow song and dance, with Willow relying on the power-hungry nature of wards to outlast Donovan, with her odd knife strikes causing a tiny bit of strain, and picking up the knives after they bounced off the ward. 

By my calculation, she had five knives. Since she kept one on her for throwing at all times, it gave Donovan a one in four shot of aiming his force knives in the right direction to strike her. 

It took him seven attempts, but there was a crash as his knives met the force armor underneath, and Willow’s yelp sounded through the air. 

The ward was beginning to thin when Willow re-appeared, and the fight started to turn in a new direction. Willow sprinted place to place, waiting for the ward to fall, while Donovan fired off increasingly desperate bursts of force knives in an attempt to pin her down. 

When one of the knives hit Willow’s shoulder, puncturing her force armor enough to clip and bleed her, I thought it was over, but Willow, to my surprise, didn’t let it stop her. 

Instead she dove at Donovan, let out a triumphant laugh, while smearing blood over her hand that held the remaining ties, as if she was wiping the blood away. I saw some ambient aura swirl into the air around the ties. It was far less than I expected, but a blood based recharge was certainly strange. Maybe the power of the blood was providing some of the aura? I didn’t know enough about blood magic or blood based recharges to say. 

Willow tossed some of the ties into the air, and a force lance exploded from her hand. 

The already thinned ward exploded. An air slash followed a moment later, and Donovan was pulled from the arena, and Willow wiped at her shoulder again. 

“Can I get some healing?” she asked.

Willow was quickly wrapped in a basic bandage, and I expected her to actually receive some healing too, but Justin made an excuse about warriors needing to fight through wounds, and being healed only after the battle or war was complete.

I frowned and crossed my arms, but I didn’t feel like it was worth challenging an archmage over a first year tournament, especially since it wouldn’t actually help Willow at all. 

Though, considering her recharge, it might actually be a minor boon. I wondered if that was intentional. Justin didn’t have mage sight, it was possible he just thought she’d built two charges into the artifact. 

Olive and Willow were quickly pushed into the arena, and I was really tempted to speak up. She’d just fought Donovan, there was no way that she should be made to fight again without a break. 

The only reason I held my tongue was the fact that it still wouldn’t help her. While Donovan and Faye would face off during the loser’s bracket to see who would take third, Willow had already secured a top two spot, and thus received a reward from Justin. The fight between her and Olive was just to see who would be able to take home first.

The two were brought to the center ring, eyeing one another, and Olive smirked. 

“As fun as it’ll be, I’ve noticed your trick. I just need to make sure your overpowered fireball doesn’t hit me, and I’ll be fine.” 

“What makes you think I only built two charges in?” Willow challenged. 

“Oh, no, you did. But in that big attack against Tessa? You used your second charge. I figure you’re on your third now,” Olive said. 

That was a reasonable conclusion, honestly. If I’d not had insider knowledge of what exactly Willow was doing, as well as Oracle’s third eye, I might have assumed the same.

Willow’s face crumpled for just a second before becoming neutral, and I had to hand it to her – she was doing an excellent job of acting. 

“Begin!” Justin shouted. 

Willow ripped a handful of burner ties off her wrist and threw them in the air where Olive had been, but they unleashed a cacophony of sounds and lights while flying out of the way of the attacks. 

Olive wasn’t able to completely dodge though, and I spotted one of their legs bending at a slightly unnatural angle. Their flight spell was fast, but it was also a new ability to them, and they’d had to balance using it against their cacophony spell. I’d have bet that if they’d tried to veil themselves too, it would have been too much, and Willow would have won right there.

Willow staggered back, and I spotted a trickle of blood coming from her ears – she must have ruptured her eardrums. Olive was taking a moment to recenter themselves, and then pulled their blade out and went invisible, diving at Willow. 

Willow slapped her artifact tie, and released a fireball in the direction Olive was diving, but the flying illusionist wasn’t so predictable. 

Willow tossed her final handful of cords out, scattering them in different directions, and Olive was forced to pull back or get caught in the barrage. 

“What now?” Ollie’s voice echoed from around the arena, the sound distortion making it impossible to tell where the theatrical mage was hiding. “You’re out of ties. Got any other neat tricks?” 

Willow activated her second force armor artifact – the armor that everyone in my class had been given the chance to make. 

“Ooh, armor. Let’s get real – that’s even thinner than the one you used against Donovan!”

Olive dove, putting the momentum into a sword cut, and the armor rippled as Olive’s sword bounced off. Willow let out a cry of victory and unleashed another force lance and air slash.

It caught Olive off guard, but they managed to just barely pull out of the way, channeling aura into their flight spell at an alarming rate. 

That was interesting. It was both a foci and an artifact. I’d never had much cause to make those, outside of the defenses I made for Osheen, but my respect for the crafter of the flight spell did rise a little bit. 

“Four?!” Olive demanded. “Who makes a spell with four uses.” 

“Not me,” Willow said, then raised her hands. Her aura lit itself and began to spray in the air. 

Olive, sensing that something was wrong, stayed out of the way, until Willow stepped forward, leaving her side open. 

They dove with another powerful cut, and Willow’s force armor broke. The sword bit into Willow’s skin, but she turned, and aura splashed over the invisible mage. 

And the power that had filled the arena, visible only to myself and oracle, the leftover remnants of her spells, activated. 

Magic exploded down onto Olive, and they were pulled from the arena. 

“It seems we have our tournament winner!” Justin said through gritted teeth. “Willow Brown!”