Bait, now thoroughly hasted, fired off three shots this time, two of which struck Pacta, sending her spiraling to the ground. The third, he pumped into the quickly approaching pikeman.
Mavec and Piquora did their best to deal with the pikeman charging them. A final bolt of lightning went through him and the gunman far behind them. The wizard and his robot rabbit kept retreating backward, trying to buy some time. Meanwhile, Rem hopped off Alvec’s head and attempted to activate the healing wand on Bait. Unfortunately, the magic just wouldn’t flow from him. Mavec’s retreat wasn’t fast enough. The pikeman put a spear in his gut as the gunman focused on Bait. Under fire from boom-boom was unacceptable for Bait. He looked to Alvec. “Bait shoot gunman?” He asked.
“For the love of Tozhen, not until that pikeman goes down!” Alvec said. Bait hated Alvec’s answer, but Bait thankful Alvec took sparkle-fist for him, so Bait do as he asked. He pumped two more shots into the Pikeman, causing him to crumple to the ground, and one shot into the musketeer in the back left corner of the stadium. With that, Bait was greeted by a hail of gunfire and went down.
It was just the wizards and their familiars left standing against three highly trained members of the Red Banner army. It wasn’t over yet, though. They just needed to take one more enemy down. If they could just take out the last pikeman, then maybe... just maybe, Alvec could handle the rest. As the plan started to crystalize, Mavec was run through and knocked unconscious to the ground. Correction, it was now just Alvec, Rem, and Piquora against the three of them. The crowd went quiet. This match was effectively over. Three on one, when the gunman had been so brutally effective. There was no way he could pull off a comeback.
Alvec offered a quick prayer to Tozhen before moving forward and advancing on the pikeman. He pulled out a small lump of charcoal and let his magic transform it; he clenched it in his hand and expelled it as a furious storm of splintered diamond shards at him. Hopefully, Mavec had done enough damage. He didn’t have to wait long for an answer; the man immediately crumpled backward under the weight of Alvec’s spellcraft, and the crowd erupted into a riot of cheering. Alvec seized on it; with the Pikeman out of the way, there was a pathway forward; he wasn’t throwing in the towel.
Piquora wandered over to her unconscious master and began digging through his belongings until she produced a wand with an almost charred exterior. She made a few excited beeps but could do nothing more than celebrate finding it. Rem stayed close to his friend, failing again to make the want produce its healing light. The two remaining gunmen opened fire on Alvec. Now that there was much less to distract him, he could see why some rounds were much more devastating. They were wielding triple-barrel muskets. He’d thought Bait’s double barrel to be strange enough, but these ones were used in such a way as to fire off two shots, reload one, fire a shot next round, and reload the other. Rinse and repeat. It also explained why they hadn’t bothered to move. Reloading that many chambers took up too much energy. He thanked his stars that he’d been so roundly ignored throughout the fight. It meant he had a good, honest shot of making this work. They unloaded on him; the one on the left struck a clone, and the one on the right struck him, but his spell ate the kinetic force sending it harmlessly to the ground.
He ran forward and plunged fire into the musketeer's chest. The blast knocked him out. Two down. The pounding of his blood in his ears was almost too much for him. This was insane. Clearly, his party had weakened them, but if he hadn’t been so prepared, he wouldn’t have even survived this much. Hell, his defenses were wearing down fast. He had a few clones left and enough projectile shield to soak a bit more, but there was no telling how long it would take to take down the last gunman, and if he switched weapons... then it would just be his arcane armor and his clones to try to stop the blows. He wasn’t sure which scenario suited him better, so he’d just have to keep attacking.
Another hail of gunfire, two more clones gone. Gunfire was now the much safer option for Alvec. As he had a single clone left. He switched the dagger from his tail to his hand and took a deep breath before rushing straight at the last gunman. He bashed the gun to the side with his buckler; it went off, sending a bullet harmlessly into the stands, and he plunged the dagger down at the man's neck. Willing the shocking spell inside to flair to life. Maybe it was the adrenaline or the tender location of the strike, but the electricity exploded with an extra oomph that knocked the man clean out with a single stab and a flashy display of electricity. Piquora and Rem rushed up behind Alvec, who stood momentarily paralyzed. He couldn’t hear the crowd shouting over the hammering of his heart.
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He’d done it.
By Tozhen, he’d actually done it.
He quickly walked over to Mavec, rummaging through his pockets until he found his companion's spellbook and took it. After seeing Mavec’s damage so easily countered by being too predictable, it was time to give him a couple of spells that might prevent that before heading off to take his seat in the stands. He’d barely been hit, and there would be plenty of time to stop in and receive some healing soon. Unlike the rest of the teams, he didn’t need to wait around.
After taking his seat with Edis and Nora, Alvec gave Rem his instructions, and the fox skittered off. He knew Sarbie's scent and would be able to track her well enough. Slowly, his allies came to, and there was confusion on both sides as members from each team asked who won. Alvec only half paid attention as he flipped open Mavec’s spell book and transcribed spells from his own into it. It thankfully only cost him time and ink to transcribe these spells. Were it a scroll, with live magic embedded into the page, it would have cost him coin to make the magic linger within the page indefinitely. This however, was more like copying instructions for how to bake a cake, or well in this case, turn a lump of coal into evicerating shards of diamond.
“Did he haste them?” The cleric shouted as he came to. “I had another dispel magic ready to deal with that! UGH.”
“What the hell happened after I went down?” Naya asked.
“The last thing I remember was seeing Alvec standing against two gunmen and a pikeman. Hey, where’s my spellbook anyway?” Mavec asked, glancing around. “FUCK, ALVEC, DID YOU TAKE MY SPELL BOOK?” He shouted up into the stands.
Alvec again called upon an illusion spell to magnify his voice. “I have your spell book, don’t worry; I’m adding some spells to it, nothing else.”
“NEAT!” He shouted back as he made his way to the stands. The rest of the team slowly reached their spots in the bleachers. When Mavec arrived Alvec thrust the spell book into his open hands. He hadn’t had a lot of time to add spells to it, but giving Mavec anything other than electric spells was a huge boon. Everyone settled into their seats which Edis and Nora had saved for them.
The fight was intense for sure, but it lacked the level of surprise that the Red Banner Army fight had. The Sons of Marora overpowered the Blue Banner army by making use of duplicates and tricking the Blue Banner into moving close enough to each other to focus fire on them with the help of an alchemist. Alvec smirked; he was an excellent counter-match for the alchemist; the fire bombs wouldn’t be all that dangerous for him. Nor would any element that they happened to switch to. He’d have this on lock for sure.
“Damn it, we’ll be fighting San Verado,” said Illaria. “The man's been trying to flirt with me all week, and now we’ll have to cross swords. Five gold says he makes a joke about wanting to sheath something else in me before he stabs me.”
“Gross,” Mavec responded.
“Want me to grease him like a goblin?” Alvec suggested.
“Even grosser,” Mavec said.
“Bait like grease! Grease save Bait from strange tongue and also big crabs. Never bathe again; you can’t make me.”
“I wish he’d just grease his goblin,” Illaria said.
“I don’t want to know,” Naya said, shaking her head. “I really don’t want to know.”
“Bait get it; Goblin mean penis.”
“Thanks, Bait; we really needed someone to spell it out for us.”
“OH, Bait, do that. P.I.N.E.S.”
“I’m just not going to correct him. He can make fucking black powder, but Sarosa forbid he can spell a five-letter word.” Mavec said.
Rem had been gone a while now, and Alvec could feel confusion. He had the scent, but it was being hidden. The location, while not able to be conveyed through their link, was at least a familiar one. Which meant she was at the church. He let out a sigh of relief. She was safe enough, and Alvec would have answers soon.