Chapter 146

Troubles That Bind

“I agree.” The Viscount said, with a snarl on his lips.

Then just like that the system began stepping in and making sure everything was above board.

A formal dueling request has been registered.

With that, I felt a wave of energy wash over me as I could tell the system was somehow scanning every part of me and of the Viscount.

Checking into whether a handicap would need to be applied due to level disparity.

At this point, I let out a sigh of relief, as this was exactly like my duel with Belaton, meaning that so far, no red flags had been raised, and I should be able to simply win this duel and get this part of my life over with. I’d save my guild members; we would then leave, and no problems would arise. At least that was the thought, until the system spit out its reply to our scans.

A handicap will be applied: The Challenger of the duel has been determined to severely outclass the acceptor of the duel. As such the Challenger will need to be handicapped to make this be considered a fair duel.

What the heck? I thought to myself, apparently, I wasn’t the only one who was confused as the Viscount and everyone else around was also confused by this. Especially as I tried to understand the wording of this. I was the Challenger? Right, but I was also at a much lower level.

Before I could think too much about what was happening, the details of the handicap came to light.

Handicap Number 1: Challenger cannot use nor create known or as yet undocumented attack spells. Any spells cast must be personal in nature. Handicap Number 2: Challenger is limited to the use of one Trait during combat. Handicap Number 3: Challenger is hereby blocked from using Dispel, or other similar “combative spells” during combat.

These handicaps all felt extremely targeted towards me. As I was pretty sure that the numbskull Viscount could not create offensive spells on the fly.

Then to make matters worse, as the details of the handicaps became apparent, I felt bands shackling down upon me. My spells were blocked from being sent externally. This was likely an advanced form of the gambling cuffs I had previously worked my way through. Given enough time I was fairly certain I could work some form of magic through the threads, but that would take time. And time was something I was certain I didn’t have in abundance at the moment. Especially as the quest description came up.

Quest Unlocked: A Duel of Magical Masters (II): Arch Spirit Viscount Grahm De’Carver has accepted your challenge to a magical duel. The terms are you two will battle until one of you is unable to continue. If you lose, you must admit my mistakes and wrongdoings, and state under oath that you lied. If you win, Viscount Grahm De’Carver will give up all claims to honor, integrity and titles, renouncing his claim to nobility and be banished from the Deolar Elven Homelands. Rewards: Experience, Notoriety, Stated objectives. Note: Rewards will be increased based on the number of handicaps you have on you, if you win.

This was bad. Really bad. Mentally I tried to go through what I could. I could only cast self-buffing and alteration spells. While anything external, even a Dispel was blocked by the restraints that I was wearing.

Mentally I checked the Traits, as I thought this would be my saving grace, being as I had a few Traits I could pull from. Unfortunately, every Trait was grayed out.

Well, that is not entirely true. I still have one Trait activated at the moment.

Spiritual Doppelganger, would you like to deactivate Spiritual Doppelganger, in order to activate a different Trait?

“No.” I hissed, dismissing that prompt, and realizing that I was well and truly screwed on this one. No offensive spells, no Traits, and no Dispels, for a Wizards duel. Did I outclass this wizard that badly.

“This cannot be allowed to continue!” The King bellowed. Fury and rage filled his voice as he realized that his precious daughter, me, was not only involved in a duel, but I would also be severely handicapped during the fight.

“I am sorry your majesty, but it would be honorless of both of us to avoid accepting this.” The Viscount said, clearly finishing the acceptance of his duel and my restrictions. As the he made a movement, and the next thing I noticed was the system countdown, informing everyone that a sanctioned Wizard’s Duel was about to begin.

Duel will begin in 3, 2, 1…

Silence.

During this time, I used to cast every spell I could think of that would help me.

Spectral Drift.

Seraphim Wings.

Awe.

There was an awed hush that covered the crowd as my four feathered wings began to grow from my back.

Fortunately, the Viscount watched me, apparently wondering what I would do.

I could already feel the restrictions in place and realized that they likely had a retaliatory component to them, if I tried to cast an external spell. Fortunately, the growing of wings was considered internal, or self-buffing as I did not receive any feedback from altering my physical form.

This gave me a few extra thoughts about what I could do, maybe create clawed hands, shark teeth, you know the usual on how to look intimidating. But before I could think about those, the Viscount struck.

Slow.

He was slow, his spells, his mana forms, his concentration, his creation of a spell construct. Everything was slow. Without the handicap, I was certain I could have Dispelled his spell thrice over before it even got halfway through its initialization phase.

Unfortunately for me, I had to wait.

Tickle.

Imagine getting hit with a nerf dart. Then imagine that nerf dart being the tracer round for an actual bullet. That is what I got hit with. Finding the spell was easy, manifesting Qi into my fingers to be able to grab said nerf dart was easier. Throwing back the dart towards the viscount was exceptionally easy, especially with my throwing skill.

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There was just one problem.

Anyone that has ever thrown a nerf dart by hand can also attest to this, in that the weight behind the projectile makes it so momentum falters quickly. This a quick rethrow where I aimed for center mass of the stationary Viscount, dropped lower. It hit, but rather than hitting in the center of his chest as I had planned it landed about two feet lower, right in his crotch area.

Everlasting Fireball.

Yes, his first spell cast was a destructive burst of bright blue fire, that rocketed out from his hand. Arced around, the spell casting arc that he had created, and I had returned to sender. Then proceeded to strike him right in his groin.

FWOOSH!

There was an impact, where the Fireball landed, ignited, and began to incinerate everything it touched.

The Viscount was either a lot stronger than I thought, didn’t have anything there, or what was more likely was in complete shock, as he just stood there dazedly letting a fire burn from his crotch outwards.

Gasp.

There was a collective intake of breath, followed by a resounding silence that filled the throne room that we had chosen as our dueling location.

Then it happened.

The Viscount’s brain activated, a self-preservation instinct, or something.

“YAAHHHH!” He cried out wildly, hands bursting through flames, trying to grab at his sacred region, trying to apparently smother the flames. The ghostly Viscount then began doing the safety measures everyone was taught, doing a flawless version of stop, drop, and roll. All the while his hands never left his family jewels, even as flames raced up his chest and began burning off some of his facial hairs.

For my part, I just stood there.

Yes, I could have gone over and given a final blow to end this duel, but the man was clearly in pain. It reminded me of when I first began taking self defense classes and kicked my instructor before he had his padding in proper alignment. This was like that, in that my nature as a healer made me want to help the idiot, even if it meant losing this duel.

Fortunately, I didn’t opt to throw the match right then and there, especially with my Guild Members being right there. Speaking of which, it was clear that they realized something was up.

“Those wings. That move, that has to be…” The one began.

“Shh!” I say, putting up one finger and turning my face towards the four bound members.

There was a hush that fell over us, as they seemed to get the intent of my hushing. That or they realized that the Viscount had mostly regained control over his body, putting out the flames, and had waited for this moment to strike.

Give the Viscount some credit. This time rather than going for a targeted spell, he went for a direct area of attack spell. This spell cost a lot more mana to cast, and was extremely wasteful in terms of mana usage, but the Viscount seemed adamant that he could end me with this spell. Despite it being extremely poorly formulated, with a concept that could barely contain his firing arc and intent, related to his relevant skill level, or lack thereof of a skill level.

Flaming Inferno Torch.

The Viscount channeled his overwhelming power through his outstretched hands and pointed them directly at me.

Again, seeing his form I almost felt bad for him. On instinct I wanted to cast Dispel, if only to alleviate the awkwardness of his casting and his inefficiencies while casting. Yet, the moment I tried; I instantly felt the coiling strike of the bands tightening on my wrists. This was a warning that I would suffer severe mana feedback if I continued beyond this point with my casting. As such I stopped and switched back to Qi.

Infusing a thick layer of Qi in my hands, I began lashing out at the weak spell structure, rupturing the expanding edge of the spell. This essentially made it, so the spell was little more than a open parachute that pointed horizontally, rather than vertically, also rather than air escaping through, a massive wave of mana flew through the open spell structure.

Since the Viscount clearly had no control or knowledge of how to cast the spell that he was casting, he likely stopped when the edge of his spell was filled. But I had taken away that safety measure from his casting, essentially making this an infinitely channeled spell.

Whoosh!

To the Viscount’s credit, he still had enough control over his mana to at least ignite it, proving he had a slight control over the intent portion of his spell. Still, this was nothing. If I so chose, I could take a step back and be completely free of the rapidly escaping burning mana.

Instead, I did something that I am not too proud of. In fact, kids don’t try this at home, as I was stupid enough to play with fire.

Keeping the Qi flowing into my hands and remembering how my skin would constantly absorb the mana from my sweat and blood, I decided to forcefully do the same with this never-ending gusher of flames.

Focusing on the mana, and drawing it in, I held out my hands. Curling my fingers as if to strike with an open palm, then I imagined the mana entering my hand.

Burning.

There was an intense burning sensation as at first the flames and mana were too much. At this point it was clear that the Viscount had either taken a step forward or had increased the rate of mana that he released.

It was hot, suddenly much hotter than I originally imagined it to be.

Flesh melting.

I could feel my flesh melting, and I almost focused on the pain, rather than what I needed to do to win. I had been foolish, not striking a downed enemy out of pity, and now that very pity was coming back to bite me.

Focusing on ignoring the pain, I instead focused on my teachings. On what I had been telling my students for the past week, to focus through the pain and envision the end goal.

That was when it happened.

Lashing out with my hand, I imagined a part at the center of my palm opening up, just as a void in space would. With that concept in mind, I imagined every ounce of Qi Cultivation and Circulation, taking in the ambient mana right in front of my palm, and devouring it right then and there.

Golden Mana Devouring Palm

The system recognized my creation of a new Qi attack, but I could not waste time on thinking about this new accomplishment, as I still needed to focus, to improve my attack.

Icy Cold.

There was a coldness that engulfed my arm, an effect of my imagining of the void, where there is no heat. This was good, and even needed, as the heat from the flames, and energy were drawn into my hand.

Vwoom.

There was a sensation of energy being drawn in. I opened my third eye, not because I wanted to see into my hand, but I wanted to eliminate all other distractions around me.

With my third eye opened, the entire process became much easier to focus on and complete. I could see the minor problems with my technique that could be fixed almost immediately. Things like opening up the channel, widening the suction arc in front of my palm. Then Altering the way, it was being pulled in, processed, converted from mana to Qi, and then reused to reinforce this new technique I was doing.

I mentally felt a system message form within my mind, but I minimized it until later, as this was too important.

There was a point when the amount of energy flowing stopped, or at least a part where the Viscount clearly tried to get his flow to stop. Unfortunately for him, I would not let him, as I continued pulling the energy faster and faster into me.

Step forward.

As the trail of energy began to dry up, I found myself walking forward, slowly at first, until I was right upon the Viscount.

“Stop, please stop.” The Viscount cried out, through trembling and shaking hands.

He had exhausted everything in this attack and was now beginning to feel the effects of mana deprivation. Where he would first fall unconscious, and then depending on how much mana was drained from him.

I placed my still glowing hand within an inch of his face.

Trembling legs.

By now, he was barely able to hold himself up, as I had drained so much energy from him so quickly that his body and mind still had not registered the sudden decrease.

At this point I closed my third eye, realizing that it had been stupid to use such an obvious giveaway in the middle of the fight. Hopefully I can explain this away in the future.

Then I shook my head, realizing that I wasn’t out of the woods yet. As I still hadn’t officially won this duel.

That is when I made my first attack of the whole duel. With my open palm placed less than an inch away from his face, I reached back with my Qi infused fingers, and flicked him in the forehead.

Pluck.

There was the audible sound of a Qi infused finger smashing into the cerebral cortex of the spirit. Not enough to kill, but given the location of the blow, and how exhausted the mage was at that time, he fell backwards. His head jerking back first, followed by the rest of his body falling out of alignment, before he fell to the ground unconscious.

Silence.

There was a moment of silence as everyone watched the two of us. I was there with my Seraphim Wings out, and still had the effects of Spectral Drift activated, both spells proved to be pointless. Though I did like the idea of the Seraphim Wings, especially now as I could likely use that as an excuse of why I had a third eye, noting that it could just be a spell that helped me counteract magical attacks.

Then before I could think too much, I was met with a system message that was displayed for everyone.

The duel between Viscount Grahm De’Carver and Dr. Octavia Spiritlight has ended with Dr. Spiritlight knocking out Viscount De’Carver with a single flick knockout.

Double Layered Permanent Illusionary Text.

As soon as I saw the message, I instantly cast my newest spell, quickly changing the text that was visible to everyone.

The duel between Viscount Grahm De’Carver and Dr. Octavia De’Arcaneri has ended with Dr. De’Arcaneri knocking out Viscount De’Carver with a single flick knockout.

I had never been so happy to have a random spell related to espionage, or trickery on hand than I was for having that tier thirteen spell that would be almost impossible to detect or better still dispel.

With that incriminating message fixed, I had a second and let the other messages that I had minimized during the fight. Already the effects of my innate Regeneration were already at work, healing my burnt hand and bringing it back to normal. This was good, as I was still suffering from the restrictions placed on me by the duel.

The most important one was about the subsequent skill that went along with my newly created Qi attack.

New Skill Golden Mana Devouring Palm has increased to level 1. Skill Golden Mana Devouring Palm is a Strength X 2, Dexterity X 2, Endurance X 2, Perception, and Willpower X 2 skill.

The skill looked and felt amazing. Though I didn’t have much time to think about the new skill or really what I had done, as the system gave me another message.

Deactivating personal handicaps.

WHOOSH!

Suddenly I felt a surge of power flood back into me, as I could freely feel my powers and extra Traits becoming available to utilize once again. I never realized just how naked I felt without my Traits or my ability to cast attack spells or dispel.

I am wondering what type of Wizards duel I was just apart of, when I was apparently forced to fight a higher-level Wizard without Spells, Traits, or Dispels. That was like having a three-legged race, with only being able to use your arms, it made no sense.

Then I got my quest reward, and suddenly I felt ready to forgive all my previous complaints, as the rewards I had received were in fact tripled due to my having to overcome three handicaps.

Quest Completed: A Duel of Magical Masters (II): Dr. Octavia Spiritlight has won her duel against Viscount Grahm De’Carver…