Chapter 24 Good.

Fen raised his right hand and pointed two outstretched fingers at Isaac. Flames of varying colors caused shadows to dance across the dimly lit room. Lenna and Jala were frozen in anticipation at what was to come. Isaac was ready to act on a moment’s notice. The world stood still. “What I seek is thunder.” Fen chanted quickly and a lightning bolt screamed across the thirty foot gap between the two masters of shadows.

Isaac’s right hand shot up and he tried to backhand the lightning bolt with five times the amount of mana that Fen had used to cast the spell, the leather covering the back of his hand, and his hand itself. The mana that exploded out of the back of Isaac’s hand and forearm was enough to cast a spell of ninth level but to Isaac it was simply the most he could pull on in the split second he had to react. The lighting bolt impacted the small compressed wall of power at a harsh angle and pushed through it even as it was deflected off to the side.

The bolt crashed into the stone wall a dozen feet from Isaac after exploding a jar of eyes on the closest table to the dark mage. Isaac’s bracer steamed and the muscles in his forearm and hand twitched before death flames removed any evidence of the recent encounter. “No banter?” Isaac purred darkly. “How rude.”

“I will not play your games.” The dark elvish shadow sorcerer replied while looking down his nose at the younger mage. He raised his left hand palm up.

“How” Isaac began.

“Stars of doom” Fen started to chant.

“disappointing.” Isaac finished.

“heed my call.” Fen finished and three small marbles that looked as though rainbows were trapped inside a hall of mirrors formed floating over his open hand.

Despite Isaac acting as though he was disappointed a grin spread across his face. It was finally time for his first duel of magic. ‘This is going to be fun.’ The young dark mage thought to himself.

Before the marbles of reality magic even left the shadow sorcerer’s open palm he began his next spell. His right hand, which had relaxed while he was casting his second spell, snapped into position once again as he repeated his first spell once more: “What I seek is thunder.” The three orbs had crossed most of the distance between the two by the time Fen had finished his chant as they only flew at a speed akin to a thrown dagger.

Isaac was waiting for this moment. He closed the small openings he had made in his shadowcloak and used the full coverage to teleport twenty feet out of the way and off to Fen’s side. Fen couldn’t see this however as his lighting bolt flashed right at the same moment. The orbs stopped at the position where Isaac had been only to be hit by the lightning bolt which caused them to detonate in small two inch explosions of rainbow light.

Before Fen could even see if he had hit Isaac he was casting his next spell. His left hand rotated from being palm up to be fully outstretched with his palm facing where Isaac had been. “Command: Be undone!” He ordered mana and existence itself.

A spindly branch of reality appeared near instantly, crossing the entire length of the room from Fen to the space in between the door and the door frame which had been behind Isaac from his perspective. The branch looked much like the marbles from earlier. It looked like a straw made of glass with a prism and a rainbow trapped inside fighting to see which could cause the most spectacular spectacle. Every few inches to a foot the straw would abruptly change direction by a few degrees with no warning whatsoever. It always ended up going in the direction that Fen was aiming it but its accuracy was limited to an area about three feet across in the general direction of which it was intended to go.

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The branch of reality froze for nearly half a second before vanishing as if it had never been there, taking a chunk of the door, doorframe, and wall with it. In that instant an area two feet across centered on its point of impact had been removed in a perfect circle. The molecules had all been reduced to their component atoms in an instant. As they tried to recombine to become stable once again the entire area around the phenomena was subjected to both extreme heat and extreme cold. Everything that had been near the affected area was instantly covered in both scorch marks and frost.

Isaac’s eyes twinkled at the sight of unrestrained power. “He’s serious.” He said to himself, thankful that his shadowcloak was completely hiding his presence. ‘Good.’ He thought with a crazed grin across his face.

Isaac appeared behind Fen mid swing with his straight sword. The blade started to cut into the shadow sorcerer who in an instant turned into shadows himself. The sword passed through him cleanly. It did damage but hardly as much as an actual hit would have. Fen spun as a blade made of shadows appeared in his hand and he swung at where Isaac had been but the dark mage had already danced away. “Where are you?” Fen growled, his voice now ethereal and airy but clearly annoyed.

Isaac appeared ten feet away facing him. “Having trouble finding me?” Isaac taunted. “Isn’t that what magic is for?”

Fen snarled, his slightly elongated elvish canines clearly visible despite him being made of shadows. “You will die sooner or later.” He growled.

“By what?” Isaac asked, his voice still almost as deep as he could make it. “A poor imitation of myself?”

Fen pointed a singular finger at Isaac while ordering existence to heed his whim. “I command you to DIE.” Reality itself shook from the power. Magic quivered, the air rippled like a stone had been dropped into a still lake.

Isaac felt his heart stop. A split second later it imploded under the weight of reality. Another split second later and the weight was gone as if it had never been there. He staggered a step before clutching at his heart. Death flames burned inside his chest more brilliantly than ever before as his heart was reformed in another fraction of a second. It didn’t start beating as quickly as he would have liked so he pounded his fist against his chest as hard as he could. The impact seemed to be all that his heart was waiting for as it began beating once again.

Lenna had taken half a step towards Isaac when Fen had used a word of power to kill him but she felt a surge of death mana and seeing as Isaac hadn’t fallen, she realized what he had done. ‘That power is truly insane.’ She thought to herself upon realizing that Isaac had literally brought himself back from the dead before he could even lose consciousness.

Isaac coughed once and then straightened. He shook his head to clear it. “That was,” He drug the word out. “rude.”

Fen’s eyes burned with fury. “That took way less mana than it should have. You are weak.”

Isaac shook his head, happy to engage in banter while his body was getting used to functioning again. “Weak? No. Low leveled? Yes.” He corrected.

Fen narrowed his eyes at Isaac. “What level are you?” He ordered as much as asked.

“Six, maybe seven.” Isaac replied and disappeared again. A sword slash cut through Fen from behind and he swung at air again.

Fen snarled. “I offer up this contract to the spirit of Primatia.” He chanted and a pulse of magic went out from his feet across the ground. With every heartbeat another pulse swept the room. His eyes darted around looking for Isaac but finding nothing.

The pulses of magic originating from Fen washed over Isaac as if he wasn’t even there. Isaac grinned. He truly was a shadow on the world. He reappeared. “Still can’t find me?” He purred tauntingly.

Fen whirled around to face him and pointed his finger at him again. “I command you” His words turned into a growl as Isaac vanished again.

Isaac swung at Fen’s side. The blade passed through him and Fen returned a swing. This time Isaac blocked the blade and summoned another made of shadows into his offhand. Isaac teleported to the other side of Fen and brought the shadowblade in a vertical chop. He stopped the blade once it had cut deep enough to be parallel with the ground then he, keeping the tip where it was, raised the hilt of his shadowblade until the sword was nearly perfectly inline with the sorcerer’s spine and then teleported away when Fen tried to spin to attack him again.

This time something different happened. Fen staggered and coughed. The shadowblade in his body was fighting with the shadows that his body was made of, both rejecting the other’s claim on the space that they shared. Fen took a deliberate step forwards and appeared a dozen feet away. He dropped to a knee and coughed up blood as he returned to his elvish form of flesh and blood. The most recent attack had succeeded in doing noticeable damage to the shadow sorcerer.

“Surrender?” Isaac offered from the other side of the room.

“Go to the hells.” Fen spat and rose to his feet. “Face me like a man!” He growled at the younger mage.

Isaac smirked under his shadowcloak. “We are mages,” Isaac began. “fighting fairly was never a part of the plan.” He spoke, his voice full of dark amusement and clear taunting.

Fen snarled. “Fine then.” He retorted. He pointed two of his fingers at Lenna while chanting his next spell: “Thunder I order thee, lightning my foes does seek.”