“Bahahaha!” Ascilla roared with laughter as I pulled myself off the ground and picked a twig out of my hair.

“Sorry, sorry! I didn’t mean to trip you up.” She said, barely collecting herself.

“What’re you doing out here? Hunting monsters?” I asked. I hadn’t seen any on our way in, and figured that they wouldn’t roam so close to the safe zone, but there was always a chance. Ascilla, though, waved her hand in front of her face and shook her head.

“Nah, nothin’ like that. I just came out here to practice. I saw you off the road and I came to check it out and well… you know the rest.” She said, barely holding back a chuckle at that last part. And who exactly was the one who interrupted my skill? I thought.

Although Ascilla was a member of Levin, she had bailed us out of one hell of a pinch yesterday. The least I could do was act somewhat diplomatic.

“You too, huh?” I said, sheathing my sword walking over to where she was leaning against a tree.

“Mm. I couldn’t sit still after that boss fight yesterday. I never did thank you, did I? For saving me back there.” She said. Her voice had lost all of the edge that it normally had. It was such a one eighty from the Ascilla that I had interacted with up to this point that I almost thought that she was replaced by a clone.

I quickly shook my head and denied her claims. “I don’t know how many times I gotta say this but y’all are the ones who came to our rescue… it was a group effort. I’m just glad that everyone made it out alright.” I said. Ascilla’s face took on a complex expression for a moment before she recovered her normal stern demeanor.

“Oh come on, now’s your chance to play the knight in shining armor who takes credit for saving the hot girl.” She said.

“It’s a video game, Ascilla. Everyone’s a hot girl here.” I said with a dry smirk. That seemed to return her normal playful atmosphere.

“Says the generic-lookin’ anime character with spiky ass hair.” She jabbed back.

I feigned great offense to this and brought my hand up to my chest. “Augh. I can take your cold remarks. I can take your barbed insults. But the one thing I will not stand is to be slandered in such a manner. I will have you know that my hair is not spiky!” I said, trying to sound as stuck up as possible. In reality I was just doing my best Fenix impression.

Ascilla looked at me with a stunned expression and blinked twice.

“No way. Did you not look at your avatar when you made it?! I don’t know how to tell you this, dude but your hair is totally spiky!” She said, pushing off of the tree and walking over to me, using her fingers to act like imaginary spikes coming out of her head.

“Aha, but that’s where you’re wrong.” I said, puffing my chest out and striking a dramatic pose. “Spiky means it pokes things. My hair is soft, and so it can’t be sharp. If it’s not sharp, it’s not spiky.” The sheer confidence in my voice caused Ascilla to stagger. I wasn’t entirely sure if she still thought I was joking or if she thought my last brain cell decided it wanted to go on a vacation.

Without any warning, Ascilla reached over and sunk her hand into my hair. As soon as she did, her eyes went wide.

“Wooaahhh, that’s kinda wild feelin’ if I’m being honest! How did you do that?!” She asked, still rubbing my head. I held my pose and let Ascilla tussle my definitely not spiky hair until eventually she stood back, content and back to her usual self.

“Trade secret!” I said with a smirk, causing her to pout and poke at her bangs with her finger.

I turned back to the small area that I had been practicing in and got ready to give Spark another go. During that last attempt at a Step Slash I had come up with an idea on how to aim it and it turned out that mana in this game regenerated fairly quickly, at least when you weren’t in combat.

I lowered my body and stared the wind up animation for Step Slash, but as I lowered my hand above the blade and felt the power begin to build I instead used my left hand to begin tracing the-

Hey, Corian.” Ascilla said, right as I felt the power of my skill crescendo. Oh for the love of -

I stopped short and just barely was able to cancel the skill before I ate another leaf and dirt sandwich.

Ascilla, who had resumed leaning against a nearby tree, wore a wide grin pasted on her face.

“Since we’re both here to practice anyways, why don’t we make things interesting?” She said with a cocky grin.

“Interesting how?” I asked.

Ascilla freed the axe from where it rested on her back and leveled it at me. Her lips curled into her trademark jeer and her eyes had a dangerously sharp glint. I was very quickly losing any hope that this would be a reasonable request.

“Duel me. First to deal half of the other person’s HP wins. You win, I’ll tell the people at the guild to let you do whatever you like while you’re here, fuck what Fenix says. I win you tell me what really happened between you Fenix and Nell.”

“That again?” I said with an exasperated sigh.

“Aw come on! You scared you’ll lose?” She asked. No, actually.

I sighed. “As much as I’d love to, there’s no way we can duel in this game. Not since one mistake could lead to either of us dying.” I said.

“I figured you’d say that. Don’t worry, that’s not gonna be an issue.” She said, opening her menu and hitting a few buttons.

“Ascilla has issued a Duel Challenge!”

Time: Unlimited

Distance: Small

Rule: Protected

Do you accept?”

Before I could ask, Ascilla filled in the blanks.

“Back in Origin, before the message from Larson came in and people didn’t know about death causing a real life game over, we’d used the dueling system to figure out how combat worked.” She said, stretching her neck.

“Basically all you have to know is that a “protected duel” means your HP can’t fall below 49%. As soon as you drop below 50 you stop taking damage and the duel ends. You even get a full heal once it’s over.” She said.

“I’ve done it like, a dozen or so times now. Never killed anyone.”

“Huh. Imagine that.” I said, realizing that with that in place there was really no way I could easily back my way out of this. Oh well. Maybe this way I’d be able to really see Ascilla’s sword skills up close. One thing was certain from our fight with the boss, she was good. Part of me wanted to know just how good she was.

I hit “accept” on the duel and a blue circle that was about 15 meters across appeared around us. In the middle of the circle, the center of the small clearing the two of us had been standing in, a large countdown ticked down from ten. An announcer called out each number as they counted closer to the start of the fight.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Ascilla stood still as a statue across the ring from me. All playfulness was gone from her expression. Her axe was in her hands and her eyes looked like they could shoot arrows.

At five seconds I dropped myself into the stance for Step Slash. Ascilla would know what the activation for this skill looked like, and what it did, from yesterday. I was banking on that.

Using the tip of my sword to help myself aim, I traced the rune for Spark as fast as I could with my left hand, leaving only the last step of the rune, one side of the triangle, blank. Right as the timer counted down to zero and a voice cried “Duel!” I finished the triangle with a dramatic swipe.

Ascilla pushed off at a sprint, her axe held in front of her in both hands, but less than half a second after the duel started a well aimed beam of lightning shot across the battlefield and struck her dead center.

“Gck!” She groaned. Her eyes shot wide as she realized she just lost all control of her body. Her momentum carried her forward, but her leg wasn’t coming forward any more. In less than a second, she’d fall helplessly to the ground. Not that she’d make it that far. I smirked. That worked better than I’d expected.

My left hand, having completed the rune, returned to an inch above my blade, instantly activating Step Slash. Even if the stun effect only lasted for one second, that would be plenty of time in such close quarters.

I felt the power rise in my heels and shot off the starting line so fast I barely had time to see what happened next.

I did my best to aim my blade away from any vital areas, just to make sure that even if the system didn’t work I wouldn’t do lethal damage, but sure enough despite a clean hit Ascilla’s HP only plunged to one point below half and the duel ended.

Less than a second later Ascilla fell to the ground. The stun had hit her right as she’d started sprinting so she was awkwardly frozen hanging above the ground until it wore off.

I walked over to where she had fallen and offered her a hand.

“Looks like It’s my win.” I said. She slapped my hand out of the way and pulled herself to her feet. I took a step back. Was she really that mad over just a duel? I wasn’t about to ask her that. She certainly looked frustrated enough.

“That was a good trick… should have known you’d have something up your sleeve.” She said. She took a deep breath and shook her head. When she finally stopped a smirk returned to her face, but her eyes still burned with enough anger to make me feel like a cornered rat. “Again. Best two out of three.”

Before I could reply she turned and walked a few meters away and a duel screen appeared in front of me. I sighed. The same trick wouldn’t work twice, but still, that was a lot of confidence.

I hit accept. At the very least, this would be better practice than swinging my sword at a tree until I collapsed from exhaustion.

The timer counted down and I started to come up with a plan. Step Slash wouldn’t work twice, she’d see the magic coming, dodge, and then use the opening at the end of my skill to land a finishing blow.

As soon as the word “Duel!” Sounded I began tracing another Spark. I finished it with a flick of the wrist and sent the bolt of magic sailing at my opponent.

She stepped to the side and the magic narrowly avoided hitting her in the arm. It was a shame that I’d missed but I wasn’t really trying to hit her. I was trying to gather information.

The only reason she was able to dodge the magic was because I’d shot it when she was so far away. If I waited for her to close the gap and used that opportunity to fire off a point blank shot…

Ascilla was slower than I was at a sprint, but that didn’t mean she was slow overall. Even though she did play as a self-identified tank, her armor was lighter than any of the other defensive classes I’d seen up until this point.

She closed the gap quickly after my Spark splashed off the ground behind her and her axe shone white as she slid in for a horizontal slash. This was the skill she had used yesterday to deflect the minotaur’s downward slice. A ridiculously heavy hitting attack.

I drew my sword down to my left hip and waited for her attack to start coming across her body.

My own skill, Cross Slash, activated and I pulled my sword as fast as I could up in a diagonal attack. It impacted the head of Ascilla’s axe before it reached me, and the two skills resonated before blowing our weapons backwards.

Fortunately, since the second attack from Cross Slash came from above, I was able to use that parrying force to drive down into another diagonal cut. Game ov- No.

Ascilla spun to the outside of the second part of my skill, letting the blade pass inches above her head and swung out with her axe in a large circular motion. I leaned back to dodge, but as I did she let one of her hands off of the shaft of the axe. Now swinging with only one arm, she was able to extend her reach farther. She let out a guttural shout as the blade clipped me on the bottom of my chin and I felt myself begin to fall backwards.

Fortunately, the blow had only knocked off about twenty percent of my HP, and blocking Ascilla’s skill had knocked hers down by ten percent as well, so I wasn’t out of the game yet.

I righted myself and leapt backwards. With my superior speed I was able to gain a bit of distance before Ascilla recovered from her attack.

As soon as she landed from her spin, Ascilla continued to twist her body, she then used the momentum to do something I didn’t expect. She threw her axe.

I ducked out of the way just as the screaming piece of metal sailed over my head. I raised my fingers, beginning to trace the rune for Spark. With no weapon, off balance from the throw, at such a close range, as long as it was on target this should work! I fired it off, and the magic crackled in the air as it sailed towards her. But right at the last second, Ascilla dashed to the side with frightening agility. What the hell? She wasn’t nearly this fast a second ago!

She planted her foot and took advantage of my surprise by lining up one hell of an overhand punch aimed right between my eyes.

Using all of my strength I leaned back, just barely making it out of range in time, but winding up off balance in the process. From this position there was no way that I could use a skill, but she was still wide open!

I brought my sword up in an awkward cut coming from underneath Ascilla’s arm. Before it could reach her though, she opened her hand as wide as it could go and let out a confident “Hmph!”

Something hit me in the back of the head, and the next thing I knew it I was face first in the ground. The chime for the end of the duel sounded, and my HP was immediately returned to full. I… had lost?

“Tch.” I said, punching the ground and shaking the grass out of my hair. What the hell was that?

A hand found its way into my field of view and as I looked up I saw Ascilla standing above me, cocky grin on her face.

I stood up on my own and brushed myself off.

“The hell was that?” I asked her. She smiled then turned, throwing her axe into a nearby tree. After a moment, she extended her hand towards it and it came flying back into her hand.

“Touche…” I said.

“Nice try, though.” She said with a shrug. Big talk coming from the one who lost faster. I said, completely aware that we had both won a duel for the sole reason that the other didn’t know that we’d unlocked a new skill.

Still, there was one thing that I didn’t understand about what had happened…

“How the hell did you dodge that second spell?” I asked. Out of all that happened in that duel, that was the bit I didn’t get. It was almost like throwing her weapon away had made Ascilla faster…

“There’s an interesting little interaction I’d figured out after trying some things yesterday night.” She said.

“Oh?” I replied.

“If you’re using a heavy weapon, and you throw that weapon, it immediately reduces your equipped weight.”

“So the reason you were able to dodge at such a close range…”

“Is because I reduced my weight by throwing away my weapon, yeah.” She said it so casually, but the amount of creativity it would take to even try something like that…

“Was that something that you could do in the game you played before switching to ID?” I asked.

“No. I wanted to see if there was a way to dodge an attack I wasn’t fast enough to dodge normally. Once I figured out that equipment weight affected mobility, it was just a matter of finding a way to justify tossing my weapon away.” I stood for a second genuinely stunned. Eventually I smiled.

“It’s the same with those crazy one-handed weapon strikes, right? You wanted a way to hit things farther away from you than you normally would be able to?” I asked.

“That’s a bit different. I learned that if you swing at an enemy, regardless of how hard the attack is, a lot of the time they’ll dodge anyways. So that attack isn’t really meant to do damage. It’s meant to make mobs dodge and put themselves into a bad position.” She said with a shrug.

“Does that make me a mob?” I asked. She just smiled and shrugged.

“Nah, you’re at least an add.” She gave me a hand and pulled me to my feet. That was low… an add, or additional monster, was the name for the trash mobs that spawned during a boss fight. So I wasn’t even good enough to be a field boss.

“Well, at least I’ll have another opportunity to raise my standing.” I said.

“Oh, and how do you plan to do that?” She replied.

“You did say best two out of three.” I said, picking my sword up and rolling my shoulders. Out of the corner of my eyes I thought I saw Ascilla twitch.

“Thanks for filling me in on all your secrets.” I smiled.

“Never mind… I think I’ve just found the raid boss.” Ascilla said, giving me a concerned look. I laughed.

“It’s okay. We can always call it a tie.” I said with a shrug.

“Ohhhh no! You’re not getting out of this that… easily…“

Just then Ascilla’s face went pale as a ghost.

“What’s up?” I asked. Startled at the sudden development.

“C-C-Co-Corian… what’s that?” Ascilla asked. Her voice was so unsteady I could barely understand her. My heart started to pound in my chest. What the hell could terrify someone as strong willed and just flat out strong as Ascilla..?

I turned around, and floating in the woods, peeking out behind a tree, were a pair of eyes.

“Bwah!” I jumped, turning around and pointing my sword at the creature? Monster? Ghost?

The faintest silhouette of a person stepped out into the clearing. Its most defining feature were golden-yellow eyes that made a chill go down my spine when I looked into them.

I was getting ready to run, to bolt back into the safe zone just a few dozen meters behind me, but the… thing… didn’t attack. Instead, it pointed at the two of us and then silently began to walk away from the town and deeper into the woods.