If there had been any shouts earlier and a couple of merchants had begun gathering their goods, it was nothing compared to the explosion of activity that followed the spread of our bet magic, which bathed the market in bright light.

The more sensible merchants fled for their lives, while the more daring ones scrambled to save their wares, and the fools cried out for the guards. Fortunately, the guards were wise enough to stay away. I paid no attention to the chaos.

My focus was solely on the jester who had murdered Alice. I had to win this battle quickly or... lose swiftly and hope for mercy. So, I abandoned my usual cautious approach and planned to go full in, holding nothing back.

True, I had that strange feedback from my magic probe about his level, but that was simply not possible. Yes, I'd seen his magic power and what he had done to Alice, and partially I didn't want to believe it.

As an assassin, I was the opposite of a mage, their natural enemy. Mages are like glass cannons, capable of inflicting immense damage but weak when it comes to defense, particularly against close-range specialists like myself.

I launched into the air with a fierce battle cry and cast the <> spell.

This devastating kick targeted the opponent's side with my left leg while aligning my hip, knee, and ankle to form a straight line. Meanwhile, my right leg was bent, and its sole rested on my left leg, supporting it, while my upper body was slightly bent upwards, creating a seamless continuation of my leg.

In this way, all the energy from the impact was transferred to the edge of my sole. Similar to the Yoko Geri karate kick but with the added teleport function. It should bring the air out of his lungs and possibly incapacitate him for enough time for me to follow up with a couple of deadly or close-to-deadly strikes.

If I were lucky, he would be down in ten seconds.

The <> was my only teleport spell, enabling me to instantly cover a distance of roughly a dozen meters.

As I glimpsed his face, he seemed to expect it and wanted it to happen.

The force of the impact was tremendous, causing nearby stands to shatter with a deafening bang. Despite my speed and weight, the kick had little effect on him. It felt like hitting a solid wall, sending shockwaves through my body.

This unexpected turn of events caught me off guard, and I lost the upper hand.

He retaliated by pointing his wand at me, but my instincts kicked in, and I rolled to the side, striking his hand and deflecting his bolt.

To my surprise, I was able to push his hand aside with ease, despite his impenetrable ice armor. I made a mental note of this vulnerability, still pondering over the spell that had given him such a formidable defense earlier. I had only seen this type of spell, called , used by very high-level tank warriors.

But was it a spell? I haven't seen him casting anything!

His fire bolt blew up a couple of beer barrels behind me, sending wood debris and beer vapors flying everywhere. Visibility dropped to sauna level, with beer vapor instead of water vapor.

Panic screams from NPCs in the vicinity filled the air as they scattered for safety.

I had to use the <> spell to get rid of the frost that had spread over me from his armor. Damn ice-mages! I hate them!

I attempted a <> with my katar, but it felt like hitting a 60-ton armored vehicle. The katar hit his ice armor with the speed, noise, and violence of a bullet, even making a shock wave in the air, but it had almost no effect on him.

That made me again lose precious fractions of a second and gave him time to react and turn to blast my face with another bolt.

I instinctively kicked him in the stomach to get rid of him just as he shot his firebolt. No magic-infused kick.

A blasted instinct that should have cost me my makeup if the result had been again a kick against the wall followed by a bolt to my face.

To my surprise, and probably his, the blow made contact and sent him flying.

His bolt met a stash of wooden boxes full of ripe tomatoes* sending a wave of small wood particles and tomato pasta in the air.

The force of my hit propelled him backward, and as he hurtled through the air, he crashed through a nearby stand that was selling chickens, shattering cages, and sending the panicked birds fluttering in all directions. Then he collided with another stand selling furs, scattering pelts everywhere.

He crashed with a collection of furs in his hands against a stone column, shattering the stone decoration that was adorning it.

That kick had been my luck, as he had just cast an ice blast area spell, and now everything around the column was subsequently frozen like an Antarctic landscape.

Several chickens fell out of the sky, shock-frozen, but most escaped, cackling scandalized.

Screams, yells, and even some laughter came from the NPC gallery that was now watching the fight from a distance.

That had been just an ordinary kick, nothing special, and I didn't even have my enchanted boots on, just my city boots.

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They're the only boots that match my jacket. I won't compromise my aesthetic standards, at least not in a city or anywhere I could meet people who understand aesthetics!

And the kick sent him flying like a rag doll?

Well, he didn't look hurt, which was a little disappointing, his ice armor didn't even crack, but he did fly through those stands! That brought a happy grin to my face.

My <> should have sent him to the moon; what the hell was happening here?

Fuck, I almost took an ice bolt to the face as I sat there, meditating, looking at him.

The ice bolt hit a flower stand behind me, causing the buckets of water to explode. This resulted in a shower of petals and snowflakes, occasionally mixed with sharp pieces of ice and other debris.

I used another stand for cover and had to spell <> again to stop the ice from spreading from the leg I hit him with. This was slowly becoming a problem; his armor could incapacitate me over time.

The gears in my brain were turning at full speed, attempting to comprehend the situation. Why were some attacks completely ineffective, while others surprisingly landed with great impact? It was the blows that I anticipated would be futile that seemed to work the best, and it left me puzzled.

He let out a curse and fired another ice bolt in my direction, shattering the stand I had taken cover behind and pelting me with ice and raw eggs. The bolt itself missed me by a hair's breadth.

I always hated to play the turkey in a turkey shoot. This is what happens when you let mages shoot at you from a distance; however, he was no ordinary mage, and I was still undecided about the best strategy.

I quickly scurried behind one of the many stone columns that held up the market's roof, trying to make sense of the situation.

He shot another bolt at me and hit the column pulverizing part of it.

What the heck was going on? This level of ice magic was insane!

I looked around.

The soldiers were coming toward us, the idiots, probably the sergeant had ordered them to intervene, likely due to pressure from the merchants.

They could easily become collateral damage with these spells.

However, they moved as in a slow-motion film... Huch, he had created a time bubble where the time runs faster than in the exterior!

But how could he be capable of creating a time bubble that altered the flow of time? This was an advanced level of magic that required immense power and special knowledge. Was he not just an ice mage but also a cronomancer? Did he possess the ability to manipulate time? Or maybe he was primarily a cronomancer, with ice magic being a low-level skill that any mage could learn but with great power? Where does the tremendous power come from for this giant time bubble?

But why would he do this spell when I am in the same bubble, so I move with the same speed as he does? Why not a limited area for him only?

Oh shit, he can block me from using my speed spell, which would probably make me even faster than him, even speeded up; however, I cannot cast that spell inside a time bubble!

Does this mean that he became wary of me?!

I jumped away, avoiding another hit, and his bolt exploded a pyramid of melons. A cascade of falling sweet and wet debris covered me as I shot two deadly metal stars, but he had already shot another frozen bolt at almost the same time.

How could he recharge so fast? He had the shortest spell cooldown I had ever seen! He must be a prodigy, or he had some extremely rare artifact at his disposal.

One of my stars was iced by the snowbolts, the other would have hit him, but he managed in extremis to duck it out.

His bolt was a damn near miss; I felt the coldness in my teeth as it flew beside my jaw to hit a stand full of glass vases.

He laughed victoriously, sending me another ice bolt while I ran through a colored glass rain.

Your laugh is for naught; my stars always come back like a boomerang if you avoid them the first time!

I ducked his next bolt, letting it crash against a sausage stand. Snow, charcoal, and sausages fell all around. I saw the soldiers running back.

At least the sergeant recovered his senses to call them back, or the soldiers simply disobeyed his order. I wouldn't blame them if they did that. You don't run out of your house with a stick in your hand to separate two wild elephants fighting in your courtyard.

I was happy to see how the star came back and hit him, and… nothing happened. Well, it did happen, he looked angry at the metal star that fell to the ground and cursed, but he was not paralyzed by the poison; he was only disappointed that he could not avoid the star.

Not even a little hampered by the poison.

I spelled a <> that tried to ensnare him with its tentacles, but he simply blasted it into Nirvana with a single bolt.

I avoided the next bolts, my mind working in overdrive, thinking frenetically, trying to compute the data from the fight while various stands exploded beside me, letting a mix of aubergine and potato puree rain over me. A beautiful handbag fell in front of me, but it was partially ripped. What a pity!

I shook my head, trying to concentrate.

Smoke will soon come out of my ears, my brain overheating. Does this shit make any sense? It was as if he would be completely immune to any magic attack and poison?

Blast! A fireblast singed me, burning my hair and setting my cloth on fire. I partially avoided it, but the edge of the huge fireball still caught me. I was distracted by that handbag, damn.

The pain went up a notch, and a pained scream escaped my lips. My interface must have a problem! Should I run away? And give up on Alice? This pain is not real; this is not real pain!

On the positive side, it annihilated the effects of the previous ice bolt; on the negative side, I am being drained...

Another <>, again, it felt like hitting a giant metal golem. However, I was ready this time, and before he managed to teleport away, I was able to hit him with another kick with my left foot. That sent him in a spin, and the first ice bolt he shot went directly up in the air, breaking a hole in the roof.

Yes, this confirmed my theory, as absurd as it sounded; he was immune to magic attacks but not immune to common attacks.

Because of the spin I gave him, he sent another bolt straight to the ground and landed cursing on his belly from his teleport under a stand with wine bottles.

He blasted another ice explosion and tried to get on his feet while glass pieces, frozen wine, and snow made out of wine fell around him.

Hell, my damn user interface is not working, and I have to estimate how it goes! I may be doing him some damage, but I take at least as much from his damn ice armor, and if I would ever get hit, that would be very painful. My attacks seemed to be rather annoying, while almost each one of his had the potential to be deadly.

* Well, the thing is that although those were not tomatoes, but some fleshy red fruits that are often used and consumed as a vegetable in cooking and in salads. So, players refer them as "tomatoes," even though they are not actually tomatoes. The same applies to many other fruits and vegetables (melons, aubergines, and so on)