Those who in their youth participated in the main competition of Dragoncull would often describe those days with ceaseless praise. Many had stories of their epic battles and unlikely comebacks. Yet Irwyn and his team made the whole event look like a child's play. From the first round Irwyn never had to even participate, just as he predicted, as Elizabeth or Crowley took on entire teams by themselves. Perhaps Crowley was not a disciple of an Elemental lord, but he was the thing closest to one. Meanwhile Elizabeth reigned undisputed among all other participants; she would crush all defence and offence without breaking a sweat. This brought them into current status quo: They reached the final round without losing a single match.
And here they stood, facing the team of the element of Time and space as their final foe. As a team their opponents had a powerhouse superior to even Crowley in the form of an Elemental lord's disciple, and there was also the unaffiliated girl who might yet be holding onto some tricks. But what was the most important trait was that they were all spacial mages. Those were not known for immense offensive power which could turn armies to ash, nor were they known for supreme defence to block gods. No, Time and space mages were known for only two things in which they reigned completely undisputed: Utility and elusiveness.
That is why Irwyn decided to send out Elizabeth first. Today it was one easy victory after another for her, while that was necessary to build up her low confidence, things shouldn't be overdone. It would not do if Elizabeth became arrogant, that is why Irwyn hoped that these final foes had what it took to bring Elizabeth down, otherwise he would have to take different countermeasures once the farce of a competition was over.
"Begin!" when the beginning signal sounded it was just as Irwyn had expected: Elizabeth stood face to face with the third member of the enemy team. It was the most reasonable tactic to weaken her through attrition before sending in their main combatant. The moment the match began two shortened incantations sounded.
"Distortion"
"Combustion"
As they both cast their spells the effects were immediate. The boy's form rapidly distorted, obstructing Elizabeth's aim as his body seemed to take up an entire area of 3 cubic metres. Meanwhile Elizabeth's magic caused magical flames to surge around her hands, potent enough to burn down a shack in an instant, which she promptly sent to where the distorting boy stood previously. Unfortunately for her, the spell just passed through the area and seemed to not inflict any damage whatsoever before it crashed into the ground which thanks to enchantments did not melt even slightly.
This was actually great in Irwyn's eyes; such elusive opponents were often the just difficult to deal with and it was bound to put someone down a notch if they could not defeat an foe they could otherwise take down in a single direct hit. It was extremely infuriating to be played with by a weaker prey.
The next solution she came up with was even more violent. She most likely figured out something in the sense of: I can't miss if I hit the entire area. And so she evoked the best spell she knew fit that.
"Churning, blazing, razing
Blast which desires those
To accept such gazing,
This I hereby propose.
Infernal blast"
The spell might not be the most powerful among those she could cast, but it stood out thanks to its area of effect and relatively bearable cost. The explosion caused by a Pyroblast might perhaps be comparable and would be far more powerful, but it would drain Elizabeth's mana pool nearly dry. In a competition which requires her to defeat multiple opponents she undoubtedly made the best choice.
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Elemental particles began to gather at Elizabeth's feet and were then rapidly channeled into a faraway epicentre, directly in the middle of the distortion spell. Even if the guy were to interfere with the casting it would only cause the spell to explode sooner, the amount of power was not particularly important as the moment the boy was hit his cover would disperse, and at that point he would be just a sitting duck.
However, the boy didn't try to stop Elizabeth in the midst of her evocation, instead he attacked. A silent chant he was likely preparing since the match began. There was no way for him to avoid Elizabeth's spell anymore, but he likely never intended to: From the beginning the boy knew his chances of winning were zero, so he attempted to accomplish mutual elimination. A child which could grasp such conviction in his early age might have more potential than he let on, although still not enough to truly impress Irwyn.
An experienced battle mage would have anticipated that simple trick, but Elizabeth had nearly no combat experience. As her own spell began to explode in an obliterating wave of flames a tear in the fabric of space spread out with barely comprehensible speed. It took a shape of a half moon, cutting through the air as thought there was no obstruction in the first place. Elizabeth's desperate dodge was not enough to save her, with a loud thud her body was propelled backwards. Unable to regain her footing she rolled a few times before landing on her back. There was no injury, but the bracelet showed clear results: Her gem had barely turned red.
And that is how David gave his life to slay the Goliath, Irwyn had a poetic thought, it was not his might, nor his sharp wit, though, that landed the killing blow. It was arrogance, the bane of all men. Or so the poetic side of Irwyn claimed, perhaps closet skeleton of the him from a long passed age. Albeit those memories were long lost they would occasionally return to haunt Irwyn. They were lessons he learned the hard way, and the consequences of those failures, all reduced to nothing, but a ghost of the past But that was not important right now, what he should focus on now was the sunken Elizabeth who was returning from the stage.
"I am sorry," her head sunk even lower "I was defeated."
"That doesn't really matter, but do you know why you were defeated?" he instead inquired. This situation was perhaps the ideal circumstance to teach her an important lesson. One that might save her, and perhaps even his, life.
"I let him trick me," she gritted her teeth, a grudge almost visibly forming in her eyes
"No, you are wrong," Irwyn just dismissed her reasoning with a wave of his hand "during that battle, did it ever occur to you that you might lose?"
"No," Elizabeth shook her head. At the very least she was well capable of listening.
"That is the difference confidence and arrogance, between a boon and a poison. To be confident is to be aware of every strength and weakness of both yourself and your foe and still believe in your victory. To believe while in ignorance is arrogance," or at least that was the conclusion that Irwyn found at some point, in times long forgotten by even him "you were not defeated by your opponent, but by yourself."
Elizabeth nodded after a bit. Perhaps it was because she was once convinced of being useless that she could accept that the fault laid in her instantly. Irwyn had to be careful when tempering the girl, or she might become a double-edged sword. But in his view he accomplished what he wanted to today "Crowley, you are up next. Give them hell," a bit of motivation to fire up the boy.
“will show them," the boy nodded, his eyes fiercely burning "that I am not to be messed with," and he stepped into the arena, where his opponent already stood: the Elemental lord's disciple, not a bit less determined than Crowley. It was unclear who would be the victor, but one thing was absolutely certain: It would be a close match.
Perhaps the tournament would not be as boring as Irwyn anticipated. He based that on a simple observation: the last member of the event team, the unaffiliated girl, was grinning widely, as though victory was already within her grasp. And that piqued Irwyn's interest. It might be entertaining to tear asunder whatever allowed her to be confident. Indeed, today just might not be boring.