Gloria couldn’t help the grin on her face. Whereas the tournament was a source of worry for a lot of participants, Johann very much included, she couldn’t help but be excited. The idea of being able to battle some of the most powerful people in Western Feulac and the surrounding areas almost made her drool with happiness. Sadly, it was only the tanks she would be fighting but at least they could take a punch.
Her match was only third in the line up but the wait was killing her. A week spent underwater and a series of infuriating riddles had done nothing for her mental state and she really needed the stress relief of punching a random person in the face. When the portal finally flashed open she charged through without hesitation.
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Trevor was prepared. Over the last year and a half he had trained tirelessly in preparation for the trials and this tournament in particular. He had realized, as most inevitably do, that the previous trials were not the real test. Anyone with half a mind and some semi-decent armor could finish the rest of the rounds with ease. No, the real trial came in the tournaments, where your were forced to prove that you were not only competent, you were the best.
So Trevor had prepared. Not to tank monsters, or to figure out puzzles (though to be fair, no one had), but to fight it out in the arena and beat his opponents in glorious battle. He had sparred against dozens of people with dozens of skill sets, figuring out the best way to counter and defeat any opponent he might face. He hadn’t just stuck to tank-like opponents either. Since roles were not technically class specific it meant he could be facing pretty much anything. So, he decided to prepare for everything and, when he stepped out into the arena, he was ready for whatever his opponent could throw at him.
Or so he thought. In reality, nothing could have prepared him for the screaming banshee of a woman launching herself at him and wailing on his shield like he’d cheated on her with her sister, her mother and her dog. The sheer shock factor, along with the river of obscenities that poured from her mouth, bewildered him so much he could barely manage a defense and didn’t even think of fighting back, as if the very thought of possibly angering this woman any more than she already was too much for his mind.
It took all he had but he did manage to keep his shield in between him and the mad woman trying to, as she explicitly put it, ‘rip his f**king dogsh*t arms off and shove them up his f**king sh**ty ass’. Despite that, each jarring crash of her mace into his shield battered his arms and shaved points off his health. In the end it only took just shy of a minute for the match to finish, but it forever changed Trevor’s life, who became a farmer.
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Gloria was happy. The match didn’t last long but it was therapeutic. She hadn’t intended the screaming, or the swearing and attempted murder, but after week of boredom followed by some extreme annoyance she supposed she might have a bit of anger in the tank so it wasn’t really a surprise. She did feel sorry for the poor man she destroyed though. It was one thing to physically beat someone to a pulp, that was expected, but she was pretty sure she gave the guy some serious emotional trauma.
Still, at least she won. Popping back through the portal she stripped off her armor and placed into the repair compartment before quickly hopping into the shower. Her armor hadn’t taken a single hit during the match but she had built up quite the sweat and cleaning armor was a pain. Standing under the hot water the last of her muscles loosened up and she just stood for a moment and enjoyed the quiet moment of peace.
Only for a moment though. With as few people in the tanking tournament as there was her break wouldn’t last. In fact, she only had to win her next match to be in the top three and secure her place in the Guild. After that she would have another two matches to determine her placement in the top three, a purely superficial ranking as there were no greater rewards for placing first than there were for placing third and therefore absolutely no reason to go to the effort.
That being said, Gloria wouldn’t be happy unless she left with the first place ranking. Even though she knew it meant very little outside of stroking her own ego, she wouldn’t accept going through the evil bastards training just to get second or, gods forbid, third. She shuddered at the thought.
A part of her was a bit sad that she’d get at most another three matches, but she was looking forward to being able to watch Torin and Johanns tournaments. The Adventurers Guild kept each of the participants completely isolated until their tournaments were over to prevent cheating, which Gloria thought was a bit over the top, so she had no idea how they were doing. She didn’t doubt that they would make it this far but beyond that… she was worried. Torin had explained his plans for the tournaments, which he kept insisting were brilliant but which Gloria thought was bat-shit crazy. Admittedly, if anyone could pull it off it would be him, so she wasn’t too worried.
No, her real worries lay with Johann.
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Johann wasn’t worried. He would have been, if not for the events of the survival round. Near the beginning he had managed to successfully use his Nature Attunement to detect an attacking participant. The incident, apart from making his view on humanity decrease by a few degrees, made him start to look at his attunement skills in a new light. The product of this new perspective was what gave him hope.
Coming into the Trials Johann had exactly one worry, the tournaments. Even though his ability to lock down a target using Grasping Roots was incredible, his actual damage output (i.e. the thing the tournament tested) was low. Until he managed to master his Weather Attunement skill he wouldn’t be able to get any new spells like Lightning bolt, making [Basic Mana Bolt] his only attacking spell. Compared to Mages who could have two or three attacking spells he was woefully under-equipped for the tournament. The plan had always been to supplement his lack of power with speed, months of training allowing him to fire out bolts at a rate of almost a bolt a second.
That had been the plan but, as the old expression goes, no plan ever survives first contact with the enemy. During the week spent in the trial Johann had been attempting, and failing, to use Weather Attunement to guide his [Basic Mana Bolt] in the same way he had used Nature Attunement to guide his Grasping Roots spell. After more than a few failures and in a fit of frustration Johann had lashed out and simply shoved his mana into his spell and, in a moment of carelessness, had managed to also shove mana down his link to the aspect of Weather.
To his utter shock, Weather sent something back. The [Basic Mana Bolt] he unleashed was completely different to his previous versions. A stormy gray bolt flew across the clearing and slammed into a tree with a sharp crack and a flash of light. When Johann managed to blink the spots out of his eyes he found a large scorch marked crater where the bolt had struck, something he hadn’t even come close to with his normal bolts.
After calming down the teammates who had come running when they heard the noise Johann had began experimenting. The results were, simply put, incredible. With each attunement skill Johann was able to send his mana to, as far as he could tell, an entirely conceptual realm that he connected to through the skill. In doing so the realm converted his mana into a mana variant that matched the realm, i.e. plant, animal and weather.
This mana could then be fed into his [Basic Mana Bolt] and [Mana Barrier] spells, likely due to the spells themselves being element-less and therefore able to take any type of mana. The introduction of the new types of mana created interesting effects. Weather mana turned the filled his [Mana Bolts] with lightning and at the same time made them fly faster than before. Animal mana gave the bolts a semblance of sentience, allowing them to track the target and alter their own trajectory. The mana also doubled the bolts damage towards ‘fleshy’ targets but halved it against everything else.
Plant mana was incredible. Johann had always known that druids were something of a mixed bag, part healer, part mage and part controller, but finding out when he mixed plant mana with a [Basic Mana Bolt] and got a bolt that healed whatever it hit really drove that home. Admittedly, not the most useful thing for the Ranged Attacker tournament, but having a healing option that didn’t take up a skill slot was an unexpected gift and certainly one he wasn’t going to turn down. Still, even though the healing bolts were a dud damage wise, the storm bolts and predator bolts, what Johann called the Weather and Animal [Mana Bolts] respectively, were incredibly useful.
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It didn’t make the tournament any easier though, it just changed the type of difficulty. Whereas before Johann had to worry that he could put out enough [Mana Bolts] to outstrip his opponents damage, now he had to worry about keeping his attunement going at the same time as launching [Mana Bolts], not an easy task in the least. Attuning with Weather or Animal was easy but also overwhelming, like falling into a roiling ocean of power with a depth that went beyond the physical. Even now Johann couldn’t do it while moving, leaving him a sitting duck.
Fortunately, that wasn’t a problem in the tournament as one of the rules precluded the participants from fighting each other. Since that was the case Johann could just stand there and pour out the damage, which is what he did. When he stepped through the portal Johann didn’t look towards his opponent, nor did he look at the massive house sized golem that would be their target. Instead he closed his eyes and attuned to the Aspect of Weather. Letting the roaring power wash over his mind he carefully edged his mind back into his body, carefully seeking out the moment of balance between the realm of mortals and the realm of Weather. It was a delicate balance, too far into either and he would lose connection to the other.
As soon as he was confident he wouldn’t lose his hold on the skill he opened his eyes to find that the fight had already begun. Quickly but calmly he started casting [Basic Mana Bolt], carefully using the stormy weather mana to fill out the spells shape. [Basic Mana Bolt] despite the name, was a small sphere of hardened mana containing the rest of the spells mana. When the spell impacted the target the outer shell would break, releasing the internal mana in a small explosion. With weather mana Johann had to make sure to construct the outer shell out of the less volatile parts of the mana in or it would simply explode in his face, a lesson learned over many failed experiments. Johann still couldn’t believe the initial accidental cast actually produced anything. Especially after the next 23 casts blew up in his face every. single. time.
As soon as the spells structure was complete Johann fired it at the golem with a flick of his will. He didn’t see the effects, already focusing on casting the next one, but his opponent did. Mar’a had always believed she was special. Her Inner Fire trait had proved it, giving her access to the Fire Mage class as her first class as well as enhancing any fire spells by 5%. She fully believed she would sweep through the Trials and then go on to glory as a high ranking adventurer.
When her first match in the tournament came and her opponent was too timid to even look at her she knew it was going to be an easy win. As the short timer finished and she launched her opening salvo, a trio of fire bolts that looked amazing while at the same time showed her mastery of her spells, her opponent was still too scared to even open his eyes. Mar’a couldn’t believe her luck, her first opponent being someone who was good enough to get to the tournaments but too timid to even face her, it was unbelievable.
In hindsight, Mar’a felt both ashamed and more than a little embarrassed that she was ever that arrogant. She should have realized that no person who made it this far would be intimidated just by the sight of her. Unfortunately she didn’t, and the look of surprise on her face when her opponent launched some sort of lightning bolt made it into the highlight reel. The fact that it seemed to do more damage than her three combined did not help things.
Her surprise froze her for a second, until she realized her opponent was already casting another one of his spells. Snapping out of her surprise Mar’a hurriedly began casting her next spell. Just because her opponent had a bit of spine didn’t mean that Mar’a would let him win. She immediately unleashed a [Devouring Flames], a spell that didn’t do a lot of initial damage but instead burnt the target over a longer period of time while also boosting the damage of any other flame spells while it was active.
With a large portion of the golems chest bathed in flames Mar’a quickly started to cast her final fire spell; [Flame Enhancement]. The spell did exactly what it said, it enhanced the flames of any ongoing fire, increasing their potency and duration. The combination of [Flame Enhancement] and [Devouring Flames] was Mar’as favorite, the ongoing damage starting small but ramping up quickly, especially as more combinations were added to the mix. Even better, once the combination was set up she could then start focusing on the adds without having to worry about keeping up her damage output on the golem.
Sadly, she was once again woefully mistaken. Her opponent, who was apparently stupidly slow in his casting, finally fired off his second spell, which was just a repeat of his first. For a moment Mar’a felt joy, an opponent that was powerful but slow would never beat her in taking out the adds, which was were most of the points lay. Then she saw the aftermath of his spell. The dickless son of a madragudian whore had apparently aimed for the fire on the golem and had completely blown it out. Her [Flame Enhancement], cast a split second after his, had failed to find any flames and had fizzled out, an utter waste of mana all thanks to the blue-haired bastard stand next to her.
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Johann was in no way paying attention to the seething bonfire of rage that was currently planning his murder. It was probably a good thing, as he was a nice person and if he realized just how angry he’d made his opponent he would have felt guilty. Fortunately no attention was paid and his casting went on, completely guilt free.
It did not surprise Johann when his spell blew out the fire on the golems chest, as that had been his intention. One of the things he had discovered about his storm bolts was that they contained a fair amount of wind and water mana alongside the lightning. A side effect of this was that the bolts not only failed to spark any fires, unlike most lightning spells, but also had a tendency of blowing out any fires they struck.
When he had seen the fire and realized he wasn’t up against a normal mage he was worried, but as long as he kept putting out the flames then he should stand a chance. Fire spells were powerful attack spells but usually took time to deal damage. As long as he didn’t give his opponent the time to build up damage then Johann could keep them on the back foot.
Which is exactly what he did. For the first minute he continued to fire out weather filled [Mana Bolts], making sure to target any fires that sprung up on the golems body. After a minute had passed the scenario changed however, as the adds were introduced. It started off with slow lumbering miniature versions of the main golem that appeared every ten seconds. With Johann blowing out any fires his opponent made she was forced to rely on her [Fire Bolts] which, while they still did plenty of damage, were outstripped by Johanns Trait boosted bolts.
In a surprising turn of events, the Druid was now taking it easy while the Fire Mage was struggling to keep up her damage. When the adds came Johann found himself able to spare plenty of time and attention to taking them out, grabbing five of the first six before his opponent could. At the two minute mark the number of adds increased to two every ten seconds. It was here that Johann began to lose his lead, only getting four out of the twelve bear sized golems. Even though his bolts packed a heavy punch it took him almost twice as long to form them.
The third minute saw another change, the number of golems reducing back down to one but this time the golem was a flying one and proved much faster than the previous. Johann found his mind straining as the strain of balancing his attunement skill and calculating where to aim in order to hit the golem was almost too much. He persevered though and managed to get another four kills, bringing him to two kills above his opponent.
As before, the turn of the minute lead to a new add being introduced, this time in the form of three dog sized golems. When the new adds first appeared Johann’s heart fell, there was no way he could keep up with his much faster opponent, but it seemed that she had reached her limits as well. Between keeping her damage output on the main golem high enough and the smaller size and faster speed of the new golems she found herself hard pressed to get any points. By the end of the minute Johann had taken down nine golems to his opponents eight.
The fifth and final minute saw one of each golem appear (normal, flying and small). With this being the final minute neither mage could afford to hold anything back so neither did, each pushing themselves to and beyond their limits. Johann found mental reserves he never knew he had and increased the speed of his casting until it almost reached normal speeds. Without even realizing it Johann entered into a trance-like state, his mind seemingly effortlessly splitting in two, one half keeping himself attuned while the other half churned out [Mana Bolts] like a factory on overdrive.
Mar’a also dug deep, immersing herself in her flames and bringing about a temperature hotter than she had ever before. Whereas before she needed two or sometimes even three [Fire Bolts] to take down an add she now found herself destroying a golem with almost every single shot. Both participants were pouring out mana in amounts and speeds that rivaled experienced tier two mages. A showdown this fierce wouldn’t have been out of place in the final, and many people felt cheated that only one of these two talents would advance, but such was the luck of the draw.
At the end of the match the remaining golems, or golem since only the main one was left, crumbled into dust. Both participants collapsed, Mar’a drained of her mana but otherwise okay. Johann on the other hand was left cradling his head, the enormous mental strain finally catching up to him as the strange trance lifted. Heals landed on him moments later, alleviating some of the pain, but it still felt like a mountain troll was using his head like a drum.
After a few seconds they both managed to stand, neither sure which had won. The silence stretched on for a few seconds before the announcers voice spoke, mercifully at a much lower volume than usual.
“Congratulations, Johann and Mar’a, on a truly spectacular match. Every single person watching felt your power, and your conviction. If it were up to me I would let you both into the Adventurers Guild and I doubt there is a single person here who would argue. Sadly, there can be only one winner, and we must say goodbye to one of you, at least for now.”
“I can now announce that, at the end of a truly incredible match between two incredible participants, Johann Alltud is the winner!"