So now it's Monday evening, and the six of us are sitting around a crystal-video display showing the preliminary matches. Oh. So after my brain started working again Friday night, we checked into this place and entered our names into the prelim match-ups. None of us got to do anything until Saturday, after which the four of us who were fighting made it through five pretty intense combat rounds, followed by three more later in the evening. That qualified us for the tournament's Grand Melee and Magic Event, which was basically the final prelim but actually the start of the tournament itself, during which all of the few hundred contestants who were sure to get that far would be whittled down to a few dozen.
Already there were streams of players who were leaving Harmonia City, though most of them were staying to support their friends, guild-mates, or parties-slash-groups. I myself caught sight of my second-to-last vict--err, opponent, slunking out in a daze towards the Magic Bullet Express. I couldn't really blame him. Getting matched up with an assassin-type character is no fun no matter what. But the poor guy was only sixty-something in level, whereas Lana was now near to eighty-one. At least my other opponents were near to my level... except that final one... I grimaced.
My last fight had pitted me against a level one-twenty mage whose sole purview of magic was flames. I understood the advantage immediately; focusing on a particular branch of magic, after all, gives you access to unfathomable skills in its growth. There are some players that even consider this a more orthodox-style of mage than people like Ariana or Healina, who branch out into different trees of magic for a more robust variety of spells. In my opinion, both types of play-styles had their benefits, and this guy proved that to me beyond any doubt.
I ended up using a run-and-gun style with my bow for most of the fight, using poison or ice arrows (an obvious choice, if simple) to counter him. Most of the ice arrows stale-mated his flame-projectiles; few of them ever actually reached him. But the poison arrows almost never missed their mark, though several of them got caught by his staff. D-daaang, I thought in amazement several times.
Eventually, though, his luck ran out when I started applying a mana-drain to the poison arrows. After about five minutes of them (each combat round lasted for thirty minutes, by the way), he staggered, nearly choked on an incantation, and fell to his knees. I saw my chance at once. I slipped into the shadows, switched my bow for my daggers, and rushed him with a sneak attack from behind to finish him off. The last expression on his face before he burst apart was a grin that promised to get me back some time. I nodded back to him, and my final round was over.
Sunday, we spent most of the time watching Maryn's rematch; her final round had ended in a complete stalemate, both opponents still standing after an intense battle. In short, she had been an immovable object fighting the unstoppable force of a hybrid rogue-magician wielding a pair of short-swords. They tried again for a second round Sunday afternoon, and when that ended in a second draw, the GMs monitoring the tournament as judges and referees had no choice but to mix and match from another draw. This time, Maryn won her battle -- but so did her original opponent, whose name I etched in memory as a possible match-up after the official opening: Myanihia Black.
I couldn't be sure, but that first name sounded a lot like meán oíche, Irish for “midnight”, though it did seem likely--and appropriate--considering that they and I had the same aesthetic of dark-colored armor. When Maryn came back from her final triumph, she watched her former opponent's round with a grim expression.
“That one's good,” she said afterward. “Even Lana would have a hard time with them.”
“Come to think of it, we've never tested our skills against each other, any of us,” I then remarked.
“Ooh... that could've been a useful pre-prelim.” Lizzy nodded.
“Were they a male or a female?” Healina suddenly wondered. I've been referring to Myanihia in a neutral sort of way, and Maryn did the same that very moment. A look of uncertainty came to her face as she paused for words, and then she shook her head.
“I'm not sure. The outfit could go either way, as could the body-type. The face was masked completely, and they never made a sound, not even for a spell-initation.”
“Which means their magic affinity is decently high.” Ariana noted. At a certain level, mage-types don't need to say anything to activate a spell, they just need to have it cued up.
“The affinity might be high, but the attacks seemed mediocre compared to a more dedicated mage.” Maryn said. “It was their sword-work that really kept me on my toes.”
“I noticed that,” I said with a wince. If I came across them, the magic wouldn't be too much of a problem, but my two daggers versus those two swords...
“Well, you all made it into the official tournament, so let's enjoy the rest of the prelim matches until it begins!” Healina then smiled, and Lizzy beamed raising her mug.
“Let's do that,” I agreed with a laugh, and so we continued doing so for the rest of the evening, minus a break for dinner.
Monday went by the same as it ever did, though at least it was a sunny day today. Ty looked half-asleep on the bus. I supposed he had done the in-game sleep thing a bit, but for some reason he always seemed more tired than I did after doing so.
“Yo, Dans,” he suddenly said, “Saw them fights. Dayum.”
“Right?” I returned with a bemused grin.
“That magic-assassin thing or whatever really had Maryn on the ropes, too.”
“Did they ever,” I nodded back.
“I ain't got to fight yet, but apparently tonight's the night.” he then said.
“Good luck -- really,” I told him, and we shook hands.
“I'mma make it through these and that brawl on Friday so we can finish our fight!” he said with a proud grin, and I grinned back.
“Wouldn't have it any other way, Ty.” I replied, and he gave me a sharp nod.
We parted ways at school the same way we always did, and then it was on to classes. Have I mentioned before how school really seems to drag on when you really want to be playing a video game? No? Yes? Well it does. The only notable things I could recall was that we turned in our assignment on the Lewis and Clark Expedition, our math homework was bordering on the unintelligible (for me, at least), science class was promising something interesting for a mid-term, Miss Andrews announced tryouts for the musical this December, and Mrs. Liang from Chinese promised us a holiday party after our mid-terms if we all passed with good marks.
When we got home, Andrea and Rachel were both on video-call with me to help me get through that awful math homework, both of them thoroughly enjoying the situation, and when that ordeal was over I went to do a few chores until dinner, after which I logged into the game, which brings us back to sitting around the crystal-display to watch the rest of the preliminaries.
“Ooh, that was good!” Lizzy remarked as the swordsman we were rooting for evaded a flurry of fireballs and then rushed his opponent, spooking the mage who had kept him on the ropes for several minutes and summarily defeating her.
“That was tense!” Ariana exclaimed. “I don't think even you could evade something as rapid fire as that,” she said to me.
“P-probably not,” I agreed with a wry grin.
No, I'm not gonna brag that I could, either. That mage was really something with her technique; but that swordsman was bonkers, man. There's a lot of VR-gamers that have gotten attuned, so to speak, to the feeling of being in these worlds so that we can do insane things on the level of a certain post-apocalyptic sci-fi franchise that was super popular around the turn of the century, and this guy was one of them. We were good, but not quite that good -- yet.
“Gonna need a lot more practice to pull something like that off...” I muttered, and she smiled at me.
“But this other fight though.” Healina then said, drawing our attention to one of the other displays we had going.
Oh yeah. This crystal thing can show you up to seven scenes at once. Not that we were paying attention to more than two at most, but hey.
“That's Ty for you,” I said.
The fight was in fact Tyman versus another claw-wielder. It had been going on for at least ten minutes, the two of them sizing each other up at first and then making some initial attacks to continue gauging the other before finally launching into a more full-on battle. This one I was watching closely. I'm sure he had watched all of my fights closely as well. Sure, we were on friendlier terms these days; but there was no way we were going to turn down this one chance to get into a situation where we could duke it out without getting in trouble for it. I had made it through, he was definitely going to make it through. And I knew for a fact that nothing in that grand opening brawl was gonna keep us from fighting each other in the main tournament.
“How do you even counter something like that without being ranged?” Lizzy wondered as she watched the two fighters.
“Well these two seem to have figured it out, anyway.” Maryn shrugged. “But basically, even if you're not ranged, you can keep the claws at a distance with swift melee strikes or a good shield-defense.”
“Oh.” our smith returned, still fixated on the fight.
They looked like two wildcats on that stage; I could almost hear growling and hissing, but that was definitely my imagination. Eventually Tyman broke down the other guy's guard and slashed him in the face a couple times. While his opponent reeled, the Mountain Tigers' lieutenant claimed his victory with a ferocious yell and a stab through the heart, courtesy of those monster-claws. I winced, as did the rest of the girls (wait a second, when did I--never mind...), and then Tyman's adversary went up in smoke and pixels. He let out a victory howl, and the people watching in person roared with cheers--a few jeers came up as well, but they were fairly drowned out.
“That's his third fight, right?” Ariana asked me.
“Ehh... yep, his third one,” I said as I quickly pulled up the match-up schedule.
“This one is also very good,” Anhe said with interest as she honed in on another fight. It was a fight between two mages, one of whom a few of us knew pretty well.
“Angelfire!” Ariana said excitedly, and I shrank back into my seat.
“Still?” Healina said as she grinned over at me.
“Sh-shut up...” I quipped back, and she, along with Lizzy and Ari, laughed heartily.
“Hm? Hmm?” Anhe wondered, a smile on her face.
“Angelfire once tried to hit on Lana,” Lizzy told her.
“Ahh!” the other girl said in understanding. “Understandable!”
“H-hey now...” I said with a wry expression.
“She'll definitely get into the tournament -- ooh, her opponent's an ice-mage, this'll be fun!!” the blonde girl said with glee. “Gotta make time next year to get into the tournament...” she then muttered, and Heali patted her on the shoulder.
“Oh, wow, there's Jannie!” I suddenly noticed on another screen. She was now wielding a longsword and a targe, and she looked just as composed as ever in her otherwise heated battle.
“Hmm?” Maryn looked at the scene with interest. “Not a tank-type, huh?”
“Huh? Oh, the targe,” I remarked. “Eh, I don't think she was a tank, no, just a cautious one-handed sword-user.”
“Maybe I should have gotten one for these fights... but then I might not have lasted against that Myanihia character,” she said with a faint grin.
“That's the thing; we know the names of the people we're gonna fight, but we don't really know all of them either, and we can't watch every fight, so it's a bit tough to prepare. You kind of got lucky,” I said, and she nodded back.
“Very true. I'd guess there's only a handful we're really familiar with,” she added.
“Like these two on the screens now,” Healina reminded us.
“Jannie's keeping that guy alert. Looks like he can't tell if she's attacking or defending,” Ariana said with a smirk.
“This ice-mage is very good.” Anhe said, completely fixated on Angelfire's match.
“Heh, don't think I've seen Angelfire so flustered since we pulled that avalanche trick on her,” I said with a grin.
“Hahh!!” Lizzy clapped with amusement. “She does look pretty mad right now. I guess their respective proficiencies are about equal.”
“Which means that her best spells can be cancelled out by the other girl's spells.” Ariana nodded.
“Which means it's gonna come down to ingenuity.” Healina nodded.
“Oop! There goes Jannie's opponent!” I said, watching as she bashed his sword upwards with her targe and then struck him for critical damage with lightning fast strikes. He disintegrated with a pitiful wail, and she twirled her sword around dramatically before sheathing it and taking a bow at the applause.
“Yeowch. But seriously, what a dorky wail...” Lizzy remarked, and we laughed.
“That's her fifth match so far, it says; and this is Angelfire's fourth.” I noted as I brought up the schedule-panel again.
“She's making a comeback now,” Ariana said as we enlarged the panel in question.
“Definitely,” I agreed. Our fellow Aldholter had figured out that her opponent was not as quick a caster as she was, and was now trying to overwhelm the other mage with DPS over skill. Basically the other person was trying to play chess while Angelfire was playing checkers. I said this out loud, and the others laughed almost too hard at the quip. I'm sure Angelfire herself would be irate with me for saying so, but whether or no, she was certainly breaking down her ice-using rival.
“Good grief!” Healina shook her head. “Forget checkers, she's playing whack-a-mole with the poor girl!”
“Pfffffft!” Lizzy chuckled again.
“Ahh-heh-heh-heh...” I wryly grinned.
“That is some very relentless casting.” Anhe agreed.
“Wait!! What in the heck is this cute fight!?” Maryn wondered, enlarging another scene for us.
This fight was a pixie-girl going up against a werefox. Yes, you can be a pixie in this game: none of them are over twelve inches in height (this girl was probably eight, if that), and they're not super strong physical fighters, but they're superb magic-users, technically magical beings. Their racial skill tree is one of the few in Panarena Fantasy Online that can work as an effective combat skill tree. Right now she was casting status-ailments on her hapless opponent, causing the werefox to stumble around drunkenly or blindly while she readied more deadly skills to whittle down his health.
“Awww...!!” the six of us chorused together, suddenly enraptured by the small pixie girl in her sky-blue outfit. We couldn't see much more of her than that, but her wings were like dragonfly wings, and they had a shimmering crystal color to them. Oh, her hair seemed to be the same color as her outfit, sky-blue, with hints of silver or white.
“Huh? What happened with Ange--oh, she won,” I noted as I looked back over.
“Hmm? Oh, she did!” Anhe remarked. “Aw, we missed it,” she lamented.
“I'm sure it went exactly as we might think,” I remarked with a grin. This did not console our staff-wielder, who made a small pout, but we did return our attention to the pixie's fight immediately after.
“Whew! She's deadly.” Maryn said, watching as she cast a series of health-drain spells on the werefox.
“Some call it low, others call it life.” Lizzy quipped. “Ooh, almost there!”
“She's got him.” Ari nodded.
“And -- there he went.” Heali said.
“Hope we don't end up fighting with her.” I said somewhat nervously.
“Anhe or I could probably hold out against her,” Ariana said.
“Probably.” the other girl agreed. “No offense, but I might last longer!” she then grinned, and Ari smiled bemusedly.
“True... your battle-auras would definitely give you an edge.” the Wood-Elf girl agreed.
“Hmm... next round of battles is in... forty minutes.” Lizzy then said, taking a look at the schedule.
“Bleh, no one we know in that round...” I sighed.
“But we should watch anyway.” Maryn shrugged.
“True, but still... oh wait, the pixie girl's up in that round!” I suddenly noticed.
“Cool!!”
“What's her name?!” Maryn and Ariana said at once.
“Ahh... Sky Belle, level eighty-two.”
“Aw, cute!” Ariana said.
“Eighty-two...!” Maryn exclaimed, and then whistled in admiration.
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“Right?” I replied. “And from watching that battle she's definitely got her Pixie-skills leveled pretty high,” I added.
“True.” Lizzy nodded. “If that werefox had put some more effort into his own racial skills he might have beaten her; not that I'm ragging on his choice to try and use the sword he had, but still. If you're gonna be a werebeast, might as well own it!”
“Exactly.” I agreed. “Man, being a werewolf was so much fun in Sorrowdin...” I recalled with a slightly dopey grin on my face.
“Duuuude. Right?” Lizzy beamed. “Anyway. Let's get some more snacks and stuff before the fights start up again.” she then said, and we all got up in agreement, heading out of our room and into town to stock up on goodies for the rest of our watching experience.
Okay, so. Harmonia City. There's five main districts to it: there's the Market Area on the east side where we arrived, also home to player or guild housing; there's the Homesteads on the north end, which is where most of the NPCs reside, along with another series of player houses; on the west side they have a Barracks Quarter (self explanatory, I hope); the Arena and its surrounding sub-venues are in the southern district; and the Holy Palace is in the exact center of it all. Of course, there's a certain amount of overlap among the districts. There are markets and such in the Arena District, after all, so we didn't have to go too far to find what we were looking for.
Ariana and I walked arm-in-arm along one of the side-streets here which was basically the feudal-fantasy version of a modern “China-town”, complete with knick-knack shops and small-time food vendors. Between one of these semi-sketchy vendors and a used sword shop we saw a magic-display for gambling odds. To my surprise, one of the columns was dedicated to a certain group of players: Garth-Queens War Veterans. I looked twice to make sure I had read the title correctly, by which time Ari had also noticed.
“Wow...” she said in a nonplussed tone.
“Right?” I agreed. “Well... to be fair...” I said with a half-smirk on my face.
“… We were some of the first major PvPers here!” she finished with a wry grin. “Still...”
“It's a bit disconcerting to have an entire column of betting odds based around that...” I nodded back, and then looked closer. “Hmm...”
Top Ten:
Tyman, Mountain Tigers
Lana Windstrider, Silvernight Queens
Jannie, The Lightbrook Brigade
Angelfire, Flamehearts
Wildeye, Mountain Tigers
Ariana, Silvernight Queens
Timidator, Shieldwardens
MacYnduff, Gears and Wheels
Humphrey, †SOVEREIGN†
Borkinator, The Tea Cupboard
“H-how did that last guy get on there...?” I wondered bemusedly, vaguely recalling that he had been someone I one-shot at some point or another.
“Why are you number two when I'm number six?” Ariana remarked in a not-so-amused tone. “And why am I below Angelfire...?” she added with obvious disgruntlement.
“B-because they're underestimating how crucial you are to me--us... well, mostly me...” I managed to stammer out in an attempt to appease her, gently squeezing her hand. She looked at me, her expression completely changed to one of amazement and adoration, and then she smiled.
“I'll take that!” she said, leaning her head on my shoulder, and I smiled too, inwardly sighing with relief. I looked over at one of the clock-towers on the street; we had about fifteen minutes to get back to our room.
“Hmm?” I automatically breathed out as I caught notice of one of the food-vendors, a panda-creature of great girth in a greasy chef's outfit running an Eastern-style hot-and-ready stand. “Ooh...!” I remarked with interest, and Ariana looked up and followed my gaze.
“Oh neat! Aw, he looks cute, despite the greasy outfit!” she remarked softly.
“R-right?” I said with a stifled laughter. “Wanna try it out?”
“Definitely!” she grinned back, and we headed over to get an order.
Everything looked pretty good, and he had some of the cheapest prices, so the two of us ended up walking back with one large bag each. Ari had gone for a veggie-and-fish combo with some rice and dumplings, while I had gone for a chicken-and-rice medley with a couple of sweet-treats on the side. We also got a bottle of rice-wine to share. When we got back to the room, the others were just getting back as well, each of them with equally appetizing and surprisingly cheap meals and-or snacks from various vendors.
“You saw a giant what now??” Lizzy asked us.
“A panda-man!” Ariana smiled back.
“Cool!”
“We saw an owl-person!” Healina exclaimed.
“Wha...?!” I said with a slight dismay. “I'll have to check out that shop next time...”
“Oh definitely.” our healer nodded.
“And we'll go see the stand you went to!” Lizzy grinned.
“Everyone found so many nice places,” Anhe remarked. “I could have fallen asleep in the little shop I wandered into, it was so comfortable there!”
“You almost were asleep when I found you,” Maryn returned with a faint grin.
“True!” the other girl said with a giggle.
“But anyw--oh! It's starting up again!” Lizzy then said, and we returned our attention to the displays, mixing and sharing our meals with each other as the battles resumed.
***
Now that I knew there was a betting pool dedicated to people who had fought in the first major PvP battle of Panarena, I kept a close eye out for other familiar names. It seemed I had been too quick to assume there was no one we knew in this round; aside from the pixie-girl we were keeping an eye out for, Timidator and Borkinator were also in these rounds, the latter being beaten by the former courtesy of a fantastic one-in-a-thousand-times reflect damage effect. I felt somewhat amused as I watched him go down, knowing that, on a certain side-street, his name had just been stricken from the lists.
“Number ten: down.” I couldn't help but remark.
“True!” Ari smirked.
“Hmm?” Maryn wondered. “Oh, you saw one of those charts too, huh?” she then said with a smirk of her own.
“Yep!” Ariana nodded.
“I can't decide what's more shocking about it,” Healina said with a wry expression, “The fact that Ari's number six or the fact that Lana's number two.”
“I'm not even on it...” Lizzy grumbled softly.
“Tyman's just more vicious when he fights, and he was usually on longer then,” I said with a shrug. “It's no wonder he's top of the lists.”
“Ahh, I see.” the Sea Elf said.
“I like to think that I was pretty vicious as well...” Lizzy quipped.
“Shh! Sky Belle is on!” Anhe then said, and we all fell silent to watch as the pixie-girl once more dazzled her opponent, literally, with several spells.
This time, she was up against a level one-forty mage. Which meant she had to be far more careful than she did against the opponent she had last fought, who had been around her level. And this guy seemed fairly experienced in dealing with opponents who used the kind of tactics she did. He had a resilience to her status-ailments that the werefox was probably berating himself right now for on account of not having them. But for all her seeming disadvantages in the fight, she still held the advantages of size, speed, maneuverability, and some good experience of her own.
Leveling up a character that uses status-ailments or debilitating effects on a monster or another player takes a very skilled and very patient person. And this fearless pixie was clearly very patient, using minor skills to distract the mage while plotting out new ways to get around his defenses, all the while avoiding his attacks and counterattacks. Eventually she managed to slip him up; she definitely made it look like a fluke in her rotation, but I knew better.
At a certain point she seemed to momentarily lose her calm, which was definitely an act (that the mage completely fell for), using several distraction spells at once to try and keep the mage busy. The spells were so random and chaotic that he fumbled in his defense rotation and left an opening which she immediately took advantage of, inflicting all sorts of negative effects on him to the point where he was literally tottering around with a stupid grin on his face.
Satisfied with her handiwork, she then let loose with her DoTs, and then she actually perched on his staff while watching his health go down to zero. He slowly stumbled to his knees, and then fell flat on his face before going up in pixels and smoke. The crowd roared with appreciation, and Sky Belle claimed what was apparently her fifth victory.
“No weapons, no armor, just pure skills.” Lizzy said with admiration.
“The dress doesn't count as armor for her?” Maryn wondered.
“That thing? You can almost see through it it's so flimsy. She might as well fly around naked.” our smith remarked. I felt my cheeks burn red, and quickly took a drink to disguise my reaction.
“Hmm...? Hahh, you're right!” the Cymbroga girl smirked as the display zoomed in on the pixie in question. Healina coughed, in the way that a teacher might do when students are being unruly, and the other two girls softly giggled.
“She's soo cuuuute!” Ariana sighed.
“Sooo cute!” Anhe agreed with a grin.
“Ahh! There's Jannie again! Round six for her,” Healina then said.
“Who said there was no one we wanted to watch in these rounds?” Lizzy quipped, giving me a side-eye.
“Who was it, I wonder...” I shrugged.
“Shush!!” Heali then called out, bringing up one of the other displays. It was Myanihia, and their opponent was Jannie.
Oh, snap.
“Ooh... tough luck, girl.” Lizzy said, her face scrunched up in a wince.
“She won't last very long with that targe.” Maryn remarked somberly.
I could see Jannie herself tensing up. No doubt she had seen at least one of the matches this character had been in, so she would know how tough they were. She then discarded her heavier armor while the countdown was going, leaving her standing there in a light tunic with leather accouterments and boots along with her weapon and shield.
“Isn't that a bad idea...?” Healina wondered with a wry face.
“To some, maybe.” I nodded. “She's definitely seen Myanihia's fights. She knows that her defense won't last long against that relentless combination of magic and sword skills, so she's prioritizing her own advantages: speed and dexterity.” I remarked, watching the counter as it continued down from ten.
“She always was exceptionally fast with her sword,” Lizzy nodded. Seven seconds.
“Come on, Jannie...!” Ariana whispered. Five seconds.
“You can do it!” Maryn said with an intensity. Four seconds. Our faces were fixed on this match alone.
“It's her seventh match, we missed the last one somehow...” Lizzy remarked. Two seconds.
“Let us watch this one closely.” Anhe then said. One second. Zero. The battle-start fanfare sounded.
Jannie took off as soon as she heard that sound, catching Myanihia off their guard with a flurry of thrusts and then a quick bash to the face with her targe, after which she twirled around to slash them, scoring another hit before the mage-rogue managed to regain a sense of order and began counterattacking. Our fellow Aldholter kept her opponent in close-quarters, forcing them to rely on their blades. They probably could have attacked with magic, but at that point blank range they could just as easily hurt themselves as well.
For all that they had a dual-wielding ability, Jannie kept Myanihia on the hop by delivering an average of four to five strikes for every one or two of theirs, using her targe to its utmost to keep them off balance and even using kicks a couple of times to interrupt her enemy when it seemed likely they were trying to cast a spell of some kind. Both of their health-bars were going down at a slow pace, but Myanihia's was going down slightly faster.
Maybe we were wrong about them and Maryn just got super unlucky... sure, she's got resilience, but Jannie has that lightning attack speed -- oop!!
It had been nearly ten minutes since the fight started, and Jannie had kept Myanihia in that close-quarter battle all that time. But then they used some sort of spinning blades trick to throw her off balance instead, and the forced pause in Jannie's rotations allowed the assassin-slash-mage to truly counter attack, blasting her back with a psychokinesis burst and then hurling a couple of poison-bolts at her before she regained her feet.
From then on, it was Jannie who was fighting for her life, weakened by the poison and then further weakened as Myanihia inflicted a couple of other debilitating spells upon her. Even then she fought like a dervish, surprising them at least twice more before she staggered to the ground, blade still pointed proudly towards her enemy as they hung back, suddenly uncertain on what to do. It was like the old legend of Cú Chulainn, the dying warrior tying himself upright to a tree to intimidate his enemies.
After a brief moment, Jannie plunged her sword into the ground, breathing heavily. No wonder, too; even if it's a virtual world, the amount of exertion we expend is definitely real. I watched her shudder, whether from being in pain or from being upset, I wasn't sure. A tear fell from my own eye as well. It wasn't like she was actually dying. We all knew that. But it was upsetting to watch one of our friends lose like this.
Jannie then collapsed onto the ground. A gong sounded. The fight was over. Myanihia would now move on to their eighth match. Lizzy sat back with a long, hefty sigh as the live-feed switched to a new fight.
“Daaamn...” she swore softly.
“I swear, she almost had him, too,” Maryn shook her head. Ariana looked over at me, but I didn't really notice. She patted my shoulder, and I let out a soft sigh of my own.
“I'm gonna go see her.” I said, and Ari nodded.
“Tell her we were proud of her.” she smiled at me, and I nodded back.
“Of course,” I agreed, and headed out of our rooms to where the preliminary fighters would exit.
I found Jannie sitting on a bench in a small park off to the side of the exits, her facial expression nearly blank except for the hint of a tear in her eye. I walked up to her cautiously, not sure now if she wanted to see anybody, but then she turned to me and smiled.
“Lana!” she said happily, patting the seat next to her. I gently smiled back and went to sit with her.
“Hey.” I replied.
“You saw that, huh?” she said with a shaky laugh.
“We watched it, all the way to the end. Maryn was sure you had them.” I nodded back, and she slowly nodded.
“That's kind of her. I saw both of her fights against Myanihia... I thought for sure...” she trailed off sadly, then leaned on me. I sat there awkwardly for a brief moment, and then placed my arm around her.
“You were amazing. Completely amazing.” I said to her, a smile coming to my face.
“Thanks, Lana.” I heard her reply. “You know, if you and Ari weren't so obviously a thing, I'd ask you to come back with me for a drink, maybe a little more.” she said, a faint giggle coming through the sniffles.
“Ah-heh,” I returned uncertainly.
“I wish I had a girlfriend like you... or even a boyfriend. You came out here to see me just like that, after all.” she continued, wiping away some more tears from her face.
“I'm sure there's someone.” I told her, softly but confidently.
“I know. Thanks, though. You didn't have to come out here for me.”
“Th-that's what friends do, isn't it? They always come for each other.”
“Agree.” she smiled. “I'll be fine; I just got shaken up a bit from how... but anyway, next time you're down, come find me.” she said, withdrawing to look me in the eyes with a soft smile.
“I'll remember that.” I replied.
“Also... Lana,” Jannie said to me, suddenly taking my hands. “Myanihia. You'll definitely fight them. I know you will. Don't let anything they do surprise you, or shock you. Always be ready for any sort of trick. Practice with Ariana, or someone else just as good.” she said to me, a hint of sobbing coming back to her face, but she closed her eyes and swallowed, taking a deep breath. “You have to be the one to beat them. They're not Garth; they're not cheating or using an unfair advantage. They earned those skills, and their gear, fair and square. I can tell that much. It's selfish of me, I know, but please, get them back for me.” she softly pleaded, looking directly at me with an earnest and intense gaze. I let out a soft smile.
“Whatever else I do, I'll do my best to knock them out of the tournament if--or when--I get matched up with them.” I replied.
“There's no ifs about it.” Jannie smiled, a laugh in her words. “You will fight them. I can feel it.” she told me. She then stood up, and gently lifted me to my feet as well before wrapping me in a hug. “We'll be here for the rest of the tournament. Some of our guildies are still in, after all. Everyone from the Aldholt is rooting for the Silvernight Queens... and Mountain Tigers, too.”
“We're rooting for our fellow Aldholters also,” I smiled back, and then she let go, fixing me with a cheerful smile.
“I know. Get back to Ari, and tell her thanks for letting me borrow you for a bit.” she then winked, and kissed my cheek before heading off to rejoin her guildmates.
I felt my face turning crimson, wondering how the situation would have unfolded if I had been slightly more myself in this game.
***
A game hour later, I was back with the others. I told Ariana how things had gone, and she had simply smiled, asserting that she would have reacted the same way Jannie had if the situation were reversed.
Myanihia's eighth match had been against an unlucky summoner who was tragically and easily overcome by the devious dual-wielding magic rogue. Angelfire managed to blast past all of her opponents as well, and Timidator's final match, which had pitted him against an archer, had gone in his favor. Sky Belle the Pixie had also finished with her preliminary fights, completely upsetting some of the betting pools from what I heard later. And then there was Tyman.
They had put him through some of the most arduous matches since his fight with another claw-wielder. His fourth fight had been against a poisoner-summoner mage; his fifth had seen him go up against a trick-archer who used not only a compound bow but also a couple of small crossbows hidden in various places on his person; the sixth opponent they gave him was a greatsword wielder who wore spiked armor; for the seventh they put him in the ring with a trident-wielding Sea Elf who used aqua-magic; and his final battle was against a werebear who, unlike the werefox earlier, made full use of his racial skills to become a devastating werebeast--at least until he came up against the man who was a beast.
His last two fights were the most interesting to me. Mostly because the others had gone nearly the way I expected them to. It's a little hard to summon anything or poison someone when there's a pair of claws raking your face off. And while it was hard for Tyman to go up against that archer, in the end the guy used too many tricks and not enough skill, so all the plucky Memphite had to do was hold on until his enemy ran out of tricks before finally swooping in for the kill. As for the greatsword wielder... he seemed to have put way too much into strength and not enough into dexterity. Power strikes are good, but you need the finesse from dexterity to wield those swords better. It doesn't matter how hard they hit if they don't hit at all.
But the trident-wielding Sea Elf then caught my attention. And no, not because she had an angelic beauty to rival the ethereal princesses in our guild. It was because she had that aqua-magic. Sea Elves, like all Elves, have a natural propensity for magics of any kind, but especially for things like aqua-magic or healing. And this girl had upgraded both to a fair degree, along with some lightning and storm skills as well. She kept Tyman on his guard for several long minutes. I wasn't sure he was going to get past her a couple times, but he pulled it off in the end.
He ended up using one of her own spells against her, goosing it up a bit so as to distract her and then rushing in like a rabid wolf, clawing away at her while she tried to regain her center. In the end she just wasn't cut out for close-quarter combat. Despite keeping him at bay for nearly fifteen minutes, she went down just like all his other opponents. And then the werebear fight.
“Ho-ly snap!! This is that guy's eighth round too?!” Lizzy said as the guy came onto screen. We didn't yet know he was a werebear. All we saw was this big burly-looking guy in a pair of ratty trousers and nothing else.
“Uhh...” I remarked bemusedly.
“W-wow...” Anhe stuttered.
Tyman seemed to be scratching his head as well. Then the fanfare sounded, and our eyes widened or practically bugged out as the burly guy in the trousers suddenly contorted and then transformed into a giant bear, coming down on all fours with a bellowing roar that seemed to shake the arena. Even Tyman hung back for a moment, gazing at the other guy with a look hovering between sincere awe and “what the hell did I get into now?!”
“Whoahh...!” I managed to say, gazing at the black and greyish colored beast in amazement.
“Oh heck no.” Healina remarked. “I'll hand it to him for the last few fights, especially against Rina the Stormcaller, but he really should nope out of this one.”
Rina, by the way, was the Sea Elf mage Tyman had beaten in his seventh match.
“That thing is three meters tall.” Anhe said, her eyes glued to the display.
Tyman, however, recovered from his daze much quicker than any of us. In what was probably the most surprisingly anticlimactic outcome so far, he rushed towards that huge beast for all he was worth and then practically rammed both of his bagh nakh into the werebear's chest, bellowing for all he was worth as the other guy swiped at him with a hefty paw. To everyone's surprise, the werebear was howling in agony. I saw his health-bar going down dramatically fast. Then there was a flash of pixels, and after a few moments, Tyman was left standing alone in the arena.
I wasn't exactly sure how a level ninety-seven werebear could be one-shot with a set of bagh nakh, but I'm sure I'll figure it out someday. In the meantime, Lizzy's reaction perfectly summed up -- well, everyone's reaction.
“What... the frak... just happened?!”