Geneva’s influence on my mind wanes and time resumes its natural flow. The hunter moving at a glacial pace moves faster. He is not as stern in the face of death as his predecessor but seems just as determined. Despite trembling, he doesn’t hesitate for a moment. He runs toward me as he opens his coat, revealing the flasks in question.

Half a dozen glass bottles with round bottoms and long necks hang from his waist. He rips off the belt holding them as the mixtures begin to bubble and pale green smoke fills the bottles. He cocks his arm and throws them toward me as he squeals, “Die!”

As he dramatically sacrifices himself to bring me down, I carefully maintain a bored expression.

As the belt hits the ground before me, the bottles shatter. The smoke inside rapidly spreads, quickly engulfing me. I see the silhouette of the hunter as he drops to his knees, resigned to the end. One that doesn’t come.

The fog stops abruptly, corralled by an invisible Rolly. This is treading the line of what the pacifist is comfortable with. She only agreed to this plan becomes it is nonviolent and more a performance than a tactic. I was prepared for her to say no. A summoner has to exert control over their elementals but purposely antagonizing them does me no favors.

The lueorale whips the wind into action, pushing on the cloud. Condensing the smoke into a swirling ball that shrinks until it is smaller than a fist. Then she moves it closer to me.

I channel mana. I have no intention of casting a spell but the people watching don’t know that. Better to reveal a second common affinity, something I will eventually end up showing anyway, than Rolly.

I may not be building a spell but I am shifting my body. Specifically, turning my throat and part of my torso into ooze.

I hold out a hand and make a beckoning motion to the ball of gas. Useless theatrics while Rolly directs it toward my open mouth and down my throat. Into the ooze filling my gut. Once it’s there, I wrap my ooze around it, not leaving the slightest gap. Good to go.

Geneva mentally informs me as she relays my condition to Rolly. Then she informs me when the lueorale releases her spell. I wait a moment but the poison doesn’t spread through my body. Hah! I knew it would work. And Geneva says I have no creativity. Forget standing in a cloud of poison. I ate the damn cloud!

The hunter seems suitably impressed. And by impressed, I mean utterly dumbfounded. He’s doing a wonderful impression of a fish with his wide eyes and dropped jaw.

“Good stuff,” I say nonchalantly. Rolly wants me to take on a more domineering persona but hearing the lueorale replicate my voice but pitched deeper, speaking in less short, clipped sentences for extra impact, I knew that wasn’t for me. I am not cold and threatening. Nor do I think I can channel the dismissive arrogance of people like Gordon Grimoire Sr.

What I can do is jolly and flippant. I can’t imagine anything more annoying than trying to kill someone and being ignored. To be so inconsequential, my target doesn’t see me as a threat. There is no pain like the pain of being irrelevant. I would know.

“You…” The hunter finally snaps out of his stupor. “How?”

“Hm? Oh, that little snack was nothing.” The young man hurries to his feet. He reaches behind his back, drawing a shortsword, slashing at me wildly as I approach him. I easily dodge his clumsy strikes and throw an arm over his shoulders.

“My wife, the elf standing over there, she loves to play tricks on me. Thinks poisoning someone is a harmless prank. Gets creative about it, uses some real nasty stuff.” She doesn’t but I can imagine it. “I’ve gotten a taste for it now. That one was good. Fruity.” Haha, his face. “What’s the name?”

He tries to stab me in the side but I catch his wrist. In response, his eyes start to glow.

“Oh, magic now? Better put your back into it. Won’t do a thing to me of course but we could use some heat. It’s cold out here. Mind your variables, we’re close enough for you to hurt yourself if you’re not careful.”

The hunter looks at me like I’m crazy. I don’t know what he’ll do. He already to die with me through poison. It’s not unreasonable to think he would try to burn us together.

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But he doesn’t. After several beats of silence, his eyes lose their glow and his shoulders slump. “Just kill me.”

“Didn’t you learn anything from the last fight? It’s dangerous putting your life in anyone’s hands, especially an enemy.”

He stiffens. Then he reverses his grip on his weapon and stabs himself. Or, he tries. I’m far too strong and stop him before the blade can pierce his throat. A small squeeze is all it takes to make him drop the blade.

“None of that.” Bell scampers over and grabs the blade, holding it up to me. I drop his hand to grab it, waving it before his face. “Look. The saints know you’re going to die. You knew that before you stepped onto this field. Only one of us can survive. It’s going to be me. Yeah?”

Without the escape of a quick death, the hunter’s courage crumples. His trembling returns as the shadow of death looms over him. Or maybe he’s missing the coat he carelessly threw aside earlier, expecting to be dead before he noticed its absence.

“Cheer up. You’re one of the lucky ones. I mean, you got me. Imagine if you tried that against my wife. She doesn’t eat poison. She bathes in it. Swims in pools of it. She would have laughed at your smoke.”

“I know,” the hunter mumbles. He chances a glance at me before quickly turning away. “I…targeted you. For the bounty. Emberton said poison wouldn’t work on a pure physical affinity.”

“Too right. Smart choice to go after me. I mean, how could you know it’d be completely useless? Everyone always underestimates what I can do. All of you think I’m nothing compared to my wife. She wouldn’t have married me if I was useless.”

I sigh. “Too bad all your thinking and all your planning means nothing. Readied yourself to face death for gold and glory and all you managed to do was feed a bored noblewoman an unexpected snack. Not a good way to be remembered. Think of the songs the bards will sing.”

“I don’t care,” he whimpers, failing to keep his mounting anxiety out of his tone. “I…I was useless anyway. At least…at least when I die, my siblings will get something.”

“Will they?”

“…what do you mean?”

Rolly, make sure the hunters hear the next part. “Don’t you remember the terms of this March? I don’t blame you for getting confused. Northern traditions are strange. You see, the winners get everything. Everything, do you understand? That includes the bounty on my head if by some miracle you manage to kill me or my wife. Also includes the money Emberton has promised to your families or favored mistresses or whoever else you all plan to throw your lives away for. Hey!”

I hold the hunter up as his knees buckle. “You can’t do that,” he whispers. Then he shouts it. “You can’t do that!”

“Of course I can. And I’m going to. I like to think I’m agreeable but not so agreeable that I’d support the families of men trying to kill me. Besides, I like crowns as much as the next person. Plenty of ways I could spend that kind of money.”

With a poor attempt at a battle cry, the hunter wraps his hands around my throat and squeezes. I don’t react, keeping a smile on my face. Not a difficult task. His wasted efforts are a little sad to watch, knowing he’s doing his best for his family, but it’s also amusing. I focus on the amusing.

“Trying to warm yourself up with a little exercise? You’d be better off running around for a bit. This isn’t going to get you very far.”

His fingers are tense as he puts all his strength into throttling me. I let him do as he pleases until he tires, his arms falling limply to his sides. Tears pool in his eyes. “They have to get the money,” he mutters. “If they don’t…I…”

“Are you wondering what the point is?” I ask. “There isn’t one. None. None at all. You are throwing your life away for nothing. You aren’t helping anyone. Your death accomplishes nothing. You’ll die in this freezing wasteland for someone else’s revenge. As a tool in someone else’s dick measuring contest.”

“No…”

“Do you think I’m lying? Why would I? You’re going to die. As soon as my wife gives the signal that she’s recovered her mana, she’s going to torture another one of your friends to death. Shame you won’t get to see that. It’s not everyday you get to see men killed in ways you could never imagine.

“Those are the kind of stories that would make a man popular in Paradise. Can you imagine describing to a saint how you watched a man claw his own skin off? Ah. Wait. Someone who kills others for money with horrific poisons won’t be welcome by the saints. Suppose it’s to the Abyss then. You’ll be nothing in death too.”

This time, when his legs give out, I let him fall into the snow and pat his head condescendingly.

In the seats, the hunters cause an uproar.

“Oi! Emberton! Is she right?”

“Our families are getting paid, aren’t they?”

“Are you telling us we’re dying for nothing?!”

“Don’t listen to her!” Emberton shouts back at them. “She’s trying to subvert your will! They know they can’t fight us all so they want us to surrender.”

“Hey, you pig bastard! You didn’t answer the question! Is she right? If they win, do our families get nothing? And don’t you dare try to lie.”

“Of course not—"

“She speaks truth,” a native of Victory, sitting on a higher bench calls down. The hunters all turn to the armored man wearing a similar helm to the duke in dark blue. “The winner of the March takes everything. Your money and your debts. It would be their choice whether to pay them.”

The hunters don’t take kindly to that. They are incensed and take their anger out on Emberton, cursing him and all his ancestors. The fodder makes the most noise. The strong hunters are quiet, re-evaluating their commitment in the face of the many men threatening to leave.

“Calm down! All of that only applies if they win. Do you really think two women can kill all of us?”

“How many did they kill in Quest?” a hunter shouts.

On and on it goes, the hunters’ wills shaken.