It was cold, dark, and deafeningly loud. The boy huddled down hoping the quickly made stone plate would hold and finally after a moment seeming to last forever the noise quieted down, leaving an eery silence.

°Do you think it´s over?° He asked.

°Don´t know, let´s take a look!° Someone answered.

Headmaster Amethyne watched, as did everyone else when a part of the arena ground opened up and the disheveled hair and head of the second contestant came out, looking around carefully. Headmaster Amethyne was surprised, how did the boy withstand such a powerful spell, without using equivalent magic himself? He should have been able to survive that attack, but it should have decided the duel and not in his favor. Headmaster Amethyne smiled, something interesting was going on and he would question that boy in just a moment about it.

Emtsor was still panting, and getting slowly nervous. Why was he not declared victor, he eliminated the nuisance after all, good he completely removed that bastard, but still it was just a commoner, so no harm was done. A sudden murmur went through the stands, and he could almost hear Ranbor shouting something at him, but he just wanted to lay down, the exertion taking his toll, making him unfocused.

Mor heaved himself out from his impromptu foxhole and looked around.

°So what now? The flunky seems to be ready to forfeit. Probably spent all his energy.° He asked.

°Well, why not ask him if he wants to tap out? We used a little bit, this "Dig-well" and "stone foundation" were great for what they cost. Even if you at first told me it would be pointless to practice "convenience" magics. But I won´t be like that and spare you the "Told you so!"° The human answered.

°Yes, I guess you are right, never thought we use it as some sort of protection against storms.°Mor conceded the point and called out to Emtsor. "Hey! Want to forfeit? You seem pretty done and I´m still fine!"

Emtsors gaze focused on Mor in surprise. How was that commoner still ok? That is not possible! Rage built within him, he was almost out of energy, and this peasant was still fine? Preposterous, it was a lie, commoners always lie. The commoner must be even more tired than him! His pride would not allow him to forfeit on such a ruse and so he called back.

"Shut it, commoner! It is not over yet!" Emtsor was breathing heavily and More just shrugged.

°You heard the man.° The human said and Mor put his hand in his bag getting out a stone.

Emtsor took a deep breath, channeling the very last of his power in a finishing attack, but before he could unleash it he felt a sharp pain hitting his stomach and everything went black.

°Well that´s that.° The human said and Mor agreed.

Headmaster Amethyne watched in amazement, as Mor did something, using almost no power and Emtsor just folded up knocked out cold. It was just too fast for him to see, and he threw a curious glance at his granddaughter as she let out a surprised whistle.

"Rosana, might you explain to me what happened? I could not see the spell that ended the fight." Rosana blushed and answered

"Mister Agaton there, wanted to bring some stones for a "Throw-stone" spell, and even though it looked like exactly what was used, it was far too powerful. But nothing else fits what we could see from here."

"Intriguing," Her grandfather said. "I´m going down to get Mister Agaton to the stands, I want to know what he did." Headmaster Agaton stood up and called out Mor as the victor, then left quickly for the little preparation room, another teacher would collect Mister Emeror, and the next contestants would be waiting in two other rooms, he rushed to Mister Agatones room and was greeted by a shocked expression of the boy.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

"Headmaster!" He called. "Why are you here?"

"Because you did something impossible Mister Agaton. How did you protect yourself against that spell?" The Headmaster asked and Mor blushed.

"I used some convenience magic, on the group-level, made a hole, hid in it closed it up with a stone foundation, and just waited until everything blew over?" Mor put forward and the human snorted at the pun.

"And how would you come up with such ideas?!" The headmaster looked like an excited kid, who had found an interesting toy. That in turn scared Mor more than anything right now.

°Time to lie!° The human advised and Mor almost wanted to give an incredulous remark, about how he would not be that dumb to tell the whole truth, but kept his quiet and answered the Headmaster instead.

"Well, sir. As you know I don´t have an affinity and my magic energy reserves are also not that great, so I have to think hard about what I want to spend this energy on to get the most efficient result."

"You say that, but I noticed your "Throw-stone" spell. It was more powerful than this spell had any right to be, at most the stone should have flown a few meters and then fallen to the ground." The Headmaster drilled Mor further.

°He is good, I didn´t think, many could identify the spell we used because it looks so different now.° The human said, and Mor had to agree.

"Well..." Mor put forward. "The magic teacher always told us, that imagination has a lot to do with how your spells would work, but it could not be something impossible. A single-class spell will never be able to do anything you couldn´t do with basic tools on your own. That got me thoughtful, and I asked our teacher in the class reserved for the study of kin history how other kin, who are not as blessed with magic as we are, would throw rocks very far, and got a short explanation of a tool. I built this tool, tried it, and it changed my view on "Throw-Rock" because with the tool, it was much further and faster the rock could travel. Then I got my imagination in line with what was possible with that simple tool and the spell represented that."

Mor just hoped, the Headmaster would not ask the teacher, because that last part was completely made up, but he could not tell the Headmaster, that the human came up with this idea.

"Fascinating!" The Headmaster said, I look forward, to what you come up next, and with that Mor was led to the stands by the Headmaster and watched the next duel. It was pretty lackluster because both contestants were evenly matched and seemed to try to save as much energy as possible until finally, one won.

°This must have cost more energy than just trying to finish in a decisive blow.° The human stated and Mor agreed.

°Good for us, then we have the advantage.°

Ranbor was furious, not only was Emtsor still out cold from magic exhaustion and probably would be for at least a day, but the peasant was sitting there seemingly unfazed by the ordeal he just went through, he should be lying on the arena floor! Something was up, he knew it, the peasant was somehow cheating! But let him get to the finale now, he would burn that peasant to a crisp. Ranbor´s rage was fueled by a little fire burning in his soul, yes he would kill the peasant.

As the rounds went on, almost always being just a slugfest of who had more energy and could unleash more power, and only sometimes someone who used some strategy or tactic, Mor nodded off, the human had told him to relax and they would wake him if something interesting was happening. This moment came as Ranbor entered the Arena

°Hey wake up! Asshat´s on. We need to pay attention to what he can do.° Mor woke up startled.

°Allready? I just dozed off for a few minutes!° Mor said and got a slight chuckle in return

°Try an hour.° the human said.

Both aimed their attention to the duel below, where Ranbors opponent was a girl with bright sapphire eyes.

°Isn´t this the daughter of the Sapphire family?° Mor asked.

°How would I know? But if we go with that logic wouldn´t she be a water specialist?° The human asked back.

°Yes and a very powerful one indeed, seems like Ranbor will lose this round, water is a bad matchup for him and I can´t see him letting go of his pride using anything other than fire.° Mor answered and they watched curious how this would go, but nothing prepared them for what happened.

It started pretty normal, Ranbor bowing and the Sapphire girl giving a curtsy.

"You should give up now Saphine!" He called to her. "You are no match for me, and I don´t want to hurt you."

She in turn gave him a beautiful smile as she answered. "I don´t think so, I have the advantage with my water, my family was always called upon if yours went out of line, and this will be no different."

And with the bantering out of the way the duel was on, it started like any other before, they both just trying to find some weakness and flinging spells left and right, but the energy level was much higher. As expected though it seemed Saphine was going to win if this kept going, then suddenly Ranbor laughed and it happened...