The pain was so intense and quick that I didn’t even realize I had passed out until I was coming to. The professor’s voice helped to bring me back to reality. “What did you just do to yourself?”
“Probably something stupid,” another voice answered. One that I recognized, though I didn’t know why they were here of all places. Opening my eyes, I was confused to see a beastman with my head on her lap, watching me. The little pointed ears on top of her head danced. Something about them had my hands reaching up to rub them.
She swatted my hand away, stopping the impulse. She packed a punch. “Who are you?” I asked in an attempt to try and distract both of them.
Her cheeks flushed, “Yeah, I keep forgetting about the changes. Well, that and we only met for a few minutes. My name’s Nancy.”
I bolted off her lap. Sitting up and turning to face her. “You’re the one that healed me when I nearly froze on my first day.” She nodded. “I thought you and your party were going on to the next town. What are you two doing here?”
“We did,” she sighed, “but the region is just too small for the number of players flocking there.”
“Why don’t they just move on to the next or at least spread out?” I asked, confused about why a game developer wouldn’t have fixed it by now.
“It is not always so simple,” the professor cut in. “If I had to guess, there are no easy paths to the next town?”
She nodded, the tips of her ears flopping a bit as she did so. “Very few people meet the minimum level requirement to make the trip, and that’s if you can find a guide willing to make the journey.” While she had been speaking, my eyes were locked on to her ears as they continued to move. I wondered about how much different they must feel for her. She must have noticed my staring because they flattened to her head as she continued. “They are a bit sensitive. Same goes for my tail. Though at least I don’t have to worry about my ears getting stuck in a door or grabbed by people.”
The way she said this made me think that it was a common occurrence. “So, are you participating in the tournament?”
“Nope.” Her eyes rolled, and something smacked the floor behind her. “Apparently it is limited to humans only or something else stupid.” She huffed and crossed her arms. “I don’t remember this town being so specist.”
“Unfortunately, I fear it is getting worse,” the professor sighed. “Earlier, there were some guards that surrounded me and demanded I go with them. If not for Kyren, I might have been killed or jailed just for being in town while not being human.”
“Just great.”
“How did your species change?” I asked her.
“SoulStone.” Her face darkened as she realized something. “Which means that this will become a bigger issue as more people use it.”
“Will everyone who uses it become something non-human?”
Nancy shook her head. “Only one more person in my party changed species. The rest just gained a few abilities but otherwise stayed human.”
“Kyren, your next match is up in a few minutes.” The professor’s words drew my attention from the cat girl to the screen he was looking at. Sure as shit, my name was on there. According to the information displayed, I was fighting someone named Ellen Ripley.
A soft chuckle came from the cat girl. As I rose, I shot her a questioning look. She waved it off. “You’re not an alien; so you should be fine. Just don’t let her get ahold of any acid or a gun.”
What she said made no sense. It wasn’t until I was halfway down the steps that her words clicked, making me turn and yell back at the two of them. “Wait, guns work here?”
“Of course they do,” the professor yelled back. “Physics works here in the game in the same way it does on Earth. It is not the locals’ fault their technological progress took a back seat to magical progress.”
My mind started to work through the implications of this new piece of information as I made my way to the room to check in. This time I wasn’t alone. Another woman leaned against the wall. Like me, she didn’t have a single weapon visible, but unlike me, she was wearing a flight suit. As I looked her over, she did the same. We only stopped when the receptionist spoke up: “Kyren Vulpier, Ellen Ripley, go ahead and head to your spots.”
I gestured for her to precede me into the tunnel. She rolled her eyes but led the way to the arena floor. Like last time, there were two circles of magic to indicate where we were to stand. I reached my spot and stood there, pulling my sword out as I watched my opponent. Just before she stepped into the circle, she stopped, pulling a stocky tube out of her inventory. As that materialized in her hand, a cylinder thumped into the sand. The straps of which went onto her shoulders before she connected the dangling hose to the tube.
A small yellow flame set at the tip of the object was all I needed to jump to conclude that she was holding a flamethrower in her hands. Though, it was crude as hell. Likely something that she or someone else had made as an experiment rather than something meant to be sold. “If you don’t want to get burned, give up now,” she spoke loud enough for me to hear her as she took the final steps to enter her circle.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
I shook my head. I was fairly sure my fire elemental control would allow me to manipulate the fire, or at least divert it enough to avoid being hit. Before I could say anything, the announcer’s voice reverberated around the arena. “Round two. Ellen Ripley versus Kyren Vulpier. READY! FIGHT!” It seemed that the people running this tournament were not going to give either of us any time to prepare. Then again, I could have taken my time to reach the circle like Ellen had. That had given her all the time she needed to prepare.
A gout of liquid fire roared across the space between us, parts of the stream falling short and landing on the sand where it continued to burn. The rest of it managed to reach where I was standing. While the faceful of fire surprised me, I didn’t react like someone hit with a flamethrowing usually would.
The heat was similar to that of a hot summer day inside my old place of work. No fan or air conditioner there to help cool us off as the sun turned the metal structure into an oven. The feeling got uncomfortable fast, but not as fast as the liquid making its way down my body and under my dress.
Jumping back quickly, I shivered as the odd sensation of a viscous and heated liquid made its way down my chest. It was a feeling I had never experienced in that location. I mean, why would I ever need to put lube on my chest of all places? She altered the angle of her weapon enough to reach me a second time, causing me to jump back yet again.
We did this dance several times before I finally found her weapon’s limits and stayed outside of them. Too bad it was plenty far enough that any spell I threw at her would be noticed well before it hit. In fact, I wouldn’t be able to do anything to her unless I got closer, which meant I would have to be willing to get lubed up even more than I already was. At least the little I had gotten on me had mostly burned off at this point.
Wait, did I really have no other options? I knew I had my fire magic, but what about my new elements? While I doubted I could pull off any sort of shadow movement like those Patric used, what about water or earth? Now, I know what you are thinking. These were elements I just unlocked. Elements I had never used in a spell, let alone trained with. There was a good chance something would go wrong but something about this situation and these two elements had my mind flying. Ideas popping up and discarding themselves before I finally settled on one that sounded promising. Of course, it all depended on whether or not I could pull the spell off before I ran out of mana.
Jumping a fair distance away, I formed a thin rod out of earth runes with a few water runes mixed in. Both runes came to me as if I had always known them. As the last rune fell into place, the spell activated. A thin spear of earth formed out of the mana. Given the number of holes and the addition of water to the spell, I was sure that this spear was weak as hell. But I wasn’t going for strength. If I needed strength to punch through her defenses in addition to the flames, I was screwed. Next came the hard part, laying a second and third spell down on top of the first.
While I had no clue what it would do, I was hoping that the layer of dark runes I surrounded the spear with would provide some help getting the rod to its destination. It wasn’t the fire from the flame thrower I needed to protect it from; it was the rings of fire runes that I surrounded the spear with that it needed to block.
My head pounded and the world narrowed as I finished the last of the spells. Holding them in place as they activated. The spear darkened as if shadowed before rings of fire hid the entire construct. Not sure how long I would be able to hold the thing, I took aim and fired.
Parts of the firebolt from hell flickered as it zipped from me to my target, a line of fire hanging mid-air, connecting the two points for a few moments in time. Not that it was time or air that removed the line. A shockwave of shrapnel, fire, and steam erupted from where the shard struck.
I stood there, a ringing sound making it hard to hear while I waited to find out the results of my attack. Standing there, frozen stiff, was my opponent. Behind her, a crater in the wall showed where my attack had made contact. As we both looked at the spot, we both knew that she would likely have been in tiny pieces if that strike had hit her. “In a sudden twist, Kyren Vulpier is the winner.”
As soon as my first foot moved to carry me out of the arena, it gave out. My body crashed to the ground as the world started to turn grey. While I could hear the people running out to help me, I couldn’t make sense of what they said or did. One of them shoved a bottle into my mouth, forcing my lips to close around it before sealing my nose. Left with no choice, I swallowed the liquid. It was vile. Tasting of stale water mixed with glitter. The only reason I didn’t spit the stuff up was due to the hands keeping my mouth closed.
Slowly, the world regained its color and I could make sense of the conversation going on around me. A man was talking. “…mana-deficient. I thought you travelers would be smart enough to not push your luck.”
Another man laughed. “If anything, it is the opposite. We will constantly push our luck, even going so far as to die multiple times. All so we can find and push our limits. And, as we can see from this last fight, it sometimes pays off.” Given their conversation, I was fairly sure that one was a player while another was an NPC.
The other man scoffed but changed subjects. “Looks like she is coming around.”
“He,” I grunted out as I tried to push myself up. “What happened?”
“What?” the man said before waving off his question. “Doesn’t matter. You played it close. Nearly passing out from mana exhaustion. Not something I recommend. Given that I only saw you cast the one spell, I would recommend you either refrain from using such spells or find a way to increase your mana pool.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” I muttered as a sudden headache assaulted me. “Is there anything you can give for this headache?”
The other guy handed me a small strip of some sort of bark. “Chew on this.” While I took it, I eyed it with suspicion. I had expected something more like magic, a potion, or even a pill. “It is a strip of willow bark. While it is not as effective as most over-the-counter painkillers, it is what we have access to.”
Not seeing any other choice, other than to live with the headache, I put the piece into my mouth and started to chew. While I knew the effect wouldn’t be instant, I was happy that my chewing didn’t make my head ache any more than it did.
With some effort, I got up and let them help me down the tunnel and into the waiting room. Instead of continuing, they sat me down on one of the benches off to the side. “Wait here and rest until your next fight,” I didn’t want to argue, not with how much effort it took to walk even this far. I didn’t want to know just how much effort it would take to go up and down those stairs. So, I simply nodded before turning and lying down to rest for the little bit of time I had before my next fight.