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She examined the edge of the blade with a critical eye. The curve of the edge was perfect, and the sharpness of the blade could rival anything the best bladesmiths could make. And yet, to her, it was barely acceptable. As she ran her psionic power through the blade, it flowed with a smoothness that no other material could replicate. Even if the blade could work perfectly well as a normal sword, just like anything made of metal, the most important part of a Witchblade wasn't the edge. Yes, the edge was important as that was what channeled and thus formed the deadly psionic energy that could be used to cut through everything. At least in theory. There were no absolutes after all. Still, the insides of the blade were the most important part of the blade, as that was the channel through which her power was concentrated and refined. Some less experienced Farseers would consider her blade excellent, but she knew better. Still, it would do for now.
This tournament was the first test for the blade, and the previous fights had shown that the blade functioned adequately. It could be a lot better, but at least she didn’t want to throw up in disgust at the thought of using the blade anymore. Now that she was satisfied with the Wraithbone making up the blade, she’d still need to add the Aeldari runes that would make the blade enchanted, and have some mage apply the requisite mana to activate the runes for the System since she hadn’t picked up a magic Class. Just because she hadn’t picked up any Class capable of enchanting, that didn’t mean she had forgotten how it was done.
She used a marker to start outlining the necessary runes that she’d carefully carve into the metal later. To her, it was not enough that the blade was effective and functional. The blade had to also be aesthetically pleasing, which wasn’t too hard with the Aeldari script. Despite some of their faults, the Aeldari were a race that dedicated to their craft, even to an obsessive degree. That obsession had even been directed to things that most wouldn’t bother wasting their time, like making their writing and language beautiful over millions of years. There was a reason their people had brought about the birth of a god whose domains included excess.
“Hey- Seraphia!” A cheery male voice came from behind her, stretching the first word playfully. “I see you’re working on your gear again. You know I could help.”
“I can manage this much.” She responded, not bothering to look up from her work. Even if she didn’t have any mana, according to the System at least, that didn’t mean she couldn’t use her [Magical Engineering] to do a bit of maintenance and adjustment that was approved by the System.
“I know. You don’t have to, is all I’m saying. I’m the team’s crafter after all. I know that sword of yours is your baby, and I can’t do much with whatever magic you psykers use to create it, but at least I could do maintenance on your armor.” The Quarian argued, not entirely without reason. Except…
“I’m not letting you sniff my armor again.” Seraphiel retorted without losing focus on what she was doing.
“Come on!” He protested. “That was one time! I just wanted to make sure if it needed to be washed and cleaned.”
“The armor is enchanted to be self-cleaning. You should know since you made both the armor and the enchantments.” She shot the excuse down.
The Quarian coughed awkwardly and decided to move on. “Come now, everyone else lets me maintain their gear. And you don’t have an issue with using any items I make.”
“I assume that’s because they haven’t caught you sniffing their gear.” She shot back again, still maintaining full concentration on her work until she finished the rune she was working on. Now she could finally look up at the Quarian. “What do you want Saen’Cunis vas Rannoch? Besides me stepping on you with my hooves that is.” She once again used his full name.
“They’re magnificent hooves. Can’t blame a guy for being curious.” The Quarian mumbled. “Beatrice was looking for you. The final four teams have been released, and she probably wants to talk strategy.”
With a small sigh, she put down the marker. “I imagine you’re right.”
She stood up from her seat and made her way towards the room they were using for such briefings, with Saen walking behind her, no doubt staring at her ass the whole time. On some level, she didn’t actually mind, and even got a bit of extra wiggle in her step, as Saen was rather obvious and straightforward in his interests. She wasn't a prude and enjoyed a bit of attention most of the time. Or would’ve if she was a bit older. She still considered her current vessel to be too young for such things. She could even appreciate a bit of persistence in a guy.
However, unwanted attention was still unwanted, and at a certain point wasn’t okay. For some, that line would've come much earlier than her. She was used to dealing with perverts, and even enjoyed it at times, as mentioned. Heck, she herself was rather lewd at times. There was a reason she liked Lucifer as much as she did. Everyone wasn’t like her though, and if the Quarian shifted his attention again, some actually young woman might react much more negatively to his attention, so she didn’t want to encourage or condone his behaviour.
That didn’t stop the extra wiggle in her step as she sashayed her way to the meeting. That was just who she was, and was allowing more of it to show the older her current vessel got.
The entire team had gathered, along with Tatsumiya, who was working as the teacher in charge. Tatsumiya couldn’t help them with strategy during the tournament but could observe their meetings and then give feedback and lessons between tournaments. “Good. We’re all here.” Beatrice stated and pulled up a list of names on a holographic projector. “The final four of the tournament have been released.”
The list of names didn’t mean anything to Seraphiel. Some students followed these kinds of competitions with rabid fervour, but she honestly didn’t much care. It was like school sports teams in certain universes she’d visited. There was the concept of school spirit and some people practically lived for the whole thing, while others couldn’t care less. She suspected there would’ve been cheerleaders too if the fights were held in front of a live audience instead of a magically reinforced alternate dimension. To her, after seeing and participating in wars that decided the fates of universes, the little fights between schools didn’t hold much excitement. The only reason she cared at all was because she was part of the team, and it provided an opportunity for leveling. For both her and her brother.
“The Argus Magic Academy is much like us, except they tend towards what could be considered darker Classes. Their registration states they have mostly Warlocks and Dark Knights, in addition to a single healer. The Thessian Academy is filled with Psykers and Biotics. Both of those are academies Mahora is often tangling with, so get used to fighting their teams, since we’ll be seeing them again. The odd duck in the bunch is one of the religious academies making it to the finals. We don’t have that many details, but from what I managed to find out, Ordo Sangreal is an academy focused on faith. So, we can assume the presence of various holy Classes. Their registration just lists templars, battle priests, and a single holy warrior. Rather vague, which makes sense since everyone keeps things vague.”
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“Wait, Ordo?” Seraphiel asked, recognizing the word somewhat. She just wasn’t sure from where.
“Something to share Seraphia?” Beatrice asked.
“Hmm, can’t say just yet. The word is so familiar, but I just can’t connect the dots. Just…be careful about making assumptions.” She had a hunch. And not a positive one.
"Fair enough. Anyway, the problem is that the runners of the tournament decided to turn this into a big fight with all four teams thrown into the ring at the same time. I’m pretty confident in us taking on any single team, but with all four teams in the mix, strange alliances might form.” Beatrice threw out a potential problem.
“Is there a reason to assume the other teams would gang up on us?” Sa’violi questioned.
“Not that I know. We’ve been crushing the opposition so far, but we’re not the only ones. All three of the other teams have been doing almost as well, if not just as well. I believe the Thessian team is the one that came closest to losing, though I have no details. Also, we know that there’s a certain level of grudge between the Thessian team and Argus, as the two teams faced off a few times last year, though I’m not sure how much of that grudge was carried over as some of their members also moved up to the next student bracket.” Beatrice explained.
Most academies used the most powerful allowed students in the brackets, which inevitably meant the oldest students. That meant there was a certain lack of stability in the teams as those advanced students were always moving up to the next bracket. That's why most tournaments allowed multiple teams from every academy, to allow the younger students to get some experience. The B- or C-teams rarely made it to the finals though. Strictly speaking, their team was a B-team as well. Just that the Mahora A-team didn't participate in this tournament.
“Do we know the format? Specifically, is the victory condition last man standing, or something else?” Raziel asked an important question, earning a pat on the arm from Seraphiel.
“Unfortunately not, which makes forming a strategy challenging. If it’s last man standing, then it would be to our benefit to stay away as much as possible and let the other teams duke it out. Of course, the other teams and the organizers know this as well, which is why I think it won’t be just that. Would make for a dull final match with four teams trying to play keep-away.” Beatrice shook her head. “If I were in the shoes of the tournament organizers, I’d set up something to force engagement. Like an object to reach, or points for eliminations.”
“I say get aggressive anyway.” Nodoka declared. “It’s not like our lives depend on the result, and I’d rather go out in a blaze of glory than hide like a coward. More levels that way as well.” The bubbly girl declared with a raised fist.
"I can agree that it would make things more interesting," Seraphiel added her own input.
Beatrice looked at the others who just nodded one at a time. "Right. It's decided then. Let's get aggressive even if the objective is to just survive." She clapped her hands. "Now, personally I'd recommend going after the Argus team if presented the opportunity. The headmaster has expressed her interest in seeing that team humiliated."
“I’m sure we can arrange something.” Raziel echoed everyone’s sentiments.
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As soon as they were transported to the arena, she could tell something was wrong, and not just because she could see only two other teams. While an entire stealthy team was rare, it wasn’t unheard of. No, she felt a deep sense of wrongness that made her stomach turn, and she had to struggle to not vomit, and it felt like her connection to her psionic powers was being disrupted. Her powers weren’t gone, but they felt far away, like she had to reach to grasp that well of power. She recognized this effect, even though the last time she’d felt it was in the first universe she’d been exiled to.
Behind her, she could hear Sa’violi retching violently onto the sandy floor of the arena, and almost the entire Thessian team was similarly affected. Any thought of the potential objective vanished from her mind.
Her eyes flashed, reading the twines of magic in the rather large arena, and she saw the missing team, under a veil of a combination of technology and magic, or magitech as most would call it. Among them was a male wearing skin-tight stealth armor, and a familiar helmet that looked like a monstrous elongated skull, and a bulky apparatus that she knew to be an auspex array connected to the helm itself with thick cables. She knew that this helmet, designed to look as monstrous as possible to strike fear into the assassin’s enemies, was a device used to enhance the natural abilities of the man himself, and it wasn’t even fully activated yet. The large glowing eye of the device was a system to both see any individuals obscured by psychic powers, as well as to focus the user’s powers through the eye into a beam of negative psychic energy, capable of burning out the target’s brain.
The helmet was called the Animus Speculum, and the man using it was what the Humans of that universe had called a Culexus Assassin, an assassin built to kill any psykers. And it seemed in this universe, the man’s powers extended to all psionic Classes.
She didn’t hesitate even for a second. She pushed her abilities to the limits, made even harder by the presence of the Culexus, and she could feel her own body damaging itself just to allow her to do what she wanted. She made herself faster with [Chronomancy], crossed the distance between her team and the assassin in a single step, slammed everyone with the full effect of her [Reiatsu] just to distract and slow them down, and slammed her fist through the head of the assassin, using all the pure physical force she could muster, knowing that anything psionic she attempted would likely only fizzle away.
As the Assassin fell to the ground, headless, the effect he had on the battlefield also disappeared, removing the suppression effect, though in large part the damage was already done. The rest of the Ordo Sangreal, now visible to everyone, turned to attack her in retaliation, but she barely managed to step away, back to the protection of her own team, although she almost collapsed as she reached her destination.
Sa'violi, as well as most of the Thessian team, was on the ground, bleeding from their ears, nose, and some even from their eyes and mouth, barely conscious. It was a small miracle none of them had been so hurt that they'd been disqualified, and that was likely because of the distance between them and the assassin. Seraphiel was pretty sure that the only reason she'd managed to do what she'd done without completely tearing herself apart was her Vitality and the fact that she was a Celestial, a XXX-ranked race with a base that could match those of the most powerful Dragons. The same reason why she’d been able to punch the assassin to death with just her fist.
It wasn’t until now that everyone else managed to react.
“Seraphiel!” Raziel called out, using her real name due to his distress, while Beatrice called out for the other hurt member of their team. “Sa’violi! What’s going on?”
Team Argus was the only team fully intact, and they decided to attack the revealed team of Ordo Sangreal. It was hard to say why they chose to attack that team, but it was likely a combination of thinking they were the largest threat, as well as maybe a bit of sportsmanship spirit, seeing as both Mahora and Thessia were still trying to gather their bearings.
"Seraphia. What just happened?" Beatrice demanded with a distressed and angry voice, knowing that she must know something since she'd reacted.
The healing effect of her Paladin powers washed over her, soothing the worst damage she’d suffered, though her Paladin Skills were still not advanced enough to repair all the damage so quickly. “That was a Blank, using the Animus Speculum. Anti-psychic. Had to act fast. Can drive psykers insane with just their presence. Not something that should be used in a battle between students.” She explained with curt speech. “Not something a student should be able to make.” She added for emphasis.
Beatrice frowned. “They’re cheating?” She asked.
“Might be technically within the rules somehow, though I wouldn’t put just plain cheating past the Mon’keigh either." She spat out with derision, allowing some of the old hatred to surface. She'd spent a long time in that universe. A universe that was a hellhole by any standards.
“Heads up!” Mu-tah called out and managed to use his magic to erect a protective barrier just in time as several golden projectiles hit the shield. The Khenra mage didn’t specialize in defence, but that didn’t mean he was not capable.
The Argus team had not fared well despite their numerical advantage. It seemed they had taken down three members of the Ordo Sangreal team, but had been wiped out in turn. All that in a very short time. Two large Humans of the Ordo Sangreal team still stood. One was firing some sort of gun with obviously sanctified ammo at them, while the other rushed towards the Thessian team with a sword that Seraphiel knew to be an inferior version of her Witchblade. Made of Mon’keigh metal and technology instead of Wraithbone. Brutish as always. Enough of the Thessian team either remained or managed to catch their bearings that they’d be able to fend off the lone attacker,
“Take them out!” Seraphiel growled out heatedly, and Raziel didn't hesitate, electing to use his new favourite maneuver of leaping high into the air before plunging at the remaining enemy shooting at them. The Ordo Sangreal warrior sidestepped the initial attack with surprising grace and tried to pull out a melee weapon, but Raziel didn't give them the opportunity, skewering the man with his spear. He wasn't gentle about it either, making sure to stab him non-lethally at first, as revenge for his sister. Despite feeling vengeful, he wasn’t a cruel boy, so he finished the wounded warrior off with his next attack, wreathing his spear in flames as he did so.
Mu-tah and Nodoka used their magic to blast out the last member of the team, leaving just the Thessians and the Mahora team on the field. The difference was that one of the teams had two members in fighting condition, while the other had four. The two Thessian students looked at each other and called for a surrender.